What on earth is a Rotengeist, an evil spirit who throws foul smells around, a spectre of stench? Who knows, but it is the name that this Polish band decided to plump for on forming in 2005. Apparently the first couple of years they had no luck finding a vocalist and in the end decided that their guitarist may as well do the job and kindly they point out he was a complete amateur. A demo later and now with debut album ‘Fear Is The Key’ belting out the stereo he has obviously improved enough to release this to the masses.
As a guitar scythes away and drums thud, some philosophical musings are cast out as spoken words and we bounce into first number proper ‘Spiritual Collapse.’ I am immediately thinking of the likes of Slayer here, this is evidently thrash laden death metal and it has a nice meaty production behind it as it booms forth. This song is probably mid-paced rather than fully raging and you feel as though they are holding something back until it gallops forth with a flailing guitar lead and bruising demeanour. One thing that I will say about the singing is that it is evident vocalist Piotr Winiarski is from Eastern Europe, he does have quite a heavy accent, not that this is necessarily a negative point. Leads are confidently handled, the drumming is nice and heavy but this does sound like a bit of a blast from the past, in fact feelings of déjà vu are constantly overpowering me as I listen to the album.
Still in its defence it does get me banging my head, although maybe not furiously and also on numbers such as ‘Erase’ noting some rather eccentric sounding bass parts. I have to admit I would be interested to hear older song ‘Death Came With A Milkmaid’ just for its bizarre title but unfortunately it is not here. The Metallica vs Slayer of ‘Eradicate Evil’ is however and it’s the standout album track. Not a huge amount more to say about this one, it is ok but if you are looking for something new and cutting edge you wont find it here, as this is standard meat and potatoes metal.
http://www.rotengeist.pl
http://www.myspace.com/rotengeistband
