Review by Michael on November 25, 2023.

On their fifth full-length album Inward To Gethsemane, Californian old-school deathers from Vastum travel with us on a very morbid and sick 38-minute trip through horrid visions and utter madness.

Starting with the very cozy title 'In Bed With Death' the listener gets sucked into a very gloomy, disturbing and malevolent atmosphere full of sick vocals, dissonant riffs and a very dense double-bass thunderstorm. The lyrics are absolutely sick as well and totally match with this creation straight out of hell. But if you thought that the quartet would blast through all of their seven songs, you were wrong. With the next one ('Priapic Chasms') they decreased the tempo so much so that the songs get a more death-doom atmosphere which spreads some very sick vibes though. Melodies and structures are, if any, secondary. Nevertheless the chaos sounds comprehensible and for sure this all is a rotten feast for everybody who likes death metal in the putrid, stinking way. In comparison to its predecessor Orificical Purge the band sounds very much fresher, inspired and destructive in the song writing. Where Orificial Purge was a very polished and almost friendly album by the band which didn't had too many of these uncompromising and disgusting parts, Inward To Gethsemane is stuffed with such elements. The vocals alone are so hateful and sick ('Stillborn Eternity' is a very good example of mixing together hateful, deep guttural vocals, high-pitched screams with some sung vocal lines) and the guitar solo full of madness and grief.

The songs are very tight and dense so that there doesn't give any time to relax or rest. In some aspects you can find some really catchy parts too but as I said before, there isn't too much space for melodies or other festive decorations on the album. The band is destroying everything that stands in their way, the relentless compositions grind down everything without mercy. 'Indwelling Archon' may be the best example for this. Starting very fast (and sounding like the decayed brother of old Death songs) this song turns into an avalanche of rotten flesh rolling down from the graveyard on the hill down into the valley and nobody can stop it.

The production is very well done, not over modulated, very well balanced and with a lot of power. This gives the album the matching flair to spread the atmosphere the band wanted to create: sick, evil and menacing. I would say that this album puts the band onto a new level and also pretty much raises the bar for the upcoming albums. Together with the new Cruciamentum one of the late highlights in sick OSDM in 2023.

Rating: 9 out of 10

Review by Norbert on February 6, 2026.

If you think a 30-year hiatus changes anything, Naked Whipper are here just to say "nein," spit on the floor, and start flogging. No explanations, no sentimentality, and no pretense that the world has become a better place. They appeared briefly in the mid-90s, returned last year, and apparently have kept the exact same level of pissed-off music in their basement the entire time, preserved alongside dampness, mold, and the German need to get things done.

This isn't a "nice to see you again" comeback. It's more like someone taking an old whip out of the box, checking if it still does the trick, and then feeling relief, discovering it works perfectly. Naked Whipper don't try to explain anything—they're simply continuing what they started thirty years ago, as if those three decades were just a cigarette break. The whole thing works like a brutally efficient desecration machine: sticky filth, a lack of subtlety, and the atmosphere of a chapel-turned-dive, where everything is permitted, and nothing is sacred.

At times, everything merges into one long stream of venom and saliva, which will delight some and tire others out faster than Sunday dinner at the in-laws'. But it's hard to blame – the band's name is a warning, not poetry. There are false moments of "breathing" that actually only presage the next kick, and there's that typically German consistency: even the wallowing in shit is done according to plan and stamped "Jawohl, approved."

For some, it will be the triumphant return of a cult, for others, the opening of a time capsule where, instead of treasure, someone left a rotten relic. But one thing is certain: Naked Whipper aren't asking for anyone's attention. They simply exist, they stink, and they have every right to be. Oh, and by the way: Naked Whipper is essentially a one-man operation by Alex Schulze, also known as Dominus A.S., who released two EPs and a full-length album between 1993 and 1995 before disappearing like a bloodstain after a botched exorcism. Three decades later, he returned with "Chapel Defilement" – a set of hymns praising Satanism, anti-Christianity, sadomasochism, and all manner of religious imagery, wrapped in sounds that teeter on the edge of black metal, death, and ground meat. The slag pours, the whip lashes, and somewhere in the background, a faint whisper can be heard: "Ordnung muss sein."

Even in hell.

Rating: 8.5 out of 10