{"id":72908,"date":"2018-05-13T00:00:04","date_gmt":"2018-05-13T00:00:04","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.metalforcesmagazine.com\/site\/?p=72908"},"modified":"2018-09-24T20:31:50","modified_gmt":"2018-09-24T20:31:50","slug":"album-review-hellish-the-spectre-of-lonely-souls","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.metalforcesmagazine.com\/site\/album-review-hellish-the-spectre-of-lonely-souls\/","title":{"rendered":"HELLISH – The Spectre Of Lonely Souls (2018) | Album \/ EP Reviews @ Metal Forces Magazine"},"content":{"rendered":"

HELLISH
The Spectre Of Lonely Souls<\/strong><\/span>
\n\"\"
\nUnspeakable Axe (2018)<\/span>
Rating: 7\/10<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

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Lovin\u2019 the album cover and it\u2019s one that matches the foetid, rasping sound within. Hellish have been responsible for a snarling brand of black thrash since 2010, scurrying from the cracks of Santiago in Chile and originally scorching our skin with a few demo recordings, a live outing and an EP before 2016\u2019s debut Grimoire<\/em> emerged. The Spectre Of Lonely Souls<\/em> continues its path into the ill-lit caverns, zipping with frenetic energy in true underground style. <\/p>\n

Vocalist Necromancer is still searching in the gloom for throat lozenges as he rasps along to the hyper workouts of drummer Cristian Le\u00f3n, who in 2014 gave up axe duties to patter the skins.<\/p>\n

The album runs for just over 30 minutes and spits out nine whippersnapper tracks that straddle the barbaric line of, say, Darkthrone<\/a>, Kreator, Destruction<\/a> and Sodom. You know the sort of thing; lo-fi, evil, fast, rusty, throwback, intoxicating, zippy and pinched. <\/p>\n

When on simpler trajectories the ratty ensemble drift into oily New Wave Of British Heavy Metal-styled musings, but when things get tetchy they become a maniacal gang whose compositions do tend to melt into one big flurry of caustic vibrations and scratchiness. However, Hellish does have a genuinely raw, street-wise snap to their gargles; not a great deal of imagination is required within this tunnel of biting winds as such roguish projections as \u2018The Night\u2019, \u2018The Curse Upon Us\u2019, \u2018Only Death\u2019 and \u2018The Walker Of Shadows\u2019 quickly become self-explanatory in their sooty and panic-stricken translations. <\/p>\n

What I really like about this record is how each instrument is given its own space, rather than the whole thing becoming a discordant mess. The bass bubbles nicely and the guitars and drums remain gutter-level yet tight. The harshness of proceedings is not a surprise to the system, but this affair rattles along nicely, emitting a foul, evil air \u2013 especially with the longest cuts, \u2018Souls Of Desolation\u2019 and \u2018Bloody Tales\u2019, which express leather-clad maturity in their playing and overall atmosphere. <\/p>\n

It\u2019s still very much scrawny thrash but with a layer of foggy heaviness over the top, and yet everything works a treat within what could be deemed a restrictive framework. There are enough rowdy bursts and chaotic strikes here to please anyone with a rabid lust for old school stylings and venomous strikes. Hellish is finally finding its way, and bringing the Chilean extreme metal underground to a new audience that should feverishly lap up their secretions.<\/p>\n

Neil Arnold<\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

HELLISHThe Spectre Of Lonely Souls Unspeakable Axe (2018)Rating: 7\/10 Lovin\u2019 the album cover and it\u2019s one that matches the foetid, rasping sound within. Hellish have been responsible for a snarling brand of black thrash since 2010, scurrying from the cracks of Santiago in Chile and originally scorching our skin with a few demo recordings, a […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[24,4149],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-72908","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-album-ep-reviews","category-hellish"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.metalforcesmagazine.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/72908","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.metalforcesmagazine.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.metalforcesmagazine.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.metalforcesmagazine.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.metalforcesmagazine.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=72908"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/www.metalforcesmagazine.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/72908\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":72911,"href":"https:\/\/www.metalforcesmagazine.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/72908\/revisions\/72911"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.metalforcesmagazine.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=72908"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.metalforcesmagazine.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=72908"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.metalforcesmagazine.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=72908"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}