Weekly Update #30 – October 20, 2024

FEATURED ALBUM
Peelingflesh // The G Code
Released: September 6, 2024

Incredible things are happening in the slamming brutal death metal (SBDM) genre. It’s bigger than it’s ever been, and it’s being led by a new wave of young bands. I didn’t mean for this to be such a long review, but I rarely talk about this genre and I’ve been sitting on some thoughts.

As a side note, my earliest memory of SBDM is a YouTube video that compared it to deathcore. This was probably 15 years ago so they were comparing slam bands to deathcore bands like Chelsea Grin, Suicide Silence, and Despised Icon. Deathcore was the hot new thing and the metal elitists thought it was a fad that would die out.

The funniest part of the video was the focus on style – the young deathcore bands would wear trendy clothes, have stretched ears, and sometimes have a “gangster” persona in their music videos. Meanwhile, the slam bands wore cargo shorts and looked like they just rolled out of a basement. The point was that deathcore was for edgy teenagers that wanted to get famous by making heavy music while SBDM was for diehards that knew their music would never pay the bills.

Well, deathcore obviously stuck around and is significantly bigger than ever before. In some ways, it has also helped pull SBDM into the modern era. Of course, there are legendary staples like Abominable Putridity, Pathology, Disfiguring The Goddess, Disentomb, Kraanium, Acranius, and many others, but they mostly hover around 30k monthly listeners.

The path to the new generation of SBDM has been in the works for at least 10 years. I give Acrania a lot of credit for helping create and popularizing “brutal deathcore” in 2014. Vulvodynia and Within Destruction took the next big steps forward in 2016 and Mental Cruelty and Hollow Prophet deserve credit for their 2017 albums. They all brought a lot of attention to the slamming elements of SBDM by combining them with deathcore’s popularity and production. They also helped rehab slam’s identity by showing that it didn’t have to be defined by crazy medical words and gore.

Fast forward to the last couple of years, and Peelingflesh and Snuffed On Sight have literally taken over. Peelingflesh has 178k monthly listeners – almost as many as every legendary SBDM band I mentioned above…combined. Snuffed On Sight also just opened for Thy Art Is Murder. Bands like this aren’t supposed to be playing in venues like The House of Blues, but that’s the power of this new era of SBDM bands.

And it’s not just hype. Peelingflesh is legitimately the most fun I’ve had listening to slam in a long time. Just straight up ignorant fight music inspired by thuggery. Ridiculously heavy with enormously thick grooves.

Originally formed by a few members from Strangled after a split due to creative differences, Peeligflesh immediately started making waves. Their combination of slam, hip-hop, and rap is insanely fresh and unique. Funnily enough, their identity (and Snuffed On Sight’s) is one of gold chains and illicit activities – the exact thing that early deathcore bands were criticized for. Kids love that stuff though, and if you’re going to reimagine a whole genre, you’re going to need the younger generation’s support.

It’s not even a gimmick with Peelingflesh though – their sound is literally built around that culture. It’s seamless because it’s not a special combination they’re trying to get the hang of – the rap sections, hip-hop beats, and samples are critical parts of their sound. Plus, those fun moments add to the album’s replayability because they offer moments of reprieve from the heaviness. Most importantly, the slamming elements aren’t overshadowed by the DJ record scratches, nostalgic rap samples, or guest features. Peelingflesh is an accomplished slam band in their own right – everything else is just the cherry on top. 

That being said, Peelingflesh isn’t exactly meant to be taken seriously. Slam in and of itself is somewhat satirical and over the top. One thing’s for sure though, the George W. Bush clip in “Shoot 2 Kill” is one of the hardest samples I’ve ever heard.

Peelingflesh is like no other, and that’s why they’re at the top of the game right now. You’ll either love it or hate it, but as a fan of heavy music, you should at least know about the youngsters that are breathing new life into a genre that has historically been limited to 100 cap dive bars.

Playlist of New Songs

Quick playlist highlights

– Haste The Day is back! These guys are an all time favorite – ‘When Everything Falls’ and Pressure The Hinges’ are classics. I always loved their raspy screams and they’re still sounding great. This made my day.

– The Crimson Armada is back too!?!? What an insane throwback. ‘Guardians’ was such a crazy deathcore album in 2009 and it still holds up to this day. Saud is a wicked vocalist with a unique style, and it was such a shame when he stepped away from music. I’m a little surprised he went back to the deathcore style of ‘Guardians’ – their 2011 album was super solid metalcore and it seemed like he enjoyed that a lot. The Holy Guile’s music is back up on Spotify too (Saud’s band after The Crimson Armada broke up). You gotta give it a listen if you haven’t before.

– Infant Annihilator has also returned from the depths. This is probably one of the most exciting weeks for new music in a long time. They just released an overhauled version of a 2011 project called Mister Sister Fister (which was guitarist/bassist Eddie Pickard and drummer Aaron Kitcher’s band before they made Infant Annihilator). The EP features Dickie Allen AND Alex Teyen on vocals. Dickie is the vocalist of Infant Annihilator and Alex is the vocalist of Black Tongue (which is Eddie Pickard and Aaron Kitcher’s other band). This is huge because Infant Annihilator announced they are currently recording their next album and their involvement with Alex Teyen might be a hint that more Black Tongue music will be in the works too.

– The Unguided have a new album scheduled for March 2025. I don’t think I’ve ever talked about Sonic Syndicate, but their first two albums are incredible. The core members of The Unguided were in Sonic Syndicate during those years (before Sonic Syndicate became radio friendly trash).

– Saltwound‘s new album comes out November 1. I need to give them a proper listen. In general, I really like the metalcore/downtempo deathcore line that they balance on. Sometimes reminds me a bit of Left To Suffer and Sleep Waker.

– It Dies Today has released the official version of a demo song that got leaked like 10 years ago. This is super solid metalcore that reminds me of the stuff that I used to listen to as a kid. Hopefully we’ll go full circle someday and get back to this style.

– Worm Shepherd‘s new album comes out November 15. I’m not as enamored with this style of deathcore lately, but these guys are heavy hitters when it comes to blackened/symphonic deathcore. Their vocalist, Devin Duarte, is a beast, but apparently some stuff came out about him and this will be the last album with the band. Not sure if Worm Shepherd has a bright future without him at the helm though.

– Slaughter To Prevail‘s new song is a tribute to Kentaro Miura, the creator of the Berserk manga that died in 2021. It’s pretty epic, and Alex’s singing isn’t too bad, but there’s just something about Slaughter To Prevail’s recent music where it doesn’t sound like the vocals and instruments are synced up. It’s like they’re doing two separate things and then they just combine them even though they don’t fit together very well.