Monthly Archives: August 2006

VV.AA. (n/a): “Septic Shock – 4 Way Split” Cd-r 2006 Septic System

Septic Shock - 4 Way Split

Septic Shock – 4 Way Split

Hey so finally I got something from Septic System records to show you for your delight! First off this is not a pro-done Cd but a Cd-r that comes in a plastic bag, but for sure these graphics are accurate. I have seen pro silver discs in way uglier packagings. The first thing I thought when I got this 4 way was that it looked a bit like a release from Fecal Matter and actually, the layout has been done by The Rev, eh! It’s dripping so much shit and goo you don’t know how to handle it ah ah. Total scat gore aadoration! The bands contained herein are quite distinct in sound, and are arranged as follows:
RAPIST WITH NO PENIS plays a very noisy breed of gore/grind with drum machine. The vocals are gurgling deep, but not completely fucked up, you can still understand this guy articulates something with his mouth, even if the roar is quite low. Musically this is mostly very simple mid tempos goregrind with some loops and skillfully placed samples (the last song has that popping noise that sounds like the 80’s hit “Pop Corn”, ah ah). The sound is very, very rough, but we’re still in the realm of the understandable, mostly we get very distorted sound with a lot of dirt, but the riffs are still clear. I’d reccomend this band to lovers of mid paced sludgy goregrind and a knack for fetid sounds. 7.50 to me.
BOWEL FETUS strikes here with his trademark, foul apocalyptic concoction of sick Death Metal a la Autopsy and vocals that remind the sound of the chain stays of a bycicle falling off the sockets. This single song in the 4 way is still totally Autopsy in feel, but degenerates slowly into a wasteland of quicksand, Doom, muck and corpses a la Disembowelement or Halo. I cannot tell exactly how much I love this shit, everything is just arranged in the right fucking way: great guitar distortion and fabulous chords of doom, a realistc drum sound, and nasty boiling vocals… No shit here, I think this could be really a ultimate band, one of the 10 best in the world today if they got a vocalist like Gurge of Lord Gore. Mind ye, I think these vocals are okay, and they’re probably the only element that stitches Bowel Fetus to the Gore Grind genre, but I have the feeling with some different vocals, we could really have some astounding, spectacular results… nonetheless a full 9.00 fucking here!
BASKET OF DEATH is completely space noize stuff instead. This is the chaotic, wicked kind of noise grind that only far easteners seems to be able to produce. The drum machine is beating a totally gabber disco tempo, with 100% artificial sound, but above that, everything seems to be allowed. Frequencies and distortions, guitar loops, multiple layers of distorted vocals, even sampled parts of what seem rehearsals of traditional instrumental bands. The cool thing is that there’s always different things moving at the same time, so you can concentrate on this drone bass sound in the background or the muffled vocals or whatever is up and always get something different. Ahone must be crazy to hear this stuff, you get the impression of hearing a cassette which has been overdubbed ten times with Boredoms and a score of other noise bands. An 8.00 is deserved
OUTHOUSE keeps following the Noisecore line, but a bit less refined than Basket of Death, mostly you get impossibly rough shit a la Anal Birth but instead of a constant wave of noise, you get a more mid tempos, short blasts of fury and oversaturated vocals above a thick carpet of fuzzy noise shit. There are some samples here as well, but you don’t get the same impression of listening to several albums simultanously, this stuff is a bit rawer and siimpler. There are some spoken vocals as well in the mix, and a good half of this track is just a long dialogue. I’d give this band a 7.00.

BEYOND TERROR BEYOND GRACE (Aus): “Still Human Still Humane?” MCd 2005 Grindhead

This is Beyond Terror Beyond Grace‘s debut, a young band from Australia’s Blue Mountains, and it consist of four short tracks of a non-defined mix of extreme music styles. The opening riff is a total killer hyperfast blast of violence strongly influenced by Rotten Sound, Jigsore Terror, To Separate The Flesh From The Bones and the likes and made me hope for the best… if things were following that line all the time we could have had something real interesting if not overly complex or catchy. However there is a big flaw that I spotted almost immediately,and it’s that these songs are made up of riffs so eterogeneous that it feels like hearing Praxis or Mr Bungle (well not exactly to be honest but you get the point). While that opening blast was full of energy, the mid tempo Death Metal slam that follows close is among the most boring I have ever heard, kind of Internal Bleeding stripped down to play even more basic sloppy death. The vocals are a schizoid chamaleon which vary completely timbre from grunt to screams according to the underlying riff, and something weird happened when those got higher: a cold, pine smelling breeze entered my room and I could hear the penguins approaching from beyond the mist… Ah! No really they sound more new black metal than Grind, but that’s just a matter of perspective, I guess I could get used to them if we get over the bigger flaws. To tell the truth, I hate the Death Metal slam mid tempos in here, but the faster riffs range really from average to excellent. They should really drop the useless parts where the vocals become guttural and keep the faster parts only, or just try to improve songwriting of the slower bridges, becouse those are real lame. As it is, this is neither fish nor meat as they say here. The Cd has a very short duration, just like 9 minutes or so, but I guess it explores clearly what the intent of this band is. The guys look very young so we can expect some serious improvement I think. I hope the singer is just growing his hair, and not keeping that cut on purpose, though (ah ah, j/k). Nothing much to add to this, working a good layout when flames are involved is real though and well, it doesnt work in here either, but this is an Ep so things might have been made with some hurry. The cover depicts a man or a scarecrow shrouded in flames, and little else. At least the quality of the pics is sharp.