Album Review: Infested Angel - Submit To Death
Reviewed by Paul Hutchings
It’s not difficult to establish the genre that Birmingham three-piece Infested Angel worship. The band who formed in 2019 and whose debut E.P., ‘Nourish Me, Satan’ reared its ugly head in 2021, leave little to the imagination.
A sinister intro paves the way for the bludgeoning ‘Harmony of Drought’, a song which incorporates elements of Gojira fused with Blood Red Throne in a splattering fist of rage. A combination of the crushing doom of Ahab and the powerful driving death metal of Bolt Thrower, Infested Angel surprise with an almost psychedelic breakdown in the middle of a lumbering section on ‘Denaturate’. The calming breather doesn’t last long, and the overall maelstrom then continues.
Infested Angel is not a subtle band by any means. The crushing ‘Eden’ threatens nothing but bruises with its whirling, dervish style assault. Vocalist and guitarist Andrew Bryan possesses some serious lung power; his feral screams and demonic roars are vicious enough to crack concrete although the high-pitched scream that appears from nowhere halfway through is a tad unsettling.
The fury continues as this 27-minute release continues forward. It’s a bit of a one-horse approach, but as I’ve said before, you don’t listen to Cannibal Corpse for musical variation and free-range expressionism. No, this is brutal, blistering death metal that seeks to level and damage with maximum velocity. It’s not a refined record, more an attack with a shovel.
By the time you’ve arrived at the pummelling ‘Torture Condemnation’ you’ll be lucky to still be standing. The riffs are relentless, the drumming solid and driven. The vocals are by now more standard death metal gruffness, but this is by no means a bad thing, the visceral delivery adding to the overall onslaught.
‘Submit to Death’ isn’t a bad release in any respect. It’s a pulverising 26 or so minutes. I have my doubts about whether it can be heard in the vast death metal release world and with so many bands delving deep into their sound, Infested Angel may struggle to push their way through. If they do, I’d suggest that it would be due to an evolution in their face melting sound. This was an enjoyable EP to review, and hopefully there is more to come from them soon.
