Freed from the ephemera of mass delusion per the chiseling-loose of the subconscious Tampa, Florida-based death metal quintet MONSTROSITY aim to continually reinvent along the razor’s edge rather than collapse into nostalgia on this sleekened nigh prog-death tempered seventh full-length album. Following the modus of the band’s two prior records ‘Screams From Beneath the Surface‘ reflects the artist’s choice to remain an adventurer with a keen sense of identity rather than a rotted old totem to morbid youth. That is to suggest that this is less an ‘old school’ prospect than it is a matured reflection of old-meets-new(er) ideation. Though it doesn’t replicate their early 90’s infamy in any too-direct sense the band’s tendency toward quality over quantity is yet reinforced.

Though they were not the first to activate within the realm the 1990-formed Monstrosity are generally revered as key asset to the authentic Florida-grown popular death metal movement by way of drummer Lee Harrison‘s (ex-Terrorizer) early associations with the scene, specifically his performances on a couple of earlier Malevolent Creation tapes beyond their move from western New York. Harrison found the right line-up, name etc. as all would momentarily align for the band’s legendary first demo (‘Horror Infinity‘, 1991) where his coalition with bassist Mark Van Erp, vocalist Corpsegrinder (Cannibal Corpse), and guitarist Jon Rubin (Malevolent Creation, HatePlow) constituted the band’s classic line-up, the face of the band through the mid-90’s. Though the demo was perfection enough it’d been ‘Imperial Doom‘ (1992) that’d left the deadliest dent upon the underground corpus, inspiring countless bands/guitarists to this day. Beyond that point their line-up and stylistic exploration have both fractalized, morphed within the founder’s hands per release.

Covering the band’s previous LP (‘The Passage of Existence‘, 2018) several years ago ensures I won’t spend too many words on their discography but I will say that there is some restitution for the militant old school tech-death metal fandom among us in seeing a tide of folks praising the band’s second album (‘Millennium‘, 1996) each time Monstrosity return with a new effort. Their work on that album remains one of the more underrated records in its style and easily some of the band’s most mind-wrenching handling of the riff; Today the band’s intent stays its general course beyond 2003, leaving one foot remaining planted in pure death metal while pivoting between progressive/technical nodes. ‘Screams From Beneath the Surface‘ resembles that general trend but eases away from rapt technicality in favor of thrashing prog-death muse.

Opener “Banished to the Skies” should be well off-putting for anyone who’d skipped out on Monstrosity‘s output beyond 2003 but to be fair it is a bizarrely easygoing piece compared to most of ‘The Passage of Existence‘, too. As the song stretches its limbs nearby seven minutes in length it isn’t exactly reaching for something like ‘Symbolic‘ so much as a modern standard for this type of death metal, a stance which only becomes less vexing as the album begins to show its full hand via the remainder of Side A. “The Colossal Rage” for example is more believably the descendant of their earlier work where we find guitarists Matt Barnes (Chaos Inception, Quinta Essentia) and recent joinee Justin Walker cutting some of the faster-paced, harder rhythms found on the album. The first impression granted between those first two pieces was compelling enough in its spread though I don’t know that I was wholly convinced on the first few listens.

Most every piece on ‘Screams From Beneath the Surface‘ has been writ to the nth degree, not overly detailed or dense but meticulous enough that the raw violence of death metal only persists loudly within heavier grooves. “The Atrophied” is where I’d felt this became most clear as percussive 90’s groove metal and technical death metal riffs bully in between their shredding, prog-death reach. There is a surreal quality to this general melding of sensibilities which I appreciate though I’ve continued to flit between admiration and underwhelm for the first ~3-4 songs Monstrosity propose here; Otherwise prominent insertion of bass guitar performances help to warm some of these movements into greater interest and I think vocalist Ed Webb, who’d notably appeared on the 2014 ‘comeback’ record from Massacre, suits the band better than some of their past frontmen.

From my perspective the peak of the full listen hits between “Fortunes Engraved in Blood” b/w “Vapors” as each rallies pace while Monstrosity‘s guitarists keep their heads down in the riffosphere. The latter is one of just a few songs on this seventh album which rejigger the band’s ancient identity most clearly but to be fair even the weirdness of “The Thorns” has a couple moments that would’ve been suitable enough for the early days of the band and their ethos. I admire the band avoiding cynical points of fanservice, and the result thankfully doesn’t hit like the usual ghost-written comeback, but ‘Screams From Beneath the Surface‘ is unavoidably uneven in tone per the ground it intends to cover.

If we can begin to more holistically view Monstrosity‘s legacy per this seventh album’s contribution the argument made here suggests quality over quantity was the superior choice versus the oft cheap and embarrassing pathos of certain suggested peers. The key point of praise here is yet a matter of standards for craft which read as principled, or at least tastefully wrought, as we consider the band’s work for its compositional ambition, many-handed feat of sound design, and general search for distinct value rather than OSDM caricature. At a time when pandering to nostalgia might’ve been the path of least resistance in an era of supreme cynicism ‘Screams From Beneath the Surface‘ admirably meets the moment on the band’s own terms. A moderately high recommendation.

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