J-Man Wormrot are Singapore's most well-known grindcore act, and their music has been raping people's ears since their formation back in 2007. Dirge, the band's most recent effort for prestigious metal label Earache Records, is an album that will completely annihilate your ears with fast blastbeats, thick riffs, and frantic vocals. This isn't an album for the faint of heart, but anyone searching for music so inaccessible that it initially seems like just a massive wall of "noise" will definitely want to check out Dirge. What the album lacks in originality it makes up for with sheer energy, and Wormrot should not go unnoticed by grindcore fans.

Dirge sounds like it came straight from the garage of angry teenagers - the album's hardcore punk attitude and relentless grindcore atmosphere make this album absolutely just reek with anger and frustration. Song titles like "No One Gives a Shit", "Semiconcious Godsize Dumbass", and "You Suffer But Why Is It My Problem" (I love the Napalm Death reference there) confirm this statement even more definitely. This album isn't easy listening by any stretch, and instead is 18 minutes (yes, you read that correctly) of some of the most brutal grindcore/hardcore punk on the planet. Stretched out over the course of 25 songs, ranging from 4 seconds to around a minute-and-a-half, none of the tracks here are substantially more than short bursts of anger. The music does lack a bit of variation, but for such a short playing time, it never becomes problematic. This isn't the type of music that is meant to be analytically listened to while sitting - this is meant to be experienced live, with mosh pits and the entire ordeal. I can only imagine what a Wormrot concert would be like! The raw, unpolished production further emphasizes Dirge's energetic atmosphere.

All in all, Dirge is a fairly impressive effort from Wormrot with enough adrenaline to shock even the biggest grindcore fans! I can't say that the band is terribly original, and they could still benefit from stronger compositions, but this still currently stands as a very strong effort. Anyone who likes their grindcore with a heavy dose of hardcore punk should find plenty to love here! Wormrot still have some room for improvement, but Dirge is still a very solid effort. 3 stars are deserved here.

Phonebook Eater 7/10

"Dirge" is a must for Grindcore fans.

Grindcore is one of the least accessible genres in music; even I was very skeptical in giving this a try, since I am no expert in the genre, at all. In fact, this is my first Grindcore review ever. And thank god it is. Wormrot is a Singapore trio that is at their second effort with “Dirge”, following 2009’s “Abuse”.

Whoever is familiar with the genre and listens to this album, he’ll find traditional elements as well as more innovating ones: the songs have all lightening-fast rhythms, with hammering drums, and those typical wild growls that turned off many listeners who attempted courageously to listen to this genre. The songs’ length is between the thirty seconds and one minute, breaking the normal song structure. But what I loved about this album is that I noticed that here there is something that you almost never hear in Grindcore anymore: the Hardcore Punk influence, that here is very noticeable in the rhythms and sometimes in the vocals as well. I’m sure Napalm Death will be pleased.

The songs in this album are twenty five, the total length of the album is eighteen minutes long. So you can imagine how intense these almost twenty minutes are. The songs are extremely flashy, and flow one into another without you even noticing. Tons of stops and goes, extremely angry and violent parts alternate with more Hardocore moments, like I said before. It seems useless to mention songs, they’re so fast and immediate that you can’t really identify them as songs, but just a different hook of a long eighteen minute track.

An album that with my surprise I enjoyed a lot, it definitely made me want to check out some more Grindcore, and maybe I’ll start getting into the genre. But let’s stick to the present. If you’re a fan of the genre, this is a must. If you’re not, just like I am, check it out anyway, if you want to explore this genre a bit more.