DeathSlaüghter – Passing Through the Valley of Sodomites
Self-Released
Release Date: 03/08/2022
Running Time: 49:28
Review by Victor Augusto
7.5/10
Welcome to one more lyrical adventure through my useless writing about this musical world that we all love. Today, my adventure will be with for a specific genre that I haven’t reviewed for years. By the way, this is my first time exploring it for Ever Metal, but I confess that it was good to flee from the usual music and sonority that I always write about. Considering that I am not the most expert person on the team where Black Metal is the subject, I will start my words with an apology in case I commit any mistake or misunderstanding over my interpretation.
But before I start, I must mention a few details that helped to create my impressions about this material. DeathSlaüghter is a considerably young band from Brazil, but this isn’t their first full-released album. Let me remind all readers of Ever Metal that Black Metal is not a popular style over here in Brasil, despite the fact that we had great names such as Sarcófago in the past. Other genres became bigger both here and globally – after we had important names like Sepultura for Thrash and Krisiun for Death Metal, but Black Metal is still growing in our land, although I now see many bands appearing over the last few years.
Another important detail about the band in question is that they consider their style as “Occult Metal” and for me, it opens space for more elements that could be considered blasphemy for fans of the Black Metal genre. First, they have a considerably good standard of production for this genre and style. It is not the best recording sound, but we can listen to the entire album without going crazy with that creepy sound you get from some of these bands.
Maybe for the composition process, they enjoyed the kind of freedom to add things like solos, as we can hear ‘Karteria’. Right after, on ‘Bestiality’, we even have passages of keyboards that more reminded me of the old and good Hammond sound than a typical symphonic Black Metal keyboard sounds that appeared after the year 2000. The bass sound is very present and loud in the mix as well, which also escapes from the pattern of Heavy Metal in general – and it also has good moments of highlight like in ‘For the Glory of Roma and Sparta’.
As I said before, it looks like freedom is the key for them, because after the guitar intro on ‘Receptacle’, this song flows with a soft and even dancing cadence, like Punk Rock played in hell, with dark moments of screaming. By the way, “hell” and all other common concept words from this genre don’t appear a lot here and the subjects are about dark themes overall. One interesting thing is the absence of vocals. I mean, it’s not an instrumental album, but you can hear passages more like narration or whispers, but not so much of the screamed vocals. When we have do these screams, they are very hidden among the instruments.
Considering that they offered a reasonably good production quality, as I’ve already mentioned, my impression is that the band really wanted to have this sound and it is a positive aspect for them when we think of a group to create their own identity. For sure it is not my favorite genre, but if they achieved their musical purpose, it is what matters.
“Passing Through the Valley of Sodomites” is dark and heavy as they want to sound inside the genre of Occult Metal. The most important is that they have offered something with a really good level of energy and the proof of it is the closing track ‘My Descendants Will Kill Your’. They also offered material that non-lovers of Black Metal can listen to entirely.
Good job!
DeathSlaüghter: “Passing Through The Valley of The Sodomites” Full Album:
TRACKLISTING:
01. Passing Through the Valley of the Sodomites
02. Karteria
03. Bestiality
04. Serpent That Becomes the Dragon
05. For the Glory of Roma and Sparta
06. Receptacle
07. My Descendants Will Kill Your
LINE-UP:
Count Demönlust – Guitars, Bass and Vocals
Truesodomizer – Leads and Keyboards
Rudimentary Light – Drums
LINKS:
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