Withered - Grief Relic (2016)

When guitarist Mike Thompson founded Withered with drummer Beau Brandon in 2003, they sounded nothing like most of their hometown contemporaries. At that point, Atlanta, Georgia (alongside Savannah) was about to churn out a bumper crop of melodic and progressive sludge acts like Mastodon, Baroness, Kylesa, and Black Tusk, but Withered always had more in common with classic Florida death metal and obscure Norwegian black metal. Neither the bands they came up alongside nor their own musical influences shared Thompson’s elegiac sound and introspective lyrics, though, and so Withered remained a wholly separate entity, caught between two worlds and sworn to none.

Not that it mattered. A rising tide raises all boats, and Withered went on to release three well-received records, culminating in 2010’s cult classic Dualitas. Lineup changes kept the band from polishing off new material for longer than anticipated, but now, six years later, Thompson has solidified the Withered lineup with the addition of bassist and producer Colin Marston (also of Dysrhythmia and Gorguts), and Primitive Man guitarist and vocalist Ethan McCarthy (who also pitched in lyrics). Together, they’ve just finished the fourth Withered album, Grief Relic, which is due on May 27th via Season of Mist—right in time for their upcoming North American tour with fellow Southern malcontents Inter Arma.

Fitting its title, Grief Relic sounds old and gloomy. With McCarthy’s aid, Thompson has written an emotional death metal record that meditates on the inevitability of human suffering, drawing on the warmth of an analog production to drive its point home. In 2016, Withered remains one of the few bands willing to take the power inherent in extreme metal and focus it not on bloody escapism, but on the grinding reality that is daily life for most people. Grief Relic is a death metal soundtrack to many evenings of insomnia spent staring at the ceiling recounting the little regrets, failures and indignities that follow us all.