Suffocation: Breeding the Spawn - Death Metal Album Review

Breeding the Spawn is the sophomore album by the brutal death metal band Suffocation. Released in May 1993, almost two years after the now classic debut Effigy of the Forgotten, this album has an interesting history.

The first thing to note about Breeding the Spawn is that this is a very controversial album. Not for the usual reasons, though. Not because it is NSBM, and not because the band sold out by playing commercial garbage metal for the lowest common denominator (that would happen after). Not, if Breeding the Spawn is so controversial, it's because of the production. Yes, the production, you heard that right.

The music itself is quite good actually, almost as good - and some would even say better, although that is a long shot IMO - than on the debut Effigy of the Forgotten. The band here incorporates more dissonant, but at the same time more harmonic elements, somewhat similar to what would later appear on the blackened death metal masterpiece, The Epilogue to Sanity by no other than Finland's Phantom.

So what about the production? It's very bizarre, and not in the good sense.

Suffocation was at the time signed to Roadrunner Records, and as you all know, it was customary at the time for labels to arrange the studio rental, as well as the mixing and mastering costs. Unless you played early second wave Norwegian black metal, in which case it was 100% DIY, the record label was the one to arrange everything not related to composing, recording and eventually playing live. But Roadrunner decided to give a big "FU" to Suffocation and the death metal scene in general, preferring to invest their money in nu-metal acts like Slipknot and Deicide, and the end result was that Suffocation was left without the means to record their album... they not only had to find their own studio, one they didn't know and that was completely different from the one where they had recorded their debut, they also had to pay for the mixing and mastering costs.

Suffocation ended up recording Breeding the Spawn in a low-cost studio near Chester, where Terrence Hobbs' brother once worked as an audio engineer. The studio itself, which is now defunct, specialised in blues and funk recording, and had no experience (or knowledge) of what it took to master a death metal album, particularly one as technically complex as Suffocation's sophomore.

The result is... less than satisfactory, to say the least. Many fans of Suffocation were disappointed with the band, when they really should have been disappointed with the way the entire situation was handled by the record companies. Had this album Breeding the Spawn been properly and professionally recorded - with an actual budget, not the band's pocket change (remember than death metal musicians weren't rich, at the time!) - it would easily have been in the top 10 death metal albums pantheon alongside the debut. Another way nu-metal ruined metal: it divested money from good underground bands like Suffocation into nonsense like Arch Enemy, Soilwork and Korn.

Tracklist of the album Breeding the Spawn (1993) by Suffocation:

Back to the band Suffocation.