This was a bit of an omen really, sitting there patiently, waiting for a forever home and some petting on our review list, this album was calling out for me to pick it up. This was in no small part due to the fact my “to watch” film pile had Álex de la Iglesia’s The Day Of The Beast on it and if grabbing them both to watch and listen to meant speeding up the arrival of the Antichrist then so be it. Whether the band are named after the film is uncertain but they do love horror make no mistake. Each track here from the US based quintet is inspired by a work of literary horror fiction and you can attempt to work this out as you go along. It should however come as no surprise that the usual suspects Clive Barker, Bram Stoker, and Lovecraft are among them but my interest was peaked on reading the title track comes via Graham Masterton novel The Wells Of Hell. It’s a long time since I read this but pulling my 1st edition Sphere paperback off the shelf, I can’t help noticing this tale of ‘Unspeakable Terror’ was 1st published in 1981 and is probably older than the band members themselves. It also has to be said, I wish there was a way they could have used the striking artwork from it, always thought it would make a wonderful album cover.
That aside and I could waffle on all day about this sort of thing, this is meant to be a music review and what we have here are 10 tracks of vile and violent deathly thrash. This band quickly illustrate they have their chops on probably both the grill and in the guitar department. Jagged riffs fly asunder as soon as we get into ‘Corruptor / Infester’ and not to be outdone vocalist Steve Harris (not that one) makes a sound like he has eaten something completely disagreeable before recovering and belching / growling out his parts. This is indisputably meaty stuff and goes like the clappers throughout. Playing as I write I am again caught off guard by the massive “boom” that explodes just after the start of ‘Disturbing Roars At Twilight’ and the production is nice and thick here with the shredding and drums particularly formidable.
Although the band are new to me, they have been going since 2006 and have three albums prior to this, they sound tight, driven and relentless here and the exuberance shines through not least via some wild cackles from the singer who is in particular fine form. I wouldn’t take too much notice of any black metal tags here, this to me is pure death thrash and if we are naming bands listen out for the melodic interplay on tracks like ‘On Top Many Layers Of Horror’ which has some pure Carcass worship going on. This and the double whammy of ‘Black Forms Materialize’ the title of which is hammered home are particular highlights but there’s nothing much to take to task here on an album that simply never runs out of steam. Those of you into pizza, party and beer thrash might find it all a bit too beastly but if you are looking for an album to seriously wreck your neck to, this will definitely do the job.
(7.5/10 Pete Woods)
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