Gout - Actual Bastard - Metal Epidemic

Gout – Actual Bastard (EP)
Release Date: 17th April 2026
Label: Self Released
Bandcamp
Genre: Doom, Sludge, Noise Rock, Hardcore.
FFO: Portrayal of Guilt, Chat Pile, Crowbar, Thou.
Review By: Mark Young

What’s in a name?

Well, as names go, I think they have picked one that lines up with the music behind it. Gout are not easy listening by any stretch of the imagination, Its harsh, uncompromising with a lyrical build and vocal performance to match.

Inmate starts with one foot on your throat and keeps it there, with the repeated exclamation of ‘won’t somebody let me out’ painful to listen to, it feels like we are listening to a break-down in real time. It’s the kind of song you don’t forget in a hurry.

Too Bleak takes a different route but is no less bleak. It’s built around that super tight vocal delivery that just rides over everything in front of it. Each of the songs are wound up so much you can only imagine the level of destruction Gout would cause live. It’s the way that they are built – I Am a Beacon of Health and Wellbeing stomps forward, with its throat shredding performance and industrial tinge whilst Junk Sick is almost light by comparison. Until it isn’t and the darkness drops in.

Lyrically, they are all devastating in their own way, especially Tarmac. It’s something else and if there is any justice more people should hear this, because it combines an emotional punch with an incredibly heavy build around it. It’s unique in its sound, unique to them, and I’ll say it right now its one of the most original things you will hear this year. This is emotions laid bare for all to see, nothing hidden, completely open.

It’s the sort of thing that you will either love or hate, I don’t see a middle ground with them. But they are the sort of band that once you have heard them, you know that you have heard something different. Give them the opportunity to bend your ears, you may find something to love.