The Vomit Arsonist – Meditations On Giving Up Completely CD (Malignant)

Anyone familiar with The Vomit Arsonist’s past body of work should know to expect a healthy dose of negativity and hopelessness with every release, but never has that been more true than with his 5th full length, Meditations on Giving Up Completely. There is no reinvention of the sound and no veering off course, but rather a narrowing of the sonic palette, condensed into a continual free-fall of complete despair and nihilism. As Andy Grant described it, Meditations is a release about "futility, failure, and no longer being able to find even a shred of worth in humanity". That mindset is perfectly captured and reflected in the stripped down, monolithic nature and sheer dense weight of the 7 tracks here, where distant furnace blasts and scraping metal abrasions churn amidst toxic fumes and opaque, polluted murk, the vocals roaring through the mix in thick sheets of distorted fury. Those with a fragile mental state may want to steer clear of this one, but for those that find solace with the curtains drawn or at the end of a rope, Meditations on Giving Up Completely is unwavering in its direction and resolute in its approach.