ALBUM REVIEW: Obscene Repressed – Benighted

French death metal has been at the front of most metals heads minds ever since GOJIRA blew everyone’s brains out with their fantastic Magma record and prior, alongside bands like ALCEST showing the countries creative underbelly in all it’s shining glory. Next to join the annals of French extremity history is BENIGHTED, who have been growing and building their stock to the point where it has reached critical mass, both in terms of creativity and brutality.

Obscene Repressed is the latest release from the deathgrind giants, and it immediately feels tighter than ever before. Keeping the coffin lid firmly nailed down, the death metal influence takes more of a front line position this time round, with BENIGHTED keeping moments of abject speed and aggression to punctuate the album. Nails bounces on a chorus hook before erupting with grinding sections that help give the song a seemingly undying life.

Smoke Through The Skull shows the band to still have a tongue firmly wedged into their cheek, and the buzzsaw riff that kicks the song off is amongst the best on the whole record. Following on from The Starving Beast gives the first half of Obscene Repressed to really flex its wings as far as the extreme box will let them. With vocals that bounce from guttural to more thrashy in nature, and a musical skeleton that switches from lightening riffs to more bludgeoning chugs, BENIGHTED truly have been able to boil down everything that made them such an exciting act to follow over the past 2 decades.

The feature from Jamey Jasta on Implore the Negative gives the song an added edge of brutality that is immediately brought to the table thanks to the pedigree of band Jasta has worked with, and it helps create one of the best songs on the entire record. With a bit of structure and a chorus that worms into your head, the song becomes a standout track in a sea of extremity and helps fuse the album together into a cohesive unit. With tracks like Muzzle also doing this, but adding in jazz transitions and more creative segments into the music, it just continues to show that BENIGHTED are adding more and more to their blueprint and becoming all the better for it.

In the same way that DESPISED ICON were able to truly capture the amazing benefits having grind as a supporting sound can be, BENIGHTED have been able to conjure a uniquely balanced deathgrind sound that still finds room for interesting transitions and segments that never detract from the overall impact of the record. Obscene Repressed is a diverse and deeply enjoyable record that is also the best BENIGHTED have ever sounded over two decades into their career. Crafting interesting songs that standout whilst also maintaining the classic brutality and speed that BENIGHTED are known for, Obscene Repressed also shows the band to still be taking creative risks that are calculated and pay off big time. This is a fantastic record and a one that should firmly shake away the isolation bank holiday blues.

Rating: 8/10

Obscene Extreme is out now via Seasons of Mist.

Like BENIGHTED on Facebook.