"I was always dreaming about very powerful people - dictators and things like that. I was just always impressed by people who could be remembered for hundreds of years, or even, like Jesus, be for thousands of years remembered." - Arnold Schwarzenegger

Mr. Gurglenator (aka Aki Järvinen, ex-Torn), the sole flesh and blood member of Goretorture, had this idea one morning, probably while suffering a bad hangover: why not mix deathgrind and Arnold "The Terminator" Schwarzenegger quotes?! And so he did and 'Promised to Kill You Last...' is the outcome.

"Milk is for babies. When you grow up you have to drink beer." - Arnold Schwarzenegger

Goretorture is musically brutal. Grinding death metal, North-American style. After all, Mr. Schwarzenegger is North-American, right??!! Guitar sounds like a rusty chainsaw. Riffing goes from very heavy and low stuff to twisted fretboard abuse, which is quite technical and fast for sure. Few leads performed are good. Tempo changes a lot, as one would expect, and of course many times during on song alone. Fastest parts are majority on the album, but thankfully Gurglenator slows down at times. 'Meat Grind Cookery' has a cool technical part, 'My Mission Is to Kill You' is a slower and heavy piece of torture and 'Barbarian' is more thrashing song. Goretorture is best enjoyed while under the influence of beer.

"The worst thing I can be is the same as everybody else. I hate that." - Arnold Schwarzenegger

Gurglenator has not thrived for personality, even though I've never heard another deathgrind album with Mr. Schwarzenegger throwing his pretty wicked lines. I waited for some stolen bits from movie soundtracks played metal way. But no, not here. Well, you have to get that 'Death's Design' (2001) from Diabolical Masquerade to hear a piece of Barbarian soundtrack...

"The best activities for your health are pumping and humping." - Arnold Schwarzenegger

Goretorture suits for pumping (if that means other than your love-muscle), but not humping. This can get you aggressive and I really don't respect men who hit their bitches. Not that I actually have tried this while humping. And hey, headbanging can be dangerous, it can fuck up your neck and even kill you. At least if you try to headbang to Goretorture at their fastest. All beats are provided by a killer cyborg from future, Dr. Brutal Robot. There's some good drum samples uploaded into its memory, so drum machine doesn't destroy this album. Only on fastest beats it's easy to notice the machine.

"Even though some people say I still speak with a slight accent, I have reached the top of the acting profession." - Arnold Schwarzenegger

Gurglenator's name isn't Gurglenator for nothing. The voice coming from man's guts is totally incomprehensible for a big part. This can't be totally human, some appliance(s) must have been utilized. The quotes from Arnie have been taken from both movies and his political work. There's much less of these samples as I expected. Sadly... At times they give a breather or two for a listener.

"My friend James Cameron and I made three films together - True Lies, The Terminator and Terminator 2. Of course, that was during his early, low-budget, art-house period." - Arnold Schwarzenegger

Production is low-budget, but definitely not art-house. Probably recorded at Gurglenator's home-studio, it's raw yet instruments are audible and reverb is weird and annoying. Guitar and bass are the heaviest things on the album. I've heard worse, much much worse, but this isn't much more than demo level quality.

"Having a pump is like having sex. I train two, sometimes three times a day. Each time I get a pump. It's great. I feel like I'm coming all day." - Arnold Schwarzenegger

Well, does Mr. Schwarzenegger actually mean pumping up his love-muscle? Anyways, as I mentioned, this kind of deathgrind ain't my favourite, but I couldn't resist of not buying this piece of musical madness mixed with mad samples from Arnie's careers. It's "cüül" enough! It was quite a cheap record, so why not check it out? We'll see if Gurglenator means what he says: "I'll be back!" It's hasta la vista from me now.

Rating: 6- (out of 10) ratings explained

Reviewed by Lane
01/27/2005 12:05