Five For Friday: June 17, 2022

Greetings, Decibel readers!

It was a glorious time in Philadelphia last weekend! Those of you who attended the annual Decibel Magazine Metal & Beer Fest (the east-coast edition) know what I’m talking about. There was a wealth of great metal to be heard, along with the the libations on tap to help you wash it down (I stuck with the mead and gose varieties, as most beer doesn’t, um, agree with me). My own personal highlights included: Cannibal Corpse running like a freight train as always; Nuclear Assault taking us all back to 80s thrash exactly how you’d want to see it; The Red Chord taking me back to the feeling of New England Metal and Hardcore Fest back in the day; Mortiferum delivering me to death metal elysium at the pre-fest show; and Candlemass. Candlemass requires no explanation.

As for this week’s new releases, I try to give you an explanation below.

Enjoy!

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Berator – Elysian Inferno

We open this week with the band that opened Decibel Metal and Beer Fest for the pre-fest show. And with such a hellish, punishing sound, Berator were a fitting band to fire the opening shot to a weekend of righteous metal. This is pure, no-nonsense aggression here, executed like a demolition team taking out a mountain range.

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Consecration – Cinis

Death-doom for those of you who like to feel dirty when you crank it up. If you’re into Bolt Thrower but want it to hit you like Autopsy or Runemagick, go and consecrate yourself to this.

Stream: Apple Music

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Esoctrilihum – Consecration of the Spiritüs Flesh

Speaking of consecrations. I, Voidhanger Records is here with its latest blessing of weird, off-putting destruction in the form of new Esoctrilihum album. Fans of the band’s dizzying death metal storm are definitely spoiled with a new release so soon after last year’s fantastic Dy’th Requiem for the Serpent Telepath.

Stream: Apple Music

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Exanimatvm – Sollvm Ipsa Mor

Sticking with the theme of bands whose names are a pain to type out, Chile’s Exanimatvm delivers four servings of nightmarish death metal mastery on Sollvm Ipsa Mor. In fact, if we judged metal on how scary it is to normies, these guys would post very high numbers.

Stream: Apple Music

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Nekkromaniac – Plague Eater

Fist-pumping, raw, evil thrash metal. Nekkromaniac doesn’t just stitch the riffs and screams together in any old way — they do it with style, with tons of hooks and catchy riffs that make you want to eat the plague over and over again. That made sense, right? Never mind, just listen to this!