Wednesday, June 8, 2011

CANNABIS CORPSE - Beneath Grow Lights Thou Shalt Rise CD review


CANNABIS CORPSE - Beneath Grow Lights Thou Shalt Rise CD
Tankcrimes
Genre: Death Metal
Rating: 4/5

Much like Phil Hall's main band MUNICIPAL WASTE went from good time partying thrashers to serious top tier genre vets with their last release 2009's Massive Aggressive. This his other project has done the same by going from a marijuana themed parody Death Metal act to something sounding far more dark and powerful than before. "Visions From the Dank Side" sets the mood of this release so perfectly as if it were a soundtrack to some marijuana themed horror epic. There are the obligatory openings on releases and then there's exceptional ones. "Visions From the Dank Side" is definitely the latter and bleeds very well into the first official cut "Lunatic of Pot's Creation". From that point on the difference between their early material and Beneath Grow Lights Thou Shalt Rise is clear. This release is a real full on death metal album with some furious parts that will rip your face off and at other times it will crush your skull. It hearkens back to the style first forged by their parody namesake a little but over all it's more a mix of a few others.

Since this was mixed by Erik Rutan (HATE ETERNAL, MORBID ANGEL) the overall sound might be part of his doing then again the band; Phil Hall - bass, Josh Hall - drums, Nick Poulos - guitar (PARASYTIC, VOLTURE) and of course Andy Horn - vocals (BATTLEMASTER) have enough ability to pull this off with obviously great results. The best aspects here lies in it's variety to keep the listener on edge. While every track on here contains something to capture your attention there's full on stand outs like the double punch of "Sworn to the Bag" and "Where the Kind Lives" both pair up chaotic brutality with mid paced grooves. "Blame it on Bud" almost has a punk influence buried underneath a pile of death metal corpses. Then there's "Dead by Bong" which is the type of cut which should have old school DM vets scratching their heads wondering why they don't sound this good. CANNABIS CORPSE has probably done more to help those early DM band's careers of late by introducing more of it, even in parody form, to a younger audience. But now with this release they stand out on their own.

Label: http://www.tankcrimes.com/


Myspace: http://www.myspace.com/CANNABISCORPSEVA



JUST FOR THE HELL OF IT HERE'S THE TANKCRIMES PROMO BECAUSE I LIKE THEIR VIDEO PROMOS.


No comments:

Post a Comment