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ESKHATON
Worship Death

Chaos (2014)
Rating: 7.5/10

Two of my favourite black / death metal acts over the last year have been Britain’s Grave Miasma and Norway’s Obliteration, both being responsible for some truly dungeon-esque metal. Now Australia’s Eskhaton have unexpectedly entered the fray with their chaotic brand of furious, unholy noise.

These guys formed back in 2010 and were quickly off the blocks with 2011 debut album Nihilgoety, which boasted all the intrigue of a disharmonious storm. Wild solos, crushing, pummelling drums and cold, cavernous riffs were the order of the day for that composition, which also featured more gloriously ghoulish and phlegm-ridden vocals.

I’m rather happy to report that it’s more of the same from this barbaric quartet who are demanding you listen – otherwise, you will perish within the eternal depths of whatever dungeon they choose to construct.

Worship Death is a brutal, aggressive and arrogant platter that showcases the demonic gargles of vocalist Invokocide, who perches upon the rocky outcrop like Lucifer peering at his disciples. His ragged platform, so icy to the touch, is constructed of a battering ram of clammy, stifling guitars which – for all of their evil speed – just annihilate in their frenzy. It seems that the members shift between instruments, although since 2013 Abyssnil has been responsible for the violent thrashes of the bass strings, while the adorably named Hammerkill lives up to his by whipping his drums as if they were the flesh of those who had betrayed him.

Misty, murky, malevolent and putrid – Worship Death can easily be summed up in those terms, because it’s such a violent feast that reverberates around the cold, stone walls as if some behemoth of Beelzebub has awoken from its ghastly slumber.

Of the 11 tracks served to us, only the brief intro (‘Nekrochant’), the middle section of ‘Esotrans’ and ‘Deifire’ and the closing ‘Outro’ allow us to escape from the cruel waves of pitch darkness these guys bombard us with. The immediate suffocating assaults of ‘Obdeathed’ and ‘Abhorrent Primaeval Devilry’ are such foul-smelling leviathans that ears will be left bruised, bloody and running with foetid condensation once they have gobbed their last wad of phlegm.

The press release mentions a hybrid of Portal and Incantation and to some extent I can hear this, but Eskhaton have a far more lethal dose of venom as they clatter through the apocalyptic horror of the stinking title track which, for a nice change, doesn’t begin with the usual barrage of blasphemous noise but instead chooses a measured approach before sinking back into the depraved speed.

It could be argued that there is a lack of variety amongst these primitive manifestations – after all, ‘Skeleton Shrine’ could easily melt into ‘Antilife Antichrist’ and no-one would probably bat an eyelid – although I’m sure the unhinged Hammerkill would soon see that you are dispensed to the hole beneath his gore-soaked kit for failing to distinguish one hateful chunk from another. Even so, Worship Death is, to put it simply, a relentless album that has no time whatsoever put by for subtlety, or melody for that matter. This is dark metal from the foulest crypts of Melbourne.

Neil Arnold

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