It’s not every day you come across a metal band that hearkens back to the days of yore, while at the same time making you repeatedly second guess yourself as you try and pinpoint specific influences. On
Current Mouth, Vorum’s style feels like an amalgamation of early Morbid Angel’s sinister melodicism and contagious riff-craft, the raw energy of war metal acts such as Bestial Warlust, and the cryptic atmosphere of Possessed. Add a generous serving of hardcore punk vigour to this already demented concoction and you’ll have some idea of what Vorum’s latest EP
Current Mouth sounds like. But namedropping doesn’t really do it justice. The best thing is that while Vorum have obviously looked to the past for inspiration, they have a clear-cut idea of how to shape their influences into something fresh, the execution of which is absolutely second to none.
The first thing the listener will notice is the production quality; “unpolished” is an understatement. The guitars scythe through you like a blade through linen, the vocals make your hair stand on-end and send chills down your spine, and the drums tumble and crash with such voracity that
Current Mouth may as well have been a shelved demo from 1986. This is old-school revivalism at its most frenetic, blurring the lines between organised chaos and total bedlam amidst a sea of feedback and analogue distortion. Believe it or not, the song structures are calculated, diverse and nuanced, and the overall presentation is so in-your-face that
Current Mouth is not only gripping and immediate, but also addictive to the point of it meriting several consecutive listens at a time. “In Grime in Lust” is arguably the most straight-forward song of the lot, consisting mostly of schizophrenic tremolo riffs and blast beats, but delving into more groove-laden territory in the middle. Compare this with the title track. Though it begins in a similar vein, it explores everything from Morbid Saint-esque proto-death to melodic soloing with a distinctly Eastern vibe. All the while, the omnipresent hiss gives the EP an intensity few can match, duly capping off what was already a meteoric effort.
Current Mouth isn’t the type of release that begs to be universally appreciated, many will find the production too rough, the vocals too harsh, the instrumentation too relentless, etc. But Vorum know their audience, and the aptitude which they sate their followers’ masochistic desires warrants nothing but the utmost praise. No gimmicks, no bullsh
it, just unhinged fury of the most primal persuasion.
