Lord Gryphus Summoning The King Of Death Review
Lord Gryphus
Summoning the King of Death
Nespithe Records
2026
I've touched on the importance of Texas's looming presence in death metal in reviews past, but it certainly deserves repeating. The lone star state has had some legendary sickness coming from its southwestern humidity and expansive landscape. I mean, Frozen Soul, Tribal Gaze, Creeping Death? And that's just the more modern bands. In the 90s/early 2000s you had (some are still at it) Devourment, Embalmed, Severance, Imprecation, Diminished, Horde Casket, to name only a few. Well, now we have another name to add to the ever-growing TXDM list. They are none other than Austin's own, Lord Gryphus and the 8-song slab of butchery that is Summoning the King of Death.
Ok, so it's really one intro and seven songs, but those seven are absolutely unrelenting surgical dissections of what made death metal from the late 80's and early 90's so vastly important and groundbreaking. Lord Gryphus are a three piece that operates anonymously and perform masked up. “Their identity and concept revolve around execution, sacrifice, and ritual devotion to a carrion deity known as Lord Gryphus, inspired by Vultur gryphus, the Andean condor, a symbol tied to death, transcendence, and spiritual power.” Doesn't hurt em’ at all, really. It's an added mystique to their sound. That sound is impeccably produced (seriously, the sound is superbly clear and mixed evenly so no one is overshadowed here) simplistic, some might say primitive extreme metal. What they may not have in blazing speeds or super technical chops and dizzying time changes, they make up for with straight forward aggression, a forlorn oppressive atmosphere and songs that are audio confrontations.
As I mentioned, the album kicks off with the intro, titled you guessed it, “Intro”. This piece is a nearly two minutes of some severely creepy soundscapes, over some sampled buzzards or crows, keys, classical guitar and timpani drums. It's reminiscent of what one might hear when Pinhead appears and is about to cause some havoc in the “Hellraiser” movies. Next up is the churning, double bass laden death n’ roll of “The Grand Spectacle” which switches gears into a heavily trem picked verse, midrange low growls and tons of groove on tap before they turn the tempo on its head going from ¾ march to blast beats, back to the grinding grooving main riff.
The faster and more chaotic blasting of “Banished Leper” chugs and grooves as well before heading back to blast city and an eerie minor note riff before unloading a breakdown heavier than herd of elephants replete with a carefully mined minor key guitar run to cap it off. “Bloodpath Dominion” steps on the death/doom button in its onset before the verses blast, d-beat and settle into another mean plodding groove section. Throughout the vocals recall the more shouted growls of LG Petrov mixed with some David Vincent via Kam Lee lower register. “Sharpening the Guillotine” brings some triads and dissonant guitar interplay into the mix behind blasting and more double bass street sweeping plod, chugs and trem picking galore. The ensuing outro is a chromatic chugger that is devastating and many a slam band could take notes here as to how those moments actually work in context of what constitutes breakdown.
“Unholy Mace” follows suit with a half time verse that is blunt force trauma set to music. I'm not kidding. That main riff is like Tyson punishing a speed bag as forcefully but as slowly and methodically as possible. Lord Gryphus simply knows how to write hooky, devastating riffs and placing them atop grimey low tuned guitars, slinking bottom end and more than proficient drumming. See the title track for what I mean. For me this track is the highlight as it touches on everything I mentioned about their songwriting above. A gnarly, low slung death metal rendering of the Sepultura classic “Troops of Doom” closes the album out, and they inject just enough of an uptick in speed and playing the main riffs decidedly more death than thrash to put their own spin on it. I would have preferred another original, but if you're gonna slap on a cover at the end of your album, you could do far worse than twisting one of the Seps most beloved songs into a bonafide 90's death rager.
Summoning the King of Death is over in just 24 minutes and some change, but they are unabashedly weighty, intense and ear worming minutes. In a landscape where seemingly EVERY new band in the genre is pilfering and plundering the best moments from their RC, Earache and Relapse Records releases from 30 plus years ago, it's refreshing to hear a band like Lord Gryphus. Rest assured. they may be mining from the same gold, but they do it with enough variance between old sounds and new brutish pummel (slamming breakdowns), updated Swedish death n’ roll and doomy Finnish riffage that they sound completely fresh and exciting. Has abrasive, riff forward old school death been done to well, death? Yeah. But few are doing it as succinct and with such justice as Summoning the King of Death. Long live Texas death metal indeed….
RIYL - Gorefest, Incantation, Autopsy, Grave, Desultory, Morbid Angel, Sinister
~TB