America Es Una Dictadura (Crimenes De Guerra, Sangre Rebelde, 2004)

Most Punx tend to worship the Scandinavian and Japanese Punk scenes but fail to comprehend the strength and aggression played in the most intense Punk scene in the world, the Latin American scene. By saying this I entitle Mexico, every country in South America and of course the homeland of Spain. Japanese Punk being as wicked and insane as it is, it does not top the Spanish speaking bands and to this day I still could not give you a definite answer as to why, until now.



Crimenes De Guerra are an Anarchopunk band from Mexico City, Mexico that in my opinion released one of the greatest Anarcho-based records of the previous decade. The album is entitled Sangre Rebelde and is a little over 25 minutes long, just the perfect length for this type of record. I originally stumbled across this looking on a news forum that did not pertain to music at all, instead focusing on the light of inhuman crimes and beheadings for a research paper when I found this awesome record for download. Didn't know what to expect but once I heard the first track "La Resistencia", I knew I was in for a good ride. Sick production and vocals very much so in the style of Latin Anarchopunk, being that they are shouted at insanely fast speeds proclaiming the evils and wrongs of man and its corrupt and vile legal system. I enjoyed the guitar quite a bit, being that is was tuned perfectly to what I think Punk should be, any lower and it would be muddy and just irritating. Drums are great, consistently pounding out roundhouse fills and d-beats just the way I like it. Probably the coolest thing about this album is the title itself, making a major reference to the old Mexican rebels that fought against its harsh and cruel government that persecuted its own country and essentially crumbled because it was so vile and despicable. I believe history will repeat itself, civil war is approaching and anarchism is now a possibility in Mexico, liberation and solidarity being their only weapon this is what the album focuses on primarily and I really dug the deep approach rather then just the generic "fight the man" bullshit we've been hearing since we were 13. If you haven't heard of this band definitely worth a listen, but if Anarchism, Human and Animal Liberation and overall Protest isn't your thing, or you just hate Punk, then this will not be anything new. Fuck taxes.

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Bez Miłosierdzie (Squash Bowels, No Mercy, 2004)

On the strength of Grindvirus (reviewed here), I decided to hunt down some earlier releases by Goregrinding Mad Poles Squash Bowels, and I managed to get myself a copy of No Mercy, and pretty much have been listening to it intermittently between Hayaino Daisuki and Hacavitz for the this week, I then decided to review this over the other two, although expect them to make an appearance at some point on this Blog. Anyway I wanted to flex my Polish linguistic knowledge and keep brain activity to a minimum,so I opted as the title of this post to just translate No Mercy into Polish, which pretty much is Bez Miłosierdzie, there you go you learn something new every day.

 As you know I hate Goregrind that focuses more on the Gore than the music, and Squash Bowels do it just right, by putting the music first and Gore is the by-product of the music. Now if I where to say that it is more Gorey with rhythm than Reeks of Putrefaction (I know there are some better Goregrind release but first to spring to mind), you may very well ask yourself how? well I will tell you, at times it actually sounds like some fluid sloshing around or other bodily repugnant in habeus condition; this achieved through the sickening vocals and occasionally through the guitar (God knows how!), the drum is there to give it that constant pulsating which set the tempo and also add to the immersion of being in the body of some rabid dying old man.
The vocals aside from the gurgling guttural bellows, also includes a high pitched little fellow discharging  a wide use of vile and gore filled verses. The guttural screaming instead of his verses is just as barbarous and absolute killer, imagine the birth of some demonic creature and you will get the idea.  The drums feature blast beats every so often but generally short-lived and infrequent, but with no exception the drumming is always perfect for what the other musicians are doing. The bass is recognisable at times, however after playing the album many times over you realise the bass is always there and adds that layer of groove and harshness into the songs.
The guitars like their 2009 release, are not fast with a few exceptions, but super catchy,Although the guitaring is much faster than Grind Virus in general, I was humming them to myself on the way to uni  due to their insane catchability. Like aforementioned the chords and riffs are pretty tight, they void from the guitarist doing any technical or show off stuff and just sticks to writing what best fits the song, I quite admire the combo of catchy riffs whilst the vox are vomiting forth, with the infrequent blast beat, it makes this release stand out from other Goregrind bands.
If you guys like Grind Virus then this is pretty much a must have, it has less groove and more speed and is by far one of the best Goregrind releases put out there. Their innovation is matched equally with their professional ability to play their instruments well, which in turn has earnt No Mercy a place in my regularly listened to spot.
Rating 90/100

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P.S Interview with Salvage the Flesh will be up soon and will be on a static page called Interviews, just working out how to do the podcast malarkey

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