This Manchester crew has been fairly busy over the last few years releasing a slew of seven inchers to gain a name for themselves locally mainly but also nationally and beyond our shores due to touring escapades I suspect. Their brand of hardcore straddles the gap between the crossover style of the mid 1980s that Suicidal Tendencies, D.R.I., Cro-Mags and Agnostic Front were so damn good at to the newer more groove metal exponents from acts such as All Out War, Integrity and Merauder who may be unfamiliar to you but are worth checking out alongside this debut full length.
With the band recruiting new blood to fill out their ranks this debut offers a full bodied assault courtesy of a range of hammer blowing riffs, bruising bass work, pile driving drums and a caustic hate filled vocal performance. I must admit my initial thoughts and scribbles about this album were less than complimentary due to the overt similarity of the songs and the rather clean sound that has softened the edges of their musicianship when you hear the bands previous releases and in some respects diluted the bands ethos of pounding meaningful hardcore.
Opening with “Take Me Away” the tune is an immediate metallic onslaught of bulldozing drums and bass that set a template that the riffs and vocals are riveted. Straight into “Leach Regress To Snake” the drum fill and opening riff have a thundering pulsation that may be a little unadventurous but is equally transfixing as your head will attest to when it starts nodding in approval. Macho styling is obligatory in this genre but they avoid trapping themselves into a quagmire of slam like breakdown riffs just for the sake of it allowing those qualities to be dotted around with utmost precision to maximise impact.
The tempo of this album is one aspect I found tedious as when the speed is shifted upwards as on “Stomp 2 Dust” there is an immediate return to the simplistic thudding beat. Weirdly the opening beat to the title track is rock infused as the riff slices into the track adopting the metallic hardcore guise with gusto. “Show No Mercy” has a fine riff as that metallic angle edges itself into the tune making it very similar to the methodology that Stampin’ Ground deployed to such devastating effect on album but especially live and I expect this Mancunian band to be blistering live when I catch a debut performance for myself at some point. Thrashers will enjoy “Prove You Wrong” due to its riff style as the shouted vocals are hurled out like commands alongside the gang chanted segues. If you want to have your ears pummelled to oblivion and your hearts racing with adrenaline then Broken Teeth HC are just the ticket for you.
In terms of originality Broken Teeth HC offer very little but what they do so effectively is shovel tons of muscular riffs onto the listener whilst being barraged by a vitriolic vocal beating all of which is bolstered by a tenacious powerhouse rhythm section.
(7/10 Martin Harris)
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