Sepulchral returns with its second album.
To end the year on a high note, Dusk (bass/vocals), Gaueko (vocals), and Gorka (guitar/drums), assisted by Pestilence Breeder (lead guitar), present Beneath the Shroud, released by Soulseller Records.
The album begins with the gentle and mysterious A Pact Written In Bone Dust, which slowly captivates us, then Beneath The Shroud takes over and develops a heavy Old School sound with abrasive tones, doubled by furious vocals. Blast beats and cavernous growls respond to each other naturally, reinforcing the song’s inherent aggression before screeching leads contrast with the bass’ groove, then Abandoned Feretrum returns to jerky riffs at a sustained pace. The song offers a few catchy accelerations but remains fairly consistent, easily joining Conflagration Of Sacred Bones, which immediately offers a sustained rhythm on which the band forges its effective riffs under wild vocals, but also an unexpected and chaotic solo. The track thus comes to an end and gives way to Torchless Crossroads, a long composition that is slow and dissonant at first, then suddenly explodes and returns to an expected cruising speed before becoming disturbing again thanks to unhealthy and then melancholic harmonics, taking a detour into doom to rejoin the fury of Cloaked Spectres and its regular rhythm changes. The track remains effective, as does From The Crypt, The Putrid Mist, which immediately gave me chills of English Old School Death Metal thanks to its omnipresent bass, and which confirms this with its majestic touches that haunt the break before the final charge towards Blood, Phlegm, Black Bile. The track quickly returns to its belligerent habits, carrying us away in its constant groove before suddenly dropping us into Gravestone Covenant, which picks up the heaviness but doesn’t take long to return to pure aggression, daring to include hints of thrash in its riffs. Leads have an epic feel before giving way to Poison Wind, which offers a similar mix of energetic bursts, thanks in particular to almost playful drums, before accelerating on Lost In The Ruins, the last and rather long track, which doubles down on fury while letting its rhythm evolve until the break, where we can catch our breath before finally charging one last time.
While the band’s influences are quite broad on some tracks, Beneath the Shroud draws on British death metal to deliver a powerful punch! Sepulchral knows exactly how to construct catchy riffs, and the whole album proves it!
90/100
