Bleeding Fist – Bestial Kruzifix666ion
The look and overall feel of this CD screamed chaotic warmetal (the gasmasks, bullet belts and barbed wire pentagram on the cover indicated sloppy redundancy/extremism), so I went into the world of Slovenia’s Bleeding Fist with a bit of disinterest. The surprise came during the opening seconds where it was unveiled that “Bestial Kruzifix666ion” was a lot more influenced by blackened traditional metal that I could ever have expected. A lot of tasteful lead work and even a few dueling guitar lines give this harsh, yet sensibly formed music a strong epic vibe even though the band tries their hardest to dirty up the performance and feel of the album with studio grit with more primitive segments of music. The vocalists mid range snarl is a good fit for this bands structured, though caustic onslaught. His vocal placement often steers clear of the obvious motion in the riffs unless it is needed, which gives each track a stately sense of power. The sloppiest element on “Bestial Kruzifix666ion” is the drum work. The technique and patterns being played sound technically diverse and just as mighty as the music, but the timing feels a bit sloppy on occasion which is the only real indication that this band would like to have that “warmetal” classification tossed around when people talk about their music. Catchy melodies and primal blasts of aggression are the foundation, breeding a memorable take on various metal styles. Bleeding Fist are far from an original band and I think the cover art of this release is an indication of this as they strive to fit in somewhere… anywhere! But the fact of the matter is that this quartet writes some interesting and effective music that borders on the thrash, black, and Necro heavy metal genres. If you need the image to match the mayhem, Bleeding Fist will be thrilled to throw another nail through the gasmask and layer of fake blood on for you in their next photo shoot. –Marty
Moribund Records
Worm Gear 