These Baltimore Bruisers (metal journalist cliche klaxon alert) are one of those bands that you feel like you have seen and heard a million times. Having been around since 10BC, it is quite possible that you may have raked up that number of listens in the years between 2001 and now. Having been spawn from the dying and fetid intestines of the first incarnation of Pig Destroyer, they have steadily built of up a healthy back catalogue of releases of which this, their latest album, being the seventh entry into their cannon of work.
To return to the previous point, Misery Index seem to be that perennial mid table, middle of the road support bands at festivals, or within the guts of a four-band club bill, always playing at around 6.30 or 7pm, and ploughing ahead full bore into their death, grind amalgam that is an inoffensive as it is competent. It is not that band are doing anything wrong with their career, they are ploughing a well furrowed furrow, almost the dictionary definition of the grey man, not doing enough to draw the ire of the errant metal fan, nor setting the world ablaze with genre warping invention or song writing brilliance. There’s nothing wrong with being middle of the road and merely serviceable, nothing at all, but what it does do, is make the job of the jobbing metal hack, a hell of a lot tougher. To be fair, it’s not the job equivalency of working down a mine, clearing mines in Afghanistan nor working eighteen hour shifts as a nurse, I get that, but relatively speaking, this is as difficult as this task gets when you have something that just about manages too illicit a meek and mild…meh…
So to ‘Complete Control and to be fair when compared against their latest albums, it seems to have regressed to their past and embraced those more hardcore elements of their oeuvre, which gives the death metal riffs and pummelling bass drums, a few minutes off here and there amongst the hand grenades blast-beats and squelches into a bounce and a groove which does act somewhat of a palette cleaner amongst the meat heavy, protein shake of much of this album’s content. And if this sounds like I am somewhat of a broken record, that is because I am and AGAIN, when the pace slackens slightly and the songs are afforded a moment to wallow, baste, luxuriate and seviche themselves in the less metallic elements on show, this is where this album quickens the pulse and morphs into something far more interesting than the hundred mile an hour riffing and barked vocals.
Again, that stuff is fine…just fine…. competent and fast, it will salve the death/grind heads amongst you, but for those looking for a slice of orange in their beer, it does come across (at times) as lumpen, one paced and little on the boring side. This comment could be applied in some degree to the current death metal scene in general, which is all a little derivative, one paced and lacking a degree of originality. The death metal self-appointed taste makers and ‘guardians of the faith’ would still kneel down like pigs at the trough marked death metal here and wolf down dried pellets comprised of toenails and shit as long as it were packaged as modern death metal regardless of its composition, taste or tenure but opinions, like arseholes, have a common theme, everyone has one.
Look, I am not slagging this scene off at all, there are some mighty fine bands plying their trade amongst the narrow parameters of the genre in general, but if it is to serve notice on anything, this album only truly sparks to life when it embraces tastes and flavours from other genres to augment the other more tired aspects of death metal. In summary, and to be fair to Misery Index, this is a competent and at times enjoyable album that does it’s best to stretch, tease, pull, and eviscerate the genre constraints it seems bound up in and when allowed to fly free, it really sings, no more so than on the self-titled track ‘Complete Control’ that sounds like Chimaira, Biohazard and Soilwork with the dual vocals of Jason Netheerton and Mark Kloeppel combing to furious affect which is also true of the songs that follow it ‘Necessary Suffering’ and ‘Conspiracy of None’ which throw everything into the genre melting pot, pours it into the kitchen sink and sets it on fire. An album that ultimately lacks enough derivation from its pre agreed musical mission statement but will nevertheless becalm their fanbase whilst giving a tantalising glimpse of further musicality and ideas within the band that hint at a deeper and more rounded future.
(6.5/10 Nick Griffiths)
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