Burning Human

A seemingly brand-new band that in fact endured a deceptively lengthy secret history, Burning Human were active in one capacity or another during much of the 1990s, broke up, then were resurrected over a decade later to record the music that the bandmembers had abandoned, but never quite forgotten, all that time ago. A death metal band from upstate New York, Burning Human were founded in the early part of the decade by vocalist Jonah Radaelli, guitarist Jason Sunkes, bassist Jason Van DerVoort, and drummer Jason Bittner, but the quartet never quite made it beyond the rehearsal and demo stage (1995's Death Is Mercy demo seeding some tracks for an obscure compilation CD) before collapsing for unknown reasons (quite possibly due to an overabundance of Jasons?). Whatever the cause, the musicians decided to move on with their lives and careers — most publicly Sunkes (who would serve time in underground metal and hard rock bands like Dead Rabbits, Stigmata, and Greatdayforup) and Bittner (who hooked up with New England metalcore stalwarts Shadows Fall in 2002). The old friends remained in touch, however, and when time finally allowed, agreed to reconvene in order to capture their original Burning Human material for posterity before it was too late. So in early 2007, the foursome plus second guitarist Mike Stack called in a favor to legendary death metal guitarist and producer James Murphy (known for his work with Testament, Obituary, Disincarnate, etc., etc.) and recorded their official debut album, Resurrection Through Fire, which was released through Koch/E1 Records in April 2009.