Review by UnhinderedbyTalent for Black Curse - Endless Wound (2020)

To say that Black Curse are a super-group is probably a little too obvious a statement.  Members of Blood Incantation, Khemmis, Primitive Man  and Spectral Voice have come together and created a right old racket that mines the very essence of death metal from the bowels of Hades.  Taking all their experience and influences and effortlessly ascribing them into one scathing and bruising death metal album, Black Curse manage to provide us with eight tracks of various levels of savagery, pace and weight.

Within mere moments of listening to this I had thoughts of bands such as Swallowed and Grave Miasma as well as the rudimentary nod to Incantation also that seems to be part of all death metal nowadays.  I also get the atmosphere of Cultes Des Ghoules (particularly their Henbane album) during Endless Wound's more blackened moments.  At it's core the band's debut release is a blackened wound with a rather thick and heavy death metal scab sat atop of it.  This blackened edge is perhaps the most unexpected influence on the record given the stellar death and doom/sludge metal credentials of the assorted band members. But let's not forget that Antinom (Zach from Khemmis) has a background in black metal with Dagon and Dominion, as well Morris from Blood Incantation still being active with Stillborn Fawn.  Tracks such as Seared Eyes are chaotic and blistering blackened attacks that undertake a frenzied stabbing approach, maintaining a constant level of threat throughout.

This omnipotent sense of menace and danger that you hear is one of the key successes of the record.  It is a tone set early on, an intensity declared from the off in fact like some Teitanblood record.  Whilst never straying to a completely Revenge or even Diocletian style of delivery you still cannot help but be impressed by the relentless attitude towards the performance that these guys deploy.

In its slower moments the album relies on painfully picked strings to continue to build the atmosphere before the inevitable weight of the percussion section crashes in to cleave all sense of reprieve in half.  With its ritualistic whispered vocals the album continues to epitomise the darkness on all fronts.  Yet at the same time check out the catchy yet sludgey sections of album closer Finality I Behold that positively charges the track with a pummelling and memorable ending that shows the variety of influences on show on this brilliant discovery.