The foremost kind of theme in the exploration of Death Metal has always been the horrific depravity. In its old school from, some of the most gruesome releases were made in the late 80s, such albums that made you shiver in fright while listening. In the present, new bands have been trying to recapture the same sensation, employing the old sound to their arsenal, returning to the primitiveness. Recently signed to the old school label, Unspeakable Axe Records, the Death Metal act SCORCHED unveiled their debut "Echoes Of Dismemberment". With a clear vision of creating a sort of a conceptual, movie oriented, album, the band was able to display a world that put into question what happens after death, and they are not talking about the bright white light.

"Echoes Of Dismemberment" is a contamination, untamed and soiled piece of charred meat, a dissection through the listener's mind, illustrating a horror B-Movie that could have only been conceived in the 80s. In a matter of speaking that is partially what Death Metal music is all about, the process of death and decay. Leaving aside the technical edge that became an integral part of the subgenre's mantra near the end of the 80s decade and right into the belly of the 90s, SCORCHED's deliveries are heavily straightforward, and in certainty, it would have sounded too obscure if it was otherwise. Even if in a broadened view, the impact is still not there, SCORCHED's trust in the fundamentals actually helped this release to take a hold more than damaging. I noticed a kind of a crossbreed between AUTOPSY / SLAYER / OBITUARY / early DEATH with a cruder edge of the Punkish swagger of NAPALM DEATH, which means brutal and immensely filthy. Two of the top notch elements in their music were the frenzied soloing and the climatic intros, to raise the heartbeat, made by a one called Phantasma. Without those synthesized intro, it would have been rather tough for the band to convince that one is actually in a blood dripping movie scene.

There were points in the album where SCORCHED proved their abilities above average, displaying shining beacons among the rotten corpses they were stepping on. "Autopsy Incomplete", added by one of those great creepy intros, is the band's foremost delivery, and quite an epic, a great shout out to old school Death Metal in its primal stage of evolution. "Dealings of a Gruesome Kind" started the improvement chain of the album, after the lesser inclements, a slaughter machine out of the rotten pit, pretty tight, maintaining the straightforwardness of the musical direction. "Rot in Confinement" is somewhat of a reprise of the previous mentioned track, surfing on the same vibe with a much heavier mid-tempo riffery approach. "Fluorescent Hell" emphasizing the excellence of the lead guitar role to the side of ultra-brutal basic riffery. Too bad that there are Death Metal bands that ignore that key element in their music.

It started slow and rather moderate, but later on developed into an example that might set away to come about with the old classics. SCORCHED still has a way to go, and I have the feeling that they would go forward.