Hard to believe this is this German death metal band's debut; good on FDA Rekotz (Ugh! Ugh! Ugh! It's not too late to change that name!) for scooping them up, shows a great ear on the label head there for finding a death band in 2012 that has enough personality but also enough of a love for the history of the genre to create a fully enjoyable full-length listen. In the case of CHAPEL OF DISEASE, they favour the grimy, sludge-y, and mid-tempo kind of death metal; it never gets tech and rarely goes blasting, instead going low and slow, like 'Descend To The Tomb', which gets so low and slow in the intro that it eventually collapses to a mid-tempo OBITUARY slug and sludge. Meanwhile, 'Evocation Of The Father' gets almost death rock, then funeral rock, great guitar solos blazing, man, my head is banging hard by this point... who are these guys? Cool closer 'The Loved Dead' goes deep sludge for the first couple minutes before the double bass kicks in, rounding out a wholly excellent death metal experience. I'd say they should make the clean production grimier and dirtier to go with their sound, then, file next to Asphyx and Autopsy and Obituary and all kinds of guttural gross-out death metal legends.
