Nightslug – Loathe

It’s Just Filthy….

When you are around for only a few years and manage to describe your own genre you know you have been doing something right. Germany’s Nightslug have been creating what they fondly call “filth” for the last few years. Their latest release Loathe is feedback drenched, heavy-as-a-sledgehammer metal as filthy as the name suggests.

The German three-piece has released another album prior to Loathe and Loathe is the sophomore release. It has already proven to be a force to be reckoned within the grind/doom scene. With their trademark distorted vocals and just unruly bass tone, this album could scare the paint off the walls.

The first song on the album, “Vile Pigs,” is obliterating. First – J.Slugs’s distorted vocal is enough to scare away Freddy Krueger himself. His desperate howls and “chewing on stones” sound is absolutely perfect for this band. Plus his guitar sound in general is that of a buzzsaw coming to rip your head off. Insane.

By the time we get to song two, the album’s title track, “Loathe,” we are introduced to the real x-factor of this band: P. Slug and his bass. He truly drives this nightmare train. His playing is both rhythmic and dynamic but also sinister in its delivery. Nowhere is this more apparent than on this track and the next one “Under A Bane.” Both of these songs have truly dark, fast and heavy bass lines.

Which bring us to the album’s opus, “Disease.” Here their drummer, F.Slug, I think is the star of the show. His drumming on this track – which is over seven minutes long – goes up and down like sea buoy in a storm. One moment it’s soft and almost in the background, the next it sounds like he is throwing all of his weight behind each swing, all the while still keeping metronome-like time.

Overall Loathe is a fantastic metal release, and one that will be the beginning of what should be a promising career. We have years worth of more filth to come – so let’s put away the vacuums and let it consume us.