HORDES OF SATAN LP INDUSTRIAL DOOM PITCHSHIFTER

HORDES OF SATAN S/T LP (Streaks Records, Germany, 2007).  Near-mint condition white vinyl with near-mint cover.  This is hand-numbered #006 from a limited editon of only 126 copies on white vinyl.

"Remember Pitch Shifter? If yer a fan of old school industrial metal, I bet you do. That British band was one of the heaviest mecha-metal outfits that Britain had to offer back in the early 90's, a pioneering group of Godflesh-influenced sludge-thugs who took the repetitive machinegrind of Streetcleaner and applied it to a grooving concoction of sluggish but near-danceable beats, ultraheavy downtuned guitars and catchy riffs that bordered on some kind of ultra-heavy metallic rock, and heavy use of textured electronic noise and samples.

Later on towards the end of the 90's, Pitch Shifter would begin to incorporate elements of drum n' bass and jungle into their sound, but those early Earache albums were pure molten robo crush that would eventually influence bands like Neurosis, Dead World and Fear Factory. I haven't paid a whole lot of attention to the later Pitchshifter stuff (the band dropped the space in their name when their style began to change) as those latter albums are nowhere near as heavy and abrasive as their first few, but I was stoked when I found out that Pitch Shifter guitarist Stuart Toolin had a new band called Hordes Of Satan that was apparently a return to the industrial sludge metal of the early PS days.

This debut LP is the only release so far from the HOS duo, and it's already sold out from the label...  Four long, bludgeoning tracks of sludgy slow motion doom powered by plodding drum machine beats and insanely heavy downtuned guitars and bass, each track made up of only one or two riffs that build into a suffocating wall of gloomy, dismal atmosphere and hypnotic repetition, comparable to an apocalyptic cross between Godflesh and Corrupted.

This mother is ultra-heavy, equal parts industrial metal and glacial death doom, like early Pitch Shifter but even heavier, slower, more desolate, more along the lines of Toolin's little-known project Skin Limit Show, with deep gutteral death metal roars. There's even a cover of Pitch Shifter's "Landfill" on here that absolutely crushes. Seriously massive mechanical doom heaviosity, and one of the heaviest LPs sitting on my record player right now. The record comes in a grey-toned sleeve with morbid artwork with a fold out insert.  -Crucial Blast