ALBUM REVIEW: Rise Of The Rotten – House By The Cemetary

Swedish death metal lunatics HOUSE BY THE CEMETARY have dropped their debut album Rise Of The Rotten. Featuring a musical pedigree which includes the likes of the utterly prolific Rogga Johansson, MONSTROSITY frontman Mike Hrubovcak and PAGANIZER drummer Matthias Fiebig, who are coming together to celebrate the work of legendary king of gore Lucio Fulci, director of the flick from which the band took their name. Allowing for such a stellar line-up and a solid source of inspiration, surely nothing could possibly go wrong?

That assertation would fortunately be absolutely correct. From the outset of the battering meted out by opener and title track Rise Of The Rotten, it is clear that these guys have too much experience and love for the genre to even consider allowing the ball to drop. There are more thick, viscera-spattered riffs on display here than you could shake a chainsaw at, all twisted into hellish soundscapes through the familiar warm tone of Sweden’s favourite distortion pedal, the infallible Boss HM-2.

The quality doesn’t let up as the album barrels forward, with tracks like Crematory Whore and Into The Murky Depths providing enormous crunching riffs and splintering drum work into the mix, while still retaining that ever-present underlayer of well disguised fun that just oozes from decent death metal.

That is not to say that there are no moments of serious carnage though, tracks such as the brutal dual assault of Defleshed By The Seasons and A Morbid Scent cast a frantic mood to Rise Of The Rotten’s middle section, keeping the tempo utterly blistering through galloping beats and throwing out savage riffs faster than the Sawyer family threw out gnawed bones. The later moments of the album, particularly closer March Of The Undead, just serve to refresh and hammer home the mission statement of the band. Slowly building in intensity and putrid melody throughout and introducing us to some of their very sickest riffs in a crescendo of distortion and violence before the album comes to an alarmingly sudden breakneck halt, leaving the listener battered and bruised, but by no means ready for it to end.

Overall, HOUSE BY THE CEMETARY have created a monster. It is short, sharp and thoroughly rotten – as disturbing as its source material, and as solid in quality as any of it’s members other projects. Also worthy of mention is just how overwhelmingly fun it is to listen to, it is a bombastic barrel of gory fun with all the easy charm of being chased through the woods by a maniac.

Rise Of The Rotten feels something like an album out of time. It feels fresh and entertaining, but also like a forgotten relic dug from the basement of an old block of flats in Gothenberg, unopened since the early nineties. If you happen to have a natural predisposition to tales of blood and murder set to music that sounds like chainsaws having a domestic, then this album cannot come highly recommended enough. As a love letter to the early days of Swedish Death Metal supremacy, it will not take long at all to find it’s place in your putrescent heart.

Rating: 8/10

Rise Of The Rotten is out now via Pulverised Records.