apanthropy

Slaughtercult
Devoured by Perversion
Vicious Instinct Records
Released: September 24th, 2026

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1 – Birthing Ceremony
2 – Repulsed by Your Haggard Appearance
3 – Perverse Bestial Lactation
4 – Horrible Cunt
5 – Menstrual Marinade
6 – Steeping in Fungal Discharge
7 – Pools of Bile
8 – Intravenous Acuphagia
9 – Strong Poison
10 – Molotov Cock-Tease
11 – Soft Foetal Malformation
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“The slam and the grind trade the scalpel for the hammer, depending less on technical flash and more on raw physical power, overwhelming the soundspace with primitive violent madness, and creating a nexus of punishing riffs that offer literally no peace and no relief.”

Over the years, based on various perspectives and interpretations from around the world, brutal death metal has evolved into something that encompasses a broad range of sound. As a catch-all term, it just doesn’t have the same direct connotation that it used to possess. This is an important point, as calling Slaughtercult a ‘brutal death metal’ band falls entirely short of what they’re actually producing. Their new sophomore effort, Devoured by Perversion, due out September 24th, 2026, through Vicious Instinct Records, is an unmerciful torture session, taking a basic thesis statement of brutal death metal and interspersing elements of modern grind and slam, executing it in a hostile and direct manner – 11 songs in 31 minutes – and shirking technical surgical precision for hammer-to-skull primitiveness.

The Australian scene is broad, that’s common knowledge. Their approach to death metal has, historically, always been unpleasant. The obvious names are Slaughterlord and Sadistik Exekution, having established the island nation’s music lineage decades ago. Early acts such as Armoured Angel and Hobbs’ Angel of Death became respected names in the 1980’s underground, becoming international names despite the isolation from the rest of the world. While the genre evolved and death metal spread, its intensity expanded into multiple offshoots, taking ancient influences and mixing them with new and interesting feats of distorted destruction. Some schools of thought led to bands like StarGazer and Portal, others led to acts like Psycroptic. The poles between the brutality were vast and the space between them was a warzone of sound.

Slaughtercult represent the new class of brutal death metal. The band performs as a trio – Jeremy McLoughlin, Sean Cartwright, and Matthew Newling – and took total artistic control over Devoured by Perversion, effectively recording and producing the record themselves. Having been established in 2022, the band’s output has been steady from the onset, striking first with the Skinless in Seattle EP the same year as their inception. Meat Head, the band’s debut full-length, reared its ugly head late in 2023, and helped establish their presence both nationally and internationally. Expanding that presence is the menace of Devoured by Perversion, which is certainly going to turn some heads. Or sever them completely.

The question being asked is simple: how violently can you deliver a riff against the listener, and how quickly can you move to the next one without losing control of the song?

This isn’t just about technical capabilities and musician mechanics; there is also the element of composition and songwriting. Too many times, tracks descend into distorted walls of sound with no real directive other than wanton violence, creating songs that possess a kind of interchangeability with one another. Slaughtercult possess a strangling grip on song design, composition, and delivery. This is brutal death metal with clear directions and horrifyingly visceral execution, the type of forward movement that treads over everything in its path, each song possessing unique structural characteristics that keep them genuinely unique.

‘Birthing Ceremony’ is, essentially, a hammer strike. Opening the record with no introduction, no build-up, no lead-in; straight into riffs and machine-gun drumming. The first thing that draws attention is the absolutely monstrous tone, clean and dynamic, but possessing a maximal distorted crunch, something along the lines of Mortician; that sewage churning, gut rumbling, obscene tonality. The point of intersection between the instruments is another immediate notice, it doesn’t feel like ‘riffs + blast beats,’ it has a deeply rhythmic quality to it that invokes the early works of Suffocation. The track possesses riff crafting that is fluid, it’s not just a pile of riffs stacked end to end for a few minutes at a time. Palm-muted chords sound menacing, the chugging feels enormous, and when the drums reach full speed and accompany grinding tremolo phrases, it creates a full tsunami of aural filth.

‘Repulsed by Your Haggard Appearance’ confirms the fact that Devoured by Perversion is, indeed, a trench warfare record. Slam elements begin to show themselves more frequently now, creating moments of neck-snapping groove. In contrast are phrases of intensely fast grind, creating a constant ‘choke and release’ feel over the course of the song, invoking an atmosphere of homicide most often reserved for bands such as Fluids or Disgorge.

Marvin Ruiz of Devourment makes an appearance on the rhythm-intensive torment of ‘Perverse Bestial Lactation,’ which captures the essence of slam the Texas-based band has become legendary for. Riffs explode in constant states of agonizing speed and half-time breaks, with each transition becoming a painful jolt. Trumpeting slow chords build an atmosphere which plays host to a ripping reverb-drenched solo that guides the song into finality.

Elfi of Norwegian gore merchants Kraanium makes a guest appearance on the unpleasantly named ‘Menstrual Marinade,’ a track which explores a more mid-tempo approach, working with wide-sounding riffs and tight clusters of palm-muted terror, eventually picking up in groove later in the track. This is the apex of slam elements at work on Devoured by Perversion.

Going deeper into the bowels of the record reveals choice cuts like ‘Intravenous Acuphagia,’ a stomping blend of mosh riffs and blasting sodomy. ‘Strong Poison’ keeps things interesting late into the experience, blending some of the most high-speed percussive patterns with sheer glacial-paced chugging that possesses so much body and immaculate dynamics that it should be considered a lesson for every new-school brutal death metal band.

The final knife thrusts come in the form of the slam-intensive songs ‘Molotov Cock-Tease’ and album closer ‘Soft Foetal Malformation,’ the closer being a particularly nasty bout of ominous atmosphere. These bouts of gore close the circle, cinching the noose, finishing an experience of an album that has no points of refuge whatsoever.

Slaughtercult show how contemporary brutal death metal bands have inherited, refined, and redefined the very concept of old-school extremity. A stylistic yet narrow vocabulary being used in manners that show compositional variation, the concept of gore as aesthetic, and a tone and phrasing that bears immense low-end physicality creates this end sum that is an abominable mass of unpleasant noise and presence. The slam and the grind trade the scalpel for the hammer, depending less on technical flash and more on raw physical power, overwhelming the soundspace with primitive violent madness, and creating a nexus of punishing riffs that offer literally no peace and no relief. As a creative trio, the band has more presence and feel than line-ups double the size. Devoured by Perversion is a total creative creation, from songwriting to audio production, showing a band that is completely engaged and will serve as a substantial point of interest both in the band’s discography and in the context of the global scene as a whole.

Label: Vicious Instinct Records
Band: Slaughtercult

AJK