Do you like pro-wrestling? I do, lots of metal fans do as it happens. Then again, some of my mates call it “pants fighting” and suggest I just like watching oiled up muscular men in lycra sit on each other. They’re wrong of course…..I was never “confused”.

Where am I going with this? Well if you are a fan of wrasslin’ stick with me….. If not, humour me.

Most modern death metal is like a WWE pay per view. Glossy, contrived and predictable. The same recycled tropes churned out by unimaginative writers who, in this PG era (where everyone’s a pussy and professionally offended) are scared to take risks. Most modern death metal is Roman Reigns!

Crawl however, to carry on with my ludicrous wrestling analogy, are ECW. Not the watered down post WWF buy out ECW but the proper old stuff…… this is “Hardcore Heaven ’96” and if Crawl were a wrestler they’d be New Jack or (my all time fave) Sabu! Their music is ugly, authentic, delivers the goods in an old school but nasty fashion and utterly crush the opposition……with or without Singapore canes or staple-guns…..

In Crawl, Indian label Transcending Obscurity have another great signing and along with such chair swinging heavyweights as  Paganizer, Henry Kane, Gutslit, Down Among The Deadmen, Ursinne and fucking MASTER have built their own must see pay per view that I’d put up against that of any other label out there.

This is Swedish 3 piece Crawls debut full length and is utterly crushing Swedish death metal….. the proper Stockholm style….. not the widdly wafty Gothenburg type! If you love old Entombed, Dismember, Grave etc you’re gonna jizz so much over this your CD case / laptop will look like a plasterers radio. This is corking stuff and a totally addictive cocktail of death metal and vile crust/punk and I love it.   Every one of the nine tracks is an expertly crafted weapon of death metal destruction, from opener “Reject The Cross” with its simple but totally banging riff all the way to album closer “Coven Of Serpents” – which at 4m42s is a positive epic compared to the rest of the LPs sub three minute, hairdryer to the face, gnarly Swedeath megabombs! This is a belting album, brilliantly produced capturing the savage raw intensity of the band but rendering it supremely listenable…… seriously, I’ve had this album for two weeks and I must have played it through about twenty times….no bullshit. If you like old school Swedish death metal (and if you don’t, you’re dead to me) then buy Buy BUY this album!!

Don’t be a John Cena, be a Sandman!

(9.5/10 Mark Eve)

https://crawldeath.bandcamp.com/album/rituals-death-metal

https://www.facebook.com/CRAWLSWE

https://www.facebook.com/transcendingobscurityrecords