An older but crucial split disc featuring Australian grinders Openwound and C-Blast futurist grinders Antigama, both of which deliver the quirky grindcore goods. Openwound open the split with 17 tracks of their awesome hyper-meth'd grind, most of which were recorded in 1999 but appear here for the first time. Heard of The Kill? They were a shortlived Aussie grind band that the entire grind scene blew a collective load over about six years ago after releasing an EP that attained total blastbeat nirvana and had some of the most ferocious riffs in, well, forever. Well, members of Openwound went on to form The Kill, so that should give you an idea of how good these guys are. Awesome, fierce as fuck grindcore somewhere in between early Napalm Death, Terrorizer and Swedish bands like Sayyadina, but with weird little passages of clean jangly guitars, over the top mock-operatic vocals, funky almost-breakbeat breaks, awesome thrash metal parts, chaotic blasts of mathy shredding, and other distinctive little flourishes that set these guys apart from everyone else. Most of all though, are the hooks...Open Wound busted out some of the catchiest grind ever, seriously hooky and catchy riffs that will stick in your head. Open Wound were awesome, one of the best post-Earache grind bands I've ever heard, and essential listening for any grind fan.
The Antigama side features a bunch of early recordings from the Polish prog-grind band, which were recorded at practice spaces and studios and live shows from 2001-2003. The sound is a little more raw and unpolished than their later albums obviously (though totally listenable), but even at this early stage Antigama had already defined their unique, intellectual style of 21st century grindcore that combines 90's era Napalm Death influences (think Diatribes era Napalm) with industrial music, gravity-defying percussion overloads, sinister sci-fi samples, electronic noise, and massive Meshuggah-esque grooves. There's no doubt that Antigama are one of the key bands at the moment that are pushing the grindcore aesthetic into new territory. Awesome stuff. They also include a live cover of Repulsion's 'Radiation Sickness' as a nod to the original trailblazers of grind.
Definitely a killer split album for anyone into quirky, forward-thinking grindcore!