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There are a lot of new records that come out every week, especially as the internet and advanced home recording techniques allow bands to produce studio-quality recordings more easily. As such, albums can go under one’s radar pretty easily; sometimes, we return to those records for a second look, like Blood Monolith’s debut album, The Calling of Fire.
The 27-minute album is the first from the Washington, D.C. based quartet and it immediately establishes Blood Monolith as a band to watch. Formed in 2023 by Shelby Lermo (Ulthar, ex-Vastum) and guitarist Tommy Wall (Undeath), they recruited drummer Nadia Tydings-Lynch (Goetia, Deliriant Nerve) and bassist Nolan (Genocide Pact) to round things out. Blood Monolith are cut from a pure death metal cloth, taking the framework laid out by Cannibal Corpse, Suffocation, Deicide and their ilk and injecting as much high-octane fuel as humanly possible.
That’s not to say that Blood Monolith play technical death metal. Though the music is, in fact, very technically demanding (just listen to Tydings-Lynch play the drums for more than six second or the guitar intro to “Slaughter Garden”), the D.C. quartet keep things a little too tight to engage in technical virtuosity for the sake of it. The Calling of Fire throws out riff after riff, keeping things going at a Slayer-like pace; despite this fact, Blood Monolith maintain control over their songs and the album stays on the rails.
As far as debut albums go, The Calling of Fire is one that should put Blood Monolith on the map for any death metal fan. It’s out now on Profound Lore, so you can listen to it below.
The post You Should Listen to Blood Monolith appeared first on Decibel Magazine.
