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There
may be about million brutal death metal bands around but
performing a quick scan of what’s in offer is evident
that death metal is a dying genre. It’s the same old
song and dance for everyone. It all sounds like such and
such, even such and such sound like old such and such.
The genre seems starving for originality. Small
branches like death core have infused such little doses
of outside traits, they are not even making a dent, nor
helping the fan look to the future with hope and while
technical death metal has some prominent and hopeful
luminaries, those usually leave the ‘brutal’ as the tag
they once enjoyed. Yes, death metal, for the most part
is a genre of repetition, where brutality is king and
that is damn boring. To most, that seems to be no issue.
To me, well, I just opt for spinning the classics and
forgetting about the current crop.
Portal come
from Australia and with their 2007 album Outre were able to
generate much deserved hype. The band sports a bizarre look
that’s given the press a lot to talk about. I won’t even get
into specifics because that’s been largely covered and because
as I listen to Swarth, it is solely the music that draws me in.
Swarth is one of the most exciting death metal records I’ve
ever heard. Here is a band that sonically is true death metal,
and yet they sound so unique. In their song structure and odd
tempos there is a lot of experimentation, but all that is
totally confined to the same type of tones that have fed the
death metal genre since its inception. Bizarre, doesn’t even
begin to describe Portal.
Their riffs
swirl uncontrollably, like they are trying to suck us into an
infernal vortex. The guitars move swiftly but also in a
convoluted fashion. They are fast puzzles of fat notes escaping
and ending up where they began. But that’s just part of the
equation. Drummer Ignis Fatuus does a hectic job. His kick drum
either is at times buried by the strings or totally absent. His
blast beats roll awkwardly like the speech impediment of a man
with no tongue. That’s what transpires in some tunes. In others,
like on “The Sway”, Fatuus plays like the awaken genius, the
underground metal equivalent of DeNiro’s character in The
Awakening. The vocalist is christened The Curator. I am sure he
likes the word archaic. Think of the horrible breath of David
Vincent, picture his voice as heard through a ten-mile tunnel.
Lovers of
dumbass brutality will be confused as in Swarth there is none
of that bashing vibe that permeates death metal. Instead of a
kick in the balls, Portal offers you a mental fuck. If you
still got energy after this is done, you will for sure be
scratching your head. Here is a band infusing some life into a
moribund genre just kept alive by numbers.
MySpace
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