Review by Felix on December 16, 2023.

It took more than 25 years until I found a band of Spain that really attracted my attention. Körgull the Exterminator convinced me with the ultra-rabid "War of the Voivodes", their second full-length. Due to their amazing performance on this record, I was very interested in their further outputs. Here we have a split album with Graveyard. While this formation belongs to the death metal genre, the girl and the guys of Körgull present their proven bastard of punk, thrash and death metal. By the way, this vinyl marks no collaboration between bands that do not know each other. Quite the opposite, two of the involved musicians play in both groups. Therefore, the stylistic differences are remarkable. If you agree, I like to start with Körgull.

Despite some initial difficulties due to the fact that their first song does not really offer some gripping or memorable parts, the band delivers a very good contribution. They create fanatically a high speed chaos while simultaneously structuring it. The result of this procedure is that the band showcases fascinating audio experiences. For example, the chorus of "Black Pandemic", the second brand new track, demonstrates its versatiliy while being catchy, aggressive and hymnal at the same time. It proves that high velocity and absolute heaviness are no alibi for the neglect of memorable parts. The mercilessly shredding guitars leave room for these outstanding moments and that´s a great advantage of Körgull´s sound in general. Furthermore, Lilith´s rasping voice adds a nice portion of cruelty.

The bands pay tribute to each other by playing a cover song. You have to keep this fact in mind. Otherwise, you will be at risk to be of the wrong opinion that "Horrors of the Undead" is a typical number of Körgull, written by the group itself. The song takes no prisoners and seems to be strictly "körgullized", because it follows exactly the usual approach of the band´s own compositions. Graveyard cover a song of Körgull´s first full-length, but the most interesting track of their contribution is "A Dream of a Million Corpses". This nightmare lasts seven minutes. It is kicked off by an piano intro and transforms to a slow-moving roller. A short up-tempo part is also included so that you will not be bored by this relatively melodic death metal tune. This is also because this song - as well as the remaining tracks of Graveyard - is well produced while offering the genre-specific low tuned guitars and the typical growling vocals. Taking into account the further solid songs of Graveyard, the band appears more or less as an ordinary death metal band. If you like the genre in general, you will also like this group in particular - and vice versa.

Nevertheless, by a narrow margin, Körgull is the winner of this competition. Their songs also benefit from an appropriate sound and they are more thrilling than those of their partners in crime. But that´s just my personal opinion. Death metal maniacs will probably not share my point of view.

Rating: 7.4 out of 10