It looks like a copy of Grave’s Into the Grave and some HM -2 pedals have finally made their way to Russia as the debut full length from Nizhny Novgorod’s Wombripper is a pure, unabashed, primal throwback to Grave’s classic debut.

Honestly- that’s probably you all you need to know right? Some Russian metal fans might be curious that Konstantin Korolev from 7 H Target plays bass here as well, but for the most part this is no frills, no BS release. It was originally released on Grotesque Sound Records back in January, but Redefining Darkness picked it up, added 3 bonus tracks (2 new, unreleased tracks  a the track “Morbid Aberration”, from the bands 2017 split with Torn Apart).

With the bonus tracks, the album is 45 minutes and it blazes and rips by with the same furious intensity and murderous midrange as the aforementioned classic. There’s a little melody  and a few slicing solos and grooves or slower murkier parts (“Frantic Exhumation”, “Locked in Ice Coffin”) amid the almost relentless salvo but for the most part- its a pure wall of midrange, buzzsawing noise . At times, it borders on Nails or Rotten Sound/Nasum-y grindcore ferocity as heard on  “Torn by the Nails” or “Immolation Rites”, aided by the more higher register screams mixed in with the early LG Petrov  ish growls.

The rumbling drums and bass of “Restless” immediately imbues “Into the Grave” or , and has one of the album’s few melody lines and leads while “Suicidal Recreation” reminds me of “Extremely Rotten Flesh”. One of the album’s two, purely mid paced songs “”Locked in Ice Coffin”, is one of the albums better tracks as you can hear and feel the heft, rather than it simply peel your skin, and would feel at home on Soulless or an Entrails album. The album’s other ‘slow’ track, the 6 minute “Godless Slaughter (In the Name of Doom)”, starts out like the rest of the album, with ripping relentlessness before it, as the name implies, morphs into a big hulking, slower, doomy track that bleeds seamlessly into “Prenatal Death”.

The 3 bonus tracks focus more on the more direct Grave style, with a slightly more feedback laden, raw guitar tone but all three tracks kind of sound similar.

 

 

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