Shotgun Blast Propaganda

As God kills

Hellywood

Cancer

RedRum

Old Nick

Watcher of a failed generation

Through Fail and Foul

Truth is Out

The Manhattan Project

Daniel Botti - Vocals, Guitars
Gary D’Eramo - Guitars, Vocals
Klaus Mariani - Bass
Marco Di Salvia - Drums

NODE: "As God kills"     node      

Produced by Pelle Saether & NODE, recorded & mixed im Underground Studio by Pelle Saether, mastered at The Mastering Room by Goran Finnberg

"

Node live in Zürich, Gryphon Party II

Das Kapital

review  by dalia "gryphon_spirit" di giacomo____        

link to review by Matthew Haumschild                

"As God kills"....simply ...kills. It's a bullet that pierces any resistance. The follow up to the revelation album Das Kapital is a decisive step towards... perfection. This time, without renouncing their technicality, the Italian Node  have prepared 10 tracks who are absolutely fluent, born to kill the pit, with a perfect musical construction which combines angriness, tremendous heaviness, brutality, violence, fierceness and melody.  Examples for this are the songs Through fail and foul (number 8), and the exquisite RedRum (track number 5), just  to introduce 2 tracks and not all 10 ones at once . The great expertise serves the neckbreaking power, while technicality in shape of experimentation just finds space  only in the final 

As mentioned above, there is care in every detail. The production is done again by Pelle Saether and is flawless.  Short samples and electronic elements just appear very shortly in order to increase the  atmosphere in certain points, each time disappearing  very soon, vanquished by the power of the guitars. 

As God kills delivers ten remarkable songs, some of them  outstanding: As God Kills, Hellywood, RedRum, Through Fail and Foul. The opener Shotgun Blast Propaganda lets immediately understand what our  teeth will bite, and the band appears at once  modern and fresh, in spite of the use of classic elements, indeed a  Metallica aftertaste in  the refrain is fully integrated with aggressive,  dynamic and  up-to-date techniques. Heavy  like a titanic press-machine, the title track , As God kills, destroys everything but also offers a melodic and immediately catchy refrain loop.  Hellywood is a kick in your mind: it has everything a thrash heart desires: precise-like assault, major heaviness, melodic break, instrumental  skillfulness. Cancer is full of impulse, compelling, the fast  changes of pace are embedded in a  logical construction. Here Node let appreciate how much they can produce in a short lapse of time yet nothing disturbs the stream of the song. And now we meet the brilliant song RedRum, a pure masterpiece of hooklines in the form of neckbreaking  riffs, of additive beats, of more varied vocal patterns  (from shouts to deeper lower supporting vocals), while guitars deliver  galloping attacks, solos and rocking flair. the final is doomsday and evilness, a awesome heavy slowing down, till  the tremendous pressure of the following Old Nick. Through Fail and Foul combines very beautiful riffs and nice melodic breaks. Explosions of  Death metal  can be found in so many points of the album as well as solos and kicking ass heaviness, agreeable tempo changes, with punishing, roaring and precise drumming. Watcher of a Failed Generation is rabid and angry, Truth is out is pursuing. 

The Manhattan Project sets the last seal: re-visited Classic Thrash elements mixed with  modern visions. By the way modern, the outro is almost experimental- instrumental . Personally, this is the only thing i don't like, but it's just my  personal taste. Many of you, on the contrary,  could find this final interesting, in particular the fans of  Avantgarde.

The release of As God kills should be seen  as a  true event by the  Extreme metal scene. This album deserves to be got and devoured. Daniel Botti, Gary D'Eramo, Klaus Mariani, Marco Di Salvia: four great musicians, one new war declaration. 

As God kills: in mind an illusion, in the hands the weapon-desperation

As God kills: in mind an illusion, in my head a new war declaration

rating: 9.8/10  

review by Matthew Haumschild ___                

It’s been a while since Node has issued out a new CD for release. But if it’s anything like Das Kapital, then it’s going to impale the listener through the skull. Most of the time when an American thinks of a European metal band, we normally think the band is from Sweden or Finland. Node might have recorded in Sweden and they sound Swedish but they’re Italian from Milan, a city that isn’t exactly known to produce metal bands. None-the-less, they could crush half the bands of the world with intensity, dynamics, and sheer fucking determination.

            Shotgun Blast Propaganda

“I’m….in a world….of….shit.” I love the way this song starts out. It has a country song playing with a clip from, “Full Metal Jacket” playing on top of it. More specifically the scene where Pvt. Pile goes crazy at the end of basic training in the bathroom in the early morning hours where he proceeds to go through the U.S. Marine basic rifle drill, eventually he kills his drill Sergeant and himself. Although, the problem I have with the song is that Fear Factory used clips from this movie too in the song, “Crisis,” off their “Soul of a New Machine” CD. For me, I consider the clips to be cool but a little unoriginal since Fear Factory has already used clips from that section of the movie. Other than that, the song title is one of the best ones I’ve ever seen and the track is just slamming, perfect track to open the CD. There are hints, however of the bands evolution of their sound. Meaning that in the future, they might not play as intense, I could be wrong.

As God Kills

This song blows away anything I said about the previous song. For me, this is a combination of a Pantera song and a Slayer song. It’s fast intense and it has attitude. Although the chorus isn’t very catchy, the verse riffs are. The guitar riffs are very menacing. The drumming is perfect in this song and the singing was screamed very well.

Hellywood

“I saw your sister on the floor (or road) she’s a whore!” This song is the type of metal song the listener could roll down the windows in the car and blast this song. It’s not as black metal as their other stuff or even old school melodic death metal. This song reminds me of something In Flames would put out only Node has a better singer in my opinion and a better drummer. The singing is a cross between hardcore and black metal all wrapped up in one where as the drumming is more groove oriented than a full on metal assault. The chorus carries a nice melody too that keeps getting stuck in my head which is probably why that this is my favorite song on the CD.

Redrum

Redrum is a strange name for a song in my opinion. However, this is the darkest sounding song on the CD. The image it projects to me is being alone, at night, in the city and having bad things happen. It has a slow guitar opening with drums. Before long though, the song kicks into hyper drive that’s perfect to run to. This track would be perfect for a horror movie. The one thing I didn’t really care for was at the end of the song there’s another sample from a movie and it was just really weird. I’m not sure if I like it or not.

Sonic Quality:

I felt the guitars and the vocals sounded superb. However, I felt the drums could have been better. I felt that there that the cymbals were too prominent in the mix and a little too bright. I also felt that the drums weren’t loud enough, if they were just a little louder than it would be very nice. The bass…I couldn’t hear at all which is a symptom of metal anyway. The rest of mix was damn near perfect except for the drums.

Final thoughts:

About the only real complaint I have is how the drums were mixed. I thought that the drum mix in Das Kapital were better. Although, there isn’t anything wrong with the drumming on this CD I felt that Das Kapital was a lot more technical and this album it seems more straight forward almost too commercial except in the song “Cancer” where he’s all over the place and it sounds just fucking brilliant. But there are other times where it sounds too straight forward. It’s not bad it’s just not the same. Everything else was as to be expected: Fucking brilliant.

rating: 9/10  

Matthew Haumschild             05.06.2006

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