The word is out at Full of Hell.
To celebrate their fifteenth anniversary, the American band led by Dylan Walker (vocals/machines), Spencer Hazard (guitar/noises), Dave Bland (drums), Sam DiGristine (bass/saxophone/vocals) and Gabe Solomon (guitar) are treating themselves to Coagulated Bliss, their sixth album, with Closed Casket Activities.
Like its cover art, by American painter Brian Montuori, Coagulated Bliss is an as constructed and thoughtful as chaotic and disturbing album. Throughout its twelve tracks, a little over twenty-five minutes long, you’ll find the band’s incredibly aggressive Grindcore and Powerviolence roots, but also that noisy touch bordering on devastated Industrial that marks the band’s personality, as on Fractured Bonds to Mecca, where the sound is very slow, letting the various screams haunt the thick rhythm. The shortest tracks are obviously the most virulent, but the band also indulges in some experimentation, as on Bleeding Horizon, which borrows from Sludge and even Drone to create its haunting, apocalyptic ambience before the band returns to pure violence, or the more unexpected Schizoid Rupture, which features some relatively strange patterns. Two musicians join the band, Ross Dolan (Immolation) on Gasping Dust, and Jacob Bannon (Converge, Umbra Vitae, Wear Your Wounds…) for Malformed Ligature, the final track, which also takes some very heavy liberties.
If you’re expecting uncontrollable violence from Full of Hell, you haven’t understood the band’s principle yet. Coagulated Bliss will, of course, deliver unparalleled rage, but the album really has no limits, either in aggression or in surprise. For discerning listeners only.
85/100