There are questions in life that demand answers. Why are we here? Is there a God? What would a nuclear explosion sound like if it was localised in your living room? And where I have always been able to answer those first two questions (beer and no, in case you were wondering) I have never been able to successfully answer the third. Until this morning when As Live as Life Gets, the forthcoming EP from HVRT, landed in my inbox.

If you read the site regularly then you will know I like to explain how records pummel you into submission or tear your skin off and pour salt into the wounds. As Live as Life Gets doesn’t do any of that. Instead, it simply kills you.

This is the sound of an atomic bomb going off. The sound you hear a millisecond before you are utterly evaporated. And it’s fucking brilliant.

If I hadn’t been told this was live, I would have had no idea until the crowd starts cheering at the end of track one, The Wait, The Weep, The Woe. Live records are supposed to sound like this: as crisp as a cold fog, as sharp as a scalpel, and as fucking ginormous as an African elephant sitting on your chest.

Live records are supposed to tell you they’re live. The audience cheer, the sound of tuning up in some cases, the anticipation of the opening track. HVRT just look at that and laugh. They go for the jugular from the opening note to the last and do not let up.

Don’t get me wrong, this isn’t relentless black metal, this is well thought out. The whole band works as a united front, with grooves so deep they should be in the fucking Mariana Trench. It is crushing and dominating, but when they go hard and fast it’s the musical equivalent of having a jet engine strapped to your face.

This is also a record that you shouldn’t listen to if you value your ‘personal space’ as HVRT don’t just break into your head with giant fucking crowbars, they raid your fridge, mess up your album collection, and start trying on your favorite band tees for fun.

As Live as Life Gets doesn’t waste time either. Four tracks. Fifteen minutes. Concise and to the point, like an electric toaster thrown into a bathtub. There is no room here for musical noodling, atmospheric intros, or ponderings on the state of Satan’s soul. HVRT show up, murder you, and leave the crime scene before your body has hit the floor.

That’s the real beauty of it. In a genre flooded with bloated runtimes and self-indulgent filler, HVRT have crafted a live record that says everything it needs to say, destroys everything in its path, and leaves you scrambling to hit play again.

Absolutely essential. Now if you’ll excuse me, I need to go buy a new fridge and some new band tees.

As Live as Life Gets by HVRT is out October 16.