(written by Islander)
It’s rare to find debut albums that seemingly come out of nowhere which are as coherently conceived and masterfully rendered as the forthcoming first album of the Helsinki death metal band Grave Hex. Although the band only came together in 2024, the album makes it obvious that they quickly coalesced in what they wanted to do and knew almost instinctively how to do it.
What they chose to do is reflected in both the name they picked for themselves and the title of the album — Vermian Death — which is to say, they chose to make primal, worm-ridden death metal that’s equal parts stupendously crushing, hideously festering, and chillingly spectral.
They’re not reinventing any wheels, but they’re really, really good at the gargantuan and gruesome artform they’ve embraced — as you’ll have the chance to experience for yourselves through our full streaming premiere of Vermian Death today, in advance of its August 22nd release by Night Terrors Records and Cavernous Records (two labels whose names fit very well with this music).
photos by Anni Lassila
By way of background, we’re told that Grave Hex began as a collaboration between Matti (of the hardcore band Vainoa), Miikka (also Vainoa), and Martti (ex-Loka, ex-Radien), and that they wrote and rehearsed the album in short order and then recorded it over three sessions during the summer of 2024. (Shortly after completing the album, the band welcomed Hanna on bass and is now preparing for live performances this year.)
Here’s how Grave Hex themselves introduce what they’ve done:
Vermian Death came to existence like an explosive spontaneous combustion. We let all of our instinctive ambitions bleed into the writing without conscious control, letting the outcome manifest its gored form with its own will.
Like the spectrum of influences ranging from the raw and punky side of death metal all the way to the vast and cavernous atmospheres, Vermian Death encompasses the spectrum of worms from earthly creatures to mythical cave-dwelling beasts.
Creation of Vermian Death was also both the birthing and teething of Grave Hex. Creating it made us. Now prepare to die.
Our execution at the hands of Grave Hex begins with “Steeping Master Worm Flesh”. It wastes no time introducing listeners to just how massive and mauling the band decided to be. The bass tone is enormous. The gut-slugging and gruesomely boiling riffage brings to mind HM-2 distortion but somehow even more brutally ruinous. The vocals clawed their way up from the dankest of caverns.
The snare drum helps mount the punkish rhythmic charge with its sharp, reverberative snap, but when the rhythm and the riffing slow down, the distorted tones reverberate like some hideous radiation disease; you can imagine flesh melting and organs liquefying, and piercing guitar strings scream like the victims.
In addition to slowing to a grisly crawl, the song also accelerates, with drums blasting and chords dismally swarming like carnivorous hornets. The tempo changes continue, as do the changing moods of the song, which are both monstrous and degrading, manifestations of violence and decay. And there’s a freakishly quivering guitar solo that flares and spasms in the final minute which makes everything seem even more wicked and warped.
People who experience that opening song are going to have a very good idea, very quickly, of how they’ll react to the following six tracks, because those ensuing songs deploy the same kind of humongous bass lines, ruthlessly corrosive guitar tones, variable neck-cracking beats, and bestial vocal vomit that flares from disgusting gutturals to rabid howls, again augmented with shrieking and squirming lead-guitar appearances, as well as soloing that feel like needles impaled and ecstatically quivering within the listener’s brain.
This isn’t meant to imply that the songs are all carbon copies of each other. Some feel more like hard-charging tank attacks or flamethrowers opened wide, others feel more like brute-force stomp-fests or writhing infestations of maggots. The band also infiltrate melodic ingredients of misery and wraithlike hauntings, and they explode in convulsions of destructive barbarism.
In fact, many of the tracks do all those things in the space of a single song, “Den of Thieves” being a prime example (it includes, by the way, an eerie lead-guitar line that slowly slithers through the destruction in the song’s back half and very effectively worms its way into the head).
Grave Hex also bring in other ingredients as the album proceeds — the chilling, otherworldly ring of a solo guitar that bookends the titanic crusher “Endless Impossible Constructs”, which makes clear why the band included “Hex” in their name; the iron-shod, rock-smashing bass riff that anchors the also-pulverizing title song; and the queasy, buzzing leads that make the doom-drenched closer “Halls Beneath the Primal Mere” even more unnerving — before Grave Hex turn it into an unearthly war zone.
In short, Vermian Death is a creepy crusher of a high order, a very well-written, well-executed, and supremely well-produced devotional to worm-ridden horror and rock-smashing thuggery.
Speaking of the production, the recording and mixing were handled by the band’s own Matti Vainionpää, while mastering was completed by the veteran Greg Wilkinson at Earhammer Studios. The cover art is an original piece commissioned from Slimeweaver.
Vermian Death will be out on August 22nd via Night Terrors Records on cassette and Cavernous Records on CD. They place it in the foul lineage of such bands as Autopsy, Undergang, and Morbific. For more info about the album and how to get it, check the links below.
GRAVE HEX:
https://www.instagram.com/grave_hex
https://gravehex.bandcamp.com/
NIGHT TERRORS RECORDS:
https://night-terrors-records.net/
https://night-terrors-records.bandcamp.com/
https://www.instagram.com/night_terrors_records/
https://www.facebook.com/p/Night-Terrors-Records-100088326873332/
CAVERNOUS RECORDS:
https://www.facebook.com/CavernousRecords
https://instagram.com/cavernousrecords
https://cavernousrecords.bigcartel.com/
