The metal landscape was a wildly different beast when Immolation released ‘Dawn Of Possession’ back in 1991: this was a time when pioneers like Death and Pantera were just beginning to shape the sound of the future, when some of the most popular subgenres had yet to be invented. Thirty five years later, Immolation are still here releasing records, and the consistency of their output is nothing if not impressive. New album ‘Descent’ could only have been made by a group completely at home in the underworld.

Let’s be completely honest with ourselves— we all know exactly what we’re getting into when we press play on an Immolation album, and we’ll be damned if the band’s newest project doesn’t scratch a familiar itch. Descent is a churning, grinding record that almost saunters its way through its various riffs and breakdowns, executing each barbaric display with absolute confidence. One need only peek at the racing tempos, squealing harmonics and bulldozing guitar parts of lead single ‘Adversary’ to know that Dolan and company are playing to all their strengths here: Immolation have their signature brand of grim death metal down pat after so many attempts, and ‘Descent’ is simply yet another display of their genre mastery. Times have changed since 1991, of course, and the rather straightforward presentation the record takes on likely won’t win over many listeners from the camps of nu metal or metalcore, but this is not a record for them anyway. If you like your death metal dark, ominous and all-around heavy, ‘Descent’ will absolutely satisfy you (save, of course, if you’re looking for something a little more progressive or experimental).

Opener ‘These Vengeful Winds’ may open with some haunting clean melodies, but make no mistake: the song is an inescapable vortex of vast proportions, designed solely to suck you in and decimate you. Steve Shalaty absolutely dominates the entire record, transforming even the simplest of grooves with a number of versatile fills and furious double-kick blasts that only intensify the heft and majesty of each cut— a drummer of his caliber is best served on a blistering track like ‘The Ephemeral Curse,’ but truth be told, the man leaves his demonic fingerprints all over every second of ‘Descent.’ Much of the album carries a lumbering presence with it, scratching a death-doom itch that makes Immolation’s work far meatier and more overwhelming than their peers’. ‘God’s Last Breath’ assembles layer after layer of dissonance and tragedy, with the only release in sight being the bloodthirsty breakdown in the second half— few songs across the record truly stand out from the others, but they all bring the violence and the depravity you’d want from your death metal.

As ‘Descent’ draws you deeper and deeper into the darkness, Immolation don’t really have that many new twists or innovative surprises to throw at you: like we said, this is one for the genre purists, and the real treat of this album is its ability to take its tried-and-true ingredients and run with them. Both ‘Bend Towards The Dark’ and ‘Host’ start off as your ho-hum, seen-it-before death metal cuts, but the undeniable evil of their lead parts will get hooks into you before long— this may be some of the strongest guitar work we’ve heard from Immolation in a while. As for the iconic growls of Ross Dolan, what more needs to be said? The man won’t win any awards for versatility, but there’s no denying how well his distant roars fit the grandiose scale of the closing title track: after the cinematic strings and moving melodies of ‘Banished,’ the song had no choice but to rip your head clean off your shoulders.

Immolation are proof that you can’t teach an old dog new tricks, especially when the old tricks still work just fine. ‘Descent’ is the sound of a band who know exactly who they are, of a group who’ve spent the past 35 years perfecting their craft— it’s a monstrous effort, bashing you over the head with its electrifying drum work and gargantuan riffs. At this point, the crew have little left to say that’s truly new or fresh, but that’s ok: ‘Descent’ is like the reheated leftovers from a Michelin-star restaurant, if those leftovers could drag you down into the depths of hell.