The undisputed kings of new york death metal Suffocation are once back on UK shores! Again bringing us a pretty stacked touring package that hits a wide spread of extreme underground metal!
As main support are the deathcore darlings Angelmaker, Boston’s HM2 filled chaos of Fuming Mouth, Canadian deathcore outfit Carcosa & Australia’s spooky Mélancolia.
Opening up first on a stack bill like tonight can be a big task, added to that an early door time. But Mélancolia didnt not give a single fuck. From the very first note of their set the band had a big swagger & turned up the heat quickly. Their whole aesthetic has your eye drawn to the band so even in a big venue like this they had no problem with having the crowd interested.
Mixing a modern feel deathcore with some heavy synth & blackened moments they had a real dark but brutal sound. One i’m keeping an eye on for sure.
Next up are Carcosa. What I didn’t know was the members of Angelmaker. As a three piece these guys blew me away. Only one guitar, drummer and vocalist they had so much power. They had tracks but even so the heaviness & enjoyment from the group came in part from vocalist Johnny Ciardullo’s stage banter or interaction with the crowd. Reminding me of early The Acacia Strain they guys play with dynamic breakdowns & sound textures to create a wall of brutality. If you like it dark, heavy & moshable these are your guys.
Now for the chainsaw carnage that is Fuming Mouth. I have a big soft spot for these guys. They blend all my favourite parts of death metal with the brutality of hardcore & their last album “Last Day Of Sun” was one of top albums of 2024. Now with a full line up the band take the stage & blow a hole in the fucking roof with “Nothing To Bleed”.
Frontman Mark Whelan demands a mosh pit straight away & oh the crowd are more than willing to give him one.
“Brutal Practices” gets the middle fingers in the air as the crowd chant “Fuck this life and everyone in it..” before a earth shattering breakdown begins. Leave it to Fuming Mouth to turn things up a notch ah? Closing their set with the beautifully haunting “Silence Beyond Life” gives any newcomers a taste of the expansive sound that FM has to offer.
https://fumingmouth.bfan.link/ldos
Now it’s British Columbia’s Angelmaker to heat things up a little more. Now admittedly AM was a band that’s name I’ve heard float around before but never really checked out & am sorry I didn’t sooner. As even more people funneled into the venue the crowd for AM was deep so i was very intrigued to what these guys had to offset & dam was it good.
Filling up the stage with three guitarists & two vocalists, these guys had a real presence. And bringing back an era of deathcore i love (yes im old enough to have been there when it was first invented ha). Keeping things ultra brutal but adding these little touches of black metal, hip hop grooves & just down right face ripping lead these guys pretty much have everyone a young metal fan is looking for. These guys killed it & i hope to see them again soon!
https://angelmaker.bandcamp.com/album/sanctum
Now for the final event, the ungodly Suffocation. Opening the gates of hell the band smashed straight into “Thrones of Blood”. The mostpit already erupts & the crowd are in chaos & it’s only the first song! Welcome to a Suffocation show ha.
Showing that even with their 35 year carer the band still are able to write the heaviest shit ever “Seraphim Enslavement” from their newest album goes over like easy & has the crowd eating out the palm of their hands, vocalist Ricky Myers with may be having a few microphone issues but it doesn’t phase him or his monster like performance. Now it might have been a scary job replacing the iconic Frank Mullen a few years ago but Myers has filled those shoes perfectly & has made his own place within Suffocation. Tonight just shows what a charismatic frontman he is himself.
“Funeral Inception” which has one of the best breakdowns in death metal history goes down like a sledgehammer to the skull. As Myers “God forbid, God forbidden” fills the venue guitarist Charlie Errigo is headbanging like a madman as the snycopated chugging hits everyone in the chest (and most probably has broken a few ribs i’m sure). The dam was heavy.
Now the band might have given the crowd a steller setlist but as the crowd chanted SUFFOCATION! The band gives us one more with the iconic “Entrails Of You” , my personal favorite track of theirs. Tonight’s show was flawless & yet again as always proves that Suffocations are the titans of brutal death metal & will never be stopped.
https://linktr.ee/suffocationofficial
Review: Joseph Mitchell