Review Summary: In order to reproduce the sound of this album, one must ram his penis down a garbage disposal unit; and allow a rabid Grizzly bear to make love to your asshole while your retarded children bash their heads against trash can lids.
Last Days of Humanity were a goregrind band based in the Netherlands, and they were “well-known” for their breakneck speed and technicality in regards to their drummer, as well as their vocalist’s pitch-shifted, “gargling” vocal technique. Now, I say “well-known” because the amount of janitors who clean up strip club bathrooms with toothbrushes probably outnumbers the amount of fans of this band, but the amount of sheer punishment, disgust, and brutality present in this album simply cannot be ignored.
The album’s title, as well as the cover, leads little to the imagination. For the uninitiated, Putrefaction is defined as “the act or process of putrefying; the anaerobic decomposition of organic matter by bacteria and fungi that results in obnoxiously odorous products; rotting.” Well, if decomposing, rotting, fungal corpses somehow started a band, this album is probably what they would sound like. Extremely down-tuned guitars, inaudible bass, rapid trashcan snares, and gargling vocals comprise this album, though the drums and vocals dominate the album. The snare drum is reminiscent of Metallica’s “St. Anger”, and the vocals sound as if the Predator was having sex with an Alien and was eating a chunky peanut butter and jelly sandwich in the middle of climaxing. You couldn’t find a more inhuman sound than if you traveled to Venus and started molesting the creatures there.
The album’s opener, “Covered with Feces as Decoration” is a blueprint for most of the songs on this album: heavy, groove-laden, down-tuned guitar riffs, ear-splitting trashcan blast beats, and gargling, inhuman vocals. Almost all of the songs are under a minute and most of them barely pass the thirty-second mark. With songs ranging from fifty-nine seconds to six seconds, this album had me constantly checking my Winamp to see if that brief pause in the noise was the end of the song or merely a break. Fortunately, to make up for the short song lengths, the band packed this album with 41 songs, making listening to the album feel like running a marathon with a Segway: it feels like cheating, but you don’t really care.The songs do end, mind you. After listening to this album, I didn’t feel like the band was just playing the same song one after another. While it’s hard to discern differences when a majority of the songs are just blast beats and low gurgling, there are subtle differences.
Half of the fun comes from reading the song titles, however. With titles such as “Sewing up the Abdominal Rupture for the Successive Acts of Degradation”, “Disconnected the Cranium with a sense of Peculiar Interest”, and “Precisely Eviscerated and Conserved in a Formaldehyde-Methanol Solution”, one can only read these over the top song titles and laugh. As for the lyrics, there’s not much to say, because I couldn’t find any for any of the songs. I’ve spent roughly thirty minutes scouring the internet for some lyrics to these song titles, and have gotten jack. It’s up to the listener’s imagination to discern what the vocalist is saying, but I guess you can only think up so many lyrics about eviscerating rotting corpses and cannibalizing tortured people before you run out of ideas.
One of the album’s better songs, “A Divine Proclaimation of Finishing the Present Existence” comes at the end of the album, and it stands out not because it runs at over three minutes, but…okay, that’s basically why it stands out. After realizing that the drummer has to maintain his frantic pace for three minutes, I was impressed. I tried doing the same thing using my rock band drums, and I couldn’t get past the two minute mark. Maybe it means I’ve eaten one too many McDonalds double cheeseburgers, but I found the frantic drumming on this song the best out of all of them. If you only want to listen to one song off this album, listen to “A Divine Proclaimation…” and you’ve basically listened to the whole album.
I don’t doubt that many people won’t give this album a listen, most likely because it’s a wall of noise for 20 minutes or however long the album actually is. There’s no melody, no cleanliness, no redeeming values from this album, but I didn’t listen to it expecting that. It’s a goregrind album, through and through, and Last Days of Humanity’s mission was simply to offer punishing, brutal, and disgusting music for the few people interested in it. Just reading the song titles entertained me enough. The “Music” is an added bonus. If you’re a fan of losing your hearing at an early age, or you enjoy listening to the sounds of a trash compactor, give this a listen.
Recommended Tracks:
The General Attributes For Partial Trunk Separation
Sexually Imminent Perverted Deviant
Immersing The Body In A Cesspool Of Lye As A Satisfying Method
A Divine Proclamtion Of Finishing The Present Existence
