|
The good folks over at Halo of Flies keep on going all out. The lp version of The Profit Feeds has been released in a beautiful gatefold sleeve, the inside of which portrays evolution and the regression of it into religious sheep and back to monkey form. I won’t go into detail but they are making a point. Not strange then that the release of The Profit Feeds is shared with labels like Alerta Antifascista, Scarecrow and Contraszt!. All of which have to a degree, politics, state and else in their minds and as their target.
The only quasi grand statement I have to make is that times are catching up (for instance, Southern Lord is taking care of the CD version) and while the crust is not necessarily harder nor tastier today than it was when the division between metal and everything else was more marked, music like this is is now a more palatable affair. The masses have definitely become accustomed to hardcore this harsch. readnot of the beatdown kind. Over the last few years the gap between metal and other extreme subgenres has become narrower and narrower. It was in part that the influence of D Beat / what have you and the crusty stuff was impossible to cover with an allusion solely fingering to metal’s past. Needless to say, Swedish death metal wouldn’t be what it is now without hardcore.
Bands have been hard at it for a long time and now is the time for one more worthy player in the game. Out of Cleveland comes Masakari a furious quartet with quite the ear for nuanced guitars and a fist in your face. Yeah, hardcore, D beat, crust, thrash. Whatever, is all here. And believe it or not, it is done with finesse. One may not buy such arguments and even the band may disagree claiming this is pure virulence, undeniable fury and irate rants for equality. But in the case of Masakari, the devil is in the details.
Of course, you’ll need a good ear and maybe, a good pair of headphones. Otherwise, while checking this out with your buds, shit turned up to eleven, chances are you’ll end up punching someone in the face. But if you have the chance you need only get to the last cut, which adorned by a soldier’s disturbing testimony, perfectly displays the band’s guitar harmonic skills. But no, you need not get to the last track to recognize.
Masakari’s core maybe hardcore, but with riffs as heavy as those that open each side of the LP, they are automatically invited to enlist into metal’s ranks. They may not get approved into Metal Archives, but fuck me if that almost black metal riff in “Abandoned” isn’t evil sounding then the deeds of Count Grishnack are sweeter than a Tiramisu. Maybe we can already speak about the surge of bands edging out this style. Nails had a great offering with Unsilent Death.. The Profit Feeds is just as brutal, but is also more detailed. As a listener, I would recommend this to everyone. Let’s strike while the iron is hot. Like is always the case in a scene that loves self destruction, the backlash also starts now.
CD version released by Southern Lord.
MySpace
|
|
