Do not fix what is not broken. This is an important philosophy that extends to many areas of life, including music. While innovation and pushing boundaries are to be celebrated, some bands just manage to settle into a particular formula that works, and which we listeners celebrate. Rotten Tomb is one such act, already unleashing their 3rd full length in the span of 4 years with ‘Vestiges of Tortured Souls’ making another fine addition to their repertoire.
Within the wide spectrum of Death Metal we can use to catalogue Rotten Tomb, the closest comparison would be the cavernous kind. Yet the Chilean quartet are by no means just another Xeroxed Incantation clone nor close to it. The first distinguishing feature of this album is the fast tempos the band are accustomed to playing, rarely slowing down. Many in this genre often defect to a more sluggish pace to emphasize the reverb drenched riffs. Rotten Tomb instead slice the listener up with a good dose of aggression and speed. In this respect, they channel much of the barbarian energy of their South American cadres such as Mystifier, Hadez or even Sarcofago.
The second defining feature are the beautifully placed melodic guitar leads, taken straight from the handbook of Dismember or Paradise Lost. Bands within this niche tend to subtly employ melody through use of eerie tremolo picks and Rotten Tomb do employ them; but the occasional harmonic leads give the music an additional layer of complexity and dynamism without sacrificing the overall viciousness. Lastly, other bands would have opted for a more lo-fi production to accentuate the murkiness of the music, whereas they opt for a mix that gives them a fuller and more puncturing sound. It makes every riff, harmony and pulverizing drum beat hit all that much harder while carefully curating an atmosphere that breathes sulphur and occultism.
If you already enjoyed the two previous albums from Rotten Tomb, there is no reason for your experience with ‘Vestiges’ to be any different. This type of Death Metal has become somewhat stale in recent years, but leave it up to Chileans to still find ways to reinvent familiar sounds in a manner which honors the genre stalwarts while very much giving it a much-needed dose of their homeland sauce. The Southern Cone country has offered us such an amplitude of great bands in the past and present, with Rotten Tomb being a great representative of why that is.
