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UNHOLY SWARM
Exterminator EP

Head2Wall (2024)
Rating: 7/10

With a contender for cover artwork of the year, Columbus, Ohio-based thrashers Unholy Swarm unleashes its new EP, Exterminator. I’m not at all familiar with the band but I immediately latched onto this release when I heard the snarling grind of ‘Machine’. The band successfully fuses hardcore with a blackened sort of thrash, the result being quite a vicious but varied mix of spiky death n’ thrash that spits like Vektor although with less technicality.

There are hints also of Venom and Motörhead, as anyone would expect from a band following this path. In turn, there is a dash of Midnight and the more obscure Deadyn too in those rawer moments, but the real quality here are those catchy, well soiled mid-tempo tracks; ‘Exterminator’ and ‘Axe And Block’ really stand out as steady yet punk flavoured joggers.

‘Give Me Blood’ is driven by its hard bass and drum where again there is the punk spine before the nasty riff and vocal slurp is injected, while ‘Ultimate Sin’ is far more thrashy, kicking fast in its drum as the axe work sizzles with an oxidized fury. Nice melody does flicker into the equation, the band slowing to a doomy hardcore traipse as the vocal tones become more abrasive.

There are eight tracks on offer here, all served up like injections of oil into the veins. Unholy Swarm are quite the lethal dose.

Neil Arnold

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