Necrowretch - The Ones from Hell (2020) Hi-Res

Ever since Vlad saw the inception of the French Blackened Metal band in 2008, Necrowretch has been spewing some of the finest music of the genre. Having released several demos and Eps, the band’s debut full-length Putrid Death Sorcery landed with full force in 2013 and was swiftly followed by Bestial Rites the same year, which was a selection of music from the demos and Eps before With Serpents Scourge was unleashed in 2015 and then Satanic Slavery landed in 2017.

The Ones From Hell was formed in Istanbul over a period of nearly 12months and recorded as a three-piece in Brussels over a period of 10 days and here we have the latest release to scorch the earth.

Opening with a serene musical introduction to the track ‘Pure Hellfire’, you can’t help but feel that something is building, and as the suspense builds more instruments arrive and the sound begins to turn toward the more sinister. Then it arrives and it arrives hard and fast, with a scream from Vlad, the drums from Ilmar and the slicing guitars provided by Wence create a wondrous crescendo of Black Metal.

The pace is fast and the sound is raw and powerful, leaving us with no doubt that Necrowretch is taking no prisoners here. The pace hardly wavers, as ‘Luciferian Sovranty’ picks up where we have been left, with the rapid sounds of some incredibly fine Black Metal that punishes and would be hard for most to hear.

By the time we reach ‘Through The Black Abyss’ and the sound of the Spanish guitars greet us to the opening and the pace is a little slower, do not feel like this is going to be any less sinister than the rest of the tracks as here we experience just how haunting an instrumental-only track can be before ‘Necrowretch’ closes the album as we would expect, loud, fast and brutally black.

The Ones From Hell is a 37 minute no holds barred masterpiece of Blackened Metal. In a time where Black Metal feels like it is becoming less underground, Necrowretch have captured the rawness and power that Black Metal bases itself on and the fact that it would be uncomfortable to listen to for the average metal fan shows to me that they want to make proper Blackened Metal for themselves fans of this glorious sound that is shrouded in darkness.