The band FLESHWORKS from Osnabrück, Germany, was formed in November 2008 in order to create a brute and vicious kind of death metal. The members already played in several bands thus gathered lots of experience in performing live and songwriting. FLESHWORKS are revitalizing the old school spirit by an innovative way of playing and do not let passing trends lead them astray. This is the band’s third album, and it has 12 songs.

“Factory Mantra” is first, and it’s an introductory piece to the album. “Down Deeper Underground” is the first proper track. Short and fast, it mostly has Death Metal elements, and very little melody. Still, the band plays with confidence. “The Misery” follows a similar pattern…deep guttural vocals, thick bass notes, pounding drums, and guitar work that moves a little here and there. Like other bands in the genre, FLESHWORKS is adept at Death Metal, but not so much at melody. “In Waves” is really the first song to feature some variation, and it breathes with the injection of some melody.

“Hydraulic” begins with some spoken word before segueing into another deep slab of Death Metal that uses the open E chord as the base of attack. “Thy Kingdom Fall” is unfortunately more of the same. There is very little dynamism in most Death Metal, so technicality is one way that bands can stand out. Although their musicianship is good, it isn’t standing out for me as a listener. The dive bombs and the spastic Kerry King guitar solo doesn’t help much either. “Cognitive Dissonance” is similar to the other songs. Vary the pacing, vary the attack…anything to keep the songs from running together. “Subdue and Dominate” is faster and here come the variation I was talking about. Unfortunately, the overreliance of open chords grounds the song.

“Fatalist” closes the album, and there isn’t much to talk about. Overall, I had a few problems with the album. First and foremost, 12 songs of Death Metal doesn’t leave many chances to vary the album from song to song, especially in this genre. Second, moments of melody were quite fleeting. Third and finally, the band overused open chords as the base for many of the songs. As a result, the album fell flat for me.