Pestilence

Active since the mid-1980s, Pestilence emerged from the Dutch extreme metal scene in Enschede around guitarist and vocalist Patrick Mameli. The band started in a thrash register heavily tinged with death metal, captured on the 1988 album "Malleus Maleficarum", before adopting a harder, darker approach on 1989’s "Consuming Impulse", which established them on the European circuit. In the early 1990s Pestilence moved toward a more technical, structured form of death metal with "Testimony of the Ancients" (1991) and "Spheres" (1993), the latter marked by progressive elements and a broader use of dissonant harmonies. After splitting in 1994, the band ceased live and studio activity for more than a decade until Mameli revived it from 2008, leading a succession of line-up changes while remaining the central figure. The discography resumed with "Resurrection Macabre" (2009), "Doctrine" (2011), "Obsideo" (2013), "Hadeon" (2018) and "Exitivm" (2021), confirming Pestilence as a death metal act both brutal and technical, regularly featured on international tours and specialist festivals.