Death Courier - Necrotic Verses (2020) Review

The mere fact that Death Courier is active in 2020, makes an analogy case to a dinosaur coming back to life in the middle of a history museum. What may be the oldest extreme metal band from Greece, and arguably claiming the first death metal record from the country, is definitely part of the genre's history and the activity we're seeing since the last decades is by no means an irrelevant comeback. The name and logo have been kept intact, the music has been rejuvenated through the lens of modern production but the material itself serves as a reminder of how death metal sounded, when it had the simplest and most crushing form. The essence is in the thunderous riffs, the pummeling drums go along, songs in short structures and sparse solos around the place, with hardly any underwhelming moment except maybe the interlude in the middle of the record. Necrotic Verses is better than Perimortem. It's not Death Courier's extravagant playing that will win you, but the pure death metal bliss and character, coming directly from a veteran. And after all this time, a well designed artwork comes along too.

Listen to Necrotic Verses:

Death Courier - Perimortem (2013) Review

Death Courier "Perimortem"

Spring 2013, Independent

Listening Needs

Death Courier are one of the first death metal bands from Greece, formed back in 1987. After a bunch of demos and a full length in 1992, they split up, but one guy from the band brought them back together in 2009, adding two new members. So, this year, twenty one years later, we have a second album entitled "Perimortem", which means at the time of death, or near the time of death. It is a noticable comeback for the greek metal scene, since the band is of some importance in the history of extreme sound here.

The new album has clear production and it can be described as thrash / death metal. There is nothing extravagant about it, just plain and simple brutality with fast jamming tracks. There is a basis of a riff or two and every song is constructed around them, adding a typical drum line and solid growls. The production is pretty neat and there is a balance between the instruments, a major improvement compared to the noisy early recordings they did. Either way, its all a matter of taste on that aspect, some people prefer raw brutality with a noisy production, some other people like me, admire the clean sound new studio machinery can provide. The lyrics revolve around psychological sickness and serial killers (there is a song named "Rostov Ripper", look that guy up).

What i don't like about this album is its length. There are nine songs here lasting 1-2 minutes each, so we have a total of twenty minutes for a full length album. They could easily make a bit longer songs to add fifteen minutes more and it would not bother, because now, its clearly a short album to listen to. Its even shorter than the tradition of modern brutal death metal bands to make twenty five minute albums that are also considered consise for me. Apart from that, i enjoyed the songs and its nice to see these guys playing again.

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DAMAGE: [7.0/10]