(written by Islander)
Maniacally savage and also macabre. A vicious killing spree, but trading off with chords of groaning menace and otherworldly agony. Ruthlessly bludgeoning but also parting interdimensional veils with melodies of hideous and haunting splendor.
Those were among our thoughts about the debut album from a group of young Norwegian marauders who took the name Horrifier, a record aptly titled Horrid Resurrection that Personal Records released in the fall of 2023. They are older now, of course, but the added years seem to have made them even madder, meaner, and more merciless, though no less proud in wearing the influence of such bands as Autopsy, Entombed, and Repulsion.
Those are some quick reactions to Horrifier’s forthcoming second album Revelations of Gore (another apt title), which is now set for international release by the same Personal Records on August 7th. We have a few deeper reactions to share along with our premiere today of a song called “Body Hoarder“.
The subject matter of the new album is as blood-congealing as the music. Revelations of Gore is a concept record steeped in death, desperation, and ritual slaughter, described in these words on behalf of Personal Records:
Horrifier’s second album follows a dying man who, standing at the edge of his final breath, encounters a monstrous entity offering him eternal life – but immortality demands a price… Driven by the fear of death, the man begins feeding the creature with human sacrifices in exchange for more time among the living. What starts as desperation slowly turns into obsession, as the line between survival and damnation fades beneath a growing pile of corpses.
“Body Hoarder” arrives as the sixth song on the album’s nine-song track list. These are the songs that precede it in Horrifier’s hideous narrative:
“Voices”
“Compelled To Slaughter”
“Human Butchery”
“The Ingestion”
“Rejoice, Children Of The Flesh”
Up above we mentioned some of Horrifier’s key influences, and they’re all laid before you in this one new song. The music quickly surges, driven by compulsive, hammering beats and fueled by a monstrously churning riff that also rises like the terrible wail of some afflicted soul. The vocals are convincingly beastly — the kind of gruesome and gritty growls that suggest a throat choked with bone fragments and hate.
The music also menacingly blares, downshifts into a staggering and groaning manifestation of chilling gloom and pestilential rot, and surges again in an even more violent and vicious onslaught, with drums blasting and tremolo’d riffing creating an eviscerating swarm.
It is as if we are witnessing, in this one song, the protagonist’s descent into madness, a madness that erupts in delirium through a berserk guitar solo. Through it all, the drumming is really dynamic, and the vocals flare in deranged howls of sheer fury.
We said it before, two years ago, and it still holds true: “Our guess is that even metalheads who’ve been steeped in death metal since the ’80s are going to recognize from just this one song that these ghoulish young hellraisers are talented songwriters and performers.”
Personal Records will release Revelations of Gore on CD and digital formats. Two other songs from the album have previously crawled from the grave, and you can let them put you in a stinking, suffocating, and slaughtering embrace below.
PRE-ORDER:
https://www.personal-records.com/product/pre-order-horrifier-revelations-of-gore-cd/
https://personal-records.bandcamp.com/album/revelations-of-gore
HORRIFIER:
https://horrifiermetal.bandcamp.com/
https://www.facebook.com/p/Horrifier-100083192538092/