Tumultuous Tamaki Makaurau two-piece Bulk Bogan return to the ring with their crushing third offering Spinebuster. Comprised of Mark Hill (Contort, Knifed, Hooked On Christ) & Fluffy Von Fluffy (Snivelling Swineheards), the duo serves up riffs like labyrinthian chambers, winding through subterranean sonics which oscillate wildly between sludgey slabs of monolith doom and swift, slicing grindcore. The pair have ramped up the fast-slow-fast dichotomy another notch since 2020’s Suplex with the latest effort’s blastbeats splitting more drumstick atoms and guitar pick particles then then the Large Hadron Collider.
With the EP as a whole resembles a haunted dreadnaught marauding across the seven seas; battered, embattled, threatening to fall apart at any moment but maintaining hull velocity long enough to land in the listeners mind and plunder their unprepared eardrums. With song structures resembling Pi recited to thirteen decimal places, Spinebuster is not for the faint of heart or hesitant of mind.
Opening number Godless sets the undeniable intent of the nine track outing seeing subbed-out, tubby-but-biting guitars writhe around the spaces between blasts, creating a bed-of-nails for Hill’s nihilist lamentations. Existence Is A Chore belies the weight of the subject’s empirical apathy with confronting agility. Only at Jetstar Bag Narc does any sense of melody or harmony begin to rear it’s head and even the diminished guitar pickings only serve as prelude to further persistent pummelling.
Tracklisting
- Godless
- Dependence
- Inhale Bullshit
- The Bolt
- Existence Is A Chore
- Muscular Atrophy
- No Reprieve
- Jetstart Bag Narc
- Alone