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Soilent Green

Sewn Mouth Secrets

Written by: MS on 25/11/2005 01:48:26

New Orleans based Soilent Green release their sophmore full-length called "Sewn Mouth Secrets". This album surely has some uniqueness to it. At first, you'd think it's pure hardcore, but that's until the surprising parts pop in. For the most part, what you get is some overly thrashy, messed up riffs, and you really have to concentrate to find any rhythm in them. On top of this they have two types of vocals: a raspy one sounding a bit like the Cradle of Filth vocalist, and another more low-pitched, at times even growling one. Vocalist Ben Falgoust screams his lungs out all the time. It all creates one big discordant mess, that really does not make much musical sense to me. The songs break continously into slower riffs that chug along with a really groovy feel to them, before bursting into a mindless blur of guitars again. This all works surprisingly well, as all of the prescribed elements are well balanced throughout the record.

Many of the songs, like "Build Fear" and "Her Unsober Ways", have a short, blues-y intro, some with the bass leading, and some with a guitar riff a little less distorted than the on the rest of the album together with some clean vocals. The low level of production of the album is revealed when the distortion is turned back on just before the thrashy overtaking riff commences. These intros work very well, but unfortunately they are a bit too short, and revisits of the introductory bluesy feel are totally absent, which is a pity, since I think that would have worked very well as a contrast to their regular noisecore sound. Once the songs have blasted away in hardcore/metalcore riffs, they stay like that.

All in all, the album needs a bit more creativity/originality and production, but the idea is good, and I think this band is really onto something. If they evolve it and develop the genre mix, they could define a whole new genre.

Download: Her Unsober Ways, Sewn Mouth Secrets
For the fans of: Into The Moat, Eyehategod

Release date 10.10.2005
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