FESTERDECAY
FESTERDECAY "Reality Rotten To the Core"
By Dr. Abner Mality
One type of extreme metal subgenre that's been pretty quiet the last few years has been CARCASS-inspired goregrind. There's been a lot of the New Wave of Primitive Death Metal, tech-death, doom death and slam, but bands taking their cue from the gory early days of CARCASS have been few and far between. Those feeling nostalgic for cover collages of mutilated corpses and gruesome injuries will therefore welcome the arrival of Japan's FESTERDECAY, who are firmly in the tradition of GENERAL SURGERY and COUNTY MEDICAL EXAMINERS.
Nothing fancy or surprising about what these fiends are up to, but it's kind of comforting to hear putrid pus-filled riffs and pitch-shifted vocal growls and also to see song titles like "Disintegration of Organs", "Aborticide" and, inevitably, "Carcasses' Revenge". These cuts sound just the way you'd think they would and don't look for the melodic experimentation of the later CARCASS albums here. One thing I will say for FESTERDECAY is that they do vary their attack a little bit, alternating short goregrinders with longer, somewhat chunkier attacks. The vocals are usually the sickening super-guttural kind, but occasional punkish and more "human" sounding tones pop up, too.
Japan has a good tradition of revolting bands like COFFINS, BUTCHER A.B.C. and ZOMBIE RITUAL and we can now add FESTERDECAY to the list. This is actually kind of refreshing since there's so little of it anymore.