Churchburn: None Shall Live...The Hymns of Misery (2018)

After his departure from death metal veterans Vital Remains, guitarist Dave Suzuki helped form Churchburn, somewhat abandoning the death metal sound and going for something even darker and more malevolent.  The band sounds quite a bit different, but the animosity towards religion is definitely still there, based on the band's name alone.

Churchburn is much more of a sludge/doom metal band, but this is not the kind of almost rock-ish, radio-friendly sludge played by groups like Baroness and Mastodon.  No, this is the kind of sick and demented sludge from the early days of Eyehategod and Acid Bath.  It's hateful, raw and undeniably heavy, with fuzzed-out riffs, slow-burning tempos and psychotic vocals, and there is precious little that can be remotely called pretty or melodic.

The album continues in that vein for the entire running time, only occasionally taking a breather with a less punishing moment.  For instance, the beginning of "Authorized to Cleanse" is a rare melodic moment with searing guitars, building into an extremely caustic atmospheric sound.  It also makes it the standout track on the album.  And then there is the eerie opening to "Before the Inferno", before it delves into utter madness.

This is one of the more interesting sludge metal albums I have heard in a long time.  It distances itself from what modern sludge metal has become and turns its sound back in time to the early days of the genre.  As a result, it achieves the kind of evil atmosphere that Dave Suzuki always sought in his days with Vital Remains.  This is not at all catchy or melodic, it is a blistering assault on the senses.  And it is all the better for its unrelenting aggression.