Review: “Hollow Allegory” by I Am Mook

Last August our ears were made to bleed by the combination of pummelling blast beats, seismic breakdowns and cannibalistic vocals coming from Jacksonville North Carolina natives I Am Mook as the Deathcore skull splitters dropped EP “Horrific Mooktation“. As is often the way it was a guest vocal appearance from Dan Tucker of Crown Magnetar fame on “The Code” that brought the band to our attention and you can rest assured that the band went scorched earth on our craniums. Seven months later the four horsemen of the apocalypse have returned having signed to Seek & Strike Records for the release of EP “Hollow Allegory”, leaving us to question how a city with a population of just seventy one thousand people could have spawned such a monster…

Crawling out from the gutter like Pennywise the Clown with an evil grin, a 44 Magnum in one hand and a red balloon in the other, I Am Mook take the essence of My Space era Deathcore to the next level the burst of violent turbulence that is “Smoke Detector” because where there’s smoke there’s fire. Samples bejewel the onslaught as Tom Verbos roars demonically into the microphone, the barbed guitar work feeling like they’ve used wire wool to dry your eyes. After that opening hit and run “W.G.I.A.” has a harsh almost Industrial Metal quality to it with the drum patterns cold and mechanical in contrast to the white heat of the ferocious vocals. As a track its darker and heavier, the choral moment at the end offering up an ethereal moment that cleanses the mind ahead of the next piece of savagery. An eerie introduction to “Confabulated” doesn’t prepare you for the devastating chaos to follow as the band take a leaf from the book of Signs Of The Swarm and go straight for the jugular for a hundred and thirty two seconds of venomous tirade from Verbos. He spits blood and venom as the red mist descends, the bass drops in the final third designed to send the mosh pit wild when the track is performed live. A random moment of hip-hop beings “Lord Of Pestilence” before the alien well and truly bursts out of John Hurt’s chest like its 1979 all over again. The blood bath is unstoppable as a whirlwind of percussive battery thins the herd, the false ending a masterstroke designed to keep you on the edge of your seat. One more for sorrow “Tower 7” has a few technical licks in the riff department so its not all distorted down tuned tones, the Slam vocals from Verbos that weren’t previously present a warning of the shape of things to come. The question is… are we going to survive to hear it? [7/10]

Track Listing

1. Smoke Detector
2. W.G.I.A.
3. Confabulated
4. Lord Of Pestilence
5. Tower 7

“Hollow Allegory” by I Am Mook is out 6th February 2026 via Seek And Strike Records