NAPALM DEATH — Scum (review)

NAPALM DEATH — Scum album cover Album · 1987 · Grindcore Buy this album from MMA partners
3/5 ·
Stooge
28 tracks at only 33 minutes? Interesting. Of further interest, Scum documents two different Napalm Death lineups on a single release. The only member who plays on the entire album is drummer Mick Harris.

The first bunch of songs, tracks 1 through 12, features Harris alongside vocalist/bassist Nick Bullen, and guitarist Justin Broadrick. The bulk of these tracks are very much punk rock influenced when it comes to the riffing. Harris’ frantic blast-beats and super distorted guitars helped to tie this album into the metal genre. Tracks such as “Scum” start at the slow and sludgy and bounce between this and more of a hardcore tempo. The track “You Suffer” is notable for being only a few seconds in length, making one question whether or not what they just heard can be actually considered a song. My favorite tracks from this section of the album are “Instinct of Survival” and “Siege Of Power”.

The remaining tracks on Scum have Harris accompanying guitarist Bill Steer, vocalist Lee Dorian, and bassist Jim Whitely. The recording quality of these tracks is significantly different, neither one being notable from a production standpoint. This is a purely D.I.Y. album where the energy of the tracks is the most important factor, not how they are recorded. Dorian’s vocals are less audible than Bullen’s, and the guitar, bass, and drum sound varies from track to track. My favorites from these tracks include “Deceiver” and “M.A.D.”. Overall, I prefer the tracks from the first half of the lineup as the stronger riffs give each song more of an identity.

There is no doubt that as it is Napalm Death’s debut, Scum is a flawed record. I was considering giving Scum a 2.5 rating, but I’ll add 0.5 for it’s historical significance and since it helped give birth to a new sub-genre of metal. It’s a good album that will no doubt please grindcore purists (Does it get any more pure than this?), and may even attract fans of punk and thrash metal. I’d recommend picking up the 2006 version of the album to get a historical perspective on the album as it includes the documentary “The Scum Story”.
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