Viscera have set Hunting Season for 12 February on Unique Leader Records, with Merciless By Nature out first and filmed.
It is their third album and the guest list is longer than the band. Jesse Leach of Killswitch Engage sings on In The Belly Of The Beast, Matt Heafy of Trivium on The Lie That Sets You Free, and Joe Badolato of Fit For An Autopsy on Hivemind. Alan Grnja of Distant and Andreas Bjulver of Cabal share the title track, and the closer Moongazer goes to the former Crystal Lake and Last Ten Seconds Of Life singer now in Dirt Helmet.
Six guests across ten songs is a lot of borrowed weight for a band who do not need it. Jamie Graham has been shouting over this material since 2019 and the Manchester five piece have been on Unique Leader long enough to headline their own corner of the roster.
Merciless By Nature is the eighth track and sits where this band usually sit, between the technical death metal they can actually play and the breakdown the room came for. Carcinogenesis was 2023 and Obsidian 2020, so the gap has been three years.
The cover art and the full running order went up with the announcement.