EP Review: Damim - World Turned Hell
Reviewed by Daniel Phipps
Damim, who if you are old like me, you may remember under the name Dam has been one of the most hardworking bands within the UK extreme metal scene and not just in the music sense, check out the graphic novel The Bloodied if that's your thing which has been crafted by the band. They have been a regular name all over the live circuit and are now working with yet another well known hardworking name in UK music namely Church Road Records to release a follow up to the band's last full length A Fine Game of Nil.
Going by the title World Turned Hell, this new release is composed of two new studio tracks with two live recordings. The two new tracks start off with the releases title track, a glorious display of harsh blackened death metal made up of uneasy dissonant guitar riffs & raging and extremely punchy drums.
What’s always refreshing is Damim doesn't stick to a particular blueprint when it comes to their music, they include all the key elements of black and death metal within their music but it’s blackened death metal on their terms and does not follow a more traditional pattern with the style. The following track 'To Catch a Falling Knife' the band attacks this track with a more focus on a big echoing and epic style of writing before they unleash their more furious riffs accompanied by the good old blast beat. Vocally this track showcases how Damim uses more emphasis on pronunciation into the vocal style, it is not really clean the way these particular vocals are performed but you can understand fully what is being said and has a nice contrast with the more aggressive vocal style used. Both live tracks are clean recordings where everything is where it needs to be and they sound really solid and add a nice finish to the release.
This is a very nice taster of what one can hope will be the first of many new Damim tracks to come. If that’s the case and it is purely a taste, the main course should be extremely satisfying.
