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It takes BALTA seven minutes to annihilate Rendszerszintű Agybaszás (Systematic Brainfucking), the debut EP by these feral Hungarians. Their approach to music is beyond urgent and their delivery equally drastic. BALTA’s sound is vicious, pounding and hectic. With one of the nastiest guitar tones to grace these ears in recent memory, and a drumming style that may collapse at any giving moment. Drawing parallels with PIÑEN, ULSTER, the first TRANQUILIZER Flexi, PLASMID or IMAGEN is fair, giving the total disregard for melody or time the band displays. But it is their anti-authoritarian lyrics and uber punk attitude that sets them on their own path; Searching for a primitive future amongst the concrete ruins.
Our take: Now this is what the fuck I’m talking about! La Vida Es Un Mus reaches its ever-probing tendrils into eastern Europe (Budapest, Hungary to be precise) and plucks out a recording that sounds like Sonic the Hedgehog destroying a low-budget recording studio with a sledgehammer. It’s seven tracks of wild, reckless abandon, and I can’t get enough of it. Rendszerszintű Agybaszás serves as an interesting contrast to the Innocent LP I also wrote about this week. While both are excellent hardcore records, they’re on opposite ends of the spectrum in terms of their overall feel and their approaches to the genre: everywhere Innocent is considered, composed, and precise, Balta is chaotic and impulsive. Balta has a single-minded devotion to constant, paint-peeling intensity, and there’s no letup in tempo or volume to be found on Rendszerszintű Agybaszás… it’s just a uniform lunge toward oblivion without break or modulation. Capturing a feeling like this on a record is difficult (try recording yourself stabbing incoherently at a guitar for 45 seconds and see how interesting it sounds) and it only happens rarely, so when people like me who crave this kind of unhinged musical release find a record with the goods, we snap it up without a second thought. If you’re one of us, I urge you to do the same.
- Label: La Vida Es Un Mus
- Format Type: 7"
- Media Condition: Mint (M)
- Sleeve Condition: Near Mint (NM or M-)
- Genre: punk
- Genre Style: hardcore
- Year: 2022