Album Review: Ancient Malice - Accept the Vile Gifts of the Dead : The Razor's Edge

Album Review: Ancient Malice - Accept the Vile Gifts of the Dead

Reviewed by Dan Barnes

After twenty-years with Dublin grinders, Abaddon Incarnate, guitarist Stephen Maher picked up his guitar and exited, immediately forming Ancient Malice with ex-Coldwar bassist, Ian Lawless and drummer Adam Power.

The trio have wasted no time in getting some tunes on tape with a couple of demos seeing the light of day in February this year. Both of those tracks have been tweaked and have found their way onto Accept the Vile Gifts of the Dead, the band’s independently-issued debut record, which serves as an introduction to this new band of old road dogs.

The first demo is the opening tune, Horns of BLZBVB, which begins as though you are being sucked into a vortex. It’s raw and unpolished, but all the better for it. There’s a certain DIY aesthetic on show, old school death metal as it originally sounded, with crashing drums and filthy guitars. Stephen, who provides the vocals, blurts bile with every syllable.

Persistent Grave’s haunting opening gives way to a barrage of whirling aggression and huge slabs and chaos, based around simple riffs played to pin-point accuracy, the combination of frenzied drumming and swirling guitar patterns are strikingly effective. Lethal Retribution has Ian’s bass rising to the fore, while Cyst of Malaise is both slammingly demonic and just a little bit groovy. The blasting is dealt with by Contusion’s brief but memorable execution

The other demo shows Ancient Malice’s more death grind side, though Endless Conflict begins with a slow and doomy procession, Sabbath darkness (RIP Ozzy) and trademark Iommi trills, it gives way to a meeting of tempos, as the battle for the song’s soul is played out before us.

Mircrodot and Infocancer are nine and six second grinds respectively and the excellent Toiling in Glass Castles is barely two-minutes long but is loaded with brutal blasts, a blistering pace and a mammoth breakdown.

The record ends in much the same manner in which it began, with the – relatively – epic five-minute coda that is Atavistic Genocide. Starting with a soundbite from one of the Hellraiser films, the closing track takes us back to the raw sound of Horns of BLZBVB, while expanding on some of the ideas posited by that opener. Guitar howls and drums rumble, building an atmosphere that has threatened through the previous nine tracks. Textured and sometimes rapid riffing, all add to the impressive closing and if you press repeat play the end will take you back to the beginning in a near seamless manner.

It's almost as if Ancient Malice got that idea from one of Dublin’s other favourite sons!

Accept the Vile Gifts of the Dead is an impressive introduction to Ancient Malice’s grim world view, one that aligns itself closely with the early grind aesthetic of Repulsion and Eighties era Napalm Death.