Pillory — Evolutionary Miscarriage

Boston (!! WOOHOO !!) based technical death metal band is back with their sophomore effort, Evolutionary Miscarriage. Coming seven long years after their debut, No Lifeguard At the Gene Pool,  one can assume that a lot of work went into this album. While tech to the gills, Pillory's latest suffers from some self indulgent noodling, but still manages to be a pretty enjoyable listen. Brutal when it needs to be and flighty when it wants, Evolutionary Miscarriage has enough balance to appeal to most of the metal community.

For the most part, when left unguarded, technical death metal can get caught in a feedback loop of over indulgent wankery that detracts from the album as a whole. One can't blame musicians for wanting to show off their chops, but when the song sounds like a faulty mp3, it's too much. Fortunately, Pillory manages to keep this reigned in more often than not, and allows solid, headbanging riffs to shine through. "Imbeciles In Defiance" plays both sides of the fence with low, heavy stomping alternating with tight riffing and hyperactive drum work. This approach rears its head on "Purify the Commonwealth"and "Bipedal Prosecution" as well. Not many can mix these styles effectively, but Pillory manages to blend them with great effect. Pillory isn't content with just stomp, though, as "Nihilarian" and "Lixiviated" prove. Shredtastic riffs and hyperspeed drums are the weapons of choice to showcase their metal heroics. Not content with just metal, Pillory introduces the album and a few other songs with nice, experimental noise. "Bipedal Prosecution" has a nine minute runtime, but half of this is tasty experimental work. Acting like a palette cleansing sorbet, the noisy bits clear the slate for new tempos and technical achievement.
 
Personally, Evolutionary Miscarriage took a few listens to fully get into, but once past the minor tomfoolery, I definitely enjoyed it. Some of the super techy prog bits lessen the experience for me, but that's all me and not Pillory. While I prefer more caveman brutality over elven finesse, I would definitely recommend this album to any discerning metalhead.