If you haven’t figured it out based on your email inbox bursting at the seams, It Is Bandcamp Friday.

Before we all head out for the weekend, real quick let me call your attention to two releases (one from early last year and one from early this year) by Pittsburgh’s Coffin Womb, self-described as “A bunch of losers who just want to ruin your day.”

Coffin Womb – Godless (Syrup Moose Records, 23 February 2024)

Coffin Womb – The Trauma Process (self-released, 10 January 2025)

* * * * *

Upon its premiere just before its release last February, 15-track LP Godless was called “music to set racists, homophobes, transphobes, sexist pieces of shit on fire to” by prolific frontperson K.M.North, which sounds like a ringing endorsement to me!

Newer (by about eleven months) album The Trauma Process was described thusly on Coffin Womb‘s Bandcamp page: “This album is not perfect. The mixes were lost in a hard drive failure. These are what was left. Enjoy.” Perhaps a less enthusiastic summation, but anyone out there who is looking for perfection can go content yourselves with some auto-tuned AI-generated bullshit with zero creativity and zero soul.

Anyway, listening to these records has a similar vibe to taking the Neurosis discography collectively — the extremely hardcore-oriented early stuff and the sludgey post-hardcore latter bits — and throwing it all into a blender. Along with a sprinkling of grindcore vibes and industrial aesthetic for good measure. I’m not sure if “post-grind” is a thing that exists? Throughout these tracks you will encounter some of that freneticism and chaos, and certainly the inspiration and attitude here fall squarely in the punk side of the punk/metal continuum, but something about the atmosphere feels a little more out-there, hence the post- descriptor. Or to put it another way, imagine a grind project partially under the influence of cough syrup?

Referring back to that 2024 interview, the creator of these songs also said, “My whole goal is when you’re done listening to Coffin Womb that you are shell shocked. I want that 1,000 yard stare. I want you to shake and then message your friend to listen to it so they suffer like you did.” Well, consider this me messaging you, my friends.

* * *

Godless is available from Syrup Moose in digital or cassette formats here; The Trauma Process can be found digitally over here.
 

Coffin Womb: Bandcamp
 
Syrup Moose Records: website | Bandcamp | Bluesky | merch store