The pioneering grindcore outfit's 16th long-player and the follow-up to 2015's unrelenting
Apex Predator - Easy Meat, the aptly titled
Throes of Joy in the Jaws of Defeatism is a sonic cudgel swung with extreme prejudice into the face of the worst that humanity has to offer.
Napalm Death is one of the few extreme metal acts to consistently eschew the generalized nihilism of the genre in favor of a more humanistic approach, at least lyrically. As hell-bent on exposing society's ills as it is removing the vertebrae from your neck, the generous 15-song set delivers a potent and whiplash-inducing barrage of death metal, hardcore, thrash, crust punk, and noise rock that bears down on its quarry with raptor-like acuity. Opener "Fuck the Factoid," a two-and-a-half-minute exclamation point/blastbeat tutorial, and the like-minded "Backlash Just Because" set a relentless pace, but as the album progresses it becomes clear that the band have no intention of resting on their considerable grindcore laurels. Echoes of the discordant noise rock of
Daughters and
Swans add ambiance to the otherwise seismic "Contagion" and "Belly Full of Spleen," both of which pair punishing riffage with clean post-rock exteriors. Elsewhere, the punchy "Amoral" flirts with grimy West Midlands-style NWOBHM, the blazing "White Kross" applies a hint of groove to its gnarly blend of punk-metal and post-hardcore, while the monastic early moments of "Invigorating Clutch" eventually give way to a tsunami of caustic, midtempo sludge. Nearly 40 years into their career,
Napalm Death remain pugilists to the core, and it's in the crucible of that apoplexy that they unearthed the sordidly splendid
Throes of Joy in the Jaws of Defeatism. ~ James Christopher Monger
