Asphyx - "Embrace the Death", 1996

While most people probably came to know Asphyx through its classic albums "The Rack" (1991) and "Last One on Earth" (1992), featuring the unmistakable vocals of ex-Pestilence singer Martin van Drunen, the earlier incarnation of the band actually featured a different frontman, the late Theo Loomans, who also took on bass duties for the early demos - most notably "Crush the Cenotaph" - as well as for the cult 7" "Mutilating Process", both released in 1989. The power trio, comprised of Eric Daniels (guitars), Bob Bagchus (drums), and Loomans, entered a cheap basement studio in Groningen, The Netherlands, in 1990 to record "Embrace the Death", a full-length that was supposed to be the band's debut album. Originally set to be released by British label C.M.F.T., who just put out another cult record, "Sumerian Cry" by Tiamat, "Embrace the Death" unfortunately never saw the light of day, since the label went bankrupt and left Asphyx without a budget to pay for the sessions; the band members then persuaded the studio engineer to tape them a copy of the album's rough mix and just fled, without ever going back to properly mix it. The album went unreleased; van Drunen replaced Loomans on vocals shortly afterwards, and Asphyx went on to record "Promo '91" and then the official debut, "The Rack".

Over the course of the 90s, Asphyx went through a number of line-up changes, originating different incarnations of the band; if guitarist Eric Daniels collaborated with Sander van Hoof and Ron van Pol for the 1994 self-titled effort, drummer Bob Bagchus regrouped with Theo Loomans for the controversial "God Cries" in 1996 (the latter will appear on this blog in the near future). At the same time, Century Media acquired the rights to the tape featuring the long-lost "Embrace the Death" album, gave it proper cover artwork (a fittingly dark and twisted painting by Alex Hermann), and finally released it officially in 1996. 

While I owned "God Cries" at some point, I remember not giving "Embrace the Death" a chance back then, since I erroneously believed it was some sort of shitty demo recording where you couldn't make out what was going on. You couldn't rely on Spotify, YouTube, or even the peer-to-peer software yet in 1996, and unless a friend or a pen pal taped you a copy of a record, you couldn't check it out by yourself without buying a CD or LP at your own risk. As a 16-year-old metalhead, I didn't have much money to gamble on records that could have sucked; therefore, I passed. Many years went by before I finally listened to the record, and funnily enough, "Embrace the Death" went straight into my top 10 favorite death metal albums ever, and now it's the Asphyx record I love the most. 

While some of its songs will be re-recorded with different lyrics and vocals by the van Drunen-fronted version of the band, this is the real deal; Loomans was a different kind of vocalist than van Drunen but equally brutal, if not more, delivering a possessed performance that incarnates his satanic lyrics perfectly, and I actually prefer him over his replacement. 

Although a lot of the material on display was written by the original 2nd guitar player, Tony Brookhuis, who left the band before the recording, Eric Daniels is a solid player in his own right, and his tone is thick and gruesome, complementing Loomans' distorted bass well. In general, the production on the album is dirty and rather crude, but it's far from sounding like a rough mix on a dubbed tape; seen from this perspective, the overall quality is exceptionally good. The band's performance isn't always tight, though, with a noticeable sloppiness, especially when it comes to the drumming, but technical prowess isn't that important in this context; it all sounds like real death metal should sound, unrefined and primitive, while not necessarily lo-fi. It's like an 80s horror B-movie: maybe the special effects look cheap and the film stock is ridden with dust and dirt, but they only add to that unmistakable charm that makes it so special for all the true lovers of the genre. And since I just came up with a horror movie analogy, it must be noted that the album's intro and outro music is actually taken straight from the 1984 movie "Children of the Corn" soundtrack theme, fitting the eerie atmosphere of the record very well.

The songs are among the best material Asphyx ever came up with, instrumental in defining the whole doom/death template together with bands such as early Paradise Lost, early My Dying Bride, Winter, Decomposed, and a few others; far from being a repetitive band, Asphyx keeps things varied with sudden tempo shifts and more elaborate riffs, alternating between Hellhammer-style patterns, sorrowful leads, and more thrashing or faster sections. If you're an old-school metal kind of guy, the chances are you're going to love everything that Asphyx threw in the mix on "Embrace the Death". It wouldn't make much sense to make a track-by-track here, since the album sounds very cohesive; it's a riff-fest, and the macabre melodies add an arcane, dramatic touch that combines perfectly with the dark heaviness of the whole thing.

I chose to revisit this album since I feel it's definitely underrated, even when compared with the more popular van Drunen-fronted Asphyx records. It's a grim, putrid slab of old-school death metal that feels genuinely frightening and unsettling and should serve as an example for all those who think that the future of death metal consists of sterile technical riffs, gravity blastbeats, and overproduced crap.