Worm Altar have put Pillars of Eternal Dusk online in full, two days before Gurgling Gore release it on Friday. It is their first album, after a demo in 2022 and an EP the year after, and there is a cassette edition as well.
Six songs, and the pacing is the whole argument. The record moves between death metal at full weight and passages slow enough to count, and it has not been cleaned up: the production keeps the grime because the music needs it, and the melodic detail is underneath rather than on top.
The names they give as influences are precise rather than decorative. Gorement and diSEMBOWELMENT for the death doom, Phrenelith and Grave Upheaval for the cavernous end, Coffins and Mortiferum for the crawl, and Black Sabbath because everything here comes from there eventually.
Portland, Maine is not a scene with a history in this music, which makes a band assembling a full line up around it and getting a debut onto vinyl and tape a local event as much as a release.