SMALLPOX AROMA
SMALLPOX AROMA– “Festering Embryos of Logical Corruption”
by Thor
Thai grind monster SMALLPOX AROMA comes out swinging with a debut album that, despite being almost two decades in the making, clocks in at just 18 short, violent minutes.
This three-piece plays a no-nonsense style of grindcore that’s typified by blast beats, d-beats, guttural vocals, and an overall raw, noisy aesthetic. Sonically, SMALLPOX AROMA takes some cues from bands such as PLF and CAPTAIN CLEANOFF as well as old NAPALM DEATH and NASUM. That’s a pretty good list.
I’m not privy to the lyrics for this release, but I do appreciate some of the album’s song titles which include “Harvesting the Aliens’ Nest”, “Oh My Sweet Gruesome Scarecrow”, “Quest for the Missing Head”, and “Country of the Ghouls”. If the lyrics are half as evocative as their respective titles, then I’m all-in, conceptually.
As good as SMALLPOX AROMA’s long-gestating debut is, it’s nothing I haven’t heard many, many times before. In fact, the band’s press material alludes to a concerted effort to shed some of their more modern sounding sensibilities and lean in to a more primitive 1980’s-inspired style instead. There’s nothing inherently bad about that, but I was around back then and listening to the bands that SMALLPOX AROMA want to emulate. I’m old now and I want my new music to sound…well, new!
Nevertheless, fans of raw, straightforward grind, crust, and d-beat will find enough on “Festering Embryos of Logical Corruption” to appreciate, even if the future of extreme music will be left for other bands to figure out.