Morbid AngelKingdoms Disdained

Morbid Angel are an institution in the death metal world. But in a year where every single thing happening on the nightly news makes institutions seem, at best, benignly irrelevant and, at the worst toxic and threatening—do we really need another Morbid Angel album to exist?

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As more and more time passes since the halcyon days where the unholy trinity of Azagthoth, Vincent and Sandoval changed the face of extreme music—the question looming over Kingdoms Disdained isn’t ‘is it good?’ but more ‘why is it a thing?’

The question looming over Kingdoms Disdained isn’t ‘is it good?’ but more ‘why is it a thing?’

For his part, guitarist Trey Azagthoth—the last remaining from that highest chorus of morbid angels—puts forward an effort not seen since Domination and now that the stakes are much lower, switching up frontman David Vincent for Steve Tucker doesn’t seem as abhorrent as it did back on Formulas Fatal to the Flesh.

On Kingdoms Disdained, Morbid Angel deliver a competent album that neither over or under whelms. Some diehards might get a kick out of the fact that it’s better than the last one, for the rest of us there’s just a solid death metal album—thankfully devoid of hooks—that can only really remind us of Morbid Angel’s past brilliance.