Labels: De Graanrepubliek – IFB Records – SuperFi
Review by: Ewan
This is an expert lesson in how to do a split 7″. Get two bands who are on top form to provide some ‘all killer, no filler’ tunes, get some top notch artwork done and press on a heavy slab of wax. This one 7″ is worth far more than a lifetime’s supply of half-arsed split 7″s just pumped out for the sake of it. There’s a whole lot of love of put into this release. However, it radiates unadulterated hatred and filth.
Cellgraft could roughly be described as grindcore but a million miles away from the super-tech or super-slop stuff that litters euro-festivals. It goes back to grindcore first principles of taking Swans’ monolithic slow grinding crawl and fusing it with fast blown out distortion and agonised screaming. The guitars creep just about as far into the red as you can get without sounding incoherent. Like the bonesaw that cut the severed pigs head in half on the cover.
First Drainland song has some nice Voivod-esque high guitar parts. Sign of a great band if they can be brutal without just relying on pummelling low chords. Of course, they’re there too. Song structure is quite Swans-y. Second song pounds out a savage, almost power violence, slow riff before an unexpected ‘fuck yeah’ moment when an Autopsy guitar solo kicks in. Those few seconds are the only nod Drainland give to ‘rocking’ in any standard punk/hardcore/metal sense. Their whole side of the split lurches and pulverises along finding ever unique ways to batter your head in.
This 7″ is for connoisseurs of the art of being brutal.