In the years since Diabolizer’s 2021 debut, Khalkedonian Death, Turkish death metal hasn’t really caught on here in the States in the same manner as say Scandinavian death metal. Furthermore, I don’t think I’ve heard a single death metallist stateside utter their name even in passing, which truthfully led to this self-admitted scatterbrain forgetting about their existence altogether (sorry guys!). So when I received a promo email concerning their sophomore assault, Murderous Revelations, I found myself saying, “Diabolizer, that sounds like a familiar name.” Yeah, because you reviewed them just a few years earlier, you big dummy!
Now that this initial embarrassment is out of the way, let’s tackle this latest offering, shall we? Upon revisiting Khalkedonian Death, the one aspect that stood out the most is the way Diabolizer freakishly replicates the sonic nuances of mid ’90s death metal. Yes, in an era where most OSDM bands draw from the glory days of the late ’80s and early ’90s, Diabolizer are more driven by those dark horse days of the mid ’90s, when death metal as a whole grew more brutal, technical, and bleaker outright. In the same breath, while at times Diabolizer teeter on the brink of brutal and technical death metal, at no point do they ever fully cross the threshold.
Like its predecessor before it, Murderous Revelations most closely resembles Steve Tucker era Morbid Angel, with hints of Deicide to boot. The songs are frenetic and unrelenting, emboldened by a mix in which each instrument boasts its own individual voice and compositions that border on mind-numbing. The opening “Into the Depths of Diseased Minds” establishes this ethos, unleashing chaotic evil at breakneck pace and setting the stage for a truly lethal listen. Outbursts like “Purulent Divinity in Black Flames” and “Set the World Ablaze (Infernal Dawn)” punish to the extreme, while midtempo tinged numbers like “Hogtied in Razorwire” and “Deathmarch of the Murderous Tyrant” channel Deicide and Cannibal Corpse.
The only aspect that sets this album back as the same-ness of the songs, especially their “fast part, slow part, repeat” delivery. I’m no stranger to metal bands sticking to one singular formula for an album. However, in the case of Murderous Revelations, things get a bit taxing halfway through, so much so that come the closing “Into the Jaws of Cerberus”, I found myself thankful this wasn’t a “fill the CD” affair. Now this isn’t to say the album is without its captivating moments. In particular, I’m taken aback by “Bloodsteam Bonegrinder” (How’s that for a title?), which embodies the psychedelic death metal that Trey Azagthoth speaks so fondly of having parented.
Like a torn-out page of Morbid Angel’s tattered necronomicon, Diabolizer’s Murderous Revelations is a dark and deadly effort. Although it doesn’t resonate as strongly with me as Khalkedonian Death before it, those nostalgic for death metal’s wilderness years, post-major label fallout and pre-every turn of the century band going slam, will get a kick out of Murderous Revelations in all it deranged delirium. You’d have to be a turkey to not even give this a fair shake!
6 out of 10
Label: Dark Descent Records
Genre: Death Metal
For fans of: Morbid Angel, Deicide, Immolation
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