Full Of Hell and Nails, for those of you who steer clear of the metal scene, over the last few years have been titans of the Powerviolence and Grindcore genres. Full Of Hell I've been on the fence on for a while, or atleast I've enjoyed their stuff very casually. Their early EP "The Inevitable Fear Of Existence" was just enough for me to enjoy, as Full Of Hell earned their name by barreling through 5 demonic, insanely dark Grindcore gems that tied in a little doom metal here and there too. Their first full length album, "Roots Of Earth Are Consuming My Home" showed Full Of Hell getting much better production, yet retaining that muddy sound, even bringing in the occasional sludge metal sound. While most of the album I really dug, it also showed Full Of Hell starting to go for some more noisy drone elements that I seriously did not care for at all. However, the Vocals on "Roots Of Earth..." were really solid, even occasionally showing off some more yells compared to screams. Then we had "Rudiments of Mutilation", which overall I really wasn't impressed by at all. There were still drone elements and plenty of experimental sounds too, but they still seriously were not doing anything for me. Some of the more straightforward tracks however such as "Indigence and Guilt" were the sound I was dying to hear, but there weren't enough moments like that to blow me away. However, one thing that I did enjoy about "Rudiments..." was the atmosphere, this thing may have been their darkest album yet. However, what got Full Of Hell back in good standing with me was their collaboration with The Body from earlier this year. The Body have always fascinated me, and their collaboration with Full Of Hell was one of the most hellish things I've heard in ages. Yes, there were experimental elements, but here I seriously questioned what I was listening to half the time, and I loved that. On the other hand, Nails I've always seemed to enjoy over the years, plus I feel overall they're just a more straightforward Powerviolence act. On their first album, "Unsilent Death", Pummeled us through Hell itself. Nails here barreled through 10 tracks in 15 minutes, with nothing but noisy crunchy guitars and explosive verses. Tracks like "Suffering Soul" and the title track were just so unbelievably in-your-face, it had a jolly wannabe flower child like myself ready to join the pits. It wasn't pretty, but it was intense and to the point, and it introduced us to Nails swiftly and violently. Now take everything about "Unsilent Death", shine it up really nice, bring in much heavier production and tack on an extra track or two, and you have Nails' second album, "Abandon All Life". This album showed Nails being just as heavy and in your face, but with a much more nicely produced sound. Earlier this year, Nails released "You Will Never Be One Of Us", which honestly I think was their most consistent yet. The production was even heavier, creating more of a wall of sound than ever for Nails, without really giving up any of what made them such a force in grindcore all these years. So that all being said, hell yes I was excited for this split EP! With all that being said, I can't WAIT for this review to be like, a third of a size of this intro.
Ok so first off, don’t blink, you may just miss this little EP, the whole thing is about 4 minutes and 20 seconds long. Nails starts this ruthless collection off with the insane “No Longer Under Your Control”. All I have to say about this, is only Nails can literally take you from sitting at your work desk one second hand have you plummeting through the deepest darkest depths of hell 3 seconds later. Call me crazy, but I seriously feel like Nails get better and more intense with age. Granted they knew how long this collection of tracks were going to be, they seriously don’t waste a single second of your time. Now Nails has never had a non-dark moment, but this may just be the darkest thing I’ve heard from them in a long time, and that’s saying something. Listening to “No Longer Under Your Control” will make you feel completely engulfed in darkness. The vocals are seriously right where they need to be, with the muscular guitars continue beating you to a bloody pulp with each passing millisecond. The solos here are out of freakin’ control, overall this is just an awesome Nails track. Hell, even that little groove metal passage that pops in towards the end (Which I 100% was NOT expecting) is pulled off wonderfully. Nails don’t loosen their grip until the track is over, with the last 20 seconds being quite possibly the most intense metal passage I’ve heard all year. Overall, this track is fantastic, and if you haven’t listened to Nails yet this may be a great place to start. Up next are two back to back tracks from Full Of Hell. The first being “Thy Radiant Garrote Exposed”. The near satanic, twisted, truly evil sounding intro may sound over the top if you’re new to Full Of Hell. But if you’re not, this is just business as usual. Full Of Hell in their later years have been slowly testing out the waters of a new sound or two, this time incorporating a wee bit of thrash in there. It comes off pretty solid though, and outside of that it’s just another solid Full Of Hell track. Obviously this is all music that you seriously need to prepare for, if you’re not into this hellish breed of grindcore and powerviolence this clearly isn’t the collection of tracks for you. The vocal performance here is absolutely fantastic, especially those high pitched shrieks. Those shrieks have seriously just gotten better and better over the years, and I’m sure they took plenty from The Body when they collaborated with them earlier this year. Personally, I need more of this collaboration. This is a great start, but it could be so much more if Nails & Full Of Hell did a full length collaboration. They have so much in common and can clearly play off each other wonderfully, but they’re also very different. I like to think of them as over the top horror flicks, with Nails being more like one of the early Saw movies while Full Of Hell is much more like “The Descent”. “Thy Radiant Garrote Exposed” is short, twisted, intense, legitimately terrifying, and most of all genuinely likable. Hell, we even hear that sludge metal influence pop in at the end. And finally we have another Full Of Hell track, “Bez Bólu”. Not too shockingly we have no fancy intro in sight. The vocals here are damn near satanic. Full of Hell show that instrumentally they’re branching out more than ever, honestly I feel like working with Nails can work out wonderfully for them. There are elements here of hardcore punk and some more thrash too, but they still keep that Full Of Hell brutality they’re famous for. Can I have more please?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y_0t9do-YdA
Rating: 7.6/10
Give A Listen To: Ok seriously, this entire EP is 4 minutes and 22 seconds, just take 5 minutes and listen to the EP. Thanks.
Overall Thoughts: It's Nails and Full Of Hell, delivering some of their heaviest, most straightforward, and interesting material in years. Yea it's good, I just really need more, like ASAP.
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