This time I'm focusing on something that's so heavy it would make the Gallagher brothers literally shit themselves.
We are going back to 1992 to examine Brutal Truth's debut, Extreme Conditions Demand Extreme Responses.
Brutal Truth were formed by man-from-a-million-bands and highly-respected multi-metal genre bassist, Dan Lilker.
The band had been signed by noise experts, Earache Records, and recorded this genre-defining grindcore classic.
What a debut it is.
PSPI sounds like an industrial metal track, full of samples and wailing power tools, but it serves as nothing more than an intro which throws you off the scent of what's to come. True, there are samples and workshop soundbites throughout the album, but they are used to great effect rather than perpetually looped or any such nonsense.
Birth of Ignorance opens with a doomy riff before the real fun starts and the drumming picks up to lightning speed. Brutal Truth showed what a cohesive unit they were and everything ticks over like a well-oiled machine. This was some of the finest grindcore I'd ever heard when it was released and I still think so today.
Stench of Prophet starts with a fuzzy bassline, showing that Lilker was the real powerhouse behind proceedings. The lyrics are more audible than a lot of other bands within the genre (mostly, anyway) and while growled, there are definite words to be heard. You might need the lyric sheet for reference purposes in parts though.
Ill Neglect is a little slower, but a ballad it isn't. Especially during the parts where it quickens. Was this drummer on steroids or what?
There's not a bad song on this record and Denial of Existence continues with a couple of thrash-inspired riffs among its arsenal.
Regression/Progression starts with drums reminiscent of Slayer's Criminally Insane and ticks along quite nicely before picking up speed and becoming shoutier. Slow and then fast and then slow was one of the band's signature moves which they executed perfectly.
Collateral Damage once held the record for the shortest ever music video. It'll have taken you longer to read this blurb than it would to watch it.
The last song on Side A (for those who remember such things) is Time. This is my favourite song on the album. It's mostly doomy with a couple of heavy-as-fuck and catchy-as-fuck riffs underpinning the whole thing. It's one of those songs that feels like it could chug on and on for ever and is a real disappointment when it ends.
Flip the record over and you'll hear "I hope you make sure we're properly dead before you start" and then bang, straight into the warp-speed Walking Corpse. This song is from the other end of the spectrum and shows a great deal of musical diversity for which they never received the credit they so rightly deserved.
Monetary Gain does feel like it was phoned in when compared to the rest of the album. It still pisses all over what a lot of other bands were doing at the time or have done since though.
Wilt should by rights have made the drummer's arms fall off and H.O.P.E. is really a song Obituary wish they had written. Both classic Brutal Truth songs in that they're so unalike.
Blockhead weighs in at just 7 seconds and like Collateral Damage is surely a nod to pioneers of the scene, Napalm Death.
Anti-Homophobe sounds like the musical equivalent of homophobes being beaten around the face, which is good in an era of Donald Trump-supporting morons. Oddly, there's a bit of guitar in this song that reminds me of Lawnmower Deth for some reason too.
The curtain comes down with Unjust Compromise, a song starting with an incredibly Slayer-esque riff which rounds off a well-polished debut in brilliant fashion.
Brutal Truth were actually a melting pot of thrash, death, grind, hardcore and possibly a hundred other sub-sub-genres that only they knew of. Genius. Extremely good album deserves extreme amounts of listening, I'd say.
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