Whodathunk that some of the best crust/sludgecore/heavy and nasty whatever in the mid-Atlantic would be coming out of Ocean City? That’d be at least one of Full of Hell’s points of origin, with some membership apparently coming from mid-Pennsylvania. Guess it makes sense. If something was going to react against a normy beach town, cold and caustic eardrum-drilling hardcore would be about the perfect antidote. Full of Hell could be an antidote for a lot of things really: the drug ecstasy, perhaps, or really any warm, fuzzy feeling. Or a baptism.

Not that the band would seem to lean toward black metal in any big way beyond being, well, full of hell. Roots of Earth Are Consuming My Home more so gave me a fairly wicked Tragedy itch with that same sort of big, brutal, and just on the edge of total destruction/pure hardcore violence low-end. It feels great, and the record sustains that rush all through it’s 27-odd-minute running time, whether it’s plodding along, teetering on the edge of a feedback blade—a pretty crucial moment on the title track—or straight speed-pummelling, which happens a lot.

Subgenre subversion is pretty par for the course in new, good underground/extreme metal, and Full of Hell keeps up just fine. The first taste you get of the record is grindcore: Electronics build and swell for a minute or so, the song runs out of fuse, and the ensuing 30 seconds level everything in sight. The aptly named “The Oars Are Broken” seems like it’s about to pull a similar trick, moving in with a kinda grooving bass and drums lounge-jazz combo underneath a cloud cover of noise and more feedback, but just bobs there not really traveling anywhere—till the next song, five minutes of, well, everything: grindy bursts, thin blades of noise, Sleepy sludge hell. Rinse, repeat. So far, I can only imagine what kind of awesome hurt this band is capable of live; if Full of Hell can make half of this storm in a room with people, goddamn.

Full of Hell plays with Thou and the Body at the Golden West café Oct. 9. For more information visit goldenwestcafe.com.

> Email Michael Byrne