Illud Divinum Insanus

Morbid Angel’s eighth album is a wild mix of ideas. There are blasting death metal tracks with Hate Eternal’s Tim Yeung on drums, some of which are excellent (“Existo Vulgoré,” “Blades for Baal”); industrial metal pieces with programmed beats and samples that feel more like bassist/vocalist David Vincent making a solo record under the MA banner (“Too Extreme!”, “Radikult”); and the bizarre “Destructos Vs. The Earth/Attack,” which sounds like a Danny Elfman song for a Tim Burton movie remixed by Laibach. (The Slovenian industrial art troupe remixed Morbid Angel’s “Sworn to the Black” and “God of Emptiness” on a 1994 EP.) There aren’t as many squiggly, psychedelic Trey Azagthoth solos on this record as most MA fans would probably like, but it’s an album no one else would have made, and offers pleasures all its own.