Masakre - Morbid Extinction Cassette

Chasm-echoed bestial black/death styled roars and commanding d-beaten kicks go a long way towards making this second EP release from Jakarta, Indonesia-based quartet Masakre a memorable set of five lightning fast stabs to the corpse of ‘old school’ death-punk. ‘Morbid Extinction‘ is a primal shout across the short distance enjoyed by what imminent doom awaits us within the toxic hellscape of the future, barked and strangled-out in short wallops — A feat wherein these menacing fellowes capitalize upon the sort of attack that’d been most key to the extreme metal colosseum at underground advent. Here a brutal exaggeration of early 80’s crust punk finds its horrifying extreme within death metal classicism, a foaming harmony of forms that still manages a personalized touch in their hands despite the long and inspired history of this sub-genre hybridization before ’em.

Though it makes the best sense to describe what Masakre do as deathcrust in fairly equal ratio the thing that’d caught my ear first in terms of riffcraft and the vocal placement/cadence was some strong or at least somewhat specific influence from early Japanese and Scandinavian d-beat, albeit with some Extreme Noise Terror and Slaughter-esque outbreaks (see: “Abolished Realms”) within a couple songs. We are technically talking about five songs that total ~12 minutes in length so bear with me as I attempt at least some light dissection where possible. Beyond this the vocal effects and their delayed stereo echo effect should perk the ear of folks attuned certain sects of bestial black/death aka war metal. If there is any apparent door to unexplored worlds to be revealed in examination of ‘Morbid Extinction‘ it is that they could easily embrace those bestial aspects to great results without leaving behind their extremist hardcore punk driven rhythms and penchant for bigger riffing. The palette is broad and yet this record is entirely linear in its attack, mayhemic and flung straight ahead.

The whole package is inspired yet not entirely unforgettable due to how brief it is. Because of this I’d suggest taking at least 4-5 rips through the whole thing ’til what is actually special about Masakre becomes apparent enough. From the album art (via MFA XII) to the raw yet thunderous mix/master, what’d stuck with me after my time with ‘Morbid Execution‘ was its cacophonic yet intentionally stylized band-specific sound, this reeks of developing personality with still more possibilities available right out of the gate. With that said, the thrill of the bigger hardcore punk riffs, such as those on “Merciless Death”, is what sustained me through so many wheels through the full listen. Not only are these timeless knife’s edge ideas hewn from the ancient ways but they hold up well enough spin after spin, a rare feat in the deathcrust mind palace that sets ’em apart for my taste. I’d love to see what else they could do with a ~25 minute LP. A moderately high recommendation.

- grizzlybutts