It’s been several years since the majority of Dying Fetus parted ways with John Gallagher to form Misery Index, and, as of the writing of this review, nearly 2 years since their most recent album Discordia’s release. Why have I waited so long to review this album? Honestly, it’s been a complete lack of interest.

My introduction to the music of Misery Index was the band’s split with (now disbanded) Commit Suicide on Willowtip Records in 2001. The material on the recording left me with a less than favorable impression of the "new" band’s musical direction because it really didn’t stray that far from the "old" band’s sound.

As far as Dying Fetus are concerned, their best material was the uber brutal early recordings, namely Bathe In Entrails, Infatuation With Malevolence and Purification Through Violence. The material was simple, heavy and catchy. By 2001, when Kevin Talley, Jason Netherton and shortly after Sparky Voyles left the group to join/form Misery Index the material Dying Fetus were creating, namely Grotesque Impalement and Destroy the Opposition had become rather stale and dull.

The material on Misery Index’s split with Commit Suicide, to me at least, sounded a lot like Destroy the Opposition done with more of a grinding style. At the time everyone was raving about the new death grind sound of Misery Index and, honestly, it was nothing new, it was just a lot of the same old shit, just done in a slightly different manner and without the terrible vocals of John Gallagher.

Jump ahead 5 years and both bands are still going strong. Gone are Mike "I Like Star Wars… Obsessively, No, Seriously, I Dress Up Like A Storm Trooper While Jerking Off To That Website With All Of The Chicks Dressed Up Like Princess Leia… I’d Like To Storm Troop That Bitch And Show Her My Dark Side!" Harrison, Kevin Talley, his replacement Mike Byers and guitarist Bruce Greg, leaving the current line-up as being Jason, Sparky, former Cast The Stone guitarist Mark Kloeppel and All Will Fail drummer Adam Jarvis. Don’t know who either of those bands are? Neither do I and after listening to Discordia I’m less inclined to find out.

Discordia is Misery Index’s first full length effort on Relapse Records, after bouncing around from label to label early in their career. Discordia contains 10 tracks of grinding death metal much in the vein of the band’s earlier outputs and not far removed from the aforementioned Dying Fetus offerings. While the material is well played I’ve been more excited watching paint dry, granted, that could be from getting dizzy inhaling the paint fumes, but the material on this recording lacks all of the elements I look for in a good death metal or grind album. It doesn’t have catchy music, the music get repetitive quickly and the vocals bore me to sleep… although again, that could be the paint fumes talking.

I honestly did try to listen to this recording with an open mind, but very quickly lost interest in the material and found myself skipping ahead from one song to the next. The moral of the story is; if you have a turd, and you cut that turd in half and jam peanuts and corn into it and present it as a new turd, the bottom line is it’s still a turd, just now it’s a bit more crunchy, just like this band, just like this album.

Review byTeufel