God Disease - Doom Howler / Abyss Cathedral

GOD DISEASE - Doom Howler / Abyss Cathedral (SOUTH FROM HERE Records - CD 2016)

God Disease is new band from Helsinki and they’re another killer death metal act that I really want to recommend you. They have done one demo “Crawling Out of the Coffin” in 2013 and then a couple of EPs, which both have now been released on CD under their common title “Doom Howler / Abyss Cathedral” (by new French label South from Here Records). Well, I can only applause such nice choices and admit with all my honesty that I truly enjoyed this CD. It’s one of those albums that fit your musical taste so perfectly that they’re almost easily listenable, even if we speak of death metal band. It surely is very enjoyable and solid stuff, once I started to play it, this CD didn’t come out of my CD player for few days and believe me, I played it loud haha! This is how you recognize great and solid albums from mediocrity. If you play something mediocre, you don’t remember about it next day, right?

Of course there’s nothing exceptional and sophisticated about God Disease. This is pure, old school death metal, you know? So, don’t expect fancy fireworks or fashionable hipster shit from it. But it’s damn well played and recorded, and more so, these songs crush! Most of the stuff on “Doom Howler / Abyss Cathedral”, doesn’t matter which part of it we speak of, is oriented on the doomy, heavy death metal, which combines that heaviness and brutality with some awesome melodic accents, which you can hear here and there. Obviously the comparisons to old Finnish scene comes quickly. I definitely can trace Funebre, Convulse and Demigod in God Disease, along with some Swedish stuff like Eternal Darkness. These comparisons are no shame though, as for sure God Disease are better than many other bands around these days.

Already the opening song “Doom Howler” proves that it’s gonna be a real old school death metal feast. I love how these riffs crawl slowly out of the dark, coming closer and closer, so that you start to feel horrified. Soon they start to suffocate you with sadistic pleasure and you realize there’s no turning back. Damn nice! “Maggots” is faster, more aggressive and straight forward, but “Necromancer” comes back to what I like the most: slow, sluggish, massive shit! Somewhere in the middle you’re treated with a nice Entombed cover and then the second EP “Abyss Cathedral” starts. It was recorded a year before “Doom Howler”, but you won’t feel much difference, when speaking of the great quality of songs. Only the production is a bit rawer, but I like it anyway. And again, the first song kicks ass. “Sepulchral Swamp” sounds incredible, with the best melodies here, reminding me even old Paradise Lost. Following tracks leave no doubt that this is just excellent stuff and the culmination and high peak comes with absolutely amazing “Abyss Cathedral”, the best song from the whole CD in my opinion.

Yeah, I just feel happy that I had a chance to get to know God Disease. And I just want to recommend them to you, trust me, if you like old school death metal, with nice doomy touch then you’ll love those Finnihs basterds. Yeah, hope to hear more from them soon.

Standout tracks: “Abyss Cathedral”, “Doom Howler”, “Sepulchral Swamp”, “Crush the Believer”

Final rate: 80/100