senescence (n.)
the condition or process of deterioration with age.
It’s not every day we see one release covering so much Bay Area ground, but here’s Senescence—the debut album by Santa Rosa trio Vile Rites, produced by Greg Wilkinson at Earhammer Studio in Oakland, and released by San Jose’s Carbonized Records.
Vile Rites powers through the depths of progressive death metal, stopping only here and there for a reprieve from the noise. There is the minute-long solo guitar interlude of “Ephemeral Reverie of Eroded Dreams,” and then midway through “Transcendent Putrefaction” there is the moment when the fast-charging metal riffs and rhythms crumble away into ambient space, revealing a spacious backdrop to the music; when the drums return, it is as if they’re heard from the bottom of a vast cavern. Fitting for an album closer, “Banished to Solitude (Adrift on the Infinite Waves)” traverses from pummeling thrash to wailing psych rock solos across its 11-minute epic.
