Review by Michael on April 22, 2026.

German Anasarca, being active since 1995 are back with their fifth full-length album "Achlys" out via the very good Polish underground label Selfmadegod Records.

Three of the new songs, namely "Achlys", "He Is Dead" and "In Memoriam" were already to be found on the 2024 promo "Goddess Of The Somber Shape", the rest was previously unreleased. So anybody who heard the promo or knows the previous albums knows what is to come for the next 40 minutes.

Kicking off with a short intro from "Funeral March" with some ghastly spoken words, the first song breaks in like a sudden nuclear strike. If you aren't prepared for this inferno, you might get a shock when you listen too relaxed to the song. The track, like the rest on the album, is full of blast beat attacks and super fast brutal death metal. Not the shitty brutal death metal bands with colored Bermuda shorts and pink sunglasses performing while the fans are going nuts in the fucking circle pit, no this is real old-school death metal as it was popular in the early 90s when Suffocation and co still were kicking ass and were some sort of new shit in town.

Apart from all the brutality you also can find some catchier parts in the songs that almost groove and what is also clearly to state is the technical quality of the songs. The instruments are performed very well and just take as a good example "Basket Of Burdens". This all comes together here and delivers really high quality death metal. Other really good and catchy ones are "Pain Remains" and "Wish You Were Here". Kicking off with a fast drum pattern, "Pain Remains" stays more or less melodic and reminds (at least me) of newer Cannibal Corpse albums with all the arrangements, the tempo and also the vocals. "Wish You Were Here" (no, it's not a Rednex cover song!) tends into the same direction but has some more breaks and twists in the middle of it.

This might be the biggest point of criticism on the album. The songs are often in the same direction and some surprising moments such as the one at the beginning of the album or in the mentioned tracks are missing here and there. To be fair, also the big role models aren't too surprising on most of the albums and I can actually live with that kind of music pretty well, so let this just be a small footnote here.

What has also become quite good is the powerful production. Especially in that genre sometimes the drums sound too tinny or muffled but on "Achlys" they sound really good. Also the rest of the instruments and the vocals are executed very well so the sound gives no reason to mourn in any way.

If you are into some serious brutal death metal stuff you should check the Germans for sure, this is probably no disappointment or waste of time! There is only one thing to hope – that the next song isn't called "Cotton Eye Joe"!

Rating: 8 out of 10