Buzzoven - Violence From The Vault

Time has been kind to Buzzoven, even though the material on this EP is over 10 years old it still sounds remarkably fresh even compared to a lot of other sludge metal that is being released now. The material recorded after the classic "Sore" album has just been released by Relapse with the title "Violence From The Vault". The songs are what you’d expect from Buzzoven but the sound is more filthy and dirty than any of their other releases. Originally put onto cassette tape in 1995, they have finally seen the light of day and any Buzzoven fan, both old and new will want to check this out. There is only two tracks that were ever released before and they are Nod" and "Mainline" which came out on EP releases after the break up of the official line-up around 1995/96. "Nod" tends to be a bit of a long - winded mess at times, at over 15 minutes long. The track has its moments but i found it way too long for the musical ideas contained within. "Mainline" and another track "Paintake" stand out as highlights on the EP, "Mainline" especially has one of those riffs that will leave you battered and crushed . "Breed" suffers from a over-use of repetitive samples which just leaves you with a bad headache more than anything else. "I Never" is pure Buzzoven greatness, this track is proof alone why they are such a important influence in the sludge metal scene today. The problem though is the tracks sound like they haven't been re-mastered in any way at all, just simply transferred from old cassette tape to CD and the sound quality really suffers for it.

This type of recording process leaves you with a sound much similar to listening to a low bitrate Mp3 so the sound is thin for the much of this EP. Putting that to one side though, this is meant to be a "for the fans" release and from that point of view it serves its purpose very well. Its also not till you get to the third track "Breed" till the poor sound quality gets a little grating. Most of the EP is drowning in large levels of feedback and distortion which i can dig but it doesn't come off too well with the dirty, cheap production. "Nod" suffers the worst where at times the music sounds muffled and often indecipherable. However this is still a essential document of one of the most the important bands in extreme sludge metal’s history. If you like Buzzoven, then you will want to add "Violence From The Vault" to your collection but if haven't never experienced the band before i would you suggest to hunt down the "Sore" album first. 6/10

www.myspace.com/buzzovenx