Street Tombs – Reclusive Decay
Release Date: 17th February 2023
Label: Carbonized Records
Bandcamp
Genre: Death Metal, Thrash Metal.
FFO: Sepultura, Bolt Thrower, G.B.H., Discharge, Death, Slayer.
Review By: Mark Young
Hailing from Santa Fe, New Mexico, Street Tombs unleash their debut effort, Reclusive Decay via Carbonized Records. Consulting their socials, it notes that they combine early phase Sepultura and Bolt Thrower with punk legends Discharge and G.B.H. which as we know is a heady mix and hopefully, they have distilled a potent brew.
Wretched Remains starts with the classic thrash intro with switching riffs, pick slides and comes at you with trad death metal vocals. It has to be said, I get more early Death rather than the above bands, and that is not a slight in any way. It’s very confident and swings along nicely with some Slayer-esque solos at the end. Diseased Existence keeps the speed up with some neat little guitar lines and a consistent tempo that is fast but not extreme. Devour has some cracking breakdowns that just keep the interest going, and you can hear Sepultura as well South of Heaven period Slayer here and in Rising Torment.
The six songs here are well written, and they have a vision in mind of how they should sound. The guitars are not super heavy, and the vocals are a little bit quiet against them, but again that might have been the aim here, but for me, they needed to be more prominent. Each one has ‘that’ moment in it when you start to nod your head, which is massive and listening to it is a positive experience, especially if that 85 to 91 period is a personal favourite.
Overall, it has all the right tools ready to slam you in the face. Musically, everything is on point and reminds of later 80s / early 90s death metal. You get the feeling that live, these songs would just stomp you into the ground but on record it is a little bit muted which is certainly in-keeping with some of the classic releases from the 80s and to be honest doesn’t really distract from what is a good, even debut. The good thing is that they will get better, and we will benefit from that.
1. Wretched Remains
2. Diseased Existence
3. Devour
4. Rising Torment
5. Commanding Voices Of The Dammed
6. Volcanic Siege
(3.5 / 5)
