Reviews

Blown Out Media

Anguished Life Shroud of Death LP

Dense and punishing, L.A.’s ANGUISHED LIFE ignites a D-beat bomb blast with this ten-song album. They don’t stray from the traditional sound, instead fully embracing the DISCHARGE blueprint in aesthetics and texture. The result is a merciless assault that never relents and rarely modulates. Fine by me. This shit rips! The riffs are on-point, with the rhythm section locked in with thunderous, pounding drums and some truly wild bass lines. The vocals are drenched in the kind of reverb that puts the right amount of space around them in the mix. Delivering bleak messages about the horrors of war and the corruption of its soulless enablers, the guttural shouts seem truly anguished. This one will be played loud and often.

B.E.T.O.E. Civilización flexi EP

Crashing cymbals, blown-out vocals, shredded guitar, rumbling bass, punk crudo at its best! B.E.T.O.E. seemingly wishes sonic demolition upon all of the broken systems that mire our world. The production of this flexi yields some of the most listenable B.E.T.O.E. material for me. A slightly cleaner sound, not quite spotless, approaching a high-end studio sound but still retaining enough noise to sound like it came from the sewers of Barcelona. This is still some noisy, smash the system/smash everything rawness. This three-song disc clocks in well below six minutes, with each track offering intricate musicianship and composition in a miniscule amount of time.

Bipolar In Absence of Peace cassette

BIPOLAR is what happens when DISCLOSE meets DISASTER. Total noise D-beat chaos. This raw punk outfit from Etah City, Greenland wears their influences on their sleeves, or rather on their ripped crustie pants. In Absence of Peace is a nine-track atomic explosion of pure crude fuzzy Kawakami worship. No melody, no gimmicks, just straight chaotic noise.

Brünner Deathmarch 20:20 EP

Damn, this is rocksteady fire! Metered, rhythmic, dense, dank hardcore from the Czech Republic!  I am really digging the knuckle-dragging heavy production. It’s like a smooth mix of raging D-beat Á  la DISPENSE and raging metallic hardcore Á  la FORÇA MACABRA. The bass is pulling a fierce barge of weight under all this. The accentuation of these lyrics are on point. Like, a jackhammer point. This band is cutting it up. It’s not a long EP, but it’s full of tight riffs, gut-knotted death-grunts, and blasting beats mixed with circling D-beats. The BRÜNNER TODESMARSCH, or death march, was the expulsion of Germans from surrounding provinces during late/post WWII. Resulting in the obvious; disease, malnutrition, death. I need to read these lyrics, because this sounds like the difference between 2020 inspired crust/hardcore and 2020 sincere crust/hardcore. 20:20 is definitely recommended.

Burning//World Peace is No Reality LP

Lashing out with sizzling fury, BURNING//WORLD brings a torrential downpour of distorted, raw D-beat hardcore. This is DISCLOSE’s Tragedy leveled off the mixing board, buzz-sawing like your ears and speakers can hardly take much more. Blistering riffs and haunting divebomb solos blast though at a relentless pace. This waits for no peace and is just above mid-tempo. Eleven tracks of a GLORIOUS?(-style) nightmare I could get lost in all day—total Dis-onslaught. D-CLONE pitches, FRAMTID pummeling, ANTI-METAFOR tightness, DISPENSE harshness…by now you know the DRILLER KILLER. BURNING//WORLD hits this style perfectly in the face and knocks its fucking jaw out. “Give Up All Hope”-core at its fullest decibels, and I seriously hope you can get this.

Existence Out of Time LP

Blown-out, driving noise-crust that is constantly on the brink of total collapse. When I say blown-out, I mean the feedback pierces like twisted steel through your already burst eardrum, and bass rumbles unintelligibly like the moment right before the doomsday earthquake hits. They successfully take the typical D-beat crust formula to maximum chaos while delivering crushing and devastating impact. The whole thing is just ugly and furious. Check it out!

Forclose Fear of Bombs flexi EP

As the name implies, FORCLOSE is another DISCLOSE worship band. Vocals like Kawakami, but the chord progressions sound a little melodic at times (especially on the title track). Yes, it’s fuzzy noise guitars and boxy sounding drums, but less CONFUSE/Jackie Crust War/static noise/EQ treble boost-type stuff, and more of the torn speaker-sounding Super Fuzz texture. Lyrics are about war (what else did you expect?). At this point, not really sure if anything positive or negative can be said about this approach. It really just begins and ends with Kawakami. RIP.

Kajsajuntti Rawpunk Forever cassette

The title of this demo says everything that you need to expect from this one-man mangel machine: noisy, raw punk worshipping SHITLICKERS and DISCLOSE alike. The man behind KAJSAJUNTTI also drills eardrums in DISPOSE as a singer/guitarist and as one might expect, the modus operandi on this one is not so different from his other ventures. This one is for all the “noise not music” maniacs that just want some primitive straightforward D-beat.

Löckheed Conflict Delirium EP

Hard-hitters LÖCKHEED from Santa Barbara return, after the brilliantly savage 4 Track Demo released last year, with Conflict Delirium. Kängpunk-worship reminiscent of early DISFEAR, DISCHANGE, or DISCARD, complete with a production that would make Kawakami proud. This EP will stand on the top 2020 lists of many Dis-beat maniacs. Sometimes you just need the simpler things in life: just plain DISCHARGE-styled hardcore.

Affect / Löckheed split EP

Two bands, one common goal: to make noise not music! AFFECT comes from Sweden, the land of kängpunk, but they could have easily come from Kōchi City. They deliver three songs of pure fuzzed-out, chaotic DISCLOSE worship with ripping shouted vocals that hit the sweet spot. LÖCKHEED comes from Portland, the land of neocrust, but they sure could have come from Sweden. Their three tracks are less chaotic but go straight to the jugular with their vicious kängpunk attack done in a perfect manner. Overall, a great split between two bands that complement each other really well. Do you wear ripped-up jeans with tons of patches? I guess you’d better get this one.

Massdead Compostable Billionaire Bones cassette

Ecological collapse is on its way. Because of capitalists’ greed and exploitation of natural resources, many species have tragically gone extinct, such as the Bramble Cay melomys, the Spix’s macaw, or the baiji, and the French social security system is bound to be next. One once-thriving species in the ’90s that everyone thought had been extinct since the late ’00s is the legendary dual-vocal cavemen crustcore. The only surviving specimen had long been thought to be MASSGRAVE. However, rumours of several sightings of the species in the wild caught my attention, and when it was confirmed that these beautiful animals had miraculously survived predatory species that had been invading their natural habitat (such as post-punk), it did bring tears to my eyes. With an unoriginal and referential name like MASSDEAD, it is pretty clear that this California unit is nodding toward MASSGRAVE’s furious grinding crustcore. That said, MASSDEAD trimmed off most of the grindcore aspect and, creatively speaking, are more akin to late DISRUPT, late ’80s EXTREME NOISE TERROR, or early VISIONS OF WAR. Compostable Billionaire Bones—a rather sensible green idea—sounds like a seriously pissed charging rhino and brings back a sound that I love dearly and that has sadly fallen out of fashion. The production is devastating and the vocals are adequately over-the-top. The persons responsible for this extreme crust assault have all been involved in bands like STORMCROW, VASTATION, and ABANDON, among many others. This Neanderthal crustcore attack was released on the excellent Blown Out Media, a label that specializes in class raw D-beat, beefy käng, and tasty old-school crust that I am following closely.

Step to Freedom Step to Freedom CD

STEP TO FREEDOM’s self-titled CD is a non-stop barrage of riff-y metallic crust with brutish and mean vocals. It’s music as intense as you’d expect from a Russian stenchcore band, especially considering the turmoil unfolding over there these past couple of years. Perhaps what’s more impressive than the fiery delivery is how catchy each of these grime-coated songs are, each filled to the brim with hooks that keep the listener’s attention in spite of the long-running track times. Standouts “Bad Karma” and the seven-minute odyssey “Revengeance Altar” are both thrashing headbangers with vicious backing vocals and guitar solos that will (not to be too cliché) melt your face. A powerful listen and highly recommended.

Syrgas Hiroshima EP

A furious stench of crust straight from the country of all things hardcore, Sweden. Untamed aggression with the pedal always to the metal, a huge low sound that hits the bowels, some guitar work that could be on an early WOLFPACK record and pissed-off vocals that make it sound like DRILLER KILLER. A straight Swedish crust record with every box checked.

Tortür Never Ending Grief LP

Scaly, scaling, escapist rÁ¥punk D-beat noise from LA. Deliberate face-ripping riffs that flail through the play with no mercy. TORTÜR plays the standard D-beat formula, but the energy is many ticks above normal. Vocals are grimaced and the chords are buoyant. Drums pulverize—sticks tumbling with classic DISCLOSE openers and breaks, at a rate a notch faster than everything else, and it works—as TORTÜR ebbs and stabs in unison. The way a band like this should sound; slightly organic but still nailing it like the nightmare machine they are illustrating. Some surprising rhythmic change-ups, in the way I fell jawless skull-over-boots for WORLD BURNS TO DEATH some 20-odd years ago, in “Who Will Survive The Human Collapse?” which adds shock treatment to the overall seizure of this album. Basically, a blistering new chaotic D-beat album that excels with production fervor and speed. Might be on my top ten had I not already sent it in. Recalling TOTAL WAR, DESPAIR, ASPECTS OF WAR. Art by Robin Wilberg of SVAVELDIOXID (previously DISFEAR). TORTÜR, a three piece of LA, are a gift (GASATTACK), and I definitely recommend trying to find this raw physical slab, it goes for $666 on their Bandcamp, and was released this past September 11th, yikes.

Trenchraid War Mentality cassette

TRENCHRAID is a Motör-charged D-beat band from the left coast of Canada who have just released their first full-length cassette. Twelve songs that pummel the skull with hardline lyrics about ecological disasters, the horrors of war, and endless suffering pull no punches as they come in a quick barrage. Having previously reviewed their four-song demo cassette last year, I can say with absolute certainty that this crew has grown into their aggro sound and fully refined their thematic devices. If you’re like a lot of the punk community and waking up day after day with ever growing rage, then you’ll find a comfortable home in this album. “Is This the End?” and “(Position of) Fuck You” are standout tracks for me, as they contain the highest level of F.O.A.D. mentality. Get this in you, and your indignation will feel fully justified.