Failure Addict

Priapus's first vinyl release on another label! I've always been so curious why these guys have never been scooped up by some big money support. Great guys and tremendous musicians, always delivering tech grind of the highest quality. This is their split 7" with Intheshit, released by Give Praise Records a few months ago. All copies are on black vinyl, 33 RPM.

Intheshit take up the A-side with 3 new tracks. These guys have been around for a few years, I have a tape of theirs that DIY Noise put out a while ago, but haven't kept up with them much since. I believe their's been some line-up changes and what not. The have a very different sound now then from what I remember. Much more chaotic and frantic, bordering on noisegrind honestly. Reminds me a lot of most of Last Days of Humanity's recordings; waves of low end distortion and gun shot snare hits gutting through the thick mess. But with a rough sounding hardcore vocalist instead of gurgles. It's not bad, it's actually better the more I play it. Priapus give us 2 new tracks of finely crafted, spotless, guitar player jizz flowing grindcore. Absolutely flooring stuff, definitely their heaviest recording. These two songs are some of their best tracks so far as well. Tons of archs, power slamming grooves and ridiculous fretwork exercising blast riffs. This is how you do technical grindcore. If you like bands such as Malignancy, Maruta or Noisear, check this band out.

Good packaging on this one. The cover sleeve is printed on very thick paper, it kind of has a hard time folding flat, but man is it sturdy. Very clean black and white printing too.

 Buy this!! Intheshit put out another EP this year as far as I know, and Priapus are recording for another split or EP.

~VII

Island Of Clones

I am not an avid collector of test pressings, but I am a collector of Needful Things. And when I saw them in NYC a couple weeks ago, they happened to be selling test pressings of their new split 7" with Roskopp. The fact that it was a test(limited to 60) and a TLAL release only sweetened the deal. Black vinyl, 45 RPM.

I love Needful Things, we all know this. I think they're one of the most criminally underrated grindcore bands going right now. The three tracks on here are vicious and unrelenting, just how NT do it. I wasn't a huge fan of the Roskopp side at all. Pretty much just standard grindcore, but without anything exciting in it. I feel like I do need to pick up an official copy of this though, because a TP can only be played a few times before it starts to go bad.

Cool artwork from Aaron Nichols of Defeatist.

This should be released sometime soon.

~VII

59 Seconds To Kill Them And You

I picked up one of the most recent The Afternoon Gentlemen splits when I ordered the Gadget LP. By far one of the best examples of current grindcore. Every record I have by these guys shreds, and pretty much kills every band they share a split with. Here's The Afternoon Gentlemen/Chiens - split, white vinyl, 45 RPM.

6 rippers from the Gents this time around. Totally solid and fierce grindcore, as usual from them. Tight musicianship, phenomenal songwriting, and more stop-starts riffs than you can shake a stick at. I am in love with the vocals in this band too, they can pull of practically everything; the highest of high pitch screams, growls, pig squeals, power violence barks, you name it. The Chiens side is awesome as well, and definitely a good companion to TAG. I'd say they're definitely more fastcore, which is all fine by me. More stop-start riffs, great drumming, it's a solid 4 tracks effort. They have a 1-sided 12" that I'll probably be picking up sometime.

Great artwork and packaging, filled with all sorts of goodies like a sticker, small poster, and a download card. 

I hate glare so much...

I just ordered a new TAG split which I've been looking forward too for quite a while. An update on that later! Enjoy some grindcore done right!

~VII

My Hummingbird Of Death Collection

Hummingbird of Death are one of my favorite fastcore bands, and I'm proud to say that I own almost all of their releases. Not counting compilations, I'm only missing their floppy disc single, which I've been putting off getting for obvious reasons. Now, I'm not someone who tries to get every color variant/cover variant of a record to try and make an artist collection bigger, I'm just interested in getting the music. I do care about getting the rarest variant, but I can make do with not having it. All of these records are 1st presses, as far as I know.

From left to right:

• split 12" w/ I Accuse (black vinyl)
• split 10" w/ Chainsaw To The Face (black vinyl)
• "Show Us The Meaning Of Haste" 12" (light blue marble vinyl)
• "Goatmeal" 5" (black vinyl)
• split 6" w/ Sidetracked (black vinyl)
• split 7" w/ Dead Stare (black vinyl)
• "Demo" cassette
• split cassette w/ Pile Of Infested Maggot Viscera 
• "Diagnosis: Delicious" 7" (black vinyl)
• split 12" w/ Titanarum (transparent red vinyl)

~VII

Vesicles

The last thing I bought from the Give Praise sale, and also the final recorded output from my beloved Dead Radical. As far as I know I have all of their records, but something in me tells me that I'm missing something. Anyway, here's the Dead Radical/Republicorpse split 7", black vinyl, 33 RPM.

Great songs from Dead Radical. I'd say that it's definitely the most metallic they've sounded. Awesome, technical, wanky fastcore, just the way I like it from Dead Radical. Not as good as "Rottenness", but still high quaility. And the Republicorpse side is pretty sweet too; definitely more "song" oriented than DR, but I'd still call them fastcore, with a definite metallic hardcore influence. I'd definitely pick up some other records from this band.

Awesome macabre artwork!

What up, Cthulhu?

Give Praise Records still has this, definitely pick it up!

~VII

Squatterstomper

Here's another 7" I bought from the crazy awesome Give Praise Records sale. This is a repress that GP and Psychocontrol Records did last year of the Backslider/Chainsaw To The Face split, green marble vinyl, 33 RPM.

Backslider is a band that I haven't gotten the chance to talk about on here, and I really should have. Very underrated heavy-hitters of the underground fastcore scene, but thankfully growing in popularity! They're even playing Maryland Deathfest this year which blows my mind! 12 tracks here in about 4 minutes. Dizzyingly fast and relentlessly changing fastcore; negative lyrics and grunty powerviolence barks, I love this band. From what I've heard, they're new EP should be the best thing they've done so far! I've talked about Chainsaw To The Face before, fastcore with the brutality of bands like Despise You. Much better stuff on here than their "s/t" 7". 

Different artwork for the repress, not so sure how I feel about it. I love the skull, but the rest of it just seems to out of place and contrasting. I'd say I definitely prefer the original cover art with the Friday The 13th image. Dig them saggy titties :p

You can find this split pretty easily. Pick it up, and look out for Backsliders crushing new EP "Maladapted"! I haven't heard anything new from CTTF in a while, I wonder what's up.

~VII

Tentacles of Influence

Here's the LP that came with my TLAL order, the new Needful Things album "Tentacles of Influence". Czech titans of underground grindcore! Gray/silver vinyl, 45 RPM with a printed inner sleeve.

Needful Things are, in my opinion, one of the most criminally underrated and underexposed grindcore bands going right now. There previous full-length "Dead Point" is an album all grind junkies need to check out. This album here, on first listen, pretty much delivers in every category and is a great follow up release. I'm gonna have to give it a few more spins to see if it's truly on par with "Dead Point", I'll be doing a review of this on Operation Grindcore in the near future. The B-side is especially kick ass. The recording is significantly more cleaner and not as thick this time around, but it's not that big a deal. Not a fan of the cover art at all.

A lot more short songs this time around too, I think only 2 break the dreaded 2 minute mark. Way more blasting and not as much groove. Though again, Side B has a lot more interesting riffs and structures.

I really hope this band gets more attention this year. They're playing Maryland Deathfest, which should get them a lot more fans here in America. Unfortunately I won't be able to see them cause I was to late to buy my 4-day pass. Endless bummer, I'm sure they'll kill it live.

~VII