Coffin Mulch – Spectral Intercession
Release Date: 30th June 2023
Label: Memento Mori
Bandcamp
Genre: Death Metal
FFO: Entombed, Autopsy, Massacre, Death, Bolt Thrower.
Review By: Eric Wilt
Those of us who enjoy death metal, like it because it’s heavy or brutal or technical or bone-crushing or all of the above. Seldom do we say, “Man, I love that death metal album because it’s so much fun!” In the case of Spectral Intercession, the debut album by Scottish newcomers Coffin Mulch, I can say without hesitation that I love that album because it’s so much fun! The band isn’t going to win any awards for most innovative or technical album, but if you like death metal, well-written and masterfully played, I guarantee that you can’t listen to Spectral Intercession without a smile on your face.
Coffin Mulch takes its cue from death metal’s early days. Boasting buzzsaw guitar tone, pummeling drums, and tortured-scream vocals, Spectral Intercession is eight songs and 31 minutes of old-school death metal mastery. Not a band to depend on blast beats to fill every second of each song, the first two tracks on the album, the title track and Into the Blood, rely much more on 4/4 double-time drumming than blast beats, while Mental Suicide goes through an entire doom-drenched verse before the first blast beat makes an appearance on the album. Another thing that sets Coffin Mulch apart from other death metals bands is their spare use of guitars solos. Coming from a punk background, the members of Coffin Mulch don’t feel the need to melt your face when they can just bludgeon you to death with their raw OSDM.
Elsewhere on the album, In the Grip of Death and Fall of Gaia (which boasts one of the rare leads) will get heads banging and the pits wide open. Infernal Mass delves back into the realm of death-doom for its introduction, and Eternal Enslavement wraps things up with more classic death metal destruction.
Coffin Mulch writes death metal songs the way the genre’s forefathers intended them to be written. Full of grimy riffs and sickening lyrics. Fans of death metal are going to enjoy sinking their teeth into Spectral Intercession.
(4.5 / 5)
