Album Review: Graveripper - Seasons Dreaming Death
An album so good we reviewed it twice!
Check out Matt and Carl's thoughts below!
Album Review: Graveripper - Seasons Dreaming Death
Reviewed by Matthew Williams
If you are looking for a record that is a thirty three minute ballistic assault on your senses, then you need to stop right now, and listen to the debut record from Indianapolis band Graveripper. After releasing their blistering EP, 'Radiated Remains' in 2021, which was mastered by Joel Grind from Toxic Holocaust, the quartet return with more crypt-crushing black thrash.
'Seasons Dreaming Death' is faster, heavier and catchier than their previous offering, with more emphasis on blackened melody, with guitarist/vocalist Corey Parks describing their songwriting approach for this album with two words “refined expansion”. And it all begins with a ripsnorter of a opening riff that leads into the thrashtastic “Into the Grave”. If you like your music fast and heavy, then you aren’t going to be disappointed by this first track, just remember to turn it up loud and annoy everyone else around you.
Throughout the record you can sense a few different styles being played with, as Parks described, “we introduced more Teutonic thrash worship on the line of death metal” and these are clearly demonstrated on songs such as 'Ripped and Torn Apart' with the added bonus of a great bass line from Chris Pilotte, and the furious noise that is 'Divine Incantations'
With the middle section of songs, the pace in still unrelenting, with title track 'Seasons Dreaming Death' proving to be a storming song with the twin guitar assault from Parks and lead guitarist Keegan Hrybyk, showcasing their talents, while 'Premeditated', 'An Influx of Fear' and 'Resist Against the Light' demonstrating their ability to play some straightforward malicious black metal with riffs aplenty.
With more room to introduce new arrangements, ideas and themes with a full length offering, the band are clearly having a lot of fun with this record, with the seemingly indefatigable drummer Jacob Lett pounding some serious beats throughout each song, with my favourite 'And I Curse Reality' combining their love of everything thrash in one truly spellbinding song.
If you are a fan of Exodus, Hellripper and Toxic Holocaust, then you are going to enjoy this record immensely, as it’s a total headbanger full of aggression and anger, from start to finish, with final song 'Only Coldness' rounding up a truly enjoyable listen.
Album Review: Graveripper - Seasons Dreaming Death
Reviewed by Carl Black
Graveripper are mean bastards!
Blackened thrash takes me to my happy place. A place where you get to hear the most extreme form of Rock N Roll. It pushes you around and knocks you to the floor and laughs as it helps you up. Graveripper don't do that. They've made their own rules. Graveripper walked into my happy thrash and roll palace, kicked me in the balls, nicked my dinner money and pissed on the floor. Graveripper are mean bastards.
On the surface it seems like they follow thrash n roll convention. thirty three minutes, ten songs, all seems fine. But this debut from these Hoosiers is far removed. Throughout the record it fuses thrash and black metal with the swing of rock n roll. This is the most extreme rock n roll album you will hear this year. Jerry Lee never knew it would be like this. The riffs are basic but massive, be it a thrash part, a black metal part or a rock part. The half an hour is utterly relentless and never lets up. It's definitely a Sprint and not a marathon.
The riff arrangements also challenge the norm. It's not a case of verse - chorus - verse blindly followed. These songs keep you guessing.
Opening track 'Into the Grave' does exactly that. Dirty verse, open chorus, and then something different at the end while still maintaining the blackened black thrash mission statement. As you move through the album you receive one kicking after another, 'Ripped and Torn' starts fast but ends slow. The album’s title track is thunderous with a great ending. 'Divine Incantation' almost tips fully into black metal, but not quite. Watch out for the massive break down in 'An Influx of Fear'. It's so big you might fall through. 'And I Curse Reality' has a bass riff to die for, which is handy because the song may well end it for you. If you can only stomach one song to truly understand what Graveripper do than drop 'Resist Against the Light'. It sums up nicely what these hard bastards do.
It's only their debut so one would assume that there is plenty of gas in the tank. I'm hoping for another assault very soon. A tour will no doubt be upcoming. Who they would tour with I don't know. With them being so mean they'd replace the Black metal bands corpse Paint with excrement, swap the thrash bands beers for meths and steal the other blackened thrash bands merch money.
Graveripper are mean bastards…
