Severe Torture - Feasting on Blood

I’ve been aware of Severe Torture for years, but I’ve never bothered to look them up. When I last saw Dying Fetus play live about two weeks ago, John Gallagher was wearing a Severe Torture shirt. I don’t know exactly why it was THAT which made me look them up once I got home, but I told myself to do that when I saw him wearing that damn shirt. Here’s the funny thing: I was really surprised at how much Severe Torture sounds like Dying Fetus! But that aside, these guys are actually really good! This is one of the best death grind bands I’ve heard since I got ahold of Exhumed’s discography. Although all of Severe Torture’s albums are great, this one has the crunchiest feel to it.

A quick summary of what Severe Torture sounds like is that they sound like Dying Fetus, but without the technicality. So that means that this is a band for when I’m in the mood for something brutal, but not ultra-technical. The overall sound of the album and production work is fairly good, but not amazing. The guitars have a really crunchy distortion, but they’re not overpowering like you would expect in brutal metal music. The bass is set on its completely raw sound and can be heard very easily since the guitars don’t cover it up. The drums sound pretty good, but I would like them to have more power. But if they had more power, it would drown out the rest of the band. So with everything as it is, the drums fit in just fine.

The bassist has his own abstract style and does quite a bit of improvising throughout the album. He’s one of those bassists that like to harmonize with the guitars instead of playing the root-note of whatever guitar chord is being played. The guitarists are what I would consider to be generic death grind guitarists that stay true to the genre and tend not to experiment a lot. In the case of Severe Torture’s sound, I would actually prefer the guitarists to have a pure and generic style because the bassist is doing enough crazy shit anyways, so the guitarists do a perfect job at making the music easy to swallow. Aside from the general sound of the music, the vocals REALLY resemble John Gallagher’s inhaled growls (at least I think they’re inhales). Like I said before, if I’m in the mood for Dying Fetus, but not technicality, Severe Torture is there to save the day!

Severe Torture is one of the better bands that I’ve discovered recently and I would highly recommend that you check them out. I would give this specific album a score of 17/20. The people that would have the easiest time enjoying this are diehard Dying Fetus fans. I’m not kidding, this band is the Fetus twin. But regardless of that, this album is great and solid in its own sense and I highly recommend that you look it up because it is amazing.