Hey there, tech fiends. It's that time of the week again. Before we dive into today's focus, here's the usual weekly reminder that if you're looking for even more sick bands to hear, all prior editions of this series can be perused here.
When it comes to super-niche stuff like technical death metal, it can be hard a lot of times to get a good handle on how well-known a release or band is among fans of the style as a whole. That's a big part of why I try to cover a lot of things people may not know or take a guess that could be the guess. Inoculation is a good example of that I suppose, the Cleveland, Ohio trio has been around since 2011 and really started to turn some heads with their 2018 debut album, Pure Cosmic Dread. Although I didn’t get around to covering it, I made sure to cover their 2019 EP, Anatomize, and loved their single song on the 2020 split release they did with Replicant, Astral Tomb, And Cryptic Shift.
A mere week ago the group dropped what I consider to be a truly fucking impressive sophomore album aptly titled Celestial Putridity through Maggot Stomp Records. If you’re new to Inoculation, the group plays an oddball form of old-school death metal-inspired tech-death. The way this is achieved, as I’ve touched on before, definitely feels like a best of both worlds kind of deal. Outside of Diskord, there really isn’t that much else out there you could rightly compare Inoculation's approach to and that’s a huge part of why I adore this album.
Clocking in at a tight 34 minutes long run time split between a short intro and nine full tracks, this album rips from start to finish with absolutely zero filler. Savage and frenetic instrumental and vocal performances from the trio aside, a definitively evil and otherworldly vibe courses throughout this release in a manner that just deepens my need to hit play again after it ends.
The group’s self-described sound for this album is dubbed as “alien caveman shit” and that sort of oddball absurdity is 100% fitting when it comes to who Celestial Putridity should appeal to. Additional props go to their go-to lyrical themes as listed on Metal-Archives which are “Aliens, Ancient Aliens, Satan, Occult”, although I might just be easily amused to be fair since that's typical metal lyrical fare. There’s something to be said for making something old sound new, and Inoculation does that better than almost anyone on their new album. So be sure to check out Celestial Putridity below through a Bandcamp Embed if you haven’t checked it out yet and orders can be placed here. You can follow the group over on the Inoculation Facebook Page.
