“And now the subject of today’s review: Nunslaughter. They’ve peddled their wares from Pennsylvania and Ohio since 1987, offering a fusion of the earliest death metal with later punk. Only 4 full records have occupied the intervening years, though they literally have dozens of other EPs, splits and live albums. 2021 brings with it their fifth full-length entitled Red Is the Color of Ripping Death, and their first release of this type in 7 years.” Nuns on the run.
“The impression I’ve always got from Noisem is that their primary goal is speed. Velocity is not an aspect but the essence of their sound. It’s a fun callback to the 80s speed race – which neither Noisem or I lived through – when bands would hear new grindcore demos via tape-trading and then try to write something even faster.” Speed thrills.
“Metal is all about excess. Be as fast as possible. Be as slow as possible. Or, in Nekrofilth’s case, be as nasty as possible. Just take the lyrics of “Junkie Cunt,” from the band’s 2013 debut Devil’s Breath: “I want to squeeze your rotten tits/Your curdled cunt gets my cock so fucking hard!” Unless you’re trying to get rid of your in-laws, these aren’t the type of people you’d invite to your Christmas party.” Filthy masses.
“Formed in 2001, this California quintet have made a career out of scorching assholes and taking names, with works like 2011’s When All Roads Lead to Hell and 2014’s Death Curse being particularly hard-hitting. Gravehill occupy that perfect niche between black, death, and thrash metal, that general “extreme metal” breed which is more about delivering killer riffs than being grimmer than thou.” Evil art, foul censorship.
“The Raleigh-based power trio of Suppressive Fire plays a brand of fun and slightly blackened thrash that skips the pizza entirely. Culling mainly from the “devil metal” of Nunslaughter, Nocturnal Breed’s Fields of Rot, and producer Joel Grind’s main outfit Toxic Holocaust, this is a modern take on thrash, infused with more extreme elements but still being rooted in the ethos of the harsher end of the classics spectrum.” So, can this debut differentiate itself in the early days of 2016?
“Thirty years past its prime, Gravewürm’s songwriting and musical delivery continues to leave a lot to be desired, and after twenty-five years of existence and ten full-lengths, I ask myself the same question before every Gravewürm release: does Gravewürm have anything new—anything at all—to offer in their newest output?” That’s a really good question.
