Beats and yelling shorts, 1st May 26

Fleshcrave: GodhandOut 20th February, self-released Debut EP from this Indian outfit showcases energetic, Slayer derived death metal, integrating a mechanical and foreboding inevitability with a playful modernist hue. The production is oddly anachronistic, grasping at a muscular digitalism that dates it toward the early 00s despite the older vintage behind the stylistic reference points. One dimensional blasts of violence akin to Malevolent Creation are softened by a strong melodic edge, one that finds its substance in an older thrash influence, here sharpened up in both complexity and delivery. Vocals veer between a punk derived bark and the early death metal articulations of the Tampa scene, adding a welcome drop of all too human immediacy and aggression to offset the impersonal superstructure of the music itself. As with much death metal produced outside of the Western “core” but still referencing Northern European and American stylings it approaches the genre with a refreshing…