Record Reviews

Album review: Open Surgery “Post Mortem Mutilation”

Open Surgery gives us Florida-inspired old-school Swedish death metal on its second stench-filled album. 

Death metal band Open Surgery, founded in a small countryside town in Sweden in 2012, released its first full-length studio album, “Experiments of Excessive Torture”, in 2013. The band is now back with its second full-length album, “Post Mortem Mutilation”.

This is beautiful, damp chaos in musical form. It is basement music full of stench and ill winds. Open Surgery plays gloriously old-school, underground death metal. This album takes me back to the early 1990s and how the death metal scene used to be before it achieved some mainstream popularity and some bands suddenly got proper record deals with big international companies. Some of the scene’s DIY feeling disappeared there and then. But Open Surgery brings back some of the old feeling with this great release.

This is not music for the fainthearted or people who like their music clean and clear. But if you are into not-so-melodic, old school underground Swedish death metal, you are likely to dig this. There is nothing fancy about this and that is why this is good. It’s not trendy, it’s not overly complicated, there is no hidden agenda or people pretending to be cool. It’s just very good death metal by a bunch of Swedes who know their death metal history.

The band’s music lives within the borders of the old-school death metal world. But within those borders, there is quite a bit of variation on this album, especially when it comes to tempo changes and some fine guitar work. The band says that they are influenced by the old Florida death metal like Morbid Angel, Deicide and Obituary and that can certainly be heard on this album.

While Open Surgery is a relatively new band, its members have been active within the scene for years and have played with bands such as Intestinal, Suicidal Seduction and Aktiv Dödshjälp.

In December you can catch Open Surgery live at the Black Christmass festival in Sweden where they will support bands such as Bloodbath, Marduk, Unleashed, The Haunted, 1349, Firespawn, and many more.

Open Surgery’s album, “Post Mortem Mutilation” is out now on BVR Records.

Open Surgery – band members

Daniel Persson – vocals and guitar

Terje Nevestveit – guitar

Erik Johansson – bass

Apollo Andersson – drums

www.facebook.com/opensurgery

www.bvrrecords.com