With a band like Atomicide, it’s not that hard to figure out what you’re getting yourself into. Even if you’re not familiar with the Chilean blackened death/thrash trio, a quick glance at stage names like Atomizer and Deathbringer—not to mention a song called “Pestilential Hammer Blows (Necrocrucifixion)”—would suggest that even a quick listen-through will smash noses into grindstones and eardrums into oblivion. And that’s more or less what the band’s new album, Chaos Abomination, does—though without anything to set it apart from the myriad other bands taking precisely the same approach. While it’s a decent enough listen to blow off some steam with, there’s nothing particularly world-changing about it.

The thing about Chaos Abomination is that aside from…really just the first minute-and-a-half or so of the opening track, “Si Vis Pacem Para Bellum,” it’s just too one-track-minded to really stand out from the pack. The guys love their blast beats, their searing, tremolo-picked guitars, and their gutteral roars, and they make it abundantly clear. And judging by the album’s production style, there’s also apparently a penchant for Phil Spector buried somewhere underneath all the brutality, too. Forget about a mere “wall of sound;” this thing sounds like a veritable fortress of it, which is ultimately to its own detriment. Without any real dynamics to speak of, Chaos Abomination ends up merely sounding like…noise.

That being said, the total run-time here is just 33 minutes—so even if that cacophony proves to be a bit too much to handle, it at least won’t stay with you for too long. And to be perfectly clear, you will definitely hear worse stuff than this in your lifetime. The trouble is, it’s just not the kind of beast that’s built to stick with you. Five songs in, you’ll have already forgotten the four that came before it—which is more than fine if you’re looking for some aggressive background noise to beat a punching bag with, but less so if you’re looking for any significant replay value.

Oh well, at least the cover art’s kinda cool!

Keep it heavy,

-Dan

Chaos Abomination is available now on Iron Bonehead Productions. For more information on Atomicide, visit the band’s Facebook page.

Live. Love. Plow. Horns Up.