Back around 2016/2017ish, when the OSDM scene was just starting to pick up steam, one band whose name quickly began making the rounds was Ectovoid. Hailing from “Sweet Home” Alabama (Birmingham to be exact, not to be confused with Sabbath’s stomping grounds), this band’s brand of dark, suffocating early ’90s death worship turned the heads of many a headbanger who was eagerly “growing up”, quick to deny that they were drunkenly thrashing to Anthrax and Nuclear Assault just a year or two earlier. While this Immolation-core niche has since become commonplace a decade later, it was Ectovoid’s spin on the sound that made them a rising prospect of the underground.
Furthermore, to call Ectovoid blind worshippers of Immolation wouldn’t just be false, but slanderous. Sure, one can draw comparisons to such monoliths as Dawn of Possession (1991) and Here in After (1996), but at no point did Ectovoid blatantly sound like they were aping the musical traits that made Immolation so special to begin with. Rather, they were dwelling within the same void of hellish, obsidian-tinged despair: Tapping the vein sonically, but never crossing the line between flattery and plagiarism. This remains the case on their latest and long-awaited third full length, In Unreality’s Coffin.
Despite the obstacles that stood in the way of this album’s making, from personnel changes to global plague, Ectovoid have managed to pick up right where their ’10s output left off. Yes, it’s been a whole decade since we’ve last heard from this band, but when you have death flowing through your veins like these guys do, time is merely a construct. As always, the arrangements and atmosphere which dominate this affair are suffocatingly bleak. The dense riffage and unsettling rhythms harken back to the glory days of Immolation, Incantation, and Blessed Are the Sick era Morbid Angel, coupled with a filthy murk akin to the death metal GOATs, Autopsy.
Some songs do tend to lean on the lengthier side (i.e. “Collapsing Spiritual Nebula”, “Formless Seeking Form”, “Erroneous Birth”), but never without becoming over-bloated, pretentious slabs of prog death pomp. Even when the compositions are sprawling, Ectovoid manage to keep things exciting, thanks to their sick bevy of riffs and the overall intensity of their performances. There are also occasional hints of death/doom, most prominently on the closing “In Anguished Levitation”, but this is executed in a repulsive, Mental Funeral era Autopsy manner as opposed to the Snoozeville, I mean, Peaceville three (Nothing “gothic” or “romantic” on here!).
So there you have it: 10 years of pent up, crushing American death, regurgitated and excreted onto glorious wax for your listening pleasure (or displeasure). Was it worth the wait? I’d most certainly say so. Ectovoid still got it, fusing slime and shadow in ways few of their peers could even fathom. In this now post-OSDM age, where so many bands have either jumped the hardcore shark or folded altogether, Ectovoid keep it real, imitators be damned. If it takes ANOTHER 10 years for album #4, so be it. You can’t rush greatness!
7 out of 10
Label: Everlasting Spew Records
Genre: Death Metal
For fans of: Immolation, Autopsy, Incantation