Album Reviews : Fuck The Facts – Disgorge Mexico

I put this album on with low expectations. The mere name “Fuck The Facts” turned me off it straight away. I’m not sure why, probably the blatant use of “fuck” in the name, but I almost formed an opinion of the band before even hearing it – a modern, metal/hardcore band that swear a lot and are trying to be all tough and angry and violent. I was wrong, but before I go into that, a bit of interesting information about the album. “Disgorge Mexico” was written and created on a 14 day road trip from the band’s home in Canada to the borders of Mexico and back. The band based the songs around old demo’s and jam recordings from years back, and recorded the album in whatever locations that people would let them use during their trip, including warehouses, stores and basements. The result is a very interesting and powerful 45 minutes of music.

There are essentially two sides to this album; the fast, extreme, crazy grind(ish) side, and the slower, more atmospheric, somewhat distressed side. The latter being the band’s better half. That’s not to say that the faster material is bad, far from it. But the atmospheres and desperate sounds created during their slower material just makes the faster seem a tad sterile.

The album kicks off with a thirty-second grind track, “No Return”, which is completely pointless and should have just been left off because it just blends into the first real track, “Absence and Despite” which continues with extremely similar material. They should have either left the intro track off completely, or just added it to the beginning of the second track, because it really does seem pointless. The first half of “Absence of Despite” is fairly straight-forward but very well written grind/extreme metal, however the haunting, high pitched guitars that come in over the top of the second half is where the album really picks up. The beginning of “Kelowna” shows the slight post-rock influences that pop up occasionally but when the track gets a bit heavier and the vocals come in, it switches to a more atmospheric, black metal(ish) style similar to what can be found on the recent Nachtmystium album. The vocals are the same style regardless of what genre they are leaning to at the time, instead just changing the length of the screams. This works extremely well as the longer screams have a very desperate feel and are almost black metal wails, while the shorter, more rapid vocals are simple grind ones. This creates a common sound throughout the whole album and links both sides together, while never sounding out of place. The short “Dead End” is a mix of post-metal atmospherics and slow, black-metal sounding guitars that are, again, very reminiscent of Nachtmystium’s latest material. “Apathy is a Karma Killer” is quite different from the rest of the album in that it almost hits the ten minute mark, rather than hovering around the two minute mark like most of the others. It’s definitely one of the highlights of the album and the band have done a fantastic job of creating quite the journey with this one. “State of Panic” is a groovier grind track with a heavy bottom end similar to Blood Duster’s later, rockier material. “Golden Age” begins with beautiful yet desolate clean guitars, before getting heavier and more distraught. Two faster numbers bring the album to a close, with the final track ending with what almost seems like a completely random mixture of musical bits and pieces; it’s almost like the insanity throughout much of the album has reached breaking point.

“Disgorge Mexico” really is a wild, engaging mind that makes you feel as though you’ve been thrown into the mind of an insane serial killer. Give this album a listen but keep in mind that you don’t really experience this album unless you listen to it all. 8.7/10

Band: Fuck The Facts
Album: Disgorge Mexico
Year: 2008
Genre: Grind/Post-metal
Label: Relapse Records
Origin: Canada
www.myspace.com/fuckthefacts

Track listing:
0. Borders
1. No Return
2. Absence and Despite
3. Kelowna
4. As Empires Expand and Collapse <- Reviewers choice
5. Dead End
6. Driving Through Fallen Cities
7. La Culture Du Faux
8. State of Panic
9. No Place For Failure
10. The Storm
11. Apathy is a Karma Killer
12. Golden Age
13. The Pile of Flesh You Carry
14. Sleepless