HIDEOUS DEATH is a Norwegian duo of guitar and drums formed in early 2021 and, as of October, have released their first sacrificial offering. This four-track demo rightfully called Remnants Of Archaic Evil is 16 minutes of Death-Thrash chaos, that is straight to the point without any time wasted. There is a resemblance to some earlier bands like DEATH and even some SLAYER.

This is a short demo as an introduction, but does not waste time getting you into it. The first track "Desolate Plains Of Hell", drives you kicking and screaming onto the plains with high tempo and non-stop pounding drums dominate your eardrums. Intensely fast fills and rolls are all over the place in this track and the album in general, leading the guitar along at a feverish pace, as The Horrifier holds nothing back. The second track comes alive with a great entrance and in addition to scorching guitars, has some well placed rhythm that allows you to catch a breath. There is a lot of power behind this track and makes entering the fires of damnation quite tempting.

Moving onto the second half of the demo you realize that these tracks were not just thrown together and some work was done in some demonic lab to get them to where they are. "Thundering Doom", the third track, is a non stop tilt at just over two minutes. A thrashy pace on drums leaves you delirious and mixed with some dirty, crunchy sounding guitar, matches the title to a tee. As we reach the last track, along with the pace and tempo of the album, there seems to be no sacrifice of melody and has a place throughout the entire demo. "Remnants Of Archaic Evil" begins with a ghoulish howl and proceeds with some galloping guitars that match the evil growl of The Archfiend. As the thundering double kick gives way, the song then takes a bit of a turn from the whole album as the tempo decreases and you are left with some evil sounding guitar that fades out.

The album as a whole, holds nothing back and is constantly pushing on with intensity and aggression. Any old Death-Thrash fan can find some joy with this short fix of rampaging drums and fast driven guitar. The production maybe could use a bit of work, but shouldn't lose the early days of the genre sound, that really makes this release what it is. I would listen to a full length release by these guys to see what else they have up their sleeves.