A Double Dose of Hell: Vicious Blade and Blasted Heath Share Two Tracks from Upcoming Four-Way Compilation

Wise Blood Records is back once again with a new four-way split: Faster Than The Devil 2 is a slightly-renamed sequel to Faster Than the Fucking Devil that pays more respect to algorithms, but not your neck. Faster Than The Devil 2 showcases four bands this time around: Pittsburgh’s Vicious Blade, Indianapolis’ Blasted Heath, New Jersey’s The Gauntlet, and Philadelphia’s Bastard Cröss; there are a lot of things shared among the bands but make no mistake, they are also very different. Vicious Blade’s blackened crust stylings work well in conjunction with Blasted Heath’s more death metal approach with a sense of manic melodicism thrown into the mix. Meanwhile, The Gauntlet offers fiery black and speedy Bathory-styled tracks, and finally Bastard Cröss close it all out with blackened thrash, making this whole split the perfect kind of combination of chaos that keeps listeners guessing as they enter and exit each crazed quadrant.

Today we are dropping two of the 12 tracks, featuring half of the bands: Vicious Blade’s “Scorched” and Blasted Heath’s “Spiraling (Crossing The Event Horizon)” are a combination that will get your Monday going like nothing else. Pure speed on one side of the coin, death metal that starts simple and ends up in the cosmos by the end on the other; the perfect kind of contrast to get those juices flowing. Make sure to pick this thing up on September 29th.

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Wise Blood Records main man Sean Frasier had this to say when deciding to make Faster Than The Devil an annual affair:

Last year Wise Blood released Faster Than the Fucking Devil, a four-band split aiming to capture the wild-blooded spirit of Warefare Noise and thrash compilations from the '80s. When I was growing up as a broke metalhead when dial-up internet was grand spankin’ new, splits and comps were an economical way to discover killer new bands. After the success of FTTFD last year, I decided to turn the concept into an annual series. Faster Than the Devil 2 is a savage sequel that leans away from identifying as a black thrash split. It's more about honoring the primordial ooze of fast and filthy heavy metal (Bathory, Motorhead, Sarcofago, Slayer, Celtic Frost, etc) regardless of subgenre.

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Faster than the Devil 2 releases September 29th via Wise Blood Records.