Get your knives out, Exhumed is back to skin you.
Since 1990, the band led by Matt Harvey (guitar/vocals, Gruesome, Left to Die, ex-Noothgrush), Ross Sewage (guitar/bass, Ghoul, Impaled), Mike Hamilton (drums, Deeds of Flesh, ex-Vile) and Sebastian Phillips (guitar, Noisem, Castle Freak, ex-Necropsy) has a habit of releasing bloody albums. To The Dead, their tenth offspring, is no exception.
Putrescine and Cadaverine is in charge to open the album with this characteristic thick sound between Death and Grind which ensures unlimited aggressiveness. The two voices crash on this morbid and Old School rhythmic which knows how to handle speed just like on Drained of Colors which leaves a room for the catchy groove. The slower parts give musicians the opportunity to place devastating solos between two morbid howlings, then Carbonized goes back to frantic riffs to maximize the striking force for the crowd movements. The band doesn’t allow us any moment of respite, and the wave of aggressiveness will be followed by Rank and Defiled, which continues to fuel the fury with jerky riffs completed by sharp leads and massive screams. The album moves on with Lurid, Shocking, and Vile, an extremely effective composition which stays anchored in those wild and fast patterns with heavy sounding choirs and visceral screams, but also with Undertaking the Overkilled which takes the dirtiest and most unhealthy roots to the extreme. The track is short, and it leaves us with Necrotica, an aggressive track which lets the musicians go wild while placing heavy influences in the piercing leads, then No Headstone Unturned comes to make us shake our head with its catchy riffs which leave an important place to the rhythmic duo. Guitars become much more melodic between two explosions of fury, while Defecated returns to the most basic and energetic patterns of a raw and direct Grind/Death. But the album comes to its end with Disgusted, the last track, which keeps aggressive and fast elements while coupling them with a catchy groove and sharp leads, confirming once again the band’s efficiency.
If you like raw violence, you will enjoy Exhumed. The band has nothing to prove anymore, and they continue to align efficient and catchy riffs under a gory aesthetic, making To The Dead a new slap in the face.
90/100