Mind Mold : "s/t" EP

I normally shun EP's, but over the course of the past five years I have learned sometimes you gotta take what you can get. This Calgary based falls in the cracks somewhere between blackened death metal and dark hard core. They are dissonant in a way that reminds me of Ulcerate at times yet on song like "Antipath" they blast off with feral snarling. They refrain from taking you on sprawling indulgences that might have made this a full length if it had been handled by other bands who like to wallow in feedback. I can say that "Antipath" didn't hook me in as intently as the opener and I think it's a case of at that point I had gotten use to what is in their bag of tricks. This can be the case with many extreme metal bands the heaviness of what they do leaves you stunned so the first song slips by with your ears ringing in it's wake with the second forced to answer the question "so I get it that you are heavy, but can you write songs?"

Once I am almost all the way through "Opyl" this question still has not been answered with a defining yes or no.I get that they know how to use varied shades of sonic dismal gray. What they are drawing with this is more abstract on this song. The mid range yowl of the vocals doesn't really do them any favors in answering this as the guitars are forced to do all the work when it comes to melody. Their drummer is good. He is not the machine like monster employed by Ulcerate, but he can fill the gaps with fills in a way that covers them well. I have heard grind core referenced in regards to these guys and I do not hear that at all. I hear less of what I thought to be hard core influences the deeper to delve into this album and more atmospheric death metal. So far I think they get the most props for creating some beautifully ugly chords which seems to be their stock and trade.

Shoe-gaze is also an exaggerated term used in reference with this band and the closest they come to that is a anguished take on atmospheric death metal called "Nyx" that closes the album. This might be the best song with the opener coming in at a close second. Since I don't feel that they really gave me a solid answer when it comes to their song writing I am going to round this down to an 8. You might want to round that up if you are a fan of atmospheric death metal who likes for it to be approached in a way that hints with bringing other things to the table. So it manages to be thinking man's metal without having to put to much thought into it.