Yeah, you can score one more for the good guys up here representing extreme metal in New England. Massachusetts more specifically. And that’s not against our friends in New Hampshire, Vermont, or Rhode Island as they are also vital components of the scene, but Massachusetts just hits a little differently.

Case in point being Escuela Grind’s aptly titled DDEEAATTHHMMEETTAALL EP (MNRK Heavy). 

Don’t know, but maybe it’s Massholes’ penchant for cold beer and the wide availability of potent yet totally legal cannabis that fuels the Bay State’s nearly endless supply of riffs and mosh parts. Escuela Grind’s brand of sonic torture fits quite nicely among other local alumni like Converge, Pathogenic, Sam Black Church or The Red Chord and DDEEAATTHHMMEETTAALL is all the proof you need. Let’s dive in. 

DDEEAATTHHMMEETTAALL is their third EP following previous releases PPOOWWEERRVVIIOOLLEENNCCEE and GGRRIINNDDCCOORREE that were designed to highlight the sounds that have influenced the band. And there’s quite a bit of Death Metal here as “Ball and Chain” opens the pit with murky low guitar tones and stacks of machine gun double-kicks that plead that this band needs to tour with Suffocation and Skinless tomorrow. The low guitars sound like walking in the dark and stepping barefoot on a carpet riddled with Lego pieces, but since this is death metal that analogy totally makes sense.

“Punishment Ritual” builds slowly for like a minute and half until Jesse Fuentes decides to ditch the pretense and forgoes the speed limit behind the drum kit. Then the blast beats come in and you find yourself screaming as the house is on fire and all the doors have been sealed shut. Fuentes continues to decimate the kick pedals on “Abyssal Plane” and although the tempo is subdued again early it still stomps and smashes around like Godzilla taking a stroll through Tokyo.

Pardon me as I crack open another cold one and finish wrapping up this blunt. Telling you dude, this Massachusetts stuff is pretty dope.

Buy the EP here:
https://escuelagrind.ffm.to/ddmm.OYD

9 / 10
HANS LOPEZ