Hypocrisy

The tenth album from a mainstay of the Swedish death metal scene, Virus is simultaneously an ode to an aging extreme music tradition and also clearly a product of the 21st century. Spewing savagery and melody in equal eruptions, Hypocrisy maintain the steady, almost droning propulsion so characteristic of the band’s sound, delving into a little Floridian morbidity, and dallying in contemporary-flavoured catchiness along the way. Tracks like "Let the Knife do the Talking,” despite a less than congenial attitude (this is death metal after all), could easily pass for singles, and album closer "Living to Die” covers the baleful ballad department, but Hypocrisy’s faster/heavier artillery ("Warpath”) and slower animosity ("A Thousand Lies”) are on hand as well. Virus demonstrates that increasing age is not synonymous with loss of vitality.