Internal Bleeding Settle All Scores Review
Internal Bleeding
Settle All Scores
Maggot Stomp
2025
Switching gears from Texas to another state that has made an indelible mark on death metal, we travel to New York to murder our eardrums with the absolutely legendary Internal Bleeding and their long-awaited new album Settle All Scores.
If you are a death metal fan and don't know about Internal Bleeding, then settle in for a brief history lesson. The phrase “often imitated, never duplicated” should be their mantra because they not only originated the “slam” style of death metal, they do it better than anyone else. The Long Island natives have been doing so since 1991, first with their infamous “$1 Demo,” then the two now-classic Wild Rags! Records demos, 1993’s Invocation of Evil (which this here writer gleefully wore out upon receiving it in the mail) and 1994’s Perpetual Degradation, both featuring original vocalist Wallace Milton. From there, 1995 saw them sign to Pavement Records, gain a new frontman named Frank Rini on the mic, and release their debut full-length Voracious Contempt, which contained some re-recordings of their demo material as well as some new tracks. Several critically acclaimed albums (Extinction of Benevolence, Driven to Conquer, Onward to Mecca, Imperium) followed until the band faced their biggest adversity yet in 2017. That year, founding member, drummer, and NYC firefighter Bill Tolley tragically died in an on-the-job accident. Local legend Kyle Eddy replaced him, and the band kept going with the ferocious Corrupting Influence in 2018.
After some lineup and label changes, that brings us to the present and the take-no-prisoners monolith that is the eight-song Settle All Scores. The album features founder/guitarist/chief songwriter Chris Pervelis, vocalist Steve Worley, vocalist/guitarist Chris McCarthy, the aforementioned Kyle Eddy on drums, and bassist Ryan Giordano. SAS was mixed by Taylor Young at The Pit Studio in Sunland, California (Nails, Xibalba, God’s Hate) and mastered by Brad Boatright at Audiosiege (Obituary, Creeping Death, Vastum). Additionally, guest vocals are provided by Sherwood Webber of Skinless, Mikey Petroski of Never Ending Game, and former Internal Bleeding vocalists Joe Marchese, Jay Lowe, and Frank Rini. Young’s production gives Internal Bleeding a tight, biting modern sound—heavy on the low-end clarity and with enough space for every instrument and vitriolic vocal. Having been familiar with them since their demo days, I can confidently say they have never had a better-sounding recording.
For the songs and the crafting of them, it seems as though IB have taken all the setbacks, copycat bands, pent-up anger, frustration, and betrayals of three decades past to “crystallize and synthesize” them into this album. If you've heard Internal Bleeding, you know what you're in for: brutal death metal mixed with tech parts, slamming breakdowns, and forbidding atmosphere among some NYHC pummeling. I don't say that to minimize their creativity here. They have “their sound” down to a ball-peen-hammer-beaten science, but they still find new twists and turns to throw at us. Look no further than the dissonant guitar work and blast beats of opener “Intangible Pact” and the acoustic guitars, keyboards, and doom-laden Sabbathy stomp at the beginning of closer “Deliberate Desecration” Said track also has some of the longest, overlapping death growls you'll ever hear at its conclusion. Worley and McCarthy both deal in low gutturals, some nice midrange high screams, and even some gravelly hardcore shouts throughout as well, making things all the more diverse. Couple that with Pervelis’ ability to write some of the heaviest, grooving riffs known to the genre and the clinic that Eddy puts on behind the kit, and you've got a band that sounds invigorated and out to prove their doubters dead wrong. There seems to be plenty of life left in Internal Bleeding, and with this seventh album, it would seem they have no plans to apply the tourniquets anytime soon. Bleed on, gentlemen, we’re happy you're still here and sounding as vital and pissed as ever. To quote the great Jim Ross, they have “stomped a mud hole in us and walked it dry.” Absolutely crushing from beginning to end.
FFO: Pyrexia, Suffocation, Dehumanized, Dying Fetus, Malignancy
~TB