Knowing I was going to see Undergang, live in Baltimore and seeing Necrot was touring with them I knew I had to check them out.  Luckily Larry Larriland Lapinsky told me Necrot kicked ass and to check them out.  Thankfully I did and what a find Necrot are.  Based out of Oakland, Ca, although the singer/bassist/guitarist Luca, is a transplanted Italian, Necrot are a real original band. In 2016 they released their demo anthology, The Labyrinth, and fairly recently their debut album, Blood Offerings, on Tankcrimes Records.   Finding bands to compare them to, to give you an idea, is kind of hard.  But I guess I do find Luca does quite an awesome job emulating the Bolt Thrower singer, Karl, on certain parts of the album.  The music has a bit of Bolt Thrower and maybe some Autopsy and some Finnish death metal influences, but by and large, I find Necrot a brutally refreshing and welcome addition to the scene.

“The Blade” opens this 8 song 40 minute album and the opening mid-paced section just pummels the listener with the massive guitar tone.  The song has a multitude of speeds; ranging from mid-paced, to classic 90’s death metal to sheer brutal blasting.  Necrot are also not afraid of melody and throw in some nice guitar solos towards the end of the song.  “Rather Be Dead”, has an awesome opening guitar tone, which has a slight raw Swede death inspired tone to this track.  The melodies permeate heavily on this tune and the rhythm section is pretty crushing and killer double bass right before the 2 minute mark.

The title track wastes no time at all, as it blasts right out the starting gates and the song just demolishes.  The 2.55 part is the Holy Shit part, with the isolated guitar moment and then going right into a killer mid-paced part, with excellent riffing, melodies and growls from Luca.  This part does have a strong sense of early Bolt Thrower, it’s like a goddamned steamroller, just with more melody than Bolt Thrower.  The mix of the background guitar solos is a neat touch.  “Layers of Darkness” closes out the album with an excellent opening and a classic 90’s death metal beat, with some mid-paced double bass and awesome bass guitar moments.  Some well-placed blast beats and then the guitar melodies, towards the end of the song, just scream classic Iron Maiden.  Really a well-done move and shows how dynamic Necrot are.

Blood Offerings has a great production and as 3 pieces go, especially after seeing them live, have a crushing and massive sound.  Folks there is a reason why just after a short time of this album being out that it’s causing such a stir in the scene and it’s because Necrot know how to write and play awesome death metal.  Each track is excellent, catchy, and the mix brings out all the instruments and vocals quite well.  The cd booklet is excellent, equipped with lyrics, liners and talk about an album cover.  Oh Boy!!  As in horror movies, sometimes the things that are more implied, rather than being graphically seen, are all the more disturbing.  The cover depicts a demon corpse priest reciting some incantation out of an old dusty book while another corpse demon holds a newborn baby upside down with a knife in hand ready to do some carving.

The cover wraps around to show a cascading waterfall river of flowing blood.  To the side, a bunch of these bastard corpse demon priests are each cradling babies and you know damn well they’re not attempting to hold them much longer.  It’s pretty disturbing, but at the end of the day, we all know this is death metal and the album covers are not supposed to be adorned with flowers and pictures of apple pie.  I love the camaraderie with Necrot and Undergang.  David, from Undergang, drew the Necrot logo and on the latest Undergang album, Necrot loaned some recording equipment to Undergang.  And they both toured together.  That’s brotherhood, my friends and what the underground scene is about.  Blood Offerings is a killer debut album and as debut albums go, a pretty crushing one, at that.  Buy or Die!

[Visit the band's website]

---

Comments