Time Signature
Roar of a thousand guitars...
Genre: grindcore/deathgrind
This stuff is simply awesome. It is one of the best grind releases I have heard in a very long time.
There are plenty of blastbeats, of course, and loads of brutality on this album, but Lock Up successfully prevent the album from becoming monotonous - there is a general tendency, I think, for music which has many blastbeats to become monotonous to the extent that the blastbeats simply lose their brutality. But not here. Lock Up combine the blastbeating grind sections with energetic thrash metal and hardcore punk riffage with d-beats and thrash metal polka beats to boot. And there are also heavier passages and a couple of groovy elements too - hell, there are even some black metal-like riffs every now and then and some melodic things now and then.
Consequently, the music on this album is very energetic, and one cannot help but wanting to headbang like a madman and mosh about in the living room - it's that great. Thomas Lindberg's vocals sound more aggressive and angry than ever, and that suits Lock Up's brand of grindcore perfectly.
With an average length of around two and a half minutes, the songs are relatively short. This is a good thing, because, by keeping the songs short, Lock Up ensure that the music does not lose its energy, and the intensity is kept at a high level all the way through the album.
This is grindcore just the way I like it. It's aggressive. It's varied. It's energetic. The musicianship is high and the production is taken serious without being too polished. For my money, this is the deathgrind release of the year.