Slimelord – Chytridiomycosis Relinquished (Review)

This is the debut album from UK death/doom metal band Slimelord.

Chytridiomycosis Relinquished comes to us from current/ex-members of Cryptic Shift and Horrified, which should bode well for Slimelord. This coupled with the promo stating that this is for fans of Disembowelment, Immolation, Gojira, Morbid Angel, Voidceremony, Tomb Mold, Edge of
Sanity, and Morbus Chron, made me quite intrigued to check out Chytridiomycosis Relinquished, as that’s quite the mix.

Slimelord’s vomited offering consists of seven tracks across 48 minutes, and conceals the sort of hideously mutated death metal monstrosity that’s rarely encountered in the wild. The band discharge a textured ejection of filth, one that they shape into terrible and foul sonic utterances that just have to be experienced.

While Slimelord’s sound definitely belongs to the cavernous, old-school death/doom sewer, it’s also a characterful interpretation of this. The band’s music is much more individual in nature, bringing that old-school sound together with elements of the progressive and dissonant styles to create something greater than the sum of its festering parts.

The core of Chytridiomycosis Relinquished is familiar, but corrupted, and rendered in a gross tapestry of intimately filth. Disgusting grooves swamp you with horror, while thick gruesome blast beats cover you in fetid offal. The entire thing is drenched in a cloying stench of decay that gets right into every orifice. There’s an old-school death and doom metal heart that beats feverishly at the grim centre of Slimelord.

As if this wasn’t enough though, we also have yet further forms of nightmares that inhabit this ripe corpse of a record. What further drives Slimelord’s ancient and atavistic death/doom apart from that of many of their decrepit peers is their ability to incorporate other layers of malevolent depth to their abyssal hymns. Serrated spikes of hateful dissonance writhe through the murk like streaks of sentient metallic darkness, while malignant melodies hunt like otherworldly predators hungry for meat. Amidst this lie progressive explorations that are just waiting to carve open the world, opening the door for unspeakable terrors that lurk the other side of reality’s thin veil. It’s enough to make you recoil in abject dread and revulsion, while simultaneously being enraptured by its unholy unlight.

Chytridiomycosis Relinquished sounds out of this world, in more ways than one. Slimelord have revealed themselves in all of their profane splendour to be a real force to be reckoned with.

Essential listening.