punk rock – D E C A Y C A S T Magazine

Sour Spirit – Mince Suite III

Sour Spirit, a band between frontman Rodnie King and drummer Riot Dent, is the sound of walking into a scream room, preparing to scream and only ever screaming inside their head. It’s a cathartic noise punk project in which the focus is on the hell of black trauma and anger. You can say that the appeal of Sour Spirit is that their brand of noise and experimental isn’t too far from free jazz, where melody, rhythm and all aren’t as important as the emotional catharsis, however explosive it may be.

You can certainly say that MSIII has cleaner vocals and a lyric sheet this time. Still raucus as ever, “Ground Teeth” showcases structure in the songwriting mirroring a math element to hardcore punk. But don’t let the classiness fool you. Mince Suite III moves towards a sludgy, dirty end of punk. The common theme of the album is suffering, whether it be suffering apathy towards an inevitable death as a black person in America or even praising the “end” of a prejudiced person’s “suffering”. The album even tackles the effort to end suffering of other people and build something beautiful in the wake (the closer “Big House”).

Their Mince Suite series further prove this with blown out aggressive grindcore that is only ever made to be a blip of aggression. Those keeping up with the series noticed that the music just happens to be longer with every entry. The first Mince Suite entry is a literal minute long with each track hardly crossing over fifteen seconds. Mince Suite II doesn’t let up on the mayhem, but extends it past that miniature 15-second blast sometimes into making sure no song is longer than 32 seconds. Only two songs are that long.) So, after hearing the series, Mince Suite III should follow the pattern of being more “filled out”, right?

Mince Suite III still covers the frustration of living in a dying universe that wants them to die faster but this time makes clear the act of changing course, even if it has to be through aggressive means. There are only so many words to say, and Mince Suite III said only what was necessary.

-mynameisblueskye

DECAYCAST Reviews: BLEEDERS “We Hate Men” Cassette (Crass Lips Records, 2017)

Anti patriarchal pro femme photo punk from the PA outfit, BLEEDERS. from Miami’s Crass Lips Records Intro track “I Hate Men” starts out in the perfect foot forwad for smashing the patriarchy, Angular guitar, punchy, punded drums, and screamed / yelled “crew style” on the chorus of “I Hate Men” prove you do have to bash a man in the side of the head about fifteen times before you get a small enough crack for anything to sink in, but when it does, for 4/4 punk, this is the type of ear blood you want dripping into your brand new headwound. Super fuzzy and distorted sounding recording, but the playing is phenominal, and for the style its done super well and interesting. Straight up all women/non pinary proto punk stylings churn out three heavy and guitar/vocals forward tracks of pure misandry! It’s fantastic! Other track titles such as “Backstabbing Scumfucker” and “Forced Vaginal Ultrasound” don’t let the listener map their own confused musings into these tracks, they are exactly what they are and don’t need to be interpreted, if you have an ear, you’ll get it, if shit clogged canal is how you roll then move right along and await the eight am ding of the churchbell for the three thousandth time (to go away)