The Hole – A Monument to the End of the World (Review)

This is the début album from The Hole, who are a Spanish Death Metal band with Thrash leanings.

The Hole thunder nicely out of the speakers with a heavy sound and crushing presence. It’s riff-heavy music intent on causing as much destruction and devastation as possible.

I’m not sure why but based on the album cover I was expecting this to be more commercial than it is, and I’m pleased to be mistaken as this is pleasantly brutal and harsh.

I think I was maybe expecting the Thrash element of their sound to be the dominant partner, but no; although their Thrash influence has its place and keeps the album from sounding stale, it’s the harsher Death Metal sound that is the driving force here.

The Thrash edge lends the songs a more considered side than if it was pure Brutal Death Metal, but nonetheless this is raging and storming music for the most part. Some of the riffs and ideas are actually quite inventive and the band strive to keep the album as varied and interesting as possible, which is to be commended.

The heaviness is offset with occasional melodic moments and the band know their business. A good amount of solos are played too, which is always nice.

Blast beats and mid-paced double bass sections force the guitars to keep up, and the bass actually has a presence in the songs which is good to hear.

The vocals alternate between deep, evil sounding growls and higher rasps. Both sound good; both do the job. Good vocal rhythms and structures are used.

An enjoyable and solid release. Have a listen to this.