Brought to fruition by 7 Degrees Records, Handshake Inc., and Nerve Altar, Collaboration sees Finland's Haapoja and Greece's Dephosphorus joining forces for a half-hour split LP—upon which the bands exchange vocalists for the first track on each side of the record.
This is my first exposure to Haapoja—who released a demo and a full-length prior—and their four songs/12 minutes dish out an interesting amalgam of what you could call an odd form of grinding metallic hardcore/punk tinted with that cold, creeping black metal aesthetic in some of its dissonantly arpeggiated runs. The bulk of the compositions center around midpaced to moderately fast note-based riffs that feel like they're winding around in discordant circles, while the percussion occasionally doubles up into high-speed blasts. The scathingly fierce, lightly distorted vocals fall in the upper midrange and fight their way forward in front of the guitars.
On rare occasion they'll break into some quick fits of tremolo picking (see "Pakon Sanelema," especially), but nothing about their songwriting sounds commonplace. It's quite intriguing the way the riffs pretty much never stop: they're more or less constantly cycling back and forth, up and down, across, and around for two to three minutes per track. And, as mentioned, "We See With Teeth (Κοιτάμε Με Τα Δόντια)," features vocals from Dephosphorus' Panos Agoros (with lyrics from a Miltos Sahtouris poem).
The dry, rugged recording works well for their style, but does leave a definite lack of bass. At least to my ears, it's hard to pick out the basslines, so it feels like there's a gap in the core of the mix. That being said, this really grants a lot of texture and breathing room to the dirty guitar tone, and also highlights the ferocity of the vocals—whose lyrics are in Finnish, and seem to deal with dark, angry, pessimistic, "weight of the world" types of themes.
Inexplicably, I haven't kept up with Dephosphorus since their earliest releases. Here, opener "Aika" features Haapoja's Jyri Kuukasjärvi on vocals, who carries the Finnish lyrics with him. The frantic intensity of his vocal style actually stands out a bit more against Dephosphorus' thicker and less wildly chaotic grooves, too. "Shades of Reality," a tribute to Slayer's Jeff Hanneman, also features a guitar solo from Haapoja's Pekka Kivelä—not to mention a more hardcore oriented vocal approach. The tune is structurally similar to Slayer at points, as well—somewhat reminiscent of tracks like "At Dawn They Sleep."
Otherwise, the group's five tracks/18 minutes continue to forge their path of self-described "astrogrind," which, of course, should not be confused with textbook grindcore (check out the droning, melodic intro to "An Eerie Transmission," for example). They are, however, a perfect pairing with Haapoja. Both have similar vocal styles, peculiarly winding riffs that occasionally flirt with the crawling dissonance of black metal, etc. Dephosphorus, though, tends to spice up the tempos more often, easing in slow to midpaced breaks and thus coming across a bit heavier, with drumming that's a little more robust and ever-changing.
The production, too, lacks emphasis on discernible basslines, but certainly feels fuller and heavier. There's also much more separation between the vocals and the music. Lyrically abstract, the astral concepts certainly put the "astro" in "astrogrind":
Thick nebulas of facts
Indomitable void
Existential agony
Cut through gordian knots
Borrowing short cuts
Crossing abysmal chasms of ignorance
I haven't seen the packaging, but apparently the LP "comes with a lyrics insert printed on gorgeous cardstock, with reverse board/uncoated paper jackets," so I imagine it looks and feels quite nice. Vinyl junkies rejoice!
All in all, Collaboration is a nice split between two curious and surprisingly comparable acts that each share a slice of their own little world, while still remaining unique and independent from one another.
Get It
- 7 Degrees Records (LP)
- Handshake Inc. (LP/mp3)
- Nerve Altar (LP)
- Haapoja (mp3)
- Dephosphorus (mp3)
