Death Metal four-piece, HORRIFIED, isn't having a particularly good time at the moment. Less than a month after releasing their debut, a Greek band with the same name stumbled across their Facebook page and they're now in the unfortunate position of having to come up with a new moniker. Which must have been especially annoying when they found out said Greek band weren't even active any more.

"Descent Into Putridity" is destined to be their last album under the original name then but even so, it's a pretty good send off to this chapter in their career. It's defiantly old school Death that's played with all the enthusiastic vigour of a young band who are excited to be in a studio. It's loud, violent, some of the lyrics are utterly revolting and if they ever play a stage bigger than the London Underworld, it'll be nothing less than a miracle, but we mean that as a compliment.

Songs like "Buried Among Putrified Flesh" for example, are not designed for mainstream appeal and they're so relentlessly heavy, it's hard to imagine anyone but the most ardent Death Metallers ever getting into it. The vocals are gruff and barely intelligible, the guitars squeal like big city boys being raped by rednecks and the rhythm section play like they hate their instruments and want to batter them into fragments.

What's more, it never lets up. Opening track "Tomb Of Rebirth" rockets out of the starting block like a psychopathic killer that just overdosed on speed and HORRIFIED stay like that until the final closing seconds of "Repugnant Degeneration". True, that does mean it's rather one-dimensional, but the sheer exuberance is still enough to carry them. Plus, despite the gore-splattered subject they're quite a likeable bunch of lads, mainly because the cover looks like a GCSE art project that scared the shit out of the teacher.<