IMPETIGO "HORROR OF THE ZOMBIES"

In 2001, I was 16 years old. I was very fortunate to have a death metal club right by my house called Smiler Coogans, and to have a family that didn't mind if I was out until 1 AM watching  metal bands destroy a room of 80 people (which was probably the max in the there). Anyways, 2001 was a fucking great year. I got to see bands like Mortician, Malignancy, Cianide, Fleshgrind, Macabre, Anal Cunt and  Exhumed on the weekends, thus making Smiler Coogans my home away from home. I would save up my paychecks from the grocery store I worked at, as well as my allowances in preparation for the shows. Then come show day, I would bring a Jewel bag up to the distro tables and proceed to blow a few hundred dollars in the course of an hour. Looking back, the stoned guys at the distro booths probably loved seeing that Jewel bag.

One summer I was at a Brodequin show, and I picked up the cassette version of Impetigo's "Horror of the Zombies" for 3 bucks. I almost put it back, but the guy behind the counter would have none of it. He said I needed to buy it now. So I did, and the guy behind the booth gave me a huge smile and thumbs up, and told me to enjoy. It took me a week or so to get through the massive pile of merch I had picked up that night, and somehow saved the Impetigo cassette for last (next to the Blood tape I also picked up). I seriously remember the day clearly. It was about 10 AM, and there was a huge thunderstorm outside. In my dimly lit room I put the tape on and laid back in my futon.

Instantly  my ears felt like they were caked in maggot covered rotted meat. I had spent all this time at Smiler Coogans seeing brutal death metal bands burp and gurgle and slam their way through the night, but this...this I loved. This was raunchy. This was disgusting. The album opens with the mid paced, headbanging gore metal anthem of "Boneyard", and goes right into the slow churning creepy crawler known as "I Work For The StreetCleaner"..The movie samples, taken from such classics as "Cannibal Holocaust" fit the album perfectly, as they set the mood for the next symphony of sickness. The lyrics are vile, and paint a clear and demented picture of absolute terror ("Staph Terrorist being my favorite, about a disgruntled restaurant employee who poops in people's burritos) . There's even "Cannibale Ballet", which is an atmospheric tribal jam that sounds like a colony of blood crazed cannibals are doing the backing vocals. You get the picture, this is some fucked up shit. The bass sounds like chainsaw going through an abdomen, and the vocals sounds like the singer is having said abdomen ripped out while he attempts to get through each track. The drumming, the riffs, the production, artwork (those crude looking zombies are freaky!)..everything about this album is perfect.

After hearing "Horror of the Zombies", I quickly became obsessed with Impetigo and their back catalog, and even named my first cassette label My Lai Productions, a nod to their song "My Lai". I hope distro guy at the Brodequin show knows that I owe him big time for making sure I bought this. Carcass, Autopsy, Repulsion, Impetigo..these are the true gods of horror and perversion. No one has even come close to the magic and genius of these sickos.