#carbonized

[k-i-l-l-e-r-b-e-e-6-9]

[dustedmagazine]

Goetia — Mortuary Cult (Carbonized)

Photo by Travis Stone

What’s in a name? Or, in the case of DC-based Goetia, what’s in a subgenre identifier? If one is to believe promo chatter and Bandcamp tags, Goetia is a straight-up death metal band. All the semiotics check out: the band’s name is also (and primarily) the title of a section of an ancient grimoire, taxonomizing the 72 demons King Solomon is alleged to have harnessed to build the Temple of Jerusalem (that’s the “Ars Goetia” of the Clavicula Salomonis Regis, if you must know…). Song titles are almost comically on the nose: the title track, “Lanterns of the Dead,” “Bestial Tomb” and so on. The music? It casts a different sort of spell.

Check out the first nine or so minutes of Mortuary Cult, and, absent the above info, you’d likely imagine you’re listening to a crossover band or maybe a hardcore-adjacent grind outfit. The pace is punishingly intense, in part set by the excellent percussion of Nadia Tydings-Lynch (who also drums for grinding death metal monsters Blood Monolith, grind band Deliriant Nerve and powerviolence purveyors Brain Tourniquet). Vocals from Matt Scott are harsh but more hoarse than glottal, in the mode of a hardcore or crust act. The dominant sensibility is muscular and ruthlessly fast.

On the longer songs — like “Corpse Candle” or “Earth Inferno,” which cluster at the middle of the record — Goetia’s death metal ambitions are somewhat clearer, especially in the tunes’ compositions. The dive bombs come heavy and hard, and the riffage and soloing are appropriately gruesome. But it’s still the case that the sonic sensibility rides a (hugely pleasurable) line between crisp and ragged, an aesthetic well fit for underground thrash.

However we wish to split hairs, the principal object at issue here is the music. Goetia makes a variety of hybrid heavy music that’s replete with the excellent time the band seems to be having playing the songs. Their excitement is infectious. Mortuary Cult provides a listening experience that we could characterize as “fun,” if fun didn’t seem entirely beside the point.

Jonathan Shaw

[dreamsofconsciousnessmetal]

Discord Server [Weekly Mixtape 209]

Flagelo | Gutvoid | Benothing | Sallow Moth | Veilburner | Defigurement | Mors Verum | Gorrch | Nightmarer | Diespnea | Abysmal Descent

Direct Download [hold + "Save As"]

Music On This Mixtape:

Flagelo: "Rey de nada" taken from the album "Insaciable"

Gutvoid: "Umbriel's Door" taken from the album "Liminal Shrines"

Benothing: "Deathways" taken from the Benothing / Warp Chamber Split EP

Sallow Moth: "Arcane Benthic Umbilicus" taken from the album "Arcane Benthic Umbilicus"

Veilburner: "That Which Crypts Howls Grandeur" taken from the album "Longing for Triumph, Reeking of Tragedy"

Defigurement: "We Are the Worst" taken from the album "Endbryo"

Mors Verum: "Serenade" taken from the album "Canvas"

Gorrch: "Larv" taken from the album "Stillamentum"

Nightmarer: "Crawl of Time" taken from the album "Hell Interface"

Diespnea: "Necromanteion" taken from the album "Radici"

Abysmal Descent: "Obscured Visions" taken from the album "Dismal Thoughts"

[cunt242]

Carbonized - Lord of Damnation

[stoneoferech]

Swedish Death Metal

[carnage-dark-recollections]

~Carbonized~For The Security~Paradise Lost~No Canonization~Au-to-dafe~Recarbonized~Disharmonization~

[portrait-of-the-jaded-dawn]

Carbonized - Disharmonization (1993)