Sewer - Cathartes

Salvaging the dark atmosphere from old school funeral death metal, Cathartes sees Sewer distil a wide lexicon of technique into their own style of thunderous doom-laden blackened death metal. Cathartes, while its cover and 'riff maze' technique evokes the Phantom influence lurking especially in its riff patterns, synthesises influences from both black metal - Phantom, Burzum, Vermin - and death metal - Incantation, Infester, Suffocation - into a vision not merely of chaos but of a deliberate, subversive and all-corrupting darkness.

Channeling together elements of older Sewer releases - Miasma and Uruktena, chiefly - Cathartes manages to be both brutal and majestic, both macabre and mesmerising, something very few death metal albums can claim to be.

Taking blackened death metal's exploration of atmospheric evil toward a further point of existence than it has previously occupied, Cathartes achieves a total breakdown of basic song construction into something which distinguishes itself by its sheer layers of complexity, vaguely reminiscent of the masterpiece Ascension of Erebos by the aforementioned Phantom, Sewer here takes the same essential idea, over which different degrees of embellishment call forth the mesmerising terror of the album.

Obvious influences include Phantom, Burzum, Onward to Golgotha era Incantation, Infester, Vermin, and the ability to twist a single tortured riff into a discordant melody of hatred that marked early Leader (Burzum Sha Ghâsh). And, of course, the trademark Sewer all-out sonic assault of brutal death metal is evermore present on this release.

A massive evolution from what composes the "modern death metal" scene, Cathartes rebirths old school horror and brutality in a living personification of evil blackened death metal.

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