BIRDFLESH
BIRDFLESH “Sickness In The North”
By Dr. Abner Mality
The foul fowl are at it again...23 rapidfire blasts in about a half hour. That is par for the course from these whackos, who throw shit at the wall fast, loose and grinding. For BIRDFLESH there is no other way to operate. My calculations show that this is their 28th release since 1994, so they have been grinding since before the internet, electric cars and nu-metal. They’ve got this stuff down to a science now and it never fails.
On “Sickness In the North”, any tune lasting more than a minute is to be considered prog rock. Some last less than 30 seconds. Take the basic elements of d-beat crust punk, thrash metal and CARCASS-style grind and put them in a blender with a huge helping of lyrical stupidity designed to offend. There we have the blueprint of BIRDFLESH. You are almost compelled to pogo around the room like an idiot when confronted with the likes of “Funeral Orgy”, “Chained To the Wok”, “Amputee Admiration”, and “Bombraid Bonanza”. To make absolutely sure somebody is offended, we have tracks called “Incest Melodies”, “Pedophile Pal” and “Balcony Piss”. Mission accomplished.
“Lose the Arise” is an obvious piss-take on a song of a similar name by a certain death metal band from Florida. “Fat Pigs” changes things up just a bit with a silly singalong ditty. But you can be sure the overwhelming amount of tunes here are thrashing grindcore designed to wreck the neck. Almost 30 years into their career and BIRDFLESH have mastered their particular idiom. Another triumph of bad taste…