If there’s one word in the English language that Pennsylvanian mob Outer Heaven is either completely unaware of or simply have no need for, its subtlety. Whether the five-piece from Douglassville are smashing Death Metal into your guts at a thousand miles an hour, or gradually reversing over your face in a steamroller built from slow, grinding Doom, then there’s not much room for nuance or sophistication.

Formed in 2013, Realms of Eternal Decay (Relapse) is Outer Heaven’s full length debut, and they clearly don’t fancy wasting time by messing about with tentative toe-dipping, and getting to know you type bullshit; right from the start, ‘Vortex of Thought’ opens up a sack of riffs so heavy they could sink a cruise ship, with vocalist Austin Haines giving a good approximation of an angry caveman being sick into a bin liner. If that wasn’t enough, ‘What Lies Beneath’ arrives on the scene like a malfunctioning giant killer robot, smashing kittens into the ground with metronomic cruelty, while ‘Pulsating Swarm’ opens with a surprisingly melodic, doomy guitar intro before gripping you either side of the head and slowly pulling your skull apart.

Tracks like ‘Putrid Dwelling’, ‘Multicellular Savagery’ and ‘Sacrificial Evolution’ speak entirely for themselves, the band slowing to a punishing mid-paced groove for ‘Echoes From Beyond’ before loading a spin dryer with body parts and explosives for ‘Tortured Winds’. Don’t blink or you’ll miss it, but the beginning to ‘Bloodspire’ is the closest the album comes to a hummable work tune, while closer ‘Decaying Realms’, as stinkingly heavy as it is, shows signs that the band are already thinking about progression with their next album.

Backed by Ray Figueroa‘s dirty bass and Paul Chrismer‘s angriest-tantrum-ever drums, Jon Kunz and Zak Carter unleash all forms of smelly hell with their sickeningly brutal guitar violence. Yes, things might get a little repetitive in places, but don’t worry about that. Just imagine an enraged sumo wrestler slamming your head into a table for half an hour while someone chainsaws your family to death in front of you. That’s Outer Heaven being friendly.

7.5/10

GARY ALCOCK