Napalm Death, The Rotted, Descent,
Nebukadnezza London The Underworld 23/11/09
Review by James Young
This gig was put on at fairly short notice, but this didn’t seem to
make any difference as there was a healthy turnout at the Underworld
on this freezing night. This was all the more impressive given that
this was the day after the Damnation Festival up north which would
have robbed London of a few of its regulars. Grindcore masters
Napalm Death had put on a storming show the previous night in Leeds,
and things were set for another great performance. After all, can
you get anything other than an excellent show from these noisy
Brummies?
First to grace the stage were London boys
Nebukadnezza, who have been bringing their unique brand
of thrash to a fair few gigs recently, and this is certainly not a
bad thing. Being only a three-piece, this band can reach impeccable
levels of tightness in their playing, stopping and starting with the
utmost precision, but never forgetting how to lace their songs with
groovy and heavy riffs. I’ve never really been keen on Antonis
Christodoulides’s caveman-like grunted vocals, but it does provide a
dollop of attitude, whilst there is some variation with Fredrik
David Rojas’ backing shouts and death metal-style grunts. For all
the aggressive vocals, Antonis’ stage banter veers on the quiet
side, and the only song title that was announced was ‘Infotainment’.
Apart from this and a few words of appreciation, this set was a
steady stream of thrash goodness as I’ve come to expect from this
band, and it was rather sad when it all came to an end. Antonis’
guitar playing seems to get better every time I see these fellas,
and the band gets even tighter. With another album I think they
could gain as much popularity as fellow countrymen Evile, whilst
being a damn slight more original, although as it happens I think
they’re happy being at the top of the UK thrash metal underground.
The last time I saw Descent,
Ross White took charge of most of the vocals, but it appears that
these have now been split fifty-fifty between him and bassist Duncan
Mitchell. Some songs blasted away with a death metal fury which
brought the likes of Deicide and Cannibal Corpse to mind, but the
majority had a melodic tinge which sounded more like At The Gates.
Whilst they can play their instruments, their songs have never stuck
out too much to me on record or in a live environment, and tonight
was no exception. Songs like ‘The Drowning’ sounded good, but were
rather forgettable, although the guitar solo in ‘Visions’ did have
my jaw dropping, showing that they do have what it takes to write a
good song. I’m sure the best is yet to come with these guys.
‘Who remembers a band called Gorerotted?’ asked
The Rotted vocalist Ben McCrow.
Now made up of more outside elements than original members, a name
change made sense for the cockney boys, and blasting open with
‘Angel Of Meth’, they showed that they are still a force to be
reckoned with. A cover of ‘Only Tools And Corpses’ brought back some
memories, even if it was to be the only look to the past (or should
I say ‘dead’…) we would get today. Never mind though, because new
numbers ‘Get Dead Or Die Trying and ‘Kissing You With My Fists’ did
more than enough to get the crowd moving. The newer material boasts
more of a punk intensity whilst retaining the original
tongue-in-cheek charm, and worked extremely well live, even with the
small area on stage they had to work with tonight. The new members
fitted in perfectly; the drumming of Nate Gould, from the criminally
underrated Screamin’ Daemon, was relentless, and Gian Pyres guitar
work a joy to behold. Gorerotted were the standard-bearers of
English death metal, and now the torch has been passed to The
Rotted, and it’s a job which they can pull off with some ease based
on tonight’s performance. |
|
Napalm Death were clearly a
little frazzled from the previous night’s outing to Leeds, but this
did not stop them laying waste to the Underworld in spectacular
fashion. The venue was absolutely heaving as the ‘Weltschmerz’ intro
boomed forth, and the band launched into ‘Sink Fast, Let Go’, and
continued to blaze through modern classics such as ‘Necessary Evil’
and ‘Suffer The Children’. And blazing it truly was, with the
Underworld a sweaty mass of bodies, as if there really had been a
napalm strike. ‘The Silence Is Deafening’ lived up to its name, and
‘The Code Is Red…Long Live The Code’ had Barney Greenway and Mitch
Harris exchanging grunts and screams respectively. As we all know,
the band’s modern day sound is a mixture of grinding riffs and death
metal, but some of the ‘golden oldies’ (as Barney put it) were aired
from the pure grindcore days. These tracks, each of which clocked in
at around a minute, included ‘From Enslavement To Obliteration’,
‘Scum’ and the second-long ‘You Suffer’. Whilst the majority of the
current members did not feature on these tracks, it was still an
honour to be in the presence of such classics, watching big-haired
Shane Embury, the longest-term member, knock out the furious
bass-lines effortlessly. A few |
 |
tracks were taken from the most recent album, Smear Campaign,
accompanied by a rant from Barney about religion, which saw ‘When
All Is Said And Done’ spewed venomously, as well as the two-for-one
‘Persona Non Grata’ and ‘Smear Campaign’, with its clean vocals (I’m
not joking!). We even got treated to a couple of new numbers from
the upcoming album ‘Time Waits For No Slave’, which sounded as raw
and savage as ever. After leaving the stage briefly, the audience
seemed happy to hear that the Dead Kennedys cover ‘Nazi Punks Fuck
Off’ would be played, as well as ‘Siege Of Power’. It’s a shame that
Napalm Death only got an hour of stage-time tonight, but with such
intense music (and temperatures) on display it’s understandable, and
the setlist was substantial, even if the songs aren’t the longest in
the world.
Tonight we witnessed a great showcase of UK metal, topped off by our
country’s pride and joy, Napalm Death, who continue to show that
they are not ‘past it’, but very much on top of their game. One can
only look forward to their forthcoming album ‘Time Waits For No
Slave’ with much anticipation |
|
|
|
|
|
|
Desecration, Dyscarnate, Hovadah,
Fleshrot London The Purple Turtle 15/11/09
Brutal death metal gigs have been few and far between as of late,
and it was thanks to Welsh death metal bastards (their words, not
mine) for putting out a new album and putting on a launch party for
the gore-craving masses. And I mean masses - it was heaving in the
Purple Turtle and pretty hard to move around. Whether or not this
was for the headliners I do not know, because the crowd had thinned
out by the late hour which they came on. Either way, it was good to
see the scene being supported in such a strong way, and furthermore
we had four good bands lined up for our listening pleasure.
Taking Ultimate Trigger Mechanism’s place, who dropped out for
reasons unknown to me, Fleshrot
opened up tonight’s onslaught. What sounded like fairly uninspiring
brutal death metal on first impression turned out to be a below par
sound, with some unevenly triggered drums not really helping things
along. After a while however, the true quality began to surface,
with some nice pig grunts courtesy of Ben and those killer guitar
squeaks from Chris and Joe bringing things to life. What stuck out
after a few songs was the excellent variation between tracks,
crossing over from Cryptopsy-influenced technical playing to
straight-forward brutal death metal. Occasionally there were
slamming riffs brought in, such as in ‘Cranial Atrophy’, which
worked very nicely indeed. Also spicing things up were the melodic
guitar solos, which contrasted nicely against the otherwise brutal
sound, providing some nice uniqueness to each song. An enjoyable
set, and one could even have made an argument for this band as main
support, as they have the most releases out of the three supports,
but that’s life I guess.
I’m still a tad confused about where
Hovadah come from. Actually, I’m just confused about
Hovadah. They say they’re from Slovakia but everything else tells me
that they hail from London. On record they play a crusty
hardcore-based grinding death metal, but live they come across as an
intense pure grind machine, akin to the likes of Nasum. Tonight they
were one member down, who they said had left the band, so they were
performing as a three-piece, but this certainly did not mean a loss
in intensity, because this was abrasive grind of the heaviest
variety. Furious blast beats from drummer Franas kept giving away to
infectious grooves and punked up mayhem, which reminded me of the
Scandinavian scene and bands like Rotten Sound. Why a violent pit
didn’t break out is beyond me, because this was as destructive as
music gets, and despite wearing their influences on their sleeve (or
Nasum t-shirt, I guess), it was a blazing set. We were treated to
new songs, which included a tongue-in-cheek ditty about making a
girl cum, and a storming number entitled ‘Waiting For Nothing’. A
good twenty tracks must have been played in the half hour that they
were allotted, and each of them had character, making a future album
a must-buy. Hopefully these guys will make a triumphant return, and
maybe on a grind bill where they will be appreciated a little but
more.
It was always going to be an uphill struggle for
Dyscarnate tonight, sandwiched
between two excellent bands, and without the experience or releases
behind them to pull off the position of main support. Still, they
had the largest crowd of the night watching them, so they must have
been doing something right, and furthermore their stage presence was
a lot greater than on previous occasions. No longer a band with
three guitarists, two more than sufficed, and the band gave the
impression that they have been touring for years, with Tom Witty
cutting quite an imposing figure centre stage with his mass of long
blonde hair. The music is the more bludgeoning sort of death metal,
which chugs along in a heavy fashion, and has never really moved me.
This was not helped by the fact that they played their first two
songs, ‘Fuelling The Ignorance’ and ‘As We March On…’ as one, which
seemed to drag on forever, with endless death metal passages. Things
did pick up later though, with songs such as ‘Assimilation Of
Indifference’ bringing some nice quirky breaks into the mix. This
band might not be ready for such a big slot yet, but judging from
the turnout and reaction they received tonight, they are very close. |
| Nobody can write a death
metal song like Desecration, who
are certainly one of a kind in their field. Whilst a wonderful thing
to behold live, their sound levels are usually their only hindrance,
and a few sets have suffered in the past because of this. As the
band came on stage to the sound of a heartbeat and launched into
‘When The Heart Stops Beating’ from their most recent album Process
Of Decay, it was evident that the sound was indeed perfect, so we
had a great hour of gore-soaked death metal lined up for us. As
usual, the darkly humoured stage banter was delivered by deadpan
vocalist and guitarist Ollie Jones, whilst bassist Andi Morris was
much more vocal than usual. A host of songs stormed by next,
including the outrageously catchy ‘Dig Up, Dig In’, and ’Asphyxiate
On Blood’ with its accompanying contagious chorus. Unfortunately
only one song from Pathway to Deviance crept onto the setlist
tonight in the form of personal favourite ‘Cleaver, Saw and
Butcher’s Knife’, with it’s abrasive guitar sound and spiralling
riffs, even if the ending solo was absent. This induced a torrent of
double kicking from fast-footed Mic Hourihan, who wore nothing but a
pair of sunglasses, boots and lycra shorts. Eek. Back to the setlist,
there was also only one song from the controversial Gore and
Perversion album, in the form of ‘Pharaonic Circumcision’, which got
heads nodding. The lyrics of |
 |
Desecration
these days seem to be geared more towards the gory rather than the
sexual side of things, so this song, which included lyrics about
sewing a woman’s parts up was more than welcome! An oldie was played
from Murder In Mind, with ‘Cerebral Annoxia’ starting up the first
and only pit of the night, which induced some violence, which is
surprising considering that this was rather slow compared to some of
the tracks on display. This being the unofficial launch party of the
new album Forensix, a fair few songs from this were played,
including ‘Overdose’, as well as a few which we were told hadn’t
been performed live yet, like ‘Sadosexual Suicide’, which boasted
some razor-sharp riffs. ‘Gravewax’ brought things to a close, but
the audience kicked up such a noise that the band returned on stage
to play a couple of closing tracks from the new album including
‘Aim, Fire, Kill’, which I can see being a future staple with its
singalong (in the most brutal sense of the word) chorus. Desecration
haven’t performed a set of this length in London for years, and it
still wasn’t long enough! With this band, you never get exactly what
you want, but you can enjoy whatever they end up playing. Some of
the best death metal on this planet, let alone this island. If you
haven’t, go and check them out this second!
Gore-n but not forgotten, this was a stellar night of UK death
metal, and you can’t do much better than ending a gig with
Desecration. Superb.
www.redravenpromotions.com |
www.myspace.com/redravenpromotions |
|
