REEKING AURA – On the Promise of the Moon
Release Date: 17th April 2026
Label: Profound Lore Records
Bandcamp
Genre: Death Metal
FFO: Artificial Brain, Cryptopsy, Replicant, Immolation, Pyrexia, Pyrrhon, Wormed, Gorguts.
Review By: Eric Wilt
April has already been a crazy month for death metal releases, and we’re just now halfway through. While last week saw a couple tech-death heavy hitters drop bombs, this week Reeking Aura is coming to smack you across the face like a load of bricks. Fans who checked out the Fires in Deep Frost EP from last year got a taste of what was to come from Reeking Aura in 2026. Now they’re back with two new members and seven additional tracks on their latest release, On the Promise of the Moon. Comprised of guitarists Terrell Grannum and Rick Habeeb and vocalist William Smith as well as new recruit’s drummer Hudson Barth and bassist TJ Coon, Reeking Aura is set to deliver a punishing blow to the death metal masses on 17 April.
From the moment the album begins, Reeking Aura wastes no time establishing a suffocating atmosphere, while the more in-your-face production makes the music feel like it’s trying to cave in your chest. Whether they’re pummeling you with the beatdown that is Concrete Basin Bath or blazing you with the speed of Sifting for Fungal Inheritance (A Mildewy, Acrid Mulch) or progging out on A Forlorn and Frozen Vapor, or hitting a groove like they do in Manure Like Magma and What Only Worms Witness, Reeking Aura’s music is always tightly crafted and crushingly heavy. There’s not much time to come up for air on On the Promise of the Moon, but the band did include Lunar Rumination, a spacey instrumental that feels like a companion piece to Fires in Deep Frost, the instrumental from the EP of the same name.
Fans of Blood and Bonemeal will find that Reeking Aura took the musical blueprint from that album and raised it to the next level on On the Promise of the Moon. If death metal’s your thing, Reeking Aura is doing it as good as anyone out there these days, and this album is definitely worth your time!
(4 / 5)
