Band:	Graveborne
Album:	Pure Negativity
Style:	Black metal
Release date:	September 01, 2011
A review by:	Doc G.

01. Metamorphosis
02. Nocturnal
03. Dark Clouds Of Pestilence
04. Aokigahara
05. Sacrilegious
06. Dark Matter
07. Sinister Moon
08. The Covenant

We're all guilty of it, let's face it, we all bitch about originality to a great degree. While pushing the envelope is always a fun thing to hear, it's also very satisfying to hear the traditional sound maintained while simultaneously creating an immensely interesting listen. In fact, in a lot of ways that's a more difficult path to follow; how to have personality without feeling the need to reinvent the wheel.

Graveborne play black metal, plain and simple. Think back to a time when black metal still sounded totally fricken' evil to your young, virgin ears. That's the type of black metal we're talking here. Think Marduk Rom 5:12 and you've got a good idea as to what it is you're in for. It's not the re-hashed, piercing, "why did they even bother crediting the bassist in the liner notes" bullshit that was only amusing during your brief teenage lapse of good taste. The bottom end is thick & crunchy, laying down a crushing platform for the bleak, yet vicious riffs. Did we mention the riffs yet? Much akin to the likes of recent Marduk, they intersperse some bizarre, broken-legged sounding guitar work in amongst the driving, but fairly typical chainsaw riffing. As a greater man than myself once stated: It's groin-grabbingly transcendent.

Yes, it's solid, heavy, evil, sexually arousing, rabid sounding black metal. Unfortunately, you've got to take the good with the bad. It does have it's fair share of moments of hero-worship that are just too painfully transparent. Luckily, the bulldozer bottom end makes most of these typical moments still worthy of sitting through, if not inducing a head bob or two.

So Pure Negativity sates that lust for violent, straight-forward black metal with minimal boring moments. In other words; it doesn't suck.