After being one of the top, but second tier Swedish death metal bands on the 90s, Wombbath broke up, but almost 20 years later, lone original member Håkan Stuvemark and some scene vets and released Downfall Rising back in 2015, a solid reunion, fitting in with the rash of releases and rebirth of the genre.

Well, a mere 3 years later we have another album, and another line up.Workaholic  Johnny Pettersson (Henry Kane, Ashcloud, Gods Forsaken, Ursinne, Just Before Dawn) returns on vocals and guitar and is joined by drummer Henrik Åberg (Mork Gryning) and guitarist Al Riglin. And the result is exactly what you would expect: solid HM 2 styled Swedish death metal.

That’s about it really, I’m not giving this as much attention as say the Demonical or Gravestone, and I think it may be due to Pettersson project overload  but it’s a beefy, rowdy, chainsaw riff filled album with a few good moments and a little doomier, atmospheric edge here and there.

“Embrace Death” puts its foot on your throat right away before the more moody title track delivers some somber menace and then “Footsteps of Armageddon” delivers the first more controlled, more foreboding riffs, and these these moments that standout more as heard on “Hail the Obscene”, “Born of filth” and “Cold Steel Salvation”. Not that more direct face rippers like “Punisher of Broken Oaths”, “Harvester of Sin” or “The Weakest Flesh’ are bad or boring, but its nothing terribly exciting, even within the paradigms of Swedish styled death metal.

Another solid 2018 entry into the HM 2 Swedish sound, along with Angerot, Womb Ripper, Crawl, Lik and such, and its only September!

[Visit the band's website]

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