CVLT Nation’s Top 6
Demos of 2013

6. UNRU: Demo MMXIII

It’s almost preposterous say in the first sentence of a review, but Unru have created perhaps one of my favorite releases of the year and it’s a demo. Unru hail from Germany and, like many bands of the more contemporary blackened crust movement, only reveal themselves through veiled mystique and runes. But image aside, let’s talk about the powerhouse that is DEMO MMXIII.

The demo itself brings with it all of the gritty qualities one would expect to be associated with a demo: low production, cymbals crashing and creating waves of non-sound, guitars that are seemingly lost in the mix, however none of this is a slight against Unru in the least bit and if anything, it really drives the point home. Four interlude tracks I-V serve as moments of atmosphere for the album, giving the listener breaks in-between the absolute onslaught that is DEMO MMXIII. I think what strikes me the most about Unru is the ridiculous vocal sound because I’ve never quite heard anything like it; the vocalist creates something so animalistic and sinister that it’s actually quite exciting to hear from track to track. Similarly, I felt as though the drums throughout most of the tracks held a particular antagonistic relationship with the guitar, much to each instrument’s benefit…Full CVLT Nation Review HERE!

5. KRAWWL: MMXIII

If you’ve been casting an eye on Ireland in the last two or three years, you may have noticed that it has become fertile ground for some exciting black metal bands; Sodb, Slidhr immediately spring to mind while you have upstarts like Ceaseless Blight. The mysterious Krawwl are the newest entity rearing their ugly heads with a demo tape of viciously meandering BM that has taken some traditional black metal influences and contorted them into something they can call their own.

At less than 20 minutes though, this demo is if anything a taster and sample of what’s been festering under the surface, but a taste worth it nonetheless. This demo instantly grabs you with its balance between grimy atmosphere and production and the presence of actual riffs as well as judicial use of melody…Full CVLT Nation Review HERE!

4. SURVIVAL: Civil War

New York’s SURVIVAL are a dark punk diamond in the rough, and their Civil War demo is perfect, put out via Burnt Books! Over the course of six songs, this band channels some upbeat dirgy melodies that will have you waving your arms in a death rock swirl. I’m so impressed with SURVIVAL that I’m almost speechless when it comes to how sick they are. What stands out to me is that their songs ooze honest and morbid conviction. CVLT Nation are releasing the bats today and we streaming SURVIVAL’s demo in full below! Make sure to pick up their tape HERE!

3. Possession: His Best Deceit

Introspectively, the demo tape has always been the first glimpse we see into any up and coming musicians’ futures, and for better or worse this first impression determines the potential success of that future. In a market where music is dissected, labeled and mass produced instead of merely listened to, the simple and sacred process of artists sharing their vision with the world has never been more influential. In the case of Belgium’s blackened thrash amalgamation Possession, we are privy to a return to roots effort that exacts its ferocity through an homage to a time when classification did not exist, and all that mattered was producing the most tangibly destructive effort possible…Full CVLT Nation Review HERE!

2. OLD WITCH: Come Mourning Come

Bleak, depressing, anguished, tormented. All of these are adjectives that I could use to describe this next album I’m about to introduce. A blistering mix of black, drone and doom layered with some beautiful atmospheric parts, all blended perfectly that will leave you under the spell of Old Witch.

There isn’t much information about this enigmatic act floating around. All I basically know is that they’re a two member band (judging by the blurred pic featured on their Bandcamp) from Canada. I understand the reason for the band to remain so scretive. As far as I’m concerned, it’s not the fact that knowing exactly from where they come from that is going to change my opinion about them. What I’m really concerned about is this: how come such an enigmatic and unsigned band, coming from God knows where, releases one of the best doom albums I’ve heard this year? The music is amazing, awesome lyrics, well performed, full of rich textures and layers. I’m overwhelmed.

“Funeral Rain”, the track that opens the album, appears charged with an immense negative energy, like a dark cloud on the horizon approaching increasingly stuffed with drone noises that completely transform the landscape, darkening it and giving rise to a bleak and desolate scenario now dyed in tones of gray, dominated under a powerful doom that crawls at a snails pace. The rough voice fits perfectly in, this record, and judging by the band’s name I almost imagine it coming from the mouth of a an old mystical and sinisterly contorted figure, forgotten by time, wandering painfully through this forest made of anguish. From here, and during the next half hour we are about to lose ourseleves in the dark old forest that is “Come Come Mourning“…Full CVLT Nation Review HERE!

1. MALTHUSIAN: MMXIII

So a little time back, we stumbled upon Hallucinogen, the first track ever thrown to the masses by Irish black metal bastards MATHUSIAN  and as you could probably tell, we were quite blown the fuck away by the senseless overload of wrath and face-ripping evil the song delivered. I mean, if you go back and listen to it here, you will realize what we’re talking about. This band simply came into this world to scare you shitless and throw you into a dungeon of fear, covered in your own feces and urine while you tremble in fear, with your head in your hands, losing all control of your brain activity and plunging into complete madness and paranoia. This music literally feels like Hell is stalking you, like demons are coming after you. And sure enough, after unleashing that song, the band announced its obvious “container” and is now preparing to deliver their first complete work, MMXIII, a debut EP comprised of 3 blasts of annihilating and terrifying uber-structured black/death metal out now on Invictus Productions.

We gave MMXIII a spin, and sure enough, it creeped us the fuck out with its insane overload of evil and uncontrollable rage. The cool thing about this band is that it couldn’t give a shit less about sounding like “trve” black metal, with a very raw, crappy and stripped down sound. Instead, Malthusian have opted for a production quality that yields enormous quantities of destruction and wrath and which derives much of its annihilating potency from the nearby realms of surreal and grotesque technical death metal. In fact, everything in this EP sounds beautifully layered and dense, almost labyrinth-like, and the sound comes out with the intensity and presence of a fucking cataclysm. If you liked the insanely complex and enveloping song structures of more evolved extreme metal bands like Ulcerate and Deathspell Omega, then you will love this shit, as Mathusian as well have opted for a formula that has at its core the primary urge to gobble the listener into an enormous embrace of blackened majesty and throw you into a labyrinth of complete sonic annihilation…Full CVLT Nation Review HERE!