Sounds of a Disease

Skam's Bandcamp page boasts that they sound like if Anaal Nathrakh if they got really into d-beat. I was ready to dismiss this as hyperbole born out of wishful thinking, but Skam legitimately do capture the hellish brutality of early Anaal Nathrakh at times. If anything, I wish they'd stick more to that. Those sections absolutely rip to the point where the rest of the album almost comes off like filler while we wait for them to come ripping out of hell again. Sweden has long been a stalwart nation of the crust scene, and this no doubt has massive influence on Skam. Ever filthy, it's no surprise that this came out of the same punk ethos in a country that gave us crust greats like Anti Cimex and Skitsystem.

Sound of Disease is meant as a sort of catharsis via anger; the disease in question is not physical. Sounds of a Disease is concerned with mental illness, and their pummeling sound meant to be an excoriation of the pain caused by these mental afflictions. Skam's catharsis through sonic violence hits quite hard at times. There's by all means a fair amount of death metal in the mix, but its clear they're coming at it from a punk perspective. The filth of the crust scene is present at all times and there are sections that come across like d-beat on copious amount of steroids. They blacken their sound in a very specific way - early Anaal Nathrakh and early Anaal Nathrakh only. They're at their best going full 'Thrakh - these sections feel like a nuclear bomb's moment of impact. However, they do forget one fundamental aspect of Anaal Nathrakh's most abrasive era. Scorchers like "Pandemonic Hyperblast" and "When Fire Rains Down from the Sky" were so good because they managed to sound that impossibly violent while still employing standout songwriting and riffing. Skam aren't bad songwriters, but none of these songs really stand out as clear highlights. Skam quite frequently have powerful riffs, but I'm not sure any of them individually will get stuck in my head.

Skam otherwise aren't too atypical of a grind band, and I doubt I'd care for this much without the bolstering of Anaal Nathrakh's most chaotic era. The sections that don't make up these hellfire bursts just aren't as notable - the chunky mid-paced grooves or more standard death metal riffage don't really do it for me and are a recipe for losing momentum. That said, when the fury is cranked up to a 10 and the spitfire rasps are in full rage mode, this really does go. Here's hoping they can hone in the abject fury for the next release and trim the fat. I really don't mind if that means significantly reducing the run time.