A shorty but goody for you all here. I’m a sucker for all things Polish, and in fairness Polish extreme music bands are among my favourites. I spent some time over there on holidays in the late 1990’s, and bought loads of CDs there when in Lodz and Krakow. Fast forwards to 2020, and I’m sat listening to this four track album from Polish extreme crew “Eternal Rot”.

This is some ultra-stygian death metal done slowly and crudely. From the “Scream Bloody Gore” inspired Zombie king in a crypt being surrounded by skeletons artwork, this is death metal done the old way. This has been dragged to an absolute crawl, tempo wise, with the kind of super deep vocals that you’d normally expect to be found in some central American goregrind outfit. There’s not much to be going on in terms of telling you about the band themselves; Metal Archives tells me that the drummer is also drummer in the fantastic The Dead Goats, and that the band are based in Watford and Poland. That and the fact that there are three in the band.

So, it’s all down to the actual music. What we have here is pummelling, simple riffs being repeated in a hypnotic fashion, down tuned to all hell and played with the single, clear purpose of being as heavy as an elephant in a lead bathing suit. it’s an effective tactic; second track “Serenity through Maniacal Flaggelation with Decomposing Limbs” is a case in point. It has a hypnotic repetition of the main riff; a simple guitar refrain which is played with enough sickening distortion to have featured on a mid-period Necrophagia album.

“Endless Stream of Coffins” is the shortest track of the bunch, weighing in at just over five minutes, with that choppy, sludge tone death metal approach so beloved of outfits like Japan’s Coffins. It’s closer, “Descent into Torment” which is the real killer though – a dizzying, spiralling main guitar riff and pummelling rhythm section that collide together to form a hugely catchy whole.

So, in the main then, would I recommend this? Without a moment’s hesitation, yes. It’s a simple idea done effectively, but then isn’t that what most quality products are?

(7.5/10 Chris Davison)

https://www.facebook.com/EternalRot

https://godzovwarproductions.bandcamp.com/album/putridarium