Sepultura – A-Lex (2009)

March 19, 2024

I appreciate the experimentation that Sepultura did with A-Lex. Previous album Dante XXI aside, Sepultura ran a very real risk of becoming stale in the years running up to this record. However, A-Lex is a step down from its predecessor in a number of ways. The first is the production is nowhere near as clear. As a musician I would find it infinitely frustrating having found the perfect palette of sonic clarity for my band or project, only to not be able to replicate that on my next record. This means a lot of the more experimental stuff gets lost in the mix, and the album sounds like one unified mush of the same song and over, negating all of their hard work. This also means that the only piece that stands out above the others is the unfortunately awful Beethoven section. Like, what? Why is that even here?

I appreciate this review probably makes A-Lex sound like it is complete dogshit. It’s not. In all fairness, it has some very cool moments. It’s just sad to see an album with a bucket full of shortcomings this soon after a record that corrected their course so well.