ABORYM — Psychogrotesque (review)

ABORYM — Psychogrotesque album cover Album · 2010 · Black Metal Buy this album from MMA partners
3.5/5 ·
Time Signature
Supergrotesque

Genre: avant-garde industrial black metal

"Psychogrotesque", the latest release by Italian industrial black metal act Aborym, certainly lives up to its title. It's an altogether unpleasant experience listening to that album - fortunately, given that this is industrial black metal, this is a good thing.

The lyrical content, which is about metal suffering, is obviously unpleasant. The guitars have a really sharp sound which, to use the title of an Annihilator track, burns like a buzzaw blade, which suits the darks atmosphere of the music very well. In addition to predominantly ultra-fast, blasting black metal parts, Aborym make use of ambient keyboards and creepy sound effects, which often pop out of the blue (such as the buzz of a fly, tortured screams representing a mental patient, drills and click representing instruments used the treatment of mental patients etc.). There are also sections with programmed drumbeats, many of which are akin to those used by Prodigy in their heyday and even some sections that sound like dark house/dance. In most cases, I think this works very well, but there are some instances, where the techno-influences come off as being a bit too forced perhaps.

There is also an avant-garde feel to this release, as the band not only blends black metal and techno music, but also make use of instrumentation from various different genres, such as a saxophone - and those saxophone parts work brilliantly.

Overall, one has to respect "Psychogrotesque" as a piece of art which dares to explore unpleasant emotions. I think that the techo music elements may throw off more hard core black metal fans, but I think that more open-minded fans of darker less mainstream types of techno music might appreciate this album.

It's psycho, it's grotesque and its wonderfully unpleasant.
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J-Man wrote:
more than 2 years ago
Expect a review from me tomorrow :-)
Pekka wrote:
more than 2 years ago
Wonder if they've seen the cover of Alice Cooper's The Eyes of Alice Cooper...
UMUR wrote:
more than 2 years ago
I´m pretty fond of their last album, so I´ll be getting this one at some point. Sounds interesting.

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