Zombie Apocalypse - Send More Paramedics

Led by Shai Hulud alum/founder Matt Fox, Zombie Apocalypse has a reputation to uphold, and they’ve done nothing but that since their inception in late 2003. Where Shai Hulud melded their hardcore with a more melodic, epic sense of metal, Zombie Apocalypse prefers to just tear shit up. Fox’s fingers burn up the fretboard more than ever, a la Dillinger Escape Plan, while the vocals are entirely guttural, throat-shredding displays of despair and futility. And to top it off, I’ve never heard a band of the metal-core bloodline ballsy enough to drop a hint of ragtime piano into a piece of battering aural assault as heard on “Tale Told By a Dead Man.” The other half of Tales Told by Dead Men belongs to the UK’s Send More Paramedics, who at first sound like a crossbreed of British crust/thrash punk, Terror, and Pantera. In other words, it’s pretty fast and plenty angry. The band deftly displays excellent, precise musicianship with rancor-filled songwriting and spastic vocals that Serj Tankian might admire. The mutilated corpse on the album cover says it all—this disc is twisted and disturbing, but both bands prove to be a bit more cerebral than you’d think. [www.hellbentrecords.com]