Foul Deformity - Disgust - 2024 - Inspired by a series of horrific real life events.

It was so refreshing to stumble onto this Brutal Death Metal group out of Las Vegas!  A three piece who describe their sound as a sonic force with elements from Old School Death Metal, Grindcore, Slamming Brutal Death Metal, Black Metal, Groove, and a hint of Jazz!  What a mouthful!  After multiple listens, I do think "Disgust" proves them correct!  

"Disgust" is only an EP, and is already guaranteed to end up in my best-of-the-year list for 2024. This will be hard to top.

The production on this, first of all, is just perfect.  Everything perfectly sitting in its own pocket in the mix.  Every instrument it still raw yet feels in your face with its own patterns and intricacies.  The vocals are some of my favorite I've ever heard; a blend of styles and techniques that may be hard to pick up on at first, but the subtlety IS master precision. The songwriting throughout is incredible, with many catchy parts and tempo changes.  The instruments, vocals included, seem to play off of each other for an amazing onslaught of creative brutality that keeps you guessing.

Alex Udar is in charge of percussion, and goes crazy with so many fills and techniques.  He grew up in Romania and started playing drums in 2009.  He has banged the drums for Sinful Serpent, Abominable Putridity, Submerged, to name a few.

On Guitar and Bass we have Bruno Macias, playing guitar since 2004 in bands like Guttural Secrete, Cerebral Incubation, and Abominable Putridity.  Also must be a fan of a lot of different styles to be writing and playing like this!

Last but not least we have these crazy fucking vocals!  Grunts and gurgles and predators all sound amazing on each track!  Nick Papageorgio has almost 20 years at working on his craft, and it shows.  The delicate enunciation while still keeping it so guttural can be witnessed when following along with the lyrics.  Check out lyric video for "(Null) Ubiquitous" below.  It features Jeremiah Jensen (Guttural Secrete).  I can't tell if the whole track is him or not, but it is still a prime example of the quality of talent on this release.

Speaking of lyrics, holy shit.  I love how dark yet beautifully written these are.  Feels like a radio-active spawning of a disgusting new life.  Extremely descriptive and gross and actually enunciated rather well throughout.  The cover art, which seems to be a hideous collage, compliments the music and the soundscapes/samples nicely.

I also have to give it up to the producer and mixer/masterer working behind the board here.  I can't find much about them, but damn this is nice.

Recorded by Randall James Thompson

Mastered by Rylie Ellen Wechta

With just 2 demos coming before this, I cannot wait for more from this 4 year old beast of a band!!!!

Check out all releases from Foul Deformity HERE

Pathology - Lords of Rephaim - Sevared Records - 2013

Artwork by PAR OLOFSSON



Ever since Pathology announced the return of legendary vocalist Matti Way (ex-Pathology, Abominable Putridity, Cinerary, Obscured Secretion) and original guitarist Tim Tisczcenko to their ranks, fans were very excited for any new material from the band.  I think probably a lot of people also figured that the return of old members might have also meant music in the vein of the bands older material.  Well folks, Matti Way is a vocalist.  Tim Tisczcenko is a guitarist.  This album seems to be getting a lot of flak on the internet.  I mean, Pathology’s last two records, “Awaken To The Suffering" and "The Time of Great Purification" were both fairly well received albums.  They also marked a turning point for the band.  Apparently, they wanted to steer further from their old, straightforward Brutal Death Metal approach to things and delve further into the realms known as Slam or Slam Death Metal.  So they lost fans here and gained some there.  Both of the aforementioned albums also featured vocalist Jonathan Huber.  Huber was formerly of Seattle, WA Deathcore outfit I Declare War, a band that most fans of Pathology had probably never heard of at that time.  Despite his seemingly unfitting influences and roots, Huber proved to be a good fit for Pathology's new breed of brutality, and that's when he undoubtedly gained the band loads of new fans.  Older fans, however, know that Matti Way brings something else to the table altogether; He is an OG of the Brutal Death Metal scene, a vocalist on most vocalist’s ‘favorites’ or ‘influenced by’ list.  If you cannot get as into "Lords of Rephaim" as you were expecting to, you're not alone, but you cannot entirely blame the vocalist switch.  Let's discuss what's really going on here.

People are jumping the gun to judge this album just because they liked 2009/2010, Matti Way era Pathology.  This is still Pathology and it is still brutal and heavy guttural grossness or whatever you want to call it.  This is also Dave Astor's, The bands drummer, first time recording and producing a whole record, or at least a whole Pathology record.  Production wise, it may be Pathology's best work yet.  Good job Dave.  Mixing and Mastering was handled by Danial Castleman, the man behind Lambesis Studios in it's entirety, due the unfortunate current events affecting Tim Lambesis.  Production and mastering and how it all sounds, to an extent, is pretty subjective.  I mean things are mixed well and everything is clear, but it's definitely missing that raw feeling that the band used to exude.  The sometimes enhancing clarity is at other times hindering to the feeling and personality of the riffs.  Parts sound a little too robotic and other parts are way more atmospheric than Pathology has ever been.  Everything flows on the individual tracks, it's just the album as a whole that struggles to be cohesive.

Overall, with “Lords of Rephaim” you get an album that feels like it is trying to hard to be brutal and, in fact, comes off less brutal than any of the band’s previous releases.  There are no more guitar solos.  There is a weird atmospheric, Deathcorish, synthed out track.  There is a rerecorded version of the song "Code Injection" that doesn't come close to the original.  There are guest vocal appearances by Mallika Sundaramurthy of Abnormality and Parasitic Extirpation and Josh Smith of Gutfucked.

The guys in Pathology are obviously exploring some new ground pertaining to building atmosphere and straying from the straightforward slam-blast-slam formula, I just wish it didn’t sound so forced.

Check it out for yourself!

PATHOLOGY

PAR OLOFSSON

LAMBESIS STUDIOS

SEVARED RECORDS

Extermination Dismemberment - Serial Urbicide - 2013 Amputated Vein Records

Urbicide: The killing of an urbanized society.

Extermination Dismemberment is a 4 piece Brutal Slamming Death Metal outfit from Belarus, Minsk.  I would describe them as Abominable Putridity worship, with one main difference.  Production.  In some places, too much.   Especially those bass drops.  If you don’t know what I mean, they sometimes occur in really bad techno music, or old deathcore.   Some people refer to them as nuclear bombs or nuclear bass drops or something.   However, I have never heard them used to quite the extent they are used on Serial Urbicide.  Thankfully, After many listens, I am glad to say that these bassy bottom-outs add to the album, further punctuating and exaggerating the humongous slams. 

Extermination Dismemberment got lucky though.  I hope this doesn’t start a trend, because this album already took it as far as it should go.  I mean take the title track, “Serial Urbicide” for example, where these things actually overpower the rest of the production for several seconds after they occur.  I realize that is probably the whole point, but it verges on cheesy.

Serial Urbicide, being basically a slam only album, is way too long. It starts to wear on you. You are in store for slow build ups to even slower and crazier slams, not much filler to be heard. “Survival” however, is a song slightly different from the rest in that it features a different vocal style and a different vibe altogether. A sort of pumping, marching riff style.

Besides a few production complaints and the album being too long, this album is really quite good.... for slam lovers.  Do not expect brutal death metal riffs or blasts.   Expect creative ways of getting your head slammed in.  Creative guitar and drums collide with decent gutturals to create a non stop, groove oriented, slam only record.

The creative song structures and drum fills make this “slam only” album a fun, brutal, groovy head bobber.

Pick it up here:

DIGITAL
CD