Review Summary: A spoonful of grinding goodness. 10% of your recommended daily intake.
Love in Hell is the latest gut-punch courtesy of one-man grind project Tanpopo Crisis. This EP tails behind a number of releases from the year previous, such as the praise-worthy
Evermillion which was undeniably a highlight of 2015, and continues the artist's prolific output of material into the new year. Unfortunately, this recent offering is in duality a success and a disappointment, managing to parade Tanpopo’s talent and deliver a worthwhile sprinkling of effective tracks, but ultimately it fails to fully satisfy the listener.
Succumbing to its own expectations,
Love in Hell is largely undercut by its sheer brevity. Sure, it could be argued that bite-sized albums and ridiculously short track lengths are part and parcel when it comes to grind, however when genre tropes begin to interfere with the music's ability to impress the listener, it's time to reevaluate your approach. At just under 8 minutes in length, the largest criticism I can level at this EP indicates that everything’s too fleeting for its own good. The album teases ideas, introducing crunchy riffs, energetic drumming, and powerful vocals throughout; but you can never get comfortable. Before the chance to embrace these elements and become properly acquainted arrives, they're snatched away and replaced by an entirely new track with a fresh set of embellishments. This approach ensures that nothing becomes stale, yet it remains equally unmemorable. Amongst the madness, an additional vocalist is even featured, crammed into two of the shortest songs at about 20 seconds each. This isn't necessarily a
bad decision, however there's very little point to the further variety his inclusion brings when there's no chance of banality in the first place. Nevertheless the newcomer's deep growls add a pleasing balance to the standard, mid-ranged yelling regardless of their redundancy. A further gripe with this album perhaps wouldn’t be a problem ordinarily, but comes as a side effect to the over-arching issue. Taking into account the albums length, it's safe to say that a good chunk is wasted on the minute long Japanese speech sample ‘Ego’, and in this context it not only adds fuel to the frustration but also gives the impression of being unnecessary filler in an already substance-scarce environment.
In the end, it's difficult to be entirely let down by
Love in Hell solely because of the quality on display here when it does kick in. The production is perfectly suitable and the album is instrumentally impressive for the genre whilst the songwriting, while never given the chance to build an atmosphere or expand ideas, is largely well executed. If you're searching for a small dose of superior grinding chaos, you shouldn't look past this.
