Label: Diabolical Summoning Records
Date: December 20th, 2021
Ok, since you joined my journey then now time for getting to know a new band has come. And I’m absolutely sure no one even heard a word about Necrobastard. Maybe except readers from the country of origin of these guys, if there’re some. But only those of them who’re really deep in the underground scene. You’ll ask me why I am so sure about this. Well, it probably will sound a little vain, but… I’m a big fan of the scene of Latin America and if not an so called accident I’d also never know ensemble like that even exist. This “accident” happened on some portal with videos, by the way. When I heard “Massgrave” I decided I have to write review of this album, what I’m doing at the moment.
In this case I think something very necessary is to mention some biographical facts here. Of course I won’t bore you with a full biography, but it should be cool to know when and where Necrobastard was born and so on. So, these four guys come from the city whose name everyone connects with the United States. What city do I mean? Hm… It can’t be too easy and that’s why I say it like that: this is the most populous city of California, but somehow its Metal scene even if big and strong is in the huge shadow of San Francisco. Anyways, this Chilean one is also quite a huge one where something like two thousand people live. Between them there’re also, like everywhere, Metalheads. Four of them decided to create their own music under the name Necrobastard. It was in 2007. And here some surprise for you – “Massgrave” is their debut full-length, before they released only demos and then had long six years break. I can only guess what was the reason of this silence. Finally last year the light of the day saw firstly a compilation with compositions from their early recordings, a single and just reviewed album.
It contains ten tracks between which you’ll find mostly old songs (I mean, from demos), but also some new ones. Musically it’s old school Death Metal with some Thrash elements in Latin American style, which means some kind of mix of the American and European (Swedish, first of all, but not only) ones with characteristic, let’s call it, way of playing, some specific feeling and stuff like that. You can find on here everything that should be in such music. Riffs are changing often and create rather morbid melodies. We have two guitars on here, by the way. Anyways, both guitarists have played in the band since its birth and as I know Orlando began even earlier his career on Los Angeles’ scene – in the bands called Agonizer (1998) and Afasia (2001). He’s also responsible for the vocal side in Necrobastard’s creativity. Of course this is real brutal growling we have to do with. But also because of the tempo which’s variable (fast or middle-fast dominate, but we also have some slow downs, too) it changes a little its character and from time to time becomes a scream and even a little clean singing. Well, these screams are short ones and in my opinion it only adds brutality and aggression to the music. Even if there’s one or another song where they take more place. Andres’ drumming is variable as well, too. He uses quite a lot of cymbals which I always liked and think it makes music more interesting.
In general, the feeling of being bored isn’t what will happen to you while listening to “Massgrave”! At least it never happened to me and I’m listening to this full-length maybe twenty fifth times. So the fact I have to write this review a second time at the moment (computer did a favor for me and decided to annihilate previous version) is something I appreciate very much, even if it wasn’t always like that. And surely I’ll get this CD as soon as possible! As I know it’s also available as a streaming, but let’s be honest – this is not for me, I need to have a physical copy, to be able to smell the booklet…. I know younger generations are into streaming, enjoy it and so on. Well, they have to forgive me for this backwardness and imperfection. I at least hope they’ll do it and will read my next scribbles!
