Yes! here we have death metal played just right, filled with monstrous grooves and delivered in a squelchy guitar tone. This is a compilation of everything Stench of Decay have done so far- which isn’t all that much, actually. Just two demos and one LP, equalling twelve tracks in total from this Finnish band, so just treat it as a really good underground death metal album. It grunts and grooves like Asphyx, with a general emphasis on mid-tempo pounding. But the warped pathway that it pursues is a distinctive one studded with arcane gems- while everything here is defiantly orthodox, there is still a pervading sense of turbulent wrongness that can also be detected with earlier compatriots like Phlegethon or Abhorrence (the latter are saluted here with a Vulgar Necrolatry cover).

Despite comprising a number of releases, the sound throughout the compilation is consistent, adding to the sense that it works as a standalone record. Alive and Rotting opens proceedings with a powerful hook, which grasps your attention like a clammy hand snatching from under your pillow. Despite the headbanging power contained herein, the track is soon twisted into strange time signatures; a tendency crystallised in the weirdly contorted 5/8 midsection that surfaces after two minutes. A garbled lead solo adds to the feverish demeanour. Their title song (like the opener from the first 2005 demo) shifts into violently contorted spasms that suggest an attempt to ape Demilich, before later skipping into an impishly malformed bass solo. But then it gives way into the concise and precise Ultimately Beheaded- a rapidfire exhalation evocative of the early Swedish scene- making for a breathless and brutal ride.

Yeah, well… what else to say? It continues thus. I love the ghoulishly doomy Creation of Carnal Lust, which reminds me of Necros Christos, the cunning guitar/bass unison lines on Into Depths of Madness, or the gravel-gargling of Vision Beyond Death. If you like death metal, this is worth your time.