Call “It’s definitely our most death metal record, our most personal record, our most focused and brutal record to date,” says SANGUISUGABOGG frontman Devin Swank when asked to sum up the Ohio brutalists’ latest album, Hideous Aftermath. Known for being THAT band with the unpronounceable name and unreadable logo, SANGUISUGABOGG has made a record as gore-obsessed and violenceinclined as any of their prior works including Tortured Hole (2021) and Homicidal Ecstasy (2023), but with a career-defining command over their ugly art. Says Devin: “It’s the one where we rolled our sleeves up and brought our A-Game.” Hideous Aftermath is the work of a band who has already cut a bloody swath into the underground and beyond. SANGUISUGABOGG has emerged from the sweat and grime of countless US and international tours with the likes of Cannibal Corpse, Lorna Shore and Kublai Kahn as well as festival slots and their own headline runs. They’ve ensnared scores of new converts to their brand of the brutally absurd. Now in 2025, the ‘Bogg’s third full length leaves any “caveman death metal” tags in the dust. From album opener, “Rotten Entanglement” to the senses-pulping finale of “Paid in Flesh” this is the sound of SANGUISUGABOGG flexing every muscle they have. Enlisting producer Kurt Ballou (Nails, High on Fire) the ‘Bogg (rounded out by drummer Cody Davidson and guitarists Ced Davis and Drew Arnold) decamped to God City Studios in Salem, Massachusetts in the Spring of 2025. “We got off the road after A LOT of touring and wanted to drill down and be as purely creative as possible without distraction,” says Devin of the band’s decision to work with the Converge guitarist in Witch City. “Kurt mixed Homicidal Ecstasy, so he already understood what we were going for.” While SANGUISUGABOGG has long been self-produced with Davidson handling production duties, this time, they put their sonic trust fully in Ballou’s hands. “From the first day, the vibe was calm and super focused,” the vocalist recounts. “You could see Kurt was completely locked in. He has very high standards and such an incredible track record behind him. He really pushed us and didn’t compromise at all. Plus, he has the sickest gear!” There are myriad aspects of Hideous Aftermath that set a new standard for SANGUISUGABOGG. “There’s real bass guitar on the album,” reveals Devin. “In the past, we would split the low-end signal on the guitar – it was kind of our thing. This time Ced and Drew switched off on playing actual bass, in addition to having that low-end signal, which made things a lot clearer and punchier.” Ballou even addressed the Bogg’s divisive-yet-rademark “ugly snare ping”. “It’s still there,” Swank grins. “It just sits a lot better, but it’s still SANGUISUGABOGG, after all!” SANGUISUGABOGG’s bloody rise and twisted road (their name, in fact, is an anagram for ‘Bloody Toilet’) was as much a shock to the boys of the ‘Bogg as it was to the underground death metal sect from which they sprang. Blame it on Ohio. The vocalist laughs when considering how much the state and scene from which the early SANGUISUGABOGG sprang contributed to his band’s musical and lyrical detritus. “Ohio has a lot to answer for – it’s like ‘Florida Man’ but cornfed rednecks,” Devin laughs. “Just the scene around Columbus or Dayton. When we started, there were a few other death metal bands in the area that had their tropes like Embalmer, who clearly influenced us. Plus, I’m pretty sure Ohio has the biggest percentage of serial killers who come from there!” With tracks like “Turkish Death Orgy” on 2019’s Pornographic Seizures EP on the cult Maggot Stomp label, the foursome quickly won fans for their blasts of sludgy, determined riffing, gross-out humor and nods to hardcore and 90’s East Coast death metal. “The logo definitely helped,” smirks Devin. “It’s the Nike swoosh of death metal!” With the barely post-Covid 2021 “Frozen Hole” US co-headline tour with labelmates Frozen Soul, SANGUISUGABOGG took to the road and calcified a next wave of U.S. death metal. For Horrendous Aftermath, SANGUISUGABOGG enlisted a circle of friends that not only contributed to the sound of individual songs but also celebrated the scene around them. “Everyone we approached was down.” Says Swank. “We approached those guest parts as fans of their bands. For instance, Todd Jones’s part [on ‘Ritual Autophagia’], he hasn’t done highs like that since [Nails’] Abandon All Life. When Todd asked us how we wanted him to approach it, we basically said, “You, from 15 years ago!’ Same with Travis Ryan from Cattle Decapitation, I wanted him to do the same highs and gutturals he was doing on Humanure for ‘Semi-Automatic Facial Reconstruction.’ He’s such a sick vocalist. Same with Dee from Peeling Flesh [‘Felony Abuse of a Corpse’] and Josh from Defeated Sanity [‘Abhorrent Contraceptive’], we just had parts that that they completely fit.” While Swank is largely known for providing SANGUISUGABOGG with it splatter-film-like, lyrical bent with favorites like “Dead as Shit”, “Dragged by a Truck” or “Face Ripped Off”, he admits to a certain seriousness creeping into Hideous Aftermath – to a certain extent. “There’s definitely songs that are more meaningful on this record,” he admits. “There’s still that barbaric element, that ‘See-Person-Kill-Person’ mentality but there’s songs that go darker and even more into real life. There’re songs that touch base about topics like gun violence or religion and cultism like ‘Sanctified Defilement’. Stuff I’ve never touched on in SANGUISUGBOGG.” From the album’s disturbing, stark imagery to its songs and production. SANGUISUGABOGG didn’t hold back taking chances and adding new twists to their already twisted vision. Full of Hell’s Dylan Walker adds a heartrendering howl to the album’s closer, “Paid in Flesh” which shifts gears into doom-dirge territory. “There’s a ton of emotion there,” says Devin. The track, “Repulsive Demise” brings together ‘Bogg’s surging guitars with a regimented, industrial pound. “We wanted to lean into a Justin Broadrick-Godflesh kind of sound.

It would be sick to include other elements like that in the future and do that kind of genre-stretching that bands like Fear Factory or Sepultura did back in the 90’s. I think we’re the kind of band that could get away with that.” With Horrendous Aftermath, SANGUSIGUGABOGG has proven themselves more than just an eccentric death crew on an acid-addled hateroll. They’re both champions of the underground and a musical force unto themselves. “Eight or nine years ago, it seemed like what we were doing was pretty niche,” Swank admits. “Where we’ve come, some of the rooms and festivals we’ve played is kind of remarkable.” Big swings including recent appearances on more “mainstream” rock festivals including Columbus’ Sonic Temple and Welcome to Rockville in Daytona, Florida, were never on the ‘Bogg boys’ charter underground agenda. “I think we were a band that was set up to do nothing or a lot of something,” Devin admits. “Why ‘normies’ ever ended up liking it was weird. Who knows? Maybe we made pain and suffering fun.”