Album Review: Foetorem - Incongruous Forms Of Evergrowing Rot
Reviewed by Sam Jones
I was very happy to see Foetorem would be releasing their debut studio album this year, having experienced their first ever live performance back at Kill-Town Death Fest last year. Foetorem are a newcomer to the exploding Danish extreme metal scene that has seen many of today’s hotly praised death metal releases come from. Releasing their first Demo last year they took up that slot at Killtown to a strong crowd and, less than a year on, Foetorem are ready to show what they’re made of to the world with Incongruous Forms Of Evergrowing Rot. Set for release March 27th having signed on to Everlasting Spew Records this is the band’s chance to finally stretch their arms wide and reel in a major audience. With copious levels of death/doom dripping and pooling in quagmires, Foetorem are here to destroy and defile.
It’s become a trend lately where death/doom records become so crushing that it’s actively difficult for the audience to withstand the band’s tone. Foetorem weaponise guitar tone in similar fashion, bolstering the scraping, festering miasma death/doom is associated with, yet their sound is never so total that it becomes something to overcome. Perhaps Foetorem will double down on the crushing aspect but herein their tone is heavy enough to believe the weight their instrumentation conveys, yet not so much that it renders arduous the listening experience. This is all the more essential for that imperative first time listen, where a newcomer will judge whether they return or not.
The variety in tempo and riff style is also welcomed for Foetorem guarantee fans old and new won’t be subjected to replicated songwriting with every track they explore. There are the trudging sequences where the band instil dread and rot and there are times when blast beats are employed, raising the intensity of riff and coupled vocals alike. But then there are moments their riffs will suddenly cease, are chopped up, breaking the flow in songwriting, which ultimately leans our attention closer. Whilst Foetorem play death/doom they remind us they’re of the Danish extreme metal scene and thus have listened, learning techniques as pushed by their contemporaries. Doing so elevates them instantly above death/doom’s rank and file, ensuring each track has a significant section worth remembering.
With track titles like “Escalating Rot”, “Peeled Face Mask” and “Rebirth In Morbid Disgust” one understands what Foetorem’s aim is and that’s to subject you to as grotesque and vile an experience as possible. Such aesthetic would typically be found in more virulent and explosive death metal, yet Foetorem’s stance drives home the sickeningly putrid tone their songwriting vies for. Should their songwriting embody blunt and heinous riffs, titanic slabs of devastation, I believe it’s innate horror would have been dramatically lessened. Through slower and purposefully deliberate means and riffs, Foetorem bring the stench of decomposition right under your nose as opposed to someone roaring in your face about it. The aroma is vile and every maggot-infested hole is discoverable.
Though the majority of Foetorem’s strength is conveyed via riffs and atmosphere, I love how rocky and uneven their soundscape feels owing to the implementation of drums and bass. Even as the band deafen you with tumultuous riffs, the experience is far from smooth. The drumming is immense even before blast beats are implemented, giving shape and space to every taut strike performed, and at the very bottom of the mix can you notice the bass drums providing the exciting, engaging foundation that the bass and rest of the band can bounce off from to your ears and back. There’s never an instance where the instrumentation hits a flat wall, and with these monstrous vocals in tow too the record feels alive and organic. Foetorem’s debut album feels like a great act of death in study, actively beholding a corpse rotting in real time.
In conclusion, Incongruous Forms Of Evergrowing Rot manages to be a strongly familiar sound in death/doom and yet feels wondrously refreshing. Foetorem showcase the importance of crushing soundscapes, albeit interpretable by the audience, whilst throwing in songwriting that’s pummelling and cohesive. There won’t be an instance throughout the forty minute runtime where you won’t know where the band have you. Their songwriting is malleable too, changing, developing and you won’t find yourself encountering the same style of riff throughout the record. You’ll find Foetorem can be blunt, discordant, erratic, sometimes all three in the same track. It’s an excellent debut full length for the band and another notch in Denmark’s extreme metal scene that is only going from strength to strength.
