Hello all, I am so excited to be reviewing for Microdose on Cybergrind. The first review and first time listen will be of a split album by Ten-Headed Skeleton and Death Envy. I have gone in blind for this to give an honest take on 2 projects within cybergrind and its adjacents. A brief history of my journey that led to me reviewing for this site is in my author's bio. I hope to lead musically open-minded people to a bevy of projects and artistry I will be discovering throughout this year.
“Haunting an Old Boat that's still afloat” is the opener for Ten-Headed Skeleton and with this track and the unknown expectations for the release in totality, I was caught off guard. As the split continued the electronic instrumentation was revealed as very simplistic, but the tracks flowed quite well for this style. The vocals weren't the kind I expected with this side of the project and lyrics seemed to both have meaning, but are also very nonsensical. What I enjoyed the most was the intersplicing of samples and drum tracking. I recommend this side to anyone who believes they need whimsy, punkiness, eclecticism and a quick break from heavy music like myself. Ten-Headed Skeleton took influence from early 80s rap and indie style punk, made it their own, and fell into a subgenre that I would call post-punk-hop.
“A Fleeting Gratitude for life” opens up the Death Envy side of the split. Right away you know that this split is meant to show 2 vastly different subgenres within the realm of the cybergrind sphere. The funny part is there is so much more melody with this side that it really offsets the skramz style vocals. This is the better side In my opinion because it's a lot more dynamic with the switches and breaks. Death Envy evokes cybergrind via the instrumentation, and yet the subgenre I consider it to be apart of is lo-fi skramz. I recommend this side of the split for people who truly like skramz and cybergrind in totality.
I will be revisiting the Death Envy side more often, but in the end, Ten-Headed Skeleton could be the side to garner attention and possible acclaim outside it’s small circles because of the mainstream aspect to its palatability.
The split tape can downloaded on the Death Envy Bandcamp.