Germany’s Sanctifying Ritual released their self-titled debut this year, and it’s been a while in the making. We’re treading that familiar path into the old school, this time wearing our death metal hats, albeit with a more atmospheric, ‘evil’ aesthetic that was once refreshing in a post tech-death world. This is the true heir of the late 80s and early 90s of Sarcofago and Merciless, with a balanced understanding of the NWOBHM roots of this music. We’ve skipped out on the blackened pizza thrash carnival that has managed to turn many intellectually deficient heads in recent years, and instead gone right back to Motorhead via some classic early 80s punk for a good portion of rhythmic bounce.
Production also apes this old school aesthetic, with drums sounding raw and organic, caked in reverb to compensate for the warmth this exudes. Vocals ditto. The guitar tone – in line with Sanctifying Ritual’s archaic influences – is warmer, with an analogue aesthetic, again dripping with reverb to compensate for the lack of bass this entails. However, everything is sharp and crisp enough to do justice to the chaotic proto-black metal riffs that make up the body of this work. Atonality meets tritone play, with the marked distinction of sticking to staccato strumming over tremolo, which not only sets this apart from fully fledged primitive death metal, but also emphasises the complexity that emerges from these rudimentary elements in a more chaotic and haphazard way than metal that was to follow this style. Hell, at this point it should be pointed out that we’re now talking about this album like it was released in 1988, and most extreme metal was yet to come. This is how convincing a relic this is when compared to many other modern attempts in a similar vein.
But there are small licks and refrains that jump out throughout this album that betray its 21st century antecedents. Not least its melding of death metal riffs from the Autopsy school, again a choice that makes sense in the context of Sanctifying Ritual, who – for the most part – bypasses the main trends of influence in American thrash and delves into an older lineage for its cues. But this is all knitted together into a grand, epic vision to the point that the whole thing ebbs and flows in a familiar yet imaginative haze of well crafted, primitive extreme metal. This also goes for their ability to contrast the animalistic elements with sweeping breakdowns, augmented by generic but engaging leads; these are also signalled by a reprieve in the relentless atonality, as melody sets in, and the drums go from their mid-tempo skin bashing to a more free-flowing approach, characterised by choppy fills and slower tempos.
Far from being yet another trip down memory lane, ‘Sanctifying Ritual’ is such a competent and imaginative album, to the point where it feels like an attempt to re-write memory lane entirely. A second chance at history, one that addresses whatever shortcomings we felt were present in those touchstone albums from the old school that are commonly name dropped when discussing the era. What modern or original flourishes are present are deliberately supressed, or so well integrated into the machinery of this album as to contribute to the unity of the whole.
So I’ll end with a word of warning to digest alongside the broadly positive response I have to this album. One wonders if there is enough to the original material found on this release to pull together an album with more of its own identity on future works from this artist. Sanctifying Ritual have enough character and class of their own, to the point where the old school aesthetic becomes a distraction. I mean, for fuck’s sake I’ve spent most of this review gassing on about it like it was their intention. I’d rather devote words to the individual character and philosophy of an artist (or lack thereof) than endlessly pontificate on the cultural streams of metal that each album taps into. But such is the obvious intent with Sanctifying Ritual that it becomes impossible to effectively talk about this album and avoid spending a significant chunk fixated on its revivalist ethic. This remains, despite this caveat, a cut above the rest, and well worth a nosey.
Originally published at Hate Meditations
Packing a couple of members from Nocturnal Witch and one reference with Division Speed, you can bet that Sanctifying Ritual follow the same fast and unholy path. A minor twist in the method of speed, however, is that this German quartet play a more deathly variant on the black and thrash onslaughts of countrymen Desaster and Nocturnal. Taking things back to a primitive time when old school death metal was the only type going, the blurring of boundaries between different types of extreme metal suits the perennial deathly themes of this debut album. After more than a decade spent on demos and smaller releases, Sanctifying Ritual seems a very confident step into full-length territory.
Perhaps the only sticking point for some fans will be that Sanctifying Ritual are another sick thrashy death metal band in the old tradition. If this debut had been released 30 years earlier, we might be counting these guys among the Morbid Angels and Nifelheims of our world, though nowadays the sheer quantity of bands makes it tough to stand out. In truth, the packaging of the Sanctifying Ritual experience has just as much impact as the music, which is why fans of the style will slaver unhealthily over songtitles like 'Stained with Rotten Blood' and 'Obsessed by Gore', as well as the creepy as fuck cover art of an ossuary stuffed with coffins and corpses. Replacing the typical band photo with a high-definition picture of 4 decayed bodies certainly makes quite a statement as well. Therefore, Sanctifying Ritual haven’t tried anything new exactly, but done whatever they can to make an impact all the same.
Musically, slightly less effort is spent on unsettling the listener than pummelling them with a massive dose of riffs. The album sounds cavernously foetid, an underground reek blasting up from the intense drumming and grainy punch of the guitar, hitting the speakers with the slightly muffled crack of enshrouded bodies dropping into graves. Frantic passages of riffing stream from 'Stained with Rotten Blood' in the manner of victims running for their lives through awful labyrinths, guitarist Venomessiah making use of panicked higher notes to ensure maximum terror. The delayed leads offer a more enigmatic, but equally effective, foreboding tone. Rounding out the visceral experience, Tyrant’s vocals balance on the edge of the blade between early Sodom and modern Hellripper. Disciples of both those bands’ sounds might enjoy Sanctifying Ritual provided they develop a taste for the creeping ambience of '(Tales of the) Sinister Appearances', which opens the album as a more complex emissary from the Germans’ tomb of desperation.
A few reshaped songs fill out this full-length, among them the early Sanctifying Ritual standard 'Abominable Death Rebels' as the album closer. In this briefest song (the band tend to head towards 5 minutes for each cut), the primal rush of pure extremity is satiated, riffs stampeding without restraint and drums hammering desperately to nail the coffin closed once and for all. Though not exactly surprising, any death metal outfit’s ability to conjure mayhem on command should be counted among their strongest assets, and that’s without mentioning the thrashier sprint attained on 'Throne of Evil Atrocity'. In this regard, Sanctifying Ritual probably know they are aiming at a broad target with this debut album, yet the venom and skill with which they attack it ensures that every shot sticks. It’s unlikely that any new fans of hellhound death metal will be converted by a record such as this, but Sanctifying Ritual may even awaken some of the most deeply buried.
Originally written for The Metal Observer - http://www.metal-observer.com/3.o/review/sanctifying-ritual-sanctifying-ritual/