Venomous Concept releases its new album !
Created by Shane Embury (bass then guitar, Napalm Death, Lock Up, Brujeria, Tronos…) and Kevin Sharp (vocals, Lock Up, ex-Brutal Truth) in 2003, the band now completed by John Cooke (guitar, Corrupt Moral Altar, live for Napalm Death) and Carl Stokes (drums, Groundhogs, ex-Cancer) offers us The Good Ship Lollipop on Decibel and Graphite Records.
While the members have mainly accustomed us to Grindcore and pure violence, this project allows them to explore Hardcore and Punk roots. This becomes evident from The Good Ship Lollipop, the eponymous track, which starts with a strange sample followed by a groovy and dissonant sound on which raw vocals settle in. As confusing as it may sound, the heady riffs are incredibly catchy and accessible, letting Timeline take us back to the roots of Hardcore while keeping a very Punk approach which makes us easily shake our heads. The energetic Old School elements are present on Slack Jaw, the next track which lets bass and leads bring the rhythmic some diversity, then Pig lets the vindictive tones express themselves on this abrasive sound. Clinical allows us a short break with its introductive sample, then the band places almost haunting riffs in motivating patterns driving us to Fractured and its piercing leads. The rhythmic remains quite soft and soaring, sometimes even borrowing from Post-Punk, but rage is never far away as on Voices which is infused with it but still manages to let softer leads break through. So Sick allows us to get back to the basis of Hardcore with a constant energetic rhythmic and threatening choirs, then Flowers Bloom will let softness soothe the airy leads. Clean vocals are also well mastered, letting this rhythmic ballad lead us to Humble Crow, a more aggressive and jerky track, which reminds us of motivating Hardcore Punk’s golden age. But the track is quite short, and it will quickly let Can’t Lose take over with similar elements, accompanied by quite diversified and intense vocal parts and screaming leads before coming back in a jerky approach with Everything is Endlessness. The track remains quite simple while proposing catchy tones, but we already reach the end of the album with Life’s Winter, the last composition, which remains in this pool of motivated and sometimes melodic Old School sounds before definitively leaving us.
Although the musicians are mainly known for their music’s violence, Venomous Concept remains attached to this violence’s Old School and more accessible roots, a motivating Hardcore Punk making The Good Ship Lollipop the worthy successor of the style’s legends.
80/100