ALBUM REVIEW: Festering Embryos Of Logical Corruption – Smallpox Aroma
Since their formation in 2006, Bangkok’s SMALLPOX AROMA have been laying waste to anything and everything with their potent mix of goregrind, grindcore and crust. The trio – made up of founding drummer Polwach “Goredick” Beokhaimook, bassist and vocalist Pratchaya “L.S.” Chaichana and guitarist Apirak “Septictanklavatory” Treesuksakul (yes, you read those nicknames correctly) – has a great deal of content spread across demos, splits and EPs, but astoundingly, Festering Embryos Of Logical Corruption is their debut full-length record.
When it comes to grindcore, the distinction between full-length and EP really is negligible, as is the case here. Festering Embryos Of Logical Corruption consists of 12 serrated blades of sonic malice, lasting just 17 minutes all told. These range from 50 seconds to 2:31 and the album moves with the pace and density of a fully-loaded 18-wheeler screaming through the night on an unstoppable path of decimation, splattering anything that crosses its path.
The putrefaction starts right away with Harvesting The Aliens’ Nest combining creepy atmospherics and feedback before swan-diving into an 80s underground-inspired grindcore that shaves your face clean off. From the thud of Goredick’s snares to the acerbic growls of L.S., you can hear everything from early-NAPALM DEATH to INSECT WARFARE in their sound.
Into The Realm Of Nothingness follows like a deluge of needles and razors with no cover around for your safety, while Oh My Sweet Gruesome Scarecrow opts for bendy riffs that showcase a relatively more measured approach that takes its time to dismember you between blasts of mindless violence. It does all of this in under four minutes, displaying SMALLPOX AROMA’s deep knowledge and appreciation of everything that came before them.
And then, like a body left in a vat of acid, Festering Embryos Of Logical Corruption just becomes a formless soup. From the frenetic and reckless speed of Swallow The Defiled to the thrash-tinged Country Of The Ghouls, SMALLPOX AROMA covers all things grind and extreme. We could go in circles for days about the semantics of grindcore, goregrind and deathgrind, which are all arenas that this power trio has inhabited at some point in their long career, but the bottom line is that they’ve smashed all of these elements into a gross mash. Eleven Corpses Disentombed sounds like Gory Sight, Shining Bright, which in turn sounds like Inescapable Visceral Erosion. It has its bright spots and it does it well enough for the most part, but when you start to question if 17 minutes of content have looped already partway through, it’s easy enough to identify larger issues at play.
While Festering Embryos Of Logical Corruption hits all the notes and tropes of the grindcore genre, in the end it feels like a by-numbers exercise that ticks boxes and checks out. Had this come out 30 years ago, it’d be fine – great, even – but now it feels like a victim of its own macabre obsession. It may well be carving its name into your flesh in the moment, but the scars won’t last and you’ll move on with your life pretty easily.
Rating: 6/10
Festering Embryos Of Logical Corruption is set for release on March 31st via Inhuman Assault.
Like SMALLPOX AROMA on Facebook.