Blast Rites: Trucido – A Collection Of Self-Destruction Review

If you’re reading a grindcore column, then you should already know (or at least be aware of) Texas tech-grinders Cognizant – if you aren’t, then take some time after you finish this to get right with the world.

Aside from that awesome pun about being aware of Cognizant (so good, I’ve used it twice here, and once in another review), I bring that other band up because forty percent of them makes up fifty percent of Trucido, in the personages of drummer Bryan “Man Of A Thousand Grind Bands” Fajardo and guitarist Irving Lopez. Here, those two are augmented by bassist Eduardo Hoyos and vocalist Alejandro Ramirez. Aside from the membership overlap and a mutual high-level of grinding quality, however, Trucido stands on its own, not all that comparable to its elder cousin.

The biggest difference between the two stands in the generally more straightforward approach that Trucido utilizes. Whereas Cognizant’s dueling guitars are intricately interwoven, its arrangements more technical, Trucido takes a more blunt approach. Lopez chunks and thrashes through punishing riffs, offset with the occasional squeal or skronk for color – and with a handful of twisting turns for flair – but mostly, he’s here not as much to cut you up and bend your brain, as simply to beat you down. He churns out a quick series of skullpunches per song, and moves along to the next.

Fajardo’s beats are typically blistering, his drums given a live and punchy sound, not overly slick or processed, and one that adds a certain welcome rawness to the whole affair. Ramirez’ growl switches between a lower guttural and a higher scream, for the most part, with occasional forays into a more intelligible midrange bellow – almost none of it is intelligible, as you’d expect, but the points it makes are in the shades of rage it adds to Trucido’s already potent mixture, swaths of blinding red atop the fire.

Most of A Collection Of Self-Destruction whizzes by in a blur of bashing beats and screams, but there are some notable moments that poke their heads above the chaos. On “Leaky Gut,” the guitar and bass alternate between a spinning faster riff and a sludgy palm-muted trudge, with Fajardo never letting up beneath, a crushing hook, simple and yet ever so effective. “Tokyo Grind” gets almost technical, with some slippery riffage throughout, with an ascending tremolo-picked slide so good it gets borrowed twice again, for “Hate Spreader” and “Torcido,” which also sports a killer rubber-band-spastic riff at the :24 point. (You’ll know what I mean when you push play down there.)

Released back in June, with the band themselves being only a year old now, Trucido’s first demo was a grand grinding start, and it certainly didn’t take long for them to make good on the promise it showed. (Only two of the demo’s four songs made the final cut here, if you’re up for celebrating their entire catalog.) A marked improvement in every manner, from production to performance to songwriting, A Collection Of Self-Destruction is one hell of a big bang, from front to back – fourteen songs in fifteen minutes, just as it should be. Grinders take note… or rather, be aware.