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SHRIEKING DEMONS “The Festering Dwellers”
SHRIEKING DEMONS “The Festering Dwellers”
By Dr. Abner Mality
Spoiler alert: innovation is not a big part of the modern death metal revival. Almost every band from the youthful surge takes its cue from a classic band: FROZEN SOUL by BOLT THROWER, SKELETAL REMAINS by CANNIBAL CORPSE, SANGUISUGABOGG by SIX FEET UNDER (I know this last one is especially hard to swallow). And now we have SHRIEKING DEMONS taking their cue from the mighty AUTOPSY.
There are worse bands to get your mojo from. The only question is: do they do their mentors proud? I have to say these Italians play some of the best AUTOPSY/ABSCESS inspired metal to spew from the sewers in quite a while. While the songs retain their catchiness, there’s an unhinged aspect to the music reminiscent of the California degenerates. The way they mix dirge-like doom riffs with fast ripping tempos and wild solos would make Chris Reifert nod his head in approval. Best of all, they have an organic, diseased sounding production that’s a pleasing tonic to the slick tech-death and brain-numbing dissonance of most modern death metal.
“Devour My Wicked Soul” starts with a deceptively dismal and laid back introduction, but when the full spectrum gore kicks in, these DEMONS begin to SHRIEK. “Abstract Hallucinating” kicks things up a notch, opening with crazed soloing that has AUTOPSY written all over it. From there, the DEMONS deliver sickening odes such as “Perennial Dirge” and “Compromised Brain” that hit all the right notes and which actually seem more to the point than AUTOPSY itself, as that band is known to wander in the maze, so to speak.
These guys are something of an outlier band on the Transcending Obscurity label, which tends to favor much more technical and avant-garde types of death metal. They are pure and simple AUTOPSY worship, but done with genuine respect and fidelity to their inspirations.
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