Bloodstained fangs and bug-eyes agleam in their trampling daemonic descent London, England-based blackened death-thrashing heavy metal quintet ADORIOR cloud the mind with wrathful psychic poison as they strike down upon the weakening pulse of humanity with an long-awaited third full-length album. Circled by a blood-soaked pentagram made of horn-gored limbs and infectious ichor ‘Bleed on my Teeth‘ hails to the infinitum of evil thrash metal impetus of extreme metal, once again accelerating to the speed of black and death metal at its most earnest yet brutal beginnings. The riff count is high, they’re cutting necks throughout, their perverse blasphemic personae is still in full effect and I think overall there is a solid argument to made here that these folks still have the right maniac mindset for this gig. They’ve basically left nothing to chance here in that regard as this record delivers everything that is uniquely theirs and for that reason their work remains perfectly representative of the ‘old school’ extremist ways.

Adorior formed circa 1994 between folks who’d largely cut their teeth in the band, having otherwise been involved in some notable black/death groups later on (Razor of Occam, Lvcifyre) as well as some punk-related business per the original drummer. By the time they’d managed a demo tape (‘Beyond the Distant Blue‘, 1996) they’d approximated a sound rooted in punkish thrashing black metal, something akin to ‘Queen of Siam‘-era Holy Moses level song structures given the obsessive swiping rhythms of earlier Sarcófago where there was a shape to each piece but it was as simple one with a bestial fury behind it. A contemporary at the time might’ve tangentially been found in Australian war-torn skulls (Bestial Warlust, Sadistik Exekution) or the staggered beatings from the (underrated) first Impiety record ‘Asateerul Awaleen‘ where their rhythms eventually became fully unhinged a couple of years later as their debut full-length album (‘Like Cutting the Sleeping‘, 1998) made a name for the group as blasphemic perverters, extremists with a unique hand applied to their rhythms which transcended the usual black, death, and thrash metal categorizations many were emphasizing at the time.

Sure, they found a better drummer, DBH of Grave Miasma, within a couple of years and definitely improved the general clip of their madness on their second album (‘Author of Incest‘, 2005) a few years beyond that but there was something raggedly esoteric, full of personality on that first record and it has long been my favorite. The sound of the band definitely took a warrior’s dose of death as they continued on but they’d generally been considered a black-thrash metal group by folks arriving upon their work per the additional visibility of their second landing on Agonia Records; Between the big venom-fanged personae of vocalist Jaded Lungs and the band’s knack for wrought iron riffcraft you could grab any one of their records (including ‘Bleed on my Teeth‘) and get a face full of their irradiating damage at this point. The whole discography smokes and this record fits right in. If you are an existing fan living on fumes of nostalgia per the ~14 year silence beyond their last split EP I’d first note that the guitar slots in the band have been filled by folks associated with Qrixkuor and Grave Miasma in the last several years while the drummer and vocalist remain. With that in mind you can rightfully expect the core personality of the band intact but with a new hand applied to their riff-obsessed guitar arrangements.

Though I wouldn’t say ‘Author of Incest‘ unseated itself from the mouth of the late 80’s its approach to blasting intensity was an extreme amplification of what the band’d been developing up to that point and with that in mind I’ve thus far felt ‘Bleed on my Teeth‘ bringing some of the wilding strikes and militaristic thrashing stampedes that’d characterized many early Adorior pieces. This is less a point of compromise for the holistic reality of their craft and more a chance to finesse different riff types, scrambling leads, and that 80’s death-thrashing rip into songs that are both bestial but sharply structured (see: “Ophidian Strike”). In fact the extreme thrash foundation of this band continues to hold the line without the authors necessarily repeating themselves (or imitating previous guitarists) over time, a benefit of releasing an album whenever they’d like rather than every couple of years. What I will say is that the black metal aspect of their rhythm guitar work here, curated by the impressive duo of S. (Qrixkuor) and R.C. (ex-Deströyer 666, ex-Cruciamentum), is intact but with less of what I’d consider punkish Darkthrone-esque rambling to it as these songs tend to hit with precision command finding that ‘Hell Awaits’ shotgun even on the most harried (“Moment of Mania”) and/or unpredictable (“L.O.T.P./Vomit Vomit Vomit Bastard“) pieces.

The major appeal which ‘Bleed on my Teeth‘ for my own taste is of course the all-guns-blazing speed/thrash metal skeleton of their work but they’re truly at thier best when creating tension surrounding those most ripping moments. You’ll find opener “Begrime Judas” is a particularly fine example of a classic level of ramping rhythm acting as an omen which precedes their more fiery moments. Their most incendiary thrashers eventually land their strike with an Angelcorpse-level whip, such as the duo of “Sips of Sarin” b/w “Scavengers of Vengeance” over on Side B, most of which make good use of a patient reveal just as previous incarnations of the band had back in their late 90’s work. In this way the signature of Adorior is upheld but also modified, refined beyond their second LP, in a reasonable way and this counts for a lot after such an extended absence from the studio. I think that is about as info anyone would need to get their foot in the door for this experience, the core momentum of this band is still potently addictive as ever and no doubt this’ll be a refreshing gust of hell-wind for folks running on fumes for true extreme heavy metal in 2024. A very high recommendation.

---