Hungarian DISKOBRA starts the split. They present 4 songs in the lately quite popular d-beat style. The trio – Kobra (guitars/vocals), Viktor (bass) & Márk (drums) – plays their kind of dirty raw punk music very intensely. Their set of songs runs off extremely quickly. But this is the deal with the aforementioned genre. The sound is also fair. Only the yelling manner of the vocalist seems to me very stressful at times. Anyway, rather good material was achieved by DISKOBRA. On the B-side we have 4 songs delivered by our local d-beaters called DISPLEASE. The duo – Vasya (guitars/vocals/bass) and Zhenya (drums) – dictates a higher tempo in their songs even blast beats are present there. Their repertory reminded me a non-stop rush, which besides the usual d-beat elements included a few short, but really cool, motives coming from the Thrash and Black Metal styles. They also successfully transformed AT THE GATES' famous "Blinded by Fear" song into somewhat new, unheard yet, as it was totally d-beat-alized! Looking forward to hear some more materials from both bands! This cassette comes with a pro-done booklet that features all the lyrics, except the cover song. To order the split, please contact the bands at the links below or Trismus Records at: trismusrecords@gmail.com

Side A of the split contains 2 tracks from the Moscow-located Black Metal-influenced Punk band called КОРЧА. Have to admit, very chaotic sound production they've got. While the first track is more into Black Metal, the second tune shows some ultra plain riffs, which are common for the punk style, but still to me, they play a rather boring music in general. Side B has 2 songs from THE SYMBIOZ, a band that in my opinion is still in search for their own style. Believe me or not, but all their releases stylistically are very different and have elements I would say actual for the period of time they've composed their tracks. In other words, bands and musical styles that had an impact and big influence on the members right then. Thus we can't speak about one exact style in their case. Their music includes ingredients from alternative, hardcore, punk, metal, crust and grindcore genres, just to name a few. Despite all these facts, I really enjoyed listening to their new songs. Plus should also acknowledge their sound became quite good. It is tough, but still all the instruments are audible and come in a crystal clear way. Let's hope their future release will be more focused on creating their kind of own and original style.

The latest EP of Kharkiv-based X-BOX MURDER consists of five well-constructed Black/Death Metal songs. The sound production is quite massive and monumental, being mixed by Luc Ferre at O'O Studio in France. During the 19 minutes of the EP I've bumped into a lot of familiar riffs and atmospheres, mainly they reminded me bands like BEHEMOTH, IMMOLATION and CELESTE. The quintet doesn't stress on originality at all, but have to say their "Обряд" piece impressed me a lot. That tune has a big potential and a very abstract interpretation. I really do hope they will continue to write new songs in that way. The drummers work is also notable. Their songs are filled with a bunch of hyper fast kick drum patterns and solid blasts. The guitars sound pretty raw and a little bit noisy, but thus giving that magic called mood to the whole material. The lyrics are written in Russian language and tell different stories, e.g. about eternal struggles for freedom, misanthropy, exorcism and spiritual experiences. The vocal parts mainly come in the screeching way, but at some places they are doubled with deep growls. In a word, this is a pretty decent EP in my opinion, so if you are into melodic or atmospheric Death/Black Metal, then go and check out X-BOX MURDER's music!