Bad Songs from Corners of Hell

When Gravecore, a death metal/hardcore band from Italy released their "Bad Songs" demo, it seemed like they were being honest about their music being bad. I'm serious, people, their demo is entitled "Bad Songs from Corners of Hell", but I think "Horrendous Songs" would be a more accurate description. "Bad" would not be a good enough word to describe any of the material on here, and that's really the nicest thing to say about it. It makes deathcore sound like symphonic power metal in terms of skill.

Exhibit A: the gratuitous repetition. There's bands out there that use riffs that are somewhat repetitive, but when it comes to annoying people to the point of wanting to scalp themselves, they really don't hold a candle to Gravecore. Some of their riffs, like in the song "Rats and Vermin", take up pretty much the entire song. Even if they're using different chord patterns, they're still playing in the same style as the other riffs and then repeating them again and again, like in "Jesus Hendrix". I'm really not pulling your leg, people. To say that the band really lacks creativity would be a complete understatement. The hooks aren't the only things to be repeated, the choruses are basically the song's titles repeated over and over. When that happens, the results can be quite painful to the listener. It's rather irritating, to say the least.

Exhibit B: the musicianship. I did mention the constant repetition of the riffs, but I what I didn't mention is the fact that these riffs are basic. They're way more basic than any retro-thrash band would ever write, and that's really sad. Not even the bass player is safe from being categorized as a lousy musician, for his bass riffs, like in "El Dia de la Bestia" are extremely formulaic. His bass playing isn't even in sync with some of the drumbeats. Just listen to "There will Still be a World", just awful. So awful, that it would even make Korn vomit with disgust. Don't even get me started on the vocalist. He just can't do death metal vocals at all. One, his voice is too high. Two, he doesn't try hard enough, and it ends up being very wimpy and weak. Three, it sounds like he's imitating the death metal vocals as a joke at a party rather than trying to do it for real. Some people could make the argument that he might be trying to combine the hardcore and death metal vocal styles. If that's the case, he's certainly not doing a very good job at it!

The drummer is good at blastbeats, as demonstrated in "Jesus Hendrix" and others, but that doesn't mean that he can actually be anywhere near besting Lars Ulrich in terms of proper drum tricks. I'm not asking for a drummer who's on the same level as Mike Portnoy or anything, I'm just asking for a drummer who can do more than just play a beat. That's certainly not the case here. Sepultura, when they released their first album, "Morbid Visions", had many deficiencies in their musicianship, but at least Igor Cavalera could have a few tricks up his sleeve. Gravecore's drummer does not, and that would mean ring the death knell for any hope of Gravecore being a good band. Basically the only good thing about this album is that the songs are mercifully short, three of them only clocking in at 58 seconds. That means that you wouldn't have to deal with the sheer agony of listening to every individual song for extended periods of time (it would simply be unhealthy).

It seems like the band knew they lacked vital musicianship skills when they recorded everything, so "Bad Songs" would be a very accurate title for their demo. If that were true, they were dead on. I don't know if they'll ever get better from here, so if they ever dare to release more recorded material, I'm just going to play it safe and stay away from it.

So far only one of the records to come out of Senseless Life Records has impressed me even slightly, and that was Terror Messiah's Reborn, which everyone else seems to dislike. This is yet more of the same stuff that I've disliked, and no matter what genre the band seems to be classified as there never seems to be anything interesting about them.

Right from the first song that I heard (even the opening few lines of that song) I could tell exactly what I was in for. The guitars are played poorly, the vocals are done poorer and then there's some weird noise somewhere between clicking and tapping in the background that puts me off immensely. At first I thought it was the drums, but I think it might actually be the bass (the reason why it's so easily audible above everything else is unknown to me). Whatever it is though, it's out of time and out of place. I thought the bass was meant to keep time, not be the only instrument that doesn't?

Another off-putting feature of this band is how short their songs are. I know that I bitch and moan about how songs need to avoid being long to keep my attention, but I don't like it when half of the album is songs that are two minutes long or less. It doesn't give any time to register what's going on or whether or not it's actually any good or not. Although judging from the names of the songs and the lyrics that are intelligible (not that there are many of those) there isn't much for me to get here anyway.

I dislike the fact that every single song seems to have the same few words repeated over and over again as well. As I said, I can't really make out very much of what the singer is saying, but he likes to repeat his ideas over and over again when you can understand him. For example, on There Will Still Be a World he pretty much repeats that same line for the entirety of the song. Maybe it would be bearable if it was one of the songs that lasted for less than a minute, but this one is the longest on the demo at just under four minutes. And if you think this is a one-off you're sorely mistaken, as the song Possession also repeats its title for the majority of the song, as does Hate Corruption among others.

Don't get me wrong, because there are moments of decency on Bad Songs from Corners of Hell. Some of the riffs sound like they might go well in a different surrounding, the drumming is actually pretty solid for the most part (even if it is a little unspectacular) and even the bass sounds alright at points. There are a few foundations here that could be expanded on, but they never come together very well, or on the rare moments that they do it doesn't last for very long. If they could just string everything together then maybe, just maybe, it might work, but alas the band never manage to do that.