MORTUOUS – FACELESS BURIAL – RUUN at Vaterland (Oslo, Norway)
June 6, 2023
by Jorge Patacas
Eirik Waadeland is one of the most active members of the Oslo underground scene these days. He’s currently playing in four bands, working at Kniven, one of the most important metal bars in the city, and he’s also co-organizing the upcoming first edition of the Oslo Deathfest as well as other gigs like this one. His band Ruun kicked-off the event at around 20:30. This death metal trio has been around since 2017 releasing an EP called “Atheos” in 2019 and their debut album “Impermanence” last year. They started their performance with an unreleased song called “Parasomnia” followed by tracks from their full-length debut which are clearly inspired by death metal adding some black metal elements to the mix as well. Waadeland’s guttural vocals were really impressive as usual and the band that also features Magnus Heitun Tungen on bass and Eivind Ditleiv Molin on drums was convincing and received very good feedback from the audience.
Next on the bill were Faceless Burial, a death metal trio from Melbourne, Australia, that has been touring for a while in support of their latest album “At the Foothills of Deliration” which came out last year via Me Saco un Ojo and Dark Descent Records. There was no interaction with the audience during their 30-minute set except for some thumbs up and gestures, letting the music do the talking. So we got to hear tracks from their most recent release as well as the previous ones and the crowd reacted accordingly to their mix of brutal yet very technical riffs and innovative complex drumming without losing their old school essence. First time these guys played in Norway and hopefully not the last!
Closing the evening was the Californian act Mortuous who released their sophomore album “Upon Desolation” in 2022. Founded in 2009 by current and former members of bands like Exhumed, Necrot and Chthonic Deity, this four-piece delivers uncompromising death metal the old school way. Consisting of utterly crushing riffs, demolishing blast beats, thumping bass lines and vocals that come straight from the gutter, their set was the longest of the evening and had the crowd headbanging from start to finish to tracks like “Carve”, “Through Wilderness” and “Nothing”.
These guys know what they’re doing and are keeping the traditional and morbid sound of the genre alive.
All in all, it was a great evening where around 100 fans got their dose of extreme metal. That’s an impressive number for an underground gig on a Tuesday in Oslo, so this is great news! Keep it up!
