Artist: Flesher
Country: USA
Label: Maggot Stomp
Formats: 12″ EP / Cassette EP / CD EP
Year: 2025
‘Tales Of The Grotesque Demise’, Flesher’s debut album from 2023, was a surprisingly good Death Metal album and one of the genre’s highlights of that year. I particularly liked the riff-heavy approach with a great dose of dynamics and diversity. The album served us with both groove and faster parts and a nice crunchy, analogue sounding production. In sort: it showed clear resemblances to the first Corpsegrinder-record of Cannibal Corpse. In my book that is far from an insult. So, I was happy to see the band returned with something new, this time an 20+ minute EP. And, apparently, the band changed labels from Redefining Darkness Records to Maggot Stomp.
After having heard ‘Gore On Gore’ at least ten times, I think it is fair to conclude that Flesher is still pretty much the same band with the same musical intentions. Yet, I am afraid that this new EP is not quite as good as ‘Tales Of The Grotesque Demise’. Essentially, the elements I just mentioned that made their debut album particularly noteworthy are precisely the aspects that are less prominent on this EP. If we start with the overall production. I loved the heavy as fuck sound of ‘Tales Of The Grotesque Demise’ and the fact that it felt organic instead of digital or even compressed. ‘Gore On Gore’ actually sounds much less organic and far more digital. The same goes for the diversity and dynamics, while this new EP surely is not a one-dimensional affair, the debut album was far more versatile.
If you’d give ‘Gore On Gore’ a few spins I am sure you’d agree with me it is not all that dramatic and perhaps a lot of it is to blame on high expectations, but still I wouldn’t compare it to some of those slightly underrated Cannibal Corpse albums. That doesn’t mean that ‘Gore On Gore’ is a waste of time and effort; on the contrary, it’s still a very solid Death Metal EP, and although it’s much better than most of today’s Death Metal, it won’t make it onto my annual list of the best releases of the year.
