Carnifex - Necromanteum (2023)

I dropped off the Carnifex train roughly a decade ago. Not that I was ever a paying passenger, but I had followed the Californians along to experience their evolution as one of the cornerstones of US deathcore. Much to my chagrin, since I despised most of the material they put out in their earlier years, an example of vapid, mosh-over-metal which I simply don't ever jive with. But once they arrived at 2011's Until I Feel Nothing, I felt there were some seismic shifts in the songwriting, an advance in musicality, and that the band might develop into a more memorable entity through trial and perseverance. I didn't care much for the follow-up Die Without Hope, and did listen once through Slow Death, mostly attracted to the creepy cover artwork. I remember that one had dabbled in this symphonic-tinted style, but not much else about it, so I went into torpor over the rest of their catalogue...until now. Call me a sucker for a cool cover, but the sepulchral massive gates, gravestones, and green mist of Necromanteum called out to me. It looks a WHOLE lot like it should be on a Black Dahlia Murder album, but I figured I'd check it out and see if this band had actually managed to incorporate even more creepy atmosphere or horror theatrics until their chug-first, ask-questions-later style.

And I'd say they have done just that, with the implementation of some orchestration that gave me vibes of other bands like Winds of Plague, or the lesser known, excellent Lorelei, or perhaps if we're going a bit more brutal, Italy's Fleshgod Apocalypse. I'll go even one further, and say that Carnifex doesn't merely add these elements, but they do so tastefully. Spectral strings or eerie sounds will break out over some bludgeoning blast beat rhythm, or a swell of a more complete symphony might lurk around a double-bass break. It's almost as if Carnifex have implemented these much like some older bands used industrial sounds, purely as a complementary aesthetic and not to drown out or distract what their core audience comes to them for. There are a few points where an added instrument can sound a little out of place or obnoxious, but I think of it from a horror perspective, it still works well within the concept, and there are some great breaks like the end of the title track where the little choir loop rings out and it's pretty awesome. I can't qualify that this is new ground for them, but it's all a huge plus.

What's even more important, is that the central music of the band itself has dramatically improved. It's still deathcore, but there are lot more melodic death metal ingredients which recall the direction of At the Gates at they gained in popularity, and then further extracted by the Black Dahlia Murder who I just mentioned. Hell, there are moments in tracks like "Crowned in Everblack" where you can almost discern a Swedish melodic black metal influence, often pretty derivative in structure, and predictable in pattern, but when fired up as just another weapon in an arsenal that includes blasting, hammering, grooving, and atmospherics, it adds a lot to what is already a loaded sound. The instruments here are technical marvels, from the dizzying drums of Shawn Cameron to the rhythms and leads of Cory Arford and Neal Tiemann. Anything you'd want out of your modern, polished extreme metal (think current Cattle Decapitation), these guys can mete out effortlessly, if not innovatively.

The vocals are still a slight sore spot with me, not because they are bad, but they're just the typical range of gutturals and snarls you'd expect from others in this niche, including those I've mentioned, but it's not that they are bad...they are professionally executed to a fault, it's simply that they never establish any unique identify for the band. However, I could say this about a lot of death metal or deathcore acts, and they function well enough. I noticed that a few of the tunes here seemed to be playing around with a little more of a progressive structure between the walls of chugging, for example "The Pathless Forest", and I think this is a good direction for Carnifex to explore, as they already have a lot of the moshing crowd pleasers to fall back on in their back catalogue. This album was a really nice surprise, and I was happy to actually buy a copy (for the first time), to eat some serious crow, and put it on the shelf next to my Lorna Shore, Fit for an Autopsy, and whatever scant few albums like this I actually have in the collection. In fact I'll probably backtrack and check out the few before this to hear what I might have been missing. 

Verdict: Win [8/10]

http://www.carnifexmetal.com/

Undead - Existential Horror (2019)

If you put Existential Horror on the turntables for me while you had me in a blindfold, no access to any other information beyond the sound, I'd surmise that this was yet another band playing on that 'uglier' fringe of classic Swedish death metal. The rhythms have a punk-like push to them akin to the Discharge influence adapted by many in that scene, though they don't always do this through the traditional D-beat. A lot of the faster tremolo riffs here definitely take me back to the debuts by Dismember and Entombed, the guitar tone has that abrasive density, and the vocals are just horrific growls, with a good level of sustain on some lines, but they don't really delve far into the morbid guttural depths. The mix of the album is also putrid and raw, clearly not going for that later death & roll punch but something totally putrescent for the cemetery-minded.

So imagine my surprise that this is a Spanish band, and with the blindfold off, I can now see the very cool if minimalist horror film artwork that instantly gives off its Fulci zombie vibes. Which, admittedly, is a great fit for this sound, and not only do I like the look of the album, but also the tunes. In saying that, though, I do feel like I'm breaking a few personal rules, because I think Existential Horror is a record with an overall entertainment value that is sketched together from some fairly average components. Most of the riff patterns play out in accordance with those we've heard thousands of time, there is little variation and they it wouldn't kill them to spurt out some surprising melodies or dissonant twists to help spice up the festivities. The pacing is largely the same throughout the track-list, with a couple points where they break it down to something almost more mid-speed, or early Death-like in the tremolo-picked groove of "Curse of the Undead", and if I'm not quite in the mood, this debut can feel quite monotonous...

But I still like it. The earthy guitar tone feels like dead meat being packed in a morgue, the bass is thick and swarthy, and the tinny crashing of the drums proves to be a cool foil for the other instruments. If a lead erupts, it's usually messy and ugly and distorted sounding but somehow works for all its flaws, and the vocalist has that cool, raving mid-range growl which feels perfectly hostile among the grimness of the band's carnal momentum. I know that if I stop to think about it, parts of this could feel dull, it's certainly not an album I'm listening to based upon the strengths of its individual riffs or solos, but more from a general gore-whore sensibility where I'm beholden to some frenzied carnage and don't need to think much beyond the pain of every blow from the meat tenderizing, every tendon clipped by the scalpel, every limb hacked off by the chainsaw and then used to bludgeoning someone else. It's a sugar rush of morbid intensity that offers nothing more or less than what it promises from the cover.

Verdict: Win [7.5/10]

https://www.curseoftheundead.com/

Xorsist - Deadly Possession (2022)

It's 1991. You've got Left Hand Path and Like an Everflowing Stream. You are hooked. You want more. Sifting through the demos and tape trades, you might come across something quite akin to what Xorsist recorded for their first full-length Deadly Possession, albeit the general levels of loudness and production that mark it as a more contemporary release. This is one of the gloomier bands I've come across using the sound, not only in obvious places like the "Gold Beneath the Sand" intro with its eerie clean guitars, bells and drums, but across the whole of its production. Xorsist seems like an attempt to take that prototypical Swedish style manifest by Nihilist, Carnage, and the aforementioned and then sink it a few feet deeper into that old bog that now doubles as a graveyard.

Does it work? In some ways, I can say that the band pays an adequate homage to their countrymen and forebears. Once the speed picks up and the guitars are roiling around, there are strong Left Hand Path vibes, only with a riff-set that feels derivative and uninteresting. Cast into this murky, impenetrable night that they've chosen for the production aesthetics, I hear a lot of potential, it stirs up the same sorts of feelings that I got back at the turn of the 80s-90s decade when I first encountered the sound. But in terms of writing tracks that are exciting or memorable, they fall behind. The transitions on the album feel a bit sloppy in places, whether by design or not, I never felt like they were capitalizing on the shifts between the blast beats or the loping, primordial grooves. Chord choice is probably also at fault, so much of the material doesn't stick, and though the primitive leads are appreciated when they appear, they too don't cultivate a lot of compelling or eerie atmosphere; like they've clamped on to the correct placement but not yet thought the patterns or squealing effects through.

The bass is voluminous and dense, and the drums have a good natural clatter to them, but they've got little of quality to drive forward and also have a few jarring fills and transitions. Vocals are a nihilistic (ha!) bark that suits the material but doesn't ever feel quite psychotic enough. In terms of the weighted gloom of the production, though, I do rather like that, it definitely matches the spooky horror mood of the album's themes even though the music itself isn't the greatest. There are a few moments where Deadly Possession does actually together, like the lead roaring out into the atmosphere of "Alive", or the punky, thundering energy of the verse to "Cranial Nails", or the title track, which is tucked back at the end of the track list, but warbles between some brighter, grind vibes and ripping death metal, with some cool vocals on the grooves, only the transitions on this one also feel a bit underdeveloped

Does this tide you over in 1991 while you're waiting for the next drops from your Swedish faves? It might, honestly, but considering that we're multiple decades into this niche, the album just doesn't come across as strongly as something like the Katakomba s/t debut I was drooling over recently. Deadly Possession has its black, rotting heart in the right place. Cool cover art, logo, even the band name really brings you back, reminiscent of pre-Obituary. This also has that swampy, frightening atmosphere going for it, through which some lonely wandering soul might not know what could approach behind any gravestone, any withered tree, but the songs and instruments are inconsistent, something they'll actually work on for their sophomore At the Somber Steps of Serenity, without dropping the rawness and ugliness that defines their take on the style. Deadly Possession isn't a bust, exactly, if you want your death metal rough around the edges, putrid, evil and gut-wrenching, but the songs themselves just don't bring as much enjoyment as the atmosphere created around them.

Verdict: Indifference [6.25/10]

https://www.instagram.com/xorsistofficial/

Seven Doors - Feast of the Repulsive Dead (2023)

England's Ryan Willis has become somewhat of a commodity of late within the horror/death metal underground, launching a number of acts simultaneously and maintaining a fairly prolific release schedule over the past half-decade, managing a decent level of quality throughout. I'd covered his campy camp slasher collaboration Blood Rage not long ago, before going exploring through his other work, and one of the standouts was the debut full-length Feast of the Repulsive Dead by Seven Doors. This one caught me for its stronger songwriting, balancing out a number of influences to create something that doesn't fall too closely under the shadow of any one seminal death metal icon of the past. Looking at the cover, or perusing the song titles, you'd think you might be getting something in the vein of Cannibal Corpse or The 'Tish, but it never broadcasts an excess of brutality, honing in instead on accessible structures, solid riffs and great leads.

You can certainly catch a whiff of rancid Floridian gloom, with riffs like the lead-in to the title track channeling a bit of Leprosy or Slowly We Rot, and this is found throughout the album, with some slight touches of Chuck's more melodic riffing elsewhere. However, the meatiness of Willis' rhythm guitars and the blunt guttural catapult this into a more contemporary sound, one that might have populated the ranks of a label like Razorback Records had it come out 10-15 years ago. But Seven Doors goes further, with a lot of mosh-driven groove carving out the grave-dirt, a few tints of the more brutal death metal you'd expect, especially when the riffs ramp up in pace. It's also clearly finding its footing in the thrash roots that would later morph into that genre, in particular where he's let the guitar crunch off on its own to set up some exciting new progression. And that 'crunch' is awesome, a thick and clenching tone without going into HM-2 overdrive. But what really puts this record into the 'must own' category for me are the scorching leads in tracks like "The Morbid Mortician", well-composed and catchy flights that elevate an already-appreciable riff-set into something I want to keep spinning repeatedly. A few of the more elaborate solos do hail from guest guitarists like Paul of De Profundis, but the praise stands.

Drums are mechanistic, suited to the task and never stepping in the way, but this is one area in which the project could probably improve its personality. Don't get me wrong, the rides, the rolls, the fills, it's all placed where it needs to be, but a more acoustic kit would go a long way. I mentioned the gutturals, and they're quite solid if nothing nuanced or unique. He'll add to these some runty snarls so you're getting a more Carcass or Exhumed vibe, and I think the latter band is a pretty apt comparison...Seven Doors doesn't go as grindy as that, but it carries that same 'fun death metal' vibe that I admire so much about Harvey and crew, something I can put in the CD player and listen through without ever needing to skip tracks. Willis varies up the thrashing, the tremolo-picking, and grooves well enough while keeping consistent threads running through them, specifically the more clinical riffs he plants under some of the leads which chop out some of the most memorable moments across the album.

Thematically this guy likes his guts and gore, and Seven Doors certainly sounds evil enough to honor those zombie and slasher flicks, although it's not too heavy on atmosphere or dissonance. This is more 'Hatchet' or its sequels than 'The Shining', if that makes any sense, a workmanlike and entertaining effort with plenty of muscle in the production and performance, but not likely to haunt your dreams in between listens. We're so deep into the death metal generations by now that I'm sure many purists will find this style arbitrary and recycled, but I've found as I get older that I just don't grow tired of a well crafted album like this one. Good for Halloween, good for horror buffs, great for death metal fans approaching from a number of directions, whether old school or more extreme and gore-splattered. I hope Ryan will prioritize Seven Doors among his legion of output so we can get more in the future. 

Verdict: Win [8/10]

https://sevendoorsdm.bandcamp.com/