By Mark Derricutt

Released November 17, 2017 - Napalm Records

It's funny how sometimes a new album hits you in the sweet spot immediately and you know it's a keeper; whilst others take time to grow on you.

My first listen through of the new Cavalera Conspiracy album "Psychosis" was more of the later, and on subsequent listens I have this odd sense that I'm actually listening to two totally different albums as my thoughts seem an almost 180 turnaround.

The name "Cavalera" brings with it a long-standing history of respect - no one can deny the importance of Sepultura to the world of metal; along with Max Cavalera's body of work in Soulfly, it's hard to look at any new material from any Cavalera without a comparative nod to their heritage.

When Insane first opened the album up, I enjoyed the riffs but felt the drums a little wooden, machine-like - solid and relentless but seemingly void of that magic 'something', now; whilst still seemingly nothing out of the ordinary or driving things in new directions, I see the solid foundation for whats to come - HEAVY, F**KEN, METAL. Once we come to the bridge, we see a drop in tempo as we fall into some serious mosh-time.

Terror Tactics shows the first time of 'experimentation' on the album with an unexpected shift in the beat, fleshing out the sound with odd sounding samples/organs atop of a riff that initially felt like it was trying too hard, but now seems natural, eventually giving way to a nice a instrumental section.

Implaement Execution kicks off with a killer riff, overlayed keys overlaid before the vocals kick in, mid-tempo riff then hard out brutality until we shift into Spectral War - with a smooth shift from slow and chunky to insanity I'm calling this the best track so far, but now we're just getting started.

I can see this album coming off epic live, moshpits full of frenzied bodies, I'm still missing much of the percussive beats I usually dig, with a lot of the drumming feeling almost clinical, but repeat listens give me more and more nuggets I had originally missed, and whilst tracks like Hellfire contain soundscapes that somewhat feel out of place on their own - seem to hold together as a collective when listening to the album back to back...

Excruciating closes the album - and on first listen, it’s pretty self-descriptive, a solid song that seems to collapse around the 3:30 minute mark of this 6:22 song, slowing down to a dreary pit of noise that just makes me want to stop listening - I’ve heard drone music that was more interesting. A spoken word proclamation about a 2 headed Brazilian god ends out the song as we fade into silence.

Psychosis is a worthy album, despite some minor oddities, and one I'm finding far more enjoyable to listen to than 2014's Pandemonium.

3.5 / 5