Album & EP Reviews

Sorrow – Death Of Sorrow

Sorrow – Death Of Sorrow
Xtreem Music
Release Date: 04/08/2023
Running Time: 46:48
Review by Richard Oliver
8/10

Over thirty years in the making, cult New York death metallers Sorrow finally return with their second album”Death Of Sorrow”.  To answer why it has taken so long for a second album from the band, you will need a bit of a history lesson.  After previous forms and names, Sorrow formed in 1991 releasing their debut release the “Forgotten Sunrise” E.P. in the same year.  This got them on the radar of Roadrunner Records who signed them and released their debut album “Hatred And Disgust” in 1992.  Shortly after the album’s release, the band were dropped from Roadrunner in their great death metal purge. The band had written a follow up album during 1992 but found themselves label-less and unable to find someone willing to sign them. Dejected and fed up, Sorrow disbanded in 1993, relegated to the realm of cult bands forgotten by all but the true old school death metal maniacs. All this new material had been recorded during a rehearsal and after a few years of toying with the idea, Sorrow finally reformed in 2022 with the original line up intact and recorded the material they wrote thirty years earlier.

Being of the era, Sorrow are very much an old school death metal band but a good chunk of their sound is made up of doom metal aesthetics with a slower, lumbering pace and a bleak and hopeless atmosphere broken up by moments of death metal ferocity. Seeing as these songs were written in 1992, the material on “Death Of Sorrow” pretty much picks up from where we were left with “Hatred And Disgust”. This is gnarly doomy death metal very much of that classic death metal era with filthy doomladen riffs and plenty of groove, but lots of off kilter time signatures and progressions meaning that this album isn’t a straightforward listen. The old school death metallers will be all over songs such as ‘Judicial Falsity’ and ‘Someone Else’s Blood’ while ‘Doom The World’ and ‘Required Irrationality’ are more of a challenging listen. The last proper song of the album is also one of the best, which is 9 minute epic ‘Hidden Fear’ which is a fabulous bit of punishing old school death metal. The closing song ‘Funeral March’ is a bit of an oddity with a distorted funeral march on piano along with spoken word parts plus moments of noise and distortion. It is the weak link on the album and a strange way to bring it to a close. Closing the album out with ‘Hidden Fear’ would have been far more effective.

“Death Of Sorrow” is going to be a very anticipated album for cult death metal fans and it has very old school aesthetics sounding a bit rough and ready at times, much like the bands original material. Even though production techniques and standards have come a long way in the last 30 years, the album is not overproduced and has a suitably raw sound to it. It is fantastic to have Sorrow to make a long overdue return but the big question is if this is a one off or will there be live shows to come, and new music? Only time will tell, but “Death Of Sorrow” is a suitably gnarly follow up to the bands original material.

‘Doom the World’ Official Audio

TRACKLISTING:
01. Doom The World
02. Judicial Falsity
03. Remembered Eternally
04. Scar
05. Required Irrationality
06. Someone Else’s Blood
07. Hidden Fear
08. Funeral March

LINE-UP:
Andy Marchione – Vocals, Guitars & Bass
Bill Rogan – Guitars
Brett Clarin – Guitars
Mike Hymson – Drums

LINKS:

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