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This Comp Kills Fascists

Volume Two

Written by: PP on 18/08/2010 21:11:02

Scott Hull is known for his work in Pig Destroyer and Agoraphobic Nosebleed, two elite grindcore bands who've made their mark known on the scene for quite some while now. He's also known to produce records, and given his other credentials, Relapse have given him a green light on a project known as "This Comp Kills Fascists". God knows if Fat Music and/or Punk-O-Rama have been an inspiration for Hull, probably not, but the "...Fascists" compilations follow largely the same format as those two seminal punk series: grab a bunch of underground bands from the genre in question - grindcore here, obviously - and give them some good promotion across the scene.

Except Hull's compilations work slightly differently. Instead of having a song per band, each band seems to have been given up to five and a half minutes of time to grind through as many tracks as they can fit into that space. That's why you have a couple of bands like HOD with ten cuts on the compilation averaging around the 30 second mark, and others who suffice to just one or two lengthier tracks, like a collection of EPs from a bunch of different bands on one disc. A multi band split, in a way. The end result is 19 bands, 74 tracks, and 78 minutes of grindcore representing all corners and styles of the genre. A good introduction to what's cooking in the furthest edges of the underground grindcore scene.

Given that fact, the quality meter swings rather rashly between garbage and genius, having pit stops everywhere in between. Things are kicked off by Lack Of Interest, who get their groove on with some rock'n'roll infused grindcore. Owen Hart slows things down to unusually droning tempo for a grindcore group. Both acts are decent, despite the terrible vocals of the latter, when put in comparison to Noisear, who true to their name have little less to offer than sheer noise. Vocals are fully distorted to make it impossible to hear anything from a mish-mash of squealing and shrieking. Hummingbird Of Death (HOD), is among the best bands on the compo, playing Discharge-influenced grindcore/hardcore punk mixture. Production is an unknown word for those guys, however. Idiots Parade are also very good, despite playing traditional pummel-away grindcore, because their screaming vocalist is miles better than many of the others on this disc. On the other extreme, you have Septic Surge, who go down as one of the worst bands I've ever heard. The word "song" seems to mean irritatingly loud electronic feedback and some weird (vocal) noises spewed on top. Horrible stuff.

Other notable (relatively speaking) bands are Despise You, Extortion, Strong Intention and Social Infestation, who all make an appearance on the compilation. So in between the truly awful bands, you've got some up-and-coming grindcore artists who are bound to put out decent full lengths sooner or later. Still, the compilation is too much of a mixed bag to be rated highly. But if you read grindcore among your favorite genres, there's no better way to discover new bands in it than this compilation, much in the same vein as Punk-O-Rama influenced an entire generation of youth to dig deeper than Green Day for punk rock.

Download: N/A
For the fans of: Any and every style of grindcore
Listen: Myspace

Release date 22.06.2010
Relapse