With Patricidal Lust, San Francisco's Vastum eschew the done-to-death (if you'll pardon the pun) tropes that so many modern death metal bands are content to endlessly recycle, in favour of delivering a far more horrifying, disquieting record than any other band has dared to release. The subject matter on offer here will perturb even the most hardened fan of a genre that often seems stale and exhausted.
Featuring members of Bay Area heretics Acephalix, as well as the prolific, seemingly ubiquitous Leila Abdul-Rauf of Amber Asylum and Hammers Of Misfortune,Vastum have come to pollute your consciousness with six sickening tales of sexual abuse, abominable deviance, and mental anguish. A far more perverse proposition than its predecessor Carnal Law, it's sure to be the most uncomfortable listening experience you'll have this year.
'Libidinal Spring' drags itself forth from the speakers, the barbaric assault of the rhythm laid down by drummer Adam Perry and bassist Luca Indrio is augmented by the twisted scrape of Leila Abdul-Rauf and Kyle House's twin guitar, while vocalist Dan Butler's invocatory growls manage to distort complex couplets such as "Primal tongues twisting into futurity, incestuous split foundations of humanity" down to their brutal essence.
Vocal expulsions are split between Leila and Dan, and when her marginally more discernible, but no less abhorrent tones join the fray, it signals a foray into down-tempo battery before a demented ripper of a solo brings things back to a mid-paced stagger. If you can endure this opening track, you may just survive the rest of the record.
If you do, you'll be treated to the likes of 'Enigma Of Disgust', a repulsive, propulsive beast that alternates between a colossal gouging riff and slower passages that are more corrosive than fluoroantimonic acid, while '3AM In Agony' is probably the catchiest ode to urinary tract infections ever recorded by a west-coast death metal band.
The malevolent opening strains of 'Incel' merely hint at the devastation to come, and when the track proper comes crashing, you'll feel just as crushed and despondent as the victim of overwhelming sexual frustration inherent in the subject matter. While the pace never quite descends to funeral doom levels, it's not far off, the agonising tempo really allowing you to wallow in the misery of the track.
The title track is another mid-paced doomed-to-death exercise in delving into the darker recesses of psycho-sexual behaviour, the perfect audio and lyrical accompaniment to gazing into the eviscerated cavern of the cover art by Paolo Girardi; the combination of these elements is maddening.
Closing the album with 'Repulsive Arousal', a funereal procession that soon erupts into a vertebrae-loosening banger, it encapsulates everything that makes Patricidal Lustone of the most essential metal albums, death or otherwise, to be released this year.
The CD and digital versions of Patricidal Lust will be released on November 12th by the always excellent 20 Buck Spin, with a vinyl edition with alternate artwork to follow.
