Necrowretch announces its fifth album.
Formed in France in 2008 under the name Vlad Rituals, then Worm Eater, the band led by Vlad (guitar/vocals) and accompanied by W. Cadaver (guitar, ex-Cadaveric Fumes, ex-Venefixion), R. Cadaver (bass, Venefixion, ex-Cadaveric Fumes) and N. Destroyer (drums, Catacomb, ex-Fhoi Myore) is set to release Swords of Dajjal on Season of Mist: Underground Activists.
The album opens with Ksar Al-Kufar, a first composition that immediately replaces the aggressive and dissonant Black/Death basis to which the band has accustomed us, while adding its vocal parts’ savagery. The effective mix features some more ethereal leads, then The Fifth Door continues the violence with fast cutting riffs, while allowing for some more mystical and mysterious parts. The raging screams reinforce the track’s brutality, barely disturbed by its break followed by tribal percussion, then come to haunt the heady Dii Mauri and its eruptions of dark rage. The progression through the hazy riffs is relatively steady, letting bursts of energy accompany our advance before Swords of Dajjal speeds up again to follow the torrent of scathing harmonics and furious vocal parts, which nevertheless let the musicians place catchy jerky passages, or a more unhealthy veil. The band continues with the oriental influences of Numidian Knowledge, which adds a more accessible and at times almost playful touch to the oppressive darkness, before returning to virulent Old School sounds on Vae Victis, a composition where aggression is definitely the main component. It’s with the break that we’re allowed to breathe again, before being trampled once more, then the short Daeva takes over, distilling bloody heavy influences to give the instrumental a more martial edge. The album draws to a close with Total Obliteration, the last and longest composition, which wastes no time in charging forward with all its strength, finally allowing dissonance to hypnotize us to hit harder before fading away.
Necrowretch‘s rage hasn’t waned with time, and it’s with raw strength that the French band deliver Swords of Dajjal, their latest compendium of dark hatred that combines the most savage aspects of Death and Black Metal.
95/100