When I was a little boy I had an intense fear of the second floor of my grandmother's country home. When it would grow late into the evenings, the upstairs would get pitch dark. The stairs seemed to ascend into a horrific inky black unknown. My brother, my cousin and I were convinced it was haunted and we would dare each other to be the first to go up and find the light switch. We—as I suspect most children in the early 90's had been—were infatuated with urban legends and ghost stories. The one about the creepy house with the neglected lawn and dilapidated front porch on the outskirts of some nearby neighborhood. The one about the hitchhiker in need of a ride only for them to vanish into thin air before reaching their requested destination.
Stories of folklore frighteners and terrifying tales of Christmas specters are told to children as cautionary fables. Shakespearian soothsaying revenants were used as literary plot devices. Even the Christian Trinity has their Holy Spirit. It seems like there isn't a culture or country in this suffering world that doesn't have a ghostly legend.
Ontario's capital city of Toronto is Canada's most populated city, which means more souls per capita and more potentiality for hauntings. There are more than enough tales of murder and tragic death to accommodate any bustling metropolis. Toronto has a string of alleged haunted universities, restaurants, prisons, opulent manors, a lighthouse, something called a "tunnel monster" and one certain Elgin and Winter Garden Theatre. The theatre is known to host a lavender scented lady, a shadowy figure in a bowler hat and, more aptly, it emits ghostly music from phantom musicians that played the vaudeville auditorium over a hundred years ago.
The phantoms from here on in are not the apparitions of the dearly departed, but instead are revelations of the soul and the desperation of keeping that soul intact amidst the savagery of a life in this world.
I wish I could say that I was saving this release for October as a special review previously buried away only to be resurrected in the thick of "spooky season," with all its spectral and paranormal prestige. But the truth is that I am hopelessly and exceedingly behind on reviews. To that, I would like to apologize to Phantom Lung as well as thank the band for their enduring patience. But rest assured, my obligation to the band's clemency will in no way cause any form of biasness on my behalf in the reviewing of this release. I have instead decided to suspend all references to Scott Pilgrim vs. the World in regards to the band's Toronto, Ontario origins as penance for my extreme tardiness.
Toronto's newest death-grind outfit, Phantom Lung—no relation to Toronto's snail-paced doom sloggers, Horse Lung—have exploded onto the grindcore scene with their debut EP, Abhorrent Entity, back at the beginning of this year and have become critical darlings of sorts. Yes, I've been actively working towards this since March. So horrid is my dilatoriness that the band has already released a follow-up two song EP—Abhorrent Entity ii: moribund. Yet, I will only be referencing the band's initial release in keeping with chronology.
Pictured currently as a four piece, but billed here as a three piece, Phantom Lung needle their stylized take on grindcore amongst throwback grind mainstays while also weaving through more modern metal bands that might sport a combination of "core" and/or "death" in their identifying genre monikers. The resulting efforts take the form of something exceptionally punishing and sharp.
Phantom Lung open Abhorrent Entity with "The Idle Mind is the Devils Playground," a mixed bag overture that really does a great job of summarizing the band's sound and style: equal parts metal double bass pedal chopper blade slaps, jerky guitar riffs highlighted with pinch harmonic squeals, and straight-up grindcore blasts. At this point, we the listeners, are first introduced to the actual weight and brutality that is Phantom Lung.
Vocalist and guitarist, Andy James Dinner, is bringing forth a vocal style that initially comes off as delirious and unhinged, but upon repeated listens, I'm convinced that they are more calculated and insidious. Generally, they are keeping with the genre's standard trope of high screeches and sunken low growls, but Dinner is offering a possessed, Evil Dead-style take on the convention. His vocals contain that profane "Deadite" layered choral demonic sneer that the cult film franchise is known for. The high screams sound especially hideous and mocking. Overall, think of the vocals as that of an unpurely resurrected Mieszko Talarczykhe—the blathering corpse of the late Nasum frontman, roaring and shrieking with a mouth full of pulpy mung. (Google it.)
What I'm assuming is Dinner's guitar work is just as ferocious as his vocals. It has a stop-and-go, skipping style that gives it that modern metal swagger. You might initially be overwhelmed by the wall of noise guitar tone, but it becomes immediately apparent that special attention was paid to the high end tones from the notable pinch harmonics on the aforementioned, "The Idle Mind is the Devils Playground" and the shrill ripping on "Heel." Yet, the two guitar tones are playing in tandem—the haze of noise roars like a funeral pyre while the highs carry the scarcest hints of melody within its crunchy dissonant gristle. At the risk of sounding cliché, I'm really enjoying how heavy and mean the guitar is on this record. Still, I know some of you are listening and already making a list of heavier guitar tones and some thick-necked kid is screaming "Mortician!" or something equally as fucking stupid over and over again like it's the ultimate throwing down of the gauntlet. I'm just saying it made an impression on me.
And just as impressionable is bassist Rino Matarazzo's refusal to merely play in the back ground of this record. Phantom Lung's bass is domineering and packed in-between that split guitar tone like some pebble-ridden grave dirt. The bass tone is rawboned and dark with almost a tinge of that slapped bass curdle. I love how it's omnipresent and just off-centered so that when the guitar cuts off, the tail end of the bass is still writhing just a little bit. During the last third of "Leave No Doubt," the bass is actually in the driver's seat and is the most prominent instrument in the song. It takes command, breaking down and strangling the song to death.
I could easily do a paragraph on every song in this EP. That is how much distinct personality each track has. But my favorite song has to be "Mea Culpa." There is a call and response in the chorus between the descending on and off again guitar and some cascading snare rolls. This, by far is my favorite thing in the album. Drummer Johnny Macri, you are seen. This little flourish makes the entire EP for me. And things like this run all through it, making it so exciting to listen to. A big part of that is due to Macri's stinging drumming. To make your snare work stand out in a grindcore album littered with overkill blast beats is no easy feat. Keeping songs driving and interesting during more mid tempo portions is crucial. Since Abhorrent Entity isn't exactly wall-to-wall blasts, Macri is leaning hard on the double bass, but has enough fills and skills on the snare to mind the gap. And again, his drumming is so in sync with the guitar that it permeates Phantom Lung's death-grind with the more catchier deathcore sound.
The EP culminates with closing track, Ennui, that is reminiscent of grindcore albums from a decade ago, where albums ended with a token sludge track; later to be replace by the more contemporary and all together useless noise track. Fans of Magrudergrind's "Bridge Burner" take note, Ennui runs in a similar vein, yet doesn't overstay its welcome.
Abhorrent Entity is a gnarly, devilish act of modern grindcore that is produced to a malevolent magnificence. With modern production levels leaning further and further towards the higher end of the studio spectrum more often than not, it's almost a given that releases these days are of some considerable quality. With that, Abhorrent Entity's production is damn near flawless, so I'm going to assume that the mix and tone along with every bend and buckle are deliberate choices. Producer and engineer, Adrian McCann, and mastering engineer, Scott Middleton, Frankenstein'd one motherfucking hell of a goddamn monster in this EP. Phantom Lung deliver a punishing and deranged performance that might land them a spot on this blog's end of the year's top ten list, if not, on top of Toronto's list of the best grindcore bands.
Abhorrent Entity has a menace and ravenousness to it that presents itself as an amazing official debut and Phantom Lung might very well be that of the ghost of grind yet to come.
FFO: Maruta, Priapus, The Drip
Listen to the album: https://phantomlung.bandcamp.com/album/abhorrent-entity
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