Voracious Scourge "In Death" Review

 

    Back at the end of August, Massacre Records quietly released a new record from old school death metal aficionados Voracious Scourge - hailing from Baton Rouge and formed from members and ex-members of many famous groups from throughout extreme metal history, the hellish imagery on the album's cover - which no doubt would look stellar on a record sleeve - is entirely reflective of the music contained within. From Voracious Scourge's Bandcamp:

'Old school death metal project formed by Jason McIntyre. The love of late 80's and early 90's death metal fuels the writing behind the project. VS hearkens back to the good old days when creating great songs with solid riffs and vocal hooks that grabbed you and stuck in your brain like mental meat hooks, was the mission.'

Consider me meat-hooked, lads. In Death is their first full-length after a compilation release and an EP previously, and opens with horror game pastiche, droning synths and ominous choir sounds punctuated with a short clean guitar instrumental that gives way to the first traditional 'riff' of the album - Heaven's Scorched explodes with a blackened death metal crunch that never feels overwrought or overproduced. Everything sits tightly in a masterful mix, with bass guitar often audibly playing independent lines from the guitars. Vocals are frequently understandable even without a lyric sheet (as a frequent listener of extreme/death metal) and the piece itself has several various 'movements' that almost feel like a trio of shorter tracks. We start with tremolo riffs, moving into a more sludgy section before giving way to a bit of death metal stomp. On repeated listens I'm actually quite surprised at how well put together this track is given how much musical ground it traverses.

    However, the outstanding first track gives way to the more Suffocation-esque Defleshed Messiah, reminiscent of more traditional death metal - still quite technical, but with more of a focus on the low palm-muted stuff at first. There are a couple of nicely harmonized guitar leads over octave rhythms in one spot that caught my ear quite a bit as well, as well as a crunchy outro with some massive-sounding drums. The guitar solo has a surprisingly triumphant or major character to it that left me wanting to hear more - Voracious Scourge does something a little different from the first track here while successfully retaining their musical identity. The band members' experience  in making this kind of music is on full display throughout, and the lyrics are characteristically as gorey as you'd expect.

    I'd like to note here that I love it when bands have tracks named after themselves, or vice-versa. Just a personal amusement of mine. Carrying on, Voracious Scourge's "Voracious Scourge” is probably the most straightforward track on the record. The vocals here are particularly brutal in my estimation, and the moderate tempo throughout is accompanied with harmonized minor guitars over top in what is an exploration of particularly 'roots' death metal, chuggy throughout and with catchier lyrical sections than previous tracks. I wonder if the band didn't write this track first - it does seem more simplistic than the rest of the record, and its placement roughly in the middle of the track list is thus palate-cleansing. Andy LaRocque also apparently plays guitar on this one, according to the track listing. This one is not on their precious EP too, so it must be new...15 MILLION MOTHERFUCKERS DEAD (??)!

    Anyway, Mental Enslavement is next, starting off at at moderate pace before giving way to a short blast beat section and looping back. There are two guitar solos on this track in the traditional vein, with Kerry King-esque chromaticism, 16th-note-triplet scale runs with often harmonized leads. It's perhaps a little less immediately interesting that the stuff that came before on the record, but not a bad track by any means. The following track, In Death, has my favorite riffs on the album - something really special comes together on this track for me. The bass is gut-wrenching while reaching up for higher notes and slidey melodies when appropriate, and the guitar riffs never move into what I feel is 'by the numbers' territory. The blast section in the middle is fucking moshworthy, and the way it falls into its' following clean section is nothing short of magical. It sent chills down ny spine the first time I listened to it and reminded me more of the Cynic and Atheist side of death metal, and this is my favorite guitar lead on the record as well. I can forgive Mental Enslavement for being a little middle of the road for this gem.

    A Life Condemned is another fun one. I personally found the ideas in it to be a little disparate and lacking the unity of stuff like Defleshed or Heaven's Scorched. There are various tempo-feels often united by consistent double-kick, but things here feel a little more all over the place. The guitar tapping in the the middle section felt a little cheesy too, but there are still some great slam riffs to be had here. I've wasted four minutes on worse. Throughout my listens of this record I rarely stopped to look at the lyrics, and based on the lyric videos on Youtube I'm probably not missing out on too much - still, they aren't terribly audible here to my ear. The following track is one of the first the band made by all evidence, as its' uniquely the only song that appears both here and on their debut EP. Harbinger of Our Own Demise. Here the band's production is far more black metal-esque, and heading back to listen to the original recording...I'm not sure which I like more! There seems to be a deliberate change in production direction to something a little thicker and louder, but I'm not sure if I prefer this sound over the more cut and dry old school sound of their EP. Think old Immolation versus their newest stuff, for example.

    Tank Tread Evisceration finishes the track list as far as original songs go - by this point on first listen I'd noted that I'd felt a little fatigued, which can happen with records like this - perhaps the Born Dead cover that comes next may have actually fit the track list better if it was before this song? In any case, this is not to take for granted the musicality of the stuff on display here - by now, you know what to expect with this record, and while it does have more of Jason McIntyre's more intriguing lead work present once again, it felt a little boring to me after thirty minutes of much of the same. That Born Dead cover is fucking awesome though, and totally on point with where they're coming from musically.

    Overall it seems the lads showed off their death metal chops in great form with a record that anyone could be proud of. There is a variety of musical ideas here and they mix them mostly effectively. As with most bands, in the future I'd like to maybe see them branch out a little more - the various tempos and textures applied here do start to blend together a little towards the end of the record. I'd also highly recommend their first EP, Our Demise, still also available on their bandcamp.

 

Faves: Heaven's Scorched, In Death, Defleshed Messiah

https://massacre-records.com/voraciousscourge/

-Eric