I’ve been a big fan of Malaysia’s Humiliation, brand of war inspired death metal, for a number of years. They release an album every year, along with some splits to boot. The band is always writing new music. As we speak they are writing their 9th album. Their brand of Bolt Thrower/classic Obituary/Hail of Bullets has garnered the band some heavy attention in the death metal scene and it’s great to see the band touring, now. No Escape arrived at my house sometime in the fall, of 2017, after the band returned from touring. I thought I had reviewed it, but it slipped past me. I also ordered the long sleeve to go along with it, since Humiliation prints high quality long sleeves on Gildan shirts and the shirt is beautiful. Full back, front and both sleeve prints.

Anyway, their prior album Honourable Discharge was one of their strongest efforts and had the best production the band had ever had. No Escape has a rawer feel to it and at times this hinders the power of the songs. “Void and Violation” begins with a nice isolated guitar riff, before the cymbals come in. Once the slow rhythm hits I am noticing the bottom heaviness, which makes Humiliation so crushing, is missing. Bear Bee sounds good, throaty and raspy, and the mid-paced rumbling is pretty ass-kicking. The middle section will have pits going wild. “Crusade in Sungai Manik” is a ferocious track. Featuring one of the fastest parts Humiliation has ever written. It’s almost like a primitive blast beat, from the mid-80’s era death metal time era. It’s really cool and then the mid-paced rumbling comes in with some strong guitar riffing and the fast parts picks up at the 1.55 mark once again with Bear barking and berating us all, over this section. The track meanders towards a little doom at the end.

“Line of Defense” begins with a real nice guitar part and once the mid-paced rumbling comes in with the double bass, I am missing that bottom end heaviness quite a lot. Then the real fast part comes in and the bottom-heaviness is sadly missing. It would have added a lot more depth and power to this section, as this part comes out very trebly sounding. Still, the track is a strong song. “Impending Death” is an exploding cannon, brutal, house smashing song. Once the groove hits again at the 1.05 section, Jason “Slips-Majinsky” and yours truly were just bashing each other ‘s head’s in with bloody fists again and again and again. A slower passage comes in and then back to the Bolt Thrower rumbling heaviness, reminding me of The IVth Crusade. 9 track in 41 minutes.

The packaging is excellent with lyrics and photos. No Escape has some faster moments, missing from past Humiliation releases and I really enjoy the faster moments. I would like to see the production values returned to that of the prior album. Overall this is a good Humiliation album and if you enjoy Bolt Thrower/Hail of Bullets, get on the Humiliation death metal tank and buy all their albums and shirts.

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