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Destruction: Cracked brain

06/07/09 || Habakuk

For some reason, Destruction is the one of the German big four thrash bands that appeals the least to me. Many of their classics don’t really do it although they’d have a lot of potential, mainly because I can’t get over Schmier’s ridiculous high squeals, whereas the new stuff, with some exceptions, seems a bit lame to me… That could have been the end of the story for me and them. One day though, I watched some strange old TV footage from around 1990, warning parents of the inhuman, life-defying evilness of so-called heavy metal music and how it spoiled the youth of, well, yesterday. Somewhere around the end, they analyzed the lyrics of “Die a day before you’re born” taken from this album and played the song in the background. There really is no such thing as bad publicity, and a couple of days later I bought the CD to spoil my fading youth just like in the good ol’ days. That one’s still my favorite track off that disc, by the way. Sometimes it just takes strange encounters like that to learn about a hidden side of a band you thought you knew, sometimes the fun is spoiled and you’ll have to content yourself with second-hand stories on GD, your favorite supplier of near-life experiences.

This is very different from “normal” Destruction, as this album destroys in a more technical way. I’m having my my doubts whether they would have been able to record an album like this with Schmier in the band. It shows that the two guitarists had a lot of creative freedom without their former frontman, and they used it well. What they produced is hardly an overly aggressive album, but still it’s far from tame. The whole listening experience leans more towards, dare I say, pre-‘Mental vortex’ Coroner than it does towards “Infernal overkill” and the likes.

There’s enough palm-muted staccato shredding, thrashy outbursts and harsh vocals to keep a rough edge, but the overall tempo has been taken down a notch. Also, the riffing does at times wander off a bit from your run-off-the-mill thrash with weirdly harmonic and at the same groovy and enjoyable riffing by Mike Sifringer and Harry Wilkens. The very clear sounding solos sound rather progressive as well and are nicely embedded into lead guitar sections, making the whole album flow exceptionally well. They obviously went for a clean sound on this one, and it works well for the musical approach they took. The overall production however is a bit flawed since it lacks some punch, so you’ll have to play this rather loud to make it sound heavy. The drums especially could be a bit more up front, but they work okay the way they sound since there’s not much interesting stuff going on on Oliver Kaiser’s kit anyway. He does a flawless job, but he’s clearly not a show-off by any means.

Same goes for the bass, which makes sense since there’s not even a real bass player credited in the booklet, instead the two guitarists recorded it together with a guy that did “additional bass”, whatever that means. Consequently, it’s solid but pretty far back in the mix, and only on few occasions you’ll hear it clearly. One of them is during the cover song – another thing “Cracked bain” has in common with Coroner is making an odd choice for that one, namely ‘My Sharona’ by The Knack. They pull it off surprisingly well though and show that the track could have used a bit more of a heavy twist in the first place. M-m-ma-myayayayay! Fun song for sure.

Oh yeah, the vocals… André Grieder of Poltergeist “fame” does a pretty good job with a catchy performance in the trademark Teutonic Thrash direction. You mostly understand what he’s singing about, he’s got the obligatory german accent, and all of his vocal range does actually sound good, although a slightly (!) high-pitched voice normally would be nothing to tickle my fancy. He delivers just the right amount of anger to make it sound awesome. The quality of his disillusioned lyrics ranges from great (“Cracked brain”, “Time must end”, “Die a day before you’re born”) to pretty bad (“Rippin’ you off blind”), but it’s definitely skewed to the good side.

Overall, “Cracked brain” is quite an exceptional record from Destruction (which probably makes it my favorite as well), and quite fittingly comes with a cover painting by Andreas “dark blue” Marschall that’s mainly green. Both, album as well as cover art, are fine pieces of work and are therefore awarded with 7.5 “My Coroners” out of 10.

Information
Released: 1990
Label: Noise Records
Website: www.destruction.de
Band
André Grieder: vocals
Mike Sifringer: guitar, bass
Harry Wilkens: guitar, bass
Christian Engler: additional bass
Oliver Kaiser: drums

Tracklist
01. Cracked brain
02. Frustrated
03. S.E.D.
04. Time must end
05. My Sharona
06. Rippin’ you off blind
07. Die a day before you’re born
08. No need to justify
09. When your mind was free

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