“Get your beach shorts on because it’s surf time!” ….as those German Surf Metallers Stillbirth return with their latest offering, full length number seven, “Revive the Throne”, but before you go thinking this is going to be a Metal version of The Beach Boys brace yourself because boardshorts (and spliffs) are the only connection you’ll find with surfing or Hawaii and this band so if you haven’t crossed paths with them before, Stillbirth deliver a BRUTAL concoction of Death Metal, Grindcore and Deathcore that slams so hard I ended up with bruises inside my ears after the first listen. The only wave you’ll experience is a brutal tsunami of sound smashing into you, so as you can imagine, it’s a pretty awesome album if you enjoy a jolly good aural beating.
“Revive the Throne” features eleven brutal songs of the heaviest material you could wish to be crushed by, a heady abundance of blastbeats, slams and heavy grooves, and it’s these heavy grooves that make this brutal offering so listenable. Without compromising on that all important brutality, it has a level and intensity of energy that would knock a stampeding elephant unconscious. Stillbirth do have a new secret weapon in their arsenal for this release, where it differs from the previous albums is, this time, they’ve added an extra bass player for maximum brutality.
Add to that, precise riffs and pummelling drums alongside a vocal arrangement that encompasses screams, growls, snarls and squeals alongside some decidedly decipherable lyrical delivery, woven into complex compositions that twists and turn in an engagingly convoluted manner with several of the tracks enhanced with openers of soundbites from films, including the distorted adaptation the famous line from the film “A Few Good Men” “You Want Answers…….You Can’t Handle The Truth! etc.” at the beginning of “Degeneration”.
There is also a decidedly hypnotic edge to the brutality that forms the core of this album. Once it gets its claws into you it’s hard to break free, and choosing a favourite track is a difficult one, you either like the whole album or don’t, so I don’t have favourite tracks but there are many noteworthy points; the engagingly addictive pounding groove that forms “Degraded to Mutilation”, or where the title track “Revive the Throne” falls away into a massive chasm like breakdown and the vocal squeals are extended to impressively inhuman protraction’s. Then there is the crushing and cavernous quality to “Breed of Bestiality” with its dark ominous edge that partners the hypnotic brutality so well, the convoluted frenzy of “Revolt of the Weak” and I love the tech bursts and the echoing dialogue between the guitars on “Echoes of the Trumpets”. There’s a whole lot to get your teeth into here….. provided it doesn’t get its teeth into you first!
“Revive the Throne” is out now on Unique Leader for those of you brave enough to face the sonic tsunami that is Stillbirth, it’s a workout for the senses. If you are a fan of bands like Ingested or Katalepsy this will be of great interest to you, it’s outrageously brutal!
Rating – 4.5 /5
https://uniqueleaderrecords.bandcamp.com/album/revive-the-throne
The Metal Wanderlust 