Artist: Demigoat
Country: Sri Lanka
Label: Black Kvlt Records
Formats: CD
Year: 2025
Ever since the birth of our beloved genre, Sri Lanka might not have been the ultimate hotbed of our metal. But despite the lack of a rich metal history, in recent years there has been somewhat of a rise in what is arguably the most extreme metal style in this Asian country. This was possibly kickstarted with Genocide Shrines’ first recordings and ultimately with their monumental ‘Manipura Imperial Deathevokovil: Scriptures Of Reversed Puraana Dharmurder’-album (Iron Bonehead Productions, 2015). Demigoat is a recent addition of what possibly is the start of a new tradition of Sri Lankan Extreme Metal.
However, ‘Bestial Empire’ came to us like a bolt out of a clear sky. Without any significant musical background or warning shots in the form of a demo or anything similar, this duo immediately fires a full-length album at us. Yet, I’d be surprised if this really is the result of one of their first steps into Extreme Metal.
Although ‘Bestial Empire’ is a very decent and solid album and it is clearly built on the same ideas and visions, it is also an easy conclusion that this first feat is not quite up to its peers and contemporaries. Not only does this feel lightyears away from what Genocide Shrines does (did?) in terms of power and sheer deafening brutality, but also on the international stage Demigoat missing just that “little bit extra”.
Musically ‘Bestial Empire’ leans a bit more to the Black Metal side of the spectrum than most of their colleagues. With a sharper guitar tone and a predominantly fast pace, the band’s foundation is perhaps more traditional, yet it is the chunky bass-heavy approach and the bellowing vocals that still firmly places the band in the Black/Death Metal domain. The thing is, as a whole ‘Bestial Empire’ does not really live up to its title. With its overall too clean and “friendly” sound, I simply miss the rough edge and a bit of a meaty bite. This sort of music greatly benefits from a slightly rougher production that emphasizes the pure energy embedded in the generally primitive aggression. ‘Bestial Empire’ has all the right elements, but it clearly needs a bit more fine-tuning and tweaking.
Not at all a bad first attempt, but for now it simply lacks the persuasiveness of the real thing. This quickly leads to the question of whether it would have been better to release some demos first before presenting themselves with a full-length album.
