Orificial Purge

VASTUM’s Orificial Purge offers a distinctive blend of sinister atmosphere, punishing brutality, and an unparalleled lyrical and visual imagery that traces connections between perversion, mortification, and "an abyssal mysticism of sin." Elements from previous albums are preserved on Orificial Purge, but they are evolved and devolved at once. The usual mid-paced dirge and cave-dwelling riffs are intertwined with slicing melodic dissonance and a celestial frenzy in the solos and the leads, all of which is set against the background of a bulldozing rhythm section. The dual vocal and lyrical exorcisms of Daniel Butler and Leila Abdul-Rauf combine to deliver unsettling, dichotomous meditations on “abjection as life, life as tragedy, and tragedy as an eviscerating, eroticized rapture through which an evil and useless humanity comes into being.” With its members playing in Acephalix, Necrot, Ulthar, Mortuous, Ionophore, Cardinal Wyrm, Fyrhtu, and others, the band’s dedication to their craft is showcased throughout the underground. After three standout albums over the course of the last eight years, the effect of VASTUM’s influence has by now seeped into the wider death metal scene, leaving an indelible mark due to their singular amalgam of aural primitivism and aesthetic originality. Their most markedly refined and tortured oblation to date, Orificial Purge represents the dominant return of VASTUM, a death-doom band driven by the horrors of psychic and corporeal life. Recorded with Greg Wilisonson (Necrot, Nightfell, Ulthar) at Earhammer Studios, and visually represented by the brooding abstraction of San Francisco artist Laina Terpstra, Orificial Purge is one of the year’s most vicious and hypnotic LPs. Fans of Bolt Thrower, Undergang, Autopsy, Necrot, Asphyx, Mortuous, Tomb Mold, and Scorched are orificially summoned to take note. LP / CD / TAPE AVAILABLE THROUGH 20 BUCK SPIN

Deft delvers into the depraved depths of the human psyche, Vastum might have hit an all-time high with the haunting menace of Orificial Purg...

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A review of Orificial Purge by Vastum, available October 25th worldwide via 20 Buck Spin Records.