Tuesday 9 September 2014

Bruto - S/T (Album Review)


Album Type: Full length
Date Released: 04/10/2013
Label: Tuneless Records


‘Bruto’ CD/DD track listing:

1). Desmerecer 04:32
2). Icarvs 03:03
3). Electroking 03:34
4). El viaje 05:29
5). Galopar 04:26
6). Mas alla 04:09
7). Odalisca 08:33
8). Lava 03:09
9). Taxi Shaman 02:48


The Band:

Cotiño | voces
Tantish | Guitarra, voz
Urgus | Bajo, voz
Mono | Bateria, "voz"

Review:

Standing between stoner and hardcore, Bruto's debut comes roaring out the gate with a familiar and fun fury. The promise they made us in their introduction email “we will show you why we call ourselves Bruto” is made abundantly clear immediately on starting the album. The opener ‘Desmerecer’ shows all these influences including heavy hardcore style power chord chugging veering into some Unsane’ish riffing and back into some Kyuss heavy stoner grooves. The cool part of the album is how seamless Bruto has integrated everything all the song writing feels very natural and all the transitions all make sense.


My favorite track on this album is the fourth track “El viaje” which is a bit of a departure but sits in a solid groove and channels some serious Brant Bjork and the Bros chill vibe. I also really like the tasty leads over the bridge and the guitar solo is AWESOME. Weirdly moving into a trippy Fu Manchu and Boris blend the fifth track “Galopar” has some unusually cool four on the floor riffing with some drugged out heavily verbed vocals. “Galopar” almost reminds me of Floor's great new album “Oblation” if the tempos were speeded up in parts. The 8th track ‘Lava’ has some riffing that reminds me of Spirit Caravan's faster stuff during the intro and verse with some shouted call and response chorus vocals.


Nice dirty fuzz tones abound throughout the tracks on both bass and guitar. There could be a little more separation between the bass and the guitar on some parts as the bass pretty much disappears on some of the faster parts where the guitarist is playing chords. A pretty awesome job on the drum recording the drummer really shines throughout all the tracks. I also like the fact that the singing is in Spanish instead of English some non-native speakers force themselves to sing in English and it can be detrimental to the vocal flow the lyrics here are well thought out and the vocal performance is pretty damn solid.

Standout tracks ‘El viaje’, ‘Galopar’. My only real complaint on this debut is there needs to be more solos and leads! The guitar work is great throughout the album but the leads and solos present are all relatively short but really well done and I'd like to see this guy just fucking rip loose more. Bruto's rhythm section is more then tight enough to allow for some serious guitar fireworks. Great first release. Listen and buy below.

Words by: Chris Tedor

You can pick up a copy here


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