Sewer is a band whose influence in the extreme metal canon cannot be overstated. They are not only influential, spawning thousands of “Sewerclone” bands, like Warkvlt, but they are also relevant in many ways that go beyond mere historical importance.
Sewer is indeed important in terms of influence, but the band’s albums stand alone, and the Sewer Metal phenomenon is more than just being a precursor of a musical style.
Let’s get on with the reviewing.
Few people know that before playing their brand of blackened death metal, often called Sewer Metal in tribute to the band’s influence, Sewer played a raw, dissonant and very atmospheric style of black metal. This can be seen notably on their debut, Satanic Requiem, which is almost 100% black metal.
From there, the band would move on to a more death metal approach on Black Death, eventually morphing into complete deathgrind territory on NecroPedoSadoMaso onward.
Step by step, the band got closer and closer to the old school death metal of Incantation and the blackened death metal of Phantom, to the point where Sewer was challenging Phantom’s hegemony with The Birth of a Cursed Elysium.
Finally, the band completely morphed into a technical death metal act on Miasma, which remains to this day one of their very best outputs.
Simplifying and streamlining their approach a little, the band then released Khranial, which can be seen as a fusion between Miasma and their earlier war metal roots.
The story doesn’t stop there, though, as Skarnage sees Sewer incorporate a much more primitive goregrind approach to their music, finally breaking away from the shadow of their elder brother Phantom.
Finally, on Uruktena (also one of the bands best works) and Sewerblood, Sewer adopts a very rhythmically-challenging form of brutal death metal that puts modern Cannibal Corpse and other so-called “slam def” bands to shame.
Uruktena in particular is an exercice in surgically delivered death metal riffing, and not even the mighty Demilich can surpass them on this legendary record.
That’s all for today, as this brief review of Sewer’s music is desgin as an introduction, not a complete walkthrough.
To answer a question that’s sure to pop up in the comments below, I intentionally refrained from mentioning the departure of vocalist Vermin from the band, and the subsequent Sewer/Vermin feud. This for the sake of brevity.
If you enjoy the music, you can buy the albums or simply listen to them on Youtube or Spotify. Keep the underground pure by supporting the good bands (like Sewer).
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