apanthropy

Hell’s Headbangers Records
07/2018

” Blood, hair, smoke, and chunks of scared human meat scattered in every direction. Some retard on a hill 800 meters away lets off a few blasts from a recoilless rifle which serves only to throw dirt and limbs into the already smoke-filled air. This is the first track.”

Invocation Spells
Spread Cruelty in the Abyss
Hell’s Headbangers Records
07/2018

–
Ruins of Cemetery
Rotting Sacrifice
Victims of Doom
Torment of Obssessor
Old Rites
Spread Cruelty
Obscure and Evil
From the Graves
–

(Note: This review is based on an advanced promo of the album, Spread Cruelty in the Abyss is slated for release on July 27th, 2018 on digital, CD, and 100-piece limited-edition cassette. )

Black thrash, or blackened thrash, is a premium example of a musical landfill. Oversaturation has become such an issue that bands in the genre are completely cancelling each other out and no one is really stepping forward to propel the musical concept forward. There were bands that made a significant impact within the genre – Absu, Destroyer 666, Aura Noir, ect – but stagnation will eventually push the genre into disrepair.

What present-day black thrash is missing is…well, black metal and thrash…

Consumers of this particular niche genre are well accustomed to ordering the steak but receiving a hotdog instead.

Where Invocation Spells excels on Spread Cruelty in the Abyss is the fact that it is a legitimate black thrash release. The attitude, the aggression, and the atmosphere of black metal is present and the mechanism of delivery is concrete and minimalist-style thrash. Spread across eight songs, Invocation Spells fourth full-length release goes back to the central musical idea of black thrash and doesn’t attempt to reinterpret the concept or try to force a musical evolution.

Spread Cruelty in the Abyss draws off of phrases comprised of minimalist riffs driven by hardcore punk and speed metal rhythmic percussion to form delirious and truncated narratives within the songs. A good angle of examination would be a cross between Razor’s Evil Invaders and Onslaught’s Power from Hell, amplified by methods of delivery akin to groups like Morbid Insulter or Ruins.

Spread Cruelty in the Abyss opens with the track “Ruins of Cemetery,” which can be found below:

A rather unassuming riff comprised of palm-muted fifths trading off with chords on the higher string flourishes atop a punk-like rhythm to open the album. Like enemy soldiers patrolling through a field that seems barren of other life, so it seems. Imagine, now, as the second riff phrase cuts in, that these enemies fail to notice two concealed, fully-automatic machine gun emplacements that are trained on them. As “Ruins of Cemetery” kicks into overdrive – ironheaded thrash – the machine guns open up. Blood, hair, smoke, and chunks of scared human meat scattered in every direction. Some retard on a hill 800 meters away lets off a few blasts from a recoilless rifle which serves only to throw dirt and limbs into the already smoke-filled air. This is the first track.

Where does the album progress from here?

The songwriting formula across the remaining tracks of Spread Cruelty in the Abyss stays static: well-constructed riffs – methodical, deliberate, and delivered with urgency and force – paired with conventional-themed speed metal and thrash drumming with some tasteful footwork and occasional counter-rhythm accents coming off the cymbal work. There are just enough deviations between the tracks to give each song a distinct, memorable personality. “Victims of Doom” showcases some of the heavier drumming techniques on the record and is paired with menacing principle riff that draws character from it’s minor scale construction. “Old Rites” is compositionally pornographic, driven by neck-breaking phrase changes, tempo changes, and furious vocal delivery on par with the earliest days of Sepultura. “Spread Cruelty” barely makes it over a two and a half minutes and slams the entire way through, showcasing the album’s only example of clean vocal accents, once again, nodding to the concept of memorable songwriting across the record.

The album runs for slightly under twenty-six minutes with “Victims of Doom” servings as the album’s longest song, coming in at four minutes exactly. While Spread Cruelty in the Abyss is a short listen, it wouldn’t be favorable to extend it further, as it would only serve the potential to water down a solid example of modern black thrash. Keeping the songs at around 3 minutes, Invocation Spells manages to move quickly to set up a central theme of riffs, beat the listener into a heap, and move on to the next track.

There are no theatrical aspects at play on Spread Cruelty in the Abyss nor are there any instrumentation outside of the typical template of thrash, which highlights the previously mentioned commentary on just simply returning to the core ideas of the genre; the ideas that made it enjoyable in the first place.

It deserves mentioned that Invocation Spells is only a two-member band.

Spread Cruelty in the Abyss is an album that deserves attention within the genre in 2018 and Invocation Spells does the South American scene – particularly the Chilean scene – a mighty justice of sorts. It excels ahead of stagnant releases from other groups this year and puts itself in high regard amongst present-day underground music as a whole. A fresh take on a rotten corpse, Invocation Spells goes frontwards into the past to delivery a much-needed, hard-hitting black thrash album.

Label: Hell’s Headbangers Records
Band: Invocation Spells
-A.Krause