If there’s a more unholy or downright disturbing alliance than Dragged Into Sunlight and Gnaw Their Tongues, then I genuinely can’t think of one. Collaborating 5 years after they first met, the nihilistic scousers and their Dutch filth-mongering pal have finally come together and the resultant 5 tracks are terrifyingly brilliant.

In a musical sense, the groove-laden, blackened tar sounds of Dragged Into Sunlight sit perfectly alongside the clanking industry of Gnaw Their Tongues’ experimental noise. If anything though, that perfect (dis)harmony serves only to make the experience even more uncomfortable. In essence, this is the soundtrack to the most disturbing horror film you’ve yet to experience.

Let’s not for a minute think that this is anything other than perfectly listenable, particularly for the already initiated amongst us, but the combination of both acts does offer something different for listeners of each. Whilst heavily weighted in favour of Dragged Into Sunlight’s blast-laden metal, the addition of a whole host of atmospherics makes all the difference. The endlessly disturbing verbal recordings that lace Dragged Into Sunlight’s previous recordings are there in abundance again but where the tension built steadily on ‘Widowmaker’, the policy here is relentless blunt-force trauma from the off.

We may be heading for the season of goodwill, but you’ll find nothing of the sort here. Dragged Into Sunlight and Gnaw Their Tongues should be roundly applauded for that though, because even filth-ridden nihilists deserve a present at this time of year.

4/5

N.V. by Dragged Into Sunlight/Gnaw Their Tongues is out now on Prosthetic Records.

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Words by Rob Fearnley.