Empire of Hate

Death metal of late has fallen into certain categories for me. Firstly there are bands that appear to be more interested in being fast and technical which is fine as long as they also write songs, but unfortunately it seems that factor has lacked recently. Secondly there are the throwback acts that strive to achieve the same feeling that old-school death metal bands give and, as seems to happen in the black metal realm as well, this is not as easy as the originators of the genre made it look. Thirdly I find that there are bands breaking into new territories and this makes for a very intriguing listen, however I have found that more than 50% of the time while a lot of these bands are refreshing and innovative they seem to lose the very essence of what death metal is.

Now I come to Repugnant Inebriation. An underground band based in London with one demo to their name, who have recently released their follow up E.P entitled Empire of Hate. Now this E.P does exactly what I prefer my death metal to do. This band, seemingly coming out of nowhere, have combined some of one, a lot of two, plus a little something extra from three while retaining that death metal feeling that is most important to me and once you see the grainy dark church cover art and band logo you know what you are in for.

As there are only three tracks I will not go into great detail so as not to ruin them however I will say that each track has its own distinct originality, be it the perfect use of gravity blasts and bass work in Dead Soul, the black metal atmosphere of War Beyond Reason or the amazing vocal performance, interesting intro and epic solos in the title track. All three of these works contain very effective song construction that is technical as well as still keeping the dark and evil atmosphere that all death metal should have.

The instruments are played with proficiency and come together brilliantly to achieve their final goal. There is great variety in the drumming going from gravity blasts to thrash beats to fairly progressive fills, similar to mid-to-late death. The guitars and bass complement each other brilliantly and we find classic riffs in the same vein as Carcass and Morbid Angel mixed with other more black metal sounding riffs and brilliantly executed solos. Every solo seems necessary to progress the song as well as creating additional atmosphere, from solos that create a chaotic soundscape reminiscent of Morbid Angel to others that recall Carcass’ Necroticism era. Lastly the vocals are quite simply top notch. The vocalist has two main styles, the very low and deep style as well as some very welcome variety in the form of a higher shriek that comes off as comparable to Jeff Walker at some points and could also be compared to the more vicious of black metal vocalists.

This combination of technical and varied drumming that has personality as they have not been ruined by pro-tools, brutal, catchy and technical guitar work, brilliantly played and audible bass and a vocalist that creates such great atmosphere makes for an incredibly enjoyable listen.

Lastly I will discuss the score I give this. Simply I found it difficult to score something under fifteen minutes long, so with that in mind I will state that if Repugnant Inebriation can produce a full-length that continues this quality it will more likely score in the mid-nineties.

With that in mind all I have to say is I strongly recommend this release. Buy the new Terrorizer, listen to the track, then track down this E.P, it is cheap as chips and one of the most promising acts in death metal that I have heard this side of the millennium.