Haemorrhage

It's cool to see Relapse reissuing some slabs of gore grind from Spain's Haemorrhage, considering the band have always been underdogs. Apology for Pathology, originally released in 2006 on Morbid Records, is full of riffs and grooves that would make Nasum and General Surgery blush, and enough garbled gore to put demo-era Carcass to shame, with a nice, solid but raw production. The band established themselves as main players in the gore scene with this, their fifth (and most recent) full-length, even if lots of us weren't paying attention. "Feasting on Purulence" is as perfect a nearly minute-and-a-half of gore grind as there ever was, the dive-bombing guitar solo evoking, again, classic Carcass. "Excruciating Denervation of the Lumbar Spine" has the holy trinity of gore covered perfectly: sick song title, sick snare sound, sick gurgling vocals. On the closing title track, the band slow down and let a bit of melody in for the disc's haunting final moments. The mangled cherry on top? One of the bonus tracks is a cover of obscure Finnish grinders Xysma, previously available on vinyl only.