Desecresy // The Secret of Death // Album Review

Finish Monolith Desecresy has risen from the darkest dwellings to bring us yet another barbaric slab of the most brutal & punishing death metal.

Tommi Grönqvist’s one-person project Desecresy is the perfect blend of the most ferocious, dark & brooding death metal with the simple, knuckle-dragging riffs & cavernous tones that I love. With nine releases under his belt, he has played all instruments on the albums & even created the album artwork.

Desecresy is a singular vision. “Not bound to the pursuit of feats of musical athleticism, not fixated on plumbing the depths of human perversion or creating anthems for the momentary pleasures of the pit”, words that Grönqvist perfectly sums up the sound & song writing of the project. Crafting albums that are meant to wash over you, soak in every moment & a sonic journey in the darkest art form.

His newest & might be his best work yet, “The Secret of Death” is eight tracks of the most pummeling death metal in the vein of Incantation & Funebre with the riffage of early Asphyx & Bolt Thrower.

Opener “Gorge of the Dead” sets the tone perfectly for what is about to unfold. With a moment of haunting & eerie tones of samples in reverse before the track explodes for just a few bars of heaviness, giving you just a taste before Grönqvist unleashes the track at full blast. Its heavy riffage grabs you straight away, but soaring over the top is a great tremolo guitar riff that blends perfectly together.

This great duo of tank-like chugs opens with beautiful higher riffs that give the track a driving force. His vocals, deep & guttural, are balanced and great. Not too buried in the mix & have enough tonality to punch through when needed, too.

Now the drums & bass on this track & whole album can make or break an album in this style. And I’m happy to say they are fucking great. Now it’s hard for me to tell if the drums are played by Grönqvist or programmed, but what I can say is they sound so raw, heavy, & very organic. The blur that is like perfectly between being thunderous & ungodly to being soft & precise in moments that need them.

As a duo, the bass and the drums give the album that heavy, punishing, & down right dirty sound you want from this style of death metal. The bass is loud, punchy, but also on big open notes, fills the air, & feels suffocation in its weight. This drum & bass sound really drives the band’s great sound & creates an overall tone that many full bands can never really achieve, yet somehow Grönqvist has been able to do so alone.

Picking up the pace, “By the Slowing Vortex of Time” feels like a freight train, going top speed & almost coming off the rails. With its swinging, groovy style opening riff for a few bars before transitioning into this fast double kick part that feels like a machine gun blast to the chest. Then finally slowly down & bringing the thick, stomping chugs. The first two minutes of this track give you it all. Fast, heavy & interesting.

At the halfway point, the higher Bolt Thrower-style riffage comes in with a lead-style section that gives you a moment to breathe & soak up its epic feel. Drenched in reverb, the tone is gorgeous & cuts right through the mix. The track brings back that slow, mammoth-like sound & closes out as the train finally comes to a satisfying halt, but leaves mountains of destruction in the dust.

If, like me, you love the barbaric & unhinged style of death metal like Incantation, then “Ancient Timbre of Demise” will give you that feeling. My favourite track on the album & has great moments that have the flavour of the whole album. This track has my favourite riffs on the album. Starting very melodic & drawing you in with something you think might be calm, NO! That’s to fool you before hitting you with the opening riff of a track which feels like a ten-ton hammer to the dome. It’s a really driven track that even gives a great shining moment for the bass to drive the song’s momentum. But the collection of riffs, even a great solo section, the heaviest drums on the album, & lastesly the best song writing on the album so far, this track has it all. Really is a stand-out performance from Grönqvist.

The album’s closest & longest track, at nearly seven minutes, “Vanishing Existence” is the perfect way to close out this goliath of an album. With a great atmospheric synth section that really builds the track, the double kick starts it & sets the pace. Then tagged in the bass joins & creates this huge wall of sound. At the perfect time, the whole band gets things into full gear. At the halfway point, this great infectious rhythmic guitar riff is introduced & grabs you.

It feels fresh & unlike what’s come before, but thankfully still stays within the track’s overall tone and adds a moment of clarity. The track’s heavy & buzzsaw-like lower riff joins in, creating a blend of high & low that are totally polar sounds but team together so well to create an interesting & engaging sound. As the track fades gradually with swirling synths, this monstrous album draws to a close.

“The Secret of Death” gave me what I wanted tenfold. I’m a huge lover of the death metal genre. Still, my heart lies in the heavy death doom style, & Desecresy has given me some of the heaviest riffs & cavernous, haunting moments, while also crafting fantastically written tracks within the genre for some time. And being a one-person project baffles me, but it really shows Tommi Grönqvist’s passion for taking all aspects of the band under his wing to create this monolithic album—a crushing, pulverising display of the darkest death metal within 2026.

Review: Joseph Mitchell

THE SECRET OF DEATH is out via XTREEM MUSIC on 21st May 2026