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Brain Drill

Apocalyptic Feasting

Written by: AB on 06/11/2008 17:43:13

Brain Drill's "Apocalyptic Feasting" is yet another album that I'll be reviewing long after its release. My skills of keeping track of new death releases isn't up to par it would seem. This won't keep my from giving this one a few spins and a comment or two to match, though. "Apocalyptic Feasting" is the first album by California based (well, all DM bands come from California nowadays, don't they?!) Brain Drill. Just after recording the album, several members disbanded the band, some were replaced, some came back, but now they're presumably up and running yet again. The band is, just like the more well-known Job For A Cowboy, born from MySpace, however, they play real death metal and not some deathcore-thingie like JFAC. Cool.

Even though this shouldn't be about the MySpace factor, I must say I can understand why all the kids looking for the newest thing picked up on Brain Drill. This is so fucking extreme that it is conspicuous enough to attract the attention of the easily pleased MySpace hordes. Anyways. The music is, as mentioned, extremely extreme. Grind-like in their manic technical DM attacks, Brain Drill takes speed to a whole new level. The speed and brutality will leave you breathless. Super fast riffing, brain drilling (get it?) drumming, harsh, screaming vocals... I mean, their drummer is a fucking machine (Marco Pitruzzella, known from such respected DM acts as Vital Remains and Vile), letting loose round after round after round of ferocious artillery. Seriously, this is even crazier than Origin. "Apocalyptic Feasting" is filled to the brim with short leads and quite a few short solos. All showcase the impressive musical skill of the guitarists, doing the 'modern' scale-climbing DM and soloing of neo-classical inspiration. The solos and leads sound like shorter, faster, and simpler versions of the work by the awesome Necrophagist. The vocals are, like the rest, relentless in their assaults, leaving no room for other things than harsh shrieking/crummy growling, and never, ever slowing down. Furthermore, they have been treated/modified way too much during mastering process. Not so cool.

So yeah. The good thing is that the drumming and guitar handling are, on a purely technical level, fucking impressive. The not so good thing is, that no matter how good Brain Drill is at handling their instruments, they suck at song-writing. "Apocalyptic Feasting" feels like one long track, because everything is just speed speed speed brutality brutality brutality. No change of pace, no variation, no nothing but speed. Even all the solos sound the same! It's not that everyone should write highly individual, progressive and special songs, but this is just too repetitive. Nothing stands out, and nothing but the speed is really memorable. I can just imagine the band during practice, wanting to be as fast and brutal as possible with the next song they're gonna do, then realizing that that's what they have done on all the other tracks too. And then don't give a fuck, and do it again.

Download: Swine Slaughter, Consumed By The Dead
For the fans of: Origin
Listen: MySpace

Release date 05.02.2008
Metal Blade