Gruesome Stuff Relish, Sempiternal Death Grind

Gurgling growls, belching snarls, sound bytes, pitch-shifting, crusty grind?… it must be Spain’s Gruesome Stuff Relish (GSR from here on out). The band’s latest slab of zombie-obsessed, entrail-splattering grind is the twelve song Sempiternal Death Grind, their third full-length. Throughout the 35+ minutes, you’ll be treated to the slobbering sounds of hungry zombies, barbaric bludgeonings and what can only be described as a band having way too damn much fun.

Embracing their Carcass-worship to the fullest, these Spanish grinding bastards attack the cranium with a rusty cleaver in the form of single-minded gore-grind that is sure to leave a maniacal grin on your face, complete with little crusty bits of rotting flesh at the corners of your mouth and in between your teeth. The music on Sempiternal Death Grind isn’t just a rehashing of past material — it’s got a much more malignant and darker overall tone. This is the type of shit you want to hear emanating from your surround sound speakers as a classic horror flick stains your TV screen.

Opening track, “A Date with Fulci,” is a reference to legendary horror film master Lucio Fulci, including movie sound bytes from a few of his films. The song is everything you want from GSR — vicious, snarling vocals, pile-driving drums and a wall of buzzing guitars (think Entombed) accompanied by dive-bombing leads. Like the rest of the eleven songs it’s chock full of gore, groove and guts. “Desecrated” keeps the groove flowing like fetid liquids from the rotting bowels of the walking dead as guttural utterances fill the air. “S.O.S” gets on the weird side with some pitch-shifted vocals and a much slower, deliberate pace.

The awesomely titled “Deadilicious Feast” kicks ass with an up-tempo attack and all out fervor of cannibalistic feasting. Zombie themed tracks like the unrelenting “They Are the Plague,” the sample fueled “They Follow Your Scent” and the stellar “Became a Zombie” serve up some decent grind while “Sex, Drugs & Grind” stomps your teeth in with a vicious delivery and vomitous sounding vocals. Album closer “Scratching the Violet Velvet” is a bit less grindy, but still serves as a decent end to another badass album from Gruesome Stuff Relish.

All in all, Sempiternal Death Grind is exactly what you expect from these guys. It’s a cracked cranium full of festering innards, rotting flesh and good, not-so-clean fun.