Album Review: Cryptic Brood - Necrotic Flesh Bacteria
Reviewed by Sam Jones
Sometimes you need to take a chance on a band you’ve heard of, but have as of yet never experienced. Today that band is Cryptic Brood and they’re back with their third full length album: Necrotic Flesh Bacteria. Formed in 2013 out of Wolfsburg, Germany, the band’s early history was peppered with smaller releases, a Demo here, a Split alongside Graveyard Ghoul there, an EP, another Split alongside Reston Humanos, and before long Cryptic Brood finally released their first full length work: 2017’s Brain Eater. The band are clearly comfortable with Splits for they released another two, one in 2018 with Minenfeld and another later in the same year alongside Anatomia. As 2019 dawned they would soon have their second album, Outcome Of Obnoxious Science, ready for fans and quickly continued to release miscellaneous material including their first Live Album come 2020. On the heels of their latest 2022 EP, Caustic Fetid Vomit, the band are prepped once more to release their aforementioned third full length album. Necrotic Flesh Bacteria will be my first listen of the band, having recalled when they released their second album yet it’s one I never got round to. Their second release, and first album, to be distributed through Lycanthropic Chants, this record is slated to be unleashed for November 1st.
We’ve had a plethora of death/doom metal releases over the last few years yet Cryptic Brood are unique in their willingness to gift us that similar aesthetic, albeit with a much dirtier soundscape. Death/doom is often stylised as this carefully pieced together, refined monstrosity yet Cryptic Brood come off as if it’s barely all kept in one piece, as if it’s always on the cusp of falling apart. In a way this is the very embodiment of doom, where we can feel the calling void just beyond our sight and so their production reflects this idea. It’s slaps worth noting Cryptic Brood’s songwriting isn’t composed of massive, sweeping riffs that bask in the time allotted to them; the band aren’t looking to use up unnecessary spaces of time that could otherwise be put towards another riff sequence or drumming pattern. Riff sequences can also be more sporadically shattered where we listen not to full chord strums or a far more methodical display of individual note playing. It is songwriting that’s much more technical than you typically discover within death/doom.
There’s also those sense that Cryptic Brood aren’t looking to take themselves too seriously which is genuinely refreshing since the ethos surrounding death/doom almost expects bands playing this style to take it seriously. This is my first exposure to the band, and it feels like what Municipal Waste would sound like if they suddenly shifted to playing death/doom; the musicianship and effort and discipline is there but you know outright the band aren’t looking to take it too seriously. They’re very aware of the subject matter they’re playing, and the techniques required to get that impact across. As a result, Cryptic Brood implement something death/doom isn’t usually ascribed for: Fun. Though you can feel the weight they possess throughout their performance, you can thoroughly enjoy the ride they take you down because Cryptic Brood didn’t wish to make their record feel like work.
In addition, the band ensured every component of their sound could be easily heard no matter where you are on record. Necrotic Flesh Bacteria sports a very open-ended soundscape that allows guitar and bass and drums to each flow one through the other; this crafts a record that’s much muddier and nowhere near as polished as death/doom traditionally is, as we’ve already covered, but it’s the fact that the band have given us the freedom to listen to something other than the riffs alone. The guitar work can sometimes dominate a death/doom record so completely that it drowns out all else within the band that could make a difference in how we perceive it. The drumming is this rolling and thumping presence where it feels like they’re hardly bolted to the ground, where every strike sees the drums jumping up and down out of sheer violence. Even when the riffs are at their most frantic, their most furious, the bass lines are still fully comprehensible as you can hear the minute changes made in the bass riffs, continuously fleshing out Cryptic Brood’s soundscape. Their efforts ensure we acknowledge the band as more than riffs and atmosphere solely; it demonstrates bands could learn, and benefit, to tone down the crushing element they feel is singularly vital to death/doom.
Arguably the most unique thing about Cryptic Brood, and this album, are the vocals. I was really not expecting to discover that Cryptic Brood utilise a more projecting, raw style of vocal delivery that is frankly unheard of death/|doom. I feel like it’s so unexpected that new fans to Cryptic Brood will be genuinely perplexed by the choice, but given their songwriting and the aesthetic the band make their own it goes hand in hand with their performance. A guttural, prolonged style of vocals would not have worked here and thus this coarse approach is much more suitable since it complements the stripped back riff attack too. The band’s periodic turn to Grindcore at times also helps the vocals’ place within the mix since it enables the delivery to be faster than one would expect to find and, since the vocals are allowed to be faster, it heightens the intensity of the band’s performance when the songwriting seems it necessary.
In conclusion, Necrotic Flesh Bacteria is a record that is going to challenge a great many people me concept of what death/doom is or can be. We’re so used to hearing death/doom be this extremely stylised, uniformed soundscape that when a band comes along and honestly throws up something unique, it’s odd to hear. But the band are certainly death/doom albeit an approach that isn’t regularly adopted. It doesn’t need to be overtly crushing at every moment as Cryptic Brood demonstrate: it doesn’t need to be refined to the point of breaking as Cryptic Brood demonstrate; the full band deserve to be heard and comprehended on a death/doom record as Cryptic Brood demonstrate. The record here is a far more dirty and unkempt example of death/doom that’s genuinely surprising to hear, but it can only be advantageous to the band since no other act to my knowledge utilises this subgenre like Cryptic Brood do. It’s great to know that in 2024 we can still find bands looking to push the envelope and enact songwriting that still surprises and enthrals us.
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