UMUR "Gallery of Suicide" is the 6th full-length studio album by US death metal act Cannibal Corpse. The album was released through Metal Blade Records in April 1998. It´s the second album by the band featuring lead vocalist "George "Corpsegrinder" Fisher". One lineup change has occured since the release of "Vile (1996)" as guitarist Rob Barret left Cannibal Corpse to rejoin Malevolent Creation (He would return to the fold again in 2005). Barret is replaced here by Pat O'Brien, who had just come out of a stint with Nevermore.

The lineup change has little consequence on how the music sounds on "Gallery of Suicide". This is unmistakably the sound of Cannibal Corpse. Technically well played and brutal death metal with gore lyrics and imagery. Songtitles like "I Will Kill You", "Dismembered and Molested", and "Stabbed in the throat" should give you an idea of where we are in the lyric department. As always there is a furious intensity about the delivery of the band´s music, that is greatly admirable. Cannibal Corpse mean business and they are not afraid to break every bone in your body to prove it (yeah there is a pun here with reference to the songtitle "Every Bone Broken").

They don´t exactly reinvent themselves on this release, and to my ears it´s not their most memorable release either, but you can´t put a finger on the excellent musicianship or the brutal and raw sound production (which for the first time in the band´s discography isn´t handled by Scott Burns, but by Jim Morris). There are a few new ideas in the songwriting department too, but they are very few and the music is generally pretty one-dimensionally brutal. A 3.5 star (70%) rating is deserved.

metalmillennium In my mind, this album is under-rated..the critics hated this album beyond belief, and to be honest I don't know why. Still carrying the shock-image persona that they culminated in the early 90s, the lyrics/cover art are gorier than a bullet wound to the head. On a musical aspect, Cannibal Corpse play a form of complex Technical Death Metal. The riffs are some of the best I've heard in Death Metal; they will stick to you like glue, which is the #1 attention getter.

Nearly every song is a highlight, though the first half is slightly better. "I Will Kill You" features brutal riffage layered around deep gutteral vocals from the "Corpse Grinder" himself. "Sentenced to Burn" and "Chambers of Blood" continue the fury with thrash-esque rhythm anthems surely to pound right through your eardrums. The top track, "From Liquid to Skin" really surprised me in that it's an instrumental (a rarity in Death Metal). Why Cannibal Corpse don't compose more instrumentals like this is beyond me! The fretwork amazed me on first listen, and it still does. Hardcore CC fans may not like this half as much as earlier material, but this album is just as good: 'not as monotonous as one might expect, the great variety in vocals and riffage are sure to keep you banging away in fine fashion. Better than The Vile, although not quite as intense as say Butchered at Birth, this is a fresh sounding Death Metal album that is still overlooked in the CC catalog.