NECROPHAGIA Holocausto De La Morte CD (1998)

Before Phil Anselmo became their hype man and before death metal got clinical and polished to a fault, Necrophagia were out here dragging the genre back into the dirt where it belongs. Ohio's most depraved practitioners of horror-drenched death metal, they never really got their flowers, which is exactly the kind of thing that makes a record like this worth owning.

Released in 1998 on Necrophagia's comeback run, Holocausto De La Morte is a filthy, gore-soaked slab that sits proudly in the tradition of Autopsy's rotting mid-paced crush and Exhumed's splatter-obsessed carnage. Killjoy's vocals sound like something dragged out of a B-grade horror VHS, and the whole record has that murky, analogue death metal production that no plugin has ever convincingly replicated. If your shelves already have Pungent Stench and Asphyx, this one fills a very specific and very ugly gap.

1998 CD pressing. Handled with the reverence it deserves.

Fans of: Pungent Stench, Sinister, Malevolent Creation, Autopsy, Exhumed, Asphyx, Vomitory