This latest full-length album from long-standing Long Island, New York-based death metal quintet INTERNAL BLEEDING comes from a band who know well enough to resemble their reputation as an influential name in the hardcore inspired brutal death metal niche, centering its purpose around crossing all who’d crossed them in the past. ‘Settle All Scores‘ never breaks character from the tough as nails windmill puncher that it is for its ~half hour duration but they’ve still found enough space to fit three or so decades of signature into it. It is hard not to appreciate such an over the top, direct to cerebellum take from a band in this style but a nail-bat to the cerebellum is what it is, they’re here to whip brains and they do only just that.

Internal Bleeding are up there on the first few names anyone mentions when talking about ‘old school’ New York death metal and brutal death metal but they hit even earlier within discussions of slamming brutal death metal’s earliest inspiration. When the band formed ~1991 and they cut their first demo tape (‘Internal Bleeding‘, 1992) their work was invoking some of the violent rhythms found in slam-danceable hardcore punk and no doubt sinking into their grooves for far longer than similar bands. Adjacency to Pyrexia and Suffocation always made sense stylistically and it was there these folks’d made their mark with brutal death up front. For my own taste their demo era is all killer with exceptional riffcraft and drumming for their time with original drummer Bill Tolley being a major component of their early signature on their second demo (‘Invocation of Evil‘, 1993) and the crispier pummel of their third (‘Perpetual Degradation‘, 1994).

If you know the blood and bones of Internal Bleeding‘s earliest work you’ll see how it still carries into ‘Settle All Scores‘ today point blank, they’re still a shotgun of straight-up brutal death metal and they’ve never shied away from making mosh metal out of it a la peak Dying Fetus or kind of rocking groove-death of it a la Jungle Rot. I would say ‘Onward to Mecca‘ (2004) was the one to fully take cues from the metallic hardcore of the time and their records from Unique Leader in the 2010’s got busier with it, pushed riffs out at a much faster clip and with more clarity than earlier work. I prefer the unaltered grime of their 90’s stuff but I’d felt those last two records were well representative of a long-active band maintaining footing by leaning into their signature.

For album number seven the quintet’s ratio of brutal death slapped swinging groove and mosh leans heavier toward bluntly hardcorish slam-worthy impact but they’re not knocking around the same old generic flat-capped dummy shit, that entry-grade bunk death metal too many bands are slugging on these days. ‘Settle All Scores‘ never loses its tense after a riff, there is a clenched fist to Internal Bleeding‘s attack here which you can feel from the moment opener “Intangible Pact” cuts off its first odd-angled riff and whips at it and the bap of the album’s sound design falls in. The collaboration between the band, mixing from Taylor Young @ The Pit, and mastering from Brad Boatright @ Audiosiege conspires toward maximum impact, leaving very little space to breathe under the enormous drum presence and the nuclear hewn overdrive of the main rhythm guitar tones. Their real test of the razor comes with that first song but the title track (“Settle All Scores”) hits a few different paces enough to showcase how the big and way loud production values emphasize its impact. If this record was longer than a ~half hour it might not work but as is I’d appreciated the over-the-top boom applied to their work here.

It makes sense Internal Bleeding‘ve gone wall-to-wall with their attack here as the title suggests vengeance, squaring up with any thorns in their proverbial sides, and all that this means to me is that it has the intensity I’d typically want from this type of brutal death metal. Does it knock me off my ass in terms of riffs? I’m less sure about that outright as the only curveball thrown within the first half of the album arrives with “Enforced Compliance” (see also: “Deliberate Desecration”) where they veer off of plain-ass mosh riffs into the heavy rock side of their gig, which I’ve always appreciated. From that point we hit some dual vocal hardcore/death metal punish on “Crown of Insignificance” and while I like what they’ve done with the song its like it goes halfway Earth Crisis on the buildup to the first breakdown and then backs off of it for the duration of the second half. They could probably push those type of interruptive riffs, or, tempo changes more often for my own taste but what is there keeps it feeling clenched either way.

The punish of ‘Settle All Scars‘ overtakes any interest in its moment-to-moment riffcraft for my own taste. I don’t think the actual movements will stain in mind all that long but the textural scourge of Internal Bleeding‘s guitar work and the spongey grinding of their rhythm section are spot-on in bold-faced representation of their own plot in the brutal death metal space. I’ll always prefer the dusty, broken scramble of their earliest stuff and ‘old school’ brutal death in general but I could still hang with this record for the sake of it being aggressive and straight forward as possible. A moderately high recommendation.

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