I have somewhat of a loaded issue with DYING FETUS, the reason for this is that up until about a maybe two years ago I considered them to be just another death metal band that's out there, that was until a friend got me acquainted with their third album "Destroy The Opposition", which I'm sure those of you who know the band are well aware of, and I immediately fell in love with it. To this day I still listen to it and consider it to be one of the best death metal albums of all times. It has everything a death metal of that sort needs to become unforgettable; monstrous guitar riffs, tons of groove, insane drumming, and incredibly powerful and venomous lyrics which in this case deal with social and political issues with immense conviction, something that is very rare in the death metal scenery. Songs like "Praise The Lord" and "Pissing In The Mainstream" managed to put in words a lot of my thoughts on society and to this day the words of these songs echo in my head.

Everything about that album felt genuine and original, and as one can imagine I immediately checked out the albums they have put out with great enthusiasm. To my disappointment, the albums that followed were simply decent, still in high standards in terms of skill, but according to me, there was nothing genuine about any of them. One possible answer of why this huge gap between "Destroy The Opposition" and everything that came after is that every band member in that album besides John Gallagher left to form MISERY INDEX, but they are a story for a different review.

Anyway when I heard DYING FETUS was putting out a new release I had no interest at first. But when I heard it is going to be a cover E.P, my curiosity was provoked, because I thought this would be the best way for them to present themselves and flourish, since even though it is true that DYING FETUS of today lacks originality the one thing they still have in abundance is skill, and what better way to show it then a cover E.P.

And sure enough my expectations where answered, this release represents a death metal band who possesses great skill, it contains covers of NAPALM DEATH, PESTILENCE, CANNIBAL CORPSE, BROKEN HOPE, BOLT THROWER and DEHUMANIZED, they did not take any of the songs to far of places in terms of adaptation  but they made them all sound like the works of DYING FETUS as one can expect, every song feels fresh and has been injected with a lot of life's blood, I believe that this a lot due to the incredible works of their  newest drummer Trey Williams that puts a lot of fresh and raw energy into his playing and it has a huge positive effect on each and every song, but other than John's feel in the guitar solos that still needs some more work all the other goods are delivered, and in johns favor I can say that he has improved his vocals a quite a bit since the days of DTO, he has developed a much more distinctive sound and has also made major improvements in terms of diction which is important , tough it may be a lot thanks to the vocal production on this release.. I am not sure.

This E.P is so good for what it is that in my opinion most of the covers are even better than the original versions, it even managed to turn songs I didn't care for like BROKEN HOPE's "Gorehog" from what I think is a very annoying song to one of the best songs on the E.P.

Even though this is branded as a Cover E.P there is a very nice surprise in a form of an original song in the midst of the release, it's called "Rohypnol", it is only 43 seconds long but somehow it manages to be one of the more memorable tracks on the album due to it's catchy attributes, "Rohypnol" is a date-rape drug and this song feels like a Death Metal jingle for a commercial encouraging it's usage, I found it very funny and I really appreciated the band for putting this in the E.P.

My conclusions on this release lead me to believe this to be the best thing DYING FETUS has put out since DSO, but the real challenge of putting out an original album that will feel genuine stands lays ahead of them and I am waiting to see how they deal with it.

It's true that this E.P is a bit of a cheap trick they did to postpone facing that challenge, but it's a trick that worked on me.