Ελληνικά
Genre: Death Metal
Country: Sweden
Label: Soulseller Records
Year: 2018
Wombbath are back for real with new members as of 2018, releasing their third full length “The Great Desolation” in a twenty-five year period, which is what followed after three splits since 2015 and the satisfactory effort of “Downfall Rising”. The style of the band has not changed significantly since three years ago, as they are proficient with the direct Swedish death metal sound and that’s exactly what you’re going to receive with the latest record.
Johnny biggest-beard-ever- Petterson’s vocals are amazing, and he’s a vocalist I admire anyway for his work in many good releases (he has also participated in other bands like Syn:drom, Just Before Dawn and Pale King), so it was rather unlikely to be a disappointing effort in Wombbath too.
At first glance, I thought the artwork for “The Great Desolation” was not at the level of “Downfall Rising”, but after some backwards thinking the cover in this release is very beautiful and looks more like a painting than digital art. Wombbath are now a new band with a history from the early nineties, yet they have transformed themselves into a modern Swedish death metal band and most their compositional ideas are in excellent quality, reaching heights that they didn’t quite do so with their early material (even if “Internal Caustic Torments” is an underground classic).
There are a lot of great death metal riffs in the new record and solos appear every now and then, supported by a rather clean and harsh production and mainly, the band focuses on simple elements for each track. Mostly moving in middle or fast paced speeds, “The Great Desolation” is as heavy as it needs, and a couple of specific moments (some background synths in “Punisher of Broken Oaths” and the chorus in “The Weakest Flesh”) only stray from a pure Swedish death sound.
“Born of Filth” has a lot of melody too, and maybe you’ll be surprised by the introduction of “Hail the Obscene”. The opener of the record, “Embrace Death”, is one of my favorites in the album and the whole offering in general depicts Wombbath in good form and with something to say in a rather saturated scene. If you liked their previous stuff, it’s very possible you will enjoy this too.
4/6
