DIESTO, "Isle Of Marauder"
Thankfully, this record is not about an island where thuggish New York hardcore tough guys work out and mosh... get it? Actually, who knows what it's about, all I know is how it sounds. And from the moment I popped this in my immediate thoughts were 'Unsane'. From the filthy distortion, grimy tones, and the shouted vocals that sound like they were recorded with a broken mic I was hearing nothing but Unsane, circa "Total Destruction"-era coming through the speakers. So that means that things started out great. From there though it just slowed down a lot, so that every song seemed a lot longer, thus making it into a bit of a different beast. I definitely like it even if it felt a bit too long at times they definitely make good use of taking those shredding sounds of New York's noisiest and giving it a different spin. By the time they get to the final track, "Black Water", things start out with clean guitars playing some melodic riffs before the crushing sets in. Those cleaner, more classic-sounding guitars emerge again here and there throughout the song, before closing out with a repeating dirgy riff out of the "Scattered, Smothered..." play book. But wait! What's with the Sabbath leads coming out here? Geez, this song is really long. It may one of the only times where 11 minutes of music of this style is welcome and tossing in a few different influence just to, I don't know, get it out of the way.. and making it all sound good in the process. Of course, that's just the last song. The rest of it is a sludgy affair, a nice surprise for this jaded dude. (Exigent Records, www.exigentrecords.com)