GOFAI – Aratov Drive
|
|
Not even a year after their first album Go Fail, Luxembourgish noise masters GOFAI are surreptitiously back with the follow-up Aratov Drive. Finding GOFAI on the Internet is not an easy task to accomplish. Apart from their Bandcamp page and a skeletal presence of YouTube, you only find their music on streaming platforms. No social media sites available to give you more information about the band and the album! It seems as if Aratov Drive has been released without prior announcement. The EP contains five songs that show that GOFAI have really worked hard on themselves these last few months. There are still the occasional hardcore punk outbursts present, but it is obvious that the quartet is nowadays developing their darker side. The opener Conditioned By Idiots begins with a pounding bass rhythm, soon to be joined by a distorted guitar recalling early Dead Kennedys, with ominous vocals reciting some text before the song erupts in an explosive way. The following Incarnate, at over three minutes a longer track, is a post-apocalyptic doom track with dark, crooning vocals alternating with screams. Again there is a ton of atmospheric density that is at such a level new to the band. The nearly five minute long The Nature Of Bystanding’s intro reminds me of Slayer’s Raining Blood, with the intermittent drum pulses, taking up the first half of the song. The latter one unleashes wild hardcore fury with tons of distortion. Sludge Boy is another shorter track, fast paced and coming with an amazingly crazy, nearly cartoonish guitar sound. The EP ends after a quarter hour with Discarnate, another rocking hardcore tune that may not be as adventurous as the preceding material but is still a great ending to an excellent second release. What I wrote last time is still partly true. There are elements of punk, noise rock and hardcore, all presented with a lo-fi spirit that lends the music an unprecedented authenticity. This time, the guys have added genres such as death rock and no wave, digging ever deeper into a unique and obscure sound that fits well with the band’s attitude of ghosting the typical social media sites. GOFAI don’t even try for a mass compatible sound, and that is what I like about them. They do their very own thing, without forgetting to write great songs full of searing riffs and suspenseful structure. This is the true underground that seems to have been lacking these last years. |
|
5 songs |
|
|
15:58 minutes |
|
|
***** **** |
|
|
Genre: hardcore punk (self-released) |
|
