Waiting for the Flies
Label: Blind Prophecy
Length: LP
Rated: NONE
Media: CD
Format: Album
WorkNameSort: Waiting for the Flies
For more than a decade, Pain Principle has been thrashing around the Orlando metal scene, gathering up a rabid following of fans who appreciate the band’s intense, modern take on golden-era thrash metal. With their first international release, Waiting for the Flies, the group finally has a chance to prove to the rest of the world what Orlando metalheads have known for quite some time: They’re one of very few bands that can live up to Central Florida’s reputation as an American metal hotbed. With a vision of metal that involves considerable doses of hardcore speed and rumbling, low-end aggression, Pain Principle nonetheless bears little resemblance to the death-metal forefathers that defined the Florida sound. Instead, their attack more resembles the revved-up revisionism of bands like Entombed, with all the visceral wallop implied by that comparison.
Thankfully, Waiting more than captures their energy and heaviness; the production job by Hate Eternal’s Erik Rutan (who also worked the boards for Cannibal Corpse’s most recent disc) is thick, angry and spacious. The nine songs (and obligatory instrumental intro) on the disc are tightly composed and brutally effective. If you only know one thing about this album, know that, according to the liner notes, “No pointy guitars were used.” That about says it all.
Pain Principle plays the Haven 9 p.m. Friday, Nov. 16, 2007.
This article appears in Nov 14-20, 2007.