Sadistic Forest
S/T

August 2010
Released: 2010, Violent Journey Records
Rating: 3.5/5
Reviewer: Luxi Lahtinen

The story of Finnish death dealers Sadistik Forest began in summer 2007 when guitarist Antti Heikkinen (ex-Fall of Man, Viha), inspired by Possessed´s comeback shows, decided to put together a band that would perform brutal, relentless and unforgiving death metal. After suggesting his idea to some of his close friends, Sadistik Forest was soon ready for its first strike as a 4-piece troop.



The band´s 8-track, self-titled debut album on domestic Violent Journey Records, is pretty much all about that what Antti Heikkinen planned it to be originally, i.e. heavy, dark, grunty, down-tuned and pulverizing death metal that rolls everyone over with an uncontrolled 8-ton bulldozer, simply mangling all of us to the finest dust. Sadistik Forest is all about old school death metal alá Unleashed, early Demilich, Mordicus, early Demigod, early Grave, Incantation and the likes. NO hyper-speed blastbeasts, NO gimmicks, NO overpolished, NO modernized or NO plastic sounds can be found from the band´s gut-wrenching, darkened death metal opus, but just pure old-fashioned death metal as it was truly meant to be played back in the 90's. As a side comment, the current trend in the Finnish death metal scene overall seems to be taking things back to the roots, which I personally find absolutely a great thing. I mean, the 90ies period was the golden time for the Finnish underground death metal anyway, and therefore it´s nice to see bands like Sadistik Forest, Claws, Vorum, Swallowed, Krypts, Ascended, Stench of Decay and some other new Finnish death metal acts flagging for the past underground times.



There´s really not much else to be said, or revealed about Sadistik Forest´s debut. They do sound somehow safe, captivating, familiar - and like a band that already impressed many of us some 20 years ago, spreading their reek of putrefaction through every keyhole, making us to want more and more of the same. This is seriously a good stuff for what it is, even if probably recycled a few times already during these past 2 decades. But who really cares – I did not anyway, but enjoyed pretty much the hell out of it.