Review by Chris Pratl on March 17, 2024.

As I'm from Illinois, Morta Skuld was always a fixture of talk around my parts in the early 90's since they hailed from right above us in Milwaukee. We always had a lot of banter about this death metal act from cheese town that didn't exactly give Death, Obituary or even fellow statesmen Morbid Saint a complete run for their money, but they proved a solid act with the 1993 opus Dying Remains, a constant rotator in my early CD spinning days. So imagine my total despair to find out they now play "modern" thrash/nu-metal in some band of which I can't even recall the name…it's a shame to see that happen, but it is what it is.

Relapse has issued a definitive collective titled Through the Eyes of the Dead: The Early Demos that houses the band’s Prolong the Agony and Gory Departure demos, which were produced by none other than Death's manager Eric Greif, and to a brilliantly discernible degree. While anything post As Humanity Fades from '94 is, at times, a languishing experiment, these two demos showcase just how potent the band was in its earliest form. The chugging riffs and chaotic resonance of the music is precisely what the Swedish death metal movement bestowed upon us just a few years earlier by way of Grave, Edge of Sanity, etc. While Death and the rest of the Floridians possessed a certain "lush" and crisp death metal sound, bands like Morta Skuld kept to the lo-fi, somewhat ‘muffled’ sound of the Scandinavian issuance. That doesn't and shouldn't denigrate the music here because not only is this demo collective extremely good in style and songs, its lush remastering has worked wonders. This is one instance where some polish and elbow grease did the recordings a world of infinite good!

When I recall hearing the original demo many years ago I always remember being impressed with the "foreign" sound these guys had for being fellow Midwestern boys. 'Feast from Within' and 'Gory Departure' were always my two go-to tracks back then, and I included them on many mix tapes I'd make for friends when trying to turn them on to new bands. These demos are some of the band's better work; they paint a very detailed and bloody picture of a death metal style that, while still detailed and battering from our U.S. contemporaries, brought that potent Swedish sound right back to the front of the lobe. There are moments where you can definitely hear Chuck Schuldiner's vocal influence, especially in 'Feast from Within', but this is more subjected reverence than pirated inferiority. The switch between guttural moaning/hissing and throaty volatility is so evenly implemented that it's hard to fathom these guys never went on to bigger avenues. The cover of 'Metal Church' they pull off is pretty interesting as well. It puts a new spin on it from every angle and it's really quite good.

The music is your garden-variety death metal but in all facets a positive. If you take in 'Preacher of Lies' or 'Senseless Killing' to an unnatural height you'll find the absolute charm of Morta Skuld. What they might lack in other basic elements they make up for in channeling the exact DM formula and pounding into your head until you can no longer stand from guitar-induced vertigo. I was truly glad to hear these recordings cleaned up so well and I can't wait to add the CD to my arsenal in the coming weeks.

While you won't find total serendipity within these tracks, you'll be treated to a very solid, integral death metal act that sadly left its lineage to the dusts of time and moved on to things they seemingly found more to their individual liking.

At least that's what I tell myself.

Rating: 7 out of 10

(Originally written for www.metalpsalter.com)