What can you say about a band that’s been around for more than 20 years and recorded more than 100 releases, other than to simply call them legendary? Belgium’s Agathocles formed in 1985 and in the span of 21 years released 8 full length studio albums and been a part of 100-ish split releases and are highly regarded among the crust and grindcore underground. I have to admit, prior to receiving this promo I didn’t own a single Agathocles full length, but I have over 20 split releases which they were a part of so I’m very familiar with their work.

If you own a single Agathocles release you’ll know exactly what to expect from Mincer, but for those of you who’ve been living in a cave for the past 20 years and haven’t heard of them, Agathocles play a high-paced blend of crust and grindcore they’ve dubbed "mincecore" that’s overflowing with simplistic riffs, rasps, snarls, growls and blast beats. The material is raw, aggressive and no frills overflowing with fun catchy rhythms, uber distorted bass and a wide range of vocal styles from guttural snarls, to high pitched squeals and everything in between. There’s no sense in comparing the sound of Agathocles to anyone else because anyone that sounds like them was inspired by Agathocles to begin with!

Agathocles fans won’t be disappointed by this effort as the band have never really strayed from their tried and true method. My only complaint with this effort, and all Agathocles recordings as a whole is with all of the songs they’ve written and all of the material they’ve recorded everything pretty much sounds the same, which is both good and bad, but if you’re a die hard mincecore fanatic you’ll love this album regardless.

While I’ve never been a fan of this band, I can honestly say I don’t hate their material, it’s good, fun and catchy, although not very memorable. I recommend all fans of grind and crust check out at least one Agathocles recording and Mincer, by Agathocles standards, is definitely worthwhile.

Written By: Teufel