Jos Hurley@ Slay, Glasgow
March 20, 2025| Harry Shiels |LIVE REVIEW
Live Review: Suffocation, Angelmaker, Fuming Mouth, Carcosa and Mélancolia | The Asylum, Birmingham | 05/03/2025
After the success of their last tour in 2023 supporting their newest album, tech death/deathcore/slam pioneers Suffocation are back for another round in Birmingham with a massive up-and-coming support bill packed with skull splitting brutality.
Mélancolia
It’s never an easy job to be the opener on these monster tour packages, with Aussie deathcore outfit Mélancolia having the unenviable task of opening a five band bill tonight. With an early stage time going on just ten minutes after doors, the venue is only sparsely populated as the unconventional four piece tear through cuts from their debut album HissThroughRottenTeeth. With two guitarists, a dedicated vocalist and drummer, they opt to use bass backing tracks, which at times were a touch overpowering but fortunately few and far between. Otherwise, Mélancolia were on killer form, their unique take on deathcore blending elements of melodic black metal, gothic industrial and touches of nu-metal is a real treat. Vocalist Alex Hill replicates their inhuman gurgles and roars, keeping the audience engaged with their oozing charisma and gothic style. Mélancolia have a great presence on the stage, shrugging off their discomfort and nerves at the thin crowd in attendance like seasoned pros, putting on a blistering set well worth the time of those making it down early.
Mélancolia
Carcosa
The crowd is looking a fair bit healthier as three-piece Canadian beatdown merchants Carcosa feed the hungry slam dancers aching for a chance to throw down in the pit. The set for their first ever UK shows presents cuts from across the band’s catalogue, a series of singles and EP cuts in lieu of an album proper so far in their career. Another non-traditional deathcore set up with just a guitarist, vocalist and drummer doing their thing. Unlike Mélancolia there aren’t any bass backing tracks, leaving Carcosa sounding quite thin in comparison to the rest of the bill. It is a shame as otherwise Carcosa come across as a bit one note, harkening back to the days of early MySpace beatdown deathcore. Vocalist Johnny Ciardullo has a great charisma about him, bringing self-deprecating, tongue in cheek humour and inter-band banter, joking “we’ve got about 500 more breakdowns”, acknowledging their meat and potatoes approach to relentless deathcore. It’s most likely more a matter of personal distaste as they get the crowd moving, but they felt a bit lacking compared to their peers tonight.
Fuming Mouth
Since playing their UK debut show in January 2024, crust tinged death metal rising stars Fuming Mouth have made several treks across the UK over the past 12 months or so, marking tonight as their third stop in the home of metal in the same time span. They waste little time, the caustic death metal stomp of opener The Grand Descent’s ‘Nothing To Bleed’ starting to rile up the passive crowd in the set’s opening moments. At this point in their unstoppable touring cycle Fuming Mouth’s sound is colossal, working like a well oiled machine. Another throwback to 2020 single ‘Master of Extremity’ keeps fanning the flames, the sludgy main riff inspiring some of the grouchier slam dancers to throw their weight around. The rest of the band’s half hour set is focussed squarely on 2023 breakthrough Last Day of Sun; the massive pit call intro of ‘Out of Time’ screeching from the PA with pendulous brutality, wrecking a path through the crowd. The blistering guitar work in ‘I’ll Find You’ is juxtaposed with the sludgy grooves of the bleak ‘Burial Practices’. Closing out their set, winning over some final fans with the melodic focussed ‘The Silence Beyond Life’ leaves a lasting impression and affirms Fuming Mouth’s place as one of death metal’s hottest prospects.
Angelmaker
Long before they take the stage, it is clear as day that Canadian deathcore seven piece Angelmaker have a lot of fans in the building, making their second run across the UK. The anticipation in the room is electric; ‘Duel of the Fates’ from the Star Wars score accompanies the band on stage, breaking straight into the melodic deathcore grandeur of Sanctum’s ‘Creator’s Conscience’. Self-titled fan favourite ‘Hollow Heart’ follows immediately, the opening vocal call and ensuing breakdown inspiring the large open pit space to explode in a flurry of limbs.
Saying the stage is busy would be a bit of an understatement, the seven-piece band just about squeezing themselves in. Melding equal parts melodic and tech-death into their biting modern deathcore, with plenty of breakdowns and some punishing slam moments that have the pits fighting through molasses. Angelmaker’s performance is excellent, the sound is balanced great, the two backing guitars work as this thick tonal wall for the lead to wail over without undercutting the bass which still has plenty of oomph. Drummer Steven Sanchez is a machine, pulverising the crowd with relentless percussive masochism. Their dual lead vocal lines sound demonic, vocalists Casey Tyson Pearce and Ian Bearer nailing their parts.
The set list is a good range from the band’s lengthy discography, newer monster singles ‘Relinquished’ and ‘Suffer Forever’ give a promising insight into what the band are cooking. A handful of throwback crowd pleasers are included, the dramatic ‘A Dark Omen’, 2016 split cut ‘Day/Day’ and set closer ‘Leech’ receiving a monstrous reception from the room. Even if you’re not all that fond of deathcore Angelmaker are worth your time live, if only for the spectacle before they sink their hooks in and pull you kicking and screaming into their world.
Suffocation
How much is left to say about the legendary Suffocation? Damn near forty years into their career, the oft claimed pioneers of technical death metal, deathcore still tour damn near constantly, whether supporting new releases or just going on another run. There is a dedicated core of fans squashed in down the front, roaring with glee and headbanging like maniacs as the classic cut ‘Thrones of Blood’ screams to life. However, the venue is still visibly empty, with a large gap in the crowd still providing the staging for all the pit shenanigans. Not that it matters all that much, it’s back to back ferocity and a masterclass in brutality. Recent album cuts like ‘Seraphim Enslavement’ and ‘Dim Veil Of Obscurity’ are paired with old fan favourites such as ‘Effigy of the Forgotten’ and ‘Pierced From Within’, non-stop barrages of fiendish riffs, ripping solos and pulverising breakdowns.
Ricky Myers longstanding tenure as the band’s frontman shows, wrapping the dedicated core of pit fiends in the crowd around his fingers and making them give the band all the energy they have left. Guitarist Terrance Hobbs, last founding member standing, still rips, delivering gut-punching chord chugs and blistering solos. Derek Boyer’s bass is so low to the stage that he’s effectively bombarding the room from the floor On the whole they sound sublime as expected, hammering their pioneering evisceration in music form to a tee and proving why they have accrued so much respect. If you dropped Suffocation in the post-apocalyptic future they could reconstitute the husks that remain of humanity to beat themselves to dust all over again.
Whilst it is a shame that tonight isn’t busier for the death metal masters, it makes sense when considering they ran through the UK twice last year. It is also a bit disheartening that tonight is a combination of the same sets they toured with last year to support the new album Hymns From the Apocrypha. They shake it up somewhat, switching the running order around and swapping the self-titled pull ‘Entrails of You’ in place of ‘Breeding the Spawn’. Otherwise, it’s their road tested hour and ten minutes of unrelenting forward-thinking metal bludgeoning. Not that it’s anything to turn your nose up at, Suffocation remain beloved within the metal underground for damn good reason, delivering the goods night after night. Closing with the pairing of debut album anthems ‘Liege of Inveracity’ and ‘Infecting the Crypts’ leaves those in attendance starry eyed and breathless, the constant reminder of the asphyxiating power of Suffocation.
