Album Review: Minors – Abject Bodies (Holy Roar Records/Deathwish)

It’s been a little over a year since Canadian band Minors’ label debut, the critically acclaimed Atrophy (2017, Holy Roar Records). A self-described “endless pit of despair”, the release tore its way through an unprepared underground music community with its uncompromising and hypnotic bend of sludge and hardcore.

The quartet are now back, intent on taking their listeners as far as they can, on their trip into the most oppressing and dismal place the mind can conjure. Abject Bodies will be released 22nd February 2019 via Holy Roar Records (UK/EU) and Deathwish (US/CAN).

Minors intent is fulfilled as Abject Bodies absolutely delivers a desperate and despairing listen. The crushing weight of everything they have forced down hard on the listener. It’s sludge, it’s hardcore, it’s metal but the most important thing is that it’s good.

After a lengthy and horrifying intro with the title track, Minors explode with Consumed. A track that is wildness personified and as likely to cause someone to throw up as it is to create a circle pit of chaos. The vocal intensity is on another level here.

It’s no major surprise that Meanderist continues the same level of crazy intensity. The sound of a band in complete control…just.

If the hardcore fury is getting a bit much for you then Flesh Prison offers brief respite with a wickedly strong doom-infused sludge start before opening up a can of hardcore whoop-ass on every single person within earshot.

Done? Not a bloody chance as Minors continue to expand with tracks that get steadily longer and more inventive. Boneyard and Erode are dripping in filthy feedback and screeching heaviness. Music to drive you mad.

A truly mind-blowing album comes to a close with the longest and most intense track on the album, Garden of Dismalism. The thump of the bass and drums here is simply phenomenal and as it wildly twists and turns all you can do is hold on for dear life.

Minors – Abject Bodies Full Track Listing:

1. Abject Bodies
2. Consumed
3. Meanderist
4. Flesh Prison
5. Boneyard
6. Erode
7. Garden of Dismalism

The UK and EU can order the album here while the US and Canada can order it here. It can also be ordered via Bandcamp here. Find out more about Minors via Facebook Page and Instagram.