Stillbirth Machine

While I knew absolutely nothing about this band previously, few of my pals decided to do this "review the album of the week thing" and someone submitted this record (and it also ended up being the chosen album) so here I am listening to a band I never even heard of (mostly because I don't keep up with anything made by current or ex-members of Revenge), and I can safely say that this is the album that gave me the most trouble categorizing. Sometimes it feels like a death metal release with black metal vocals sneaked into it, but other times it just feels like a black/thrash album which is interesting to say at least.

After an intro track taken straight from 2001: A Space Odyssey, we get hit by the second track The Edge of Forever. It's fast and chaotic. These two words are the ones that could describe the entire album the best. The production (on this song especially) is extremely raw and when I say "extremely raw" I mean war metal levels of raw. This comparison is also fitting considering that war metal also shares the chaotic nature. So you might think "Oh well this is easy then, it's war metal", but the thing is that war metal usually doesn't have a huge variety in the riffs, unlike this record. While the aforementioned track is probably my least favorite on the entire album, it still has a massive wall of sound that just crush your eardrums.

The third track (Power Elite) on the other hand is a lot less noisy and actually has some pretty loud drum bass at times. This is still a song that focuses on the black metal side, but you can clearly hear that the riffs have some death metal feel to them and the tremolo picking is nowhere to be found. The vocals are worth praising here since the screams are pretty hellish. It's closer to the black metal shrieking than it is to the death metal growling, but at the refrain (of this song) it feels a lot more rhythmic and energetic.

While I like the first half (4 songs if we are counting the intro as a different song) since it has some memorable parts (such as the chorus of Power Elite), the rest of the album is definitely superior. The songs after Iconoclasm Conquest all have a more death metal edge to them, but they are also filled with grindcore influences (dare I say even thrash at times?). The title track is probably my favorite on the entire record since it has a little bit of everything. The black-ish vocals (with some effects to complement it at times), some riffs that remind me of early Bold Thrower and the insane drumming without blast beats.

The only thing I don't like about the album is the inconsistency. While the first half is good on its own, but I would rather listen to an album that is consistent in the quality since now out of the 8 tracks only 4 ended up being memorable. I should also mention that the noisy and raw production might be a throw-off for some (but if you managed to even look this band up the chances are you are into the noisy shit), but luckily it didn't really affect me at all.

Overall this record is unique to say at least. It's a heavy, noisy and riff-filled 35 minutes. Highly recommended to check out at least once if you don't mind listening to bands with elements from more than two genres.

The highlights of the album are Power Elite, Stillbirth Machine and Blood and Thunder.