MONDAY MORNING (?) MEXICAN PORNOGRIND CORNER

Metal brothers, we are now in Day 10 of cold turkey withdrawal from lllCon West's benevolent mother teat. I have to say, I CRITICALLY underestimated the reach of Shelby Cobras's influence and the strength of his resolve. I see now the man will stop at nothing. See, my kid hasn't stopped throwing up for two days now. How did we go from pot shots at my spelling to attempted INFANTICIDE?? Well, it's gonna take more than a few chow showers from an 18 month old to weaken MY resolve. Thanks to Jason, who rightly reminds me of my sworn duties to uphold, MONDAY MORNING MEXICAN PORNOGRIND CORNER goes on.

Uritkaria Anal is this week's featured scumfuck porn-shilling monstruos. On Divine Depravation, they eek our nearly an hour's worth of microphone-too-close-to-the-mouth guttural ejaculations, glandular skinwork, and lyrical STDs. If one jam called 'Sifilis' isn't enough for you, don't worry, this record has two. I don't quite get what happened but the recording fidelity switches gears halfway through the album and you get like these alternate versions (maybe?) that let the songs breath a little more (which, really, is what pornogrind needs isn't it? just a little more breathing space?).

has anyone used Tako to ama for pornogrind cover art yet?

Jesus Christ, what kind of distortion does that guy use on side 2 anyway? Anyone know? Not the HM2; maybe that $50 Digitech unit? I dunno, it fucking RULES though. My first band, Sticky Bear, recorded STRAIGHT to some Maxwell 60 mins. (if we were flush that week; otherwise it was Sonys). My Peavey Predator came out sounding exactly like this.

DAT FONT

You know how bad you hate it when someone says your music all sounds the same? Yeah, well, every track sounds EXACTLY THE SAME here. Flip this on the hi fi, crack open a high life, and expand your horizons.

Uritkaria Anal - Divine Depravation

Cryptosporidium Parvum - Demo 2008

I hereby direct your attention to Cryptosporidium Parvum, a quotidian blip on the acne-pocked face of pornogrind circa late 00s. I normally have little patience for this sort of thing but CP's brand of sloppy, under-produced, overblown grind endears itself to me every time. They've got a track, "vaginal love" on their 2007 demo whose amorous title is out of place with pornogrind's usual over-the-top nomenclature and whose beginning does not sound entirely unlike "Louie, Louie." So where most bands lose you with their tales of clitoral evisceration, CP warms the heart with a track about simply loving pussy. Even if this kind of thing isn't your kind of thing (pig grunts and the like) do yourself a solid and have a couple of chuckles over the video for "Ay, Mamsheeta" below. That's right, Mamasheeta. See what they did there?

couldn't find any band photos so used this instead

Cryptosporidium Parvum - Demo 2008

Important Announcement for the New Year

After a decade of bitter infighting and rancour between two ideologically polarized camps within ICHQ, I am delighted to announce the grand opening of IllCon East, a new subdivision of IC Enterprises which is charged with ensuring East Coast considerations are factored into decision-making around marketing, product development, and systems change. This venture comes on the coattails of a debate that has been percolating beneath the surface of everyday business and has made working alongside one another no longer possible. I now present to you IllCon East's mission statement:

FUCK YOU, WEST COAST

Allow me to explain...

Here on the East Coast, being metal is a fucking chore. You have to work at it. If you're a metalhead and come from anywhere East of Sanford Parker's fiefdom, Ohio, you're already handicapped. You're fucked. You have to ship in all your bullet belts and patches from El Salvador. Out on the West Coast every other day Wormrot is playing in LA, fucking Brocas Helm is playing Gilman or whatever it's called, blah fucking blah.

2nd one from left is 9th grade me

I was just talking to These a Beast, who lives in Jersey, about what shows we'd been to recently and it was downright scornful. The only show either of has had been to in the last month was the same goddamn show, one night apart from each other. Granted, it was Inquisition, and they fucking killed, but still. West Coast's got the labels, the communal groundswell, the bands, the venues, AND legal kush. It's like the metal is being handed to you on a silver plate; all you need to do is MOSH.

And don't get me started on Black Metal. How do you have all these awesome goddamn black metal bands on the West Coast? What do YOU know about Black Metal? Any 'banger worth his Nargaroth back patch knows Black Metal is all about winter, midnight vision quests through frost-choked ravines, taking your shirt off, and takin' a pic for the album cover. What does the West Coast know about winter? Where I'm from we're living an Immortal album 30% of the entire year while your metal bands are playing flutes around the bonfire, fucking celebrating the harvest, and yukking it up over a sack of northern lights.

er, we're not all like this, promise

(Speaking of New Jersey, that's probably the most metal places on the planet ain't it? Fuck sylven forests of primordial hardwoods and awe-inspiring ocean vistas, forget Norway...New Fucking Jersey man. It's basically built on top of toxic sludge and car parts. Anyone who elects to live there voluntarily earns their spike cuffs automatically.)

is more metal than

The East Coast always seems to get left out of conversations about metal (New Yorker notwithstanding), perhaps due to regional metal xenophobia, perhaps ignorance, perhaps its the smaller profiles of the bands, maybe a combination of all this. We gave you NYDM, Dio, Grief...the nascent scuzz-BM scene (see Mutilation Rites) is giving the Black Twilight Circle a run for their money IMHO...hell we've got Florida so right there we've buttoned up 90% of the American Death Metal legacy.

ANDMANOWAR

i know u like my layout skills

Now, I'm not saying we're completely infallible. In fact, we owe you a couple of apologies: namely Liturgy, the whole Savannah/Atlanta thing (seriously, what the fuck is up with the whole Kylesa/Baroness/Mastodon scene? can someone fill me in plz thx). We MIGHT be single-handedly responsible for metalcore also, now that I think about it. Whoops lol. I hereby apologise for all our past transgressions.

So anyway, yeah, this:

WEST COAST
i detect your pose
all the way from here

EAST COAST
trve

I rest my case.

You are cordially invited to the ceremonial ribbon cutting of the brand-new, 230 acre IllCon East campus, featuring an exclusive Evoken and Cannibal Corpse showcase*, and we will vote on IllCon East's new charter. I hereby lay down the gauntlet, West Coast pussies. The metal world is overdue for a good beef with all the trimmings, don't you think? Infantile posturing in album intros, threats of violence via YouTube, all that. How great would that be? Minus the assassinations, Varg.

FUCK YOU, WEST COAST.

*not verified

Near Death Condition - The Disembodied - In Spiritual Spheres

Now that Christmas cheer is no longer getting crammed down our every orifice I feel we need to hit 'reset' here at IllCon. Maybe a nugget of techy brutal death metal with bits of doom and some synths thrown in will do the trick. Perhaps it's because the band in question is from the land of eternal neutrality--Switzerland--that they're able to toe the line of so many sub-sub-genres without seeming contrived. On their newest release, The Disembodied - In Spiritual Spheres, Near Death Condition take a shotgun blast approach to brutal death, throwing elements of Suffocation (the musicianship), Coffins (the delivery), and Morbid Angel (the riffs) at the listener and hoping something sticks. Well, almost everything sticks. Two albums into their young career I'm keeping a close eye on Near Death Condition, and so should you. Don't let the board shorts or political disposition towards neutrality fool you, these are evil motherfuckers.

Near Death Condition - The Disembodied - In Spiritual Spheres

My Stoopid 2011 List

Year end lists...who's got time to read 'em, let alone write 'em? Do you follow The Long Way Home yet? No? What the fuck is WRONG with you? Homeboy assembled the most comprehensive metal year-end list ever. It's funny, insightful, and encyclopedic. Fucking mandatory reading.

Your humble writer, on the other hand, mustered a measly top five. This is attributable to holiday-onset ennui (fuck Christmas obviously), business (fuck the end of the fiscal year AMIRITE?), and the fact other year-end lists out there (see above) already destroy mine.

Here's to 2011 I GUESS. It was an OK year for metal.

Not posting links. You've got Google on your computer too.

5) Obscura - Omnivium (apogee of modern tech DM)
4) Mournful Congregation - Book of Kings (see this)
3) Absu - Abzu (all that is Good in one concise, perfect package)
2) Obsequiae - Suspended in the Brume of Eos (no surprise considering the pedigree. reinventing BM is no small feat in an oversaturated market)
1) Atriarch - Forever the End (Atriarch destined for world domination #realtalk)

BONUS: Top 5 albums on everyone's list I didn't get.

5) Autopsy - Macabre Eternal (mandatory pot-stirring selection - return to form? not hearing it)
4) Tombs - Path of Totality (i mean yeah it's good but really everyone?)
3) The Atlas Moth - An Ache for the Distance (ima pro-lo fanboy as much as the next dude but sorry this is just weeeeeeeak)
2) Disma - Towards the Megalith (i count at least 5 records that did the Swedish DM revival thing better than them)
1) Krallice - Diotima (nothing worked for me on this release, not the least of which was the vocals, extra-ugh)

SEASONS GREETINGS

Sunday Night Blues is an Acute Condition

Dang, Sunday night already? That means work for most of us IllCon slobs except for Cobras who lives exclusively off Apocryphon royalties, and school for a not-insignificant segment of the IllCon workforce. Lucky for you, I've culled a trifecta of newish death metal newish releases to kick off your week. The first, The Virally Enthroned's Catharsis, a pitch perfect tech-death effort crafted by your five younger cousins apparently, if their metal-archives photo is any indication. I mean yeah, they may need some image work but I'm a little surprised there isn't more chatter about this band. I guess I shouldn't make fun too hard because this band photo could probably double as a snap of an IllCon staff meeting.

The second, a tardcore slamfest by a Belgian band who decided to call itself Putrified J; I love any band whose name looks like a typo. Putrified J is not to be confused with Putrified, whose debut LP, Spawn of the Dead, just dropped recently and just so happens to shred (evidence to follow). Putrified J has been making the rounds lately on some of those other metal blogs you read, and for good reason. Not only are they giving their album away for free - total bro move - but their low-threshold brutal slamz are just the thing you need to ease into this week and the holiday season that is well nigh near. 12 tracks in under 20 minutes makes this the perfect substitute for your Quiet Storm: Slow Jams tape when it goes missing. Putrified J get bonus points for proclaiming on Facebook that THIS SHIT WONT EVER STOP AND U CANNOT MAKE US!

Truth.

Virally Enthroned - Catharsis

Putrified - Spawn of the Dead

Putrified J - The Last Harvest

Dead Reptile Shrine - A Journey Through the Darkest of Forests (2005)

Sure, you're already an expert in Finnish Death Metal by now, but Finnish Black Metal? Not so much. These a Beast kicked it off with the post below mine. I invite you to continue your vision quest with Dead Reptile Shrine. Hammer Smashed Sound turned me on to em a few months ago and their spot in the rotation is pretty secure at the moment.

So yeah Dead Reptile Shrine. The base is sloppy, raw, primitive black metal. The tempos drag and sometimes forget a beat here or there. Suddenly, there is a techno song that makes no apologies for its derivative, lazy nature (Illud Divinum Insanus this is not) even though it's patently bad. Then, you get a riff that sounds like you did when you got your first electric - just a series of fourths (one finger, two strings, same fret) up and down the neck. You get primordial chants, flutes, and ogres lurking in the brume. You get straight-up d-beat bangers. Not infrequently do you wonder whether the haphazard performances are intentional or symptomatic of a talent deficit. This is Black Metal Roky Erickson.

Over at The Left Hand Path, Todd DePalma describes their sound thusly: "The Fernow-esque gold plated cock-in-socket fumbling manufacturing death moans, gulag dances, and clunky faux-percussion, which explodes like rows of compressed air-canisters." Sure, it's not a complete sentence, but it says enough.


Dead Reptile Shrine - A Journey Through the Darkest of Forests

AUSSIE METAL

So once again I'm riding the coattails of someone else's work; this time it's Aegipan and his superb take on Disembowelment's album Transcendence into the Peripheral. Yes, the album rips, yes it's a genre touchstone, yes they're from Australia, etc etc etc wait, hold up, come again, Australia?

Yeah dude AUSTRALIA.

One thing I've always loved about metal is its connection to place. Whether it's this blog, a tet a tet with your bros down the pub, or tracing a genre's roots, the conversation ultimately turns to place eventually. Sure you've got your Swedens, your Finlands, your Norways, but there's a million other places usually left out for one reason or another. Like Australia.

AUSSIE METAL. You've heard of it, you always kinda knew it's a thing, but you never scratched the surface. Every now and again some new album will drop and you'll be banging it out your LeBaron pulling all kinds of girls with it and then you'll find out the band is from Australia. And you think to yourself, "Huh, Australia, well that's odd oh well LOL @ Australia."

LOL INDEED

While Australia has a bumper crop of metal powerhouses, it rarely comes up in conversation as a hotbed of metal inspiration/innovation. Overall trends you find in Aussie metal are good songwriting, bad cover art (see aforementioned dISEMBOWELMENT post), and a rather intense surrealist impulse attributable to the country's overabundance of psilocybe cubensis.

mmmmmmm

Whatever the cause, something's brewing on that giant island in the South Pacific and deep scrutiny is utterly mandatory to your comprehension of metal. I'll take you through some Aussie metal highlights; your homework is to get on metal-archives, filter by country, put on your gum boots, and slog through some of this shit for me. DoomUnicorn can only do so much.

Since I'm piggybacking on Aegipan's Aussie-doom motif, I am compelled to start at Mournful Congregation. Everyone can get behind this band. Mournful Congregation make some of the sickest, most wretched, agonizingly slow, and haunting funeral doom this side of the Murray-Darling basin. They recently released Book of Kings, the band's crowning achievement (which is saying something considering the quality of their body of work) and a release of such monumentally depressing and beautiful proportions that it somehow feels like doom's apogee. As we swing into end-of-year list season, I'm certain Book of Kings will occupy its fair share of 1 and 2 slots. I mean sure, there will be those detractors out there who LIKED THE EARLIER STUFF BRAH but these folks are false. The best elements of Cathedral, Evoken, dISEMBOWELMENT, and even Musk Ox rolled into one. You can't not find something to love on this record. All u haters kill yourself.

Mournful Congregation - Book of Kings

On deck is Destroyer 666, another band with which you're undoubtedly familiar, which crushes all posers with a blackened thrash melange calling to mind Von (only more evil), Beherit (only slightly less evil), and Bathory (about as evil). Crawling from the disbanded detritus of Bestial Warlust, Destroyer 666's finest moment was 1996's Cold Steel...for an Iron Age. You get the phrase "all killer, no filler" in a lot of metal reviews and no where is this truer than in Cold Steel...for an Iron Age. Each track oozes a palpable intensity buttressed by KK Warslut's vocals. (i only wrote that last sentence to have an excuse to type KK Warslut's name, KK Warslut). Truly, this is the sound of extreme metal, with flecks of black, death, and thrash all orbiting around metal's raison detre: songs about satan, war, death, and crucifix rape.

Destroyer 666 - Cold Steel...For an Iron Age

Still not a believer? Shall I go on?

The next logical stop is Urgrund which has connections to, let's see, among others, Destroyer 666, Tzun Tzu and Ignivomous. My head is beginning to hurt. I'm going down a These a Beast-ian 'Six Degrees of' rabbit hole. You can easily identify the Destroyer 666 in Urgrund's sound, perhaps with a bit more control and a flair for the epic. They're like an early, heathen-era Enslaved filtered through a thrashy Australian lens. Tempos rarely notch above 100 BPM or so and the vocals are discernible, revealing a lyrical depth uncharacteristic of the genre. Non-essential but important to understanding the Australian metal ouvre.


Urgrund - The Graven Sign

All right, buckle in. Drowning the Light up next. I had a difficult time picking just one record from their considerable discography but I settled on Of Celtic Blood and Satanic Pride because I think it's fairly emblematic of the overall DTL aesthetic (blown out, raped, vomited, dope sick BM filth). It's clear Azgorh, the band's sole member, was meant to have have been spawned in Norway and not New South Wales from his tense, paranoid, frosty delivery and the rampant Burzumisms. It often sounds like he'd play faster if he could, but he can't, so he doesn't. This is my favorite defining characteristic of DTL. He sounds like he's eternally practicing. The most common DTL complaint is he's a poor-man's Darkthrone/Striborg/what have you and, indeed, it's true somewhat; but, he's enveloped everything in a distinctly Australian sheen that saves it from copycattism. Whereas Burzum is all horns, trees, and mead, DTL is all spiders, sedimentary basins, and Ayahuasca. Does this clarify anything?

Drowning the Light - Of Celtic Blood and Satanic Pride

Bridging the gap between Black and Death is StarGazer (that's a big S little tar big G little azer). StarGazer is Absu minus Proscriptor. It'll do for when your Mom borrowed your Absu tapes but most other times it just leaves you pining for the real thing. They do the whole mindfuck-via-time-signature shifts thing which I personally outgrew after binging on Yes and Nile back in junior high. According to metal-archives, there is notable membership overlap between SarGazer, Portal, Mournful Congregation, and others. Again, non-essential IMO but there are those whose opinions I hold in high regard who would disagree, and they are important to the discussion.

StarGazer - The Scream That Tore the Sky

Now, of course, Portal.

(OK first, when I searched IllCon to make sure no one beat me to the punch on this already-classic, the only search result was this. It would behoove you to go back and read that in its entirely.)

OK, done? Great.

I can't really add anything insightful about this record you haven't read or intuited yourself so I'll just cut to the chase and say THEY'RE FROM AUSTRALIA and LOOK AT THESE DAFT ASSHOLES. no but srs do yourself a favor and cop this if you haven't already and prepare for the aural equivalent of an unanesthetized liver biopsy. But before you dig in, don't let the over-adjectivization (murky, cavernous, frightening, atmospheric, etc. etc.) that surrounds this album fool you: motherfuckers can PLAY. Peep game.

Portal - Outre

We wrap up with Impetuous Ritual, whose 2009 debut Relentless Execution of Ceremonial Excrescence completely flew under my radar. Who let me drop the ball on this one? Why the fvk is it so good you may wonder? Oh that's just cuz it's Portal's ENTIRE rhythm section doing the downtuned DM thang, so this release comes to you immediately authenticated before they even play a note. Ignis Fatuus and Omenous (sic) Fugue nail the disorienting, nauseating DM vibe with generous sludge n' doom intervals for the druggies like you to get off on. This is Portal with the Entombed levels turned up to 11--Portal-lite if you will--combining the oppressive, foggy atmospherics of Portal with slightly more accessible songs. SLIGHTLY.

Impetuous Ritual - Relentless Execution of Ceremonial Excrescence

So that's your Aussie metal snapshot. I'm sure I forgot your favorite band, and you know more than me, and you've got all these on vinyl, so tell me all about it in the comments sweetie.

Polluted Inheritance - Ecocide

For tonight's entertainment, I present Polluted Inheritance's debut LP, Ecocide. I mentioned them in my last post and I thought for symmetry's sake I would offer up another example of Dutch tech-death circa '92. You may be more acclimated to their totally limpid and accessible 2001 album, Into Darkness, which feels more like a coattails-riding cash grab (gash crab?) than anything. But back in the day, Polluted Inheritance were straight legit. They've got the rhythmic attention deficit disorder thing going with songs unfolding in unexpected ways and harmonized leads that kind of come at you out of nowhere. In that sense, they've got more in common with Retribution-era Malevolent Creation than, say, Grave. In fact, they'd fit nicely alongside some of those other Florida heavyweights but I'm not ready to take that line of thinking any farther.

Whatever you do, don't listen to the lyrics too hard because you'll probably lose your shit. In the halcyon DM age you'd hope they could do better than, "Scream out, the agony of pain!" (track six, "Fear") but apparently Polluted Inheritance could not. Not for nothing, 'the agony of pain' just doesn't sound all that brutal. No one listens to the lyrics anyway so you should be good. But, to be safe, these guys should've had the common sense to bury their lyrics in that swirling miasma like everyone else back then.

lololol

oh yeah here you go

Polluted Inheritance - Ecocide

Delirium - Zzooouh (1990)

The Netherlands ws rly bumpin in the early 90s. They're overlooked because of (or mistaken for) early Finnish DM heavyweights like Demigod and Demilich and of course the whole Sweden thing, but the Netherlands held their own with Asphyx, Polluted Inheritance, and scores of bands imitating whatever was coming out of Finland and Sweden. Delirium's trade is classic early death/doom in equal measure, evoking Hellhammer, Bolt Thrower, and yeah, Asphyx. The lackluster production, mid-paced tempos, average playing, and guitar 4 beginner riffs will alienate the more myopic metal fans among us; to the discerning consumer, however, the songs speak for themselves, stand out from one another (more than can be said for most DM coming outta the Netherlands these days -- lookin' at you, Hail of Bullets) and combine to create a massively destructive death/doom juggernaut. No face melting here; just demon hordes impaling you slowly on creosote-slicked ship masts. Bonus points for the logo nod to Candlemass. Official certified lost classic status. DL OR DIE.

make em say zzooouh

Title Fight 2011: JGD vs. Judge Shredd

VERSUS

The other day, JGD and Judge Shredd came to blows over the merits of Suffocation's 1991 classic Effigy of the Forgotten versus Beheaded's lesser-known Ominous Bloodline. In order to help these gents bury the hatchet once and for all, as IllCon Director of Quality Control, I sanctioned an independentanalysis of the two records. Fortuitously, they lend themselves nicely to comparison. Each peddle a similar vein of technical slam, Beheaded with a decidedly grindy approach and Suffocation with a jazzy one, both have 9 tracks, both fall just shy of the 40 minute mark, etc. So we have our baseline; next we need a rubric. In order to drill down to elements that account for the major genre identifiers, after careful review I selected five criteria: musicianship, production, songs, slamz, and intangibles. Each criterion carries a maximum score of 5. This process enabled me to fairly pit a veritable slam classic against the underdog, a relatively obscure album that earned the Judge's unqualified recommendation: no small praise, mind you.

Before you get started, go grab the Beheaded from the Judge's post.

Now here is Effigy of the Forgotten in case you left yr copy in the car.

Now let's get it.

MUSICIANSHIP - Suffocation 5, Beheaded 3
Both bands posses top-notch rhythmic chug and an uncanny knack for propelling songs with strategic time changes, but Suffocation took this category easily. The solos, flecked with jazz, chromatic scales, and non-Western lines, allow Effigy to tower over Ominous. Throw in tons of whammy dives and pinched harmonics and you've got a recipe for a classic. Ominous' solos on the other hand come off as somewhat limp and were hurt by the fact that they sound like they are played on the same ultra-down-tuned guitars that carry the rhythm. Everything sounds like it was played on the G string which gives it this weird chopped and screwed aspect (that sounds awesome on paper but it's not really). Plus, the drumming. Yeah, they can both play 600 BPM but I'm pretty sure they didn't have drum triggers in '91.

PRODUCTION - Suffocation 4, Beheaded 3

This was comparing apples to oranges. If you're into warm bass tones, chunky drums, analog tape hiss, fat cables, etc., you're voting one way. If you're into the sonic equivalent of crisp lettuce filtered through a hard disk, you're voting another. You can prolly reckon which side I fall on. The Beheaded album has this sort of deathcore sheen that I can't stomach but that could be a matter of personal preference. I'm not about to introduce an argument about analog vs. digital because then the real nerds will come out the woodwork. But I will agree with The Judge about the drum tone: total weirdness (two snares?) that adds heft to each song and kind of rules. They actually got a point just for the drum sound.

SONGS - Suffocation 5, Beheaded 5
I gotta hand it to Beheaded here, they come through with some boss tracks. Tons of variety, interesting time changes, identifiably proggy read of brutal DM, each track is equipped with a good, solid structure and plan. Track-for-track, Beheaded matches Suffocation's impeccable ability to make a fairly proscriptive genre compelling.

SLAMZ - Suffocation 4, Beheaded 5

Before yr all WTF DUDE this was a controlled scientific study so it's a FACT. Please hold your questions for the end. This victory was enabled by the aforementioned drum tone and, indeed, learning at the left hand of the genre masters, Suffocation. This was a controversial category because, overall, Ominous Bloodline slams harder. HOWEVER, the slamingest track on Effigy, "Infecting the Crypt," slams harder than the slamingest track on Ominous Bloodline, "Rooted in Profundity."

INTAGIBLES - TIE
+1 to Beheaded for being from Malta. There is something to be said for conjuring abstract, abrasive DM in the Mediterranean vs. doing your thing in Long Island. +1 to Suffo for overall weirdness (jazz scales, eastern melodies), ideas, and variety. +1 to Beheaded for getting the job done with just 4 commandbros instead of 5. +1 to Suffo for artwork.

FINAL SCORE: Suffocation 20, Beheaded 18

In conclusion, Mullen and co. FTW. However, Beheaded is nipping at their heals with a solid effort. A classic, maybe not, but definitely worth your attention. That score is way closer than what I predicted going into this experiment. So kiss and make up, JGD and Judge Shredd, you're both winners.

BONUS :-O

Since we're sharing our fav brutal DM albums from weird Eurozone nations, I present you with 1997's Union Carbide by the Czech Republic's Garbage Disposal. This album rips on all fronts: slamz, skillz, songz, intangiblez. Vocals take the Demilich/Wormed approach you've been getting a lot of here at IllCon lately and add a hypnotic dimension. Bass work is rad and the overall highlight on the album, which is unusual in metal. When they bring the bass to the front of the mix they drape it in this Alice in Chains chorus effect which makes me nostalgic for the mid-90s. A couple tracks fall into a Coffins-esque death/doom plod which provides relief from all the face-pummeling slam. I dunno, just download the feckin' thing, yiz cunt.

Garbage Disposal - Union Carbide