### Plector: Dark & spiteful

#### 14/02/11 || revenant

Death metal and thrash metal. Both awesome in their own right, but try putting them together. It’s like having Jennifer Lopez and Jennifer Love Hewitt bred to make the ultimate super babe. Not that they can, mind you, as neither of them has cock nor balls. At least I hope they don’t. But picture it for a moment, J-Lo’s curves and moves combined with J-Lo-He’s bust and big beautiful eyes and you will have something to make even the staunchest Catholics filling their socks with sin. Oh yeah.

Wait, where was I? Oh shit, I was talking about how good two ace sub-genres are, and how in theory bringing them together should create something better. Enter Plector and their debut album, “Dark & Spiteful”. Now in theory a death/thrash album should be right up my alley, having already enjoyed bands like Demolition Hammer, Tribulation and the like. But when I sit down to listen to Plector… my mind just wanders off. According to the play counter on my computer, I’ve listened to this five times through now (number six in progress as I write this) and not once has this album held my attention.

Now at this point I do want to point out that there’s nothing exactly wrong with what Plector have done. My lack of interest stems from two core areas: it’s pace (or lack there of) and brutality (or lack there of).

Aside from the pacey “Embrace our Shit”, this album is a mid paced affair. The focus of the songwriting has been creating a bunch of riffs with hooks, a lot of mid paced guitar crunching and the odd breakdown with the obligatory guitar solo. Generally, I find it pretty unexciting and the riffs pretty unmemorable, with really only the aforementioned “Embrace our Shit”, with it’s catchy and memorable chorus (”drinking, fighting, fucking, embrace our shit“) and up tempo approach getting the blood moving.

For an album that is part death metal, the brutality is sorely lacking. I mentioned above my enjoyment of other death/thrash albums. The key reason why bands like Demolition Hammer and Tribulation are ace is the pure brutality they bring. It seems to me the death metal element of Plector’s music comes in the vocals only. The growling, though, lacks impetus, and is probably too high in the mix. The production also fails to bring any roughness to the sound and lets the band down in this regard. “Dark & Spiteful” but name, but not by nature.

I won’t write this album off as a complete crapfest, it’s just an album that I find uninteresting. There is talent in Plector, but until they pace things up and add bit of brutality to what they do, I doubt they’ll get any more attention from me. Embrace your shit? Guys, I tried, and I’m afraid I can’t.

- Information
- Released: 2010
- Label: Discourage Records
- Website: Plector MySpace
- Band
- Erik Engbo: vocals, guitars
- Patrik Wall: bass
- Vilhelm Norberg: drums

- Tracklist
- 01. Spiteful Love
- 02. Past Is Done
- 03. Alcoholic Refuge
- 04. Slave Until You Die
- 05. Emotions Decline
- 06. Embrace Our Shit
- 07. Apathic Mind
- 08. Kill Yourself Inside
- 09. Released Aggression