ALBUM REVIEW: SHADOW WORK BY DESPISED ICON
Reviewed by Alec SmartShadow Work, the new album from Canadian deathcore band Despised Icon, has been released and is available NOW on renowned and influential metal label Nuclear Blast.
Shadow Work is the seventh full-length studio album from the Montreal six-piece, and it’s a bloody scorcher. And not scorcher as in “Ouch! I touched the BBQ hotplate”, but, “Faaark! Where has the village gone after the meteorite struck?!” incineration-hot! Scorched-Earth au-go-go!
With its roars, screams, growls, sprays of machine gun-like drums and relentlessly thudding heavy guitars, this is the soundtrack to the Zombie Apocalypse.
From the thumping snarls of Over My Dead Body (which features Matt Honeycutt of Kublai Khan on guest vocals) through to Fallen Ones, listening to this album is like hearing a multi-car pile-up on a foggy motorway.
The 11 tracks are short and sharp too, no drawn-out guitar solos and noodling about, they thump you like a fully-laden freight train leaving the tracks and leaping onto the platform – pure impact!
Other guests appearing on Shadow Work are Scott Ian Lewis, vocalist with Carnifex; Tom Barber, vocalist with Chelsea Grin; and Australia’s own metal musical prodigy, producer and creator, Misstiq.
You know those cars that have concealed headlights in triangular mounts on the bonnet, which fold-down into the engine hood? They were most popular in the 1970s-90s, on high-end sportscars like the Porsche 928, Ferraris, BMW 8-series and the Lamborghini Countach, but also on the more affordable Toyota Supra and Mazda Miata.
Listening to this album I imagined I was driving one, but replaced the headlamps with speakers.
Then, when I encounter one of those pipsqueak pushy drivers who cut you off in traffic, or flip the finger after they swerve between lanes without indicating and nearly cause you to rear-end a ten-tonne truck, I slowly accelerate until I’m sitting on his (it’s always a ‘he’) tail.
Pressing the button to engage the tilting speakers at the front, I insert the Shadow Work album into the in-car stereo, crank the volume up to a Spinal Tap-worthy 11, then press PLAY.
Roooaaaaaarrrrrrgggghhhhhh!!!!!!
Despised Icon, the scourge of arrogant pipsqueaks!
