UMUR
"Serpent Devourment" is the third full-length studio album by Danish death metal act Maceration. The album was released through Emanzipation Productions in January 2025. It´s the successor to "It Never Ends..." from November 2022. "It Never Ends..." was a comeback album from Maceration who at that time had not released an album since the 1992 "A Serenade of Agony" debut full-length studio album. Maceration was originally a project band formed by two members of Invocator and "A Serenade of Agony" also featured the prolific Swedish musician/producer Dan Swanö (Edge of Sanity, Bloodbath, Nightingale...etc.) on vocals. Swanö also performed vocals on "It Never Ends...", but on "Serpent Devourment" he doesn´t perform, but is instead responsible for the mixing and mastering of the album. Since "It Never Ends..." almost the entire lineup has actually changed and it´s only guitarists Jakob Schultz and Robert Tengs (who has switched from bass to guitar) who remain from the lineup who recorded "It Never Ends...".
Stylistically this sounds very Swedish...the guitar tone, the mid- to fast-paced brutality, and the relatively simple structures of the tracks. I´m often reminded of especially Grave (and occasionally of Dismember), although Maceration add more gloomy atmospheric moments with lead guitar themes and solos. The musicianship and the sound production are top notch for the genre, and the songwriting is effective and relatively memeorable too, so although "Serpent Devourment" is neither a huge surprise (it´s more or less the naturel development I had expected since "It Never Ends...") nor a standout album in the genre, it´s a solid effort from Maceration and defnitely worth a listen if you´re interested in old school Scandinavian death metal. A 3.5 star (70%) rating is deserved.
