Deathcult :"Beasts of Faith"

The debut from the Swiss band, comes with a strong sense of influence from early death metal in the raw pummeling they dish out. The vocals are manically croaked rather than just growled. This places a sometimes emotionally charged aspect to them.  It's dark and for death metal of this kind a reasonable sense of songwriting and dynamics. There is a more straight forward take on the genre when they rip into the second song. They managed to chug into harder hitting riffs that really take me back to the early 90s. By the third song I am starting to get that their formula seems to be hit you with the most direct attack then build the rest of the song from there. The bassist player has a more rubbery tone that coasts over the drums here. They stay more focused on the feral intensity than paying the same attention to detail displayed on the first two songs.

A more thrashing attack eventually develops on the equally animalistic "Death In July". The guitar tone of "Foul Glint"changes to give us another color to paint this albums anger with. While this darker turn is appreciated it turns out to be more of an instrumental interlude than an actual song. Some of this darker mood stays with them for "Discreate Homunkulus" . This song's main focus is the rabid  speed, though they rekindle their commitment to songwriting here and take you on more of a journey."the Sick Within" not only stumbles across a guitar solo, but stomps into a more mosh inducing section. They wander into a darker place by the end of the song that reminds me of older Tribulation.

Lyrically I am unsure what these guys are about due to the crazy manner the vocals are howled out. I am guessing "Evil Dead" would be about what the title suggests. It starts off with more of a thrashy old Slayer feel. The guitar solo is even vintage Kerry King. The album closes with more of a "Leprosy" era Death feel. Slowing things down is to their advantage for sure as it allows more of a mood to build. I'll give this album an 8.5 it's pretty solid as far as death metal goes , fans of the genre's more classic period who are hungry for more might even round this up to a 9. This album comes out September 26th.