Death Metal goes beyond music. It's the expression of [in]humanity's darkest side, devastation, sorrow. Could it all end just as another fucking trend? It won't. That's the only message HOUR OF PENANCE want to give with their sickening, mind-devastating, brutally conceived music.
Hailing from the immortal city of Rome (Italy), HOUR OF PENANCE is a 5 piece Brutal Death Metal Band in the vein of most of the American Gods such Nile, Hate Eternal, Gorgasm and other band that plays Death Metal at the speedlight! Formed back in 1999 HOUR OF PENANCE started as a Black-Death cover band. The sound made by all those incredible bands from Florida (that we all know, huh?)… it was what H.O.P. was trying to imitate. The band began to write songs, mixing the sound of different influences from Europe and USA. But the real epiphany came out when Cannibal Corpse released in October 1999 their "Bloodthirst" album (don't you think that is a killing album?!? You moron!!!). Just one year later H.O.P. release their first demo, which was recorded in only two days at the Outer Sound Studios (by Giuseppe Orlando of Novembre). The mini-CD is 20 minutes long, and includes the first song H.O.P. ever wrote, that gave the name to the band. It immediately make H.O.P. themselves known in Rome (a few time later also in Italy, after some positive reviews by 'zines and webzines), the band has some shows in the city, playing with other metal combos. H.O.P. entered Outer Sound Studios again in September, 2001 to record a split 7"EP (still waiting to be released for Warlord Rec.) with Cadaveric Crematorium (Brescia, Italy). Their side includes a new track plus a cover to paying homage to the Death Metal-gods Deicide: 5:19 minutes of blasting sonic fury! As a [dramatic] oddness, the recording session ended on Sept 11th, just before the terrorist outrage. On June, 1st 2002, H.O.P. travel to Sweden to play at the first edition of Gothenburg Deathfest. The bill includes Iniquity, DeepRed, Impure (ger), Insision, Convent, Visceral Bleeding, Immersed in Blood, Spawn of Possession. In October 2002, the band is officially under contract with the Spanish label XTREEM MUSIC (ex-REPULSE Rec.), and released their first full-length album "Disturbance" in February 2003.
What next?! Well, "Disturbance" had a large number of very positive reviews worldwide and became album of the month for the Swedish Nekrologium Webzine and for the Peruvian Metallerium Webzine. The German Possessed'zine claims that the album is the best thing done in Italy since Bud Spencer & Terence Hill's spaghetti western movies... is there any better compliment in the world?! I don't wanna know.
Solved some line up problems, the band starts a very intense live activity in the beginning of 2004, and for the second time H.O.P. play outside of Italy: this time the band joins Houwitser, Harmony Dies, Sinners'Bleed, Spawn and Symbiontic for a brutal gig in Wermelskirchen (Germany) on April 24th. A few weeks later H.O.P. supports Disgorge (mex) and Sanatorium at the Brunch Live (Porto d'Ascoli, ITA), Prophecy and Godless Truth in may , and , once again outside italy , in august the band take part as headliner at Mountains of Death Festival 2004 with band such as Spawn of Possession and Despondency. In October the band plays at the third edition of Made In Sickness Fest togheter with Malta's Death Metal combo Beheaded and technical Death Metal Prejudice.
Beginning of 2005: after two months of hard work in the new 16th Cellar Studio, HOUR OF PENANCE unleash their second attack of uncompromising Brutal Death metal untitled "Pageantry for Martyrs". The new album (that will be out once again for XTEEM MUSIC in June 2005) shows, in 10 tracks of blastbeat Fury and a unrelentless guitar riffing, the high level of songwriting and musicians capability reached by the band. We worked very hard in these last two months to bring you another DM merciless assault in the vein of what you've heard with our previous "Disturbance", and now we're glad to claim that "Pageantry for Martyrs" will definitively blow your stereo player away! 10 songs of twisted extreme music, more than 40 minutes of total Death Metal insanity, an intense mix of American and European brutality with killing production and nice gloomy artwork done by Metaphobia (you can see the cover above)... you'll love this!!
Xtreem Releases:
Band:
HOUR OF PENANCE
Title:
Disturbance
CAT. #:
XM 005 CD
Format:
CD [39:06]
Genre:
Brutal Death Metal
Released:
04.2003
Band:
HOUR OF PENANCE
Title:
Pageantry For Martyrs
CAT. #:
XM 029 CD
Format:
CD [43:45]
Genre:
Brutal Death Metal
Released:
06.2005
Media:
If you run a zine, webzine or you need high quality graphic stuff about the band, you can download here a .ZIP file with: Pictures, Logos and Album cover.
