SKULL391

Posted on January 26, 2014 by Friar Johnsen

GHJTTATURA, Dai Su Entre (2008, demo)

The skull:
Of all the Big Dumb Skulls I’ve looked at, this has to be one of the ugliest. At least it’s not brown, and I do like the pinky ring on the severed hand (so Italian!), but really, what’s going on here? My best guess is that it comments on the fine prepositional distinction between tripping on acid and tripping into acid. Grindcore for grammarians.

The music:
This basically sounds like a Napalm Death rehearsal demo circa 2004, although to be fair, the raspy vocals would never be mistaken for those of Mr. Greenway (who also rarely sings in Sardinian, as far as I know). Grind doesn’t do much for me, and so I can’t claim to be an expert in any way, but to my untrained ears these songs sound alright. For grind, that is. I mean, they sound terrible, but they’re reasonably well written. Some of the riffs, namely the ones unaccompanied by blasting, are good. But, when the blasting sets in, lord knows what else is going on. This is partly a problem endemic to all blasting, but here the confusion is exacerbated by the garage-quality production. You’d have to be pretty hardcore for grindcore to go for this, I’ll assume, but it seems like no one who likes grind likes it casually, so maybe Ghjttatura have what it takes to go all the way. All the way to a 2:30 pm slot at Maryland Death Fest, that is.
— Friar Johnsen

SKULL381

Posted on January 16, 2014 by Friar Johnsen

ACE OF SPADES, Ace of Spades (1994, demo)

The skull:
The odd angle of the skull and the random floating junk, combined with the green palor, immediately made me think that maybe this is some macabre jello-mold. Just out of frame to the right, there’s probably a chunk of pineapple, or a maraschino cherry. Revenge is a dish best served cold. And lime-flavored.

The music:
Although nominally thrash, Ace of Spades don’t sound obviously like any other thrash band, or really any other band that I can think of. It’s not that they have an original sound, it’s just that they seem to have just mashed together every kind of heavy-but-not-extreme style they came across in the late 80s and early 90s and called it a day. Like, 90s Loudness meets Machine Head, maybe? It’s not really good, but at the same time, it’s sort of refreshing to hear a band that’s not trying to be anything in particular. Just metal. I kinda like the singer, whose throaty, more-or-less melodic vocals kind of mix the best and worst of Japanese vocals. He has an accent, but his warbling delivery is fun nonetheless. The riffing occasionally reminds me of weak Megadeth or Annihilator, or even some reject Black Mark power metal band. I dunno. This is a weird thing. Not great, not even very good, but still weirdly endearing. The band released only this one demo, and it doesn’t appear that any of the members went on to do anything else. It’s a time capsule, this one; that’s for sure.
— Friar Johnsen

SKULL236

Posted on August 24, 2013 by Friar Wagner

DISPATCHED, Terrorizer (2004, Khaosmaster)

The skull:
Stock skull (we’re sure we’ve seen this exact one at least 22 times in the last 236 skulls) with cyber-hair and weird twisty cyber-tentacles. Looks like it took about five minutes to create, with even less time and thought going into the band logo. I’m not even gonna get into how bad the music is. (Oh wait, the Council is telling me I have to, per the rules as a lowly Big Dumb Skulls friar. Okay then…)

The music:
Achieving a small degree of notice during their long 12-year slog, poor Dispatched would be occupying bargain bins everywhere if bargain bins still existed. Terrorizer is poorly
recorded, and remarkably so, which doesn’t help their cause. This production is thin, frail and brittle sounding, which might work if you’re a one-man bedroom black metal demo band, but they’re not. They are, however, bad metal, despite trying for something bigger and better. Dispatched attempts to achieve a melodic death metal sort of sound, one that doesn’t mind adding in a flute or lead keyboard role here and there. It’s maybe akin to In Flames right around the time In Flames started getting junky. But whether the songwriting is good or not (it’s not), you need a production with some degree of power to convince. Dispatched’s other problem is ambition, but not because they’re lacking it. In fact, they throw out a ton of ideas, sometimes within the same song, but most of them aren’t very interesting to begin with. If they are, they fly by too briefly before some dippy keyboard-driven gothic sort of melody line flies in. And then they’ll deliver another stock riff out of the Unused Dark Tranquillity Riffs box. I’ll usually give some credit to any band who tries to, you know, “mix it up” a little bit, but in Dispatched’s case it’s unlistenable and annoying. And I realize my criticism is very surface and probably unfair, but why try any harder if they themselves can’t be bothered to write better lyrics than this…from “I Am thy Lord”:

“The world is mine
I grab it with my soul
Identify
Me as your lord
The world is mine
I grab it with my soul
Realize
I am thy lord”

But hey, if faintly “cyber” melodic death metal with cheesy keyboard sounds and a terrible
production appeals to you, go for it. You might even enjoy living in hopes that some label
comes along and releases their numerous demos and EPs in a four-LP box. For me, I hope this band stays buried. Please do not exhume!
— Friar Wagner