Austria's Mastic Scum aren't newcomers, but are a new acquaintance to me. Mastic Scum perform groovy grindcore on this, their 2nd, full length album. I'm personally not following much grindcore bands. 'Scar' just fell on my hands through a records trade.

Even if the band sound energetic and keen, the problem I find about 'em is the same as with many a grindcore band: too fucking familiar riffs. There's some catchy ones, sure, but it's all pretty monotonous in a long run, or worse, not even in that long a run! The band's punky riffage meets noise rock stuff and groovy drumming with periodical blast beats is pretty much what this platter is all about. Many times it's Napalm Death's 3 last albums that this reminds me about, but only this fails to be as good those godfathers' stuff. Vocals are pretty Barney-esque; low throat and monotonous spoken lines (lyrics are about shit called human, very daily stuff). Soundwise this is live yet it's easy to pick out every instrument, and heavy stuff.

If groovy grindcore is your stuff, be my guest and try this. As mentioned, I'm not a grindcore maniac, but can enjoy it a lot, at least when something special is going on. But, sadly not this time around.

Rating: 5+ (out of 10) ratings explained

Reviewed by Lane
09/04/2007 15:56