Disciplined, deliberate, and defiantly alive.
More than three decades after helping define the sound of “slam” death metal, Internal Bleeding returns with Settle All Scores, an album that feels both like a reaffirmation of their legacy and a brutal reflection on the times we’re living in. Released on October 17, 2025, the record proves that age hasn’t dulled the band’s aggression — in fact, it’s sharpened it. Across eight unrelenting tracks, Internal Bleeding channels rage, exhaustion, and survival instinct into a statement about corruption, conformity, and the dark.
The album opens with “Intangible Pact,” an atmospheric slow-burner that erupts into chaos after a deceptively restrained intro. The song feels like an invocation, a recognition that unseen forces — political, economic, spiritual — bind us to systems that thrive on exploitation. Vocalist Chris Pervelis sounds as furious as ever, delivering lines that cut through the mix like shrapnel. The band’s signature groove-driven brutality remains intact, but there’s a more controlled precision here, as if every riff and breakdown is placed with surgical intent.
The title track, “Settle All Scores,” is where the album truly detonates. It’s a declaration of vengeance, both personal and societal. Guitars lurch and grind over relentless double-kick patterns while the lyrics call for accountability from those who’ve profited from chaos. It’s Internal Bleeding at their best — vicious, focused, and purposeful.
“Prophet of Deceit” turns its gaze toward manipulation and media control, its jagged rhythms mirroring the disorientation of living in a constant fog of misinformation. The track’s call-and-response vocal sections add a ritualistic element, making it one of the album’s most haunting moments.
With “Enforced Compliance,” the band delivers one of their tightest performances to date. It’s a war march against blind obedience, propelled by palm-muted riffs and explosive tempo shifts. There’s a deliberate ugliness to the production — it sounds live, almost claustrophobic — which fits the song’s message about the suffocating grip of authority.
“Crown of Insignificance” slows things down without losing intensity. It’s an introspective track about ego, power, and decay — about realizing that the symbols of dominance we worship are, in the end, hollow. Pervelis’s guttural delivery gives the track emotional depth beyond sheer anger; it’s the sound of disillusionment turned into strength.
The final stretch of the album —“Empire of Terror,” “Glorify the Oppressor” and “Deliberate Desecration” — cements Settle All Scores as one of Internal Bleeding’s most thematically cohesive releases. “Empire of Terror” roars against endless cycles of war and fear, while “Glorify the Oppressor” indicts cultural complicity in glorifying violence. The closer, “Deliberate Desecration,” is a scorched-earth finale — part elegy, part call to arms. It ends not in triumph, but in reckoning, as feedback fades into silence like smoke after a battlefield.
Internal Bleeding proves that slam death metal can still evolve without losing its bite. It’s not just another exercise in heaviness. The album’s brutality isn’t empty spectacle; it’s purposeful, political, and deeply human. Every breakdown, blast beat, and guttural scream feels like a reflection of a world on the edge. Internal Bleeding reminds us what genuine fury sounds like: disciplined, deliberate, and defiantly alive.
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