Holy shit! It’s been a long time since I’ve heard a groovy brutal death metal release that’s caught my attention, but the split CD by Albany, New York-based brutal sludge grinders Clitorture and Massachusetts-based brutal death metallers Goreality is definitely an album that caught me by surprise. Well, not so much the Goreality side of the split, but the Clitorture material is definitely worth a listen or thirty.

The album starts out with 5 tracks from Clitorture and is of some of the heaviest, grooviest and downright crushing brutal death metal I’ve ever heard. The material is rather simplistic as there are no blazing solos, or attempts at great technicality, but what it lacks in technical proficiency it makes up for in catchiness and heaviness. Clitorture combine the guttural vocals and guitar tones of brutal death metal with the crunching bass and rhythms of sludge to form the most moshable material I’ve ever heard. As Billy Nocera of Razorback Records would say Clitorture provide a double dose of "violent slammification." While Billy would say it mockingly, I say it in an entirely complimentary manner.

The final four tracks by Goreality have a strong Vader-meets-East Coast brutal death metal vibe to it. The raspy vocals, quick pace and blasting elements instantly bring to mind Vader and other similar sounding Polish death metal acts. The riffing itself has more of a generic East Coast brutal death metal sound to it. The production for their material is rough making a lot of elements hard to distinguish, but it sounds as though the band members are all relatively proficient musicians. The song-writing itself is rather dull and lacks anything that makes their material stand out from other acts.

While Goreality are the more technical of the two acts, it’s the simplicity of Clitorture that captured my attention. I’ve listened to the Clitorture half of the split at least 100 times so far, while I’ve only sat through the Goreality material twice, and have no interest in listening to it again. The disc is the price of an mCD, so just think of it as an awesome brutal death metal mCD with bonus tracks from some other band. Definitely worth the money for the first 5 tracks alone!

Review byTeufel