Plague Thirteen

Plague Thirteen Healing Ground LP

Neocrust is the perfect soundtrack for a post-pandemic world in which darkness seems to engulf every aspect of our day-to-day lives—there is always a glimmer of hope in the lyrics and songwriting, with its heavy-to-melodic riffs. PLAGUE THIRTEEN plays heavy and sludgy crust that leans towards the more melancholic spectrum. Filling the void left by neocrust agitators LINK (their previous incarnation), they follow the steps of TRAGEDY to early NEUROSIS. Soundtrack for the days of no hope.

• Reviewer João Seixas
• Label Phobia
• Issue MRR #481 • June 2023

Plague Thirteen Plague Thirteen LP

It’s dark. It’s heavy. It’s oppressive. It induces moshing. It’s the debut album from PLAGUE THIRTEEN, a crust punk band from Czech Republic formed by ex-members of LINK and SORE in 2019. Inspired by last year’s COVID lockdown, the band presents six songs that achieve a really satisfying balance between expansive arrangements (like the brutal breakdowns of “Eyes Wide Open”), guitar epicness, D-beat fury, and full-on assaults and melodic richness.  If you wanna sample the intense power they can produce, I command you to listen to “Saturated Black,” which veers into extreme metal territory with some vicious riffing and death metal growls.

• Reviewer Miguel Franco
• Label Phobia
• Issue MRR #457 • June 2021