Pissgrave – Posthumous Humiliation (Profound Lore Records. 2019).

Pissgrave – Posthumous Humiliation (Profound Lore Records. 2019).

Expect no mercy, as Pissgrave return to bludgeon you to death. Right from the start, the album dives into a savage frenzy of blasting drums, savage riffs, and relentless vocal attack in the brutal Euthanasia. An unrelenting assault begins, hammering your sense without mercy, before around the two-minute mark when a tremolo picked riff comes in which intoxicates the mind and leads perfectly into the ending palm-muted riffs that are hard, heavy, and set things up perfectly for the sadistic Canticle of Ripping Flesh. You barely get a break to catch your breath before the bestial violence begins again. This is a masterfully written album, with intricate, winding song structures and vicious riffs combining to create a barbaric slab of Death Metal violence. Pissgrave have managed to meld a raging War Metal all-out assault with old-school Death Metal riffs in the style of early Deicide to create an intoxicating sound. There is a sinister atmosphere that permeates the album, one which reeks of the morbid catacombs and charnel houses, as perfectly exemplified by the disgusting riff around the three minute mark of Into the Deceased, a slower section that highlights some of the influence from the old-school masters of evil Death Metal such as Infester and Incantation. That solo over the top of it shrieks like the souls of the damned, adding further to the Hellish atmosphere. Much like the debut album, Suicide Euphoria, the production is a wall-of-noise that brims with an intensity that further escalates the barbarity and sonic violence. The guitar tone during slower sections sounds absolutely evil, which magnifies the feral assault when there is an all-out war metal attack as well as adding to the rotten miasma that pervades on this fantastic release. The drumming is masterfully done, blasting where necessarily and restraining itself during some of the slower, more atmospheric passages with the rolling of the bass drum adding perfectly to the dread majesty of Hades that is summoned in some of those sections. Posthumous Humiliation is a killer album and a fitting follow-up to the debut. 9/10.