“What the fuck happened to Lord Worm‘s voice???” That was my first comment on “Once Was Not” first play. The rest of the guys in Cryptopsy sound better then ever tough. They kept their characteristic style, but Worm, oh God. Oh well, I’ll ignore the vocals while trying to describe “Once Was Not”.

So… First track is “Luminum”, an instrumental track.

“In The Kingdom Where Everything Dies,The Sky Is Mortal” follows. And GOD damn!. Cryptopsy rocks or what? Brutality invades. Cryptopsy are so complex and technical that you got to love it [or hate it]. With this track I noticed several things. Cryptopsy lose the jazz elements [great] and the riffs are, once again, more interesting and catchy [“And Then You’ll Beg” was kind of boring. One or two great songs and the rest of the album just drag us until the end].

“Carrionshine” must have the fastest drums in the world. Just check it out at 0:40m. Oh yeah baby! Mr. Flo Mounier has mastered the Gravity Roll technique. This track is just insane. How the hell this guys play this stuff? Amazing.

Next in line is “Adeste Infidelis”. Great riff in the beginning. Then chaos comes in. Only at minute 2:00m we have some “rest”. Great solo section. Then, chaos once again. I must say that this track is a bit confusing. Most of the time I can’t ear the riffs, just the drums blasting away. Great guitar solo section and ending tough.

Track #5 is “The Curse Of The Great” and the pace seems to be dropped with a slow heavy intro. One minute passes and Cryptopsy shows us, once again, who’s tha band. Flo did a tremendous job on this record. I guess he must have earned the Godlike status by now.

The second riff of “The Frantic Pace Of Dying” rocks. I always enjoyed this kind of Cryptopsy catchy melodies. It’s very cool how they manage to create a “theme” and then play it throughout the song. Pretty much like in classical music. Hey, they even have a string chamber doing the riff just before the recall. Great effect. When the band comes in it adds a lot of power.

“Keeping The Cadaver Dogs Busy”. Nice song title -_- This one starts with a ten seconds jazzy riff [it’s the only jazz oriented passage in the record]. Soon brutality steps in. One more great riff. It’s very hard to describe this Cryptopsy songs. It’s all happening so fast that there is not much to say.

“Angelskingarden” has another intro. This is the longest song in the record. Near the end there is a very cool passage with a big classical guitar solo.

The next song is kind of weird. “The Pestilence That Walketh In Darkness [Psalm 91 : 5-8]”. It sounds like…. Like… A death metal ballad? Well, just the first riff anyway. The spoken vocals doesn’t help much either. Weird track.

“The End” is another instrumental track. An intro and next we have some acoustic guitars with some tribal percussion. This track links with the next and final one: “Endless Cemetery”

Slow heavy riff in the beginning. Towards the middle we have another cool section with those melodies I talked before. It breaks all the chaos and brutality. Then another guitar solo begins and the song evolves to a softer vibe.

Well, overall: This is a great Cryptopsy record. Probably not as good as “None So Vile” but, at least, better the “And Then You’ll Beg” – the previous one.
They are better then ever, even with the loss of the “None So Vile” mastermind: guitar player Jon Levasseur. Didn’t miss him at all, as strange as it seems. Negative remark for Lord Worm. Maybe he tried to be more versatile but it just backfired.

This is a tremendous extreme death metal album. Pussy metal heads keep out.

Cryptopsy – Adeste Infidelis