MACABRE (IL) — Dahmer (review)

Album · 2000 · Death Metal

5/5 · 2020-09-12
UMUR

"Dahmer" is the 3rd full-length studio album by US, Illinois based death metal/grindcore act Macabre. The album was released through Decomposed Records in October 2000. It´s the band´s first album release since "Sinister Slaughter" from 1993, and although they did release the "Behind the Wall of Sleep" EP in 1994, it´s still been quite a lengthy recording break. They´ve spend the break well though, researching the story of infamous American serial killer Jeffrey Lionel Dahmer and composing the music to go along with the gruesome real-life tale.

Thus "Dahmer" is a concept release featuring 26 tracks, and 52:12 minutes of music telling the story of the life of Jeffrey Lionel Dahmer from his early childhood, building shrines from the bones of roadkill, to his first murder of a Hitchhiker when he was 18, to his short army time in Germany where he ended up being dishonorably discharged as a consequence of his alcohol abuse. The story then goes on to tell how Dahmer is charged with child molestation. He didn´t serve time for the crime (he received a probation sentence) and soon moved in with his grandmother and began taking young gay men home, drugging them and killing them. There´s also a song about the short time he was kicked out of his grandmother´s house and stayed at the Ambassador Hotel where he also killed a man.

Around the middle of the album Dahmer moves into his own apartment and that´s when his killing spree really takes off. Quite a few tracks tell how he drugged his victims, killed them (most were strangled but some died from having hydrochloric acid or boiling water injected directly into holes in their skull that Dahmer had drilled while the men were drugged), dismember them (while taking pictures of the corpses in sexually suggestive positions at various points in the process), have sex with various parts of their dead bodies (including their severed heads and viscera), and eat them. But also details of how he disposed of their remains (some where dissolved in acid and flushed down the toilet). He kept quite a few parts for a skeletal alter he was contemplating building though, and also severed heads and other body parts he would use for masturbation. There´s also a song on this part of the album which tells the story of the poor 14 year old boy who escaped Dahmer´s apartment, but in a bizarre chain of events ended up being escorted back to the apartment by the police and handed over to Dahmer, who was able to convince the police that the drugged boy was his 19 year old lover, whom he had just had a domestic fight with. Nothing but bones were left of the boy, when Dahmer´s activities were finally revealed.

The last part of the album concentrates on how Dahmer was captured (one of his intented victims fled his apartment and contacted the police), the ensuing media circus, the trial, Dahmer becoming a born-again christian in jail, and finally his murder at the hands of another convict...

...and that´s pretty much the story contained in the lyrics save for a few details. Stylistically the music on the album is unmistakably the sound of Macabre. The "core" elements of their sound are drawn from death metal, grindcore, and thrash metal, but the band add many other elements from various musical styles to their music, which ultimately makes the overall style a bit hard to tag. There are for example a great deal of hardcore punk influences on the album (tracks like "Grandmother's House" and "McDahmers" are basically punk songs done the Macabre way), a track like "Jeffrey Dahmer Blues" is as the title suggests a heavy blues track, "Coming To Chicago" is Macabre´s bizarre version of the folk traditional "She’ll Be Coming ‘Round The Mountain", "In the Army Now" features parts of the melody from "When Johnny Comes Marching Home" (an 19th century American civil war traditional), "Grandmother's House" features parts of the melody from "Over the River and Through the Woods" (another 19th century traditional), and "Jeffrey Dahmer and the Chocolate Factory" is Macabre´s version of the "Oompa Loompa" song from "Charlie and the Chocolate Factory". It may sound a bit silly to use children´s tunes and folk traditionals on an extreme metal album, but I assure you it has quite an impact when paired with the unpleasant lyrical subject matter.

It´s not all tracks on the album which feature "alien" elements, and there are several pretty extreme and relatively more "straight" death/grindcore tracks on the album too. The whole album is one long highlight with no sub par tracks and an overall great tracklist flow and the quality of the material is high throughout. So it´s a bit unfair to mention some tracks over others, but I still think tracks like "Hitchhiker" (that chorus is damn heavy and infectiously catchy too), "Exposure" (probably the most grindcore oriented track on the album, and it´s delightfully extreme), "Scrub a Dub Dub" (great heavy track with yet another catchy chorus), and "Temple of Bones" (heavy, heavy, and heavy riffs and rhythms) deserve a special mention.

If you´re familiar with the preceding releases by Macabre, it should come as no surprise, that the musicianship is on a high level on all posts. Especially drummer Dennis the Menace (Dennis Ritchie) is an incredibly skilled musician. There´s something very special about his drumming which drives the music forward most effectively. It´s like his drums roll and even the most awkward breaks and changes in pace sound natural when he plays them. His performance on this album cannot be praised enough. The guitar and the bass (which are both placed quite high in the mix) are also well played, but in addition to the great drumming, it´s the vocals on the album which take the prize. That part of the album is varied to say the least. That´s not unusual for Macabre, but it´s like they perfected the vocal part of their sound on "Dahmer". The vocals on the album varies from deep juicy growling, to brutal and aggressive growling, to high pitched screaming, to varies types of clean singing. The different types of vocals are often used to emphasize something in the lyrics, which is a slight stroke of genius to my ears.

So "Dahmer" is in every possible way a high quality release. The songwriting is varied and memorable, and the lyrical concept well chosen and executed, the musicianship are on a high level, and the Neil Kernon production is powerful, detailed, and raw. The perfect sound for Macabre´s music. In terms of musical development since "Sinister Slaughter (1993)", the band have taken giant steps and a 5 star (100%) rating is deserved.