Good things come when you don’t expect them sometimes, and Walk with Vermin EP by Swedish Sanctrum (with some Bosnian transplants among them) was that hit of the week.

Sanctrum dive into The Descent without much warning and before you know it tight chops of Swedish melodic death/thrash along the lines of The Crown, Dimension Zero or The Everdawn subjugate, high pitch voice leads the way and melodic grinds show that someone studied At the Gates iconic Slaughter of the Soul. Not overly or artificially brutal, with guitar sound cleaned up during the lead, The Descent is actually pretty endearing as it unfolds, and so is the overall EP.

Sanctrum have a knack to space their guitar touches just enough for the tempo not to slow down, but for individual notes to be heard. They have an excellent cadence of quick rapid guitar hits with rhythm section supporting, so that the tempo is constantly on the go and prodding, yet nothing blends together into one undiscernible wall. With their melodic death sitting with one leg into thrash and another into grindcore, when vocalist Irfan Cancar lets out a feral scream (To the End) or goes non-stop with his verbal litanies (Prevarication) Sanctrum also sound a bit like groovy The Haunted with Marco Aro fronting them on Made Me Do It. Cancar truly has a leather throat, is good at screaming, but needs help with backing vocals when something more powerful, lower register, is needed.

Well written, muscular and with buoying riffs, yet with some melodic leads interspersed throughout (Prevarication, To the End, Let It Fall), Walk with Vermin is an awesome quick EP, caffeinated enough that it can serve as a moodlifter in the morning or a moshstarter in the evening. Whichever you prefer, approval nods are guaranteed.