In 2012, Harvest Gulgaltha first made their presence known with their underground-shaking demo tape, I. Two years later that self-released tape saw a vinyl reissue from Nuclear War Now! While 2014 also saw the release of a compilation of unreleased EPs from the Arizona-based death-doom squad. And that—by working slowly and somehow inconspicuously—is how Harvest Gulgaltha have spent that past half-decade dwelling in profane obscurity.
Like their compatriots Sempiternal Dusk, Harvest Gulgaltha play dreadful, mid-paced to downright crawling death-doom. You’ll find Altars of Devotion, their debut full length, bereft of guitar solos, jarring song structures, astonishing technicality; in essence, there is nothing here to distract the listener from the sickening claustrophobia that these eight tracks conspire to create.
“The most difficult challenge of writing for any project is to stay within the confines of the already established sound,” explains one of the members behind Harvest Gulgaltha. “[T]here was not a conscientious effort to make this album more ‘crushing and sinister.’ Just to stay the course of writing plodding dark death metal inspired by necromancy and death worship.”
Plodding may be a little self-deprecating. But we totally buy the necromancy and death worship bit.
In an attempt to rectify how shamefully underrated and obscure Harvest Gulgaltha remain, despite their malign godliness, we present you with an exclusive full album stream of Altars of Devotion.
Get Altars of Devotion today from Nuclear War Now! Productions.
