Not bad. I don't know much about this Louisiana grind act, but even though there are elements of this disc that aren't my thing, there's a lot of promise as well. Their style is a pretty chaotic blend of styles that focuses on speedy grindcore with lots of death metal riffing and a little bit of quirkiness, so you'll find everything from straightforward blastbeats and classic churning death metal chords to sinister dissonance and absolutely awesome breakdowns (Check out "I'll Feed You Shit", that breakdown is absurd - in a good way!), all with a significant dash of technicality and vocals that jump from snarling screams to burly growls and some hardcore-ish yelling as well. The band's writing style is pretty jumbled and chaotic, and that's where they definitely start to lose me, but the stronger riffs are damn fuckin' good and tend to hold enough weight to carry things along well enough. They're able to harness a good amount of energy when they play fast and hit on some thrashy influences, and that's pretty cool. Hell, "Sealing the Ring" opens with a total 80's thrash riff before it plows into the blasting discordance and flurries of notes, and the sludgy Crowbar-isms that pop up briefly in "Silent" kick some serious ass. "Beating the Path" is a little more dissonant than some of the other tracks, partly because the tempos tend to stick within a nice midpaced range that gives the playing a little more room to breathe, and I'm really into that approach 100%. The recording is a little raw for what the band has in store, but I can live with it for sure. The mix is nice and even and lets the pounding bass tone play a great role (accenting a fuckin' sweet bass performance that easily holds its own with the guitars and drops tons of prominent runs), the drums sound natural, the guitars are heavy, and the vocals sound fine. It needs a little more crispness and clarity, but I kind of like a little of the ruggedness they have going on. The CD-R comes in a standard jewel case with packaging printed from a decent color printer. It looks a little shoddy and plain, but it gets the job done for a self-released affair. The lyrics aren't included, so I'm not sure what's going on there. Not bad. There's a little bit of an underdeveloped streak all around (which includes my commentary on the packaging and production), but I like the attitude I'm picking up from this, and god damn if these dudes don't write some fuckin' amazing riffs. They might not be turning many heads at this point, but they could be if the right doors opened. There are a shitload of bands out there right now on sizeable labels that are very similar but far inferior to this because the bands are simply incapable of writing the quality of riffs that it takes to leave a mark. So... hopefully the name Rat in a Bucket will start to work its way up in the ranks among them, and maybe those metalcore losers can learn a thing or two from these guys in the process. I'm pretty close to giving this a 7/10 but I know the band can definitely do better. Keep an eye out, I'd like to hear more from 'em, there's a lot of value to work with here.
[self-released]
Running time - 23:00 (approximately), Tracks: 6
[Notable tracks: Sealing the Ring, Beating the Path]
Rat in a Bucket - http://www.ratinabucket.com
