Over the past few years, there’s been a serious revival of brutal, cavernous old-school death metal, and Rochester’s Undeath, a 2022 Stereogum Band To Watch, are one of the movement’s leading lights. Today, Undeath have announced plans to follow their 2022 breakout It’s Time… To Rise From The Grave with a new album that promises to be even more insane. We know this because the album is called More Insane, and also because of that glorious cover art above.

Undeath recorded More Insane in Nashville, co-producing it with Cannibal Corpse collaborator Mark Lewis. I’m delighted to report that it’s got back-to-back songs called “Disattachment Of A Prophylactic In The Brain” and “Bones Clattering In The Cave.” Lead single “Brandish The Blade” is a triumphantly grimy riff-beast. Here’s how the band describes both the album and its lead single:

More Insane is the biggest, baddest, nastiest Undeath record yet by every conceivable metric. It’s a fucking sick death metal record for sick death metal freaks and anyone out there who can appreciate the transcendent power of a good riff played fast on distorted electric guitars. No bullshit whatsoever — not even for a second. Ten tracks of death metal earworms crafted by five guys who shower just irregularly enough to invoke the spirits of the death metal ancient ones.

Follow me on this one for a sec: In weightlifting terms, if our last record, It’s Time…to Rise from the Grave was our cut cycle record, where we trimmed the fat and honed things down to the raw essentials, More Insane is us entering our bulk cycle, where we built a big, filthy record on top of a canvas of pure death metal muscle. We co-produced it with Mark Lewis, who engineered, mixed, and mastered the whole thing and made the best-sounding album we’ve ever made. It’ll sound absolutely killer on literally anything you play it on, and it’ll sound even better if you turn it way the fuck up.

There’s songs about advancing armies of the undead, demonic bounty hunters, homicide, perverse experiments gone horribly awry, dead people screaming and crying tears of blood, homicide (again), and so much more. Matt [Browning, drummer] painted the cover art, and this marks the end of the trilogy of paintings starting back with Lesions Of A Different Kind, where we’ve zoomed out far enough now to reveal that the entire fucked up universe of these covers has taken place entirely within the collapsed and bursting skull of a rotting godhead floating in a soulless void.

To put a bow on it all: More Insane is the sickest shit we’ve ever done, full stop. Death metal reigns supreme forever, and we are but its humble servants. Enjoy and smoke em if you’ve got em…

“Brandish the Blade” was one of the first songs that came together for More Insane, and it’s easily one of the most anthemic songs that we’ve ever written. Specifically it’s about a conquering army (probably of the undead, as is our M.O.) moving from battlefield to battlefield and annihilating anything and anyone who gets in their way, but broadly speaking I’ve always felt that it was a call to arms for all those who believe that death metal in all its unadulterated glory is something worth fighting for. The chorus repeats the line “The time is now,” and I see that as a natural evolution from the chorus of “Rise From The Grave,” which was the first single from our last record. We’ve risen from the grave, and now it’s time to brandish the fucking blade.

That’s how you write your own press release. Below, check out the Errick Easterday-directed “Brandish The Blade” video and the More Insane tracklist.

TRACKLIST:
01 “Dead From Beyond”
02 “More Insane”
03 “Brandish The Blade”
04 “Disputatious Malignancy”
05 “Sutured For War”
06 “Cramped Caskets (Necrology)”
07 “Bounty Hunter”
08 “Wailing Cadavers”
09 “Disattachment Of A Prophylactic In The Brain”
10 “Bones Clattering In The Cave”

More Insane is out 10/4 on Prosthetic.