Sepsis - The Divide 7" (2022)

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Here's an illusive slab of frenetic crust punk/hardcore from the murky depths of Australia few here will be privy to but likely interested in! Drenched in reverb and grime. every corner of music is ransacked by overblown tone and bass, giving little time for reflection beyond total destruction—It sounds and feels like the halcyon days of newly-shaped hardcore, when early thrash was in its conception, but with ample energy taken from the UK crust scene of yore and what the band claims as a strong influence from the Swedish hardcore scene.

Taken from their bandcamp page: "Sepsis! A charged 4-piece crust bombardment from Naarm, Australia. Following hot off the heels from their sold out demo, they offer up 4 tracks thats are inspired by early UK crust with a strong Swedish hc backbone. For fans of Absolut Country of Sweden/ Scandinavian Jawbreaker era Anti Cimex, Hellbastard and Sacrilege. Maximum Devastation! Limited to 300 hand number copies."

Sepsis - The Divide (Bandcamp)

Crypt Lurker - Baneful Magic, Death Worship & Necromancy Rites Archaic (2013)

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Every now and then, I'll glance backwards towards critically overlooked albums and resuscitate them for a few more gasps of life through this blog—That's more-or-less the function of this blog, pointing a shaky finger to the albums I like and hopefully giving them some more life.

Crypt Lurker were a flash in the pan of filthy and bloated doom metal from the outskirts of Liverpool, England, and their sound was a gargantuan accumulation of perfectly executed doom metal which flitted around the murky waters of sludge to breathe life into a genre that's more often than not way too clean with very little essence and hardly any depth.

Baneful Magic, Death Worship & Necromancy Rites Archaic is without none of those flaws, it's an incredibly heavy plod through serpentining tunnels of slowly churning guitar riffs, that flicker between the reverb drenched riffs of Witchfinder General to something even murkier, giving birth to something that reminds me of New Zealand's Meth Drinker—Caked in grime and molasses paced.

The drums on this album are spot on, the toms sound bulky and the cymbals sound like actual drum cymbals… Bonus points for using the bell on the cymbals appropriately. Listen to the 01:40 mark of 'Bearer of Two Torches' if there is any confusion. It's a kidney shot to the world of doom and sludge that these guys split-up shortly after, but this EP will live on forever!

Crypt Lurker - Baneful Magic, Death Worship & Necromancy Rites Archaic (bandcamp)

Hässlig - Guillotine (2021)

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Somehow this debut release completely flew under my radar all of last year until a few weeks ago, where I have been over-listening to it ever since. Crude and primitive black metal punk a la a similar attack as Raspberry Bulbs and Bone Awl, with emphasis on raw aggression and a firm grip on how to effectively use unpolished riffs and chord progression to take something simple and make it compelling. I found this through the reliability of the Mystískaos bandcamp page, check it out or forever be a dud!

Hässlig - Guillotine (bandcamp)

Grinning Death's Head - Cataclysm (2021)

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Youth Attack Records always has my attention. It's consistently putting out crude and bile filled records running the gamut of hardcore, punk and metal with rudimentary attempts to step outside the box. The box isn't important, only devastating bursts of ferocity count for something here—Mining the vein of anything and everything in between caustic and tameless.

This two-track EP by Grinning Death's Head made a big impact with very little last year, building upon what JW has already established over the years—something between hardcore and raw black metal. I don't know if I'm chomping at the bit yet, but I get it… It sounds like a cross between early Cobalt with healthy nods to acts like Bone Awl or Serum Dreg. I'm not convinced with the use of the synth in track-two but who am I to yuck your yum.

Grinning Death's Head - Cataclysm (bandcamp)

Skourge - Hardcore Up Your Ass (2021) [EP]

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New Skourge EP is right up my alley! Nothing new being invented here, in fact it's more of a regurgitation of things already out there  (I mean this in a positive way), because it is a mish-mash of all that good stuff in the early 90's—Exxxtremely heavy and up your ass hardcore with half a foot in the early metal scene of thrash. A pivot from the production of 'Spiritual Disrepair', trading in murkiness for a bit more bottom-end and heft? Make sense? Doesn't matter. 'Spiritual Disrepair' is very worth your time, to say the least.

I can't find a damn thing anywhere on this album except the album uploaded on YouTube.

Sesso Violento - Mondo Perverso (2021) [EP]

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Incredibly janky and blown out punk with a black metal backbone that manages to find a good foothold in sounding catchy and bleak at the same time, despite being so stripped down and crude. Emphasis on primitive energy instead of aesthetic and pretension. Sonically it mashes these influences in a way that is less like Ash Borer and a lot more like early Raspberry Bulbs, highly recommended for fans of this ilk!

Sesso Violento - Mondo Perverso (bandcamp)

Septage - Septisk Eradikasyon (2021)

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One close look at the cover of this album and you would be outta your skull to think this will be anything less than a putrid and rotting slab of death metal with a predilection for blood, fascia, tendon and offal… Only a muppet wouldn't admit the garishness an album like this imposes on the listener but sometimes in the creases of our being we are more fossil hominid than we are homo sapiens. My taste for death metal is mostly in another direction, but it's been a while since I have gone down the rabbit-hole of gore inspired Death Metal, moreover it's an appropriate follow-up to the Taphos post a few days ago as 1/3 of Septage shares a member with Taphos. 

Septage - Septisk Eradikasyon (bandcamp)

Taphos - Blood Plethora (2021) [EP]

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I've posted about Denmark's Taphos before, particularly when their debut album was high up in my Top Albums of 2018 list… and I have kept both ears on them ever since, eager for the next thing. I guess I'll have to settle for this 2-track 7" they released a bit ago featuring some admirably terrible cover art? It looks like something conjured up out of 1994 Microsoft Paint. The quality of death metal more than makes up for the dismal album art though, Taphos are somehow still flying under the radar which is equally about others' desire to seek things out as it is bad taste. Take a listen, and pay attention!

Taphos - Blood Plethora (bandcamp)

Ancient Tome - Final Tomb (2021) [EP]

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I'm really digging the way this album is coming across like a mixture between the murky sludge and drone saturated doom of Meth Drinker and Cult of Occult with major emphasis on hanging glacially paced riffs. The drums are burly as hell and the cymbal work is noteworthy for me, plodding along like a dirge without ever feeling stale nor exhaustingly repetitious. Haven't heard anything prior from these guys, but this EP is pointing in a promising direction for the sonic landscape of Ancient Tome.

Ancient Tome - Final Tomb (bandcamp)

Cult of Thaumiel - Palaces of Iniquity (2021)

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Completely blown out and sonically malignant is Cult of Thaumiel's newest offering, it sounds rightfully evil and barely straddles that line of what most would consider to be "unlistenable", but we here at SHOM know ripe fruit when we see it. The pacing is at best frenetic and the structure is at worst crumbling, and I do mean these things to be taken as assets to the sound on Palaces of Iniquity, the entire backbone of the genre relied on the rebellion against a cleaned up and polished sound. Raw and absolutely abrasive, check it out and keep your ears to the ground on its full release on October 01, 2021. Hail motherfuckers!

Cult of Thaumiel - Palaces of Iniquity (bandcamp)

Cirith Ungol - Half Past Human (2021) [EP]

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Cirith Ungol are very much part of the old guard of metal, having been around for over four decades albeit with a few minor pauses and lapses in activity they returned in 2020 with Forever Black, planting their flag in the ground with some exemplary old-school doom laden heavy metal with tinges plucked from the crossover scenes of back then.

Just recently they released another crop of tunes under the same umbrella of doom/heavy metal and though I winced at the thought of it biting the big one but it never let me down at all, much like Forever Black… Sounds like the good old halcyon days of the genre. Half Past Human is just a fun listen through, and if you don't think so then you're probably taking things too seriously, maaaan.

Cirith Ungol - Half Past Human (bandcamp)

Deiquisitor - Humanoid EP (2021)

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Denmark's Deiquisitor dropped a 25 minute EP on us this year and it's a steep descent into the meat grinder abyss of pummelling death metal. Focused on the chunkier side of death metal, there's always a purveying, simplistic brutality to their sound—nothing particularly cacophonous, but meaty with a lot of weight behind its hooks and any semblance of space is squeezed out with Deiquisitor's deliberate assault.

Deiquisitor - Humanoid (bandcamp)

Diocletian - Darkness Swallows All EP (2021)

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Diocletian have been pummelling peoples ears into submission for the last decade and with their newly realized 'Darkness Swallows All' EP the band is looking to turn a corner after 'Amongst The Flames of a Bvrning God'. New Zealand has proven to be a gestation ground for bestial sounding death metal with bands like Vassafor, Heresiarch, Witchrist, Vesicant and Diocletian at the helm of all the chaos. Vassafor's 'To The Death' release last year was among one of my favourites, just ugly!

But this new EP from Diocletian seems to be cut from a cloth of death metal that is at its core even more raw and even more crude than that of their opus "Gesundrian'…which a lot of the time, is a welcomed force in terms of my taste… This time, I'm not too sure. One thing is certain, It's an absolute far cry from the sheer ferocity a band like KNEEL were able to impose on their 3-song EP last year.

I'm posting this one up for the vultures to feast on, as for me, I am unsure of the direction these brutish Kiwis are taking. All is fair in love and war.

Diocletian - Darkness Swallows All (bandcamp)

KNEEL - Infinite Worship, Slaves Eternal EP (2020)

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Probably one of the finest EP's cut from the cloth of black metal I've heard this year, and if it were instead a full-length I'd probably say it was up there with one of my favourite releases of the year so far by virtue of it's sheer ferocity and unyielding production.

KNEEL offer up their first musical output on the sacrificial altar, and it's in the form of absolutely nailed-down raw black metal with a clear influence in ethos and sound from the more caustic aspects of punk. Not in the same vain as Raspberry Bulbs or Okkultokrati, where emphasis and structure is more simplified and unison but more akin to Morbid Insulter or Bone Awl who have traded the affects of simplicity for intensity and are built around a thicker viscosity, with more layers and dimensions floating around the bones of the songs.

Musically Infinite Worship, Slaves Eternal charges through 3-songs of densely layered black metal that pulls heavily from elements of bestial death metal a la bands like Swallowed, Teitanblood and Triumvir Foul so sonically and atmospherically everything is bloated and caked in grime and the vocals lurch between schizophrenic howls, belches and grunts which is something if not recorded and executed right it just sounds like a mess, but this is spot on. Everything is spot on!

Infinite Worship, Slaves Eternal (bandcamp)

Regional Justice Center - Institution EP (2019)

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Here's a blazing quick EP for you to flash through in less time than it takes for one of those office fucks to place an overcomplicated Starbucks order. (Hint; Throw it on repeat a handful of times and it will play out like a short full-length.) Straight for the throat hardcore in the vain of Mind Eraser and early Harms Way, etc etc. It's easy to sink your teeth into and is 100% guaranteed to help you crank out a few extra reps the next time you're at the gym. Get into it, or don't. I won't ever care. Thanks!

Regional Justice Center - Institution (bandcamp)

Void Eater - IIII (2019)

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There's absolutely no surprise that Void Eater's EP IIII is right up my alley, as it's putrid to the bone black/death metal to the point of mummifying in it's own reverb and calcifying under the weight of itself. Too often adjectives are haphazardly thrown around and I am certainly not above it myself, but one would be out of their fucking skull if they were to try and describe Void Eater without using words like; Primeval war-stomp, barbaric body-slam, bestial blood-doner, antediluvian head-kick, troglodytic beat-down, etc, etc.

Everything about this downward spiral of black/death is impressive and far more oppressive than lesser forms mascaraing under the banner of bestial death metal.

Void Eater - IIII (bandcamp)

Combust - The Void (2019)

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Very good tough guy New York hardcore. Heavyweight riffs and a kick drum that sounds like a 44 caliber round hitting a church bell all while neanderthal vocal incantations call the majority out for being kitten soft sheep. This is an easy listen if you're in the mood for a stomp or dumbbells are around.

Combust - The Void (bandcamp)

Moloch - Love Songs (2019)

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Moloch and Severed Heads Open Minds have a long and consistent history throughout the inception of this blog, in all of its gestation periods, I have posted up Moloch albums on here a few times since 2012 and even interviewed a few of the members a long while back. For some reason I'm always reminded of Meth Drinker, and I'm not too sure why the two bands are always in the same conversation with me, but it's likely to do with the absolute immensity each of their songs have while retaining this crust of pure filth draped over each song; Completely fetid and bloated sludge, no strings, no gimmicks, no frills and certainly no regard for your well being.

With that being said, here's a measly two-track EP from Moloch for you to suck on, until there is more.

Moloch - Love Songs (bandcamp)

Ekulu - Half Alive (2019) [EP]

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Second EP is by Ekulu, and man do these guys know how to draw salivary molecules out of your tongue through the power meat and potatoes alleyway hardcore, which is a convoluted way of saying, Ekulu of New York hardcore pride, bring the floor stomp, and if you had to share a house with these wild boars, you'd better pray to the gods of riffdom that you live upstairs and not below them otherwise, because there is no way in shits hell that each member of this band doesn't walk around like a gang of agitated minotaurs in steel-toe boots carrying sledgehammers and chains around their necks… They are that heavy, and they swing that hard.

NY Hardcore without a single flaw. Every element firmly in its rightful place, executed by a group that understands the inner and outer facets of what makes raw hardcore and thrash such a likeable sound. Listen to their flawless self-titled EP released in 2018 back to back after this one, and make sure none of your grandma's breakable ceramics from Romania aren't around when you do. Enjoy.

Ekulu - Half Alive (bandcamp)

Cruz Somers - Sit & Stare EP (2018)

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Cruz Somers EP is a good way not to fuck up 10 minutes of your time. It's glaringly simple fuzzed out punk with a drum machine, which sounds like it should be stale, but it ain't man, it ain't.

Sit & Stare (bandcamp) - name your price