• 1
• 2
• 3
• 4
• 5

It seems like these days that much of the world has forgotten what Death Metal is; locked into a spiraling miasma of Deathcore and music that sacrifices songs for technicality and vocals that sound like some wet, bean induced flatus, the supercharged bulldozer of Death Metal that cleared the way for the current crop has been relegated to the old school. Well, leave your pig squealing at the door folks because what we have here is some old school, properly brutal Death Metal that will melt the face right off the heads of the innocent (who are obviously the most deserving of a good old fashioned face melting). This is Entombed before they started playing rock'n'roll. This is Carcass before they invented melodeath. This is filthy, furious metal that heralds the impending onslaught of the forces of death. In short, this is EVIL!

Sweden's Necrovation take their inspiration directly from their national forbears, with a nasty, blood dripping sound straight from the early 90's. Crushing guitars riff their way over pummeling drums, backed by raw, low rasping vocals and a bass that sounds like Ash from Evil Dead started playing using his chainsaw arm to pick the notes. No shit! Listen to that bass and tell me these guys haven't managed to tune a chainsaw to C#. This album will have you moshing in the aisles (because you just burst into a church wielding an inverted cross like a demented air guitar) and throwing the horns until your hand explodes like a ripe boil. Necrovation also revels in the almost forgotten art of the Death Metal solo as well with several well placed, fret blistering exercises in torment that hearken back to times of yore when melody had its part to play in extreme metal, and while guitarist Seb is no Michael Amott, he acquits himself nicely. The vocals are nice and low in the mix, far from inaudible and placed perfectly to compliment the music rather than overwhelm it, with Seb's low, raspy growls calling forth the darkness in a very convincing manner.

The tunes here are mostly mid-paced assaults complimented with occasional blast beats and, of course, frequent rumbling double bass, and none of them outstay their welcome with an average running time of around 4 minutes or so. There is nothing original here; anyone who's been listening to Death Metal for a while has heard this before, but it is rarely done to such perfection. No one expects every band to reinvent a genre; it's enough that a band does what they do well, and brother do Necrovation deliver on all counts.

For fans of the old school this is an absolute no brainer, putting to shame some of the less inspired comeback albums of the last few years. To those brought up on "modern" Death Metal, leave your over-compressed tastes behind, this is coarse, filthy metal that will leave you feeling like you just spent a week buried up to your neck in your own grave, and once it's over, you'll be smiling so widely you'll walk straight past the shower to press the play button again.