A very long-standing act, originally formed over twenty years ago in 2002, Earthburner has a bit of a storied history. Originally a new act for Broken Hope’s Jeremy Wagner while said act had gone on a ‘hibernation period’ around that time, the only release to the band’s name is that of a 3-song EP back in 2011. To make a long story a bit shorter, in more recent years the line-up has come together and now features members from Broken Hope, Sanguisugabogg, and even Napalm Death’s Mitch Harris as an ‘honorary member,’ and their full-length debut Permanent Dawn is set to be released.
Given the death metal hands at play, don’t expect something in the brutal realm. Earthburner is a band that’s more akin to that of Terrorizer and early deathgrind than anything else. It’s buzzing and blasting galore for sure, and the 2-ish minutes that seem to be the average for each track will give you a quick reminder of their vicious direction as needed. Opener “Necrodisiac” features Ross Dolan of Immolation guesting with his immediately recognizable growls alongside vocalist Devin Swank (Sanguisugabogg), and gives a solid first impression of the band’s contrasting blazing speed and groovy, headbangable slowdowns. While “Like Dogs” is an all-out assault and 37-second blitzkrieg of old school grinding violence, “Broken Head” keeps a variety of tempos considering it’s 2-minute runtime, hitting some momentary chugs to frantic blasts, and somehow hitting everything else in between. Mitch Harris adds to a number of tracks with his high shrieks, which just like with Napalm, do a nice job of layering intensity into the mix.
For such a caustic, brusing grind album, it’s got that buzzing guitar sound but it sounds relatively clean. It’s not super grimy, which is a positive, so you can get a better ear on all of the instrumentation occurring. It’s a nice balance of overwhelming chaos, so this little tweak keeps it sounding like deathgrind, but never at the point where it sounds too undecipherable. Also, the more hardcore-influenced lyrics are a nice deviation from this usual style where things routinely divulge into porno-grind or the more grotesque. Considering the members involved, it’s something they could have done, but nice to ensure that Earthburner stands out a bit more from their other acts.
While it isn’t going to revolutionize the extreme metal scene per say, Permanent Dawn offers a solid wink to the past without rooting itself there and a copious amount of fun. It’s scorchingly heavy and as devastating as one could expect from the genre, and done with a pristine level of polish from some veteran players. With any hope, it won’t take nearly as long for a follow-up release.