Gaskammer Edict

I can never hear the word vivisection without immediately thinking of the Aus-Rotten track “Pathetic Humanity” from their 1998 classic ...And Now Back to Our Programming” I know it's a term reserved for animal liberation activists to label cruel treatment of animals, so whether or not the mysterious US based black/death band Vivisektion got their name from that track, it doesn't really matter, as the band does share that penchant for sleazy and filthy sounding music that embodied most of the crust punk scene. Rather than punk riffing and oi's, though, Vivisektion approaches their filth through barbaric aggression.

Gaskammer Edict, the band's debut demo, was released through Wohrt Records in April 2015, and features three tracks over a whopping six minutes of material. Despite the short playing time, Vivisektion's debut will do all manner of nasty things to you and leave you wondering what the hell actually happened and whether or not you should report it to the nearest responsible adult. The music is buried under a nasty, throbbing wall of sound that makes it really hard to focus. The bass sound is extremely loud, the percussion rumbles along sounding like an idling Mack truck and the deep growled vocals mix with the bass, cutting in and out of the murk, but never really rising above the roar. The riffing is actually quite good, going for the primordial aggression of bands like Revenge, Conqueror or Axis of Advance, but it's extremely hard to digest because you can barely hear it, even with headphones.

Vivisektion has some really powerful moments of barbaric black/death metal, but it's extremely hard to focus with the band's noisy wall of sound blocking the path. I guess Gaskammer Edict does what it set out to; if it set out to be a pummeling and primordial slab of unhinged aggression. Fans of the so called war metal scene might find something to their liking here, but this is a rough recording even by those standards. Hopefully they can channel some of that aggression into a more listenable release next time.