Phonebook Eater
7/10
"Dirge" is a must for Grindcore fans.
Grindcore is one of the least accessible genres in music; even I was very skeptical in giving this a try, since I am no expert in the genre, at all. In fact, this is my first Grindcore review ever. And thank god it is. Wormrot is a Singapore trio that is at their second effort with “Dirge”, following 2009’s “Abuse”.
Whoever is familiar with the genre and listens to this album, he’ll find traditional elements as well as more innovating ones: the songs have all lightening-fast rhythms, with hammering drums, and those typical wild growls that turned off many listeners who attempted courageously to listen to this genre. The songs’ length is between the thirty seconds and one minute, breaking the normal song structure. But what I loved about this album is that I noticed that here there is something that you almost never hear in Grindcore anymore: the Hardcore Punk influence, that here is very noticeable in the rhythms and sometimes in the vocals as well. I’m sure Napalm Death will be pleased.
The songs in this album are twenty five, the total length of the album is eighteen minutes long. So you can imagine how intense these almost twenty minutes are. The songs are extremely flashy, and flow one into another without you even noticing. Tons of stops and goes, extremely angry and violent parts alternate with more Hardocore moments, like I said before. It seems useless to mention songs, they’re so fast and immediate that you can’t really identify them as songs, but just a different hook of a long eighteen minute track.
An album that with my surprise I enjoyed a lot, it definitely made me want to check out some more Grindcore, and maybe I’ll start getting into the genre. But let’s stick to the present. If you’re a fan of the genre, this is a must. If you’re not, just like I am, check it out anyway, if you want to explore this genre a bit more.