The most interesting releases of the week!
Onirophagus sound like they’ve listened to a lot of Hooded Menace. That’s great for me. On Revelations from the Void, released on Personal Records, Onirophagus create a darker, slower, murkier sound than that typically found in death/doom bands without the word “funeral” anywhere in the genre tags. Within that dismal sound, the band maintains focus on melody. While some of their riffs do sound quite similar to Darkness Drips Forth, but Onirophagus have made this beast their own and created an album I couldn’t help but finish every time I turned it on.
Outside of the perfect production, the first strength of Revelations from the Void to hit the listener is the songwriting. Onirophagus sound like they’re trawling the depths and finding gems. The album continuously moves forward at a satisfying pace, never losing my interest. This feels less like a bunch of songs and more like one piece of music split into parts. Even on the massive fifteen minute closer I’m too engrossed to notice that time is passing.
Exempting Reality is a big, slimy, brutal death metal record originally released in 2001. It’s being re-released now by Comatose Music. Apparently they got the band back together recently. Cerebral Hemorrhage make exactly what it says on the tin. Pure burps, blast beats, and a snare that sounds like the drum is broken. I love the riffs, the aggressive barks. I love the pure aggression, as the band feigns that all attempt at musicianship has been given up in favor of being ridiculous while secretly maintaining some pretty crisp and performances to maintain the illusion.
If you’re not into brutal death, this won’t change anything anymore than it would have two decades ago. It’s a good time for fans of the genre, but it’s filled with everything that plagues the genre. But that’s why I love it. This is pure, honest bludgeoning that’s exactly what it means to be. Exempting Reality was the band’s only full release, and I’m hopeful for more.
Sentient Ruin Records have picked up in 2025 where they left off in 2024: With off-center, rough-around-the-edges music that fits the label perfectly, sounds unique, and occupies outsized space in my head. Necrotechnology is an EP with repetitive, hypnotic, industrial riffs that the band turns into something ragged and enthralling. As an EP, this is short and sweet, but the band squeezes everything out of their time that they can.
“Reality? Existence?,” the midpoint of the record, contains an intro for nothing and a lot of whispers and wordless screams. It shouldn’t work, but it does. Necrotech give such a sinister feel to every second that I can’t help but follow along. The passion is there, the performance is there. Necrotechnology is an interesting release for interesting times.
Ulver, Fellowship, Defeated Sanity, Nekus, Nepenthe
