Album review: Sanguisugabogg – Hideous Aftermath

If you’ve ever wondered what it sounds like when a band of grubby miscreants decide to evolve from caveman death metal to murderous death metal, then Hideous Aftermath is your answer. The third album from Sanguisugabogg is covered in blood, bile and bass, and moves the band into a more assured territory.

The Ohio quartet might still be the reigning champions of unreadable logos and inappropriate song titles, but they have taken a surprisingly mature turn here. That is, in the same way Frankenstein’s monster was mature once he learned fire safety. With Kurt Ballou of Converge steering the sonic bloodbath at God City Studios, the ’Bogg sound tighter, meaner, and, yes, horrifyingly professional. Devin Swank and co. have finally let an actual bass guitar rumble beneath their riff-rot, and the result hits harder than a hammer to the sternum.

From the opening blast of Rotted Entanglement, a track that feels like it is being fed through a meat grinder with rhythm, to the gloriously ghastly Felony Abuse Of A Corpse, this album is equal parts disgusting and devastating. Later on, Semi-Automatic Facial Reconstruction, bolstered by Cattle Decapitation’s Travis Ryan, is pure sonic sadism with blastbeats so demonic, they sound like they’ve come directly from the arsecheeks of Satan after a vindaloo, and that’s not to be taken as a negative. Elsewhere, Erotic Beheading somehow manages to be both catchy and deeply upsetting, almost like a love song, if you squint whilst gritting your teeth.

The album’s bruised centrepiece, Repulsive Demise Extended Version, drags Sanguisugabogg into industrial, Godflesh-esque territory, as it transforms into this bleak, thudding experiment that works. It’s the sound of a band sharpening their knives instead of just swinging them wildly.

The band have claimed that this is their ‘most personal record to date’. Maybe so, but it’s also their most putrid, powerful and perversely listenable. Hideous Aftermath proves that Sanguisugabogg can grow up without cleaning up.

Verdict: 3/5

For Fans of: Godflesh, Cattle Decapitation, Cannibal Corpse

Hideous Aftermath is out now via Century Media

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• Knocked Loose: “Sacrificing heaviness was never an option… As this band grows, it only gets more uncomfortable and extreme”
• Sanguisugabogg: “Death metal doesn’t play into political agendas. It’s the anti-norm”
• The Callous Daoboys: “I’m not interested in art that goes down easily. I’m trying to make something that I would find challenging”