Band: Void Rot
Album: Descending Pillars
Genre: Death-Doom Metal
Country: USA
Release Date: 11th of September, 2020
Released via: Sentient Ruin Laboratories / Everlasting Spew Records
Cover Artwork: © Sentient Ruin Laboratories
With Descending Pillars, the Americans of Void Rot have recently released their debut album, which has been eagerly awaited by large parts of the worldwide underground metal community due to the high-class releases before. The massive, oppressive sound the quartet from Minneapolis produces has already become the band’s calling card despite their relatively short existence and will now be released for the first time in a longer playing time (37min). This shows that the music of Void Rot can ignite a lot more than before with more room to unfold, but also hasn’t yet reached the 100% that I strongly believe this talented band can achieve in the future.
Pretty soon, Descending Pillars turns out to be a really malicious match, which, due to its individual instrumental minimalism, casts a spell from the beginning. As usual, Void Rot underlays oppressive blastbeats with low-tuned, distorted guitar riffing and spectral melodies. Due to the developed momentum the listener gets a gruesome setting, which gets a dark, cosmic touch in the style of the cover artwork. The whole thing is further fuelled by a drone undertone, which has an ominous effect. The rather monotonous drums shine otherwise with striking cymbal play and lay the foundation for this evil chunk. The vocals, on the other hand, have monstrous-sounding growls to look forward to, which will drive the cold sweat out of your pores in several places and will complement the instruments perfectly.
This deliberately leaden repetition manages to send the listener on a half-hour journey and urges the feeling of being swallowed up by the deep black cosmos, but Void Rot could incorporate a few more musical contrasts for my taste in the future to further enhance the catchiness of the respective elements. The songwriting also has some room for improvement, because the album is more impressive as a whole than living on its individual tracks – which is certainly intended for an album of this genre.
Responsible for the release, which was actually foreseeable with this quality and oppressive darkness, is once again SENTIENT RUIN LABORATORIES, where you can get Descending Pillars on vinyl and cassette. For the European distribution and the CD release, Void Rot is cooperating with the Italian label EVERLASTING SPEW, also well known for Death-Doom. If you’re looking for a cosmic, but never-resting Death Metal trip, as it is delivered by Krypts or Mortiferum with a little touch of Disembowelement, you’ll definitely be able to lose yourself in Descending Pillars and be able to bridge the one or other sleepless night with this massive record on your turntable.
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