After four years of steady improvement these Malmö, Sweden based old school death metal upstarts have finally released the hulking, rotten full-length I knew they could. Their first demo ‘Enter the Creep’ didn’t do much more than your average throwaway old school Swedish death metal demo did beyond a ‘grind’ song that I actually wish they’d recreated on ‘Corpse Defiler’. A year later ‘Howls From the Grave’ was a more serious demo that kicks off with “Puking Necrophilia” which is still probably one of the best songs they’ve written and thankfully they’ve recorded it for the full-length. That second demo showed both a reverence beyond Dismember and Nihilist towards the early works of Autopsy. The beats went a bit more d-beat, the bass took on a rotten rumble and the songwriting went ‘Mental Funeral’ whenever possible. My interest in the band really kicked in with that second demo and ‘Corpse Defiler’ picks up that gore baton and twirls in an even more crusted, rotten sound.

Hearing reworked and polished versions of songs they’d demoed before highlights not only how much I liked the varied style of each demo, but how impressed I am that they’ve made it all work as a full-length. You have your slow stomping Murder Squad freakouts like “Dust” alongside more complex Afflicted style beauties like “Puking Necrophilia” and “Pyre at the Graveyard”. I guess I’m surprised that a band who seemed less serious on their demos ended up putting in the hard work for a lengthy and impressive old school death metal adventure. In fact their debut is a full hour packed with the type of banging riffs that most Swedeath wannabe records manage 4-5 minutes of.

If you’re a fan of the Autopsy influenced school of death metal and love the demo days of bands like Carnage, Nihilist and can’t get enough of what bands like Tomb Mold and Mass Burial are doing then Coffin Creep should be on your playlist. Independent music like this is well worth supporting and this band appear to be fully dedicated to crafting memorable and truly rotten old school death metal.

Craving rot, demanding ruin. 4.0/5.0

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