Vassafor - Vassafor
March 24 2008 at 06:55:25 AM
Some may look cross at the gaps in Vassafor’s recorded history, but so far the Auckland dreadnought is off to a strong, if prolonged, start.
Formed in 1994 as a collaboration between guitarist/vocalist Phil Kusabs and drummer Daniel Lomas (Nazxul), Vassafor released their first of two demos tapes in 1997. Four years later the group was put on hold, the members living in separate countries at the time. “Albums worth of music,” were thrown away in the interim, according to Kusabs, who finally put together a new lineup in 2004. Slowly but surely, he’s been putting their sound into motion through a complex, rabid and often-haywire mixture of blackened Death Metal.
Vassafor's four tracks take on a range of different styles, filtering vague reminisces of Autposy (“Vassafor”), Darkthrone (“Black Winds Victoryant”), derivations of sunken sludge and early Black Metal (this time covering Merciful Fate’s “Black Funeral”) through Kusabs mudslide guitar and mouthful of blood. No one influence prevails as accessions hold strong through throttling drum kicks, fluctuations of blast-beats and crash-rhythms (remarkably different from Kusab's second band, Diocletian). Their ambition in stretching the onslaught to an average 10 minutes per track is not without excess, but neither does it remove the burn from Vassafor’s corrosive brew. Not the best you’ve heard all year, but worth keeping an eye on.
[Todd DePalma]
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