Opprobrium, aka Incubus, are an example of a real shame in music: when an obviously groundbreaking and competent duo, in this case Brazilian brothers Francis and Moyses Howard, get ground down and shut out by industry related issues despite their competency and capability. Francis Howard and vocalist Scott Latour sang background vocals on the song “Stronger Than Hate”, the third track on the Sepultura album Beneath the Remains. Francis did guest session vocals on two Cannibal Corpse songs on the album Eaten Back to Life. The members of Incubus amount to Louisiana/Florida/Brazilian death metal royalty, but real success has always escaped them, despite consistent dedication. Unfortunately the quality of their first two records was never particularly matched by later efforts which, despite their often excellent writing, suffer from terrible production.
Opprobrium/Incubus are an example of rights-hell compounding rights-hell: a groundbreaking death metal band that saw it’s name hijacked by a popular nu-metal band on the other side of the country. Making things more confusing, they re-recorded their first record, turning it from thrash to death metal after a lineup change and wider exposure 8 years later. According to an interview linked below,
“The original 1988 version had Scott singing. And the “Serpent Temptation” remake in 1996 was me singing and has a different bass recording on it with different lyrics. Both albums sound like they are from different dimensions musically. Moyses and I at that time wanted to explore different music possibilities.”
Well they absolutely did. While the 1988 version is a BLISTERING thrash record, Latours vocals often sound a bit like an out of breath version of Pat Lind from Morbid Saint, and in fact the entire band had a bit of Morbid Saint with a better death-metal drummer feel to it. Unfortunately, not unlike Morbid Saints Spectrum of Death released the next year, it feels raw to the point of resembling a demo. The 1996 version for Nuclear Blast, however, has a far thicker and fuller mix partially due to André Luiz basslines; the new vocals and new lyrics make it feel both completed as a record and like a real companion to their 1990 album Beyond the Unknown.
Unfortunately this 1996 version has become the red-headed stepchild of their discography, part of a Nuclear Blast double release from 2000 and released under the name Opprobrium again in 2008, but ignored for the current Relapse re-release of the original since 2016 and not mentioned on their wiki. This may be because, according to drama from 2017 when Brutal Records sent a cease-and-desist, Brutal is run by the Howard brothers Uncle, Mike Howard. It’s likely that Brutal doesn’t own the copyright or masters to the 1996 Nuclear Blast-version, just the original 1988 thrash trio-version.
The story of Serpent Temptation, which is an excellent record regardless of which version you get, is somewhat bizarre and begs some relevant questions:
When is an album a demo, or an early version, or the “real” version of a later record? What happens when the creators re-record the bass and vocals, remix the drums and guitars, alter the style of the vocals, keep the name of the record, and change the lyrics and song titles to most of the songs? And then, eventually, change their own names and reissue the ORIGINAL version under the new name?
While I enjoy both versions of each song on both records, the 96 version more represents what they ended up becoming, and to that end I feel like it ends up being a record that was demo’d out and shelved for nearly 8 years before being completed. The artists involved, however, may disagree.
interview: https://www.voicesfromthedarkside.de/interview/opprobrium/
Berserker Hymns 