{"id":581867,"date":"2026-05-13T14:53:11","date_gmt":"2026-05-13T14:53:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/581867\/"},"modified":"2026-05-13T14:53:11","modified_gmt":"2026-05-13T14:53:11","slug":"jungle-rot-cruel-face-of-war-review","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/581867\/","title":{"rendered":"Jungle Rot – Cruel Face of War Review"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"After four years of studio silence, Kenoshan cavemen Jungle Rot<\/a> emerge from the bush with twelfth platter, Cruel Face of War. For the uninitiated, Jungle Rot<\/a> plays groovy death metal that\u2019s hostile, bludgeoning, and never dares to overthink anything. Their output has been more reliable than our coverage, and reviewing every other album since 2011\u2019s Kill on Command<\/a>, each has earned a \u2018Mixed\u2019 rating. Interestingly, the two albums we missed reviewing, Terror Regime and Jungle Rot, are the best of that group, particularly their self-titled effort. Now faced with our first consecutive Jungle Rot evaluation, can Cruel Face of War break the mold, or does it run through the Jungle on cruise control?<\/p>\n

\u2018Consistency is key\u2019 perseveres as a pillar of advice I mete out and live by, and this lesson sticks with Jungle Rot like flies on a decomposing carcass. After three decades of mouth-breathing death jams, the band still delivers freshly forged OSDM every two to four years that reeks of Obituary<\/a> and Bolt Thrower. While the hardcore and deathcore vestiges have diminished, trace amounts of Hatebreed<\/a> and Slaughter to Prevail lurk within Jungle Rot\u2019s fetid funk, especially Dave Matrise\u2019s vocals. To be fair, any fluctuations in their sound become conversations of degrees, and since Fueled by Hate dropped in 2004, Jungle Rot has been lodged in a groove so deep they haven\u2019t pulled out from it yet.<\/p>\n

\ufeffCruel Face Of War by Jungle Rot<\/a><\/p>\n

Jungle Rot sounds best when they inject a bit of melody into their formula, and those crumbs unerringly serve as the best morsels on Cruel Face of War. Maybe that\u2019s because only those moments break up the monotony of an otherwise wearisome chuggathon, where an unvarying landscape of riffs and grooves blur together into an indistinct sea of homogenous death metal. For instance, the riffs on \u201cWhen the Elders Rise\u201d and \u201cRot Riffs\u201d carry just enough character to help differentiate themselves from the rest of the pack, but otherwise, I can\u2019t distinguish between most others without playing them back-to-back. To Jungle Rot\u2019s credit, they possess a sound uniquely their own. But like a painter who only uses a single color, they lock themselves into a self-imposed prison of uniformity that undercuts any notion of tension or contrast.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

Despite the detractors, Jungle Rot\u2019s adherence to convention pays dividends as well. Pit-ready grooves and stank-inducing verses make great fodder for good ol\u2019 fashioned head-banging, and while the simplicity limits Cruel Face of War\u2019s upside, it also ensures a stable foundation to build upon. Regarding pacing, Jungle Rot plays with two speeds: a menacing, mid-paced skulk and a faster, more predatory trot. Though they never commit to woebegone plods or balls-out blitzes, there\u2019s just enough variety to keep things engaging without moving too far away from Jungle Rot\u2019s established sonic ideal. Additionally, Cruel Face of War merits praise for the efficient yet expressive solos, particularly on \u201cCruel Face of War\u201d and \u201cHorrors Vile,\u201d with Geoff Bub and David Matrise credited for guitars. Bassist James Genenz rumbles and groans alongside, supplying a meaty dimension to Cruel Face of War, and drummer Spenser Syphers pounds and pummels as needed. Dan \u201cThe Man\u201d Swan\u00f6 even handles mixing and mastering, granting the immediate boost he bestows to nearly everything he touches.<\/p>\n

Cruel Face of War never outright errs, yet Jungle Rot proves so reticent to stray from the path oft-traveled that I wonder why they recorded new material. Jungle Rot felt like a promising step forward, infusing wicked melodies into the band\u2019s brutish brand of death metal. Since then, Jungle Rot seems content to churn out mildly different flavors of the same core recipe with rapidly diminishing returns. After thirty years of staying the course, I\u2019m not hopeful that Jungle Rot will venture into unfamiliar territory, but without stepping outside their comfort zone, I don\u2019t foresee them bursting free from their Jungle Rut.<\/p>\n

Rating: Disappointing
DR: 6 | Format Reviewed: 224 kbps mp3
Label: Unique Leader Records<\/a>
Websites: Bandcamp<\/a> | Facebook<\/a>
Releases Worldwide: May 15th, 2026<\/p>\n

\n\tGive in to Your Anger:<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"After four years of studio silence, Kenoshan cavemen Jungle Rot emerge from the bush with twelfth platter, Cruel…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":581868,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[28],"tags":[81406,47816,6447,54247,198868,9986,96,198869,167746,191545,128,2285,263,129,32290,56,21455,54,55],"class_list":["post-581867","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-music","tag-2-0","tag-47816","tag-american-metal","tag-bolt-thrower","tag-cruel-face-of-war","tag-death-metal","tag-entertainment","tag-hatebreed","tag-jungle-rot","tag-may26","tag-music","tag-obituary","tag-review","tag-reviews","tag-slaughter-to-prevail","tag-uk","tag-unique-leader-records","tag-united-kingdom","tag-unitedkingdom"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/581867","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=581867"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/581867\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/581868"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=581867"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=581867"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=581867"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}