Dissection - Dissected Tapes (2009)

   Dissection's (from Lithuania, not to be confused with Dissection from Sweden) short active period in the early '90s well represents the typical lifeline and features of Eastern European death metal bands. Their 2 demo tapes have been released in remastered form as a compilation album, that could be an interesting and exciting gem for the old school fans of the genre.
   First of all, the death metal scene was on its highest in '92 and '93 when the band's demo tapes came out, but the same time the genre got slowly exhausted, and most big names tried to come up with something different to renew their styles. The least fortunate vintage intro of "Dissected Tapes" and the technical, experimenting song compositions are the evident signs of this influence. Pestilence's 'Spheres" album might come into mind at first, but the "Individual Thought Patterns" era by Death could be also mentioned as possible direct influences. Death metal came by some delay into Eastern Europe, and most bands seemed to be confused about which direction should they pick, the already exhausted old school way, or the technical, progressive path. Time also didn't work for them, cause after the middle of the decade the interest for the style drastically decreased, and the musicians simply couldn't keep up to improve their skills. Also to find the same way skilled and motivated members for a band could have been also a big challenge in small scenes, not to mention the strictly limited possibilities of recording. Usually these have been the main reasons why '90s Eastern European death metal sounded kinda odd and raw by the mix of pretty simple, basic themes and more complex, technical ambitions. At the other hand there are plenty of analogies with their fellow coetaneous bands of the Eastern European region if it's about the themes and the concepts. Mostly Polish bands like Schismatic or Mortal Slaughter sounded kinda similar, but the vocal style is reminding to Necrocannibal from Russia. However, the possibility of direct influences from neighbor scenes could be closed out, since the mentioned bands had quite limited access at the time. The analogies are the consequences of the same feeling of the era, the same musical roots that led to an interesting form of "convergent evolution". For those who might enjoy some early '90s Eastern European extreme metal nostalgia, "Dissected Tapes" might be very enjoyable.