Burial Hordes
Devotion To Unholy Creed
7.5
"Greece is the word, is the word that you heard
It's got groove, it's got meaning.
Greece is the time, is the place is the motion
Greece is the way we are feeling..."
Naturally I'm not referring to feeling "Greece" in accordance with the wanky musical featuring d-bags and dizzy broads jazz-handing their way through tragic high school dilemmas. I'm talking about GREECE, people: the area of the globe responsible for belching forth some of the most eeeeevil black metal this side of the Phlegethon River. Remaining true to the set course, our Hellenic friends have slipped yet another filthy beast into the population with the deliverance of the alluringly wicked Burial Hordes. So, if your hankerin' to feel heinous, dive on in.
Devotion To Unholy Creed is one of those nasty little gems that just managed to float under my radar. And to be perfectly honest, my initial spin didn't exactly deliver the goods effectively. But oh what a difference the ol' volume knob can make! Once properly cranked, this record completely blossomed, revealing an immoral intent to filthify, corrupt and send me hurdling towards hell faster than a weak-hearted priest at a Tijuana donkey show.
The production is raw as dog balls, but still clear enough to distinguish between instrumentation. The guitar tone is muddy and strangely reminiscent of some lost treasure from Earache's late 80's/early 90's catalog, and riffing switches between frantic cutting and slower gallops on nearly every tune. Vocals are rasped and bellowed from muppet monsters of various sizes -- sometimes layered and other times spotlighted -- giving the overall vibe a bit of a classic Behexen feel. And while I'd say there's not much wrong with the more succinct, straightforward tunes ("Praise the Bloodcode of Hatred", "Infernal Necromancers" and "Hellborn"), things truly get fiery during the longer cuts that incorporate more varied time signatures and a couple of lengthy & gruesome samples (the epic choir alongside an obviously distressed woman towards the close of the title track, and the captivatingly corrupt Big Boss-styled croon damning us towards the close of "God's Cutthroat").
Devotion To Unholy Creed ain't exactly the most original black metal releases you'll hear this year, but it's a foul sonofabitch that performs its cursing task quite handily. I say pick it up, crank it to 10 and get ready to burn in Hell.
