As I’ve mentioned in other Dark Descent Records’ reviews, I really like the fact they are balancing out some awesome reissues (Uncanny, Utumno, etc.) with some new acts like Adversarial, Miasmal, Corpsessed, Gorephilia and Washington DC’s sickly heavy, crusty d-beat blackened doom act, Ilsa.

While essentially lying in the same murky sludgy and heavy territory as Eyehategod, Negative Reaction, The Abominable Iron Sloth and other sludge/doom riddled acts, Ilsa adds a nasty array of other influences that cull a little from Bolt thrower, Abscess, Crowbar, Celtic Frost and the famous “Dis” bands. The end result is a massive, beastly album of extreme music that fits the misanthropic, nihilistic and exploitative namesake.

The dense, earthy production and mastering (by James Plotkin) on Tutti Il Colori Del Buio (All the Colors of the Dark) is just fucking nasty. And whether delivering a galloping, punky d-beat throw down (‘The Butchers Castle”, “Primrose Paths”) or a hacking, sickly slab of more doomy filth (the Autopsy-ish start of “Blue Moon Haze”), or just a pure, nonsense groove and rumble (“No Man’s Land”), the result is the same; a festering, pus-filled infection of your ear canal. That being said, I would have really like to have heard more tracks with a doomy, scrawling tone, as the d-beat crust numbers do tend to sound a bit samey, but no less punishing.

Vocalist Orion has a throaty, rasp that’s pretty standard, and something a little more unhinged (Desolatevoid’s Aaron Howard for example) would have elevated Tutti Il Colori Del Buio into something even more disturbing and nasty. As it stands though, Tutti Il Colori Del Buio is a pretty damn solid, bruising affair that that shows dark Descent isn’t just about Swedish death metal or Incantation worship.

[Visit the band's website]

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