Country: USA Genre: Ambient, Doom Metal, Industrial Metal/Electronica, Stoner/Sludge Metal
The duo of Natas Corpsegrinder (vocals, guitars) and Slave Voltage (drums, keyboards) formed Philistine last year and they name bands such as Khanate, Grief, and Halo as influences. They also mention industrial metal legend Justin Broadrick (Godflesh, Jesu) in the booklet. With those names flying around you expect Philistine to be slow, doomy, and sample laden. That's exactly what you get on this debut full length.
Consume and Devour is underproduced, but that's fine with their sludge doom sound. The most obvious Godflesh reference is the cover artwork which is very reminiscent of Godflesh. Philistine apparently prefer the doomy side of Godflesh's early work. "Smell the Blood" and the haunting "Voluntary Extinction" have the strongest Godflesh influence. "Crushed Under the Temples Collapse" a pure doom. There's an awesome guitar and rhythm collaboration on "So He May Die"- perhaps the best track here. Philistine get ambient on the boring "Infestation" followed by "Jain," the latter thankfully segues into heavy doom with some noisy guitars. For an independent, low budget recording from a new band this is very impressive. I believe this disc is being given away free at their website so check it out.
Album Score: 7 out of 10
Reviewed by: Brett VanPut