SICK'S AGONY „Depressive Instinct”

Music: Black Metal
Website: www.myspace.com/sicksagony
Country: Italy
Duration: 23:51 (4 Songs)
Cool Songs: Depressive Instinct, Sick's Agony/Outro

Sick's Agony is a two man project hailing from the depths of Italy. The unit consists of Suffer (Stormfrost, Common Grave) on Vocals/Guitar/Bass and Blackhate (also from Stormfrost) on skins and backing vocals. Although the area isn't quite well known for producing material in the vein of what some might consider “Depressive Black Metal”, I was quite impressed with what I was hearing on my stereo the minute I pushed “Play”.

The CD starts off with a 34 second Intro building up the atmosphere for the title track “Depressive Instinct”. My first impression on the production quality of this release was quite commendable for a Demo release. Because if there's one thing I've noticed is that there are always bands who conjure insane, gloomy atmosphere's with minimal production quality possible, and there's also always (regarding the fact that opinions differ from one person to another of course) bands who do the same, at times even better, with well produced material. And for a outfit who encourage self destruction and advocate paranoia, fear and depression, “Depressive Instinct” has been manipulated by Sick's Agony to a near perfection standard. Going back to the title track, with a duration of 5:01 minutes Sick's Agony experiments with what a lot of bands in the genre exercise with their material, repetition.

Although, the above description fortunately cannot be used to define “Conflictual Cohabitation”, the 3rd track of the CD. Clocking at 9:10 minutes, Blackhate's drumming patterns for this song have to be complimented greatly, as he has stayed a way from the “repetition” element using various drum patterns for riffs. Suffer who's on vocal duties for this release, seems to be taking a more aggressive and more powerful approach regarding his style of vocals for this track compared to the earlier one.

Moving onto the last part of this release, which is also my favorite part of it, “Sick's Agony/Outro”. This is what this band's all about ladies and gents. The atmosphere Sick's Agony has created for this track perfectly executes the bands ideals. This ambiance continues to the end of the track from the opening clean guitar intro to the song, which is also my favorite section from the whole CD, the clean part just screams out Nocturnal Depression's “Nostalgia” for me.

Collectively for a DEMO release, “Depressive Instinct” is on a near perfection level as a whole, and regarding the polished production finish they also have been careful not to propel away from the raw side of the genre while maintaining the demented and gloomy atmosphere. Sick's Agony has also made a perfect and without a doubt a definite impact with “Depressive Instinct” as a Black Metal band hailing from Italy in the vein of the sub-genre and is absolutely recommended to all fans of the genre, this one's definitely worth picking up!

note: 7.5/10

Tracklist

Intro
Depressive instinct
Conflictual cohabitation
Sick's Agony / Outro

Line-up

Suffer – vocals, guitars and bass
Blackhate – drums and backing vocals