Ritual Necromancy/Fossilization – Split (Review)

This split is between Ritual Necromancy from the US and Fossilization from Brazil. Both  are death metal acts with doom influences.

Ritual Necromancy, (featuring a member of Decrepisy), open the split with a 15-minute track named Enter the Depths.

Accurately named, the band take us on a foul and grim journey into underworld horror. The song is a horrendous death metal monstrosity, and I mean that in a very complimentary way. Conjuring creepy atmosphere ripe with dark malevolence and brooding menace, this is not a song to play alone in the dark, lest hideous grim daemons be surely summoned. Crushing doom is wholly embedded into the song, and the band’s skill at weaving this around their death metal core is not to be taken lightly.

Enter the Depths is a top-tier track from Ritual Necromancy.

Fossilization, (featuring members of Jupiterian), offer up two songs, with a total duration of 13 minutes.

Exalted in the Altar of Insignificance is the first, and introduces us to the band’s festering underground malignance. Balancing destructive speed against a mood-based backdrop, the song gruesomely slips between paces with serpentine ease. With Blood and Feathers follows, further cementing my impression of the band as one with a firm grasp of both atmosphere and aggression. It’s a version of death/doom with a strong emphasis on death metal, allowing the band access to a greater repertoire of mood and atmosphere than they might otherwise have benefitted from.

Fossilization have impressed, and both of these tracks are as high quality as Ritual Necromancy’s one.

What a strong split release this is. Connoisseurs of the underground with a taste for doomed death metal should not miss this.