Had – Had (Dark Descent Records. 2020).

Had – Had (Dark Descent Records. 2020).

In recent years, Denmark has vomited forth numerous killer Death Metal bands, and Had, a project consisting of members of Sulphurous and Deiquisitor, is no exception. The assault is relentless and unabated, with killer riffs and hammering drums bursting forth right from the start of the first song Et dyrisk ondt ønske mod alt og alle, with some earth-shattering heavy, doomy riff briefly around the 2-minute mark before a return to the frantic assault. That doomy section around the 2-minute mark seems to be possessed by some macabre majesty, as if you are in the presence of Death in all of its terrifying glory. This same sense of the dread magnificence of the Reaper is invoked in the following song Ler i dødelig smerte, where around the 3:30 mark, which adds to the morbid atmosphere of the song, which captures the terrifying, macabre feeling of some ancient chapel turned into a catacomb. This EP is imbued with a morbidity unfettered by flesh, as whilst it feels putrid and evil, this evokes more of a feeling of the worship of Death rather than an evening of grave robbing. Or, to try and explain in a different manner, the atmosphere evoked by this album is more of the catacomb or the charnel house rather than the lair of the serial killer or the grave with a rancid corpse. The songs are hymns to Death himself in his skeletal form, with no sign of life or flesh. This comes to the fore in the final song, Skingrer de døendes pinefulde skrig, around the 1:30 mark, before you are swept up again in the whirlwind, or as you are being drowned in darkness with crushing mid-paced riffs around the 3:40 mark, that are evoke the shadows of Gehennah and a mental vista of subterranean realms decorated with bones, the human form reduced to building blocks in the shrine of Death. The production is decent, though there is a part of me which feels as though maybe a slightly different tone on the guitar could have improved it, but nevertheless it still generates that morbid atmosphere that one craves and is a solid slab of killer Death Metal.

7.5/10.