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I was told that this album by Polish Death Metal gods Vader was one of the best Death Metal albums ever, so I had to check it out myself. A recent fan of Vader after listening to Litany, I can now see that Vader have been excelling at this for a while now, as The Ultimate Incantation should please just about any Death Metal fans.

What we've got here is your standard Death Metal album - by standard I mean it contains the usual Death Metal characteristics: blast beats, growling vocals, blazingly fast guitars (yeah, I'm stalling here.) I always have a problem when reviewing Death Metal albums since this pretty much sums it up. Death Metal is not really about "atmosphere" like Black Metal for example. So the bottom line is really the songwriting, and how good the band is at playing. Well, this is Vader, so as far as playing goes, of course they do it well, very well. Can't really complain here. And I can actually make out some words when listening to the vocals. Unusual.

A problem I have with some Death Metal albums is that they sound the exact same from start to finish (also known as "booooring".) This is not the case here - at least not too much. As with most brutal Death Metal album, it's kind of hard to differentiate one song from the other, as the songs are pretty much played at full speed. There is an occasional slowdown here and there, which helps prevent the album from sounding too much the same to the unattentive listener.

The Ultimate Incantation is not for everyone, but Death Metal fans should appreciate it, as this is essentially a classic in the genre.