Band – Feed Them Death
Album – The Malady
Country of Origin – UK/Italy
Genre – Avant Garde Grindcore
Release Date – May 23, 2024
Label – Brucia Records
Author – Hayduke X
It is with great pleasure that I introduce to you Panopticism II, the first pre-release single from “The Malady” by Feed Them Death. The track is riveting, driving into the listeners psyche with power and punch. I’ll let Void’s own words speak, while you press play, but do drop below for my full album review:
Panopticism II is of course a hint to a previous album, but even more so an attempt to summarize, both musically and lyrically, what I already tried to convey in the past.
Far from attributing convicts and guards, slaves and lords the same identical weight – the lyrics actually de-legitimise the supposed moral authority of dominant roles within our society, stripping them of merit and placing them against the backdrop of fate.
In this sense, yes we are still those who are “controlled,” but those who control us are equally just part of a higher design set to create and maintain a dichotomy that is functional to the smooth run of a consumerist society.
Back in March of 2020, I first covered the then-solo avant-grind project Feed Them Death with an interview and review leading up to “Panopticism: Belong/Be Lost,” the sophomore release under the moniker. You can go back to read that here. In October of 2020, Void and I experimented with a dual post about his “For Our Culpable Dead” EP, with him having some column space to share his thoughts, followed by a more traditional review by yours truly. You can read that here. March of 2021 brought my review of FTD’s third full length “Negative,” which you can read here. Over a similar span of time, I also began working with Brucia Records, a small Italian label run by Void and Derhead. I’ve even chosen a Brucia Records release (“Dissolution to Salt and Bone” by The Sun and The Mirror – 2021) as my album of the year.
All of this is to say that I’ve gotten to know Void quite well since 2020, so I was thrilled when I was offered the opportunity to help launch the release of “The Malady” with this review and track stream (also available on the label’s Bandcamp page). While I have written much in the past about the wonderfully difficult sound which defines Feed Them Death, there have been a couple of changes. First, the project is no longer a solo endeavor. Joining Void (vocals, bass, lo-fi guitars, noise, piano) are DaviDeath (Cogas) on guitars and Nigel “Nige” Coleman (Tannhauser Krieg on drums. The results speak for themselves.
Feed Them Death as a trio remains a monstrosity of angular riffs and stuttering rhythms. “The Malady” is still clearly an FTD release. However, whether because of the growth into a trio, leading to collaboration, or simply due to a decision for a small change of direction, the sound is more organic, easier to picture as a live possibility. (Indeed, I hope FTD live is a real possibility…and we’d love to see them in Michigan). This particular album contains a very noticeable old school hardcore punk influence, which this old thrash-punk finds as a delightful development. To be sure, the album is still avant garde and strange, engaging as always, but also off-putting as always. There is a little more to hook onto if you’re a fan of 80s hardcore and crossover though. You will find hints of familiarity across these eleven tracks.
Before wrapping up, Void has some thoughts to share on the album as well:
In a wider sense, the underlying message of “The Malady” as a whole is only apparently bleak: the two hands in the artwork cover can be stretched to protect ourselves from a collapsing world, or it could be us that, like Sysiphus – keep pushing a heavy boulder up the hillI: our fate is not in our hand, but how we decide to approach life, that most certainly is.
We use here a vast spectrum of counter (sub?) cultural references to tackle themes such as guilt, suffering and hate, but by stating that people are the malady we also intend to offer a solution: people can be the cure, provided that they act with an understanding of what a real rebellion should be. Not retribution, not a new order, but a revolution of the soul.
Winning is unimportant in this sense: tumult is the only thing aglow.
“The Malady,” as Void suggests above, speaks to the many problems within the modern world, but also speaks to solutions for those problems. I find this very fitting, given the addition of the more noticeable hardcore punk influence, as so much of that scene contained a kernel of hope for change within it. The scene I grew up with certainly pointed out many, many flaws in society, and with righteous fury, but there was always that hope. On “The Malady,” Feed Them Death has re-ignited that passion. The album is visceral and difficult to be sure, but also a brilliant Trojan horse for potential. I predict this album with show up again in my writings (as will the project, so long as they keep making music).
Biography: Hayduke X has been writing for MoshPitNation since June of 2016. He is also a contributor to The Metal Wanderlust. Prior to joining the MoshPitNation team, Hayduke published reviews on his own blog Rage and Frustration. In addition, he has DJ’ed an online metal radio show of the same name as his blog, written for TOmetal.com, done interviews for Metal Rules, and collaborated with The Art of B Productions to create video interviews with a wide variety of bands.
