Sarcofago ~ Decade Of Decay (hits comp) (album review) ... Orgy of flies!

Style: thrash, black metal, death metal
Label: Greyhaze
Year: 2012
Home: Brazil

Members: Wagner "Antichrist" Lamounier ~ vocals/guitar
Geraldo "Gerald Incubus" Minelli ~ bass/b. vocals
Zeber "Butcher", Fabio "Jhasko" ~ guitar
Juninho "Pussy Fucker" ~ bass
Eduardo "D.D. Crazy", Armando "Leprous" Sampaio, Lucio Olliver ~ drums

Additional: Manoel "Joker" ~ drums/b. vocals
Vanir Jr. ~ keyboards
Eugenio "Dead Zone" ~ drum programming/keyboards
Claudio David ~ b. vocals

Sepultura might be the name everyone thinks of when talking about the Brazilian thrash/death metal scene ... the two scenes overlapping there venomously with profound influence on the rest of the world ... but Sarcofago is a name not to be ignored that helped put the death into South American thrash & would even inspire the Norwegian scene. All their albums are now being reissued for the first time in North America, overseen by frontman Wagner "Antichrist" Lamounier, the original singer of Sepultura though he never recorded with them. Decade Of Decay is a good introductory album as it collects twenty highlights from all their albums (i.e. INRI, Rotting, The Laws Of Scourge, The Worst & Hate) plus songs from the demos Satanic Lust, The Black Vomit & Christ's Death, so there's something for the fan who already has all the main releases or plans to get them. One gets a solid picture of the band's musical growth over numerous line-up changes & the later controversial introduction of a drum machine, though in the casual listen it all sounds like its crawling from the same mold of Metallica riffing (for example, "The God's Faeces") with the devilish influence of Slayer, Celtic Frost & Venom. Though listening carefully one will hear in the demos how under-developed & rough the music was compared to later days. Sarcofago is heavy, slow & gloomy & Satanic in a way that really only Slayer dared to be in the thrash scene. Sensitive ears be forewarned of such ghastly black metal beasts as "Orgy Of Flies", "Christ's Death", "Satanic Lust", "Song For My Death", "Desecration Of The Virgin", "Crush, Kill, Destroy" & "Rotting". Euronymous of Mayhem was a fan & would claim Sarcofago as a major influence on the Norwegian death metal scene, while Sarcofago's early use of corpse paint would help make the trend international. If only there were more church burnings in Brazil the Brazilian scene might have as much clout as Norway. Instead the originators, including also Sadistick-Exekution in Australia, are lost to time while the imitators get the spotlight for eternity. The luck of of the draw. Much like the Hanoi Rocks story in regards to the L.A. scene or all the blues guys that were ignored while the early Rolling Stones conquered the charts doing old blues covers. If there's any weaknesses in this comp it's the growled vocals of frontman Antichrist as one can imagine him actually drooling between words. For one used to the cleaner vocals of James Hetfield or Dave Mustaine it's a bit discerning. But, I would recommend "Midnight Queen" & "Screeches From The Silence" for those fans as these tracks come from their most mainstream album The Laws Of The Scourge. There's also a few ethereal keyboard heavy horror soundscapes included (i.e. "The Anal Rape Of God", "Recrucify", "The Lost Of Innocence") which are good in showing the range of the band but one just wants to get to the music. San Francisco might have given birth to thrash but to get a real picture of the scene there's so many other countries that deserve equal attention - Germany, Australia, Brazil & even the Florida swamplands. I mean, the first black metal album is considered by many to be the debut of prog-metal Florida outfit Savatage ... who now tour playing Christian-laced Christmas songs as Trans-Siberian Orchestra.