A couple of demos and a thoroughly enjoyable and filthy EP in 2010 sees this bunch of Swedish muck monsters put their debut full length in a scene that has had a resurgence of activity that saw the return of the legendary Autopsy and their monstrous comeback album.
Morbus Chron sits firmly in the grimy barrel scraping death metal gutter here and if anything it is glorious in its stench ridden grubbiness. The band’s demo like logo with satanic overtones is in stark contrast to the disturbing gaudy psychedelic album cover. Opening tune is “Through The Gaping Gate/Coughing In A Coffin” and immediately a repulsive yet highly clear sound greets you after the horror sound track intro. It is hard for bands like this to hide from Autopsy influences and other acts like Hellhammer, Sarcofago, Slaughter etc, such is the fine line this style has. That isn’t to say that Morbus Chron are rehashing old hooks and sludgy bass lines, far from it. In fact these Swedes have taken the style a little further by adding excellent leads and copious amounts of thudding melody all set to a bulldozing drum sound that is organic and triggerless.
“Creepy Creeping Creep” has a riff to match the title with a truly old death metal sound of the mid 80s when bands were drifting from thrash into something far more hideous. “Hymns To A Stiff” has a wonderful grating and rasping guitar sound with a hefty death-thrash riff that is barbaric in its beauty. It is songs like this that have that added nuance of guitar hooks and melodious grime that make Morbus Chron get their head out of the gutter for a quick peak around the rest of the death metal scene. A death grunt laden “Red Hook Horror” is fast, chaotic but perfectly executed creating a vision of Venom from their very early days. An industrial rumble opens “The Hallucinating Dead” which is similar to Norway’s Fester with tons of demonic bellowing.
I really enjoyed “Ways Of Torture” with its groovy (yes I am using that term) beat and a barrage of cymbal work (a dominant feature of many of the songs in fact). The song morphs into a manic lead and blast as I was left thinking about 70s Black Sabbath on the riff. “Lidless Coffin” has been re-recorded from the EP and is a stand out track due to its doom laden thuggery and clever switches in pace leaving only “Deformation of The Dark Matter” to end this scab and crust infested beast of an album, as here more doom threatens to cave your ear drums in before the song is brought into fetid life with a great riff change that has an element of chaos but works so well in this bands song writing. An album to compete with the new Autopsy? I damn well think so my grubby friends, check it out.
http://www.myspace.com/morbuschronband
Martin Harris
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