Human Error .. Global Terror

Another recent act making noise here in the new millennium, Death Mechanism stormed Italy and beyond for a good ten years before apparently disappearing from the scenes for a while. They seem to finally have a new album in the making, but while we wait, what's better than giving a spin to their trifecta of full-lengths released so far? So, 2006 saw the band's debut, Human Error .. Global Terror hit the shelves, after a couple of demos. Their aesthetics, from the band moniker down to the song titles, arguably promised a good dose of vicious, 'mechanical' thrash with social criticisms or something like that. Y'all ready for another lesson of 'not judging a book from its cover 101'?

Okay, the expectations above don't miss by a wide margin the album's content: what we have here is savage, constantly full-throttle thrash metal that sounds hugely inspired by the less sloppy Brazilian school (I've been reminded of Sepultura, Attomica and maybe a sprinkle of Torture Squad in more than one occasion), with a serviceable modern production. Putting it in a less nice way, however, Human Error .. Global Terror is made up of ten songs, plus mandatory useless intro, that show very little (if any) deviations from the exact same route, and glaring songwriting issues that arguably betray a collective still not mature enough to present songs that feel 'finished' or 'developed' in any way to the listener. You could pick out some songs that appear more convincingly bludgeoning while the album is playing ('Anthropic Collapse', 'Necrotechnology', 'Genuin-Cide', 'Contaminated Soil'), but I have a hard time seeing myself remembering them tomorrow. The lone exception is closer 'Slaughter in the Jet-Set', which strikes with an incredibly effective simple refrain and doesn't come to a halt at a random point like many of its peers, making for a solid Avenger of Blood-styled banger.

So far I've probably been describing a plethora of retro-thrash debuts, haven't I? Yet, there's something that brings the whole effort down. No wait, let me reformulate that better – a feature that irredeemably razes it to the ground: the leadwork. Playing an average thrash solo doesn't sound too hard, sometimes a little bit of shredding, as long as it isn't too atonal and/or sloppy, might suffice. Now, for a good solo it's another story, obviously. But this, folks, is laughable. I reckon I usually find the presence of a lead section indispensable in a metal song, but I stand corrected this time. Almost every solo consists of an extremely short (and I mean, like, rarely exceeding 10 seconds) sequence of notes that serves no purpose and sounds annoying after a few tracks. Not helping matters, as stated before, is the fact that the songs often end soon after them, feeling extremely rushed. It's no wonder I called the closer an exception, since here frontman Pozza manages to stick to somewhat of a melodic line that at least serves the track more than fucking it up.

I've probably been too harsh on some aspects, and drummer Manu (currently also in local giants Bulldozer) being the literal equivalent of a freight train in musical form will force some neck workout, but we're talking about the bare minimum of thrash metal for now. Luckily, the band would soon outgrow this unrefined phase.

-review written for the 10th Diamhea Memorial Review Challenge – may you rest in peace, Chris.