E.P. Review: Sickrecy - First World Anxiety
Reviewed by Dan Barnes
Just in case Cannibal Corpse thought that they were going to romp unopposed to the Death Metal title in 2021, along comes Sickrecy, debut E.P. in hand and a hold-my-beer kinda swagger. Formed by members of Birdflesh, General Surgery, World in Ruins and Damned to Downfall, it’s abundantly clear that First World Anxiety is the product of experienced hands, well used to crafting such a deliciously diabolic noise.
Infused throughout the six tracks on the record is a masterly understanding of old school death metal and, although Sickrecy call Sweden home, they aren’t some At The Gates copyists. Instead, their riffs are fast, extreme and chaotic, injected with the (un)healthy doses of crust punk and a Discharge-style hardcore.
With this quality DNA coursing through the collective veins you would (and should) expect a barrage of blistering speed and brute force trauma from the very beginning. With less than seventeen minutes with which to pound you into submission, Sickrecy waste no time laying brutal riff on top of brutal riff, all augmented by Adde Mitroulis’ guttural growls. Man’s the Leech features some precision guitar work from Marcus Dahl as he goes about building with some surprisingly clean tones.
Those clean chords can be heard again within the parameters of I Am Paty’s neck-snapping tempo and bleeding-throat vocal. Martin Eriksson does double-duties and locks down both drums and bass tighter than your boss at pay-review.
The title track teases the possibility of groove, only to have it cruelly snatched away in a frenzy of high BPM drumming and a crisp solo.
The E.P.’s most accessible track, Banner of Contempt, sees the groove enter with a vengeance. The sharp riffs and machine-gun guitar oversees a song that swings like a recently divorced nymphomaniac.
Liberty is a return to the earlier chaos and spat vocals, conjuring images of a packed pit and air-bourn bodies, whereas Last in Line (sadly not a Dio cover) is a less accessible and more guttural groove-number with a touch of the Tardy-vocals.
With the track records of those involved, First World Anxiety was never going to be a pop release; but the determination to deliver the most fearsome riffs imaginable feeds the ethos of Sickrecy and allows them to create a monumentally weighty prologue ahead of a promised full-length album.
