Without question one of the all-time greats of death metal, New York legends Suffocation have spent the best chunk of 30 years carving a savage and bloody path through the extreme music scene. From their 1991 debut full length – and undisputed classic – ‘Effigy Of The Forgotten’, through to 2013’s ‘Pinnacle Of Bedlam’, Suffocation have mastered the art of unrelenting technical brutality, and in the process have been forefathers of not just the tech death scene, they also are arguably the original progenitors of what would now be described as deathcore, their sound incorporating unmistakable hardcore elements even from the beginning, not least their devastating use of slams and breakdowns. This mashing up of dizzying speed and gut-churning heaviness continues apace on the band’s first album in four years, ‘…Of The Dark Light’.
Never a band known for subtlety or beating around the bush, Suffocation don’t give even the slightest option for you to brace yourself before ‘Clarity Through Depravation’ launches a full-scale attack on every nerve ending in your body. As relentless an assault as the band have ever crafted, the track is like a runaway freight train packed full of dynamite, and it’s as invigorating as it is terrifying to behold. Before the song ends it manages to throw in one of the quintet’s famous breakdowns, the effect being that of the aforementioned freight train slamming into a concrete wall at full-speed. It’s almost impossible to get through without your face contorting into a satisfied grimace, the track setting a frightening precedent for an album full to the brim with face-peeling riffs, inhuman drumming and an overall feeling of menace that’s as relentless and inescapable as a masked killer stalking you in the shadows.
Suffocation have had a number of line-up shifts in their career, which is understandable for a band that have been at it as long as they have. These changes of personnel have never negatively affected the band’s sound though, likely on one hand due to the fact that they’ve only ever hired new members capable of holding together the band’s legacy, and on the other hand thanks to founding vocalist Frank Mullen and almost-original guitar master Terrance Hobbs casting their experienced hands over everything. Mullen’s performance on ‘…Of The Dark Light’ is reassuringly solid as ever, and though he’s never had much of a variety of tones in his vocals, his throat-shredding guttural roar is as effective as it ever was at commanding Suffocation’s blasphemous orchestra. Hobbs too is still a wizard when it comes to progressive shred, some of the riffs on the album easily sitting among the band’s best.
‘…Of The Dark Light’ is another solid swing and a hit for Suffocation. Tracks like the crushing ‘Return To The Abyss’, the churning grind of the title track, and the majestic yet agonising ‘Caught Between Two Worlds’ are as heavy and mind-bendingly technical as anything you could dig out of the band’s back catalogue. To prove this, there’s even a re-recording of the classic track ‘Epitaph Of The Credulous’ from their second album ‘Breeding The Spawn’ thrown in at the end, and it sits comfortably with all of the new material, proving without a shadow of a doubt that Suffocation’s 2017 incarnation are capable of ripping just as hard as their 1990s counterparts. It’s unquestionable that without Suffocation’s early material, bands like Decapitated, Necrophagist and The Faceless might never have picked up guitars in the first place, and with ‘…Of The Dark Light’, the band have yet again proven just why they’ve been such an influential force in the world of extreme metal.
JAMES LEE