Birmingham grindcore warriors Napalm Death and Seattle sludgewaders Melvins have announced a joint album, entitled Savage Imperial Death March, to be released April 10 through Californian independent rock label Ipecac Records. 

One single, ‘Tossing Coins Into The Fountain of F**k’ was released on Wednesday alongside the announcement of the album. The track starts with a punked-up riff and harsh, barked vocals before a lead guitar line reintroduces the bluesy tones Melvins have always been known to create, owing more to ‘70s rock than any extreme metal. 

The album will not include all members across the two bands, but will comprise Melvins’ singer and guitarist Buzz Osbourne on vocals alongside drummer Dale Crover. Napalm’s contribution includes vocalist Barney Greenway, who has been in the band since 1990’s Harmony Corruption, bassist Shane Embury and guitarist John Cooke. 

Napalm Death have long been known for their respect of different styles of heaviness beyond merely metal, as Embury said in this interview for the TV show Metal Evolution. Speaking of this new collaboration, Embury said that the project was “an honour and a whole lot of fun, which surely is the whole point! Let’s do another one soon.”

Osbourne returned the compliment, declaring that “Napalm Death are one of my favorite bands ever. It was an absolute pleasure and a dream come true to do this collaboration with them”. Osbourne’s rough vocal delivery and frizzy locks have made him an icon of the heavy underground. 

Melvins and Napalm are from different corners of the extreme music world. Following their formation as a Crass-esque anarcho-punk band in Birmingham in 1981, they practically reinvented heavy music in their own image with their 1987 debut, Scum, birthing grindcore and spawning countless imitators. In later years, they explored far beyond grindcore’s minute-song boundaries, venturing into death metal, thrash, alternative rock and hardcore punk. 

Melvins, by contrast, walked a brutal path through the altrock explosion of the late 1980s in their native Seattle, drawing on influences from punk to metal and beyond, being instrumental in the birth of sludge metal. Hugely influential, their 1993 album Houdini was co-produced by one of their disciples, Kurt Cobain, and is namechecked as one of the ten most significant sludge albums of all time.

In early 2025, the two bands performed together on a tour bearing the same name as this new album, sharing the stage with North Carolina sludge troopers Weedeater. That acted as the root from which this new record has come. Since then, Melvins have toured with RRed Kross, a Californian altrock entity whose sound has embraced both hardcore and pop punk, while Napalm Death have embarked on ‘The Campaign for Musical Destruction Tour’ alongside ‘80s thrashers Whiplash, D-beat punks Varukers and Polish doom-meisters Dopelord, which returns to the UK in two weeks time.