GRUESOME — Fragments of Psyche (review)

GRUESOME — Fragments of Psyche album cover EP · 2017 · Death Metal Buy this album from MMA partners
3.5/5 ·
UMUR
"Fragments of Psyche" is an EP release by US death metal act Gruesome. The EP was released through Relapse Records in March 2017. Gruesome was formed in 2014 out of lead vocalist/guitarist Matt Harvey´s and drummer Gus Rios involvement with the Death To All (DTA) touring project. Gruesome is basically the band members playground for playing early Death (the band) influenced death metal. Gruesome released their debut full-length studio album "Savage Land" in 2015 and the "Dimensions of Horror" EP followed in 2016. Both strongly early Death worshipping releases.

That trend is continued on "Fragments of Psyche", but that´s only natural as five out of the seven tracks on the 30:59 minutes long EP are demo versions of tracks which appear in their final studio versions on "Savage Land (2015)". In addition to the five demo tracks, the EP features one new original track (the opening title track) and a cover of "Choke on It" (titled "Choke on It '91") from Death´s "Leprosy (1988)" album. Now I wrote above that the material is strongly influenced by the early Death releases, and in particular "Leprosy (1988)", but the title track is actually a technical death metal track, which sounds more like a homage to Death´s "Human (1991)" album, so in that regard Gruesome have developed their sound a bit.

The quality of the material is high throughout, and personally I think the demo versions of the tracks from "Savage Land (2015)" sound slightly more interesting than the versions on the studio album. They have the right authentic old school death metal rawness to them. The cover of "Choke on It" is also well performed, although Gruesome don´t add much to the original. The title track is a high quality technical death metal track, and it´s great to hear that the band are also able to cover other areas of the death metal genre. "Fragments of Psyche" is a well produced EP from the demo tracks to the studio tracks, and upon conclusion a 3.5 star (70%) rating is fully deserved and maybe even slightly too low.
Share this review
more

Review Comments

Post a public comment below | Send private message to the reviewer
Please login to post a shout
No shouts posted yet. Be the first member to do so above!

Review Index

Member Zone

Username:
Password:
Stay signed in

Metal Subgenres

Artists Alpha-index

MMA TOP 5 Metal ALBUMS

Rating by members, ranked by custom algorithm
Albums with 30 ratings and more
Master of Puppets Thrash Metal
METALLICA
Buy this album from our partners
Paranoid Heavy Metal
BLACK SABBATH
Buy this album from our partners
Moving Pictures Hard Rock
RUSH
Buy this album from our partners
Powerslave NWoBHM
IRON MAIDEN
Buy this album from our partners
Rising Heavy Metal
RAINBOW
Buy this album from our partners

New Metal Artists

New Metal Releases

Tarantula Heart Sludge Metal
MELVINS
Buy this album from MMA partners
God Damned You To Hell Traditional Doom Metal
FRIENDS OF HELL
Buy this album from MMA partners
The Absence Melodic Death Metal
THE ABSENCE
Buy this album from MMA partners
Unextinct Technical Death Metal
HIDEOUS DIVINITY
Buy this album from MMA partners
Powerlords Power Metal
ELETTRA STORM
Buy this album from MMA partners
More new releases

New Metal Online Videos

Fallen Ashes - Wage War (Official Lyric Video)
FALLEN ASHES
Bosh66· 5 days ago
EXISTENTIAL DEAD - Unreality (Single) 2024
EXISTENTIAL DEAD
Bosh66· 5 days ago
EXISTENTIAL DEAD - Cold Hands
EXISTENTIAL DEAD
Bosh66· 5 days ago
IRON MONKEY - Misanthropizer (Official Music Video)
IRON MONKEY
Bosh66· 8 days ago
??? (Losing ART) - "????" (Official Music Video) [HD]
漂浮者樂團
Bosh66· 8 days ago
More videos

New MMA Metal Forum Topics

More in the forums

New Site interactions

More...

Latest Metal News

members-submitted

More in the forums

Social Media

Follow us
Follow us on Twitter Become a Facebook fan RSS Feed