This is great shit. Blazing technical death/grind from Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. And quite honestly, considering that this demo is over a year old, I'm shocked that not only has this band not been signed, but I've barely even heard anything about 'em. It's sort of in the vein of a less complex Cryptopsy as far as being predominantly fast and throwing around lots of changes and rhythmic influences, but in my opinion the writing is far better because the songs are short and to the point and the riffing flows very well. There's more of a grindcore influence happening as well (think Terrorizer with some Ass?ck thrown in). "Unconsciousness Damage" is one of the longest tracks and throws in some great dissonant melodic arpeggios with some percussion that has a tribal sort of feel, and that's definitely something I'd like to hear more of. The last three tracks are unreleased material from their previous demo, "Hybris", which had a noticeably rawer sound (big time) and was perhaps more rooted in straightforward death metal in part. There's more tremolo picking and basic arrangements as opposed to quirky riffing and fast paced changeups (some of the latter elements do appear, but it sounds like they were trying too hard back then). I'm pretty stunned that the entire demo was recorded and mixed in a mere 18 hours! It's definitely not bad considering, though it could use work. The guitars are a little bit dirty, so even though the distortion works, it can get choppy on occasion, so it makes the performance sound a little bit sloppy, probably more so than it actually is (notably in "Sacrifice Thy Skin"). But the vocals sound fine to me, the drums are natural, and the bass is back there (barely). I'd smooth out the guitars, turn up the bass, and even out the mix so that everything plays an equal role (the mix on the drums needs work as the snare can get lost quite easily). The CD-R comes in a plastic sleeve with a full color one-sided booklet that appears to have been printed from a high quality color printer. The cover art is great, showing the band logo and title amidst some deeply red tinted artwork collaging skulls and newborn babies. The back cover has a small band photo and the lyrics, most of which are in English. The lyrics seem pretty abstract and could deal with a variety of topics from ignorance and greed to general socio-political/personal issues. It's hard to say. This is a nice demo. I'm impressed. With a slightly tighter performance and a more efficient recording I would be all over this shit, so I hope these guys get picked up by a suitable label. This is definitely a band to watch out for.
[self-released]
Running time - 17:40, Tracks: 7
[Notable tracks: Paradox, Unconsciousness Damage, Raze]
Agorhy - [email protected]
