Our bodies buried in shallow graves, imprints of barbaric violence and pools of moldering blood spoiling beneath clusters of carnivorous fungal bloom. — The race to globular ruination, the hottest festering point of wrathfully mushing psychedelic gore-chasmic wounding within the various, yet often meagerly varietal, underground death metal clod-kickers worldwide hardly have anything on the loudest lunging walls of sickened sweetness, the scum-guzzling refineries of mind-altering putrefaction found within the flaps and eel-like floundering of Québécois death metal quartet Sedimentum. Armed to the teeth, with teeth and bearing new traits, structures and dimensional alignment for the sake of morphology altered by an incomplete (indeterminate) protein-shunted rebuilding process (beyond a shocking bout of seemingly endless decay wherein the misery of mutation were telegraphed through the abandoned crypt-tunnels of long-dead planet eaters with fickle drill-tongued tastes) ‘Suppuration Morphogénésiaque‘ does not convey a complex form of monstrous creature bled of its living death but instead a bluntest reanimated corpse of filthiest, most furious ancient death metal’s collapse. There is no shelter here in the realm conjured and misshapen forever by their distorted lows and terrifying scrawls of shrill metallic clangor, only the bellowing of the unfortunate, lost and numbed by the realization of their own deterioration.

Everything began to collapse, organ after organ, around the time ‘Demo‘ (2019) released to widespread panicked acclaim, its brutality crossing the line in ways that combined the step beyond ‘Onward to Golgotha‘ which Funebrarum (see also: Phrenelith‘s debut) offered on their records with heavier shades of the neck-grappling grinds, weirding grooves and rotten junked-out production values courtesy of early Finnish death metal taken to an absurd, unlimited exaggeration. It was one of those instantly appealing sort of demo tapes where you could tell the band would always be meaner, uglier and more ‘real’ on their demos (see: Ossuarium, Disma), though as we heard more from their camp with the ‘Horrific Manifestations‘ Split 7″ with Phobophilic in 2020 and a second split 7″ in 2021 (this time with Total Isolation) it’d seem that horrendous wrack they were making was entirely in place by design and going in the opposite direction of accessible bands like Undeath where the riffs only seemed to get more freakishly over the top with each track dropped. The hype was exactly where it should be, the dark and fucked up gnarls of the ‘underground’ and this is exactly where a record like ‘Suppuration Morphogénésiaque‘ will be best appreciated as a genuine article of filthiest creeping and kinda doomed death metal magick.

Although they’ve not yet shown any interest in pushing their style towards the otherworldly plateau of records like ‘Transcendence into the Peripheral‘ (see: “Supplice” and its Slugathor-esque refrains, though) the enormous rumbling terror of the sound design on Sedimentum‘s debut stomps along with similarly captivating intensity of presence, a hulking and surreal crawl-and-burst sort of record which intends to weave together a very specific combination of ‘old school’ death metal ideals while maintaining imposing sonic density. This means it’ll be a bit of an aural adjustment to be made before you’ll recognize the sort of ‘Primordial Malignity‘ and Undergang‘d grooves which root some of the better pieces on the first half of the album but, it might take some concerted listening ’til the chugs line-up in a row and insight gained will grant you the heavin’ and hoofin’ mud jog of “Excrétions Basaltiques” with any particular sense. Naturally the filth-creeper death metal ear will pick up on these elephant-level deep space baritone tuned riff shapes but part of the appeal of this album on my end was that when they’d really begin to get involved in a riff or a key moment the whole thing would splatter into surrealistic, kinda confused grinding heft. There exists plenty enough precedence for that sort of chaotic peaking mush in terms of sound design but rarely for the sake of songs worth hearing, much less repeating as is the case here.

The title track will have most sold on this record long before we’ve even truly taken our first steps into the truly lethal stages of infection available to ‘Suppuration Morphogénésiaque‘ and on my part this is for the sake of simple classicist death metal additives, such as whammy dives placed atop riff transitions or pace changes, which showcase taste rather than rote participation in ‘old school’ minded guitar mangling. The first major single from the album, “Funestes Manifestations“, is well chosen in the sense that it is readable for its main riff and offers a quick in-and-out moment at the midpoint of the album wherein we find Sedimentum shaking a leg (and probably justifying the early Tomb Mold comparisons right there) before things get decidedly doomed, heavier and most serious on the final three pieces of the album including the aforementioned “Supplice” and one of my favorite pieces on the album the ‘Necroticism‘-esque scraped yet doomed trappings of “Nécromasse”. I could earnestly ramble on about every bit of this album containing some manner of entertaining burl of explosive death noise as there really are no ‘filler’ pieces to interrupt their flow and, well, only a few truly memorable pieces to start but this is more an experience of captivity, one to experience in a row and uninterrupted.

A ~forty minute ‘old school’ styled death metal album with an extreme, over the top rhythmic push and plenty of gnarly riff ideas to thunder about with has a special place reserved in the hellscape of my mind already, this is certainly one of the more stylized and instantly appealing events of late and it certainly helps that there is an especially representative Brad Moore painting on the cover. In terms of what folks can expect beyond the demo tapes who’re wondering if they lost that crazed, raw edged sound I’d say they’ve kept serious parity in mind while also finding balance enough that it isn’t going to cause a migraine each time you crank it to ten. A very high recommendation.

ARTIST:	SEDIMENTUM
TITLE:	Suppuration Morphogénésiaque
LABEL(S):	Memento Mori, Me Saco Un Ojo Records
RELEASE DATE:	July 25th, 2022

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