In May 1999, Steve Miller, head of Extremities Productions, had sent me a few sound clips of a couple of bands he was considering signing. One of the clips he sent me was a track of "My Once Shadowed Desire" by Eternal Suffering. Upon listening to it I basically laughed and told him not to bother signing this band. Of course he didn’t listen to me and signed them anyway. Nine months later I received a copy of the CD to review. The CD was recorded in August of ‘98 and was supposed to have been released on Pathos Productions, but, unfortunately, Pathos folded in early ‘99 which is how Steve was able to get his hands on the rights to release the CD. I’m not a huge fan of brutal groove death metal, so my first full listen basically left me laughing and shaking my head. I put it aside and put it back in the CD player a few days later and gave it a few more listens. For whatever reason the music just seemed to grow on me like mold on a stale brick of cheese. The CD opens up with a humorous intro featuring Mr. Rogers. I’m sure all of the North American kids remember who he is, from Mr. Rogers Neighborhood "Won’t you be… oh please won’t you be… won’t you be… my neighbor?" Well, the actual intro starts off with Mr. Rogers asking if people what they do when they’re angry and finishes with "Here’s some loud music that just sounds like it’s saying I’m angry, I’m very very angry.", which goes right into "My Once Shadowed Desire". The majority of the music on this release can be described as brutal death metal in the vein of Dying Fetus with Cannibal Corpse and NYDM influence. The musicianship is far from overwhelming, but their simplistic chugging style is extremely easy to get into, much like the material on the first two tracks on Killing On Adrenaline. I’m not saying Eternal Suffering are a Dying Fetus clone, just their down tuned guitars and bass mixed with the constant pummeling beats is reminiscent of their aggressiveness and sound. I must admit I found the vocal approach a bit aggravating at first, but with each listen the vocals of Wayne Sarantopoulos irritated me less and less to the point that I actually started to get into the singing style. Wayne rumbles along with a deep guttural snarl then breaks into a high pitched scream fairly often. Though it may not be the greatest vocal assault I’ve ever laid my ears upon, it does suit this style of the music very well. I did find the bonus track "T.T.P." to be a pleasant surprise. The music is more or less just the opening ten seconds to "Eye Of The Tiger" (you may remember that from the Rocky soundtrack) down tuned and played over and over with clips from the movie Three O’Clock High running in the foreground. I found it very cool that the band was able to do an entire song with just a simple riff and movie samples with no vocals and still have it interesting and worth listening to. Then again it kinda helps that I’m a fan of corny 80s movies, that movie being on of them, so that helped. On the whole Drowning In Tragedy, much like former Pathos label mates "Dehumanized"’s Prophecies Foretold, took me several listens to get into, but once I got into the rhythm I couldn’t keep the CD out of my stereo.

Written By: Teufel