Chestcrush came to life in 2020 from the dark imagination and talent of Evangilos Vasilakos.After initially releasing a couple of singles and an EP, ‘Evan’ released his debut full-length to high applause from the underground scene. Based in Scotland, this one-man project highlighted the burgeoning scene up there.
For the release of the second full-length, ‘Ψυχοβγάλτης’ Evan recruited Tobias Jokipii on vocals and Robin Stone on drums. The addition of these two gents enabled Evan to focus fully on creating a maelstrom of destructive Death Metal. However calling ‘Ψυχοβγάλτης’ a purely Death Metal release is an injustice.
What Evan and the boys have done here is create an album that has layers of aggression that crush the listener. This album at times shakes hands with the devil and touches into Black Metal territory and even the occasional nod into Industrial Metal. The production is tremendous highlighting each individual element of the project. The guitar tone is savage with riff after riff burying themselves into your psyche. The drums are ferocious without being overly intrusive and Tobias has some of the best modern vocals around in my humble opinion. He has the guttural growls you associate with the genre but is also able to pierce your tympanic membrane with a scream when needed.
Overall this is an album that needs to be heard by as many people as possible and considering it is an independent release it makes me wonder where these boys could go if they get signed to a major label.
