It should come as no real surprise that these particular Sombre Figures reside largely in anonymity. All we have to go on is that they are Finnish and comprise of U on drums and S on everything else. Relatively new they released a demo cassette a couple of years ago and a split with labelmates Blood Red Fog in 2019, this is their debut album.

That said we have a short and fiery slab of ‘terrifying & noisy sound-radicalism’ here comprising of 7 tracks of harsh black metal, scourged out in just under the half-hour mark. As suggested ‘Broken Bones’ is a contusion of fractured noise based around battering drums and grinding guitar work. Vocals are rasped out with throaty discourse and it all sounds primitive and hellish, perfect for the misanthrope as a soundtrack to the demise of mankind. This is pretty much what one expects for the rest of the album, destructive force all the way. But wait, the oddly entitled ‘Grandmother Of Death’ slowly shuffles forth on a zimmer-frame and brings an air of fetid doom to proceedings. It’s an abrupt change of focus and has one thinking of recent Darkthrone in stylistic shifts at first. However, like a slap round the face this does not plod but swaggers quickly into full-force once more; perhaps grandma has been bitten by something rabid, she’s certainly gnashing false teeth here and proving she ain’t ready for any rest home yet.

‘Forest’ actually shows that this dastardly duo can inject a bit of melody into things, its basic but bounces about and has a good groove around the thudding drums and bursts of savagery, so heads can bang as well as being lopped off at the neck. There’s a bit of olden Satyricon about ‘Ancient Ride’ and this is very much borne from the Norse great spruce land which started all this in times before the light, so it should certainly appeal to the traditionalists even if not particularly offering anything new in the way of enlightenment. I would go as far as to say its all meaty with little in the way of lean but there’s a bit of unnecessary discordant feedback propping up the start of ‘Great Realm,’ I guess they wanted to pad the running time out a little due to the brevity of it all, either that or cause some bleeding from the ears. As for ‘Rancid Corpses,’ what a stench!

Not much more to say here, if you are looking for a quick dose of Finnish filth this will do the job adequately.

(7/10 Pete Woods)

https://soldeviantrecords.bandcamp.com/album/sombre-figures-streams-of-decay