It’s always a musical cause for concern whenever an Extreme Metal band feels the need to sensationalize their genre (or subgenre for that matter). The Grotesquery referring to their sound as “Occult Death Metal” gave me plenty of uncertain pause heading into The Lupine Anathema (Xtreem Music).
I get it, the melding of Lovecraftian themes and metal so therefore its now “Occult Death Metal”. But isn’t the Death Metal tag alone enough to paint the picture in listener’s minds? Think about it, how many Death Metal songs have been written about zombies or The Evil Dead? Also, it’s another Kam Lee project. You know what you’re getting from a former member of Death and Massacre.
When a band has so much window-dressing my brain is trained to immediately expect the try-hard antics of Mushroomhead or Motionless in White. Is Grotesquery that musically bankrupt? No, but we’ve got to talk about the levels of cringe here. Spoken word piece ‘Advent of the Werewolves’ attempts to push along some sort of lycanthropic narrative, but it’s embarrassing coming from an adult man. This immaturity streak follows along in ‘The Faceless God’ with its lame vocal effects and in the cheap samples of ‘Dark Cry of the Wolf.’
But those indiscretions can be forgiven when Grotesquery drops the Hammer Horror schtick and really clamps down to the business of Metal. ‘Under the Curse of the Full Moon’ viciously attacks in an Entombed-meets-Deicide blood frenzy. And if a taste of Swedish Death is more your style, ‘By Feral Ways’ borrows mightily from At The Gates yet while sounding totally fresh. This leaning on melodic Death also makes a strong return on ‘As Death Dies.’ Now if you really need the extreme, jump to the totally unhinged guitar and drum assault on ‘The Beast of the Bayou (Night of the Rougarou)’ where Rogga Johansson rips out some string melting leads.
The unevenness and sophomore antics may be a bit too much for some extreme aficionados, but if you stick with it, the good outweighs the cringe on The Lupine Anathema.
6.0/10
HANS LOPEZ