DEATHCOLLECTOR: need I say more? This OSDM-inspired UK and Irish collective took the underground by storm last year when it released its critically acclaimed debut EP, "Times Up". Not only does the band consist of some serious brawn (and metal royalty in the form of the inimitable Andy Whale of BOLT THROWER, no less), DEATHCOLLECTOR made tsunamis when it hit the scene and tongues have been wagging ever since from the attention the EP garnered. It's been virtually impossible for anyone to contain their excitement with anticipation over the band's first full-length, "Death's Toll", especially since "Times Up" laid down such a heavy and potent foundation. Without further ado, it's time to see how this death metal monolith fares...

First off, this is a nine-track OSDM-influenced affair that your ears will thank you for, delivering a glut of OBITUARY meets MORBID ANGEL styled death, with splashes of BOLT THROWER and early ENTOMBED for good measure. It's heavy-hitting, bruising and fashioned in a way that sways from the expectant menace of traditional OSDM through to the faster causticity of death metal, with both sides of the spectrum equally as capable of melting you into a puddle of lipase quicker than you can blink. It should also be mentioned that DEATHCOLLECTOR has opted to intersperse the EP within "Death's Toll", so if you loved "Times Up", you're guaranteed to enjoy a third of the new album. Now, although the EP features within the full-length, don't jump to conclusions thinking that they've been plonked in to pad out the other half a dozen tracks. "DeathCollector", "Terrorizer", and "Internal Expansion" have been utilised as a sort of death metal 'cement' to fuse the 'building blocks' of the other tracks and stack different shades of the band's sound one on top of the other. It works. It works VERY well.

As the title-track opens with Scott's bowel-slathered growl, you realise that "Death's Toll" is just as unyielding as its predecessor and you'll not be leaving the experience whole. Underpinned entirely by muddied and thick tonality, and shaped by temporal shifts that get a kick out of mashing your brain to a pulp, DEATHCOLLECTOR nails down an aptly unnerving intro. Moving to a more Swedeath flavoured territory, "Mental Hedonist" piles in some dirty grooves and a rather delicious solo from Carey to bridge an altogether unhinged cut that's going to bind you in a straightjacket and dump you in a bodybag in one hit. Jumping to "Coarse Visions", the BOLT THROWER influence bounds with Whale's finesse and Cummings's enriched bass line; where this track will have you nodding with approval, "A Taste of Ichor" manifests an all-out rubber stamp of metallic mayhem and visceral vivacity with its downright dirty combination of bellowing gutturals and seething instrumentals. And just to encase this soiled mass of muck in one final layer of filth, where "Revel in the Gore" will permeate your dermis with its grinding stench in an all-round denser output, "Rearview Guilt" is that diseased with its grimy riffs, clanking bass, and inhumanly low vocal register, you'll feel yourself rotting from the inside out.

The threat levels that come with "Death's Toll" fall somewhere between the polluted backwash that floats in a bottle of pop after a toddler's slapped its chops around it, and Kim Jong Un and Putin having a fondle: it's germy, it's dangerous, and it's bloody lethal. If you want a solid death metal album that amalgamates all the stellar aspects of the genre, sure to leave its scungy mark on you, "Death's Toll" is your jam.