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Pretty
impressive musicianship from this young Swedish quartet. Memfis
was formed in 2003 in the city of Kristinehamn and judging by
how tight and elaborate The Wind Up is, this band must
have worked hundreds of hours polishing material as intricate as
the one contained here until it was refined beyond the
likelihood of human failure and timing screw ups. At a
different level though, such grueling work takes some of the
soul away from the music. Many progressive works lack just that,
and The Wind Up, or about half of it, is no exception.
Funny then, how most of the humanity of the record comes from
the unreal and beyond human threatening growls of vocalist Mattias
Engstrom. For a prog band though, Memfis are a bit more violent
than most; trash metal fills the songs with speed, turns and
bulky sounds. Downright jaw dropping is the performance of
drummer Carl-Johan Lindblad who is not only incredibly creative
at sparkling the songs with taste but who is also dexterous like
a young Neil Peart or Mike Portnoy. Guitar wise Memfis also
shines; though not at the same level of Lindblad, the tandem of
Mattias Engstrom and Daniel Godstedt shoots off riffs like they
are free and prescribed to all. Their work is nuanced and in the
best instances, rather melodic; a fact that's put on a spotlight
by the clean production work.
The Wind-Up
was nominated in the Hard Rock/Punk category of the Swedish
Independent Music Awards. There is absolutely nothing punk about
it, so the competition (alongside In Flames, Wolverine and a few
others) might have been a bit unfair there, but that goes to say
a bit about Memfis' success in their native land and about how
well-executed these songs are. The band would be wise to work
some angles; Memfis for the most part sounds like a thrash
progressive band with a Pitbull at the mike. There are the
traces of death metal that could appeal to a fan base hungry for
stuff that goes beyond plain sweat and guts, that handful open
to all those technical death metal combos Willowtip Records is
so fond of. And then there are those fans who grow disappointed
with each consequent Dillinger Escape Plan record. At times, the
music of Memfis is so intricate and bent on blast beats The
Wind Up seems to fall in math rock pavement cracks, but
those occasions are wholly inconsequential and sparse throughout
the record. The violence factor is also never elevated to
ridiculous degrees. For the most part though, let's take this
for what it is; a pretty technical progressive record.
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