CoC : Iniquity - Grime : Review

Iniquity - _Grime_
(Mighty Music, 2002)
by: David Rocher (8 out of 10)

Iniquitous drummer Jesper Frost Jensen is a deserving man indeed -- a hard-working musician in the death metal underground since 1989 who did not get the opportunity to release a full-length album until 1996, when Iniquity released their first doom-laden chunk of death, _Serenadium_ -- after which Iniquity's world fell apart owing to continuous, unceasing line-up changes, leaving only founder member Jesper Frost Jensen in the band. The interestingly gloomy, yet not overwhelmingly indispensable material on _Serenadium_ was however not exactly ominous of Iniquity's forthcoming tracks, as the Danes' 1998 MCD, _The Hidden Lore_, saw them veer towards some hard, violent and technical death metal, a direction which they have since then stuck to -- and by which _Grime_ totally abides. The opener _Tides of Vengeance_ sets the mark clearly enough: massive, raging and blasting rhythms, speeding axe lines with a cool, snapping crunchy feel, bowel-churning low-case riffage laden with distorted harmonics, and brilliant, thick, blood-curdling vocals. All throughout the maiming, seething 45 minutes of supermean death metal on this disc, the really enjoyable point about _Grime_, besides its blasting fury and sweaty intensity, remains the fact that it does -not- sound like your average Scandinavian death metal album; offering a balanced compromise between all-out burly American-style thrashing brutality and typically aggressive Scandinavian melodies, _Grime_ is merely catchy upon a first spin, but soon becomes annoyingly addictive. The sheer, bare-toothed meanness of this blasting sample of Danish cookery works a treat indeed, and if proof was ever needed, _Grime_ has instantly blasted its way into my five most frequently spun death metal albums these days.

(article published 14/1/2002)