Demonic Death Judge – The Descent (2011)

Rounding up the promo package we received from Inverse Records, today we have Demonic Death Judge and their highly entertaining mixture of Sludge Metal with Black Metal. Before you start frowning in disgust, you actually have to give this band a chance and listen to their very original musical approach. The only band we can think that plays something in this alley is Glorior Belli on their last album “The Great Southern Darkness”.

Opening with “Nepal”, the band fully explodes into some crunchy riffing and very hellish vocals. While this combination might sound odd at first, it slowly grows on you. The guitar work is very traditional Sludge/Southern inspired and the atmosphere feels this way, but the vocals gravitate towards another area. There are some very good acoustic melodies thrown into the mix that makes this song even more appealing.

One of the weak points of “The Descent” has to be the amount of repetition in the songs, while this is not new to the genre, it does get on your nerves when a song like “Churchburner” clocks in 7 minutes long. The experimental opening of “The Descent”, a 14 minute epic, is very interesting and breaks the monotony of the release a bit, only to fully explode into very crunchy guitars riffs. The production obviously highlights the guitars (and vocals) making them shine and drill into your eardrums very effectively. In the middle of this song we have a little experimental section that greatly showcases the band’s musical abilities and that show that they are not a one trick pony only.

The dreamy instrumental “Stick that in Your Pipe and Smoke It” nicely surprised us with a different vibe and a very interesting musical direction. As a ‘middle’ song in this release, it helps break the monotony and keep the listener engaged. The riffing attack continues in “Green Totem”, “None of it” and “Four”, but what makes these songs more appealing is that the band mixes some atmospheric instrumental sections in-between the songs making them more dynamic and less predictable.

Closing with “Shitgiant”, the band gets back to basics with a gritty song featuring more hellish vocals and crushing riffs but at a very mellow and enjoyable pace. This release indeed shows that Demonic Death Judge has enough quality to make a big impact in the future. The songs are nicely composed and arranged but they need to be a bit less repetitive and contribute to a more unified sound for the band. If you like Sludge Metal and are tired of the same approach to it, get “The Descent” and start enjoying an alternative take on the genre.

Release: October 19th, 2011

Country: Finland