Primal Scourge – End of Eden
Release Date: 14th November 2025
Label: Iron Fortress Records
Bandcamp
Genre: Death Metal, Death/Doom Metal, Old School Death Metal.
FFO: Sanguisugabogg, Frozen Soul, Tribal Gaze, 200 Stab Wounds, Spectral Voice, Temple of Void.
Review By: Rick Farley
Knoxville, Tennessee death/doom duo Primal Scourge are releasing the apocalyptic soundtrack to a collapsing world, content on eating itself from the inside out. End of Eden is the bands striking debut, being released November 14th, 2025, via Iron Fortress Records. A brutal surge of colossal death metal dripping with raw sewage and doomy atmosphere.
End of Eden carries the weight of the cosmos within its nine tracks, it’s ungodly heavy with a decaying airiness that’s full of filth soaked musical savagery. Its atmosphere is suffocating, twisted and full of loose chaos yet remains controlled through crushing riffs and lethal percussive precision. There’s a horror/fantasy vibe throughout that gives the album additional bleakness outside of its already ominous soundscape. Everything combined comes together in what sounds like a leviathan of rein, it’s so massive in feel, it becomes hard to describe in mere words. Just saying monstrous or cosmically immense doesn’t do it justice. I felt every bit of this record’s pace and it’s crushing heaviness. The guitars twist and churn with chunky hooks and jagged melodies, all backed with a ten ton rhythm section that’s either forcing you to move your body violently or beating you mercilessly with its spastic switches in tempo. Each with the sole purpose of consuming everything nearby. This is nasty pit music for people who enjoy assaulting others under the legal authority of death metal. Sign me up.
Abyssal Imprisonment kicks things off exactly as its title suggests. Wickedly oppressive twisty riffs, build into a nasty groove full of brutish, low toned gutturals. Blast beats and tempo changes intensify the suffocating feel of the track. A slinky bass line leads to a creepy, tribal, atmospheric outro that feels alienlike. A perfect introduction to the otherworldly swampiness to come.
The chugginess and groove of Morbid Gestation combined with its gloomy sections is just a small taste of everything this album offers. Bits of hardcore influence in the riffs and vocals occasionally peek around the corner, just to remind you that this record will smash your face at any moment with a cruel slab of hook filled heft. There’s also plenty of spacey, eerie atmospheric elements that enhance the feeling of desolation. One fitting example is the beginning of Visceral Crown. It starts with the sounds of clean guitars that are on the verge of being deformed. The more the track proceeds, the more the guitars sound warped until it fully explodes into its distorted brutality. Altars of Eclipse is another example of the album’s spacey elements. It’s insanely heavy for the entirety of the track, but half of it is slow, doomy, and crawling while the other half is a train wreck of chaotic pace.
End of Eden was recorded, mixed, and mastered by Dalton Skinner at Anchor Sound. The record sounds like it’s going to reach straight out of the speakers and crush your skull with its heaving grasp. It’s heavy as fuck, grimy, dizzying and cleverly rich in warmth. The records clarity invites you in despite its world ending tones and dynamics. For a death/doom record this beastly, the production is top-notch. The sick cover art was done by Adam Burke and just another reason to check this out.
Primal Scourge’s Austin Asmus (guitars, bass, vocals) and Rio Mariucci (drums, vocals) both longtime collaborators sharing a musical history, brings a carefully thought out approach to old school death metal that feels both reverent as well as modern.
Dense, knuckle dragging riffs, gargantuan looming depth and primal gutturals are all present but presented in a way that gives the band away as extremely skilled songwriters. This is far more than just brutal, catchy riffs, destructive blast beats, and ominous, cosmic atmosphere, this is a living breathing organism that’s ten times the size of your puny existence. If you want to wield the power of a prodigious, sentient being, If I were you, I would start with this. End of Eden is an easy recommend.
(4 / 5)
