On a day packed with so many mammoth releases, it’s far too easy for the efforts of smaller bands to get lost among your Sleeps and your Behemoths and your Rebecca Blacks (in all seriousness, that last one is brilliant and well worth checking out), but that’s why this site exists, isn’t it? Case in point – Distill. The Edinburgh-based two-piece have quietly dropped their debut EP Válto z Djepas and in ten brief but eventful minutes they have squeezed in some of the rawest, filthiest d-beat and grind to come from these fair isles.
Comprising just bass guitar and drums, their sound is sparse but has a sense of malevolence and violence, with much of this coming down to Apostolos’ grimy bass tone, a gravelly death rattle of a sound that prowls through these fifteen songs with the focus of an apex predator. Keeping a largely steady pace throughout, it falls on Alex’s energetic drumming to set the pace, switching up d-beats, blastbeats and a steady mid-paced swagger while the two trade growls and bellows. Chuck in a few choice samples, including Spoon’s immortal last words from Dog Soldiers on the brilliantly titled ‘Lucy Was A Lycanthropunk’ and you’re already starting to see what makes this EP stand out.
In grand grind tradition, the focus is largely on delivering maximum impact in the briefest amount of time, with the shortest offering (‘Tsipouro Power’ at 17 seconds) a sharp blast of blunt-force percussion and only the faintest thrum of Apsotolos’ bass; at the other end of the spectrum is ‘Lucy, I’ve Been Nuked!’, the only song to exceed the one minute mark with much of its time dedicated to a simmering bass groove that gradually rises to a boil. Though the lyrics occasionally amount to little more than the song title growled and/or barked at the listener (especially noteworthy in the case of ‘Haggis, Nips and Titties’) it’s an effective tactic that seems perfectly in tune with their uncluttered approach to basically everything.
In short, this is grindcore taken right back to its punk roots – confrontational, irreverent and with a skipload of go-down-swinging gusto crammed into its minuscule runtime. Perfect for when you need an aural kick in the head to start off your day or get you through that next Teams call, hopefully this is the start of something massive.
