Behold the sound of an ancient and arcane void that vomits forth a guttural pestilence that at once corrupts and enraptures our very souls. Driving down-tuned, atonal angular sew saw guitars. Bestial subsonic heavily distorted bass that clashes with a tribal constantly changing and thunderous drum. All fighting for ascendency to gain prominence only to be subjugated at the heel of a vocal that crushes all before it. BEHOLD THE GREAT CONJURATION.
Heads for the dead have for some time now been a constant on my week-to-week playlists. A multi-national enterprise that has produced 2 albums and one EP, the EP Slash and Roll was for me the stand-out production of 2021. The guys have many things in common with me. A love of extreme and interesting metal, and a deep love of horror movies, so as often as they can they throw in nods to horror movies some more subtle than others. A dark foreboding nightmare-inducing maelstrom drenched in the blood of the innocent and so heavy in parts it takes HEAVY to new levels. After the first listen I had to take a rest from it as it felt like I had been picked up and thrown from wall to wall as a rag doll shook in the jaws of a beast from the very depths of hell. Its relentless driving rhythms are punctuated by icy staccato minimalist guitar and a guttural vocal belching forth vitriol and despair.
I feel very at home with bands like this as they themselves are products of late-night cinema and underground celluloid trawling that unearthed hidden gems that balance on either side of society’s moral compass. From the relative normality of John Carpenters’ 1980 version of James Herbert’s 1975 novel The Fog that closes out this record, which continues their love of Carpenters movies Halloween and The Thing, that screamed from the very groves of Slash and Roll. Along with subtler references to Hershel Gordon Lewis, the godfather of gore and Lucio Fulci’s 70’s Italian extreme cinema, this clever and not-so-subtle band clearly shows their influences both musically and artistically for all to see and hear.
So if you’re wanting thunderous, enigmatic, and beautifully brutal modern metal that will engage you right to the end this is it. Not many bands these days are as inventive within a tight and sometimes restrictive musical format.
Heads For The Dead are quite clearly HEADS above the rest of the crowd right at this moment. Yes, Horror themed extreme metal might be a niche market but here’s a big but why should it be.
Is heavy metal not already so influenced by the darker side of humanity, if you agree with this wildly obtuse and verbose statement then these guys should be at the vanguard of a new and more interesting musical direction? And I for one am right there with them Video Nasty in hand and hunting for my uncle’s VHS machine the one that had crystal clear Freeze Frame.
Heads For The Dead: Facebook
Release Year: 2022
Label: Transcending Obscurity Records
Category: Album
Country: International
Reviewed by Tony Evans
