Necrophobic: The Nocturnal Silence (1993)

I finally discovered Necrophobic last year with their eighth album Mark of the Necrogram.  That album made it into the top five of my top albums list.  Realizing that the band had been around for a long time, I decided I would go back and find out what I had been missing.

Being a Swedish black/death metal band, Necrophobic's music would appeal to fans of groups like Dissection, Naglfar, Nifelheim, Lord Belial and others.  I am a fan of all of those bands, so of course this appeals to me as well. 

The music is heavy, based more in thrash and death metal than black metal, at least at this time.  In fact, this is much more of a melodic death metal album played with thrash metal riffs a la early Amon Amarth than a black/death metal album.  The only black metal influences are the occasional tremolo riff and the vocal styling, which is delivered in more of a guttural rasp.  The other element that is clearly present throughout the release is the evil atmosphere.  Necrophobic take cues from groups like Slayer, Possessed and Morbid Angel, resulting in a very unsettling and evil-sounding album. 

This is Necrophobic's debut album and it was one hell of a debut.  The band fits in well with the titans of Swedish black/death metal that I listed above.  I am not sure how I missed out on Necrophobic all of these years, but I will definitely be working on changing that.