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The perfect melding of two timeless facets of punk, the honest forward thinking DC style hardcore of Faith/Void split (yes, both sides) with total Deathside style anthemic hardcore. Both are furious and immediate and work together in perfect harmony here without really sounding like either exactly. New, important music is made this way. RASHŌMON has had their share of setbacks with immigration, mental health, modern American life in general... and that urgency and frustration is reflected here crystal clear.
500 copies of 150gr black vinyl with an etched B-side are housed in a beautiful 24pt jacket along with an insert and a download card. Recorded by the band in DC. Mastered by Golden. Art by Kohei.
Our take: I was looking forward to this debut 12” from DC’s Rashomon, and I’m pleased to tell you it does not disappoint. Rashomon have a Japanese singer and take some obvious stylistic cues from Japanese hardcore’s history, but Pathogen X doesn’t sound like a tribute record or a genre exercise. The qualities that Rashomon share with Japanese hardcore are top-level and abstract: an emphasis on melodic lead guitar; a quasi-epic propensity to brood; metallic riffing; an overall sense of heaviness. They aren’t so gauche as to borrow riffs directly, or maybe they’re just so good at it I didn’t notice. Instead, they’ve forged their own path and, as a result, Pathogen X sounds like nothing but Rashomon. It’s hard to imagine this record appearing at any other time than the present, and consequently it feels vital and alive. The only bad thing I can say about this record is that it is frustratingly brief. I hope this isn’t the last we hear from Rashomon, because Pathogen X is one of the most exciting and stylistically innovative hardcore records in recent memory.