Aura Damage

Hell United present fire-breathing death metal in the same unflinchingly brutal vein as other Polish bands like Masachist, Lost Soul, Azarath, or even their hated local rivals Hell City and Hell Athletic. As with those bands, here we have scuzzy, black metal-influenced guitar riffing cruelly meshed with barbarous percussive assault, resulting in a sound that emanates sheer crossness. It would be pushing it to place this band in the elite tier of blackened-death wrathbringers, but they do have some interesting things going on here.

It begins furiously enough, with the fast and extremely direct Red Limitations stomping balefully from blasting riff to blasting riff in a particularly thuggish way. A brief, reverb-heavy lead solo adds a flash of light, but it lasts only a couple of seconds- I’d say the lead guitar is underused throughout the album, but then I am a sucker for a death metal solo. About half way through the track drops down into a clanking slow section. This is a move Hell United pull frequently. Indeed, songs like Hinterland or the closer Totality of I are based around down-tempo riffing: usually pretty simplistic, but aiming for a barren and imposing sensibility that is only heightened by the disturbingly guttural timbre of the (often dual) vocal rasps. Add its darkest, this can indeed be a foreboding album.

It’s a short record, and after 35 minutes it does feel like it has run its course. It can be impressively ugly, as with the surprisingly “Kill! Kill them, make them disappear” chorus on the title track, or the abovementioned slow-burners. Odore Sanctitatis, in particular, features some killing moments, like the vicious riff and guitar solo that close it out- unfortunately this is a mere flourish in the closing twenty seconds of the track! A concise exercise in Polish-style death metal.