INNUMERABLE FORMS : " Pain Effulgence '

This dark death doom band features members of Power Trip, Mammoth Grinder, Iron Lung, and a litany of underground metal acts. They have mastered a dark and oppressive sound, but once I am in the second song, I find myself faced with the question, Can these guys write a song. Just because they are from bands with a name, does that mean they were the songwriters for that band, or did they just show up and play their parts as required? There is no answer found in the second song, as they are trying to solidify a depressive mood. 

"Blotted Inside" finds that even after slowing down, they are a death metal band at heart. The low, heavily affected guttural nature of the vocals works at either tempo, though it feels more resonant in the more depressive drone they lock into. Melodic guitar lines flow around the steady pulse of darkness. "Dissonant Drift" is truth in advertising as the gurgle of the vocals bubbles under the atmosphere of trudge of doom. The pace is picking up into a more deliberate stomp by the end. Then they hammer back at you, going into " Ressentiment," it is punctuated by atmospheric fills of guitar, but largely moves like death metal until the guitar solo takes over. 

By "Overwhelming Subjection," things are starting to run together as the uniform sounds collide.  Guitar melodies can help to differentiate things if you are giving a close neough listen. This can be heard as 'Pain Effulgence." Everything sounds heavy and the guitar tone is as miserable as you want it to be, but it do get mired into a sound where the best moments of a band like My Dying Bride, who pulls this sort of mood off with more grace, or even a funeral band like Voken might be a fairer comparison., has more layers, these guys are just playing guitar well with little story to tell.  For that reason I am going to give this album an 8, excellent execution with not much to say, but for some fans of this genre, that is what they are looking for.Out on Porfound Lore 

pst401

Bleach Everything :" So We Gnaw"

 It is clear that despite the fuzzy blown out tone of this recording and the primitive hard core they rumble out from it that these guys know what they are doing. They should since they are comprised of guys from the likes of Darkest Hour, Mammoth Grinder and Iron Reagan. The sound of Iron Reagan being the more prominent  if you compared the influences of the their collective resumes.One you get about 4 songs in the punk side begins to make everything sound the same. Their is a more metallic d-beat sound until the more dumbed down leanings of punk take hold in "Soft Bigotry". They are more impressive earlier in the album. The first song almost has a sludge feel to it. There are some catchy riffs still laced with enough anger to keep them legit. 

The harshly yelled vocals keep the lyrics from really being in your face, but the song titles are enough to tell you they are political. I am glad I can't make them out. I tend to stray away from wanting politics mixed with my music even when it comes to punk where that is more of a thing. I remember when Trump first got elected , people consoled themselves with the fact that perhaps they might get some good punk out of it. There did not seem to be an increase until 3 years later. Since these same people who bitch on the internet about the world they only see from the filter of their Facebook feed, they are unlikely to actually vote. Even if the system was not already rigged  and it would do any good so for the next five years we are going to see even more widespread influx of punk.

You are asking the computer screen, so why are you talking politics now? There is not much mroe to say about what these guys are doing because if you heard one angry punk song you have heard them all. I do like the last song "Dumb and Dug In" because it offers more in the way of dynamics and the riffs have more of an edge to the,. We have been getting all in your face aggression for the duration so needed some sonic variations. I will give this album a 7.5, these guys are good at what they do . I wish what they do was more like the first and the last song. Still it is well done , since the genre itself does not lend it self to a ton of new thoughts.

Mammoth Grinder : "Cosmic Crypt"

In music journalism there seems to be two schools of thought either paint the band into the picture of who you want your audience to be or if you are really into kissing a record label or P/R companies ass, paint them into being who they want them to be. I try not to play into either school and try to just call a spade a spade . It's what I used to like about rap from the 80s or 90s they had a quality control and used to call out rapper who were whack, These days that only happens in the comment section of music blogs and tend to devolve into trolling with not reference point or fact. I can say this band is not whack as they are good at what they do , however what they do is very easy to define. I think i'ts pretty easy, to say without question these guys are death metal. Upon second listen I think these guys benefit from the fact that they come in so heavy it makes it sound like there is more of an original flavor than might really be there, however The  execution of the second is more convincing. They tend to steer closer to the tried and true formula for death metal the rest of the way to the point that it's not until the fourth song "Divine Loss" that I am able to hear a clear cut distinction between songs. There is a little more of a punk undercurrent to that one. I think one of the albums more redeeming aspects is the fact these songs are very condensed. The longest song is still under 4 minutes so they never wear you out in one song with too much of the same thing.

Many of the guitar solos recall early Slayer and Morbid Angel, lots of diving off of the whammy bar.The drumming is a little less nuanced than what I want from death metal that I find exceptional. There is less double bass, making me think this guys used to be in a punk band. "Superior Firepower" is so straight forward that it begins to bore me a minute into it. The punk element to the drumming starts to get on my nerves as it does the stiff pitter patter on the snare that makes me think of those monkey toys with the cymbals. "Human is Obsolete" doesn't do anything to change my opinion and "Locusts Nest" really only seems to be a faster paced version of the previous song. "Mysticism" is the first song that really begins to change my mind I think I like the fact the dense dark riff reminds me of the first Unleashed album. They slightly revert back to their old ways by going into the monkey cymbal beat here and there, but I can handle it better when it's book ended by something more interesting."Rotting Robes" has a moshier riff to it that I could have found my self wanting to jump into the pit as a teenager so I gotta give them props for that one as the title track that closes the album is much less memorable.

Are these guys good at what they do? Yes. Do they have some cool riffs here and there ? Yes. Do you think I am someone who is content with cool riffs here and there? No. Do I need a greater sense of dynamics and some atmosphere to convince me things are darker? Yes. Do I already own all of the death metal albums from the 80s where this was done ? Yes.  So given these facts I am giving this album a 6. If you would have answered them differently or are too young to remember when this type of music came out then it might be more impressive and you might want to round it up higher.