Heard of KONTUSION before? Yeah, me neither, but apparently the gruesome twosome of Mark Brozino (formerly of IRON REAGAN and MAMMOTH GRINDER) and drummer Chris Moore from a somewhat important band named REPULSION have been touring like fools across the US since a self-titled demo was spewed forth in 2022. And now, to add to the glut of death metal of the past few years, we’re provided Insatiable Lust For Death. Hey, if it sucks, it’s less than a half-hour long, right? I’ll suffer for your edification.

Proud students of the get in, grind, get out school, ‘Endless Horror’ dispenses with a warning shot, going straight for the cranium with rampage beats and a guitar attack that seems hauled up from the depths of early NIHILIST before they got all fancy and turned into ENTOMBED. ‘Countless Atrocities’ begins haphazardly and, to be fair, much of Insatiable Lust For Death sounds unfocused. Listen, though, and the chaotic becomes an assault from all sides on all senses, unexpected riffs colliding with brain matter through a drum-pulverized skull, and Brozino’s bellowed delivery fitting exactly the style of slobbering, hulking death found here.

Stabbing synths should feel exceedingly out of place in ‘Hemorrhage’ but instead add to the chaotic nature of the entire album. Four tunes deep into this fetid soil, and I already feel like I’ve heard an album’s worth of riffing…and I guess that’s part of the win for KONTUSION, that feeling of displacement brought about by truly never knowing where the next one’s coming from, or how long – usually briefly – it’ll be around.

At 3:45, ‘Subjugation’ is the longest song on the debut, but the most punishingly brutal, disjointed and out of sorts in every second, channel switching and a churlish, churning malevolence on a cosmic level. The theme song of some Lovecraftian undeity returning to earth to wreak havoc, this and, followed by the 1:32 of ‘Melting’, it’s all the more discomfiting.

Ending with the aptly titled ‘No Escape’, Insatiable Lust For Death finds KONTUSION already staking out their own plot in the overcrowded graveyard that is today’s death metal scene. I haven’t felt this out of sorts after listening to a death metal album in too long a while.
Welcomed and worthy.
Review By: Lord Randall

KONTUSION
Insatiable Lust For Death
Profound Lore