Kingdom of Conspiracy is not a state-of-the-art death metal record. Whether you're judging by speed and technicality or by sheer enveloping atmosphere-- see recent releases by Wormed and Defeated Sanity on one hand, or Portal and Abyssal on the other-- you'll have no trouble finding albums with more impressive on-paper stats. What this ninth Immolation full-length is, though, is something even more satisfying: a state-of-the-art Immolation LP, and a continuation of a hot streak by one of the most rewarding veteran acts in the genre. The Yonkers band, co-led since its 1988 inception by guitarist Robert Vigna and bassist/vocalist Ross Dolan, has never paid much mind to death metal's arms race of extremity; like their contemporaries Suffocation and Incantation, Immolation are currently producing some of the strongest material of their career, an expertly calibrated blend of the byzantine and the straightforwardly brutal, simply by following their own muse.
If there is such a being, he or she communes directly with Vigna-- the band's sole composer-- who wields his riffs like paint, splashed at irregular intervals, or spread out in more methodical arcs and whorls. Since the beginning, Vigna has employed death metal's stock cadences sparingly. The blastbeat isn't an auto-pilot move for him; his riffs clank and lurch, skank and shimmy, high and low registers dialoging incessantly like two opposing hand puppets, one that goes "chunk" and the other that goes "squeal." Parts appear first in basic form and then take on an eerie neon-like vibrancy thanks to the guitarist's signature whirring harmonies.
This M.O. has remained more or less intact since Dawn of Possession, Immolation's 1991 debut full-length. What has changed is the ferocity of the band's delivery-- which peaked in the early 2000s on extraordinary albums like Close to a World Below and Unholy Cult-- and, more recently, the integrity of their songcraft. With 2010's Majesty and Decay, Immolation were writing the kind of death-metal "hits" that distinguish the genre's most elite catalogs-- those of bands like Morbid Angel, Obituary and Cannibal Corpse. Providence, from 2011, was the best kind of stopgap: an EP that upheld Majesty's standard while adding a new element of trancelike, downtempo repetition, further cementing Immolation's indifference to shock and awe for its own sake.
Kingdom of Conspiracy is exactly the record any fan of the two bulls-eyes that preceded would've hoped for. It's less offbeat than Providence or Majesty and Decay; there are few surprises here and even less fat. But as a summation of what Immolation does well, it's close to flawless. The production values are pristine. Mid-period Immolation albums embraced an organic grit, but now the band is all about fierce clarity. Vigna's current method is to compose and arrange entirely on the computer, via Ableton Live; the members then learn the songs and perform them piecemeal in the studio. The end result has a mechanized quality that takes some getting used to, but suits the material well. Kingdom of Conspiracy's core mission is the perfect articulation of Vigna's outlandish ideas.
Even though the album's aesthetic terrain is well-mapped, it's hard not to marvel at Vigna's inventions. "Echoes of Despair" is an instant Immolation classic, a perfect illustration of how the band manages to obey the basic tenets of death metal while sounding completely off-the-wall. The intro section staggers forward in top-heavy waltz time, a feel rarely employed in the genre. The song eventually arrives at a blastbeat passage, but first, it makes its way through a series of a brilliantly demented riffs, full of zigzagging chugs and divebombing squeaks. For all its weirdness, the track builds logically to its steamroller of a climax, demonstrating Immolation's trademark feat of simultaneously spinning your head around and inciting old-school fist-pumping.
Other tracks favor atmosphere over density. "The Great Sleep" is a mood-driven piece, a demonstration of Vigna's compositional economy. It features a series of tanklike riffs, lumbering and deliberate, offset by majestic leads. The band give each idea its due; they don't move on until each section seems indelible. As well as any item in the Immolation discography, it sums up the way the band juxtaposes frenzied technicality and poetic simplicity in the service of sturdy, memorable writing.
Lyrically, Kingdom of Conspiracy hangs out in the Immolation wheelhouse, while making slight tweaks to the formula. As in their back catalog, the band rails at length here against those who would wield religion as a tool of control, but on songs like "A Spectacle of Lies", they widen their scope to include what scans as post-9/11 fearmongering. Lines like "Inventing the problem/ Naming the enemy/ Creating the conflict" don't exactly jump off the page, but in the context of the band's firestorm riffage, they capture the right mood of seething outrage. Ross Dolan's uniformly gruff vocal style serves a similar purpose: His delivery isn't the most distinctive or versatile in death metal, but like a top-tier hardcore barker, he summons a rare conviction, focusing Vigna's bizarre creations to a diamond-hard point.
Strangely, there's something heartwarming about Kingdom of Conspiracy. It isn't just the realization that Immolation have retained their staunch intensity for 25 years and counting; it's that you can still hear them pushing to do better, and to do so purely on their own terms, without regard for the kind of arbitrary benchmarks that have threatened to turn death metal from a richly expressive medium into either an athletic contest or inscrutable art project. Immolation are at heart a band that's comfortable in their well-established style; fans know they're not going to throw out a wild curveball like Morbid Angel's industrial-steeped 2011 head-scratcher Illud Divinum Insanus. At the same time, they've managed to find new ways to refine and progress. There's a pride in their steadfast devotion, not to mention a joy. A record as lean, untrendy and straight-up satisfying as Kingdom of Conspiracy could only have arisen out of the passionate care of lifers such as Robert Vigna and Ross Dolan. Their songs might fixate on hate, but they radiate a master craftsman's love.
