Lock Up - Hate Breeds Suffering
Nuclear Blast - 2002
Reviewed by Philip Whitehouse
Go to the Nuclear Blast website.
Go to the Lock Up website.
Although the band are uneasy about being called a grindcore supergroup, that's basically the only succint way I can find of describing them. Comprising such high-profile members of the extreme metal community as Thomas Lindberg, Napalm Death's Jesse Pintado and Shane Embury, and Dimmu Borgir's Nick Barker, you just know Lock Up are going to be a harsh listen.
And so it is that the second album from the side-projecting death-grinders is about the most visceral, furious and clinically precise slab of extreme metal to fall through my letterbox in all my time of writing for this website.
Songs such as opener 'Feeding On The Opiate' feel like being simultaneously mauled by a group of marauding wildcats while being pummeled with machine gun fire by SAS troopers on speed, and that feeling is not let up for a second. The speedy, meaty yet surgically sharp riffs coupled with Barker's unmistakably mechanical and furious drumming style form the bulk of the sound, which is filled out by Lindberg's harsh screaming and 'Sir' Shane Embury's assured, rapid-fire bass assault.
Frankly, I've got a feeling that of Miesko Talarcszyk (if I've even spelled his name correctly) from Nasum and Justin Broadrick from Godflesh (and, formerly, Napalm Death) got together with these guys and spend months in the studio as opposed to just weeks, we could have the best grindcore band on the planet on our hands. As it is, what we have is a group of seasoned professionals taking time out from their day-jobs to show the young upstarts of the grind scene how to do it properly.
And don't they do it well?
9/10
Nuclear Blast - 2002
Reviewed by Philip Whitehouse
Go to the Nuclear Blast website.
Go to the Lock Up website.
Although the band are uneasy about being called a grindcore supergroup, that's basically the only succint way I can find of describing them. Comprising such high-profile members of the extreme metal community as Thomas Lindberg, Napalm Death's Jesse Pintado and Shane Embury, and Dimmu Borgir's Nick Barker, you just know Lock Up are going to be a harsh listen.
And so it is that the second album from the side-projecting death-grinders is about the most visceral, furious and clinically precise slab of extreme metal to fall through my letterbox in all my time of writing for this website.
Songs such as opener 'Feeding On The Opiate' feel like being simultaneously mauled by a group of marauding wildcats while being pummeled with machine gun fire by SAS troopers on speed, and that feeling is not let up for a second. The speedy, meaty yet surgically sharp riffs coupled with Barker's unmistakably mechanical and furious drumming style form the bulk of the sound, which is filled out by Lindberg's harsh screaming and 'Sir' Shane Embury's assured, rapid-fire bass assault.
Frankly, I've got a feeling that of Miesko Talarcszyk (if I've even spelled his name correctly) from Nasum and Justin Broadrick from Godflesh (and, formerly, Napalm Death) got together with these guys and spend months in the studio as opposed to just weeks, we could have the best grindcore band on the planet on our hands. As it is, what we have is a group of seasoned professionals taking time out from their day-jobs to show the young upstarts of the grind scene how to do it properly.
And don't they do it well?
9/10
