(written by Islander)
This is a tough day for people with friggatriskaidekaphobia, the fear of Friday the 13th, especially because we just had another one of those last month. But we’re about to magnify the fear of this day with a new song from the Costa Rican death-dealers in Candarian.
This song, “Altars and Ancestors“, is from the band’s debut album Trepanación, which will be dropped upon the world by Memento Mori and Me Saco Un Ojo on April 27th.
We’re informed that Candarian were spawned in 2020 when Christopher (guitar) and Jose Pablo (bass/vocals) decided to start a new project inspired by old-school death metal from the early ’90s, like Autopsy and Incantation, with lyrics revolving around themes of gore and horror. After some rehearsals, Pablo (drums) and Felipe (guitar) were recruited, and the lineup was then completed. Their debut demo, Stagnant Livor Mortis, was released on tape in late 2022 by Me Saco Un Ojo.
And now we have Trepanación looming on the horizon, accurately described on behalf of the labels as a “pulsing & putrescent soundscape of horror and doom,” revealing “real terror and carnage” — both a “sometimes-bestial aspect to their rhythmic surge” and also an “atmosphere of the haunting and hovering”.
In the case of “Altars and Ancestors” Candarian furiously rumble and pummel while inflicting riffage that dismally vibrates and wildly writhes. Fronted by abyssal growls and tyrannical howls, the music moves like a grisly tide, rising in carnivorous frenzies and descending in gruesome agonies.
The tremolo’d riffing also ascends even further in convulsions of freakish lunacy, backed by equally nimble (and equally demented) bass-work. But then Candarian use a gruesomely lurching sequence to telegraph a change, a change in which the pace slows and the music inflicts a phase of primitive, brutish, and highly headbangable monstrosity — though still infiltrated by ghastly and dismally swirling guitar-leads — and then concludes in a final hideous outburst of guitar mania.
Prepare to get trepanned and press Play below:
As noted above, Trepanación will be released on April 27th. Memento Mori will handle the CD version, while Me Saco Un Ojo will release the vinyl and cassette versions, all of it adorned by the grisly cover art of Grant Hatfield. Orders will be fielded at the locations linked below — and also below, we have a stream of the album’s first single, the aptly named “Skull Drilling Exorcism“.
TO ORDER:
https://www.memento-mori.es
https://mesacounojo.bandcamp.com/album/trepanacion
CANDARIAN:
https://www.instagram.com/candarianhorror