Necrophagia - Season of the Dead (1987)^{Release ID: 12552}

For those that think Death's "Scream Bloody Gore" album was the first true death metal album (for the record, it was Possessed's "Seven Churches" from 1985), think again because the debut full-length from Ohio's Necrophagia entitled "Season Of The Dead" beat them to the punch by a good three months & came armed with the gory horror movie themes & palm-muted tremolo-picked riffage that would go on to become a trademark of the genre.

Killjoy's vocals might not be as deep & monster-like as modern death grunters go for but they certainly sit within death metal guidelines in my opinion & are similar to those of Mike Browning (Morbid Angel/Nocturnus) & Henry Veggian (Revenant). Unfortunately they do represent the most annoying part of the album though as some of the good work that's done by the instrumentalists is undone by some unusually random phrasing that seems almost improvised at times. In fact, it often sounds like he's growling away over a completely different song but the moments when he's on the money are some of the album's highlights (see "Ancient Slumber). 

As with most early death metal, we still get our fair share of thrashy Slayer worship here at times but this is generally offset by a grisly death metal atmosphere which is occasionally enhanced by the use of horror movie cinematics. It's interesting that Necrophagia aren't averse to slowing things down a bit for the odd doomy passage with the darkness turned up to ten & it's easy to see where a band like Autopsy might have picked up on that concept. I can't say that I'm a fan of the bizarre experimental sections that pop up on a couple of tracks such as the twisted circus-style parts of opening track "Forbidden Pleasure" which is presumably supposed to tie in with the zombie flick themes. It sounds particularly random to me.

The production doesn't do the album any favours & it would have been good to hear how this would have sounded with a little more emphasis being placed on the rhythm guitars. There's a lot of bass in the mix & it highlights a pretty decent performance from Bill James. Larry Madison's guitar solos have a serious similarity to the style that Morbid Angel's Trey Azagthoth was pushing at the time & it's an interesting question as to who influenced who here given that Necrophagia had been around for a good four years by this stage. I've never heard Necrophagia's demo tapes so I can't say for sure but I suspect that Trey is safe in this respect.  

There are some strange cut-&-paste style drop-ins scattered across the tracklisting where it's very clear that two disparate recordings have been pasted together in a haphazard manner & it can sound a little jarring at times but overall I still find "Season Of The Dead" to be an enjoyable listen all these years later. It's an important (if inessential) part of the death metal story.

For fans of: Revenant, early Morbid Angel/Autopsy.