Demonologists – Rakshasa
Demonologists – Rakshasa
Aesthetic Death/ Phage Tapes
Release Date: 18.04.25
Running Time: 37:01
Review by Dark Juan
Score: 666,666,666,666/10
Greetings, my dear friends. It is Dark Juan here, your favourite ersatz Extreme music hack, and I am writing here instead of doing my NVQ work for my job because it is a glorious Sunday at Crow Cottage, Mrs Dark Juan is at her studio creating yet more esoteric works of art and I have just put out the washing on the line, because only by using the elements to dry my clothes can I be trve kvlt. Tumble driers are for wimps and poseurs. It should be said, apart from my work shirt and some disturbingly fluffy socks belonging to Mrs Dark Juan, the predominant colour of my laundry is stygian black. Her socks, however, are pink and blue.
I am avoiding my NVQ work because I have dedicated every last waking moment of the past two weeks learning my new role at my employment. This has been somewhat challenging as it has left no time for music work, and I offer my sincere apologies to Demonologists as this review will hit some time after the release of their album. Unfortunately, having a job that pays an excellent rate to allow me to keep Mrs Dark Juan in the style to which I hope she becomes accustomed to requires sacrifice on my part. And I’m not talking about my preferred method of sacrifice which normally involves young ladies with alabaster skin being defiled on altars by yours truly, fuelled by wine and every single “party treat” I can cram down my avid throat. It has involved rather a lot of actual work and having to go and justify myself to the OFSTED inspectors in York. I don’t like having to justify myself to anyone.
Today’s offering upon the gore-encrusted Platter of Splatter™ is a band I have not heard of before. They are called Demonologists, and they hail from Indiana in the United States of America. Judging by what I have heard here today, there’s something REALLY fucking weird happening in Indiana. “Rakshasa” is the name of the album and Demonologists play music they have described as Industrial Blackened Noise.
Well, music is a relative term to describe the sounds I have just exposed my brain to. This is an utterly harrowing experience. I shall not describe individual tracks, because this is an album that has to be listened to in its entirety in order to be able to process what has just happened to my poor, abused auditory canals.
If you’re looking for melody, you’re not going to find it here, and you should probably stop reading now. If you are however looking for the nastiest kind of Lovecraftian horror, then step inside…
Demonologists do not play Black Metal, by the way. There is a lot of Black Metal influence in the music they create, but it is not Black Metal. It is horrific maschinenklang that takes its aesthetic from the cold wastelands of Black Metal, to be sure, but it is based on electronics. There are some truly terrifying sounds that you can drag out of a bunch of microchips. Frequencies that could rewrite DNA and destabilise continents are the order of the day here. Nothing is comfortable. If your spine isn’t quailing then you are trying to hold on to your gorge as it rises up into your throat. Vocals aren’t just vocals, they are invocations, they are communication from something that doesn’t have a mouth, or exhortations from the deepest bowels of Hell. Everything is disquieting, or esoteric, or just downright fucking scary. There is no respite on “Rakshasa”. It is the sound of technological damnation. Electronics spark and burn and scream and sear and the atmosphere becomes ever more ozone-charged and difficult to breathe, yet underneath the tang of it and the stench of burning insulation and the coppery tang of exposed wiring, there’s something else. It throbs, wetly, and it stinks like an offal pit in the sun. The stench of organic decay mingles with the crackling of failing electrical circuits. It is the endless grinding of machinery and rapid burst data transmissions. Yet amongst the circuitry and pneumatic and hydraulic systems, there’s sinew. Skinless muscles gleam among the metal, and they swell and contract as electrical current is pulsed through them. If you looked up you’d see the face of the Devil regarding you from above. But it is not the Devil you think it is. This is a cybernetic nightmare – targeting sensors replace eyes and there’s lenses which switch as it looks at you through normal vision to infra-red, to ultraviolet, to who knows what other fucking methods it has at its disposal. Ears have been replaced with high-gain audio receivers and the mouth is a colossal speaker forced into a gap where a broken jaw has been wired open. No discernible syllabification comes out of it though, merely a spine-chilling, unrelenting inchoate roar that is permeated with disgust and hatred for you, the insignificant meatsack, the unimportant bag of mostly water in front of it, at a volume that bursts your eardrums and leaves you streaming blood and cranial fluid from nose and ears…
Musically speaking, there are actually influences at work on this album. ‘FFWD To Death’ has tinges of old Earache stalwarts O.L.D around their “Musical Dimeansions of Sleastak” era, when they abandoned Death Metal for terrifying Electronic mayhem. There are also times where I can hear the influence of Throbbing Gristle, and The Electric Hellfire Club in their less melodic moments. There’s the bleakness of Skinny Puppy and the absolute, uncompromising rage of Unter Null in there as well. This makes for a listening experience that is deeply unsettling and more than a little terrifying.
Needless to say, I have listened to this at maximum volume and now I am not sure what reality is any more. It is also needless to say that I fucking love this album and think it’s the best thing to come out of the USA since They Watch Us From The Moon, and I REALLY love They Watch Us From The Moon. Over to the Patented Dark Juan Blood Splat Rating System…
…Which awards Demonlogists 666,666,666,666/10 for THE Industrial album of the year so far. It is challenging, frequently painful to listen to, not even SLIGHTLY melodic and utterly crushing and uncompromising in every way. It’s a perfect Blackened Industrial Noise album.
TRACKLISTING:
01. Rakshama (ft David Reed & Terry Vainoras)
02. Rat Piss Receptacle (ft Bill Moseley)
03. Nebulaeic Phantasm As Eloquently Dreamt By The Abominable Primordial Ooze (ft Andy Ortmann)
04. Autophagy
05. Wet Wings
06. Ritual Death (ft Grant Richardson)
07. Samskara
08. Tsuchigumo
09. FFWD To Death
10. Symbiosis Omen (ft Eric Wood)
LINE-UP:
Cory Rowell
Evan Price
LINKS:
Disclaimer: This review is solely the property of Dark Juan and Ever Metal. It is strictly forbidden to copy any part of this review, unless you have the strict permission of both parties. Failure to adhere to this will be treated as plagiarism and will be reported to the relevant authorities.