The Body

The Body are, for want of a better phrase, absolutely fucking bonkers. From the trippy All the Waters of the Earth Shall Turn to Blood to the disturbing video for the track “The Ebb and Flow of Tides in a Sea of Ash” (don’t click that link if you’re of a nervous disposition) that’s featured on this new EP, The Body have always been a band to push the boundaries of acceptability and their extremity is theirs entirely. No one can touch this duo in terms of an output of complete insanity and Master, We Perish is a three song descent into a whole new level of hell. 

Air raid sirens introduce the aforementioned “The Ebb and Flow of Tides in a Sea of Ash” and a steady thrum of unease situates itself right in the centre of your heart. Sludgy reams of guitar churn beneath Chip King’s heightened screams of utter devastation - his voice is instantly recognisable in tone and terror and is one that conjures images of deep tracts of horror almost immediately. “The Blessed Lie Down and Writhe With Agony” rolls in industrial drum beats (Lee Buford) and curious choral vocal lines – performed by The Assembly of Light Choir, who also appeared on the previously mentioned All The Waters of the Earth Shall Turn To Blood - are interspersed with an unsettling sample that King eventually takes over with his high level screech before a shotgun pump action kicks this song into another gear. The Body shift into doomed patterns of true hatred before the third and final track, “Worship” twists into being with droned out sections and stripped down lines of total noise-based abhorrence. The song filters out with no real ending, as have the other two pieces of music on this EP. It’s a strange and unusual approach, but then, The Body are strange and unusual. Never once a sludge act, or a doom project or even drone or black metal or anything that easy to pinpoint, The Body are an entity to be endured rather than enjoyed and for that they should be praised. 

8.5 / 10 — Cheryl