Style: Brutal death metal, progressive metal (gurgle vocals)
Recommended for fans of: Devourment, alt rock and synth in your brutal death metal
Review by: Zach
Country: US-NY
Release date: October 20th, 2023
Think about your top band in every metal subgenre. I know Andy probably has his immediately recalled from memory or on an endless spreadsheet. Then, think about why they’re the best at what they do. Are they Opeth and did they do the coolest shit by mixing prog rock and death metal? Are they Dissection, and did they add beauty into icy black metal riffs? But brutal death is never a genre I’ve thought of super highly, so a favorite would probably be one of the long standers. Cryptopsy is always a good choice, and I’ve considered None So Vile to be not only one of the best brutal death metal albums but one of my favorite albums in general.
However, I’m a prog guy through and through. I need something genre bending, something that’ll floor me with its innovation. An album where I can say, “holy shit, I’ve never heard something like that.” Afterbirth isn’t exactly a band who’s sound I’ve never heard before. However, they may have just struck gold. Brutal, slimy, swamp-laden gold.
Let’s back up for a second. Afterbirth is considered a progenitor of the “toilet bowl” vocals the brutal death and slam genres are associated with. So, yeah, if I were the first brutal death listener in existence, that’s something I’d never heard before. But brutal death is very reliant on the standard CHUG-CHUG riffs, compressed production and programmed-sounding drums. I would be lying if I said I didn’t like a few generic BDM bands myself.
Starting with Four-Dimensional Flesh, they added a few synths whirls here and there, and some spacey ambience. But that clearly wasn’t enough. We have the synths on this album, and they sound like something Vangelis would compose. We’ve got alternative rock riffs, post-rock sections, Voivod-esque thrash riffs, emotive guitar solos. All on top of the brutality at its core. There is so much diversity in this album’s guitarwork alone that it boggles my fucking mind. Everything from black metal trem-picking, slam-y chugs, and actual melody can be found here.
Opener ‘Tightening the Screws’ made me want to start a mosh pit in my apartment, but it was ‘Devils With Dead Eyes’ that made my jaw drop. This is a progressive epic squished into four minutes of brutal death metal, but giving it that label isn’t sufficient. I’ve talked about how I want prog to surprise me and how it rarely does that anymore. This album, though, is completely unpredictable. No songs sound completely alike, and each section of this winding, proggy odyssey of gurgle vocals left me nearly speechless.
No album this year has better riffs, all five-hundred of them on this album are downright incredible. The drumming is varied. Will Smith’s disgusting, frog-like vocals have never sounded better, courtesy of one of Colin Marston’s best production jobs. Some people will see this as a drawback of the record, but those people are cowards. This is the biggest leap I’ve ever seen brutal death metal take in joining the many prog styles as a mainstay for me. As I write this, I’m on my eighth or ninth listen, and I’m still finding so many new sections that I’ve missed. Never before has a slam album made me think “that’s a beautiful melody,” even though the entire genre of brutal death metal is to make you shrivel in disgust.
None of it should work. The switching between a beautiful synth right into gurgles in ‘Hovering Human Head Drones’ should be stupid and cheesy, but they’ve gotten it so right. And just as you think the album’s back to being standard brutality, they hit you with a lush atmosphere that wouldn’t sound out of place on an Alcest album. The title track sounds like Queens of the Stone Age! There were multiple points where I had to make sure I hadn’t accidentally switched albums.
I can safely give this a coveted score, because I genuinely believe this to be, right now, the best the genre has to offer. Afterbirth is the unlikely hero of this arc. Should they continue on with pioneering the genre, this album is going to be insanely difficult to top. However, they’ve proven themselves to be geniuses among cavemen riffs. The next one shouldn’t be any trouble.
Recommended tracks: Devils With Dead Eyes, In But not Of, Angels Feast on Flies, Time Enough Tomorrow
You may also like: Artificial Brain, Analepsy, Wormhole
Final verdict: 10/10
Related links: Bandcamp | Spotify | Facebook | Instagram | Metal-Archives page
Label: Willowtip – Bandcamp | Facebook | Official Website
Afterbirth is:
– David Case (bass)
– Keith Harris (drums)
– Cody Dresser (guitars)
– Will Smith (gurgles)
