Iron Flesh returns to carry the weapons of French-made Death Metal.
Created in 2017, the band has already proposed two very Old School albums. In 2022, Julien (vocals/guitar, Withdrawn, ex-Otargos), Sylver (guitar, Death Lab, live for Aephanemer, ex-Fall of Seraphs, ex-Heboïdophrenie), Seb (bass, ex-The Great Old Ones) and Guilhem (drums, Allegiance) announce the release of Limb After Limb, their third album, by War Anthem Records.
Overthrow ov The Sermon ov God opens the album with a weighing and melodic introduction before placing heavy and straightforward riffs, accompanied by raw vocals over aggressive patterns. The thick, Old School mix lets the heady melodies lure us in while keeping sharp sounds just like on Cursed Within and its dark Black/Death influences mixed with a groovy, catchy rhythm. The unhealthy sounds coupled with wild vocal interventions slowly fade away before giving way to In Agony You Must Reborn and its devastating blast that overlaps with soaring harmonics which will give way to more straightforward riffs. Limb After Limb, the eponymous track, remains in pure aggressiveness coupled with this greasy and shrilling sound which still lets calmer parts reinforce the contrast with the pure brutality while leading us to the long Blessed Be The Creators and its oppressing dissonance. The slow riffs borrow from Death/Doom and its heavy melodies to develop an unhealthy atmosphere before Sacrorum Profanationem, a rather short track, comes to offer devastating riffs after a disturbing introduction. Honor In Death comes back in an oppressive, dark and saturated mix to let its haunting darkness be spreaded by slowly crushing us, then this occult final drives us to To Become One With The Dead and more aggressive influences which let blast and piercing leads play with an ominous break. As Ghouls March On returns to Old School influences’ thick, catchy and raw tones to develop an effective basis for dissonant and heady harmonics, then the album ends with Procession of Living Cadavers and its ghoulish tones illustrated by the violin before the rhythmic offers a place to melancholic leads on this instrumental track.
To be honest, I was impressed by Iron Flesh. From a basic Old School Death, the band has developed more melodious, oppressive and above all more marked tones, which make Limb After Limb an indispensable album.
95/100