Classic Album Review : Repudilation - Purging of Impurity (1996)
For any normal musician, a demo is something you don't intend general public to hear. It's a recording meant to showcase labels what you're about. Demo versions of songs might appear on a deluxe version of a greatest hits record late in a band's career, but many of them are never heard. In extreme metal, a demo is a prized artifact. A display of purity of intent and a collectionner's item. If your band only recorded one or two demos before breaking up, it's considered even more pure. I know, it's weird.
Today, I want to talk about one of the greatest, almost mythical demos ever recorded: Purging of Impurity, by Repudilation.
Repudilation is somewhat of an urban legend of the New York death metal scene. They released this absurdly brutal four songs demo out of the blue in 1996, recorded (to my knowledge) only two other songs that I’ve never heard, disbanded and were never heard from again by 1998. That’s why they’re so representative of the mystical powers of the demo. They materialized, dropped something perfect on unsuspecting kids and self-combusted before they had a chance to ruin it. Purging of Impurity is fucking pure.
In good old school death metal fashion, Purging of Impurity starts a solid 43 seconds of backwards Satanic messages (it was a thing then, don't ask) before launching into Fall of Oppression, a groovy, twisty slam song lead by mysterious frontman Rich Turnbull guttural croaks. Seriously, I’ve never heard vocals that low and unintelligible that aren't pitch shifted in some way. Turnbull is the only frontman I ever heard who can go lower than Dying Fetus' John Gallagher and he has zero other credits than Repudilation to his resume.
I don't know if the poor production helped, but it's truly spectacular. It's what Hank Hill talked about when he said "it's all toilet sounds."
Decimation gives the filthy, swampy guitar tone and the chuggy, mid-tempo riffs more room to shine without sacrificing on Turnbull alligator vocals. It's less self-consciously groovy and fun than Fall of Oppression, but it's still gnarly as shit. Although the idea of slam was in the air since Suffocation recorded Liege of Inveracity, Repudilation were creating a sound and production was a huge component of that sound. Decimation is vile, thin and unreal at the same time, like a radio transmissions from another dimension.
The drum sound is another important element of classic slam and Decimation is an example of how it's meant to sound: high-pitched, alien, sticking out of the primordial muck of guitars and vocals like a sore thumb. Classic slam drum sound as devised by Repudilation’s Brian Wishin is cold and grotesque on purpose. Somehow it still sounds better than Lars Ulrich's drum sound on St. Anger by any means of comparison. Go figured how it's even possible coming from a band who doesn’t want to sound good on purpose.
Eternal Depridation, the third song on Purging of Impurity, involved another glorious toilet sound vocal performance that veers on spoken word at times to groovy, but wildly disjointed guitar riffs by the late Matt Ferrara. It’s one of the most weirdly experimental and abstract brutal death metal song I ever heard. It borderlines on performance art at times. It changes tempos on the fly. There's two parts where the song almost collapses and stops. It speeds up and slows down. It's complete chaos. But in a good way.
The closer Decay of Humanity is another wildly different offering that starts with a sample followed by perhaps the only moment on the record where the bass is audible. You've heard slam songs like Decay of Humanity before I have no doubt, but this is the original copy. There's a greater emphasis on the groovy guitar riffs and the circle pit-inducing heavy moments, but Matt Ferrara's work is almost trance inducing. It's played with such laser tight execution. It makes you want to stomp and fuck shit up.
*
So, there you have it. Purging of Impurity is the canonical example of why metalhead weirdos worship demo recordings. On top of having historical and cultural value, this one was such a shocking innovation in sound and production texture that it is still not only it is fondly remembered, but it is also still being enjoyed by many today and often rereleased by independent labels. It is also one of the purest iteration of a sound that’s done nothing but dilute itself over the years. An artifact and an enduring classic at once.
