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Defect Designer – Chitin Review

By Dolphin Whisperer

Where do you even start with a band like Defect Designer? Part Trollfest, part Diskord—one fewer part now that bassist Eyvind Wærsted Axelsen has moved on since his brief participation on 2022’s blasting EP Neanderthal—and three parts weird, this eclectic Russian-by-way-of-Norway export hasn’t defined one singular sound for itself over the years. Full-length debut Wax showcased their would-be trademark of wildly bouncing riffs and pulse-hopping bass runs against an of-the-time mid-00s groovy Morbid Angel death metal that felt like it could have fit on a bill with Terra Incognita-era Gojira—except it was 2009! 2015’s Ageing Accelerator saw an injection of Cryptopsy punch enlisting the legendary Flo Mounier himself to add a kit smattering across the extra carnival synth embellished and hard-to-love sophomore outing. However, trimmed to grind lengths and with the quirky musical spirit of Diskord emboldened, Neanderthal proved to be less prehistoric and more fresh in attack than any of their past efforts, a true progression. Now with a fresh coat of Chitin, does Defect Designer threaten to strike hot again?

Before we get into the music that this newest effort presents, we can’t pass the most obvious link between the spirit of Neanderthal and Chitin: that glorious, intricately crosshatched Ian Miller artwork. Every buggy, creepy cornstalk; every sneering, veiny pillar; every paisley-mouthed demon spewing from the warped manor that houses Defect Designers’ unsettling thoughts, this cover continues the off-kilter, funhouse aesthetic into which this ensemble has slowly settled. With a scratchy, sliding scrawl, Defect Designer carves through many of Chitin’s twisted numbers a tense riffcraft that falls in line with skronk-bearing grind acts like Antigama or Atka, and its funkier bass-pop predilection also reminds me of the seemingly similar-minded underground groove of the recent Arthouse Fatso release. But rather than find a uniting, quirky lyrical theme, Defect Designer simply aims to tie together the room with referential tones and an insistence on remaining strange.

The problem, though, with valuing weirdness above all else is that Chitin, outside of pushing its image to a breaking point, does very little to hook the listener in that lane, at least not right away. Defect Designer leads with high crunch, wide-focus riffs, which struggle to leave a mark across the front half of Chitin. As sonically thrilling as many of the buzzing intros are, these kinds squirmy footings largely render as a blur in high doses, that is until the extra-torqued grind of “Certainty After the Kafkaesque Twist” and the slower escalation of “Gaudy Colors from Your Plastic Bag.” Ironically, the tangling of these two cuts highlights both how out-of-place Björn Strid’s Night Flight Orchestra intrusion on “Shine Shine” rests against all else, as it does exactly what the song implies. Glaring, garish, galloping, it kind of works, like a dark chocolate spread on a spicy wedge of salami.

Reaching back into the rhythmic oddities that carved the most vicious edges of Neanderthal, it’s the closing quartet that really brings home what makes modern Defect Designer work. Session smasher Eugene Ryabchenko (Fleshgod Apocalypse,1 Burial Hordes2) sprinkles in jazz club cymbal walks (“Story of a Styrofoam”), circus folk pomp (“Nu, Pogodi!”), all while striking back down to a crashing groove (“Insomnia”) or pummeling death metal assault (“Orgone Accumulator”). These cuts don’t feel entirely like a different band, but the writing focus on them builds around rhythm instead of in spite of it, allowing the tricky six-string work to find a home amongst more defined swells and splits. A few earlier hits come close to this kind of cohesion, but with the intro of “Uglification Spell” setting the tone early with a hard multi-second pause that stutters the album’s first strut, Chitin does not set itself up for a flowing success.

Despite its flaws, though, Chitin remains fun and forward-moving in its forty-minute run. Unlike other bands that tip-toe about the progressive moniker with flashy time changes and virtuosic squealing, Defect Designer wears its technical prowess to steer the audience around its misdirecting halls and trap doors. While the path that these devious death metallers take poses its own hurdles, Defect Designer stumbles about with full commitment to an outré attitude with a refreshing honesty. Sure, it’s taken them three full-lengths and an EP to really nail down what that means, but that leaves the future looking bright, still, for Defect Designer. Bright and weird.

Rating: 3.0/5.0
DR: 7 | Format Reviewed: 320 kbps mp3
Label: Transcending Obscurity | Bandcamp
Websites: defect-designer.com | facebook.com/defectdesigner1 | defect-designer.bandcamp.com
Releases Worldwide: March 15th, 2024

#2024 #30 #Antigama #ArthouseFatso #Atka #Chitin #Cryptopsy #DeathMetal #Deathgrind #DefectDesigner #Diskord #Mar24 #MorbidAngel #NorwegianMetal #ProgressiveDeathMetal #Review #Reviews #TranscendingObscurityRecords #Trollfest

Defect Designer – Chitin Review

By Dolphin Whisperer

Where do you even start with a band like Defect Designer? Part Trollfest, part Diskord—one fewer part now that bassist Eyvind Wærsted Axelsen has moved on since his brief participation on 2022’s blasting EP Neanderthal—and three parts weird, this eclectic Russian-by-way-of-Norway export hasn’t defined one singular sound for itself over the years. Full-length debut Wax showcased their would-be trademark of wildly bouncing riffs and pulse-hopping bass runs against an of-the-time mid-00s groovy Morbid Angel death metal that felt like it could have fit on a bill with Terra Incognita-era Gojira—except it was 2009! 2015’s Ageing Accelerator saw an injection of Cryptopsy punch enlisting the legendary Flo Mounier himself to add a kit smattering across the extra carnival synth embellished and hard-to-love sophomore outing. However, trimmed to grind lengths and with the quirky musical spirit of Diskord emboldened, Neanderthal proved to be less prehistoric and more fresh in attack than any of their past efforts, a true progression. Now with a fresh coat of Chitin, does Defect Designer threaten to strike hot again?

Before we get into the music that this newest effort presents, we can’t pass the most obvious link between the spirit of Neanderthal and Chitin: that glorious, intricately crosshatched Ian Miller artwork. Every buggy, creepy cornstalk; every sneering, veiny pillar; every paisley-mouthed demon spewing from the warped manor that houses Defect Designers’ unsettling thoughts, this cover continues the off-kilter, funhouse aesthetic into which this ensemble has slowly settled. With a scratchy, sliding scrawl, Defect Designer carves through many of Chitin’s twisted numbers a tense riffcraft that falls in line with skronk-bearing grind acts like Antigama or Atka, and its funkier bass-pop predilection also reminds me of the seemingly similar-minded underground groove of the recent Arthouse Fatso release. But rather than find a uniting, quirky lyrical theme, Defect Designer simply aims to tie together the room with referential tones and an insistence on remaining strange.

The problem, though, with valuing weirdness above all else is that Chitin, outside of pushing its image to a breaking point, does very little to hook the listener in that lane, at least not right away. Defect Designer leads with high crunch, wide-focus riffs, which struggle to leave a mark across the front half of Chitin. As sonically thrilling as many of the buzzing intros are, these kinds squirmy footings largely render as a blur in high doses, that is until the extra-torqued grind of “Certainty After the Kafkaesque Twist” and the slower escalation of “Gaudy Colors from Your Plastic Bag.” Ironically, the tangling of these two cuts highlights both how out-of-place Björn Strid’s Night Flight Orchestra intrusion on “Shine Shine” rests against all else, as it does exactly what the song implies. Glaring, garish, galloping, it kind of works, like a dark chocolate spread on a spicy wedge of salami.

Reaching back into the rhythmic oddities that carved the most vicious edges of Neanderthal, it’s the closing quartet that really brings home what makes modern Defect Designer work. Session smasher Eugene Ryabchenko (Fleshgod Apocalypse,1 Burial Hordes2) sprinkles in jazz club cymbal walks (“Story of a Styrofoam”), circus folk pomp (“Nu, Pogodi!”), all while striking back down to a crashing groove (“Insomnia”) or pummeling death metal assault (“Orgone Accumulator”). These cuts don’t feel entirely like a different band, but the writing focus on them builds around rhythm instead of in spite of it, allowing the tricky six-string work to find a home amongst more defined swells and splits. A few earlier hits come close to this kind of cohesion, but with the intro of “Uglification Spell” setting the tone early with a hard multi-second pause that stutters the album’s first strut, Chitin does not set itself up for a flowing success.

Despite its flaws, though, Chitin remains fun and forward-moving in its forty-minute run. Unlike other bands that tip-toe about the progressive moniker with flashy time changes and virtuosic squealing, Defect Designer wears its technical prowess to steer the audience around its misdirecting halls and trap doors. While the path that these devious death metallers take poses its own hurdles, Defect Designer stumbles about with full commitment to an outré attitude with a refreshing honesty. Sure, it’s taken them three full-lengths and an EP to really nail down what that means, but that leaves the future looking bright, still, for Defect Designer. Bright and weird.

Rating: 3.0/5.0
DR: 7 | Format Reviewed: 320 kbps mp3
Label: Transcending Obscurity | Bandcamp
Websites: defect-designer.com | facebook.com/defectdesigner1 | defect-designer.bandcamp.com
Releases Worldwide: March 15th, 2024

#2024 #30 #Antigama #ArthouseFatso #Atka #Chitin #Cryptopsy #DeathMetal #Deathgrind #DefectDesigner #Diskord #Mar24 #MorbidAngel #NorwegianMetal #ProgressiveDeathMetal #Review #Reviews #TranscendingObscurityRecords #Trollfest

Defect Designer – Chitin Review

By Dolphin Whisperer

Where do you even start with a band like Defect Designer? Part Trollfest, part Diskord—one fewer part now that bassist Eyvind Wærsted Axelsen has moved on since his brief participation on 2022’s blasting EP Neanderthal—and three parts weird, this eclectic Russian-by-way-of-Norway export hasn’t defined one singular sound for itself over the years. Full-length debut Wax showcased their would-be trademark of wildly bouncing riffs and pulse-hopping bass runs against an of-the-time mid-00s groovy Morbid Angel death metal that felt like it could have fit on a bill with Terra Incognita-era Gojira—except it was 2009! 2015’s Ageing Accelerator saw an injection of Cryptopsy punch enlisting the legendary Flo Mounier himself to add a kit smattering across the extra carnival synth embellished and hard-to-love sophomore outing. However, trimmed to grind lengths and with the quirky musical spirit of Diskord emboldened, Neanderthal proved to be less prehistoric and more fresh in attack than any of their past efforts, a true progression. Now with a fresh coat of Chitin, does Defect Designer threaten to strike hot again?

Before we get into the music that this newest effort presents, we can’t pass the most obvious link between the spirit of Neanderthal and Chitin: that glorious, intricately crosshatched Ian Miller artwork. Every buggy, creepy cornstalk; every sneering, veiny pillar; every paisley-mouthed demon spewing from the warped manor that houses Defect Designers’ unsettling thoughts, this cover continues the off-kilter, funhouse aesthetic into which this ensemble has slowly settled. With a scratchy, sliding scrawl, Defect Designer carves through many of Chitin’s twisted numbers a tense riffcraft that falls in line with skronk-bearing grind acts like Antigama or Atka, and its funkier bass-pop predilection also reminds me of the seemingly similar-minded underground groove of the recent Arthouse Fatso release. But rather than find a uniting, quirky lyrical theme, Defect Designer simply aims to tie together the room with referential tones and an insistence on remaining strange.

The problem, though, with valuing weirdness above all else is that Chitin, outside of pushing its image to a breaking point, does very little to hook the listener in that lane, at least not right away. Defect Designer leads with high crunch, wide-focus riffs, which struggle to leave a mark across the front half of Chitin. As sonically thrilling as many of the buzzing intros are, these kinds squirmy footings largely render as a blur in high doses, that is until the extra-torqued grind of “Certainty After the Kafkaesque Twist” and the slower escalation of “Gaudy Colors from Your Plastic Bag.” Ironically, the tangling of these two cuts highlights both how out-of-place Björn Strid’s Night Flight Orchestra intrusion on “Shine Shine” rests against all else, as it does exactly what the song implies. Glaring, garish, galloping, it kind of works, like a dark chocolate spread on a spicy wedge of salami.

Reaching back into the rhythmic oddities that carved the most vicious edges of Neanderthal, it’s the closing quartet that really brings home what makes modern Defect Designer work. Session smasher Eugene Ryabchenko (Fleshgod Apocalypse,1 Burial Hordes2) sprinkles in jazz club cymbal walks (“Story of a Styrofoam”), circus folk pomp (“Nu, Pogodi!”), all while striking back down to a crashing groove (“Insomnia”) or pummeling death metal assault (“Orgone Accumulator”). These cuts don’t feel entirely like a different band, but the writing focus on them builds around rhythm instead of in spite of it, allowing the tricky six-string work to find a home amongst more defined swells and splits. A few earlier hits come close to this kind of cohesion, but with the intro of “Uglification Spell” setting the tone early with a hard multi-second pause that stutters the album’s first strut, Chitin does not set itself up for a flowing success.

Despite its flaws, though, Chitin remains fun and forward-moving in its forty-minute run. Unlike other bands that tip-toe about the progressive moniker with flashy time changes and virtuosic squealing, Defect Designer wears its technical prowess to steer the audience around its misdirecting halls and trap doors. While the path that these devious death metallers take poses its own hurdles, Defect Designer stumbles about with full commitment to an outré attitude with a refreshing honesty. Sure, it’s taken them three full-lengths and an EP to really nail down what that means, but that leaves the future looking bright, still, for Defect Designer. Bright and weird.

Rating: 3.0/5.0
DR: 7 | Format Reviewed: 320 kbps mp3
Label: Transcending Obscurity | Bandcamp
Websites: defect-designer.com | facebook.com/defectdesigner1 | defect-designer.bandcamp.com
Releases Worldwide: March 15th, 2024

#2024 #30 #Antigama #ArthouseFatso #Atka #Chitin #Cryptopsy #DeathMetal #Deathgrind #DefectDesigner #Diskord #Mar24 #MorbidAngel #NorwegianMetal #ProgressiveDeathMetal #Review #Reviews #TranscendingObscurityRecords #Trollfest

Walking Corpse – Our Hands, Your Throat Review

By Saunders

Heavyweights Gridlink and Rotten Sound have led the grindcore charge in 2023, but to discount less heralded acts carving a presence in the modern grind scene runs the risk of overlooking the next big thing. Hailing from Gothenburg, Sweden, Walking Corpse independently released an EP and debut full-length, 2020’s The Fear Takes Hold, before inking a deal with one of heavy music’s more impressive modern labels, Transcending Obscurity. Presumably named after the legendary Brutal Truth song, Walking Corpse take the essence of traditional, old school grind, including such raw, precision attributes and glass-shattering intensity of classic Brutal Truth, yet throw down other intriguing elements and influences. They craft an uncompromising, eleven-track shitstorm of teeth-gnashing, jaw-shattering grind. Can the upstart power trio harness this unhinged cacophony into a cohesive and memorable batch of songs?

Walking Corpse impress with a tight batch of songs, mostly eschewing sub one-to-two-minute jams, for more fully fleshed, yet still compact timeframes. Our Hands, Your Throat will have your head spinning once Walking Corpse are finished putting the boot into your battered body after the 34-minute explosion has expired. The sleeker sonic profile, shreds of melody and white-knuckle tension recalls fellow Swedes Nasum and Gadget, amidst shades of Nails and Antigama for good measure. Gritty undertones of sludgy hardcore, noise, and death are leveraged into the curb-stomping assault. It’s intense, unrelenting stuff, with the noisy chaotic grinding enough to scare off the less seasoned listener, though will no doubt please grind aficionados up for the challenge.

“Dreamflesh Navigator” hits like a hammer blow to the back of the head, setting a rabidly aggressive tone of face-melting grind. The frenetic attack and noisy dissonance offering a blood-pumping good time. After the blistering beginning across the first couple of tracks, the punky, d-beaten charge and groovier stomp of “Our Hands, Your Throat” offers a modicum of respite and accessibility to latch onto, showcasing Walking Corpse’s ability to shift between varied modes of destruction. Similarly, “The Wheel” stretches across nearly five minutes, deftly shifting tempos between speed-riddled blasts, crunchy slower moments, and swaggering, sludge-infected passages of grimy dread. It’s a killer, ambitious slab of forward-thinking grind. There is much to enjoy on the longer songs, allowing Walking Corpse to flex their creative muscles. However, shorter throat-stabbing grind cuts will keep the traditionalists happy (“Brainworm,” Malediction,” ‘Forever Sleep”). Walking Corpse are perhaps at their most intriguing when they wrap their razor-sharp, abrasive grind with other genre elements. “Nothing Grows Here” deftly ping pongs from savage grind blasts to violent bursts of sludge, hardcore, and technical, unhinged grooves to unsettle the nerves.

Closer “Eye of an Angry God” possesses a bonkers edge, its measured opening giving way to zippy riffs and skronky axe battery, wrapping the album in an intense, brain-scrambling manner. Our Hands, Your Throat backs its nasty, serrated riffs and tornado-like percussive battery with a tight technical bent, meshing nicely with the band’s varied execution and slight experimental inclinations. Fredrik Rojas (guitars, bass) covers impressive ground, his fleet-fingered fretboard abuse and warped dissonance encompassing elements of grind, sludge, noise and death with aplomb, firing off catchy riff-driven nuggets amidst the technically proficient chaos. Magnus Dahlin (drums, bass) smashes his kit with manic energy and finesse, while vocalist Henrik Blomqvist ties together the trio’s tight package with a solid array of hardcore-tinged barks, growls and higher-pitched screams.

There are no major faults, only nitpicks to level at Our Hands, Your Throat. It is perhaps not the most instantly gratifying grind album, taking a few listens to fully appreciate the band’s unique quirks and make sense of the more subtle hooks. The whole album can seem impenetrable on occasion, but it is worth sticking with. Sleek, though gritty production features jagged, impactful instrumental tones. However, despite a reasonably dynamic master, the solid length and noisy, relentless nature can bring on some ear fatigue. Our Hands, Your Throat catapults Walking Corpse towards the upper tier of the grind pack in 2023. Though perhaps not the best place to start for entry-level listeners testing the grind waters, Walking Corpse smashed out a varied, in-your-face slice of top-shelf grind, scalpel-sharp yet delivered with the burly force of a ten-ton hammer.

Rating: 4.0/5.0
DR: 7 | Format Reviewed: 320 kbps mp3
Label: Transcending Obscurity Records
Websites: walkingcorpse.bandcamp.com | facebook.com/Walkingcorpse/Gbg
Releases Worldwide: December 1st, 2023

#40 #Antigama #BrutalTruth #Gadget #Gridlink #Grind #Grindcore #Hardcore #Nails #Nasum #Noise #OurHandsYourThroat #Review #Reviews #RottenSound #Sludge #SwedishMetal #TranscendingObscurityRecords #WalkingCorpse