### MindGrinder: MindTech

#### 02/07/04 || Lord K Philipson

Judging from the monikers of the members, I think we have the whole Gladiator-team with us now.

So, let the games begin:

Every once in a fucken while a regular mail arrives at my place. Usually it’s bills but his time the sender is superhero Zamoth of Zyklon-fame. I really didn’t quite understand what this band was about when I first looked at the album… A few questions popped up… Is Zamoth in this band? Is Zyklons’ “Aeon” album one of the better releases lately? Is Peter Forsberg the best fucken player around? Why isn’t my cock the size of the late Twin Towers? Etc, etc…

But most of all… Why the fuck is HE sending me this for? I’m still not sure why, but I think he’s got a finger or 6 in the actual label, Nocturnal Art Productions. Either that or he just thought it’d be a nice thing to send me seeing we toured together in Japan earlier this year. I don’t fucken know and I’m not going to spend many sleepless nights over this matter, I’m just glad I got the fucken album. It’s a competent piece of plastic.

The band holds a ex-session member of Zyklon. That alone is a good thing. Just thought I should put that out before getting further into this crap.

I never heard about this band before, that won’t help me from stating the obvious though; the bandname fucken suck cocks. The members’ stage-names suck cocks as well (if the metal-thing doesn’t work out, you’ll have a career in the WWF with those names atleast), but I’ll leave that for someone else to review. MindGrinder are Norwegian in case you didn’t get that just yet. Normally when you are in a band from Norway, one can pretty much sense what’s to come sound-wise. These fuckers are a little bit different compared to the usual fjordish sound though seeing they use programmings and weird sounds here and there thruout the disc. They do it with a nice touch, but what it all comes down to is that’s it’s nothing short of metal.

Fans of Zyklon ( I have to do that comparison seeing Zamoth sent me this one you know) can find stuff enjoyable enough on this one. Whereas Zyklon are more full-on brutal, MindGrinder throws in more melody and clean vocals in the stew. The Grinders’ vocalist sounds pretty much like Secthdaemon of Zyklon as well, just to make another comparison with those heroes. Fuck, I rule at this crap. I wouldn’t be suprised if it IS Sectdaemon doing the vocals under a different name, but seriously, he sounds better than this on the Zyklon albums (Zyklon-comparison number 3, I win), so I don’t think it is. And actually, he’s not in the picture of the album, so I’m pretty sure it’s not Sectdaemon. Ok, I’ll try to let those Zyklon-references slide from now on.

By the way, the programmed drums sound like Trym of Zyklon. Ok, ok, I’m kidding. Fuck you, fuck you, fuck you.

We are talking 70 percent death metal here, 15 percent clean singing over slower parts and 15 percent weirder stuff. That should give you an idea about the sound of these guys. It’s not the most brutal shit you ever heard, let’s make that clear right away. MindGrinder actually throws up some originality in yer face. And it tastes all ok.

As said earlier, there’s alot of stuff on this that sounds inspired by the Z-band, and there are definitely worse bands to draw inspiration from. These cocks are not a cheap rip-off of the Z’s, I better point that out becoz I know you guys reading this are beyond retarded, they just use a somewhat similar formula when it comes to riffing, executing verses and choruses. I like it.

Being someone who programs drums myself, I must say I’m not overly impressed with the way they are handelled here. I would do it better, with more groove and with better sounds. But that’s just me you know. They definitely sound good though, don’t get me wrong. They obviously have a real drummer now by the way, that’ll probably add some groove to the next recording.

If you wanna hear something out of Norway that’s not sounding like the Norwegian sound we are used to, I think you should give these guys a chance. I don’t think they’ll turn out to be yer all-time faveband from Norway, but they are a good compliment to what’s out there already.

You wanna know what the Lords’ fave-song on this album is you say? “Starspawned Vision” with it’s cool technosounds and clean vocals is definitely up there… “Surviving Gadzooks” (surviving fucken what?!) with it’s killer chorus might be a runner-up for the title as well…

Seriously, fuck you, I have some PC-games to play.

6 and a fucken half fucken technobeats out of 10 fucken technobeats. Or something.

- Information
- Released: 2004
- Label: Nocturnal Art Productions
- Website: www.mindgrinder.com
- Band
- Titan: guitars
- Nitrous: guitars
- Cosmo: bass, vocals, programming

- Tracklist
- 01. Repulsive Evolution
- 02. Regeneration
- 03. War Solution
- 04. Deception
- 05. Starspawned Vision
- 06. Human Error
- 07. Fire & Equanimity
- 08. Sadistic Images
- 09. Surviving Gadzooks
- 10. Soul Inferno