Review
For a band that built its name on pushing the boundaries of extreme metal, Ingested has abruptly pulled the ripcord on experimentation. Following the atmospheric concessions of their last few records, Denigration actively strips away the frills. Facing sudden lineup chaos just before release—which forced guitarists Sean Hynes and Andrew Virrueta to furiously rerecord all lead vocals—the Manchester crew channeled that friction into pure, bludgeoning punishment.
Reviewers view this recalibration as a massive victory rather than a creative retreat. Blabbermouth praises the pivot as a "skillful reset" and a "towering statement of defiance in the face of the Riff Police." Echoing this severity, KNAC highlights the menacing thematic weight of the record, characterizing its tracklist as "one long downward spiral through decay, betrayal, manipulation."
Sonically, the album favors dizzying technical death metal tightly coiled around groove-driven breakdowns. The blast beats are relentless, and the sheer hostility yields a "mechanical tightness to the songs, but it never feels sterile" (Scene Point Blank). Denigration is a pitch-black, suffocating pivot that proves Ingested strike hardest when letting staggering metallic weight do the talking.
