While cross pollination between hardcore and black metal is now thoroughly commonplace, back in the late 90s it was a different story. Bar a handful of bands (Gehenna, Knives & Greenwater and Congress if you count those funny/incredible Ieper Fest photos…) the twain rarely met, with most metal-inclined hc kids more focused on ripping off Slayer or breaking endless e-strings in their endless quest for god-tier beatdowns.
Spread The Disease were another bunch of weirdos who chose to look to frost-blasted Scandinavia for influence, putting out a handful of outlier releases on labels like Eulogy, Good Life and Witching Hour before quietly powering down. That they’ve returned after 27 years isn’t really a surprise considering the endless nostalgia fest that hardcore has become and the fact that every band ever is now iconic / legendary / the 🐐, but what is refreshing is just how bitter, brutal and vitally alive the new material sounds.
The album’s success is, I think, based on the band having stuck to their guns rather than trying too hard to contemporise. What I’m saying is that while this is definitely a release that sounds ‘2026’ rather than ‘1998’, Spread The Disease have managed to keep their initial furious spirit intact rather than trying to awkwardly squeeze into whatever clothes today’s youth are currently wearing.
The attack is violent and ugly, but there’s also an unrefined clumpiness to the approach that sounds simultaneously fresh and atavistic. The songs are lean and taut and their design is ironclad, but things also sound crazed and unpredictable. This is due in no small part to their singer (‘new kid’ Shane Post, who served with Bird Of Ill Omen and plays in the deeply unpleasant Fistula), who has his his razorblade-gargling rasp down pat but also sounds genuinely pissed at the world and its inhabitants. It’s this boiling urgency and sense of tightly-controlled chaos that really helps push ‘The Darkness. The Dread. The Suffering.’ over the edge, making it not just a welcome return, but also a thoroughly exciting release in its own right.