Mutagenic Host – The Diseased Machine Review

By Tyme

Cooked up like the T-Virus in some underground UK lab and now stalking the streets of London, is Mutagenic Host, a newcomer to the British death metal scene. After the release of The Genotoxic Demo in 2023, Mutagenic Host signed on with Dry Cough Records, as well as Gurgling Gore and Memento Mori, to release their debut album, The Diseased Machine. Primarily concerned with the world’s increasing levels of apathetic complacency and the rampant proliferation of AI, “their work is an allegory for the systematic industrialization of humanity’s eradication—whether by human hands or by the machines we create to snuff out life.” In a genre packed with competition, Mutagenic Host steps up to the line, prepared to toss their fedoras into the ring alongside fellow new British heavies like Coffin Mulch, Slimelord, and Mortuary Spawn. I wondered if they’d have the DNA necessary to stand out in the crowd or if they should keep percolating in the petri dish.

Mutagenic Host‘s primary organism is a mass of old-school death metal, with hardcore elements pustulating its writhing appendages. More Obituary than Monstrosity, the death of The Diseased Machine‘s metal harkens back to the halcyon days of Florida’s nineties scene. Rife with tight, precise riffs but trading in the thrashier influences for sprinkles of hardcore, Mutagenic Host manages to set themselves apart from their British brethren. Whether they’re crushing skulls with Unleashed abandon (“Genestealer,” “Promethean Dusk”) or dragging their knuckles through chug-a-sludge swamps of Wharflurchian slime (“Organometallic Assimilation,” “The Twisted Helix”), the unrelenting riff-slaught of Jack Thompson and Sami Tuohino1 packs The Diseased Machine with enough globby chugs, oozy leads, and twisty solos to reduce even the meanest Resident Evil end boss to a purulent puddle. Combine that with Dan Bulford’s bulbously punchy bass work and George Kinsella-Pearn’s world-beating drumstrosities, and you have one devastatingly lethal mutant on your hands.

Completing the vehicle through which Mutagenic Host brings you their post-apocalyptic vision are the vocals of Ash Moore. His Maulti-pronged attack comes with the standard weaponry of guttural grunts, throat-ripping roars and raspy shrieks, but floats in a reagent of hardcore-tinged shouts. Moore’s performance, recorded with cavernous echo, sits siloed in Ben Jones’ beefily brutal mix. This bifurcation enhances rather than detracts from The Diseased Machine‘s gene-splicing approach, which opener “Neurological Necrosis” fully encapsulates. After a brief eighties-style science fiction intro, the track builds with slimy guitar licks and bubbling bass lines before spewing forth with Moore’s mighty roar over a brain-bashing brutal riff. The song weaves through hardcore laden d-beats, and gang shouts before lumbering to its conclusion under massively thick riffs that stick like slow-churned pus-butter. And despite its state of youthful embryogenesis, Mutagenic Host presents as a band much more mature, The Diseased Machine sounding like a product from well-established scene veterans.

Weighted neither to its front nor back half, The Diseased Machine is a balanced platter of gurgling goodness, nearly void of anomalous flaws. Deft injections of groove and melody give the tornadic guitar swirls of “Artificial Harvest of the Obscene” and the bludgeoning bass of “Incomprehensible Methods of Slaughter” extra depth, ensuring not a second of The Diseased Machine‘s ideal forty-one-minute run time is wasted. Even the mid-album interlude “DIRECTIVE:: [kill_on_sight]” furthers the narrative effectively and offers a point of poignant respite. This break is needed to make it to the instrumental closer “Rivers of Grief,” with its Holst-inspired riff on the “Mars” theme to start; it gives way to a river of brutal chugs on which listeners float to the album’s conclusion.

Even before my most recent demotion to staff, I had been eyeing The Diseased Machine, so I was exuberant when I saw it glimmering in the sump pit, unclaimed by senior staff. I could only hope the album lived up to my enthusiastic expectations, which it does. Mutagenic Host has released a death metal album that checks all the boxes, a rifferously frenzied affair of epic proportions. It will not be the only thing I recommend in 2025, but it’s undoubtedly the first. I will be intently eyeing Mutagenic Host, anticipating their next evolution, and fans of this style should, too.

Rating: 4.0/5.0
DR: 8 | Format Reviewed: 320 kbps mp3
Labels: Gurgling Gore | Dry Cough | Memento Mori
Website: mutagenichost.bandcamp.com
Releases Worldwide: January 3rd, 2025

#2025 #40 #CoffinMulch #DeathMetal #DryCoughRecords #EnglishMetal #GurglingGoreRecords #Jan3 #MementoMoriRecords #MutagenicHost #Obituary #Review #Reviews #TheDiseasedMachine #Wharflurch

Morbus Grave – Feasting the Macabre Review

By Steel Druhm

2022 saw the debut by Italian death metal low-lifers Morbus Grave splatter on the walls of the metalverse like so much gore slop. Lurking into Absurdity was like a moist and sticky love letter to Autopsy, Impetigo, and Pungent Stench, with no fucks given for refinement or subtlety. It was caustic, greasy and sleazy and therefore it was good (shit)fun for all. The band crammed in ominous doom segments with a vague second-wave black metal vibe and it all came together in delightfully nauseating ways. I still go back to it when I need a booster shot of distasteful abominations so it must have struck a raw nerve. Fast-forward a scant year and change and we get the diseased follow-up Feasting the Macabre and surprise, surprise, it sounds like a pus-filled blister torn open to reveal the grotesqueries within. It’s gross-out death metal for those who wish Autopsy sounded less healthy and hygienic, and it all but guarantees you’ll need a hydrochloric acid sponge bath when it’s all over. Are you on board yet, you sick little freak?

The Morbus Grave blueprint is more or less the same here, with punky, rowdy death mixed with doom and blackened edges, but the overall product feels a touch more “polished” and “smooth” this time. That said, this is still a big ole bucket of pig entrails and goat semen that was left in the sun all day. The stench of extremity fills the ear nostrils immediately on proper opener “Where Evil Dwells.” It sounds creepy, low-fi, sludgy and all-around shitty as it lurches from mid-tempo gallops to unsteady, wobbly blasting. The Autopsy-isms are mixed with The Return era Bathory and touches of punky d-beatery for maximum destruction and it works. Frontman Erman sounds like he’s having a massive brain seizure and by the end he sounds like he’s in vocal rigor mortis. “Funeral Embodiment” is thrashy and savage with sweet vocal bits that reek of early Mayhem. The minimalist yet unusual riffs are fun, as are Erman’s increasingly deranged vocals.

Back-to-back ass kickers “Congregation of the Exult” and “Feasting the Macabre” are high points loaded with slimy riffs and unsettling vocal excess. There’s a blunt force to the former that’s nicely offset by eerie, creepy moments that sound like horror soundtrack bits, and the latter is d-beaty caveman thuggism and it’s so goddamn thick and slimy, it’s like slipping on someone’s intestines and falling into a mass grave. “Dissolving Obscurity” also deserves mention for its Winter-meets Mayhem-meets-Autopsy cluster fuck of gruesomeness. This one is a queasy little puppy that will make folks question your metal health. At an anorexic 28 minutes (including an intro, outro, and one interlude), there’s not much meat on the rotting bone. The sheer brevity makes Feasting the Macabre feel like a too-quick dip in an abattoir’s waste collection pool, and it comes across as somewhat incomplete. It has high points, but a few numbers don’t quite rise to that next level of essential death metal listening, which is annoying on such a short offering. Then again, Morbus Grave aren’t the band to drop a Record o’ the Year anyway. They just club you with a shit-splattered bat and leave you to die in pain, and I respect that.

As with last time, the star of the show is Erman and his twisted, hideous throat tortures. This guy takes the Chris Reifert model and goes 10 layers deeper into revolting unhingement. He rampages across every song like a loony toony cookie monster and his overdoing it is a big part of the fun. Edy and Blacksodomagickkk (don’t ask) do a lot with a little, utilizing minimalist riffs that walk the line between death and black metal and generally sound really olde. They d-beat, they thrash, they chug, and at key moments they doom, but they do it all in a threadbare way that sounds evil and enigmatic. Meanwhile, Danny Guerra pounds away at the kit with great vengeance and furious anger. He’s not the most polished pummeller in the biz, but you get pulverized nonetheless.

Morbus Grave are good at their very specific brand of damp, bloody death metal and they’re in the running to carry the banner brandished by Autopsy should those legendary sleazebags move on to shittier pastures. You can snag Feasting the Macabre without fear of being let down because this stuff is more fun than a gallon of spoiled shrimp milk. It’s a fast, fun shotgun blast to the face and we all need that sometimes. Don’t play this at work though, ever.

Rating: 3.0/5.0
DR: | Format Reviewed: 320 kbps mp3
Label: Memento Mori
Websites: morbusgrave1.bandcamp.com | facebook.com/morbusgrave |
Releases Worldwide: July 26th, 2024

#2024 #30 #Autopsy #DeathMetal #FeastingTheMacabre #Impetigo #ItalianMetal #Jul24 #LurkingIntoAbsurdity #Mayhem #MementoMoriRecords #MorbusGrave #Review #Reviews

Stuck in the Filter: April 2024’s Angry Misses

By Kenstrosity

The heat persists. Intensifies, even. We’re not even to the dead center of summer, where pavement melts and sinew sloughs off of bones. And yet, we toil. Endless trudges through the slime and grime of sharply angled ducts and beveled sheet metal characterize an average workday for my filtration minions, who do my bidding without question as I sip a piña colada in these run down and ragged headquarters. Alright fine, we don’t have piña coladas here, but a sponge can dream! A sponge can dream…

What was I saying? Oh, right. After many months of constant pep talks and gentle reminders with a cattle prod, my team of hack crack sifters managed a respectable haul from our April buildup. Dive in at your own peril!

Kenstrosity’s Sooty Slab

Exhumation // Master’s Personae [April 26th, 2024 – Pulverised Records]

Indonesian blackened death duo Exhumation never would’ve made it to my queue were it not for our burgeoning Discord server. Rollicking tunes, produced with a charming rawness that tingles my spine, task themselves with the summary destruction of that same spine and waste no time getting started. From the onset of opener “In Death Vortex,” Master’s Personae eviscerates with rabid teeth gnashing through my flesh. Ghoul (guitars) and Bones (vocals) display their respective talents vomiting souls out of their body and concocting sickening infernal riffs with aplomb—and made damn sure their session musicians could do more than just keep up on bass (Sebek), drums (Aldi), and lead guitar (J. Magus). With songs that kick as much ass-tonnage as highlights “Pierce the Abyssheart,” “Chaos Feasting,” “Thine Inmost Curse,” and late bloomer “Mahapralaya,” the only thing that could possibly stand in between you and total metallic indoctrination is the record’s gritty, extra-crunchy production. For some, that might even be its greatest selling point. Either way, Master’s Personae is, at its core, just a nonstop demonic party. Ipso facto, if you like fun, you like this. If you don’t, leave the Hall!

Thus Spoke’s Chucked Choices

Alpha Wolf // Half Living Things [April 5th, 2024 – SharpTone Records]

Aussie gang Alpha Wolf have always had an “angry” sound, but until now, they remained quite firmly smack dab in the middle of modern metalcore. With Half Living Things,1 however, the band move as far as they ever have into beatdown hardcore, albeit, a very glossy, and very metalcore interpretation of it. While many, myself included, think they sound better with a little bit of intrigue, a little bit of mournful melody and atmosphere, there’s no denying that this album does contain several bone-fide bangers. Opening run “Bring Back the Noise,” “Double-Edge Demise,” and “Haunter,” are a groovy set of smacks upside the head, and later cuts “Feign,” and “A Terrible Day for Rain” echo the same menace, safely keeping your head bobbing and your mean face on. The aggression can veer into the realm of cringe at points, not least on single “Sucks 2 Suck,” which includes the wild misstep of a thuggish rap bridge courtesy of ICE-T. But on the other hand, Alpha Wolf do show they have a heart, with surprisingly sadboi “Whenever You’re Ready,” and closer “Ambivalence.” It’s all pretty angsty, but questionable decisions aside, Half Living Things is worth at least the time it takes you to hear one or two of its best tracks. I’ll always be here for a little bit of adolescent ennui anyway.

Sarcasm // Mourninghoul [April 12th, 2024 – Hammerheart Records]

Whilst still a n00b, I reviewed Sarcasm’s previous album, Stellar Stream Obscured, and, to my initial surprise, really rather liked it. It was simply a quirk of circumstance that I didn’t pick up the promo for Mourninghoul. And looking back on that week, I wish I had. This thing is just as fun, just as furious, and once again the perfect balance between odd and straightforwardly blistering. Once again, they lace creepy organs and synthwork into death doom (“Withered Memories of Souls We Mourn,” “No Solace From Above”) to add a little mystique. Once again, they display some brilliant, beautiful, melodic black(ened death) metal riffery to lead refrains (“Lifelike Sleep,” “Dying Embers of Solitude,” “Absence if Reality”), not only soaking the listener in the nostalgia of the golden years of Dissection and Necrophobic, but memorable and moving in their own right. Overall, the album is a little slower and more atmospheric than its predecessor, but in this light perhaps a little more thoughtful. One to check out for anyone who dug Stellar Stream Obscured.

Dear Hollow’s Loudness Lard

Lord Spikeheart // The Adept [April 19th, 2024 – Haekalu Records]

Lord Spikeheart is the alias of Martin Kanja, one-half of grind/noise duo Duma, whose sole self-titled LP was received warmly back in 2020 by the gone-but-unforgotten Roquentin. Now a solo act, Spikeheart fully embraces the manic in his debut full-length The Adept, a fusion of noise, industrial, trap, grind, and hip-hop and tinged with native Kenyan instruments. – guaranteed to scare off unwanted listeners. Featuring a bevy of featured artists, The Adept is as jerky and unpredictable as you might expect from its laundry list of sounds. Including all, but not limited to, Author & Punisher-level of manufactured brutality (“Sham-Ra”), layers of jagged hip-hop a la Skech185 (“Emblem Blem,” “Djangili,” “33rd Degree Access”), and outright metal guitar solos and blastbeats (“Nobody”), as well as outright bananas explosive Igorrr-esque breakcore seizures and Kenyan percussion (“TYVM”) and ominous sprawls of haunting humid ambiance over manic beats (“Rem Fodder,” “Verbose Patmos,” “4AM in the Mara”), and there is little that is predictable about The Adept. Throw on Lord Spikeheart’s incredible charisma, shocking vocals, and evocative primal songwriting, and you’ve got yourself a tastefully insane and impressively uncomfortable slab of experimentation that feels dangerous and unrelenting in the right ways.

Whores. // War. [April 16th, 2024 – The Ghost is Clear Records]

Sometimes you just need a good concussion and drool out your brains to the curb because you got dinged around so much. Atlanta four-piece Whores. will provide mightily in more ways than one. Professing a riff-heavy noise rock/sludge metal combo reminiscent of Chat Pile or Iron Monkey, each of the tracks in War.’s 34-minute runtime is a thick-ass spanker with thick-ass riffs, bad-ass cymbal abuse, and mad-ass yells, and you’d be a fool to miss this broken-tooth abuse. Groove is embedded in the marrow of each bone, and the swill of riffs and noisy leads will get your head bobbing before you can learn how to pronounce opener “Malinches.” From the outright onslaughts of “Imposter Syndrome” and “Sicko,” to the bass builds and guitar squonks of “Quitter’s Fight Song” and “Hostage Therapy” or punky rhythms of “Hieronymous Bosch was Right” and “The Death of a Stuntman,” you don’t need to get all academic to abuse the drywall, and Whores. will set their teeth behind your bruised knuckles. The message is clear: get unga-bunga with riff.

Spit on Your Grave // Arkanum [April 12th, 2024 – Self Release]

You always run a risk when you change up your sound, even slightly. Mexican death metal peddlers Spit on Your Grave are familiar with it. Formerly bringin’ the slamz and gooey brutal shit to your court with unhinged insanity, Arkanum keeps the core sound while incorporating more tempo and nimbleness, making a blazing death metal album with some Behemoth-esque experimentation that keeps the album from falling into gnarly monotony and injects a necessary regality reflected in its art. Subtle plucking motifs grace opener “The Infection” and closer “The March of the Innocents,” chanting and choirs spruce up limper portions of “Into the Devil’s Realm,” and dancy rhythms and melodeath noodling kick up “Broken Hourglass.” In spite of the levels of experimentation, the riff reigns supreme throughout, made most plain in the no-holds-barred death metal assaults of “The Heretic,” “Dark Lullaby,” and “Self Sacrifice.” It’s somewhere between Behemoth’s wicked conjuration of crowns and Hate Eternal’s blazing scorched earth campaign, and while imperfect, Spit on Your Grave’s new direction is tantalizing.

Dolphin Whisperer’s Crossed Up Casting

Nuclear Tomb // Terror Labyrinthian [April 12th, 2024 – Everlasting Spew]

Filthy, frothing, furious, Nuclear Tomb embodies all that fueled the origins of the thrash and death movements, which actively rejected the tonal shift toward “pleasing” that pop-leaning forms of heavy metal were taking at the time. So, yes, it’s unsurprising to hear a punky and driven bass identity reminiscent of the overdriven pummeling of Dan Lilker in Nuclear Assault or Stéphane Picard in Obliveon. But though thrash rings true in the speed-needing assaults of “Fatal Visions” or “Vile Humanity,” death—the gnarled yet precise riffcraft you would heard in an early Pestilence summoning—feeds ugly and foul this acts hefty ambitions. Terror Labyrinthian gives exactly what its name promises: a sense of profound encapsulation and isolation in the density that Nucleur Tomb conjures alongside a sci-fi-informed fear and terror. Its ambition is such that it can fly off the rails a touch when it gets too moody (“Dominance & Persecution”), and its level of discordance can leave tracks feeling like intangible pulps of sick and snarling riffage (“Manufacturing Consent,” “Parasitic”). Despite these minor concerns, Labyrinthian Terror shakes enough to leave a worthy, full-length mark after two promising EPs. And with members of Nuclear Tomb floating around in their small scene with oddball grinders Ixias and the avant-minded Genevieve, it’s all but a promise that what comes next will be weird, frightening, and demanding.

Steel Druhm’s Rancid Requiems to Rotpitting

Engulfed // Unearthly Litanies of Despair [April 19th, 2024 – Me Saco Ojo]

Straight outta Turkey comes the vicious, face-melting death metal assault of Engulfed. Featuring members of Hyperdontia and Diabolizer and bearing hallmarks of both, Engulfed are a nasty savage on a war march to destroy all that lives and breathes. With a highly seasoned lineup and a lethal mission statement, Unearthly Litanies of Despair is a “not fucking around” kind of death platter full of blazing speed, thunderous blasts, and more sub-basement croaks and roars than you’d find in an illegal Balrog mining facility. All the old school legends get sound checked, with plenty of Vader, Morbid Angel, and Incantation-isms to be unearthed, but to my ears, Engulfed sounds most like brother band Diabolizer. That’s certainly not a bad thing, as anyone who heard 2021s Khalkedonian Death will attest. There’s not much subtly on display on Unearthly Litanies, and Engulfed are happy to blast away at Mach 9 for the bulk of the album’s runtime, only slowing down long enough to let slithery riffs do their tentacle things. It isn’t until the closing stanza “Occult Incantations” that they opt to get down and doomy, and though it runs way long at nearly 8 minutes, it digs up some nicely dark, gloomy textures. All in all a brutal trip to the belly of the beast feaster!

Coffin Curse // The Continuous Nothing [April 22nd, 2024 – Memento Mori]

The sophomore offering from Chile’s Coffin Curse is 100% military grade old school death with enough rot and pus to win over any genre fancier. The Continuous Nothing is really a continuous something, and that something is gnarly, thrashing death goodness in the varicose vein of Autopsy with some Deicide and Morbid Angel in the gore batter. There’s absolutely nothing new here, but the enthusiasm with which Coffin Curse comes at the classic death style is refreshing and invigorating. You’ll be smiling early into opener “Thin the Herd” due to its oh-so-righteous blend of Autopsy and vintage Morbid Angel, and it’s tough to blast “Bacchanal of the Mortal” and not want to throw your BarcaLounger out the fucking window. This is meat n’ tatters gutter death that could have come out in the late 80s or early 90s, but that doesn’t lessen its vitality and impact since these cats know how to write a ripping tune. I’m especially enamored with the disgusting vocals of Max Neira who gives even the hideous Chris Reifert a run for his scuzz-vomit money. This thing is just good, gross fun!

Tombstoner // Rot Stink Rip [April 26th, 2024 – Redefining Darkness]

Staten Island-based death thugs Tombstoner came back to kill with second album Rot Stink Rip, showcasing a whole lotta New York attitude. With a sound mixing mouth-breathing caveman brutality with New York hardcore undertones, the menu items all come with brass knuckles and steel-toed boots to your fat face (no substitutions!). This is street-level tough guy death with a Biohazard/Pantera-level IQ and anything remotely intellectual is tossed in the dumpster like a carpet-wrapped corpse. Songs like “Sealed in Blood” will rot your brain stem as it curb stomps your skull, and the beefy death grooves are ugly, stupid, and dangerous. Internal Bleeding-isms rebound off Skinless idioms amid the brainless forward momentum of the title track, and the groove-busting, barroom-bullying nastiness of primal cuts like “Metamorphosis” and “Reduced to Hate” are made for Roids Appreciation Day at Planet Meathead. The riffs are hella weighty and the overall approach is lead pipe brutality. Don’t bother spinning this if you’re one of those fancy-dancy tech types. This one is strictly for the gashouse gorillas and pimpanzees.

Saunders’ Slimy Selections

Satanic North // Satanic North [April 19th, 2024 – Reaper Entertainment]

Featuring members of Ensiferum, Finnish black metal troupe Satanic North ripped out a seething slab of old school black metal on their self-titled debut. Although the album seemed to drop with minimal fanfare or notice, having been clued into its existence, Satanic North has since provided a helluva fun time. Satanic North pull no punches and dispense with flash or bombast, adding modern beef to an endearingly old school formula that stomps hard. Harnessing the raw, punky, Venom-esque attitude of ’80s black metal, along with distinctive second-wave elements, and dashes of Darkthrone and Goatwhore, Satanic North is a varied, aggressive and utterly addictive opus. Regardless of the mode of destruction the band chooses at any given time, the songwriting quality generally maintains the rage. Grim, icy atmospheres envelope blasting, viciously executed songs, loaded with a bevy of badass riffs and pissed-off attitude. The relentless, hammering blows on opener “War,” sit comfortably alongside the crawling, sinister melodies and infectious hooks of “Village,” while expert pacing and builds highlight epic later album gem, “Kohti Kuolemaa.” Satanic North throw down some awesomely thrashy barnburners for good measure on powerhouse nuggets of black gold in the shape of “Wolf” and closer “Satanic North.” One of 2024’s underrated gems.

Iron Monkey // Spleen & Goad [April 5th, 2024 – Relapse Records]

UK veterans Iron Monkey’s 1998 opus Our Problem is a sludge classic that I’ve held in high regard for many years. Sadly, the untimely death of raw-throated vocalist Johnny Morrow, a distinctive, glass-gurgling beast behind the mic, saw the band dissolve, until reforming and crafting a solid comeback with 2017’s 9-13. Stripped own to a trio in their second coming, with long-serving guitarist Jim Rushby doing an admirable job taking over the vocal slot, Iron Monkey sound as though the piss, vinegar, and hatred still flows in their veins. Spleen & Goad offers few surprises, continuing the trend of its predecessor while maintaining the signature Iron Monkey sound. And although Iron Monkey cannot quite match the esteemed heights of their early days, this modern, well-trodden incarnation of the band still bludgeons, grooves and seethes with sledgehammer force and infectiously diseased riffs. Channeling the bluesy Sabbathian meets NOLA mode of sludge, with a side of Grief, and a shit ton of spite, the Iron Monkey lads deliver the goods again. Noisy, feedback-drenched bruisers rule the day; as swaggering, drunken grooves, surly riffs, and feral vocals drive this unhinged hate machine. Spleen & Goad is victim to some creeping bloat, however overall, it’s a stellar return and addition to their storied catalog, as rugged, bludgeoning cuts like “Misanthropizer,” “Concrete Shock,” “Rat Flag” and “Lead Transfusion” attests.

Mystikus Hugebeard’s Filthy Finding

Diabolic Oath // Oracular Hexations [April 5th, 2024 – Sentient Ruin Laboratories]

Oracular Hexations is a blast. It is a chaotic, colossally dense album of what can ostensibly be called blackened death metal, but the music is just so fucking filthy it might as well be sludge. The fun thing here is that the guitar and bass are completely fretless; the riffs aren’t hard to parse but the guitars feel almost slippery. It allows the brutal riffage of a heavy track like “Serpent Coils Suffocating the Mortal Wound” to become borderline hallucinogenic, while still hitting like a truck. The slower, oozing riffs of “Rusted Madness Tethering Misbegotten Haruspices” and “Winged Ouroboros Mutating Unto Gold” have a real viscosity to them that always reminds me of the stoner doom stylings of Conan. This album is definitely a lot, but it’s an extremely satisfying listen. The fretless imprecision paired with the music’s intensity, the delightfully disgusting guitar tone, and the vocalist’s tectonic gurgles all give Oracular Hexations a ritualistic atmosphere so thick you can practically sink into it. There’s plenty one could say about the musicianship—the drummer deserves praise for his diverse, technical performance—but trying to dial in on any one ingredient is like trying to appreciate the subtle flavor undertones of sheep stomach in a plate of haggis. Just cram the whole thing in at once, man, because this is the kind of sensory brutalization that you’ve gotta just let happen to you.

Iceberg’s Singular Surfacing

Venomous Echoes // Split Formations and Infinite Mania [April 05, 2024 – I, Voidhanger Records]

Extreme metal’s penchant for horror and destruction never ceases to amaze me. It doesn’t matter how I came across Venomous Echoes second album Split Formations and Infinite Mania, one look at that album cover and the curtain rise of squelching music within had me transfixed. Brutal Floridian death metal meets the dissonant disintegration of Portal meets the crushing weight of funeral doom and they all come together in the unrated cut of a Cronenberg flick. One-man-band Benjamin Vanweelden takes the listener inside his own personal hell as he wrestles with body dysmorphia, making for an experience not unlike recent cuts by An Isolated Mind or The Reticent. This is challenging, highly uncomfortable music, abandoning pitch and rhythm at will, bending and twisting notes and smothering the listener with oppressive atmosphere. From the sickening stomping sound effects of opener “Ocular Maltosis ov Schizophrenia” to the ultra-dissonant ostinato and DSBM wailing of closer “Split Formations and Infinite Mania,” this album is the definition of the car crash you can’t look away from. Far outside any zone of comfort is exactly where Vanweelden wants his listeners, and I have to say this makes for a sickly impressive, revolting, yet mesmerizing experience.

#AlphaWolf #AmericanMetal #AnIsolatedMind #Arkanum #AustralianMetal #AuthorPunisher #AuthorAndPunisher #Autopsy #Behemoth #Biohazard #BlackMetal #BlackSabbath #BlackenedDeathMetal #BrutalDeathMetal #ChatPile #ChileanMetal #CoffinCurse #Darkthrone #DeathMetal #Deicide #DiabolicOath #Diabolizer #Dissection #Duma #Engulfed #Ensiferum #EverlastingSpewRecords #Exhumation #FinnishMetal #FuneralDoom #Genevieve #Goatwhore #Grief #Grind #Grindcore #HaekaluRecords #HalfLivingThings #HammerheartRecords #Hardcore #HipHop #Hyperdontia #IVoidhangerRecords #Igorrr #Incantation #IndonesianMetal #Industrial #InternalBleeding #IronMonkey #Ixias #KenyanMetal #LordSpikeheart #MasterSPersonae #MeSacoUnOjoRecords #MelodicBlackMetal #MelodicDeathMetal #MementoMoriRecords #Metalcore #MexicanMetal #MorbidAngel #Mourninghoul #Necrophobic #Noise #NuclearAssault #NuclearTomb #Obliveon #OracularHexations #Pantera #Pestilence #Portal #PulverisedRecords #RawBlackMetal #ReaperEntertainment #RedefiningDarknessRecords #RelapseRecords #Review #Reviews #RotStinkRip #Sarcasm #SatanicNorth #SelfRelease #SharpToneRecords #Skech185 #Skinless #Slam #Sludge #SludgeMetal #SpitOnYourGrave #SpleenGoad #SplitFormationsAndInfiniteMania #StuckInTheFilter #SwedishMetal #TerrorLabyrinthian #TheAdept #TheContinuousNothing #TheGhostIsClearRecords #TheReticent #ThrashMetal #Tombstoner #Trap #TurkishMetal #UKMetal #UnearthlyLitaniesOfDespair #Vader #Venom #VenomousEchoes #War #Whores_

Necrotum – Defleshed Exhumation Review

By Steel Druhm

I cannot claim familiarity or history with Romanian death metal act Necrotum, but the promo sump was shallow in January and an album title like Defleshed Exhumation was sure to catch the eye of Steel even in more target-rich environs. This is the band’s third full-length effort and it features a sound sitting at the crossroads of tech/prog/OSDM. Their earlier releases were much more traditional caveman death, but here on Defleshed, it seems like the boys wanted to stretch themselves and try some new things. This newfound progressive leaning gives the material a heavy, yet unpredictable style, like classic Suffocation mixed with the latest Tomb Mold. The template is quite promising, but can these old school dogs learn enough new tricks to keep things interesting and under control or will the wheels come off the death bus with no one around to Asphyx them?

Leading the charge with very downtuned guitars, opener “Warped in Entrails” (yes, I thought it should be “wrapped” too) comes out swinging and tries to bulldoze you into a mass grave with heavy grooves accented by fancy time signatures and frequent tempo shifts. There are bits of classic Cryptopsy in the sound and the band can play their instruments well, with an enjoyable lunacy and exuberance to the music, but little of it sticks. “Noxious Breeze” tries to walk that delicate line between straight-up brutal death and proggy/techy fare and falls off both sides along the way, though the flashes of Nile-esque guitar noodling are quite cool. When they restain their proggy impulses and shove heavy, ugly grooves up your Hersey highway as they do on “Dissolved in the Flesh Pits,”1 things get slightly more memorable, and the uber-low, burly riffs sometimes smack like Dying Fetus. “Mouldered Orb” is also a touch more immediate, though not exactly hooky.

Unfortunately, roughly half of Defleshed Exhumation leaves me staring vacantly at the walls of my office/holding cell. Cuts like “Shattered Flow of Time” and “Psychotic Apparations” are stock standard examples of tech death without much to trigger replays, and the album ends with a needless cover of Demigod’s “As I Behold I Despise.” Considering the album is just over 36 minutes, the fact they needed a cover to pad it out is troubling. Had I been asked to guess the album length, I would have said it ran much longer, which is generally not a good omen. The production is fine for the style though, with the guitars delivering a very low-end, oppressive impact, crushing your fat face from can-see to can’t-see. There’s a nice heavy punch to the drum sound as well.

This is a talented trio who have command of their instruments. Robert Brezean’s guitar work is impressive and he manages to cast off all manner of herky-jerky, jitter-inducing leads as well as the big, road-paving grooves. Alex Tampu is a fury behind the kit, doing everything he can to propel the music through your skull, and Filip Garlonta’s vocals are appropriately guttural and sick, though very one-note. Unfortunately, these individually solid pieces don’t come together often enough to form memorable songs. They try to do too much too often and the songs end up too cluttered and frenetic. Also bringing the album down are the downtuned guitars that make the material resemble deathcore pablum and this becomes tiring by the album’s halfway point.

Necrotum have talent and potential and their earlier works are quite entertaining, but the switch from more basic OSDM to the flashy, proggy style here hasn’t done them any favors. There’s a good EP buried in Defleshed Exhumation, but wrenching it out would require more effort than I’m willing to expend. I’ll keep an eye on what the band does going forward but my time will be spent with their early platters, not this one. Hardened tech death fiends may get greater mileage from this than I did though. Guard those Necrotums, boys.

Rating: 2.5/5.0
DR: 6 | Format Reviewed: 320 kbps mp3
Label: Memento Mori
Websites: necrotumdeathmetal.bandcamp.com | facebook.com/necrotumdm
Releases Worldwide: January 22nd, 2024

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