This short, 4 track blast comes come from the anarchic school that the likes of I Wrestled a Bear Once and War from a Harlot’s Mouth belong to. SykØDe, who are from Canada, lay great importance on the fact that their music is deranged and belongs to your nearest lunatic asylum.
The trick with this kind of music is whether it’s well played and hangs together, in spite of being in appearance like a few random bits of paper stuck on a wall. Actually, it works well, which is partly the result of it being more conventional than the band’s claim. Mainly Hardcore / Grind, it’s straight into the action with “Freakshow”. It’s driving, fast, hard-hitting and not entirely discordant. There’s constancy about the way the drummer rattles out his stuff. The rhythm is jerky but it’s there. The vocals match the overall tone – violent.
“Cosmic Fool” introduces a weak Hardcore clean vocal but like everything else, it’s not there for long. The guitar goes round and round, it’s sharp and there’s even a brief progressive element at one point. It all ends without any sense of continuity having been achieved but I suppose that’s the point. “Silent passion” has a quiet beginning. It’s stop – start, oscillating between mellow guitar work and brutal Death Metal violence. The intensity heightens. Anguished screams cover a hint of melancholy.
The final track “Of Libel and Slander” left me cold, I’m afraid. I’d got used to the pattern by now. Yet the mixture of content remained varied. Growled vocals, sharp instrumentals, a hint of respite, passion but generally brutal Death / Hardcore were all on the menu.
“A Few Seconds of Delusion” wasn’t as anarchic as it claimed, but it’s certainly a bundle of energy and never stands still. On the face of it, this album is quite interesting but after a few listens, I can’t really say it stood out as anything really special and it’s not as lunatic as they seem to want it to be.
http://www.myspace.com/sykode
