Ritual of Darkness

How many of you have actually heard this? Well, it did get a re-release on vinyl through Hell’s Headbangers, so I hope at least some of you picked it up. When Nunslaughter began their career they were possessed by bands such as e.g. Possessed, Mantas/early Death, early Sodom and Massacre (USA). The sound of this demo is very chaotic. This is due to the fact that the band opted to record it on two tape decks instead of going to a proper studio. I’d describe the sound as that of an average quality rehearsal tape, you can tell what’s going on but only if you’re used to very rough recordings. The sound is like this purpose, as the band wanted an underground sound and didn’t give a fuck about polished sounds.

The music itself is fast, ugly and evil death metal the old way. The bass is at times louder than the guitar and the drums are many times almost buried. There’s also a constant hiss to the guitar sound and the guitar sound also goes “back and forth”, like when you record with a porta studio and get a messed up sound. The vocals are surprisingly clear and well mixed. Gregoroth’s vocals are the in typical 80s thrash style, sometimes bordering on growling. He also throws in a few cool evil laughs.

Nunslaughter also employ blastbeats, which makes me think of bands like Repulsion and old Napalm Death, yet I really can’t call this grindcore. The band just mixed together all the styles they themselves were listening to at the time. “Ritual of Darkness” is four songs of not-that-original-but-still-very-enjoyable old school death metal with touches of thrash and grind from the deepest 80s underground. The band I’m reminded of most here is without a doubt old Sodom (the demos, “In the Sign of Evil” and “Obsessed by Cruelty”). All the songs except for one are under three minutes long, ideal song lengths for stuff of this kind. Many bands today claim to be old school but why not check out the real thing? All the tracks found on this demo were later re-recorded for a couple of subsequent Nunslaughter releases, including the band’s debut album “Hell’s Unholy Fire”.