According to the dictionary sitting six feet to my left, "After Gods" comes "Godavari," a "river in western India that is sacred to the Hindus." Now that makes zero sense in the context of a review of the Finnish death doom metal/noise band Ligation's first full-length album, so I'll look at the entry below Godavari, that being "god-damn." It's a better descriptor than the river flowing east into the Bay of Bengal.

Notice the "noise" tag on Metallum, this article, and in the expanded credits of the album. Ligation blends the iconic Finnish death metal sound with equal parts doom and experimental noise. Many session artists, TK, JK, and JR, are credited with saxophone noises, tape loops, and pure, unadulterated racket. They assist in furthering the record's depravity by layering additional blankets of reverb and chaos. The trio themselves are quite loud, but cloaked under this desperate label of "noise" is solid doomy death metal. It's almost used as a distraction, as if a straightforward alignment with death metal is too common or basic. There's an ironic amount of ambient segments (latter halves of "Turmoil in Harvest" and "Eruption"), humorously contradicting many of the record's key points. Another rather ironic point is that Ligation shines during these less-busy parts. "Reflection" is a nine-minute doomfest relying solely on the band's key instruments, and it's hopelessly crushing without the over-the-top mess of noise. Sure, it later evolves into avant-garde saxophoning and mountains of feedback, but the "calm" parts are the best. HK helps MN on vocals here, and one of them hit a drawn-out, wince-inducing whistle note that blew me away.

I'd just disregard any claims Ligation forms about noise. They've already enveloped themselves in a beast of a genre, and the addition of extra subgenres overcomplicates the record. The record's opus, "Reflection," would've ended it, but three bonus tracks, all taken from their 2023 and 2025 splits with Hail Conjurer and Gravagrav, are included. They mirror the regular releases' attributes, but with less noise. I wonder why I heavily preferred them over some other pieces... "Earthlings" is the definite bonus track highlight, providing a lovely balance of faster-paced death metal and throbbing, guttural-drenched doom. The saxophone reappears in "Human Success" to a less bombastic extent, and the solid nature of these additional recordings makes me wonder if Ligation always had their sights on noise, or if "After Gods" is a new step.

I said "noise" too many times here. Ligation is a fine death doom band that needs to cut it out with the ruckus.