Artist: Summoning Hellgates
Country: Spain
Label: Osmose Productions
Formats: 12″ EP / Cassette EP / CD EP
Year: 2025
‘Spear Of Conquest’ is the debut EP of a Spanish duo that presents itself as Summoning Hellgates. While one of the two has no known experience in other and/or past bands, we do find Simón “S. Augusto” Da Silva here on guitar, his name might ring a bell or two for his involvement with bands such as Aversio Humanitatis, Velo Misere and Primigenium. Musically, however, Summoning Hellgates is cut from quite a different cloth.
In fact, ‘Spear Of Conquest’ feels like a release that could’ve been from Osmose Productions some twenty-five years ago already. Not because it sounds dated, but because this is the sort of music that Osmose Productions was known for at some point in history. Those days of the label that bands like Angelcorpse, Ravager and Abominator were dominator its roster. That means that this Spanish twosome is building pretty much on a tradition of unrelenting and merciless Extreme Metal. You can easily file this under Death Metal or Black Metal, or label it as a crossover between the two. But regardless of your definition of either of those terms, it is the forward pressure of the music that typifies this first offering.
Indeed, lots of Angelcorpse and Abominator here. The label itself markets it as a release that suit fans of bands like Angelcorpse, Of Feather And Bone, Ascended Dead, Black Curse and Lvcifyre. In a way these comparisons are not too far off, but personally I do not see (hear) that many similarities with such new-school bands like Ascended Dead and Of Feather And Bone. To me it clearly is like a good step into the proud tradition of super-fast, wild and aggressive Black/Death Metal that’s riff heavy with lots of great hooks and impeccable song writing. This is not simply about tuning down your guitar and build walls of layers and layers of guitars so everything becomes a indistinguishable blur. This is all about riffs!
‘Summoning Hellgates’ is only clocking in around 20 minutes, but even within this rather short playing time the band definitely knows how to convince. Without a doubt this is one of the strongest releases from Osmose Productions in recent years. Add the great cover art and you have quite an incredible debut in your hands.
