EP review: Open Surgery “After Birth Abortion”
Swedish death metal band Open Surgery is back with an EP that smells like a damp Florida basement in 1989. And that’s a good thing.
Open Surgery is one of our favourite Swedish death metal bands. This is a band that plays proper death metal without making it unnecessary complicated. The new EP continues along the same path as the band’s two previous full-length albums. The band formed in Finspång in rural Sweden in 2012, but its music is of the Tampa, Florida kind. On this six-track EP, the follow-up to 2016’s terrific full-length album “Post Mortem Mutilation”, Open Surgery delivers exactly what I want from them: Smelly, damp underground death metal of the best kind. This is music built on the foundation of old-school death metal. Open Surgery has stayed focused on creating fantastic death metal without adding any modern touches to it. This is death metal that could have been recorded in 1989. Love it. It is an underground Swedish response to Morbid Angel’s classic album “Altars of Madness” from, yes, 1989. Or Obituary’s debut album “Slowly We Rot”, also from 1989. Open Surgery is not merely copying its forefathers from Florida, but rather paying tribute to their groundbreaking work and creating new music based on the same musical foundation. There is nothing fancy here. No trends, no fads, nothing new. Just bloody good old-school death metal from the underground. The EP has six strong and solid tracks. “Altar of Death” is splendid while “Reduced to Broth” is my favourite among the new tracks. This is indeed terrific brutal music that will reduce you to a broth.
Open Surgery’s new EP “After Birth Abortion” will be released on 17th December via BVR Records.
