Meatwound... what a fucking name. It could either be a butcher's term of art or a tactless way of describing a condition that will require half a dozen stitches and a trip to the ER... in either case, it's most certainly a name befitting a sludgy hardcore band out of Florida. Meatwound haven't been particularly active since 2019, but that was a big year for them, so I suppose they've earned a vacay (or a dirt nap). Why was it so eventful? Well, it's the year they released their most ambitious album to date,
Cularo, a menacing slab of boggy, strong-arming putrescence that will slap across your soon-to-be bruised, fat little cherub cheeks like it was made to order.
Culero (“coward” en español, but can mean much worse things based on the context) is slightly more atmospheric than their 2017 LP
Largo, but maintains the sludgy, Helmet meets Unsane strain of punk the band has cultivated since 2015's
Addio. Heavy, caustic, unbalanced hardcore with deliberate and dynamic rhythms and concrete cracking beats, their sound on this LP is not quite as methodical as Fistula, and not nearly as adventurous as Unwound, but manages to be just potent and weighty as the former and exciting in execution as the latter. This freshly elected atmospheric direction the band has taken to slithering down is best exhibited on the acid mist psychedelic organ-driven odyssey of “Elder,” which introduces some Hawkwind-esque space rock explorations to the group's spiteful oeuvre. Dummy-hard haymakers like opener “Void Center” and the doomy downpour of “Fist of God” deliver the punishing gooey noise-core the band is best known for, while closer “...In the Fields with the Beasts” leans towards surging fast-core with lyrics liberally (and lovingly) cribs from the works of Ray Bradbury.
No matter where you find yourself in the claustrophobic grooves of Culero's interior, there is nowhere to run and even fewer places to hide from Meatwound's flesh-scaring fury.
