• RELEVANT FEW (swe): s/t split Cd with AFGRUNG (swe) 2006 Life Stage

    Afgrund - Relevant FewCompared to the bestial burst of Afgrund, I am not overly impressed by Relevant Few. Too much wanking in the field of dissonance and disharmonies, and all the grindcore energy sinks in the overuse of these experimental bridges. The vocals are lacking real solidity, they’re more like an exercise in screaming that real outbursts of rage if you know what I mean. Seems like the band is lacking in anger  and anger in grindcore is everything. That said there are a lot of interesting aspects here that deserve to be exploited like precise drumming, decent production, brilliant ability to sew together the riffs in a flowing song that parts from the classic schemes, and an interesting array of lyrics. Comparisons might be done with “as far from metal as possible” grindcore bands like His Hero Is Gone or Man is the Bastard but that just scratches the surface – I am not good with finding similarities. Blasting grindcore a good 90% of the time, too bad for the really useless use of leaks and weird harmonies – I’d go for the throat instead.

    Top track is the last one, where the band seems to have finally shrugged away the bullshit and did everything the right way. Screams, blasting, guitar hammering for 61 seconds. If I had to save a song it would be this one.

  • AFGRUND (swe): s/t split with RELEVANT FEW (swe) 2006 Lifestage

    Afgrund - Relevant FewMan I am so fucking stupid sometimes ah ah! I really don’t want to like it, I always try to convince myself that I don’t like political grind but everytime I hear a band that rips like this Afgrund does, I always have to admit: “fuck, this is goddamn excellent”. Another footprint in the fresh concrete gallery of Swedish Grind. Afgrund belong to this new generation of grindcore that just surpassed the big change of the late 90’s when bands like Nasum began installing super productions in a genre that had deep roots in the filth of crusty punk. This new breed has all the good elements of this late grindcore kind but also a massive sound and loads abrasive energy by the dozens. Names that come up to mind when looking for comparisons are those of their first label No Tolerance – Krigshot, Skitsistem, Wolfpack etc. in other words extremely powerful and groovy grind with a huge sound prouction – this is really nice shit. Good replacement for a Red Bull when driving home in the late of the night. Sometimes this fat sound gets almost messy and a bit splatterish, one can even dare to say some early Malignant Tumour or Squash Bowels hints appear scattered in the songs. I only didn’t like much the very last song “Det Sista Brevet” – ithas some dissonance that I never manage to tolerate. Perfect packaging by Szymon Siech (always a master), since I guess the lyrics are of the introspective/social kind, I really don’t care if they are in English, for once – ah ah!

    They have a full-length out now, called “Svarta Dagar” on the same label Lifestage – check out the cover, it’s KILLER. (weird, the label’s website is severaly outdated…!).

  • FORMICIDE (USA-Ma): “Formicide” compilation Cd 2006 Due Process

    Formicide - FormicideDespite I have been into Thrash Metal for a long while when it was vibrating and alive and not a resurrected corpse (I want to stretch this becouse I am really sorry but today there is so much hype about Thrash in Italy that I really cannot stand it much anymore) I admit I never heard of Formicide before. Thanks to Andrew of Aversionline for rediscovering the band for us ignorant worms. I read that the tracks have been ripped straight from the tapes, if that’s the case I am sorely impressed, all the instruments have a punch that I can barely find in professional recordings. I do not mean it is elegantly encased in a super production, I mean it has the real Metal crunch of the ’80s – hell I can even hear the bass lines clearly, I really wonder why some people had a problem with the production of this collection of demos.

    Talking abot the music, Formicide is playing pure American Thrash/Power Metal (Power Metal as in Metallica or Jag Panzer, not Blind Guardian – dick) and later evolved into the mildly interesting HC band Only Living Witness (I have seen the band with Cro Mags years ago and they were hopelessly annihilated). The number of power riffs on this album is uncountable, there is really a load of pure Thrash energy loading these tracks. And the vocals too are not just a moan, but aggressive and raucous without sounding indistinct. That said, I realize now that I am really not much more into this kind of music. I like the single songs, but I cannot really listen to the whole thing in a row, two subsequent spins have really exhausted my reserves of energy. I cannot really tell why becouse this thing is technically perfect, with a perfect share of solos and a spectacular drumwork. Must be I am more into really primitive Metal from exotic countries these days, and after hearing Mortuorio a few hours ago my ears were calibrated on a different frequency. Whatever. I am sure this thing is going to please anyone looking for neat Thrash with all the right proportion of screams and palm muted riffs. In my case I am not sure I will be putting this on again soon…

  • NECROS CHRISTOS (Ger): “Grave Damnation” compilation Cd 2005 Worship Him

    Necros Christos - Grave DamnationNecros Christos from Berlin. A phenomenon that has exploded like a burst of flames straight from Hell taking everyone by surprise, cabonizing churches and immolation priests praying for salvation. The whole underground is buzzing and murmuring on how fucking great this band is. And, well, I could not but agree with the mainstream this time. Necros Christos is really the best Death Metal band coming out of the underground in the last few years – it incarnates perfectly every parameter that makes Death Metal the sickest and darkest form of Art of all times. I cannot tell exactly HOW they do it but the band is able to recreate a kind of dark, hypnotic, demonic atmosphere which moves something inside me that was slumbering inside me since the early nineties. Influences of Hellhammer (a LOT of Hellhammer), Incantation, Imprecation, Symphony of Grief, early Samael, old Paradise Lost and some old school Finnish doom/death (and damn I can even say Disincarnate) are abundant but perfectly balanced in a strictly personal interpretation Metal of fucking Death which is equally obscure and spiritually powerful. This is a band which is 280 times more Black than your average Norwegian penguin. Everything is stripped to the bone, leaving only no nonsense quality music. The vocals are deep and demonical, reverberating as if they were coming from beyond the grave, the guitars deep and grating, slowly evocative of images of gothic damnation. There is really something infernal going on here, haven’t heard this kind of feeling since Immolation‘s “Dawn of Possession”.

    Worship Him records re-released this third Necros Christos demo “Grave Damnation” in Cd format – which is a bit disappointing for me since this is the only one I already had in tape, but whatever, anything from this band seems to be sold out nowadays so it is a great buy for people looking for anything by the band. The packaging is superb and everything again just falls in its place in this grand design of blasphemic necromanic Death Metal . A great Goatlord cover ends the Cd.

    I am sure I have already heard something similar in style in the past but really cannot remember when… what matters anyway is that Necros Christos has a full-length album out now, so go for it as well.

  • No sign of the Eps yet

    The factory has not delivered the records yet so the tentative release of 28th August has been skipped. I can only hope it’s a matter of days now. I also have a temporary laptop computer now so I will check all my emails this weekend and possibly upload a review or two.

  • Temporary closure

    My dear old laptop computer failed me last week for the last time. Too much stress for its old frame. I am currently without a computer so I will not be able to answer mail, update the website, follow the label, do reviews etc. I am currently selecting the component for the new PC but I doubt I will be able to assemble everything before next weekend (I bought the case in Germany). This time, after so many HD failures, I decided to grant myself a professional system with a solid structure and steady backups. Hopefully this is the last time I lose so much data at once.

  • DOWN THE LINE (Ita): “Apotheosis is Decline… Decline is Apotheosis” Cd Ep 2004 DTL-Ickno-Grind-Corporation

    Down the LineIt is fun to read how prolific and compact the scene from Sardinia is. I was first introduced to Sardinian grind with my long time friend Wally ‘s band Ass Ache still in the 80’s (!!) and then with a bunch of other bands which appeared in the “Ugo Story” compilation tapes. Let’s tell it straight: this Cd is just made up of 5 minutes of real music plus a bulk of intros and a very long (and a bit sleepy) concatenation of electronic loops. But those 5 minutes of real shit are intense enough to raise a brow. Very few, extremely basic crusty riffs with a bit of Agathocles feeling, coupled with unintelligible liquid vocals in pure gore-grind style. I especially like the metallic sound of the bass distortion. In short this is genuine dirty to the point goregrind with some courageous experimentations in the electronic field. I just wonder why they’re still promoting 5 scarce minutes of material which were recorded 5 years ago (!!) and released only 2 years later. Songs like these are generally mass produced by the dozens – one riff, one song. The cover art is okay too, even if it spots a photo which was already used on Meat Shits‘ “Sniper at the Fag Parade”. Not a mandatory “demo” but fun.