365 Days of Metal: Rebecca Black Metal Friday vol. 5

Day 54

Skeletonwitch - Forever Abomination

Artist Origin: Athens, Ohio, USA
Genre: Thrash / Black Metal
Label: Prosthetic
Running Time: 51 minutes
Release Date: October 7, 2011

Best Part: The clean guitar on This Horrifying Force leading into the frantic pace of Skeletonwitch is the perfect intro piece.

Favorite Tracks: Cleaver of Souls, The Infernal Resurrection, This Horrifying Force, and Shredding Sacred Flesh

Grade: 4.5

Side Note: Skeletonwitch has always had metal as fuck album artwork.

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Forever Abomination in 20 words or less:

The lords of mixing thrash metal, black metal and metal as fuck album artwork are back again, with their best record to date.

The Band:

Skeletonwitch is a five member thrash metal band out of Ohio that over the course of their career have deviated from straight thrash metal, to incorporate a crossover with black metal, creating an awesome sounding blend of the two genres best respective traits. Skeletonwitch is about speed, heaviness, solos, Chance Garnette's raspy shrieks and growls, and of course Satan - Skeletonwitch wouldn't be Skeletonwitch without a little dose of Satan. Their crossover of less mainstream black metal with their base thrash roots has still garnered them relative mainstream success, and the band provides one hell of a live show with their high energy performance.

Skeletonwitch's other releases include: At One with the Shadows (2004), Beyond the Permafrost (2007), and Breathing the Fire (2009)


Jay's Take on Forever Abomination:

Forever Abomination starts off with a clean, yet foreboding clean guitar intro, and then in classic Skeletonwitch fashion gets straight to the point - And that's what I love about Skeletonwitch. Ranging from 30 to 35 minutes, with tracks averaging 3 minutes or less, the bands' albums don't skip a beat, moving from track to track with an unrelenting fury that is at the core of their thrash metal roots. They set the pace for their records from the first track and Forever Abomination is no different, shredding at breakneck speed with Garnette at the helm commanding the tracks with his low death metal growls and more prominently his piercing, raspy black metal reminiscent shrieks. Forever Abomination includes some great technical variety in their guitar work, with some solid solo work as always, as well as some well placed clean interludes and melodies, adding variety to the fast paced tempo that the band keeps at all times. Cleaver of Souls is a standout track in this regard. And the newest member of the band, drummer Dustin Boltjes provides some great work behind the kit, replacing longtime drummer Derrick Nau. The album is also of a higher production quality, which shows with just how much crisper the band sounds compared to their previous release Breathing the Fire.

It'll take some more plays through, but Forever Abomination is most likely my favorite Skeletonwitch record, having in my eyes (and ears) surpassed their second album Beyond the Permafrost - not to take anything away from Breathing the Fire, which was also a great album.

Sample of the Day:


- J