Trenchgrinder - Peace Is Forfeit

Forever locked in a war of attrition.

(Originally submitted to the Metal Archives on February 7th 2024) 

Chances are I’ll get my “death metal fan” licence revoked for this, but I’m not a huge Bolt Thrower fan. Sure, there’s a couple of their albums I enjoy, but ultimately they never resonated with me quite as much as they seem to have with most extreme metal fans. What’s even weirder is that I have found myself to be more engaged by bands inspired by them, which cropped up with metal’s revival in the 21st century. Among these bands is Trenchgrinder, whose debut, Peace Is Forfeit is a release I found myself listening to far more often than I ever expected for some reason.

Now as one might have gathered from my prologue and the band’s name, this is some exceptionally militaristic death metal, filled to the brim with drumming and riffs that, like their main inspiration, sound like a tank running over you. That being said, while they do take a lot of influence from Bolt Thrower (“Waking Terror” even features the “World Eater” riff at the end), it’s far more chaotic in nature, and they’re not averse to adding some extra sauce to the mix. For one, they use blast beats far more often, something that is particularly effective on the first proper track here, “Lay the Earth to Rest”, whose jagged riffing and chaotic drumming are an excellent showcase of the band’s excess ferocity.

Trenchgrinder might seem deceptively simple at first glance, but in reality there’s a lot of cool details to uncover on repeat listens, with stylistic diversions like the manic thrashing of “For Knowledge of Blood”, the more crust-leaning pace of the title track, or the doomy inflection of “Destroyer Unmaker”. They’re not just repurposing Bolt Thrower riffs, even though their spectre looms large over the music. Not to mention the noisy lead work that is unfortunately not as common as I’d have liked, rearing its head on select occasions like “Deterrence and Retribution”. It’s things that I didn’t originally pick up on my first listen, and only caught wind of as the album inexplicably drew me back in.

There’s also the matter of atmosphere, something I didn’t expect to bring up when talking about a release such as this one. It’s genuinely suffocating, with the instrumentation doing nothing short of outright obliterating the listener. It’s pure grime and it sounds huge, especially the drums and the bass -arguably the stars of the show here- providing the tunes here with most of their oomph. And I couldn’t possibly forget Owen Rundquist’s vocals, which are quite the peculiar fit for this music, seeing as they lean far more into black metal with all the rasping and snarling. Undoubtedly he won’t be everyone’s cup of tea, but I find them to couple along nicely with the more feral approach.

For how good Peace Is Forfeit is though, it lacks one thing, and that is a “superb” standout. Discounting “Incursion” and “Desolation”, this is a uniform 28-minute beatdown that, while flowing nicely, doesn’t have a specific tune that makes me think “This is it”. There’s bits and pieces here and there, but ultimately it’s a holistic experience. Ironically enough, the aforementioned two tracks are some of the most memorable because there are some forlorn doomy melodies peeking through the murk, and they ended up sticking with me the most. It’s unfortunate that they were relegated to being an intro and an outro, respectively.

Trenchgrinder knows how to get one’s blood pumping, but ultimately lacks the "je ne sais quoi" that would make them truly stick with me. Peace Is Forfeit is 33 minutes during which I am having an absolute blast, but find it hard to remember outside of isolated moments after the fact. Nevertheless, it still exercises a hold on me that is frankly beyond my understanding, and that is a win in its own right.

Highlights: Lay the Earth to Rest, Destroyer Unmaker, War to Wage

Rating: 77%