Polish black metallers TERRESTRIAL HOSPICE stream the entirety of their highly anticipated second album, Caviary to the General, at the Black Metal Promotion YouTube channel. Set for international release on February 10th via Ancient Dead Productions on CD and cassette tape format.
Forming in 2018, Terrestrial Hospice quickly set to work on their first EP, Universal Hate Speech, released later than year by the esteemed Shadow Records. It’s not surprising that the feverish winds of creativity blew across the duo, as Terrestrial Hospice is the work of two veteran members of the black metal scene, most prominently drummer and driving force Inferno, who’s the erstwhile drummer for Behemoth and Azarath as well as lately playing guitar in Witchmaster. In any case, Universal Hate Speech was a terrorizing tease at a mere 20 minutes, and the duo followed it with the deathblow of their debut full-length, Indian Summer Brought Mushroom Clouds, during that cursed year of 2020. The album was truly titled, and then some: there was no submitting to it, only the act of being flayed alive.
Now, TERRESTRIAL HOSPICE return with an album arguably even more extreme: “Caviary to the General”. Compared to its quick ‘n’ concise predecessor, Caviary to the General is undeniably a more expansive spin at 46 minutes; with nine songs instead of the seven on Indian Summer Brought Mushroom Clouds, Terrestrial Hospice are more able to display the full fathom of their flaying strength. Indeed, Caviary to the General caustically keeps the duo’s sound unyielding – a dark, dirty, devastating blast of classic Nordic-style hate steeped in the ancients – but somehow intensifies that berserker flourish so endemic to their native Poland, even with a wider variety of tempos employed. The recording, in kind, is confrontational but never faked: there’s no punching in of parts or copy/paste “production” techniques; the ultraviolence here is very real, and very overwhelming. Despite that unapologetically OTT approach, Terrestrial Hospice never forget actual songwriting – they shift speeds with deftness and dynamics, utilizing their full arsenal – nor the power of RIFFS, which flow and explode in equal measure across Caviary to the General. And perhaps the most surprising aspect of the album is the occasional and ever-so-subtle incorporation of eerie synths into their barbed-wire attack: at once remarkably vintage 1996 and palatably modern.
As savage and acidic as ever but proving they’re not a one-trick pony, TERRESTRIAL HOSPICE obliterate past and present with Caviary to the General.