It’s been a good year for the still-nascent sub-genre of hardcore punk, which favours light-speed riffing, shrieksome vox and jazzy tempo shifts. Excellent albums from The Locust, Daughters and The Blood Brothers have indicated a possible way out of rock’s current trad trough. Oakland, CA’s The Mass lack the futuristic, synthoid edge of those bands, but their sax-assisted Crimson-meets-Slayer hybrid is a lot of fun. The bloodthirsty verve with which they go about their angular sorties is balanced by excellent musicianship and a keen sense of dynamics. Fripp’d love it.
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