The Misanthropy machine returns.
Six years after their last release, the band comprising Kevin (guitar/vocals, Gored Embrace live), Mark (bass/vocals, Xenopredator, ex-Texas Toast Chainsaw Massacre), Paul (drums, Xenopredator) and Jose (guitar, ex-From Those Ashes) sign to Transcending Obscurity Records to unveil The Ever-Crushing Weight of Stagnance, their third studio album.
The band attacks without delay with Of Sulking And The Wrathful, a chaotic dissonant debut that emphasizes both its brutality and its uncontrollable Prog touches. One sometimes takes precedence over the other, but the two respond in a fairly balanced way until the solo that finally leads to The All-Devouring after a final wave of heaviness, letting the new composition to bring its own riffs. The band clearly favors complexity on this track, with all instruments developing a veritable imbroglio before moving on to A Cure For The Pestilence, where the same touches of madness color the violence. The rhythm is slower at times, once again reinforcing the heaviness before becoming jerky again, overwhelming us again and again before Condemned To A Nameless Tomb takes over, redoubling its intensity to create disturbing, overlapping sounds. The novice listener will be totally lost in this steadily boiling mass of rage, but the musicians take a slightly more accessible approach on Descent, the next track, at least on the first wave of riffs. The rest of the track is just as hellish as its predecessors, also featuring powerful but rather changeable vocal parts before the final gradually slows down, exploding again when Sepulcher takes over at full speed. Each strike nails us a little more to the floor, and the band seem to have understood this as they multiply them before offering us a rather different central touch, but we quickly return to the thicker tones before coming up against Consumed By The Abyss, where the combo adds darkness to its oppressive rhythm and its very many unexpected bursts that complement the power and low tuning.
Although I’m used to dissonant progressive death, I find Misanthropy‘s universe extremely heavy and unique. The Ever-Crushing Weight of Stagnance is a veritable block of complexity, with a variety of forms that follow one another without warning, always striking where you least expect it.
80/100