San Diego’s RITUAL TORTURE can stand proud in front of all the other current newcomers of the rising old school Death Metal movement. That’s something I have to point out after a couple of listens to their debut demo “Rise Of The Fallen”. RITUAL TORTURE’s sound is American to the bone. I hear huge hints of my old favourites in REVENANT at their “Prophecies Of A Dying World” times. RITUAL TORTURE sound old school, but not fitting to the current old school revival that much as their brand of Death Metal has many elements of Thrash Metal, too. Especially the solos are not the typical Death Metal shrieks. Their weird elements are those parts which bring me to the conclusion that they are in a way linked to the early work of New Jersey’s REVENANT as mentioned above. And as REVENANT where influenced a lot by POSSESSED I can mention the influence of this band, too. The word “influence” might be wrong here for both bands as I don’t read these 2 bands in RITUAL TORTURE’s biography or any other kind of infosheet and hope that the band don’t mind that I bring them in connection with these bands. Never mind, there could be much worse comparison than this one, and I’m sure the band can live a good deal with it. “Rise Of The Fallen” is the first output of this new band and a great start if you ask me. Next to an atmospheric, almost Black Metal-like, intro this tape contains 5 songs including a coverversion of VADER’s ‘Vicious Circle’ from their “The Ultimate Incantation” debut album. Are VADER probably an influence, too? Might be possible… Well, as I already wrote, this demotape is a great start and I can only recommend it to each and every one of you who can stand the sound of the mentioned three bands and would like to support a new hopeful. A necessity is to own a tapeplayer as this recording is only available on tape so far. Get in touch with the band through www.myspace.com/ritualtorture. The tape is available from www.bloodharvest.se.