Written by Kep
Celestial Sanctuary – Visions of Stagnant Blood
> Death metal
> UK
> Released June 11
If you’re plugged in to the current death metal scene at all, it would be pretty hard to not already be a fan of Celestial Sanctuary. The UK four-piece made waves with their debut Soul Diminished back in 2021, and then turned those waves to a veritable tsunami last year with their sophomore effort Insatiable Thirst for Torment (which, you may remember, I adored). Many bands would be content to do some touring and enjoy the success of a hit album for a couple years. Celestial Sanctuary, as it turns out, are not one of them.
Nothing like a surprise mini-album to keep the fans on their toes and a band’s name on the tip of the tongue, eh? Celestial Sanctuary are here to give the people what they want—nay, NEED: a three-track, 19-minute dose of filthy big boy death metal to kick off the summer. Visions of Stagnant Blood is just what the doctor ordered, if the doctor were Rifflover McStankface, MD. It’s short, not so sweet, and drives home its point like a railway spike beneath a sledge…and still manages to show growth in the band’s songwriting chops.
The biggest bulk of that 19-minute runtime is in the closer, “Gavage of the Vile”, an appropriately grimy biohazard of a track that stretches over ten minutes in length. Celestial Sanctuary hasn’t been afraid to write longer, densely composed songs in the past—“Trapped Within the Rank Membrane”, Insatiable Thirst’s opener, was notably 6:26 of pure pulverizing punishment that set the tone for that album—but “Gavage” is by far the lengthiest number in their discography. It doesn’t feel like ten minutes, either, because it’s actually quite tightly written. A towering intro built on tremolos and an eerie klaxon in solo guitar, sequences of vocal verses and two instances of a huge booming “chorus” highlighted by frontman Thomas Cronin’s drawn out howls, and the song has already reached seven minutes and a quiet, shimmery interlude. From there it’s back into a final stretch of howling brutality, capped by an animalistic “OH YEAH” and a wicked solo. It’s a hell of a show piece for a band that’s just at the start of their prime.
The release’s other two tracks offer plenty of pus-ridden, gore-soaked pleasures. The opening title track rips and bludgeons its way through a breathless three minutes, all power and blasts and evil downturning riffs while Cronin spews and raves madly over top. My favorite track lies in the middle position: the deliciously named “Puddles of You Reflect the Filth Within”. It gets rolling with a frantic Cannibal Corpse riff before finding its filthy home in a monster mid-tempo chug that’ll leave your neck sore. The song spends a lot of time in that “Scourge of Iron” sort of vicinity, then blending the edges of those deeply satisfying chug passages into more expansive stretches with a macabre guitar melody above.
I’m not sure what more death metal fans could ask for. Bassist Jay Rutterford gets some tasty moments to shine and lays a layer of thick grime down on the bottom end, while Cronin and fellow guitarist Matt Adnett do plenty of the thing we love them for: channeling bits of influence from our old school faves together to make one hideous hulking monstrosity. Cronin’s vocal performance is brutal like sandpaper scrubbed across a weeping gash, and drummer James Burke turns in another strong, well-suited slab of meaty work behind the kit. It’s just killer death metal, top to bottom—though I do feel like the production has more in common with their debut than I’d prefer, given how big and wide Insatiable Thirst sounded last year.
THE BOTTOM LINE
Surprise! You’ve got nearly twenty more minutes of Celestial Sanctuary jams in your life now, and they don’t disappoint. Visions of Stagnant Blood is more of what we’ve come to expect: big, filthy death metal with riffs for days. Don’t think twice, just crank the volume up and get that head banging.