Around 26 minutes of tech slam with sci-fi horror scenes is upon us from US band Wormhole. Let the onslaught begin.
What I immediately liked about this was the distortion and eerie sound backing. My one small criticism of this album would be that Wormhole could use more distortion as a means of expressing their world. This said, there’s plenty of content to interest us. The core of the opener “System Erase” is chugging brutality and in such a way that it grinds you down rather than flying past you without noticing it. Accordingly, “System Erase” has a delightfully rancid atmosphere. A nice start. “Ellysism” has a brightness about the riff which again I liked. Don’t worry, the growly, paint-stripping vocals and deep bass put us in our place but I liked the fact that the technicality is put into the structure of the song rather than technicality for the sake of technicality, which sometimes happens. “Spine Shatter High-Velocity Impact” is more what I expected in advance: in-your-face crunching brutality, deep bass lines to clear out the bottom of the barrel and uncompromisingly angry firepower ending in a march to who knows where.
“Data Fortress Orbital Stationary” is the most technical so far – cutting in and out, the chunky core is there as is the dark vocal force, but the instrumentals take us in all sorts of directions and make this an interesting as well as dynamic technical piece. This is followed by the slow and solid death march introduction of “Delta Labs”. The tempo is ramped up and there are layers of attack, creating controlled destruction and bile. A breakdown leads to an ominous and dangerous atmosphere, with sirens blazing as the guitars plumb their depths. No less harsh or solid is the following title song. The solidity is in the deep riff, but around it are little technical explosions. “Tech slam” announced a voice, brightly. And away it goes in again in very pleasing patterns, at least to my ears. It’s time for another high-tempo brutal technical attack. After the initial onslaught, “Bleeding Teeth Fungus” breaks down into layers and turns the knife with its slamming sound and technical contortions. To finish, “The Grand Oscillation” mournfully but loudly exposes a harsh world of death and decay. The impression is of the world crumbling. Once again it cleverly fuses the uncompromising deep sound with subtle and evocative instrumental accompaniments.
There are many aspects of this album that I like. It’s not overdone so its relatively short length does it a favour. Wormhole don’t waste a note as they pack in varying sides of technical death metal and in eight distinct songs, expertly create multi-layered structures and dark atmospheres.
(9/10 Andrew Doherty)
Leave a Reply