Well I walked into this with eyes wide open. Don’t care what any PR spin says, this is slam. Pure and simple. Hell I’ve even listened to this bunch of Taiwanese sickos before as the only actual slam fan I’d met at the time recommended them to me. But this is first full length sit down and I genuinely had an open mind to it; always like to have a go at a new genre.
I mean, up front, I’ve always been…wary of slam. Not only does it veer towards the worst song title content of goregrind (done by a fourteen year old having a Tourette attack with a pen) but frankly very little I’ve seen from fans seems to have anything to do with metal or hardcore or even having music as a centrepiece. I don’t see many obvious slam fans at other kinds of shows either which is very curious. Like it’s all about something else. Fashion? Debateable. But it is most definitely a musical style too and it is extreme and I have no problem with that. So again, here we are.
Cover art is as expected. And showing an unusual grim gore punning humour at least. Same for the song titles (I mean ‘Blood Is Really Warm With A Lot Of Screaming’ is pretty funny… especially with English as a second language.)
But?
Why would anything think it is remotely funny to introduce a song called ‘The Toilet Is A Person’ with an extended sample of some apparently real life shithead being interviewed? You don’t link real life, horrible crime to a stupid bit of (pun not intended) puerile toilet humour. See I know the difference between silly lyrics and real life, I can separate them, but the juxtaposition isn’t ‘sick and edgy’ it’s just being a twat.
So not a good start.
OK, on to the music. Do you know about slam? Well the album is 35 minutes long, which is about perfect for this kind of racket. They don’t include lyrics and I’d be lying if I said I do wonder if there actually are any, mostly because of the vocals but some would say that about a lot of brutal death so hardly an issue. Again this is perfect slam; gurgling, guttural pig squealing. The riffs conform to the slam ideal too; endless chugging, no real lead breaks, similar pace and sound and little to declare their musicianship. For thirty five minutes, give or take the samples.
Sounds like a nightmare right? Well…. I listen to all sorts of horrendous rackets – bestial black metal, zero production war metal, brutal death, pure noise, power violence, Corrupted, stuff like Gnaw Their Tongues that genuinely defies description. So no not really.
Musically it is what it is. Genuinely pointless picking out songs; this is an album that you put on to play the whole thirty five minutes.
You get the chug, the odd bit of faster riffing and the drums which may or may not be heavily triggered. In the favour of the Rumps they do often spread far more into a death metal style; brutal and basic for sure but definitely there with some decently judged tempo changes as well which is cool but especially with the vocal overlay it is pretty much thirty five minutes of one wall of sound with tempo changes here and there and guitar squeals to break it up.
Look I have heard an awful lot worse than Fatuous Rump; they clearly have some talent. The more death approach works really well for them, definitely, but the core is that slam; heads down, keep on going until the song ends style with no deviation. And start again after the obligatory sample which seems to be used in the place of lyrics. I know it sounds like I hate it. I don’t. If you’re into slam I am pretty confident that this is a must buy so give it full marks and get out and buy it.
Here Fatuous Rump show that they could, carefully, branch out a little further into brutal death and still probably take their fanbase with them. Keep the humour, ditch the samples and explore more what a guitar can actually do instead. Hey, the vocals are kinda fine by me too. It’s a style. Pretty much like slam as a genre. It is what it is. Just all a bit dull.
(3.5/10 Gizmo)
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