Album Review: Bull Elephant – Created From Death (Eat Lead and Die Music)

UK anonymous collective Bull Elephant will release its second album, Created From Death, on August 14th 2020 on Eat Lead and Die Music.

The album, part two in the Bull Elephant trilogy mythos, picks up where the debut ended. The eponymous creature, originally resurrected to fight occultist Ahnenerbe SS just before the outbreak of world war, has been destroyed and reconstructed into human form; then placed into the care of a renegade ape. The child’s witch-mother sacrifices herself so the duo can escape and they live in exile for several years, attempting to remain hidden from the enemy.

Meanwhile, Nazi Germany and Allied forces fight battles on two fronts: in conventional theatres all over the world and as a secret war for control over supernatural powers that neither fully understand.

Eventually, after being discovered and temporarily under siege, our heroes are compelled into action; launching a campaign to harness nature against the worst of mankind’s impulses; which now includes reanimation at a mass grave site of an undead legion in service to the Reich. The ultimate renewable human resource.

The doomy riffs wash over as Bull Elephant emerges with the title track, the scum of the vocal roars and deep percussion sticking. Then, unexpectedly, this beastly unit burst in a faster and hotter tempo that is more akin to thrash before dropping into an echoey melody and back to the doom. So much in such a short amount of time, yet it works.

It’s with pretty melody that Oneiromantic Rites begins but the depth quickly becoming more apparent. A very dark flow that is both ominous and exciting, even the guitar solo just works.

Followed by a similar but still fascinating formula for Lebensraum and the daringly eclectic Cult of the Black Sun Nemesis. The riffs are just a little rockier and the vocals more stretched. Consistently impressive stuff.

So consistently strong is the album that it’s like stumbling and falling down an endless gorge where every guitar note is another rock to the temple, every drumbeat is another shattered bone and every vocal scream is the sound of your unending pain. Last Defilement and Perverted Science are the suffering while Escape to the Arctic is the realisation that there is no end.

At least to the fall, Bull Elephant’s incredible story closing with Wayfarer. A wonderfully animated finale that is mournfully doomy and hard-hitting in metal delivery. An effective wrap up to an album that can rightfully be called spectacular.

Bull Elephant – Created from Death Full Track Listing:

1. Created From Death
2. Oneiromantic Rites
3. Lebensraum
4. Cult of the Black Sun Nemesis
5. Last Defilement
6. Perverted Science
7. Escape to the Arctic
8. Wayfarer

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