With the audio-visual aspect of classicist death metal forms now fully mutated into revisionist generated tropes and with no certain purpose prescribed to the sub-genre the process of approaching a band like Helsinki, Finland-based death metal quartet GRAVE HEX offers no surety that the innards might match their outward appearance. In the case of their shorted n’ grime-shined debut full-length album the result is exactingly death metal but a simpler, modern version caked up with slimier hi-fi sounds. The strengths of their work are obvious enough as they’ve achieved an atmospheric yet barbaric ratio which we find in very few of their contemporaries and despite years of iteration. In this way ‘Vermian Death‘ puts a best face (and foot) forward as they deliver a wild sounding but altogether fairly standard ‘new old school’ result with decent potential. Still, there is no denying the impact of a huge guitar sound and a diarrhea inducing bass tone coming together for a brief yet well-arranged introductory statement.

Grave Hex formed early last year by way of folks involved in hardcore band Vainoa, sludge metal group Lake Vanda, and a former member of another newer death metal band Plague Vessel. Their collective resumes generally reflect upon the modern idea of ‘old school’ style death metal on tap here as purposefully under-thought and groove oriented sounds flow throughout. In this way ‘Vermian Death‘ buys into the Undergang and Autopsy-esque sensibilities one’d expect while making an effort to build some personage within this sub-half hour length debut. Presentation is key here in communicating some of this but this is a rare case where a nuclear guitar tone, a distorted bass to back it up (a la Morbific) and a few simple riffs at least gesture in the right direction.

In fact I’d initially tucked ‘Vermian Death‘ away for short review after previewing its sound and finding the HM-2 scrounging rhythm guitar tone and punkish throttle of key single “Vultural Scourge” a short and slopped-out whammy bender. Though there are a few of those easy rippers among the seven total tracks here the greater sound and flow of Grave Hex‘ debut finds a way to make a charming enough gloom-dozer out of similarly basic movements. While opener “Steeping Master Worm Flesh” is kinda sleepy in its death-by-numbers riffcraft it eventually drops into “Vultural Scourge” without flinching or pausing, linking the two songs together as their collective pour between ideas makes more sense in context. Though the punk-stepped bap of the beat and their mid-paced roll through is entertaining enough it is the slickness of the transition between ideas paired with the big-assed sound of the record (engineered/mixed by drummer Matti, mastered by Greg Wilkinson at Earhammer Studio) that’d impressed. That introduction could potentially be more inviting as a bombastic sluice down their gore portal as an opener should show ’em how rather than chunk through the motions.

The whole of this ~27 minute experience could be described as punkish to some light degree but not so far from the effect of the death n’ roll n’ grind era underground stuff of the early 90’s with Sweden and Finland in mind. This won’t be all that obvious up front as the riffs are a little too bouncy and “fun” as they gear up but there is a slightly more interesting atmospheric side to Grave Hex‘ treatment which shows up via their doomed/slower-paced movement. I was reminded of God Macabre to some small degree with this in mind but naturally the mood and sound here has a bouncy, lighthearted neodeath feel that would probably line up better with the debut from Murder Squad or something of that nature. “Den of Evil” specifically gets us there in its second half in passage through to the first half of the sludgy, Carcass-esque “Endless Impossible Constructs” which follows, another example of the relationship between each song being thoughtfully set and tonally sensical. They’re working with some manner of oeuvre here and not just seeing what sticks, so, this is already leagues ahead of many better known death metal bands in terms of flow.

Though the first half of ‘Vermian Death‘ takes a while to fire up the second half generally held my attention. The caustic snarl and whopping distorted bass guitar tone brought on the title track (“Vermian Death”) particularly help to stoke some additional eerie, menacing tonality beyond the two songs that’d preceded though the slugged-up riffcraft within ends up underwhelming. Slinging a few divebombs and that same puked ugh every band does these days likewise injects some ‘tude into the song, but again a big part of the draw here is just the sound of this record and not necessarily the minutiae of its arrangements. Closer “Halls Beneath the Primal Mere” more-or-less iterates with an engorged version of the same dynamic brought beyond “Den of Evil” and this is where Grave Hex impress most, bringing that doom and gloom to a colder, deadlier place. It isn’t exactly ‘View to the Dim‘ or whatever but it was satisfying to get a more serious and involved piece as the grand finale.

Grave Hex have the right idea here in terms of curating and performing something adjacent to classic death metal forms and standards, particularly when it comes to their sound design, but also per the imagery on hand. The cover artwork from Slimeweaver has a certain subterranean horror-toon quality which suits the muddier, groovier sound of ‘Vermian Death‘ well. There is a fine line between generica and simplicity in this realm and from my point of view what keeps it all from landing by-numbers in this case boils down to presentation, not only the look and sound of the record but how they’ve stacked the tracklist into tonally related portions. Otherwise my biggest criticism here is that a ~27 minute debut LP is more of an outsized EP, the whole deal reads like two-thirds of an actual full-length which is notably lacking for any sort of killer, momentum setting opener. I’d had a great time with this album but only for the sake of persisting with it for a bit and getting the bigger picture, there is yet a ton of serious potential here in terms of these folks showing up prepared with the bigger picture applied to a death metal album experience even if the songcraft is at-times hobbled by the dryness of the current status quo. A moderately high recommendation.

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