When we last heard of our New York heroes in All Out War they were still practicing a charged-up, violent brand of Metallic Hardcore on 2019’s Crawl Among the Filth. Yet it’s now 2023 and a global pandemic later and those gentlemen are again picking up that metallic mantle like it never went out of fashion on Celestial Rot (Translation Loss Records).
Then again blending hardcore and heavy metal will always be in fashion as far as I’m concerned. Just give me all the thudding double bass kicks and ignorant riffs and I’ll be as happy as the proverbial pig in shit. You know what I like. Give me albums by genre stalwarts like Hatebreed, Leeway, Slapshot, Merauder, Sworn Enemy, and Madball. The stuff that turns the dancefloor at the Palladium in Worcester Massachusetts into an active warzone.
And like all those East Coast mosh institutions mentioned above All Out War is looking to enlist as many slam-dancers and circle pit veterans as it possibly can. Let’s cut to the chase here and please understand that while most of Celestial Rot fucks, the numbers you’re certainly going to need to check out are ‘Wrath’ and ‘Caustic Abomination.’ The former for wholehearted dedication to blazing tempos and impressive work from drummer Jesse Sutherland and the latter for being a sick breakdown that decided it was a song. While on the topic of utter brutality, we must address ‘Revel in Misery’ as All Out War goes full Death Metal for nearly three minutes – while making room for a chaotic guitar solo – and now the children won’t leave their rooms.
There you have it folks. Nearly thirty minutes of blast beats, mosh parts and cracking breakdowns. If loving the unholy peanut butter and chocolate-like combination known as Metalcore is wrong, then I don’t want to be right.
Buy the album here:
8 / 10
HANS LOPEZ