On June 6th, 2011, VISCERAL DISGORGE released their debut album "Ingesting Putridity." This year (2020), Agonia Records has remastered and rereleased this classic album. VISCERAL DISGORGE is a brutal death metal band from Maryland Deathfest's hometown, Baltimore! At the time that "Ingesting Putridity" was released, the lineup of VISCERAL DISGORGE consisted of Steve Rosenzweig (R.I.P.) and Eric Vieraitis on guitars, Dan Harris on drums, and Travis Werner on vocals. While Travis is still in the band as vocals, the rest of the lineup has changed.

Whether remastered or not, the brutality is ever present. VISCERAL DISGORGE's brutal death metal has great guitar riffs, unrelenting drumming, and unintelligible murky growls. Guitar riffs alternate between groove-laced hooks, chugs, and a bit of technical wankery. They are mostly downtuned, though an occasional sharp and jarring high note will make an appearance. Vocals are a constant low growl slightly buried in the mix. They aren't cartoonish-ly brutal like other bands in similar genres. Drums batter your eardrums relentlessly with blast beats. However, I would have liked a heftier tone to the drums. Even on the remastered version, the drums sound like taps as opposed to thuds. It takes away from the overall great instrumentation on the album. Don't get me wrong, the drumming itself is great! It's just the sound and the mix that is lacking.

The opening track is "Force Fed Shredded Genitalia." Lovely start to a lovely album. From the beginning, the slams and riffs are infectious. "Sedated and Amputated" is the following track. The second half of this track features a great series of slow and heavy chugs. "Colostomy Bag Asphyxiation" is hilarious to me because of the sound clip that starts off the album. Purposefully on topic and grabs your attention!

In death metal, growls are used as an instrument to their fullest extent. To me, towards the end of "Necrocoprophagia," the interplay between the vocals and the music exemplifies the almost percussive role that vocals can have in death metal. The closing track "Skull Fucking Neonatal Necrosis" is awesome. The headbanging groove that starts off the track reels you in, but it only gets crazier from there. Slams are usually a good outro to a song, and in this case, it's also a good way to close out an album.

Overall, I recommend this album to fans of extreme forms of death metal and fans of slam. To my pleb ears, I don't have a preference between the reissued or the original version. However, maybe fans of the band will hear differences. Regardless, the album is a great time, and it is no surprise the album was so well-received when it was originally released.