Label- Prosthetic Records
Released Date - 16th September 2022
Words- Tony Bliss
Press release, internet research and straight up fact be damned; these things may tell us that Phobophilic hail from North Dakota and were formed in 2016, however one cursory listen to Enveloping Absurdity more or less confirms the band to be some recently unthawed gem from the early 90’s Finnish death metal scene. Indeed, long-time fans of this stuff can sniff out the real thing from a mile away, and there is little denying that this debut LP taps into that arcane spirit of not just the old school, but also that palpable sense of ‘the other’ that so thrillingly informs the genre’s immortal, time-honoured classics.
And so, as ‘Nauseating Despair’ recalls the freakish, swamp monster complexity of an (ever so) slightly less deformed and avant-garde Demilich, and ‘Those Who Stare Back’ mutates in real time like a precision-tooled Timeghoul, the Phobophilic formula may be tried and tested for over three decades now, yet when it’s executed with this level of intensity, musicianship and songwriting suss, theirs is a sound that never gets old. Just check out album centrepiece ‘Cathedrals Of Blood (Twilight Of The Idols)’, which contains shades of everything from early Hooded Menace, ‘Covenant’-era Morbid Angel and even some melo-death style ripping, to stamp out any doubt that this is mothers milk for riff-hungry lifers across the globe.
Bowing out on the grotesquely multi-limbed ‘Survive In Obscurity’ and closing title track, both of which slam ‘n’ spike with an absurd number of great riffs, and it’s clear cut; Phobophilic are the real, deathly deal. Echoing the nascent Finn-death glory days but with more than enough of their own scalpel-keen fluidity to be more than just a mere retread of past victories, Enveloping Obscurity is still darker, nastier and weirder than the majority of their peers still furthering death metals current renaissance. There may be an absolute truckload of high-quality new bands to choose from, but Phobophilic have just seized the title of connoisseurs' choice from the death metal new breed.
8/10
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