‘Back to the primtive, fuck all your politics’ was the opening verse sang by the mighty Max Cavalera from Soulfly’s ‘Primitive’ album. A slight alteration to this will be catalytic enough to start off my review for death metal mammoths ‘Obituary ‘s latest record.

Back to the primtive, fuck all the new shit, these are some burnt out feelings captured and described best after listening to ‘Xecutior’s return’. The Album has a tank like shell and movement. When on roll it’s on a killing spree it fires and decimates. ‘Face your god’ (track 1) and ‘lasting presence’ (track 2) pop out such an aftermath. Riffs on these are very medieval Obituary signatures Motory- rotary-groovatory yet at the same time wicked, mean, and harsh in terms of lead playing. ‘Ralph Santolla’ a replacement justified for ‘Allan West’. Track 3 ‘Evil ways’ is like dense mercury flowing towards the higher temperatures in a thin barometer, mid way it’s caught and dissolved in acidic leads that literally explode all over (at the final corner) when acted upon by sky-touching vocal chords of John Tardy.

‘Drop dead’ and ‘Bloodshot’ are dark, scary tunnels linking the first phase of destruction to the final. Both the songs have a pressing overture beating riffs into listeners cracking skull bones. ‘ Seal your fate’is the fastest song on the album having fast sliced riffs, thrown up, up and away, very refreshing reminding us of Jurassic period of ‘Slowly we rot’ and ‘Cause of death’.

‘Feel the pain’ and ‘Contrast the dead’ (seven mimuter) are slugfests, having some slowest head moving parts and pounding drum work, very ruggedly built and for sure most catchy/remembered riffs. I call it death metal at the mountaintop, where it takes ages for you to climb and when there you play lethargic-drugged death metal. Readers, there is just one band of that sort which can do all that, that’s-Obituary.

Final 2 tracks are ‘Lies’ and ‘In your head’, on these obituary show what they are best at, delivering pain soaked death metal through-utmost emotion, slowly caressing through the mind fields of an average death metal fan, who doesn’t understand too many technicalities.

For the love of a band that scaled many heights for almost 2-decades, Xecutioners return is a return to perfection. In your CD rack right now.