If you buy only one face-liquidising, denim-skinned album of demonic metal thunder this year because you saw it reviewed in NME, then make it this face-liquidising, denim-skinned… well, you get the message. The effectively faultless output of Seattle rivetheads Black Breath prior to this – one EP, one album – is not remotely diminished by ‘Sentenced To Life’, which is half an hour of double-kickdrum rippage that raises tankards to Slayer and Entombed while sounding crustier than a pie shop. It’s like the best bits of every extreme metal subgenre: a deathly crossover of sludgy, blackened thrash that will put hairs on your chest. And then shave a pentagram into them.
Noel Gardner