Review by Greg on September 22, 2025.

So, a couple of years ago, after having spotted an Almost Dead show close to me, supporting none less than Atheist, and subsequently having seen Kelly Shaefer and friends cancel the whole thing (guess you could say I've Almost Seen them... okay, I'm deeply sorry for that), I still did not forget about this Californian thrash/groove quartet I previously had not heard anything about. And yet their latest Destruction Is All We Know is their 6th full-length in more than two decades of activity. With such a title, and having been released in January, I'm already expecting the most hostile album I'm likely to come across all year...

This concoction of thrash and groove metal does not limit itself to these vague premises, however. I'm not familiar with Almost Dead's back catalog, but far from being the umpteenth mere Pantera/Exhorder offspring, I'd probably think of Destruction Is All We Know as a meeting point between the thrashiest moments of The Haunted and the boneheaded hardcore stomp of something like Lamb of God, or Superjoint Ritual at their grooviest. The mention of the oft-hated Swedish outfit isn't unjustified since, every now and then, the band breaks away from the constant bludgeoning and enriches the recipe with some unexpected, all too rare Scandinavian touches here and there. You won't have to wait much for the first example: the symphonic(!) reinforcements in the incredible opener 'Warheads In The Sky', which is so explosive it might as well have caused the detonation pictured on the artwork – I mean, it opens with brute frontman Tony Rolandelli belting out the album title, after all. Seriously, listen to that irresistible pre-chorus riff, or that simply glorious, fist-in-the-air refrain. This is truly the stuff of legends. Also notable are the flat-out melodeath tendencies of 'Within The Ashes' and the especially intense 'Where Sinners Cry', the plausible MVP of the album. Drummer Ryan Glick's unforgiving blasting and endless tempo changes steal the show in a way I'd have never expected on a groove metal album, but there's more to it all, as those two tracks would be passable as lost and never recorded The Black Dahlia Murder songs (obviously Rolandelli's extremely Trevor Strnad-esque strident high register fed the comparison), respectively with a rotten, 'This Godless Endeavor'-like-but-not-quite-in-the-right-octave solo wrapping the whole track up, and in the closer's awesome intro. Such a fascinating display of versatility while still sounding incessantly and thoroughly pissed off and proud of it. Damn, I'm really digging this stuff.

Now, the reason I mentioned those exact three songs is, well, because they're sadly also the only episodes where Almost Dead break out of the norm. And yeah, I might be biased for not being a sucker for tough guy chugfests like 'Eight Eyes Of Black' or 'Nightmare Coming', where said Pantera influence returns in full force, but re-listening to how extremely and epically devastating the above-mentioned highlights are does nothing but accentuate the contrast between the two 'sides' of the band, and I'm left sincerely perplexed by that. Sure, tracks like 'Commandments Of Coercion' with some very vaguely semi-(maybe quarter-?)clean vocals or, after a rather lazy first half, 'Brutal Devotion' are anything but friendly, and 'Selfish Suicide' is worth it for maybe the longest breakdown I've ever heard, with Glick being arguably the last to surrender to the slowest tempos in any case. I can't say each and every track maintains a strong identity and independence from the others, but there was at least some effort in that regard, as well as enough attention to fit the whole package in slightly less than an adequate 40 minutes playing time.

As such, expressing a final judgment about Destruction Is All We Know wasn't easy. I sure liked it way more than I expected, but with some reservations... meanwhile, if you were already fond of Almost Dead's aggressive groove/thrash blend and had actually high expectations for this one, boy, I think it's gonna be a game-changing album for you. As for me, I'll eagerly dream of the day they'll release a new album with more songs in the vein of... well, you should guess which ones, by now.

Rating: 7.4