Worse than Death have been operating out of Chicago since 2011, combining death metal's technical brutality with grindcore's compressed ferocity in a city that has long been a fertile ground for both. Their decade-plus run in the Chicago underground has produced music that refuses to settle for only one form of extreme.

Out of Philadelphia since 2013, Worst Episode Ever grind through a relentless collision of death metal brutality and grindcore chaos. Their music strips song structures down to bare, savage essentials — blast beats, down-tuned riffs, and throat-shredding hostility delivered without mercy.

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A Washington State act formed in 2019, Wraithborn fuse the abrasive extremes of death metal and black metal with the modern heaviness of deathcore, creating music that's equal parts atmospheric menace and crushing brutality. Their approach refuses easy categorization, pulling influences across the extreme metal spectrum into something deliberately unpredictable.

Wrath of Logarius formed in San Francisco, California, having evolved from the project Martyr Logarius, and signed with Season of Mist ahead of their 2023 EP Necrotic Assimilation. The band describes their approach as "formless black metal," navigating between raw black metal, brutal death metal, and post-metal textures without settling into a fixed genre identity. Named after the boss character from the video game Bloodborne, the project earned early attention for its layered and eerie compositional sensibility within the Season of Mist underground division.

Phoenix-based melodic death metal act founded in 2020, blending the hook-driven melodies of the Gothenburg school with the blunt force of American death metal. The Arizona desert heat seems to fuel a sound that oscillates between atmospheric guitar harmonies and full-throttle brutality.

Richmond, Virginia black/death metal project formed in 2022, fusing the cold dissonance of black metal with the visceral heaviness of death metal in a city that has long bred uncompromising extreme music. Their Bandcamp handle — wrathbearerde — hints at a Germanic black metal influence woven into their approach.

Devastating Death Metal out of Texas.

Providence, Rhode Island death metal and grindcore outfit active since 2016, delivering short, savage bursts of extreme noise from a New England city with a fertile underground scene. Their sound leans into grindcore's economy of destruction — fast, ugly, and mercilessly brief.