Artist: Infernaculum
Country: Spain
Label: Rex Diaboli
Formats: CD
Year: 2026
The Spanish band Infernaculum has already featured twice before on these pages. On both occasions, these were cassette releases on the Spanish label Profaner Records: a reissue of their debut demo cassette ‘Esperma De Satanás’ (2024) and a split cassette with Secret Tongues (2025). I did rather like the demo, but the band’s contribution to the split cassette actually left me a bit disappointed. And now that the band has released what they call their debut album, the result falls somewhere in between. Certainly not bad, but it does fall short when compared to what’s currently on offer in the Black/Death Metal scene. As the English so aptly put it: neither fish nor fowl.
With a musical scope that strikes a balance somewhere between the wilder variants of black and death metal, Infernaculum essentially plays it fairly safe; fans of both genres will find something to their liking in ‘Cristo 666’. But not everything works equally well. The remarkably raw, rehearsal-like production does give the band a certain identity of its own; whilst the thick Death Metal or Grindcore-style riffs often dominate and create a heavy, muddy sound, ‘Cristo 666’ feels noisy and even somewhat indecisive. Although I’m a fan of unpolished productions, in this case it actually works against the band. The somewhat annoying tape hiss that runs throughout the entire 25-minute running time is also more than audible during the samples and distracts from what is ultimately the most important thing: the atmosphere.
It may, of course, be that what we’re presented with on ‘Cristo 666’ is entirely in line with what the band had in mind during the creative process; in that case, they’ve succeeded brilliantly in their aim. But I’m still left with a slightly unsettling feeling, the same feeling, in fact, that I had after listening to the split cassette tape with Secret Tongues. It’s certainly not that the band has nothing to offer, but for me it just doesn’t quite come across properly. It is, indeed, neither fish nor fowl.
