It’s hard to believe Michigan’s melodic death metal masters The Black Dahlia Murder have been around for almost two decades into their career and are truly one of the hardest working bands in the extreme metal world. As someone who’s followed them since the days of Nocturnal, I have enjoyed every album they’ve made and became my favorite band in the world of death metal. Three years later, we have the brand new album titled Verminous as the follow-up to 2017’s Nightbringers which took the world by storm with many fans appreciating the band’s evolution to keep striving and pushing the boundaries to do what they do best.
Nine album’s later, they’ve incorporated their influences from Swedish death metal bands but still retaining that traditional melodic death metal approach we all know and love throughout the band’s discography. Musically, lyrically and atmospherically they have once again proved themselves, combining the black metal- esque shrieks to guttural sounding deep growls from vocalist and songwriter Trevor Strnad, amazingly written lyrical themes cross the empathizes onto boundaries that past albums couldn’t touch and offering ten tracks which symbolized the band’s aggressive, emotional and well driven material they’ve ever put out since 2007’s Nocturnal which is among many fan’s favorite in the catalog.
Verminous brings the amounts of horror-influenced death metal and relentless signature sound of a potent blend of black metal and even some grind, these results came together to form a giant leap of brutal atmosphere. Music wise, they have grown into a maturing state associating harmony guitar lines, galloping beatdowns, hellhound like drumming techniques from Alan Cassidy who’s contributions for the band unleashes his double bass signatures and organic melodies are so perfectly balanced alongside Brian Eschbach and Brandon Ellis’s mid-paced riffs, Max Lavelle’s progressively crafted bass tones and Trevor Strnad’s harmonic vocal deliveries is what makes every album standout from the rest which therefore each album is memorable, iconic, and special in its own way. In their own respective musicality, the members from The Black Dahlia Murder described Verminous is heavier, darker, aggressive and their most polished albums they’ve created in a very longtime as not only one of the most organic landmark due to the band’s highly influenced style to borrow elements of European reminiscences of Dissection as what this album strictly went forward to but from a technical and musical standpoint this album is beautifully crafted, stronger, progressive, destructive and flawlessly monstrous release that opens new representations into a onslaught of melodic death metal while borrowing Swedish death metal signatures.
As a longtime fan since Nocturnal, Verminous to me terms of musical progressions, directions and lyrical themes combining heaviness, complex, structured, intelligent and designed chemistry this created has been very well received as a band showing melodic death metal is more presentable and forevermore a field of pure passionate desirability. Verminous is another massive continuation to the band’s long-running career to bring the finest, ambitious, and cataclysmic pieces of music The Black Dahlia Murder has done to date.
Overall Score: 10/10
Review by Jake Butler
