Squash Bowels – Grindvirus (Willowtip 2009)
Spewing violently out of Poland’s anus like the undigested remnants of a bean and cheese burrito during a bout of swine flu, Squash Bowels serve up 14 tracks worth of thick ‘n’ chunky grindcore with their 5th album, Grindvirus. Employing an approach to the genre that is both as memorable as your first broken bone and as violent as a 10-car pile-up, Squash Bowels ensure that prolonged exposure to this pleasantly putrid platter of splatter may cause the following severe symptoms: nausea, projectile vomiting, diarrhea and the uncontrollable urge to headbang.
While there is no question that the band can blast away relentlessly with the best of them on Grindvirus, Squash Bowels also manage to cram plenty of diversity into this 28 minute assault on the senses. Rarely is a grindcore recording imparted with so much character and individuality, and it is this that truly sets Squash Bowels apart from their purulent peers. Tracks like “Two Cows and Monkey”, “Wriggler” and “D.I.” bring the gore, grind and groove in equal measure, and it is this varying approach that keeps the album compelling throughout its all-too-brief duration. But what really makesGrindvirus such a perfect piece of biological weaponry are the riffs. Guitarist Andy Pakos is a master of his craft, churning out a barrage of six-string gnarliness that will get stuck in your head like the discharge of a nailgun to the frontal lobe.
From a songwriting, playing and recording standpoint, Grindvirus is catchier than the clap and more devastating than an Ebola outbreak. The album is wrapped in a burly production perfectly suited to the devastating music, each instrument is perfectly audible even when the band is blasting at full speed. Although Andy’s riffing might be the album’s definite highlight, all three members of Squash Bowels demonstrate flawless musicianship throughout, displaying why they are a power trio in the truest sense of the phrase. Although the band has had a revolving door membership over the years, you’d never know it from listening to Grindvirus as the band sounds like a well-oiled machine, albeit a machine bent on committing acts of mass slaughter.
Regardless of what the Center for Disease Control may advise regarding exposure to communicable grindcore, fans of the likes of Nasum, Rotten Sound and latter-day Pig Destroyer are strongly encouraged to seek out Squash Bowels as soon as possible. Try as you might to get the band’s indelible yet ferocious attack out of your system, you’ll soon come to the terrifying realization that there is no cure for Grindvirus.
http://www.myspace.com/squashbowels
(review originally written for Sonic Frontiers.net)
