Track Premiere: Brazilian Metal Punks Obsoletion Reveal “Abominable New World”
Obsoletion's upcoming self-titled album, releasing on October 11, 2024, marks their evolution with the track "Abominable New World," blending dystopian themes with their distinctive and original blackened hardcore sound.
Few bands manage to capture the essence and magic of punk and metal quite like Brazil’s Obsoletion. Formed in 2018 in São Paulo, they caught the attention of local label Thinking Straight Records and released their demo tape in 2019.
This six-track debut was a great nod to the mystery and allure of early extreme metal, the fierce darkness of ’90s legends like Integrity, and the raw brutality of pioneering “negative” Japanese and USHC bands. With thrashing riffs and cavernous, old-school production, the band explores lyrical themes of dark science fiction, post-apocalyptic visions of a very possible dystopian future, and a spiteful yet pessimistic political stance.
Obsoletion’s new self-titled album, scheduled for release on Sentient Ruin Records on October 11, 2024, also centers around these morbid topics. After a couple of lineup changes, the band’s vision is clearer than ever. The album’s fourth track, “Abominable New World,” is a grand representation of their evolution and what the debut album will be like. With its not-so-veiled reference to Aldous Huxley’s famous dystopian novel Brave New World—where humans are genetically engineered and conditioned for specific roles, individuality and critical thinking are suppressed, and consumerism dominates all aspects of life—the song taps into similar themes.
Beyond Huxley, the album’s artwork and underlying themes also evoke classic and modern literary references like Orwell’s 1984, Gibson’s Neuromancer, Vonnegut’s Player Piano, M.T. Anderson’s Feed, or Richard K. Morgan’s Altered Carbon. The Brazilian band paints a dark vision of a world where AI technology becomes more horrifying each day when ruled by exploitative corporate entities, and where humanity has ceased to live organically—totally dependent on an increasingly one-dimensional political order in which profit and capital rule above all, and humans are mere cogs in the machine, if even that.
This concept is powerfully complemented by the band’s distinctive blackened hardcore style. The ominous death growls—reminiscent of early Sepultura, Vulcano, or Possessed—hook you from the start. Their killer guitar work instantly throws you into a dimension of despair, evoking a strong Celtic Frost/Hellhammer vibe, but played and composed with the exquisite approach of metallic hardcore bands like Integrity, crust punk pioneers like Amebix or Japanese metal-punk legends Effigy. The thunderous rhythm section introduces itself with a raw bass sound and drumming style akin to Sodom, Bathory, or G.I.S.M.’s Detestation, with definitely a touch of Voivod in there too.
While clearly influenced by various genres and niches of musical aesthetics, Obsoletion still manage to sound original as hell—unlike a cult band like Darkthrone, which, despite attempting something similar in terms of musical conception over the last 15 years, often ends up sounding boring and bland.
Despite its short duration, “Abominable New World” is truly a sinister hymn of dystopian nightmares and an integral piece of Obsoletion’s utterly bleak sonic journey into the possible realities of the near future.
Listen to “Abominable New World” here:
Brace yourselves for October 11, 2024, when Obsoletion’s self-titled debut album is blasting out—this is one truly worth paying attention to. The album is up for pre-order on Sentient Ruin’s website and Bandcamp page.
