Continuing on the brutal death spree that I’ve been on as of late comes a band that made headlines in the death metal scene as being a joke of a band, but in turn have turned themselves into a band with more potential and commitment than half of the bands I come across. Give it up for Waking the Cadaver!
Waking the Cadaver began in 2006 straight out of New Jersey then kicked off their start as a band by releasing a two-song demo containing “Blood Splattered Satisfaction” and “Chased Through the Woods By a Rapist.” “Chased Through the Woods…” ended up going viral because of a mock video that someone made up due to the song’s “misheard lyrics.” It was seen as a horrible song with absolutely nothing more to it than a joke. At first, that’s how I saw as well, but my mind changed when I came across the band years later with their second release, Beyond Cops, Beyond God – which had a much sharper sound and way better production value all across the board. It got me into them for a few more months until I subsequently forgot about them other than the odd times where I would listen to “Chased Through the Woods…” just for old times’ sake.
When I heard that Waking The Cadaver would be releasing their third album, Real-Life Death, I got super excited because I saw how far they came between Perverse Recollections of a Necromangler and Beyond Cops, Beyond God, and I couldn’t wait to see what things they had in store for us with this next release. What they gave us was well produced, in-your-face brutal death metal that any fan of the genre couldn’t turn down. Honestly, a lot of the songs came off as being a sort of Whitechapel attitude that I have fallen in love with (mostly due to the fact that I have loved Whitechapel for years). Aside from the Whitechapel influence, the vocal range on the album was phenomenal. It could go from straight-up gutterals and squeals to real powerful Whitechapel or Ingested-level vocals that ripped my face off constantly throughout the release.
Only on the second track of the album do we come across “Money Power Death,” and holy hell, this track was so damn powerful that it actually made my headphones crackle, resulting in me having to turn my volume down a bit. The chant before the breakdown and then the breakdown itself flowed so well together and was just way too destructive. The rest of the release follows suit and doesn’t let down in terms of brutality; and not just from the vocals, but from the incredibly quick drumming and blast beats followed with two guitars and a bass just shredding along. I honestly haven’t been this impressed with a brutal death release in a long time, but Waking the Cadaver have set the bar so high and ended 2013 on the highest possible note. Any fan of death metal should be able to get into this and there’s truly not anything I can say that’s wrong with this album other than the fact that it only stems out over the span of eight tracks, which makes it seem like a long EP rather than an actual full length release, and that’s pretty disappointing. Other than that, almost every technical aspect of this album is flawless and the only thing that should be changed or improved is the production quality, thought that’s almost never perfect in any release, especially brutal death. Pick this album up and support this band now if you are in any way a fan of death metal. 
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