Brass Knuckle Abortion

'Classic' is probably the wrong word to use, but this is a sort of notable part of the brutal death scene, relatively obscure though it may be. It's an item that most have heard of (maybe due to its fairly straightforward title) but few seem to have actually listened to it. It has a special infamy about it for reasons that no one really seems sure of, although really it's not an immensely special release once you get your hands on a copy. It's good but probably not deserving of the extreme notoriety it receives throughout the brutal death scene.

This was released in 2000, and so it's pretty typical of the United Guttural sound of the time. It's reasonably technical, slightly chaotic brutal death with occasional forays into more grinding territory. I can see how this could almost be brutal death's 'Morbid Tales' in some ways; it has a lot of elements to it that seem to have been elaborated upon later in the genre's years. There's a proto-slam feel in some parts, the occasional burst of almost Malignancy-inspired intense technicality, and a bit of raw goregrind influence here and there, but it never seems to commit to any of those things for very long before collapsing back into the tried-and-true UGR sound. Now I've never been a huge fan of the UGR sound, but it seems to work pretty well here probably due to the music here feeling a notch or two more intense than most others at the time.

Maybe this is where the notoriety comes from in this release: it does genuinely feel very violent and aggressive, and not just in the way that all brutal death is going to feel. There seems to be an extra dose of misanthropy floating around on this disc, making the absurdly over-the-top lyrical themes seem almost believably at times. All instruments seem to be played with additional ferocity than usual; the drums have a pounding intensity and the guitars an almost Dying Fetus rip to them that backs up the equally barbaric vocals quite well. While the songs themselves are nothing to write home about, the performance of them is what makes 'Brass Knuckle Abortion' as solid as it is. Granted, the brutal death scene's love of it is probably more than it deserves, but it still stands out a bit from the pack with it's almost insane bloodlust.

It's good that this disc is as short as it is, and it's also good that this is the only thing the band put out, because I'm completely sure this material wouldn't come across nearly as well on a full-length. All the band's best ideas were spent right here, making anything else that they could have produced rather irrelevant. If you're a dedicated fan of brutal death, there's no reason not to pick this up; it survives many listens without losing its brutality and is a good spin on a regular basis. Those who aren't enamored with the style, though, can probably ignore it, since they wouldn't get why it's supposed to be important in the first place.