Chicago thrashers Bloodletter have shredded stages across the USA for over twelve years. Their new album Leave the Light Behind is a vicious culmination of over a decade’s worth of sweaty moshpits, broken bones, and riffs sharp as a guillotine blade.
After releasing A Different Kind of Hell in 2023, Bloodletter headlined the third volume of Wise Blood’s black thrash split series “Faster Than the Devil” last year. Those three new songs revealed an even darker and more sinister version of Bloodletter’s sound. Their melodies are still polished atop relentless battering ram rhythms while invoking classic thrash and modern melodeath. But Leave the Light Behind creates an atmosphere of otherworldly dread, introducing a world of darker shadows and lurking horror.
“This time around we wanted to take the melodic riffing from our Funeral Hymns record and the brute force and speed of A Different Kind of Hell and really blend the two more,” explains vocalist/guitarist Pete Carparelli. “We wanted to shoot for more grandiose and dramatic arrangements, while still keeping the elements of the core Bloodletter sound; speed, harmonized riffs and themes that can get stuck in your head. We pushed ourselves performance-wise, tried new vocal techniques and really tried our hardest to go further than we have before musically.”
The song lyrics are rife with supernatural threats, cosmic beasts, and the specters of depression and mental illness. It is an ominous, dynamic thrash record that strikes with lethal power and leaves the listener with whiplash and a skull full of evil spirits.
Recommended for fans of:
Death Angel, Warbringer, Skeletonwitch
Release date:
July 25, 2025
Format:
CD, cassette, and vinyl
Catalog number:
MM-0041C, MM-0041T, MM-041V
Support the band directly:
https://bloodlettermetal.bandcamp.com
https://www.instagram.com/bloodlettermetal
https://www.facebook.com/bloodlettermetal
https://open.spotify.com/artist/1Kl2hY9GG8Wt5iON3tAHtY
https://www.youtube.com/@bloodlettermetal