Diamonds & Rust: 35 Years Of Rigor Mortis

[Cover artwork by Cort Johnson]

We’re always told that we shouldn’t judge a book by its cover, and of course, we still do. But the good news here is that this first Rigor Mortis album isn’t a book, and so by the letter of the law, I can safely judge it by the blood and bones that adorn it, and I will, and I have.

I have judged it, and I have decided it’s… totally frickin’ awesome.

I mean, just look at that thing, will you? (Scroll up if you can’t see it.) It’s simple, direct, to the point. It’s instantly eye-catching, bright red; it’s got a skull with scruffy long hair and a smashed-in nasal bone, very possibly from having its face punched in by a venom-spitting Bruce Corbitt. There’s an axe and a morning star and the band name / album title spelled out in impossibly twisted bones. It’s like, how much more awesome and metal could this thing be, really? And the answer is “none.” None more metal and awesome.

Like the best album covers, the image without perfectly encapsulates the music within. It’s cartoonish, the kind of thing certain cooler-than-thou types would (will / probably did) dismiss as silly and trashy and, in that dismissal, they miss the point entirely, which is that Rigor Mortis is kinda silly and kinda trashy, and they’re also, fun, funny, furious, and, to reiterate: totally frickin’ awesome.

Like the b-level horror and gore movies that inspired it, this first full-length Rigor Mortis is a gleefully giddy rush, rough-hewn and raw, and clearly the work of those who love what they’re doing. Art is often, if not always, defined by its limitations, and Rigor Mortis makes the best of its boundaries. Even with the capital resources of Capitol Records behind it – and even with it being a marked improvement over the preceding demo – Rigor Mortis still sounds like the underground that it crawled out of. It careers at full speed along a razor’s edge, and yet, in the white-knuckle exhilaration of seemingly imminent collapse lies the adrenaline rush we seek, the fear, the fun, the fist-in-the-air freewheeling release that sends bodies crashing into one another in front of the stage. It’s chaotic, manic, transcendent; it’s low budget and lowbrow, high octane and high on life and death. More than anything, it’s an absolute blast from start to finish.

Mike Scaccia’s guitar runs skitter across the neck in spinning, fast-picked melodies. Solos spin off in flurries of notes, more defined and articulated than mere Hanneman / King divebomb cacophony, and yet equally frenzied. There’s nary a rhythm guitar part to be heard, leaving plenty of space and breathing room for Casey Orr’s bass to fill that void, the two often interplaying like twin guitars an octave apart. Harden Harrison’s rhythms are relentlessly racing, rolling along at the frantic tempos set by Slayer and Kreator and up against the realm of what would become (or more accurately, “was then becoming”) death metal.

But, even amongst all the Rigor-ous rough-housing, the most immediate of all remains Bruce Corbitt’s baritone bark, a shouted hardcore-toned roar that invokes both rage and mischievous meanness, and only in a few moments (like the almost Tardy-ian scream that opens “Die In Pain”) does it cross the line into growling or screaming. That Araya-meets-Rind tonality keeps Rigor Mortis rooted in the thrash that birthed them, even as their own musical extremity pushed them further towards the edge, providing both the anchor and the anger to their madness.

Almost uniformly furious, all ten of Rigor Mortis’ tracks – or thirteen, if you get the expanded edition, which you should – burrow into your brain like the flesh-eating earworms they are, though, as with any collection of songs, there are standouts. The instrumental introductory “Welcome To Your Funeral” gets the band’s point across handily, even without Corbitt’s bite, and “Bodily Dismemberment” hacks you apart with serrated riffage and jackhammer drive. The entwined clean guitar and bass intro to “Wizard Of Gore” could be described as “pretty,” one of the very few moments on hand to earn that adjective, especially when compared to the savagery that follows. The perfect thrash-and-bash of “Re-Animator” sports Rigor Mortis’ most immediate hook, with that insanely infectious chorus, Corbitt’s shouted call generating a snarled response in turn, punctuated by a singular “Angel Of Death”-ian falsetto shriek in the midsection.

Used only sparingly, that shriek pops up again right after “Re-Animator,” in another instant-singalong moment, this time from “Slow Death.” Tagging the tail end of the chorus, the final word of that one leaps up in an airy, almost King Diamond wail, appearing twice before the band takes to a downshift into the bridge, a (relatively) midpaced jaunt wherein a playful Corbitt instructs them each by name on the finer points of making carcass stew. Top that all off with a particularly wonderfully unhinged Scaccia solo, and what was originally the album’s closing number is a perfect summation of the mayhem that precedes it, one of both Rigor Mortis’ best and also a highlight of classic thrash as a whole. (The three bonus tracks appended to the album’s reissue contains a further highlight in the rabid “Foaming At The Mouth,” which you might remember as appearing on the soundtracks to both The Decline Of Western Civilization Part II and 1993’s clearly-a-classic Mr. Nanny, starring Hulk Hogan and David “Buster Poindexter” Johansen.)

Released on July 19, 1988, Rigor Mortis’ debut is 35 years old now, and in the quarter-century-plus since, it’s an album the ferocity of which hasn’t been equaled by many, let alone eclipsed. In their initial run, Rigor Mortis managed a strong EP and a follow-up that, while far from a failure, certainly felt lackluster by comparison, and then they split up. Scaccia found himself in Ministry and Revolting Cocks, while Orr donned the Centurion helmet of Beefcake The Mighty in gory goofballs Gwar and later joined back up with Corbitt in Texas thrashers Warbeast. Harrison toned down the metal, but kept the high energy high behind the kit in Speedealer. Sporadic Rigor Mortis reformations included a stint on Ozzfest and what would become their reunion effort Slaves To The Grave, but all of that ended when Mike Scaccia died of a heart attack onstage with Ministry in 2012. (Slaves was eventually released in 2014 after a crowdfunding effort.) Further tragic turns took Bruce Corbitt in 2019, forever sealing the coffin lid on one of thrash metal’s fastest, funnest, and finest acts, although Harrison, Orr, and others keep the blood flowing in tribute to themselves under the name Wizards Of Gore.

Sometime in the middle of the 2000s, I had a chance to see the reformed Rigor Mortis at a club near my house, and for whatever reason – I can’t remember now, and it doesn’t matter, I guess – I did not. And now I’ll never get to, which is a huge bummer. But the music lives on, even if the band does not, so put on Rigor Mortis however you choose, on the turntable or in the player or dialed up on your phone, and gaze into that busted-in cyclopean eye socket, feel the heft of the axe and cut of the riff, hear the thump of the drums and the morning star breaking bones to spell it all out before you.

The cover says it all, and yet the music says so much more.

Posted by Andrew Edmunds

Last Rites Co-Owner; Senior Editor; born in the cemetery, under the sign of the MOOOOOOON...

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