Ah, horror movie samples. Always guaranteed to make me feel my age when I struggle to place them. But of the lovely rich tones reaching out here, I am certain one is The Devil Rides Out, and t’other may be The Plague Of Zombies. Both classics. Relevance to a review of music? Mmm, a fair bit. Uncoffined, you see, are that luxurious mix of old school horror and classic doom/death metal. A simple mix and easy to do averagely but hard to do well.
So which are Uncoffined? Well if we start off with the fact that they are made up of current members of The Obscene and Winds Of Genocide, which means (I think) three ex-members of doom band Blessed Realm, we have perfect pedigree. Does that translate into the music? Oh yes. Oh yes it does. From the slow, dragging riff and growled vocals on ‘Twisted Shape Of Creeping Terror’ things begin to glisten darkly and stink of the grave. This is one of those great riffs balanced right on the edge between true doom and doom/death; that dredging blues from the bottom of the ditch guitar sound and the death edge and vocals twisted and torn over the top. Kind of Winter and Warhorse out robbing graves under a freezing, fog bound night sky. It actually shocks me how good this is, really. It also sounds beautifully recorded, a fine production job which a little digging shows to be the expert hands of Bri Doom at his Bradford 1 In 12 studio. Seriously, the sound is just nigh on perfect; clear but with all the lovely thick black tar clinging to these riffs.
‘Night Of The Witch Childe’ adds a little more roll and rumble to the sound and some fine variation to the vocals with the rhythm section of Gory Sugden and Kat Shevil (bass and drums/vocals respectively) keeping things down tight as guitarists G Hall and Johnny Rot dig down through a little old Celtic Frost shading into deeper darkness. The title track shivers with portents of doom, a shambling corpse rising slowly to follow cloaked figures to the ritual. Yeah, the kind of great metal that paints pictures in your mind with just deep, sludgy guitars and rasped vocals, trembling guitar leads shining a little torchlight on something you may not want to see.
‘Blasphemous Execration Of Holy Ground’ drags Black Sabbath through the sludge before cranking it up a little and then letting it slide back into the grave with some blood curdling howls from Kat and classy guitar lines. Honestly, this is just great, beautifully handled and written doom/death with the miasma of the grave and freshly turned, damp earth lying heavy upon it. Fresh and very tasty.
The Devil And The Old Cursed Tree’ is probably my favourite song here; all classy Candlemass style almost melodic riffs and lead plunged deeper into the filthy desecrated ground and rotten with sludge as the horror filled vocals howl in the darkness. More fun than inviting Burke and Hare round to your local cemetery, this is real top drawer stuff from the guys and gal. They round things out with an excellent and very Uncoffined cover of the old Revelation track ‘Frustrations’ whose sombre tone perfectly closes this first book of horror.
There is not just class here, there is a real feel of four people thoroughly enjoying getting down to some old school nasty, corpse raising mischief and doing it so well I genuinely have to keep pulling myself up from smiling too much. Ah, bless ’em, this is just what the doctor ordered. You will not hear a finer slab of corpse dragging, goat bothering, devil summoning doom this year. Probably. Whatever, it is marvelous and you need it. Metal that makes you kinda proud to be a metalhead.
(9/10 Gizmo)
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