Review: Consumption “Recursive Definitions of Suppuration” [Iron, Blood and Death Corporation]

The brand new Swedish duet Consumption this September has released their debut album “Recursive Definitions of Suppuration” through the Mexican extreme label Iron, Blood and Death Corporation, presenting the old school death metal in the spirit of their favorite band Carcass – melodic and strong death metal straight from the 90s.

This project is the brainchild of multi-instrumentalist Håkan Stuvemark, famous for his works with a huge bunch of extreme metal bands (and the most notable from that list is Wombbath). And he invited the experienced drummer Jon Skäre to complete his band to a new level. Of course, they still pay homage to old school death metal in other projects as well, but Consumption was created like a symbol to their true love for the inimitable Carcass, the influence of these British melodic death metal pioneers on this album is undoubtable.

It should be noted, that quality of the sound is far from perfect, and that’s not the point of deliberate dirtying for rawer and shabbier effect to be closer to the golden era of death of the 90s. But it’s not that bad to be messed up within a noisy cacophony. Generally “Recursive Definitions of Suppuration” is rather minimalistic and not at all pretentious, although the song “Splenium Corporis Callosi” has a technical guitar solo, rather fitted for technical death metal. The low-tuned sound and primitive guitar riffs are the core of the spirit of this release, making impact on the whole atmosphere and the mood of the songs. The songs have a different pace, usually they start up more slowly (like “Suppuration” and “Rigor Mortis”), and then speed up to a solid death/thrash rhythm, full of furious energy. The melodic parts can be found widely throughout this record, but there are some songs, that are more melodic and soft, and then the old school death metal transforms into classic MDM (like “Consumption”). There are some strange passages on this record, revealing the echoes of tumultuous disharmony (the songs “Fermented Tissue” and “Fragmentum”), but they are too short to demonstrate an avant-garde character. And one more interesting statement from Consumption is two-voiced performance, Håkan uses various extreme vocal techniques, preferring screaming, and this alternation makes the music more variegated, energetic and emotionally generous.

Death metal genre is not yet dead after 30 years of existence, the bands like Consumption are the living reminder of it, there are still dozens of young bands on the scene, preferring the old school death metal. Surely, these Swedes don’t play an innovative or unique material, but this release isn’t performed just technically or bluntly, it is obvious, that they live through this music wholeheartedly.

Release date: September 15th, 2020

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