Saturday, April 9, 2011

2nd chances w/: Rotten Sound

Swedish grind byway of Finland
I love Rotten Sound. The fact that I missed them on their last American tour has already put a damper on my entire 2011. Their latest record Cursed, is a beast. The only problem is, it's a quite a different beast than the previous Rotten Sound albums we (and by we I mean I) know and love.

In the April 2011 issue of Decibel, the band reveals that their sound has slowly evolved since the release of their 2006 EP, Consume to Contaminate, their first recording with drummer Sami Latva after former PhD in blastology Kai Hahto left the band. Kai was renowned for his insanely fast double bass and blast beat implementation as well as mind boggling drum fills. His playing helped make Rotten Sound's rabid grindcore acceptable for technical metal dorks to appreciate. Since Kai's departure, the band has begun amping up their punk rock and sludgy roots, using current drummer Sami to exercise an unprecedented amount of groove. None more so than on their latest record, Cursed.

So yeah, much like my experience with the last Misery Index album, I listened to Cursed waiting for Rotten Sound to kick my ass in all sorts of new and creative ways but instead got a nifty rockin' album from my old Finnish friends. This is arguably, the band's most controlled and accessible record to date. Less blast beats and break neck tempos, more groove, punky d-beats, unholy sludge riffs and the occasional howlin' guitar solo! Good stuff all around. My only real complaint about Cursed, is it's lackluster production job. This album sounds a little too low-fi/DIY compared to the tone of their previous albums. Production aside, my initial reaction to Rotten Sound's latest release has changed from, "oh...cool," to "oh...COOL!"

Any curious Rotten Sound newbies might want to start with this album, and work your way back to their older, crazier stuff.

27 comments:

  1. not a big fan
    but thanks for sharring

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  2. Metal's never really been my thing, but that song was so hectic that I couldn't help but listen to it through. Have to say, I enjoyed it too.

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  3. Oh yes, I wanna punch my dog! Actually, I'm doing it right now!

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  4. Is that the album art? Those would make great tatoos.

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  5. wow that was really intense! I don't know too much about grindcore only bands like early carcass, napalm death, and pig destroyer. Thanks for introducing me this band I need to expand my knowledge on grindcore :D

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  6. pretty intense, i really like grindcore but havnt heard of these guys. il lhave to check em out

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  7. These guys seem really intense, thanks!

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  8. As I've said before, production value is really important to me, so that was something that I couldn't really get over.

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  9. I have never wanted to cut my wrists so badly... but to each his own :D

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  10. really hard from the start ) not bad

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  11. yeah, a bit too heavy for me :x

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  12. There...

    There is older and crazier stuff?

    WUT

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  13. I actually like, Iv always been a hard core metal fan (especially blasting it while flying down the freeways hehe) Ill have to check out some more of them.=)

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  14. that sounds like the concert i was at last nite. my hearing is still fucked lol

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  15. How can you discern audio quality from something like this? Interesting album art.

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  16. Expected worse, but I actually like it a bit

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  17. I wonder how they came up with the name for their band?

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