EP review: Invoking Thy Eternal Reign Of Torment by Desecrator
To desecrate is to violate the sanctity of a holy place or object, or to treat something revered with violent disrespect. To name your death metal band ‘Desecrator’ is, ironically, to treat the death metal genre with the upmost respect. You cannot be in a death metal band called Community Spirit.
Worcester-based Desecrator are not in the business of violating holy places, and if they are, they didn’t mention it in the press release for their new EP: Invoking Thy Eternal Reign Of Torment. Can we all take a moment to appreciate such an impeccably Satanic title? But halt, pitiful peasant! Desist from thine nomenclature worship and plunge into the depths of distorted guitars! Desecrator demand the attention of your puny ears – listen!
‘Thy Kingdon Will Crumble’ begins with a false dawn: imagine a Year 10 orchestra performing their own piece inspired by the ominous moments in Snow White and the Seven Dwarves. However, hath no fear, heathens, as the extremely hoarse Mark Dubanowski soon growls about treachery and a plenitude of other sins. If you’re in need of conjuring the courage to participate in a fight in a car park, then ‘Thy Kingdom Will Crumble’ will supply all the vicarious agitation and mind bullshit you need.
Impossibly fast drumming? Check. Blue whale belly rumbling vocals? Check? Slap bass? Er, check. ‘Scourge Of The Green Tide’ makes Metallica sound as hard as a fart. “There’s more where that came from…What are we smashing next?” Dubanowski asks at the end. In the 1990s, members of the Norwegian black metal scene burned churches, though you suspect Desecrator are not entirely serious about causing equivalent mayhem.
I can think of only one song that appears to have been named after Councillor Alan Amos’ political trajectory, and it’s ‘Repent Lament Detest Defect’ – the third track on Invoking Thy Eternal Reign Of Torment. If you made the audio track of a Reform-led council meeting ten times slower, and added guitars deeper than Elon Musk’s pockets, you will not repent for having created something akin to ‘Repent Lament Detest Defect’. ‘Within This Shadow Bleak’ sounds like the collapse of society, and if that isn’t the highest of praise for a death metal track, I don’t know what is. Drums like an elephant dying of a ketamine-induced heart attack? Check. More time signatures than Farage appearances on Question Time? Check. Another daft comparison to inject more humour? No, that’ll do, pig.
Based on the first two seconds, you would be forgiven for thinking that final track ‘From Ashes We Rise’ might be a Cure-like synth-led singalong. It is, of course, nothing of the sort. It is a rain-speckled epic, it is a battle cry, it is an absolute head walloper. The press release for Invoking Thy Eternal Reign Of Torment did reveal that the vocals for the EP were recorded at Spin The Black Circle. Given its central location, it would be no surprise to learn that complaints have been made about the noise. If this is the case, it would be sensible to remind the killjoys that the EP is called Invoking Thy Eternal Reign Of Torment. Being tormented is the point. We’re all tormented, and death metal is the most honest soundtrack. Desecrator know this.
Invoking Thy Eternal Reign Of Torment is out now via Bandcamp and other online platforms
By: Neil Laurenson