When As Gods Devour by Ribspreader drops, you immediately realise what you’ve got in store: a band long steeped in the shadows of Swedish Death Metal, sharpened by time, who aren’t here to re-invent anything so much as to burn it all to the fucking ground..
Ribspreader have been around since 2003, a project of Rogga Johansson, joined over the years by changing line-ups, now with Håkan Stuvemark on lead guitar and Jon Rudin on drums for this album. This is their 11th studio album, and with As Gods Devour they throw down a gauntlet so heavy and rotten-edged that other bands in the genre will feel it clawing at their throat.
Rogga’s voice, guitar, bass— carries weight everywhere on this record, while the new members add muscle and precision, but never softness; they’re not softening the blow, they’re amplifying the brutality, the rot, the carnage. From track one, As Gods Devour, it hits you: riffs that buzz with vicious intent, rhythms that stomp with menace, and vocals that sound like they crawled out of some half-buried pit. Lyrically and tonally, this feels like Ribspreader at their most uncompromising.
Each song title—The Pig in You, Cold Dead World, Rotten Soil Serenade, Punish You—signals there’s no room for mercy here. What makes this album stand out is not just its brutality, but how well Ribspreader shape the brutality into art. This isn’t noise made for its own sake; there are moments when the riffs coil and stretch, giving you breathing room before roaring back. You get passages that are straight-forward death metal stomp, others that feel almost cinematic in their atmosphere, but always with that Swedish core: savage guitar tone, chord progressions that hint at that frosty, mid-winter coldness, hyper-charged drums that pummel every crack and shadow.
The production on As Gods Devour is excellent. It preserves the raw edge you expect from old-school Swedish Death Metal, but with clarity enough that the brutality doesn’t become a blur. You can pick out the guitar details, the weird echoes and decay in certain leads, the drum hits that sting, the bass rumbles that underlie everything like a low rumble of earth shifting. This clarity matters, because it lets you hear the craftsmanship beneath the carnage.
If there’s a thing to admire, it’s consistency. Over 11 albums, many bands tire or lose focus. Ribspreader here sound like they’ve spent that time in the Death Metal gym, honing every sinew. As Gods Devour doesn’t just continue their legacy, it reinforces it. It shows that Rogga Johansson isn’t just churning out albums — he’s refining a vision, pushing the envelope of Swedish Death without losing its core identity.
Bottom line: this is Ribspreader at their height. Fast, filthy, rotten, and heavy. As Gods Devour both praises the bloody path that came before and drags you deeper into the abyss with fresh teeth. It’s a statement — one that says, “We’re still here. We still threaten. And we still fucking devour.
As Gods Devour by Ribspreader is out September 30th via Xtreem Music.
CHOICE CUT: Deadhunter
The Black Metal Archives Verdict: Ribspreader have delivered a scything, merciless slice of Swedish Death Metal that tears apart the complacent and cements their legacy.
PRESS SOURCE: Cátia C./Against PR.
