Track By Tracks: Torrefy - Necronomisongs (2024)

1. Of Wind and Worm:

The opening track of Necronomisongs gets both its title and its concept from Frank Herbert's genre-defining sci-fi series “Dune”. The grand scope of the riffage from beginning to end within this track inspired the lyrics to focus on the cruel landscape of the planet Arrakis, the central planet within the plot of the first Dune book. As the track progresses through its high-paced lead-driven sections the lyrics shift to encompass the concepts of future-sight, destinies, and the sacrifices required to accept the responsibility of both those overwhelming abstracts.

This was one of the first tracks developed and written for the album, and actually was completed before the final vision of the album’s concept was completely realized. The theatrical and bombastic compositions made by the instrument wielding members of Torrefy were inspiration for the lyrical content, and in such were largely the inspiration for the album to be entirely based on different books from across several genres.

Of Wind and Worm was chosen as the first single and music video to be released ahead of Necronomisongs, not only because it is the first track on the album but because it presents the sound, intent and voice of the band in a succinct and powerful way, all the way from its explosive opening to its titan-scale outro.

2. Street Reaper:

Street Reaper erupts out of the ambient feedback of the previous track with a syncopated thrash assault defying the hypnotic blackened outro that preceded it. This track is an immediate assurance of the band's eclectic writing style. Death and Thrash Metal shine through this track which takes no breaks and pulls no punches delivering a simple message of brutality, bloodlust, and screeching tires. Stephen King’s novel “Christine” supplies the concept of a possessed car of a bygone era wreaking havoc upon a small American town. Focusing entirely on the book’s antagonist Christine, a sentient 1958 Plymouth Fury, this song forgoes metaphors and deeper thought choosing to paint the imagery one would likely associate with vehicular carnage and blood-soaked asphalt. With several hypnotic sections, this song represents our ability to utilize rhythms in such a way as to be equal parts intense, relentless, and catchy.

Warning: listening to this song while driving may inspire some best-ignored intrusive thoughts.

3. Corpseback Rider:

Set against the backdrop of a crimson sea, the lone survivor of a pirate raid stands amongst his fallen shipmates and the splintered debris of his ship. He knows with certainty that the scurvy devils who just laid waste to his vessel are now heading straight towards his hometown, and the home of all his loved ones. He makes the unthinkable decision to tie together the bloated remains of the men he once knew as friends, and cast off to prevent the same fate of these poor decaying souls befalling that of his wife and children. Hence the name, in a very literal sense, Corpseback Rider. Taken from the pages of “The Tales of the Black Freighter” a fictional comic book that is read by a character within the pages of Alan Moore’s graphic novel opus “Watchmen”. Musically this song fits the grim and nautical themes presented by the frantically shrieked lyrics, switching from a decaying shanty, whose rhythms swing like a captured buccaneer at the gallows end, into a manic and unforgiving tremolo-driven frenzy.

One would be forgiven to think this track’s music was written after knowing that there was a plan to write a song driven by a mariner’s worst nightmares, but no, it was a happy accident that a track was written with such fitting themes and movements to bring alive the brine-soaked horror of The Black Freighter. A happy accident but not an uncommon one on this album. The novels written throughout the album were chosen separately by the vocalist and main lyricist simply by virtue of being his favorites. His decision to write about The Black Freighter instead of Watchmen itself was simply that the imagery evoked by a decaying raft of fallen men was simply too metal to pass up.

4. Arachnomancer:

The opening of this song is the listener's first reprieve from the pummeling of tempos and decibels the band has been dishing out since the first note of the album. What may at first sound like the promise of light in the darkness with its ascending melodic beauty, is in fact the last flicker of a candle before it is snuffed out, plunging the world around into a cruel darkness. Here is where the band unapologetically and deftly submerges into a pure blackened sound. Pummeling drums rapidly push a choir of chainsaw riffage to produce a melody that is sorrowful and hopeless all at once, before collecting itself into a showcase of chaotic triumph.

Any DnD fans reading this already know from the title that this track is inspired by the Drow. An evil race of elves who reside beneath the denizens of Faerun in the world of the Forgotten Realms. The most famous of this race is a ranger by the name of Drizzt Do’urden who defied his races evil heritage to become one of the greatest heroes in his worlds history. This song, which is inspired by the entire series “The legend of Drizzt” however, is not his story. It pays homage to the cruel Spider Queen, deity and creator to the Drow, a goddess of chaos, domination, and tyranny, Lolth! This blistering black-thrash track puts heavy emphasis on the black but injects the melodies with inspiration from baroque chamber music echoing off the stony walls of an abandoned keep. Much like the beings who this song pays homage, there is an enthralling mixture of beauty and horror twisting its way through each passage of this song.

5. Enslaved New World:

I suspect the intro of this one grabbed your attention. Continuing forth with the classically influenced compositions, this track puts its thrash foot forward and swiftly uses the other foot to kick you in the chin. Lyrically driven by the tale of necromancy within a dying planet found within the pages of “Fire Sea” the 3rd book in the “The Death Gate Cycle” series by Margeret Weiss and Tracy Hickman, known for their “Dragonlance” series of books. It is hard not to overuse words like “intense” and “relentless” while describing the tracks in this album so let’s say this one is extreme and remorseless. The vocals erupt into this track somehow finding a new and deeper fervor five tracks into the album, showcasing an elasticity between hardcore, blackened, guttural, and sheer unrestrained frantic bellowing, all of which compliment the wall of blistering undiluted extreme metal in their excess. Drum fills performed at mach 5 lead into shrieks that threaten the structure of any nearby windows, while the lead guitar careens through the passages with the subtlety and meekness of a top fuel drag car, the bass guitar rumbles through rhythmic complexities with such confidence it convinces the soundwaves they are groovy, brutal, conspicuous and complimentary all at once while the rhythm guitar seamlessly provides the arena for this circus of extremes, pulling at chains, misdirecting the audience and leading the narrative for the audience to comprehend the feats of wonder they are bearing witness to. This song is about fireworks on a volcano to the tune of a burning orchestra.

6. Nature vs Torture:

A bell rings out to signal the beginning of the bout. The age-old philosophical conundrum of nature vs nurture, here represented by Alex, the main character of “A Clockwork Orange” a novel that has long been outshone by its cinematic interpretation. Can one be considered a good man if the only reason they do good is their inability to do evil? At what point does rehabilitation through conditioning become an unjustified end to a problematic means? A brief but powerful showcase of rhythmic experimentation precedes the gnashing assault of the track's buzzing movements. Galloping through the twists and turns of a frantic soundscape, akin to an all too immersive rollercoaster within the skeletal closet of a man losing the thread of his reality, you find yourself colliding with the song solo, which cackles with the pace and emotion of a corner-dwelling straight-jacket garbed echo of a sane person. The solos all across this album slip amongst the rhythms with the assurance of a melodic lead before a sudden burst of skillful eccentricity dances off into sharp-witted phrases of hair-raising intricacies, as though a pressure had built from the controlled sections throughout the songs until the guitar could hold back no more and, like an over-charged tesla coil lets loose with a display of lightning streaking across the ozone and leaving the viewer at attention, ready for the next display. From this solo comes a massive moment of introspection, the band seems to have finally broken orbit through all their effort and velocity in the previous tracks, and now the float through a technicolor cosmos as the pleading shrieks of the vocal lament the person they once were and the guitars howl like grieving wolves. The drums, as always, steer the vessel further and further into the great black void as the vocals and guitar reach a pitch reserved for the loneliest of moments and the deepest of losses. This moment lasts only long enough to be lost in, before the band slams back to solid earth in a high energy and chaotic crescendo that closes the track, leaving a crater in the form of a single moment of silence before the next track announces its presence.

7. Apex Shredatorr:

Deep marching drums echo from within a rain soaked tapestry of dense vegetation and unseen hunters. The water collecting inside the footprint of a great beast ripples as each colossal step taken by the band shakes the foundations of the untamed jungle.

Yes, it’s about Jurassic Park. Specifically, the novel by Michael Crichton actually outpaces its film adaptation both in violence and the nightmarish luck of the characters trapped in the park with the resurrected kings of Earth’s pre-history. An intro solo snaking over the funeral march of a riff lures you into a trance of comfort just for the band to once again pull back the veil in a flourish of breakneck speeds and lung-shaking double kick, revealing the horrors of reptilian carnage tearing through the weak flesh of mankind. The snarls and shrieks of the vocals perfectly capture the intended imagery of rampaging dinosaurs, while the band delivers powerful death thrash riffs, that seem to be conveying a message of triumph. It doesn’t take long to know that the triumph is not of man, but of the uncaring killing machines of eras hence. The song drops into a bridge that prioritizes the churning rhythms of the riffs over the melodies themselves before an almost mockingly jubilant riff skates over the consistent and threatening rhythms. Here the vocals drop into a guttural growl for an extended section, the only occurrence of this on the album, fittingly in a passage that represents a mocking interpretation of man's need to play god, and the consequences playing out in this song because of that need. As if the song had not already manhandled the senses and attention of the listener enough at this point, the band returns to their comfort speed of supersonic to deliver pure thrash directly to the veins of anyone within earshot, settling into an outro heralded by a flurry of lead work and the animalistic shrieks that have hung off of this track, like the sloughed flesh of a raptor victim, for its entirety.

8. Total Perspective Vortex:

Here the listener once again finds themselves adrift amongst the stars. Alas, this celestial destination is not one of tranquility but of hopelessness and insignificance. The Total Perspective Vortex is a torture device taken from the pages of The Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy series. The purpose of the device is to make the victim all at once perceive the enormity of the entire universe, both on the micro and macro level, while simultaneously recognizing their place and significance within it. The overwhelming sense of unimportance as a person and how trivial all aspects of existence become drive the victim to a level of madness beyond coherence. 

A haunting cosmic chorus rings out in the form of melodic tremolos, setting the stage for the band to present a yet unseen side of them. Here the music flows like a nebulous cascade of celestial bodies, molding the sonic landscape into a moonlit pool of black water perfectly mirroring the night sky and stealing from the horizon its ability to divide the earth from the heavens. The usually vicious and confrontational vocals pour forth with an airy indifference, as though the listener were just a forgotten detail concealed within the fleeting thoughts of the narrator of this story. The windy delivery of the lyrics plays off the lamenting and dreamy melodies presented by the string and drum work. The raging torrent that has been this album seems to have finally calmed itself into a lagoon of introspection and knowing. That is, until the tide shifts and once again the band plunges you into their trademark blackened assault. This is only a mild detour from the galactic orchestra playing a tribute to infinity.

The band once more resolves into a saturnine movement, ghostly rhythms build on to one another as percussions dance within the meaningless seconds of an uncaring galaxy, phantoms of echoing shrieks plead with the cold apathy of eternity for a shred of self-actualization, and all these efforts find each other in the grand expanse, and together create a harmony brimming with the listless definition of humanity's place in the grand scheme of all. Here the narrator, and perhaps the band themselves, find a purpose by looking within. The band once more, in a final output of energy, a defiant cry to the misguided proposition of higher meaning, let loose their unchecked and preferred expression of ballistic tempo while the now shrieking vocals proclaim their potent self-worth. The album settles into an unassuming fade of frequencies, a final whisper of a leviathan returning to its slumber, threatening at any moment to once again awaken and shake existence to its core.