Welcome to the third installment of DEMO:LISTEN, a weekly peek into the future of underground metal. Whether it’s death, black, doom, sludge, progressive, stoner, retro, grind, post-, etc. we’re here to bring you the latest demos from the newest bands. This week’s DEMO:LISTEN we scream into the abyss and the abyss screams back with New Zealand’s Veneficium, Obduktio & Scumripper from Finland and Brooklyn’s Horns & Hooves.

Scumripper vs. Obduktio

Finland’s Obduktio play death metal like little kids make dinner. I bet the studio was a fucking nightmare after they were through recording their 9 track demo. Not that the music is sloppy. In fact, it’s tighter than a powerviolence vocalist’s grip on her mic. But something about Obduktio’s vibe (name’s Finnish for “autopsy,” by the way) suggests that these four young men probably don’t give a shit about the mores of the hearth.

Same could be said about Scumripper–who hail from Lappeenranta, which is only like an hour south (as the Ringwraith flies) of Obduktio’s hometown, Joensuu. Scumripper and Obduktio are up to practically the same thing. Both bands purge grinding death metal; both Scumripper and Obduktio seem completely unaware of the past twenty five years in underground extreme metal, and somehow legitimately so. And both demos have Repulsion vibes aplenty, cuts of obscure Japanese hardcore spliced in; Holy Terror breakdowns when you least expect them, that flailing-arms drum styles a la Chris Reiffert. Plus–and here’s where you come in–Obduktio’s and Scumripper’s demos were both just put out by Caligari Records!

But don’t go thinking Scumripper and Obduktio are interchangeable. For starters: Scumripper’s material is more riffcentric. Their lyrics are in English (“Run for the Pills” !!!) and these degenerates from Lappeenranta are more likely to show a little restraint in comparison to the unhinged frenzy of Obduktio’s sound. That is, Scumripper’s songs sound to be composed, even rehearsed; where Obduktio’s tracks sound like barely harnessed outbursts of long repressed rage. Scumripper’s sound is less diluted by modern influences, but Obduktio’s demo is more barbaric and so more atavistic. In the battle for your attention, any of these observations could go either way. Luckily I have a lot of time on my hands so I’ll enjoy many nights listening to both Scumripper and Obduktio back to back, and interwoven, while researching Lappeenranta’s and Joensuu’s Wikipedia pages, reading microfilm from their respective various newspapers, befriending some random Flemish guy in a moment of confusion, etc. And it will be time well spent. But no. I would not let them crash at my place.

Horns & Hooves

With lyrics like lewd acts, riffs like eruptions of boiling sin, and vocals like a teen possessed with demonic hormones, Horns & Hooves’ three song demo Consecrate the Marrow is what happens when devout Venomites presumably high on PCP and XTC start channeling dead spirits via their vast musical talents. H&H is just two guys from Brooklyn who probably venture outdoors, hooded and misanthropically huddled over, only like once a day to wander stonily to the closest Indian buffet. Profanatica or Don’t Break the Oath blasting in their ears while they get yellow dal on their Negative Plane shirts. You get the picture. It’s stateside black metal–worse, it’s from Brooklyn–but there’s no questioning its trveness. Consecrate the Marrow (as well as Salpsan’s other band Spite) is possessed by a powerful evil that simply commands worship.

VENEFICIUM

Like pus from a whitehead on the ass of Beelzebub, Veneficium spew forth from way down under. Not much else is known about these New Zealanders who must share their moniker with a few other acts over the world and throughout time. It is known that Iron Bonehead plans to release Veneficium’s three song demo on tape in the coming months. In the meantime, you’re left with one promising track on Soundcloud. Thankfully, “Mefitic Exhumations” is as multi-layered as it is addictive. Mmm! Nothing like the stench of newly discovered putrefaction!

Hit this space next week for the next installment of DEMO:LISTEN!