Necrotorture - Blood Feast - Reviews - Diabolical Conquest Webzine

Alex "Necrotorture"- Vokills
Gianluca "The Butcher" - Guitar
Antonio "O' Fenomeno" - Drums
Domenico "Dr. Gore" - Bass

“Happy Birthday” it says, in the colour of love. Ahh, don't you just adore receiving such greeting cards? I mean so what if it's not your birthday. Who remembers them anyway? So when Brutal Bands' new subsidiary label Extreme Underground sends you one on behalf of the new Italian brutal death band Necrotorture, you are bound to get sentimental. After completely dehydrating myself by crying for about half an hour, I blew scary globs of phlegm from my nose and proceeded to play the attached cd that came along with this greeting card, to listen to their rendition of the birthday song.

It was first a woman who kept screaming excitedly because of my birthday (I wish she didn't), and then Necrotorture greeted me themselves. They did it quite emphatically by blasting the shitcake out of me, using the unrelenting method of Internal Suffering, Disgorge, Liturgy and the likes. These intimidating blasts with the exhortations of the Hour of Penance vocalist Alex "Necrotorture", are executed almost like in a series of undulations, each one making me stagger more and more backwards until I finally fell down rudely on my bum. That's their way of giving you a birthday bump/spanking. Then they tried to appease me by playing some technical riffs similar to Abysmal Torment and Malignancy and followed it quickly by a succession of crunchy chugs bearing the elasticity of Dying Fetus and the alacrity of Liturgy, making me clap my hands with joy with a birthday cap on. My first impression about Necrotorture was fairly good, but the very short-lived, expendable next song “Re-Exploring Ways of Flesh” that merely blasts its way till its end, tarnished it. I was afraid of having to slot them in the category of those humdrum blast-crazy bands when the next two songs changed my outlook.

In “Pleasures of the Moribund” and “Blood Feast”, Necrotorture unexpectedly deliver a totally charged up, virile and reinvigorated performance. Their music here, carrying influences by Decrepit Birth, Cannibal Corpse and Disavowed, now has a sort of wobbly bounce to it as if the guitarist was jumping up and down on his bed while playing them. Acting impulsively, I too flung myself on the bed but bumped my head badly with the bedpost in the process. Never mind that, this is some good fun, the tremendousness of which brought to my mind moshy memories of Ultra Vomit. And like them, there are certain vocal improvisations done too over here. If you are a regular reader of Diabolical Conquest, then you'll already be familiar with the term “ree-ing” but Alex here goes a step ahead and forces me to invent a new term for him: “whee-ing”. Whee!! Whee!! he goes, sounding very happy these days. “Blood Feast” reminded me of Serial Butcher and towards its end, the guitarists create this brutally convincing sawing sound. So convincing is the sound that you'd feel as if it's sawing right at the back of your neck, making your head bob up and down like a hairy brown float (in my case).

Following that is a well done cover of Napalm Death's celebrated song “Scum”. Although it's been done a countless number of times, you shouldn't mind it if you're a fan of this kind of music. How the hell can you not enjoy that momentous breakdown? Yeah, the one that first gets you in an athletic stance and when fired, shoots you off in whichever direction you're facing regardless of what's around you. You invariably end up running into one of your room walls and fall down like a bowling pin (if you don't run out of the window) and while down there, writhe like an injured worm until it comes to an end – that's when a nodding metal horn emerges out of the battered human mass that's you, signaling your absolute surrender to that song. You guys are such fags if you don't like this. Wait! It's not over yet! There is still a song after this. “Chiavica (Cicala Grind)” starts off playing a grinding riff from Dead Infection and takes it forward with the support of Prostitute Disfigurement as it seems, until you reach its end where after a superb vocal part, the guys like Devourment, chug so excruciatingly, with so much pressure, it's as if the ceiling caved in on them while they were performing that part. This song is a tad different as compared to their earlier ones but it's good nevertheless.

‘Blood Feast' is the first official release of this band as well as the label, and I must say it's a winner. Necrotorture should however be careful of not falling into that sterile blast-happy trap that has ruined so many bands. They should just continue with these fun parts and if possible write some authentic death metal riffs, without which it will be difficult for them to sustain our attention during the longer version of the album. Along with Septycal Gorge and Cadaveric Crematorium, they're really putting Italy on the brutal map of the metal world.