Alright, what’s happening over in Adelaide?! That town is generating some killer shit as of late with CHARNEL ALTAR, DECREPITORUM and EXHUMED KORPSE all putting out very strong releases over the last couple of years, and now ENDLESS LOSS (don’t let the name fool you, this isn’t sad boy doom or DSBM as it may suggest) lay waste to wimpy shit with their debut full length album of incredibly dense, churning, EVIL DEATH METAL.
Right off the bat, you can feel this record pulling you into the void with an intro that, for once, actually succeeds at sounding eerie and ominous instead of sleepy and boredom-inducing. Violent, pounding hammer blasts kick the album off proper and from there it's a case of TOTAL DEATH punishment across nine tracks, for a perfect length just shy of 28 minutes. Not a second is wasted in this CD's relatively brief runtime and it's packed full of twisting, winding tremelo riffs, blizzard-like atonal chord carnage, demented solos consisting purely of whammy abuse, heavy-handed blasts (you can tell the drummer isn't doing anything but straight-arm smashing ala Chris Volcano), pitch-black atmosphere and contorted howls both high and low. Despite tuning very low, the guitars don't just sit around the first 5-7 frets of the bottom string all the time (no spidery shit, though), and so when they go low, skulls are crushed. Bands I can immediately reference are classics by ANTEDILUVIAN, IMPETUOUS RITUAL (first album), IGNIVOMOUS' early records, CORPSE MOLESTATION/BESTIAL WARLUST, PROFANATICA, TEITANBLOOD and the like, with the oft-abused and rarely well-used descriptor of "staunch" being an excellent fit. The mix is blunt and natural-sounding, but pretty clear so that everything is legible - there's zero typical modern metal production here, so it sounds like an actual band (think of the physicality in how REVENGE plays). If you're down on the current state of death metal after being disappointed by all the disposable trendy shit getting around, get on this immediately. It reminds me of the late 2000s-early 2010s days where more bands were taking influence from the old days and running with it, rather than just lazily pumping out a tired copy-of-a-copy. Sure, the album art is both thematically and visually very similar to many others in the cavernous death/black metal sphere, but really, that's to be expected, and it doesn't take anything away from the putrescent black evil oozing out of the speakers here.“Traversing the Mephitic Artery” was released by Nuclear Winter Records (a perfect fit) and is available to order now from the band’s Bandcamp (embedded below), coming in the form of a six-panel digisleeve. Hopefully a 12” version appears too as it’s well worth putting on vinyl. 8/10 and another highlight of the small but strong Adelaide scene.
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