Xasthur - Defective Epitaph (2007)^{Release ID: 5709}

The harsh and unforgiving sound of Xasthur is in full flow on Malefic's 2007 release. Recorded on an analogue 8 track between 2006 and 2007, the usual desolate and dank ambience is blended with subtle attempts at rhythm and slow burning guitars that painfully pick out some arpeggio like tremolo sounds.  Occasionally there's the ghastly, whispered vocals polluting the ether with their foul and nefarious intent still smothered by the dense atmosphere that covers everything.

The haunting and ethereal atmospheres that comjured here do possess their own surreal beauty and entice the listener into the malignant environment of the record.  Over twelve agonising tracks the album takes you the end of a tattered and threadbare rope from which hangs all the depressive notions of one of black metal's finest purveyors of the DSBM sub-genre.  There's little in the way of comfort to be found here (unless you are in a very dark place already one would assume), tracks are almost mercilessly drawn out as they baste in their own melancholic juices slowly cooking the life out of themselves.

As difficult a listen as this is you can't help but admire the effort that goes into writing, recording and sharing such raw emotion and melancholic thought that took over a year to put together.  If it is hard to listen to imagine how the artist themselves must feel.  Amidst the dissonance and the reverberating there remains constant structure and melody, albeit it does get a little too off-kilter sometimes to sound anything other than just poor musicianship or lacking in compositional awareness.

There's more than one occasion where things just sound a little too basic - which I get is sort of the point - and over twelve tracks this does start to get arduous from just over halfway through.  I found myself wanting the album to end a lot sooner than it did.  It is not like any sudden change of style or direction is going to occur to make you want to stay engaged for longer so the predicatbility factor is quite high here.  If you like your music to feel like some wet fabric draped over you, slightly inducing a sense of panic and cloying at your throat with talons of jagged misery then this is right up your street.