All This Filth: Misery Season (Label: Rockpit Records)

NOTE: ATF were a five piece, with only one guitarist, when they recorded. The second guitarist joined before the tour.

We caught All This Filth at Staves Brewery as part of their Drowning in Misery tour, in support of this release with a new line-up. And, we were totally blown away. The Perth industrial groove metal band was tight, focused, and used their uncompromising sound as a cathartic release, like primal scream therapy.

Misery Season opens with a sample of a pouring storm with mutters and a magnificent piano melody which is the perfect introduction to Misery Season before the album launches into the first track, harking back to the more orchestrated bands of the seventies, like Rainbow, without letting go of the more aggressive music that has impacted them all.

There’s a great deal happening on this album, musically. The band members bring their outside influences into the mix while remaining honest to their group vision. They create a stunning mix of thrash, hardcore, death, and sludge to fashion something unique. Every instrument gets a showcasing in the mix. The music bounces making you want to mosh.

The album is filled with little cinematic interludes that add to the dips and builds. The drummer, Keiffer McMillan, is clearing having a ball. That, mixed with Mark Honey’s crushing guitar and Cam Harris’ muscular bass, supported with Benny Bones’ the keyboards and anguished howls of Brendan Preston, you have the epic that is Misery Season.

There is the feel that this is a concept. An overall theme runs through Brendan’s acutely personal lyrics. However, we may be interpreting our own take on the story, if there is one. And, that’s the beauty in the album.

All This Filth are a Purposeful and resolute band with a message and a purpose. We look forward to seeing them live again.

NOTE: ATF were a five piece, with only one guitarist, when they recorded. The second guitarist joined before the tour.