Chestcrush – Apechtheia (Recommendation)

Does anybody still remember that glorious the broken movie by Nine Inch Nails? Especially the “Happiness in Slavery” bit? A man giving himself to a machine, getting tortured (very NSFW to put it nicely) and getting fabricated into mush. If your stomach is tough enough, this is a must-see for music video historians, the whole movie is for a fact.

So what does this have to do with Chestcrush? Their new EP Apechtheia (disgust, repugnance and loathing) is like that machine in the “Happiness in Slavery“-video. In one second you’ll get into a grinder while the next step just slowly stretches you until you rip apart.

In three tracks and 30 minutes, the listener gets the full Grindcore / Doom Metal / Ambient treatment. “Misery. Decline. Death” and “The Despiser” are ever shape-shifting songs that don’t let the listener feel safe in their space. Grindcore and Doom are the most prominent genres here, but Chestcrush intertwine them in such a delicate fashion that you don’t know whether you should bang your head against the nearest object or stare at the ground in disgust for life.

The closer “Repression” is an unsettling Ambient track that is like looking at what is left of you after you went through the aforementioned machine, surrounded by flies in a dirty, empty room. Sounds scary? It is, as this EP is.