Dragged into Sunlight’s first full length Hatred for Mankind was originally released in late 2009 on Mordgrimm records.   Despite being well over a year old, the album has only recently been released on Prosthetic, and become widely available. Dragged into Sunlight are a very difficult band to classify, as their style touches on just about every type of extreme metal that I can think of.  First and foremost though, Hatred For Mankind is an abrasive and oppressively heavy album.

The album opens with “Boiled Angel,” a track that had me thinking of Godflesh’s Streetcleaner album almost immediately.  The thick, distorted guitar tone, and mechanical drive of the song really seemed to be channeling the vibe of that classic album.  Hatred for Mankind isn’t pure Godflesh worship though, not even close.   This becomes abundantly clear when “Boiled Angel” blends into the album’s second track “Buried With Leeches.”  The up-tempo death metal riff that marks this transition comes across as both jarring and seamless at the same time, taking the album in a whole different direction.  By the end of the second track, it was clear that this was a pretty unique album.  Dragged Into Sunlight are primarily mixing death and black metal together, but they sprinkle in hints of sludge and grind.  The whole thing is filtered through a production that fuses the different styles in a way that defies typical genre mixing descriptions.  The production gives the album a cold, murky feel with a nice thick bottom end.  The result is a dense rumble that creates the kind of heaviness that gnaws at the pit of your stomach. 

Vocalist T’s variety show of grunts, growls and shrieks, is accompanied by spoken word samples from a mixture of nefarious people, I picked out Charles Manson and a couple of serial killers, and you no doubt have heard some of them before.  These samples lurk just a bit below the surface, causing the listener to strain just a little to completely understand them, a trait that really helps them blend into the album without dominating the songs.   The drumming is also note worthy, as it is surprisingly well defined given the overall density of the album.  J makes good use of his kit, blasting away at will, but keeping things busy and interesting when something less straight-ahead is warranted. 

Hatred for Mankind is an ugly, and malevolent sounding album that creates a bleak, suffocating atmosphere.  Dragged into Sunlight do a great job of harnessing the brute force of death metal and fusing it with some of the subtle atmospheric elements that are more common in black metal.   When I take the samples and the production into account though, my mind keeps drifting back to bands like Godflesh and Neurosis.  After multiple listens I still can’t really classify this release as belonging to one genre in particular.  Hatred for Mankind is best taken as a whole, as samples of the album fail to properly capture the wide swath of the metal world that these guys draw influence from.  If you like death, black or sludge metal though I recommend that you give this thing a couple of spins front to back.  It probably won’t be the best album that I hear this year, but I am sure that it will be one of the most unique.

TRACK LISTING

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*Comments:

1.  Boiled Angel
2.  Buried with Leeches
3.  Volcanic Birth
4.  To Hieron
5.  Lashed to the Grinder
     & Stoned to Death
6.  I, Aurora
7.  Totem of Skulls

Total playing time:  51:37

Release Date: January 18th 2011
Label: Prosthetic Records

Dragged into Sunlight - Hatred for Mankind

Reviewer: Garett

May 5, 2011