Well, well, well, look who decided to reform??  New York’s Immortal Suffering putting out a brand new 7 song 22 minute ep, ready to rip your head off.  I could not think of a better cd to come back to sending in Teeth of the Divine some new reviews every once in a while.  I will always have a special place in my dark heart for Immortal Suffering.  I laid down vocals to several of their songs on their ’95 incredible demo, Eternal Damnation.  In 2013 Pathologically Explicit Recordings remastered all of Immortal Suffering’s past material and the layout and sound is a thing of beauty-get your hands on it!  The band puts the pieces back together that same year, playing shows and thinking about new material.  What was originally destined to be a full length comes out as just an ep.  This is to reintroduce a new audience to the band as well as saying to us old school m’fers, ‘Yo we still have some gas left in the tank!’.

Immortal Suffering have put together quite an ep, that will probably be my favorite ep of the year, although I think the band is stating this is their first official full-length.  Whatever the case may be I only care about the music.  Some highlights of the release.  ’S.T.F.U.C.’ (this does not stand for Stanley Took Food Under Couch!) has quite the slam at the 1.16 mark.  Once the sound byte hits and Rudy does a double snare hit-BOOM!  Massive slam.  Funny thing, being a NY Italian, as some of the band is, I ate pasta and meatballs right before I listened to this-I am not kidding you.  ‘Murder-Suicide’ is another beastly track.  Killer opening after sound byte.  33 seconds in the guitar riff hits and it’s like get outta the way.  The slam destroys.  2.15 into the song an even more destructive slam comes in.  Very catchy slam part that you will hum all day long, no joke, while head banging in sync.  3 minutes in, barely catching your breath, little double bass comes in, and it’s back to kicking ass in the pit.

Track 4, “Slaughtered Souls” harkens back to the bands earlier material, with doom/slower elements and ‘Suffering of the Immortal’ is pure old school with pinch harmonics.  But ‘Beast’, is aptly titled.  I am pleading with Immortal Suffering, to play in Maryland, so I can see them play this tune live.  Surely not only one of my favorite songs this year, but Immortal Suffering-Stop the Clock!!!-this has to be your new opening song, when playing live.  You can leave out the piano intro and just go into that riff.  I am telling you, one of the greatest & heaviest opening slam riffs of all time! Hot damn, this song will destroy you.  This is one outrageous slam.  Once that opening riff begins it’s like ‘This is the holy shit part’.  1.15 gets into a nice older school quicker beat. Then back into that monster slam with amazing guttural vocals.  This song is a crime to play loud on the beltway-it would cause too many accidents, pile-ups and sink holes, as well as bridges collapsing.

My only gripe with the release is the weird snare sound.  This was recorded at Full Force in NY, with Joe Cincotta, but the snare sound has either too much reverb or something, that I can’t put my finger on, just yet.  Other than that Joe and Leo’s guitar sound heavy and thick.  John’s bass creates an undercurrent of heaviness and Ray and Ralph’s back n’ forth vocal attack are fantastic.  The lmd ed comes in a digi format, that has band photos, no lyrics, but who reads death metal lyrics, really?  If you’re into bands like Internal Bleeding, Dehumanized, Devourment etc…, you will salivate over this.

Welcome back Immortal Suffering, do not go away and come to Maryland to play and I’ll be there.  You guys should be proud of such an outstanding release.  Heavy, brutal, slamming, powerful and lots of hate and menace thrown on top to spice this sucker up.  Asylum is one of the best releases for 2015 and a no brainer Buy or Die!!!!!

[Visit the band's website]

---

Comments