There are a few similarities between death metal acts Chapel of Disease and Deserted Fear; both German, both of FDA Rekotz, both released solid debuts in 2013 and both recently released their second efforts. The only slight difference is the style of death metal each band plays.
While Deserted Fear had a little more modern, chunky thrashing vibe on their sophomore effort, Kingdom of Worms, Chapel of Disease as with their debut, Summoning Black Gods, continues their more musty old school Death/Pestilence/Morgoth inspired take on death metal, albeit with a little more expansive, experimental hue sneaking in here and there.
While retaining the aura of the old school, those familiar with stylistic shifts by the likes of Tribulation, Stench, Morbus Chron, and Usurpress might recognize the shift into more off kilter territory. Now don’t get me wrong, this is far from a full Tribulation -like paradigm shift as Chapel of Disease is still ripe with dusty old school riffs, simple percussion and echo-y distant throaty shouts, but the subtle shift in the structures of the songs are a little more twisty yet rocking and unpredictable and solo laden. Look to third track “Masquerade in Red”, to hear the band’s more creative varied delivery of old school death metal complete with acoustic bridges and rank Execration/Autopsy-ish crawls.
While the band employed slightly longer songs on their debut, that has even been tweaked as evidenced by the presence of 8 minute standout “Lord of All Death” which rarely settles into any sort of pace over its convoluted but deft and interesting delivery (including rollicking, rock n roll final 3 minutes which carries over to the sultry southern rock inspired start of “Symbolic Realms”) and 10 plus minute closer “…Of Repetitive Art”. This beast lopes and staggers with undead determination and shifty, doom crawls, again imbuing Autospy with an LSD spiked miasma.
Fear not though, as the band can still bear down and knock out some good ol’ fashioned death metal as heard on “The Dreaming of the Flame” or “Life is But a Burning Being” (even with its psychedelic interlude). However, Chapel of Disease have entered into a more creative, experimental phase with their second album and it shows some real promise and development from the now saturated Asphyx/Death/Pestilence worship that is now pretty common place.
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randomly checked this out the other night, was at first pleased by the nods to old/raw Slayer/Possessed but then when the Sabbathy doom and 70s atmospheric and rock elements came in on “Lord of All Death” I really took notice.
That song and “Symbolic Realms” are the standouts here – wonder why the hybrid approach doesn’t rear its head earlier on the album – it could have been the cornerstone of the band’s sound. Regardless, digging this a lot right now.
on Feb 19th, 2015 at 15:43New ones seems use the hybrid approach more.
on Dec 19th, 2018 at 04:06