Hall of Fame Countdown: Cannibal Corpse’s “Kill”

When the time came to put together a Cannibal Corpse special issue, it was pretty clear what album to induct into our Hall of Fame. Bear in mind this is a band not unfamiliar with the Hall’s glory, with their Tomb of the Mutilated and The Bleeding albums already residing in the glorious catacombs. So where do you go from there?

Clearly, you go to career rejuvenating Kill. The 2006 album is a monster, and is absolutely deserving to sit in our hall.

Grab a copy of the special issue here, then crank up Kill and read along as we rank each song from worst to best, with the usual warning here: on a Hall of Fame album of this level of quality, even the worst song is most likely something you’re going to want to spend some serious time with.

13. The Discipline of Revenge
The songs on Kill that don’t quite jump out and grab you still absolutely rule, such as this late-album rager. “The Discipline of Revenge” absolutely does what it came to do, which is destroy all listeners, and ensure that this album doesn’t start to wane as it enters its final third. It doesn’t, and this song, especially its excellent first 22 berserk seconds, make sure of that.

12. Brain Removal Device
Good song title, great, frantic, disorienting song here, the band keeping the listener’s attention at this late point on the album with crazed blasting, sideways riffing, and delirious soloing. Approved.

11. Submerged in Boiling Flesh
I always end up wondering what sort of consistency boiling flesh would have and what it would feel like to be submerged in it while this song races past me, which is a shame, because it’s got tons of killer riffs, tight drum and guitar interplay and a great flow to it all around. But mainly I just end up thinking boiling flesh would probably be a bit sticky and totally painful. Oh, and, killer song.

10. Infinite Misery
This is a great way to end off this album, Cannibal delivering a solemn, pacing, mid-paced instrumental that sets a tone and says goodbye more powerful than words could. After 12 excellent songs with vocals from a crazed Corpsegrinder, here’s one to give you a moment of reflection on the amazing album that just finished before it sends you back to reality.

9. Maniacal
This song inches its way a bit higher up the list some days for its guts alone: “Maniacal” is a brief 2:12 blaster placed way down as song 11 on Kill‘s tracklisting, the song more than making up in pure energy what it lacks in length. Sometimes two minutes is enough; in the hands of a band like this, it’s more than enough.

8. Death Walking Terror
Solid and sturdy, “Death Walking Terror” is Cannibal Corpse offering the listener a bit of respite seven songs in to a very brutal album. The tempo is mid to slow—except when it’s not, of course—and the band is just a slowly steamrolling machine, “respite” here coming in the form of the five men of Cannibal Corpse just punching, punching, punching, until it’s lights out. Songs like this are why Cannibal are a death metal band that gets picked to open for Slayer.

7. Barbaric Bludgeonings
One of the many things that makes Kill great are the riffs, and “Barbaric Bludgeonings” has tons of them. I mean, this song alone has an alarming amount of amazing riffs; some look back to a more classic death metal sound, some are pure of-the-era Cannibal Corpse, and the rest just make you realize how those two things are one and the same with a band this legendary.

6. Necrosadistic Warning
The jittery stops and starts, the fantastic guitar solo, the feeling of dread this song carries with it… “Necrosadistic Warning” is a killer on an album full of them, the song’s atmosphere a nod back to The Wretched Spawn, but the delivery pure Kill. It doesn’t stop this album’s excellent forward momentum but does manage to add a little something new four songs in.

5. Five Nails through the Neck
Clearly, a great song title, and “Five Nails through the Neck” is no slouch as far as being a song goes either, the excellent riffing shining through during the slower moments, which are few and far between, the band instead spending most of their time bludgeoning and attacking, driving those nails in deep, Corpsegrinder killing it behind the mic, everyone just killing, killing, killing.

4. Purification by Fire
I love this song for its first psychotic minute alone, the band mixing blasting, crazed soloing and disturbing riffs to create a truly alarming song, and this is before Corpsegrinder even shows up. Once he does, all bets are off, Cannibal Corpse putting their heads down and just plowing through this glorious platter of DM splatter. Listen closely and you can even hear a bit of swing amongst the carnage.

3. Murder Worship
If the cement-grinder mid-tempo parts don’t get you, the blasting grind will, “Murder Worship” holding up very admirably as a third song on the album, nothing particularly outlandish happening but the band managing to make it sound completely engaging all the while. Just a huge, churning, grinder of a song.

2. Make Them Suffer
Make Them Suffer” encapsulates much of what makes Kill such a fantastic album: incredibly tight playing, energy levels through the roof, cohesive songwriting, and a chemistry between the players that is both ’91 in feel and forward-looking in delivery, the band totally shredding through this song, which is a fantastic example of how to make flesh-and-potatoes DM edge-of-seat exciting.

1. The Time to Kill Is Now
It’s not just a totally massive Cannibal Corpse album opener, “The Time to Kill Is Now” is a huge return to life from a band that wasn’t dead, but was in need of a slight energy burst at this point in time. This album, and this song opening it up, was just that, this huge, grinding, manic opener a total Cannibal classic from the very second it was introduced to our lives.