Death but Undead, it is possible with the death metallers of Undead. In 2015, two years after their formation this band released their debut EP Blood Enemy, to follow that one up with another EP, Redemption, one year later. Last Halloween vocalist/guitarist V. Repulse, guitarist A. Von Hell, bass player J. Surt and drummer Matt de Vallejo released new material. This time it’s about their debut full-length, which is titled Existential Horror.
A few seconds into opener Haunted by Hate Undead immediately pounds in very heavily with pummeling drums, constantly sawing guitars, filthy vocals, such as also can be heard in Sin & Death and Beyond Divine Regulation, and, at some moments, a nicely humming bass, such as also can be heard during the end of Sin & Death. In addition to all that Haunted by Hate also includes a quite chaotic-sounding guitar solo.
During this entire album it becomes clear that Undead puts a lot of energy in their music and that surely is coming off of it while listening. To give you an example be sure to listen to the very energy-raising drums at the beginning of Masters of Mankind and the nice, energetic combination of the constantly sawing guitars and the pummeling drums that are strengthening each other during the entire album, such as in City of Silence and Curse of the Undead. Both examples can also be heard in the title track, which starts with a fading in beginning with lingering guitars, that are returning towards the end of this track and are being followed by a roaring guitar solo.
We already mentioned some guitar solos, but those aren’t all of them. Guitar solos are regularly to be found on this album, such as in, in addition to the already-mentioned, the quite atmospheric ending Santa Muerte, the raging track City of Silence, the crunchy guitar solo in Sacrophagus, in which we’ll also hear very chuggy guitars, and the closing track Beyond Divine Regulation in which the guitar solo is part of the atmospheric second half of this track.
Undead pounds quite heavily on Existential Horror. They leave a lot of energy behind with this album and they regularly shred their guitars. Of course, that sounds, and is, very nice, but what makes that Existential Horror stays very interesting despite this quite simple basis are the changes in rhythm they regularly put into this album. It’s not about a huge amount of rhythm changes, but just enough to keep everything very interesting without giving in on the pounding, energetic aspect of Undead’s music. To get an example of this, be sure to listen to Santa Muerte, Sacrophagus and Beyond Divine Regulation.
Are you in for some heavily pounding death metal for a bit more than half an hour? Then be sure to check out this Existential Horror by Undead!
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Hi!
I’m Tim van Velthuysen and I started DutchMetalManiac back in 2014. I’m 29 years old and I live in Nijmegen, The Netherlands. Of course, I like metal, but I can also appreciate other musical styles.
In addition to DutchMetalManiac I also have a personal website on which I’ll post various things that won’t fit on DutchMetalManiac, but might be interesting for you as well. It’s in Dutch though.
