Now available as a gorgeous gatefold LP from Enucleation, with David D'Andrea's ghoulish psychedelic artwork looking massive in this larger format.

A devestating split album of extreme deathsludge that features three new songs from Tokyo's lords of atavistic death metal Coffins and four from the Cali quartet The Arm And Sword Of A Bastard God. As far as the music goes, I'll be very surprised if any underground death metal fans out there haven't heard Coffins yet. When it comes to crushingly slow, sludgy death metal, I don't think there's a heavier band on the planet. The Japanese death metallers have been sticking to their primitive, Hellhammer/Frost/Winter inspired deathsludge with virtually zero variation in sound or style, and they pull their brand of grimy, vomitous heaviness off so perfectly that I cringe at the idea of these dudes trying to mess with ther sound. The three tracks on their

half of this album are so fucking heavy I can barely take it. Opener "Mortification To Ruin" is a subsonic sludge assault strafed by sickening psychedelic blues leads. "Decapitated Crawl" drops a megaton heavy neanderthal groove that is so mindlessly crushing that when the band suddenly switches into an upbeat, punky verse, it's like they just kicked you in yer sternum. Some KILLER zonked out soloing is spewed in this one too. At the onset, "Bonesaver" suggests the most rocking jam that I've heard from these guys, and then it finally dawns on me that I'm listening to a Pungent Stench cover. Ugh. Is Coffins my favorite death metal band? Quite possibly.

So who are The Arm And Sword Of A Bastard God, and how can they possibly match up to the diseased bulldozer power of Coffins? Gotta trust in 20 Buck Spin boss Dave, 'cuz whoever these guys are, they are RIDICULOUSLY heavy. Christ, their singer Tim has one of the most over-the-top brutal and pissed off death roars this side of, I dunno, Barney Greenway maybe? What the fuck. These four jams ("Annex Wasteland", "Giant Invisible Liar", "Storm The Throne", "Shit Life") come from the same slow-mo, bile and blood encrusted death sludge realm as Coffins, so fans of the one will surely jizz o'er the over, but TAASOABG bring an unhealthy level of swampy boogie to the show, and by the time "Giant Invisible Liar" starts to bash me over the head with it's grimy riffing, I'm reminded of what Grave At Sea mighta sounded like if they had been consuming Autopsy and early Entombed cassettes on a daily basis. Extra points go to these guys for a nice and warty recording that seems to leave every string-squeak, mouth vomit, and broken drumstick intact. Fucking skullcrushing. Did I mention how badass D'Andrea's artwork is on this? Amazing and creepy psychedelic illustrations of skeletal death angels and bird totems that amp up the weirdness on this killer split.