Review Summary: Blackened black metal.
One of the first black metal albums of the year is Devouring Famine’s debut. This name-your-price Bandcamp release comes with corny album art, low budget production, and - more importantly - mountains of riffs. Production isn’t everything, a sentiment that Devouring Famine hammers into his debut. The end result is an album that hearkens back to retro black metal releases, and the nostalgia it induces has left me a melty marshmallow.
Based on the light pa rum pum of the drums, one might expect a weak of the week release, but such is not the case. Shrieks on offer push sharp daggers into the chest, whilst blastbeats play. The riffs are especially good, icy cold yet served up fresh, so very raw indeed! There’s nothing fishy about it, it’s good ol’ black metal, hard as metal goes. I forgot to mention that Devouring Famine is a one man act. If you weren’t impressed before you should be now, because one might be easily deceived into thinking this debut is from a full band. This solitary human strikes forth, and brings surprising supplements of endless energy to his riffs. Tally-ho!
One drawback to mention is the minimal uniqueness of the album. It’s straightforward black metal with nary a memorable moment. The tracks begin to blend not long into the album, and attention may be readily disengaged. It is an album that doesn’t demand much but a few moments of your time like a religion peddler; the difference of course is I enjoyed coming across Devouring Famine. Perhaps the human behind Devouring Famine caught me in a good mood, or perhaps this debut is as good as I imagine; I'm leaning towards the latter. By no stretch is this a special, or groundbreaking release, but that’s part of its charm. It’s pure, underground metal from an unknown artist, and this one is worth listening to.
