Scalpture - Panzerdoktrin

SCALPTURE - Panzerdoktrin (FINAL GATE Records - CD 2016)

Old school death metal, which Scalpture plays on their debut album "Panzerdoktrin" is absolutely nothing new. Neither is the concept of the lyrics, which deals with the world war, tanks and all that machinery of death we know from countless other bands and albums. But it doesn't have to be original, if it's quality music. And damn, definitely "Panzerdoktrin" is a great and fun album, I always take a lot of pleasure from the listening sessions of it. 

I suppose that if I mentioned old school death metal together with the war themes, you will immediately think of the Bolt Thrower / Asphyx / Hail of Bullets / Humiliation type of death metal. And you will definitely be right about that. These bands must have had an enormous influence on Scalpture, together with the great Swedish death metal scene, with bands such as Paganizer, Facebreaker, Just Before Dawn and so on. Put all these names together and you will get the musical content of "Panzerdoktrin" described perfectly. As I mentioned, it is nothing new and the music is rather predictable and obvious, but I do enjoy it anyway. Scalpture serves us a bunch of great songs on this debut CD, all filled with punchy, aggressive and memorable riffs, which infects the listener from the very beginning. It's kind of a record, which will easily get into your head, it's hooky and yet brutal. It's not too technical or fancy, it's just plain, old school death metal, which focuses on both heaviness and aggression, as it does on melody and sort of groove. And I really like that combination, where some riffs are like a heavy cannonade, bloodthirsty artillery looking for crushing devastation and other time the music becomes a bit more epic and mournful. "Panzerdoktrin" is very well balanced in that aspect, so every song really stand out. What I like also is that there’s around 35 minutes of music on the album, so it goes very fast and never starts to bore the listener. And once the cannonade is over, you start to play it all over again, because you want more. You have no other choice, if there are such killer songs like “Flattened Horizons (Pounding Howitzers)” or “Embrace the Afterglow”. 

Summing it all up, it’s a very good debut album from Scalpture. Honestly, I didn’t know it at the time of its release, first time I’ve heard of it was when Scalpture joined FDA Rekords and did “Eisenzeit”, but it’s better late than never. And I have to say that “Eisenzeit” is also a crushing piece of death metal, I truly love that album too, so if you’d want to jump in the Great War trenches and breath yperite, get that album too. Scalpture is a really strong, impressive band, in my opinion. 

Verdict: 85/100