Gosudar/Malignant Altar – Split
Release Date: 16th December 2022
Label: ME SACO UN OJO/ROTTED LIFE RECORDS
Bandcamp
Genre: Death Metal
FFO: Phobophilic, Worm, Undeath.
Review By: Jason James
Deciding to pool their resources with two tracks each, Gosudar and Malignant Altar get set to release Split on December 16th.
The two bands reach across the political wasteland that is a number of the developed countries in the world today to bring us this offering, just in time for the celebrations of the holiday period. Gosudar is from Russia, whereas Malignant Altar hail from the good old US of A, the traditional world superpower enemies of the Cold War era.
Here, the bands bring their own specific brands of destruction and mayhem, sonically rolling across pockmarked, ruined no man’s land like an encroaching army. These bands make the kind of music that wouldn’t sound out of place accompanying movie scenes of tank tracks rolling over human skeletons, followed by row upon row of faceless soldiers all marching in unison.
The styles of the two bands are very similar, and it is plain to see why they decided to team up for this LP/EP. Both bands make that slow, heavy, ‘creeping sense of doom’ type of music, the only slight difference being that Malignant Altar incorporate some blastbeats into their sound, marking it out as a little more urgent than its Russian counterpart’s sound.
There is absolutely no let up in the hopelessness and gloominess on show here, and it is made all the more foreboding being released at the same time as the pop charts are once again filling to the brim with jolly Christmas songs from the last 60-70 years or so. This album serves as an antidote to all the saccharine sweetness of these holiday standards, a solemn rectifier, peeling back the layers of the glossy, polished behemoth that is Christmas.
My only criticism of this release is that it is too short. I could have easily listened to a full album from each of these bands, but this release will definitely be added to my library for me to blast after stuffing my face this holiday season.
(3.5 / 5)
Splits are meant to be shorter!