DISMEMBER — Pieces (review)

DISMEMBER — Pieces album cover EP · 1992 · Death Metal Buy this album from MMA partners
4/5 ·
Vim Fuego
Way back when death metal was vital and dangerous, Dismember were the most dangerous of them all, for a short time. 'Pieces' was their 15 minutes (well, 15 minutes, 57 seconds, to be exact) of infamy. Dismember took the Swedish death metal sound pioneered by Entombed and Carnage to a new extreme. Faster, more brutal, and more convincing than their contemporaries, there is not even a trace of subtlety in this EP. Perhaps the most immediately distinctive element of Dismember's sound is the "clicky" kick drum sound. Instead of thundering along under the mix like, say, Obituary, Dismember's kick drums are right there, beside the snare, slapping you round the face, demanding attention. While not a great technical drummer, Fred Estby's performance is brutal, and fancy drum fills and off-kilter time signatures would have ruined the overall bludgeoning effect. The guitar and bass sound is basically the same as Entombed's 'Left Hand Path' and 'Clandestine' albums. It's the sort of noise a V8 powered chainsaw would make ripping through a concrete wall. It is also surprisingly well defined for a death metal band. The riffs, like the drumming, are far from spectacular, but are clear enough to stick in your head hours later, particularly ‘I Wish You Hell’ and ‘Torn Apart’. A little something that set Dismember aside from other Swedish death metal bands in the early 1990s were the guitar solos. They were a little sparse, as they generally are in death metal, but showed thrash and NWOBHM influences, an unheard-of combination for the time. Matti Karki growls like a man possessed, and from the sound of it, the demons inside him are none too keen on each other. There is the deathgrunt demon, which seems to be Karki's prominent musical persona. There is also the anguished-burning-in-Hell demon, accentuating lyrical highlights, and then there is the disgruntled grumbling demon, which complains the other two talk too much. Short and sweet, this EP managed to help define a scene and satisfy the hunger of Dismember's fans wanting more of the incredible 'Like An Ever Flowing Stream' debut album. The band also managed to get themselves banned in a number of countries due to the lyrical content and artwork. At The Gates? A bunch of schoolgirls compared to Dismember.
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