Scattered Remnants — Destined To Fail

First released in 1998 on Repulse Records, Destined To Fail was the lone studio album from Massachusetts death metal band Scattered Remnants. The eight-track album offered up a brutal, bleakly simplistic at times grooved take on DM form, with some effective jarring tonal shifts, and a few more creative/ experiential touches.

Here from Redefining Darkness is a reissue of the album, coming as either a CD or blue vinyl release. I’m reviewing the former of these- with the CD presented in a clear jewel case- including a twelve-page inlay booklet, featuring lyrics/ thank you lists/ band pictures.

The album opens with an effectively moody intro track in the form of “Destined To Fail”, which mixes bleak film dialogue samples with dark & lightly bombastic neo-classical tones. Then we jarringly shift into “Lamentation Of Tortured Souls” with a speedily gunning pace & double guttural vocals, with some nice grooving to crushing breakdowns along the way.

Later on, “Angelic Redemption” mixes up a blackened maelstrom of rapidly churing riffs, duo vocal growls, hard-hit drums- along the way there are a few NWOBHM moments, and most surprisingly some darkly warbling & wavering female vocals, over a more gothic DM crossover moment. The album plays out with the charmingly titled “Vaginal Vomit” with its grim ‘n’ galloping main riff, double vocal chaos, and moments of all-out speeding DM grimness.

Destined To Fail was a really promising debut- with memorably brutal ‘n’ grooving riffing, effective double vocal growls, and one or two more creative/ experimental moments- so a real pity they split up after this, though they did re-group in 2018, but have yet to release new material.