Fatal Casualties - Psalm

Coming off of Seja Records, a minimal, post-punk, EBM, and electronic based label, Fatal Casualties are set to release their next album in the early days of September. Not necessarily falling into any one genre, but rather combining and loving a whole lot of different influences into a sort of unique package, the duo behind Fatal Casualties have crafted a nine track album titled Psalm.

Misanthropik Filth starts us off, a fairly low rhythmic noise sort of approach slowly building out the beat, as acoustic instruments join the fray. The lighter pitched vocals that flow in gives the song an almost sacred feel to it, a second set of darker, more grudge-holding vocals kick in to give it a darker feel. A more electronic beat takes over and dominates later on in the song. This song definitely knows how to move in more directions than one, which is great, however, sometimes the vocals can come off outright terrible. Especially when grunting is involved. The smooth beat is nice, however, so there's no problem in that sense.

Dod Man has a pretty set EBM beat going for it with tiny bits of electro hitting in here and there. The vocals, as they squeal at parts, sound good sometimes, and then just completely make me want to shut off the song at other points. I'm not sure if they were trying to get a sort of creepy like standing with them, but it didn't work out all too well. And, the beat itself remained pretty stagnant in comparison to the previous song, so that was a let down.

Skirk Tyst had some angry chanting from what it sounded like, with some drum work in the background that gave it a tribal feel for the intro, but that soon disappeared as the EBM influences rolled in. And, the vocals actually weren't that bad in this song. Odd, but nothing cringe worthy.

Laica surprised me with a very soothing, very minimal beat that had a slight bit of ambience to it. Once more, the vocal work went well; a bit off here and there, but still able to carry the song through. I wasn't too huge a fan of Somewhere In The Middle, as it kind of just was all over the place; and not all over the place in that good and righteous sense. More or less, it was an unstable mess that hardly sounded pleasing to the ears.

Drums and ambience combined in Jag Ar Slowburn, and that was very nice. I really dug this track; it was very well put together, and able to hold itself over for its entire run. The first half was purely instrumental, while the second half turned up some vocal work. It was wonderfully made.

New just didn't cut it for me at all; the quality seemed to have dipped, although I think this was intended. Even then, the sloppy effect was carelessly inputted, and I just found it odd to listen through. Other than that one bland sound effect, and once again off putting vocals, the minimal electronic work wasn't half bad.

A bit of a tribal sound returned in Missfostret, allowing a decent sound to emerge. But, once again, I felt as if there was a quality dip. I don't know why this occurred; but, because of this, crisp sounds melted with muddy noise, and that didn't go over all too well.

Slut was the last song on the album, and it remained pretty well throughout. Drums, decent synths, and an organ all played through. Not the greatest in the world, but definitely decent.

And, through and through, the album was hit and miss on a lot of occasions. The vocals need work; sometimes, they can come off extremely nice, but, at other times, it sounds like a caveman grunting and that just doesn't work. The instrumentation was pretty well done, however, at times, as I said, when there are low quality sounds mixed with higher productions, it made me cock my head and wonder as to why the whole song couldn't have just sounded well. It's almost as if some songs sounded like a demo; and for an official release, that really just isn't all too great. BUT, you know, these guys have talent. They just need to pull it altogether, and I'm sure they'll be able to punch out a great album some day. Aug 22 2014