#10 PETRIFICATION Sever Sacred Light
Unholy Hell Fucking YES! Petrification is back with a slamming new album entitled Sever Sacred Light out NOW on Svart Records. WTF, no other band manifests deep, dank riffs like this band does! I’m beyond impressed with their growth and their putrid focus on creating another record that is steeped in Sonic Filth! Jason’s vocal delivery on every song is SICK AF! The riffage you will experience while blasting Petrification is pure fucking wizardry and then some. While digesting songs like “The Hourglass Dissolves” or “Transmissions of the Unseen,” I can’t help but get hyped by the Crust vibes that lurk beneath the layers of reeking Old School Death Metal. This band is so comfortable in their creative skin that it’s pretty infectious. Hold on, Chris Nukala (aka Nukes) lays down thick Dirge-filled basslines that have this sense of torment injected into them! The guitar playing on Sever Sacred Light is next-level awesome! I’m beyond stoked for these humans because they deserve all the shine that they get! I want all of y’all to join me in my celebration of Petrification’s new album…Trust me when I say this, they are SO SO SO SICK live and I know their songs are brutal as FUCK live. If anyone from Petrification reads this, we are super stoked for y’all!
#9 HARSH REALM Death Carries On
Death is as constant as life. The end of our lives is a reality our culture mostly turns away from, so there’s something cathartic about music that revels in the depths of our unknown endings. HARSH REALM‘s record Death Carries On is anything but uplifting — instead it feels like the crushing rhythms and seething riffs and rotted vocals are trying to bury me in a pile of sonic corpses. It’s got breakdowns that steamroll my synapses and speed that taps into the rage of loss.
#8 MAMMOTH GRINDER Undying Spectral Resonance
I write this from a place of radnesss! I write this from a place of Motörhead love! I also write this from a place of love for all things Anti-Sect. Hey WTF, MAMMOTH GRINDER, just so you know, your new EP Undying Spectral Resonance (out now on Relapse Records) is a fucking banger! Honestly, I expect nothing less from a band that has never let me down. The first thing that is going to jump out and smack you in the grill is the tone and atmosphere you will encounter while blasting this record. I dare y’all to play the title track LOUD AF — I know for a fact that y’all will become fans instantly. Every song on this offering is its own mini horror film of despair and anguish! Their song “Decrease The Peace” proves how fucking sick this band is because they know how to balance fury with raw melody! MAMMOTH GRINDER closes out the EP with “Obsessed With Death,” which only makes me even more obsessed with this band! The reason why I mentioned Motörhead earlier is that when I first heard them, I never viewed heavy music the same, and when I hear MAMMOTH GRINDER I feel the same way!
#7 DIABOLIC OATH Oracular Hexations
Diabolic Oath by now need few introductions. Those who follow the US extreme underground closely will already know that the Portland-based bestial death metal horde has established its name in the underground through a unique experimental formula they’ve created which is both dumbfounding and mesmerizing. For those not yet familiar with the three-piece, all of Diabolic Oath’s stringed instruments are all fretless (so both the bass AND, quite unprecedentedly, the guitars are fretless as well). In addition to that the band’s three members all share lead vocal duties equally, and the effect is like an acid trip gone totally wrong. The vocals are passed from member to member frenetically, often juxtaposed, in a frenzied-like manner, an effect that ends up sounding like and encirclement of the listener, with bellowing growls coming from all directions, while the fretless instruments allow the guitarist and bassist to land on notes that wouldn’t normally exist or be used in a conventional instrumentation setting, allowing for the creation of a lysergic, liquefying effect that makes the riffs sound completely alien, in a highly surreal and otherworldly manner.
#6 INFILTRATOR Remnants Of Battle
As this world spins on a chaotic axis of pure hate, I look for music that puts me in the right state of mind to deal with this fucked up world. INFILTRATOR’s Remnants Of Battle out on Heavenly Vault and FUCKING KILL RECORDS is one of my favorite Death Metal records of 2024, and I say this with my chest. This band has manifested a putrid sonic tone that has infected this whole affair in a very addictive way! The down-tuned morbid glory of “Fire And Steel” reeks of awesomeness.
#5 INFERNALIVM Conquering the Most High
It was an unforgettable run when back in the 90’s bands like Profanatica, Morbid Angel, Deicide and Incanation wielded the death metal spear to inflict mortal havoc upon the putrid flesh of christendom, spewing blasphemies unbound in His name. Long days gone it seems like, as death metal in the last couple decades seems to have steadily steered its attention toward gore, death, violence, B-movies, esotericism, surrealism and the occult. Well, say hello to France’s Infernalivm, an unholy legion of absolute sonic brutality that has just restored the order of things and made death metal the chosen weapon once again for the most unutterable blasphemies of orthodox satanism. You heard it right, their debut EP Conquering the Most High is a perverted crusade of absolute violence straight into the most sacred realms of holiness. A venom drenched-blade aimed straight at the throat of Christ, and a statement of what unbound sonic violence and darkness can become when the goal is evoking absolute evil incarnated.
#4 TORTURERS’ LOBBY Deadened Nerves
Unholy What the Fuck — TORTURERS’ LOBBY’s new album Deadened Nerves is out now on Caligari Records and Ixiol Productions is straight up fucking UNREAL! Press play on the track “Barbaric Alchemy” and you will hear for yourself that this band can not be FUCKED with! Their riffs are spectacular and full of morbid decaying filth simultaneously. Not too many records released in 2024 sound as gnarly as this one. A big factor that sets this offering apart from others is the level of elite songwriting that takes place on Deadened Nerves. They have crafted compositions with various levels of sonic hate that exist within one song — case in point is “Humanity’s Husk.” Also, TORTURERS’ LOBBY has no problem showing their love for classic metal, all you have to do is turn their song “Re-education” up past 10 and you will experience their feral audio fury for yourself! This album has harnessed the power of all of my favorite Metal genres into one from Death Metal to Black Metal to Thrash Metal. “Enduring Spirit” is a beautiful Death Hymn that reigns down on your black soul only to shed light onto your life. “Reptilian Hide” closes out the album and will destroy what we know as our reality! TORTURERS’ LOBBY’s debut is sinister AF and just might be the sickest Metal record of 2024!
#3 CONCRETE WINDS S/T
Concrete Winds is no stranger to our EOTYLs — and this fiery death horde has made yet another top-ten worthy collection of murderous anthems! This is their third full-length, and their third record to reach high into our top records of the year. It’s rare that a band can keep their output getting better and better, but Concrete Winds has yet to fail at decapitating our senses. Someone on Bandcamp pointed out the deathcore sound of some of the tracks, and I hear it — an almost industrial electronic-sounding rasp that feels like an army of cyborgs marching to the slaughter, assaulting both my body and mind at the same time!
#2 BLACK CURSE Burning in Celestial Poison
How insanely outstanding is the BLACK CURSE album Burning in Celestial Poison? It’s so unreal that it can cut through all of the grief that I’m dealing with right now! Since my mother’s recent death, plus with all of the senseless slaughter of humanity taking place right now, it’s been hard for me to focus on music. But this Death Metal band is like no other, and when it comes to songwriting and manifesting an atmosphere of sonic dread, they’re on some elite-level type shit! From the very first moment that I heard “Spleen Girt With Serpent,” a black hole opened in my brain and my whole reality was scrambled! What makes BLACK CURSE so special is how they balance pure unhinged sonic filth with a macabre chaotic melody that leaves the listener transfixed. They also know how to make even their nonvocal moments able to speak to places in your soul that you did not realize existed! I swear as I listen to this band I can envision myself getting back on all of those who have wronged me. It’s not that I want to exist in a place of revenge, but as “Flowers of Gethsemane” drags me down into their pit of despair I feel empowered. That being said, maybe I’m fucked in the head because as I blast Burning in Celestial Poison, I find myself going into an almost meditative state. BLACK CURSE is a band that kicks ass on so many levels and brings so many layers of putrid angst to the game. They have raised the bar again and for that, I salute every member of this horde for creating a perfect record! Also, respect due to Sepulchral Voice Records for releasing this dark fucking gem!
#1 BLOOD INCANTATION Absolute Elsewhere
Let’s talk about BLOOD INCANTATION‘s record Absolute Elsewhere, a weird, wild, freaky cosmic death metal trip. On side one, you enter The Stargate. Blood Incantation hits you with blastbeats that take aim at your mortal soul, and just when you feel the life energy seeping from your flesh, they put you in a psychdelic dub trance and mesmerize you with star-crossed synths and expansive Pink Floyd-esque riffs. Only to drop you back into the death pit of despair head first. Retro-future electronics and samples echo across The Stargate, and if they didn’t keep returning to their absolutely crushing death metal, this record would have kept me in my imagination for hours as a kid. Read the full review here.
