Sarcofago: Decade of Decay

Sarcofago is a band well-known in underground death metal circles as a controversial Brazilian group as well as the first project of Sepultura's original singer, Wagner Lamounier. It seems that main members of the second wave of black metal also supported this band; Darkthrone, Mayhem, Satyricon, Impaled Nazarene, and Gorgoroth all cite them as influence. What a selling point that was!

But really, this deserves the credit. Decade of Decay is basically a compilation of songs throughout their career, exemplifying a raw, blackened death sound with a hilariously maniacal drum machine. "Orgy of Flies," "Screeches of Silence," and many other tracks even have keyboards. For a death metal record, there are some surprises...surprisingly, one might say. "Midnight Queen," is a, dare I say, pretty song - despite turning evil - opening with acoustics and synths and transitioning to a sinister black/doom groove. Definitely a highlight, but clearly influential, especially in the desperate, raspy vocal shrieks. Throw in a couple Tom Araya-esque, high-pitched shrills, a couple tracks with constant blast beats (especially INRI), and you've got a good time.

The band also understands that effective death is distinguishing, and thus a lot of this doesn't blend together, which is unheard of today, let alone at that time. For example, a couple more doomy songs "Rotting" and "Nightmare" drench the guitars in effects, giving the mix a lot of low end, and "Piercings'" many tempo changes are accented with style alterations, giving it lots of replay value.

But really the first 15 songs of this record has lots of replay value despite how arbitrary the tracklist is in regards to the chronological order (they get older the further along). The last five are really old, really poor quality but I'm sure many people dig them. At any rate, this still gives a broad view of the many avenues the band travelled in their short, adventurous career. Buy or die, as Fenriz would say. Or, as I would say, why don't you already own this?

Track Listing
1. The Loss of Innocence
2. Orgy of Flies
3. Hate
4. The God's Faeces
5. Song for My Death
6. Midnight Queen
7. Screeches from the Silence
8. Piercings
9. Crush, Kill, Destroy
10. Nightmare
11. Rotting
12. I.N.R.I.
13. Desecration of Virgin
14. Recrucify
15. The Black Vomit
16. Satanic Lust
17. Christ's Death
18. The Anal Rape of God
19. Satanas
20. Third Slaughter

Added: May 15th 2012
Reviewer: Danny Heater
Score:
Related Link: Band MySpace Page
Hits: 2057
Language: english

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