Corporatocracy

Afgrund is a multi-national Grindcore project with members hailing from Austria, Finland and Sweden. After three full length albums, Afgrund returns with a nineteen minute EP entitled “Corporatocracy”, which, in all reality, is not much shorter than most grindcore full length albums. There are eleven tracks here, with three of those being cover tracks, so it’s whirlwind ride that’s over rather quickly. While the band isn’t bringing anything new to the table, they are good at injecting small doses of modernity into their somewhat crusty blend of grindcore.

The band grinds through the nineteen minutes in style, rarely relenting. Except for a few sludgy bass breaks and melodic chord progressions, the band is on full tilt for the entire ride. Tracks like “Satanic Sativa” and “Corporatocracy” blast through their grinding maneuvers with little to-do. The production is modern and clean, which is odd for a grindcore album, but given the modern touches throughout it fits quite well with what Afgrund are attempting. The drums, for the most part, are fast-paced, blasting patterns typical to grindcore, but they slow down to a trudging crawl at times, like on “Pharmageddon” and “Dog Days”. When the drums slow down to a crawl it’s usually when the rest of the band incorporates one of two things: some type of groove laden guitar riff or some form of pseudo-breakdown. “Pact of Perfection” shows Afgrund’s affection for rhythmic chugging breakdowns during start/stop double kicked drums, injecting a modern, metalcore-ish feeling into their blasting grind. Much like the Nasum school of grind, Afgrund deals fast paced tracks with touches of groove and modernity. Well, since this band is one-fourth Swedish it’s fitting that Afgrund would sit so well alongside the typical Swedish grind scene. The guitars are decent, but nothing too memorable: there’s a fairly fun chord progression during “Common Ground” that toys with a distorted melody but, that section aside, the rest is bland. The lone standout during the music is the bass, which is crusty, fuzzy and thick. The modern production allows the bass to shine through as a distinctive element, which is surprising given the grinding nature of the music. A few bass only sections are an awesome way to break up the constant blasting, like during “Pact of Perfection”.

There is a lot of variety with the vocals, with most being a deeper, throaty shout: they’re powerful without descending into the guttural realms of a lot of acts. There are occasional descents into the typical frantic grind style, which are higher pitched, fast paced and, frankly, somewhat grating. These higher pitched vocals sound fairly decent when it’s a quick trip into the range, like the occasional standalone yelp or squeal. The fascinating thing about the higher vocals is that they are rather infrequent until “Splattered Cadavers” and “Shadows” which are Repulsion and Nasum covers, respectively. The band finishes off the album with a Discharge cover in the form of “The Nightmare Continues”, which brings the band’s punk and crust influence to the forefront. The covers are decent, but the band really doesn’t place their own imprint on the songs.

Actually, now that I think of it, the band really doesn’t have an identity of its own. There are a lot of bands out there doing this slightly modern grindcore thing and doing it well: the Swedish scene, for instance, is rife with modern sounding grindcore acts. While there are some sporadic injections of breakdowns and a few crusty outbursts of punkish attitude, Afgrund doesn’t leave a lasting impression once the music is over. Honestly, if you dig grind you will like this, but don’t except anything groundbreaking or overly original. The covers are enjoyable, especially if you really dig the originals, but like I said before, Afgrund fails to put their own stamp on them. Fans of Nasum and Mumakil should like this, but I, for one, feel that while the music is good enough to listen to when it’s on there’s nothing enticing me to go for repeated listens.

Originally Written for The Metal Observer:
http://www.metal-observer.com/