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GARGANTUAN
Age Ov The Coffin

Self-released (2025)
Rating: 7.5/10

That’s an eye-catching album cover, this being the second full-length from Springfield, Illinois based act Gargantuan. These guys have been dishing out blackened death metal since 2018 and this new effort is quite the tirade. For 60 minutes the audience is swept up by a truly chaotic storm consisting of 15 tracks, most of which are not only violent but quite short, resulting in an album that feels a lot more concise than it actually is.

Only occasionally do tracks veer into accessible mid-paced drudgery (i.e. ‘Flesh To Dust’), but the key here to the band’s gnarly sound is the guitar tone delivered by the one and only Nihilus. There’s a rough black metal vibe alongside a punky nature to each hostile link, in turn the vocals are like a spouting furnace although I’m not quite sure which of the four members is responsible for such belching, but maybe it’s the guy named Maelbolgia who is also behind the “noises and samples”. Whatever the case, he, alongside Nihilus and fellow madmen Doomass (bass) and Count Cogliostro (drums) make one hell of a cacophony.

Age Ov The Coffin isn’t the prettiest thing you’ll experience and upon initial listen it’s quite the barbaric tirade, almost tyrannical in its lethal aggression. Sandwiched in-between the multitude of shorter blasts there exists ‘Fed To The Ravens’, a snarling slow builder with fuzz drenched doomy guitar leading to eventual horror as the vocals erupt like a demonic outburst.

The album is both raw and primitive and has its grubby, clawed hands in the death and black metal pies alongside a key to the kingdom of sludge as ‘Doom Philosophy’ oozes to the chime of a churchyard bell. ‘Brutaliate’ boasts a thick layer of filthy crust as the vocals literally poked forth through the rank haze of soupy fog.

I certainly found it easier and less soul destroying by dipping into tracks even though I’m sure the band expects the listener to be in it for the long haul. However, by dipping in and cherry picking tracks I was able to focus and in turn appreciate each song more. For example, the ear clogging rant of ‘Condemned To Live’, the foul and monstrous ‘Bakhmut’, the hammering ‘Summoned To Bludgeon’ and the colossal closer ‘Inexorable Proclamation Ov Total Conquest’, which is a vile racket dripping with blasphemy and contempt. By all means dive straight in to this nefarious experience but be warned, it hurts.

Neil Arnold

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