Industrial Puke – Alive to No Avail Review

By Saunders

Usually, the illustrious Mark Z deals with the vomitous streams flowing through the promo sump. But for the second time for this particular act, I’m taking one for the team. However, the subject is not in the vein of vile underground death or hellraising blackened thrash. Rather, Sweden’s Industrial Puke rip through a nasty collection of crossover hardcore/crust/death metal on second LP, Alive to No Avail. Featuring a chunk of the Rentokiller line-up and charismatic, raw-throated vox of Burst frontman Linus Jägerskog, Industrial Puke pull no punches in their bid to fuse genres and bust heads in one hefty swing. The band’s short and sweet debut, Born into the Twisting Rope, was a solid outing that didn’t break boundaries but executed with oodles of pissed off attitude and breakneck efficiency, resulting in an entertaining listen. Can they capitalize on a promising debut to deliver something more intense and well-rounded on their second opus to match the awesome on paper love of Dismember and Disrupt?

Alive to No Avail treads similar worn territory to its predecessor, while sharpening the points of their sound. Again, the formula skews more heavily towards their hardcore and crust influences. However, refreshingly, the old school Swedeath, thrash, and occasional melodeath influences add spark, heaviness, and versatility to their aggro, frantic attacks. Overall, it’s a more adventurous, fully fleshed album, dripping with spiteful aggression, speedy gallops, punchy riffs, and thumping grooves. Alive to No Avail is every bit as vicious as its predecessor, yet by the same token, everything feels bigger, beefier, tighter and altogether stronger in writing and design. Compact in length like the debut, this time around Industrial Puke have upped the runtime to lengths more closely associated with full-length territory, allowing more time to develop and expand their sound across a near half-hour smackdown.

Immediately, “Daily Chest Pain” goes straight for the throat, nasty belligerent riffs take hold as Jägerskog’s acidic snarls and gang shouted backing vox lend the song a vicious edge. A short, nifty solo rips through the controlled carnage, adding a welcome melodic spark. While boasting a more pronounced death metal influence, the hardcore crust vibes remain the focal point, thus tolerance towards these influences will likely determine the mileage. Integrating their dueling influences into meaty riffs that pack a solid punch, Industrial Puke leverage their stomping hardcore riffs and motifs, with Slayer-esque thrash chops, gnarled Swedeath riffs, and raw Gothenburg throwbacks (“Alive to No Avail”). Whether incorporating seething hardcore meets sludge tones on The Atlas Moth-esque “The Regretful Climb,” ripping through Slayer-indebted thrash with crossover attitude (“Flaccid Provider”), unleashing violently stomping grooves and punchy gang shouts (Biblical Curse’), or embracing the d-beaten Swedeath fury and dueling vox of “Average Dicks,” Alive to No Avail marks a consistently raucous, nasty ride.

Musically, Industrial Puke play fast and tight, demonstrating steady, experienced hands. The influences are broader than the debut, the scope has expanded. However, the raging, jugular ripping directness and amped up speed reign supreme. The death metal influences are slightly more forward, though again the hardcore and crust elements take center stage, generously dosed with old school thrash and snippets of buzzsawing death. As sharp and gnarly as Industrial Puke sound, moments arise where I crave a little more death in the mix. Jägerskog’s vocals are very good, and the recurring gang vocal trade-offs and occasional lower variation lend variety. However, it would be nice to hear more low growls and death vox to complement Jägerskog’s aggro snarl (such as those used to great effect on “Average Dicks”).

Industrial Puke write fast, fun, bruising music, featuring the songwriting smarts and raw aggression to draw in listeners from both hardcore and death metal worlds. Alive to No Avail marks a step forward for Industrial Puke, building from the solid groundwork laid on the debut, to punch out an album of deeper substance, stronger riffs, and tons of brawling aggression and headbangable anthems. Metalheads opposed to hardcore influences or put off by the higher-pitched, strained vocal style of Jägerskog will be unlikely to be swayed. On the flipside, fans of crossover styles and hardcore forward metal with a death crust should find much to enjoy here.

Rating: 3.5/5.0
DR: 7 | Format Reviewed: 320 kbps mp3
Label: Suicide Records
Websites: Bandcamp | Facebook
Releases Worldwide: March 28th, 2025

#2025 #35 #AliveToNoAvail #Burst #crossover #Crust #DeathMetal #Dismember #Disrupt #Hardcore #IndustrialPuke #Rentokiller #Review #Reviews #Slayer #SuicideRecords #SwedishMetal #TheAtlasMoth #ThrashMetal

SpiritWorld – Helldorado Review

By Dear Hollow

SpiritWorld’s lone appearance ’round these here parts, like any good vigilante, is an entry in the 2022 AOTY list of then-n00b, now gone-but-never-unforgotten ItchyMenace for sophomore album Deathwestern. But guess what? There’s a new sheriff in town, and he’s mad as hell. So mad, he’ll riff you at sundown in front of the town hall at high noon, so say “yeehaw” and “howdy, pardner,” because that piano’s gon’ stop at the saloon because there’s a fire at the watering hole.1 Out in the desert, there’s a snake with your boot’s name on it and a bullet with your name on it too. So tread lightly, cuz there’s a big black train named SpiritWorld heading straight for your ass – to take you to Helldorado.

All Wild West stereotypes and John Wayne-isms aside, Vegas natives SpiritWorld have been going with the “deathwestern” trope for three albums now. Hardcore punk, thrash, death metal, and country have a hand on their revolver in this five-man shootout, sometimes all at once in an O.K. Corral massacre, sometimes in doses like a hefty shot of laudanum afterwards. Helldorado riffs first and foremost, with kickass and cutthroat Slayer shreds and D.R.I.-inspired hardcore attitude kicking in the saloon door with a steel-toed boot, while a spittoon of experimentalisms are like gooey tobacco made of black metal and jazz. Ultimately, in spite of consistency issues and one-note beatdowns, thanks to SpiritWorld’s utterly batshit ideas and straightforward viciousness, Helldorado is one mighty hell of a good time.

What keeps me coming back to Helldorado is the riffs, SpiritWorld completely surging with adrenaline. Crossover thrash a la D.R.I. gets the riffs going, with heftily constructed beatdowns of speedy Slayer leads (“No Vacancy in Heaven,” “Western Stars & the Apocalypse,” “Waiting on the Reaper”), while more western-themed mid-tempo jaunts laced with gang vocals and meaty breakdowns bring the anvil of brainless mayhem (“Abilene Grime,” “Stigmata Scars”). Compared to its predecessor, Helldorado’s guitar tone is much more nimble, allowing it a cutthroat viciousness and weighted beatdown in equal measure. Vocalist Stu Folsom somehow injects a cowboy accent into his blend of Henry Rollins yells and James Hetfield sneers, always annunciating the lyrics for hardcore callouts.2 Bluesy country-western scales are built into every moment, manifesting in delicious leads, technical shreds, all alongside wailing heavy metal solos that seem to hit at just the right moments – culminating into something that feels a tad like a crossover Pantera. It’s a kick to the groin, and you’ll love every bit of it.

While the previous outing Deathwestern grew old with its overreliance on the chuggy riff, Helldorado changes things up considerably. While the majority of the album only features wild west-sounding melodies, some tracks throw off this structure like a rattlesnake in the boot – it serves to break the monotony of SpiritWorld’s omni-riffage. You’ll first notice the softer country twang that pervades some of the album’s midsection, but its experimental vibes draws comparisons to Kirin J. Callinan’s “Big Enough” (yes, the screaming cowboy song),3 – “Bird Song of Death” and closer “Annihilism” feature rough thrash vocals atop Jason Aldean-esque plucking in an odd concoction, while the whispery vocals and sidewinding sax solo in “Prayer Lips” are sure to turn some heads. “Oblivion” is a curious track, as its ridiculously chunky riffage builds up to a feature of Blackbraid’s Sgah’gahsowáh shrieking atop a thrash riff, later followed up by a punky solo by Rise Against’s Zach Blair. Kreator/Sinsaenum guitarist Frédéric Leclercq contributes a rip-roaring solo to “Stigmata Scars.”

Helldorado is just fun as hell. SpiritWorld’s riffage is front-and-center, but you’ll also be singin’ these songs into the moonlight with a clunky guitar and a cup o’ cowboy coffee, pardner.4 With hell-raisin vocals, kickass riffs, and just enough experimental elements to keep you guessing (or scratching your head), it blows its predecessors out of the watering hole. Sure, in spite of the frivolities, SpiritWorld remains a one-trick pony – but Helldorado ensures they can ride that pony into the sunset.

Rating: 3.0/5.0
DR: 4 | Format Reviewed: 320 kb/s mp3
Label: Century Media Records
Websites: spiritworldprophet.bandcamp.com | spiritworldprophet.com
Releases Worldwide: March 21st, 2025

#2025 #30 #AmericanMetal #BlackFlag #Blackbraid #CenturyMediaRecords #ColdChisel #DRI_ #GrooveMetal #Hardcore #HeavyMetal #Helldorado #JasonAldean #KirinJCallahan #Kreator #Mar25 #Metallica #Pantera #Review #Reviews #RiseAgainst #Sinsaenum #Slayer #SpiritWorld #ThrashMetal

Purified in Blood – Primal Pulse Thunder Review

By Cherd

I came of age, musically and otherwise1 in the American Midwest in the 90s. Like so many of my adolescent male peers who lacked cultural outlets for our instinctive angst around blue collar upbringings, I latched on to the exploding scene of hardcore and early metalcore. For the better part of a decade, I mainlined releases from record labels like Victory, Revelation, SolidState, et al, but by around 2002, the prevalence of screamo and my own shifting tastes pushed me down other musical paths. Small wonder, then, that I was unfamiliar with Norwegian metalcore purveyors Purified in Blood when I selected—with trepidation, given the metalcore tag—their new record Primal Pulse Thunder from the promo sump. As I have learned, Purified in Blood formed in 2003 and have dissolved and reformed multiple times since. We may have been ships passing in the night lo these many years, and my introduction to them may come on their fourth full-length, but now I’ve found them I’m pleasantly surprised.

Any fear that I was in for some weepy post-metalcore with nasally cleans disappeared as the d-beat drums and beatdown riffs of first advance single “Jernbur” filled my Heavys. This is tough guy hardcore, but without the cocky barked vocals of most bands I’d categorize that way. Instead, vocalist Hallgeir Skretting Enokssen has an enviable harsh delivery for both gang-shouts and the death growls he frequently slips into across Primal Pulse Thunder’s nine songs. In fact, hardcore may be the structure of Purified in Blood’s sound, but melodeath is the cladding. The style pops up all over, from the tremolo sprint in the otherwise knuckle-dragging title track, to the bridge in “Key and Stone,” to the the harmonized chorus in “Jernbur.” While the band started as hardcore (sorry) proponents of the straightedge ethos, resembling Earth Crisis in philosophy and in sound , the remaining members have since dropped the overt social politics of it lyrically. Instead, there’s a lot of rumination on transcending a world on fire, and no small amount of chest-thumping declarations.

There are significant strengths to discuss on Primal Pulse Thunder, but the most impressive is how hardcore and death metal serve each other as the band deftly blend or switch between the styles. The title track is a great case in point. Before listening to a single note, I read the album’s title and thought “that sounds stupid.” Those three words in that combination came across as try-hard toughness. But by packaging those words in a perfect blend of dummy caveman death riffs and slowed-down beatdown, the song has me wanting to see it played live so I can join in shouting “PRIMAL! PULSE! THUNDER!” And then there’s that late tremolo riff that packs tons of Amon Amarth swagger into the song as Enokssen roars “I refuse to be killed! Set fire to everything!” Purified in Blood know exactly what each of their two main styles are for, and they deliver several choice cuts of monstrously heavy metalcore.

That’s not to say Primal Pulse Thunder is a world beating record. It’s long for as much hardcore as it has at 50 minutes, and there is definitely bloat that wouldn’t be missed if it were cut. The two song stretch of “Ascend to Nothing” and “Spiritual Thirst” is where that trouble begins. The first of these is actually a welcome slow down after the white hot intensity of the tracks up until that point, with a nice mid-paced groove that helps the record breath. Unfortunately it’s followed by an even slower, more experimental song. “Spiritual Thirst” is the low point of the album, starting with un-asked for throat singing, stick clicking, and riff development that feels out of place among the otherwise tight writing. At nearly eight minutes, it’s also the second longest song on the album. The longest, 11 and a half minute closer “Portal,” fits the album much better, but it’s fair to say a song like standout “Jernbur” does everything “Portal” does, but in almost a third of the time.

Relatively minor bloat issues aside, Primal Pulse Thunder is a three word phrase that, despite it’s awkwardness on the page, now conjures for me the sweaty basement shows and the live-wire energy I experienced as a 20 year old. I remember friends at the time telling me “You can’t listen to this kind of music forever.” Oh, can’t I?

Rating: 3.5/5.0
DR: 9 | Format Reviewed: 320 kbps mp3
Label: Indie Recordings
Websites: purifiedinblood.bandcamp.com | facebook.com/purifiedinblood
Releases Worldwide: March 14th, 2025

#2025 #35 #Beatdown #DeathMetal #EarthCrisis #Hardcore #IndieRecordings #Mar25 #Melodeath #Metalcore #NorwegianMetal #PrimalPulseThunder #PurifiedInBlood #Review #Reviews