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THE REVIEW
If you are looking for neatly arranged albums with crystal-clear production, this record probably isn’t for you, and you likely won’t agree with the content of this review. But if you love chaos, extremely lo-fi productions and the Italian underground, then this is exactly what you’re looking for. Cripple Bastards are a band formed in Asti in 1988, a year after the release of Scum by Napalm Death, an album from which—perhaps not explicitly, but still undeniably—they drew generous inspiration.
Grindcore isn’t a genre that calls for complex song structures, nor does it care for conventional song lengths or promotional singles; this Your Lies In Check, the debut album of the band from Piedmont, fully lives up to what was just stated, packing a whopping 69 tracks into a total of 48 minutes. Yes, that’s right—with an average song length under one minute, here we have an almost total musical outburst and anarchy; if Giulio The Bastard’s vocals and Alberto The Crippler’s buzzing guitar (with such a dreadful sound that, by comparison, Transylvanian Hunger by Darkthrone is Dark Side Of The Moon) are not enough to fuel this “organized disorder,” just take the song titles. “Italia Di Merda”, “Nichilismo Ampliato”, “Images Of War/Images Of Pain”, “Polizia, Una Razza Da Estinguere” are some of the most notable ones; this immediately tells us the musical intent of these guys: they were certainly not aiming for profound and poetic lyrics like Guccini or De André, but in their own way, these lyrics have a message to spread, one that oozes the rage of the society they grew up in; nihilism, a will to destroy, and repressed hatred are the main ingredients of this album and of their forthcoming discography. The outbursts in the titles and lyrics are not characterized by a specific political identity, as was the case for many other groups in the Italian hardcore punk scene of that era, but rather by a generalized stance against society and the establishment itself. Among the tracks most attentive to social issues, in “Padroni” we find an outcry against the world of work and Italian entrepreneurship, and it’s also interesting to note the presence of covers, reinterpreted in their own way, of historic rock songs such as “We Can Work It Out” by the Beatles and “21th Century Schizoid Man” by King Crimson, showing that behind all this chaos and misanthropy there is nonetheless a certain musical culture.
As previously mentioned, the production on this debut album of theirs is extremely bare-bones, to the point where some tracks are even mixed in mono; we probably have demos from other bands with much better audio quality available, but this is what Cripple Bastards are: take it or leave it. The albums that followed marked a step forward towards a more structured and better-produced sound (so to speak—after all, it’s still grindcore), right up to their last studio album in chronological order, where we find more death metal-influenced sonorities and audio production; however, for me, and I believe for many others, I like to appreciate works for their purpose even before their sound impact, and therefore I consider this record a fundamental debut album for the Italian underground.
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Summary by Bot
The review highlights the relentless energy and aggression of Cripple Bastards' 'Your Lies in Check.' The album stands out in the grindcore scene for its intensity and raw sound. The reviewer appreciates the uncompromising style and fast-paced tracks. Fans of extreme metal and grindcore will find this record both authentic and powerful. It is recommended for those seeking an unfiltered musical experience.Tracklist Videos
02 Without a Shadow of Justice (00:22)
03 Prejudices and Walls (00:37)
04 Images of War / Images of Pain (01:21)
05 Imposed Mortification (00:17)
06 Prospettive limitate (01:04)
07 Intelligence Means... (00:19)
08 Disagreeable Selections (00:44)
09 Caught in Your Silence (01:39)
10 Prisons (00:26)
11 Irenic (00:12)
12 September, 18th 1993 (00:53)
13 A dispetto della discrezione (00:05)
14 Watching Through My Chaos (00:59)
15 Newscast Slave (00:08)
16 Round Table (00:17)
18 The Outside World (00:17)
19 My Mind Invades (01:07)
20 Danas Je Dan Za Lijencine (01:28)
21 More Frustrations (00:35)
23 Ghiacciaio (00:09)
24 What I Thought (00:44)
25 Negative Fractures (00:46)
26 Ratings (00:53)
27 Paranoiac (01:15)
28 Frightened/Neglected (00:26)
30 Milicija Die (00:15)
31 Walk Away (00:45)
32 Nichilismo ampliato (00:05)
33 Vital Dreams (01:35)
34 Blue Penguins (00:09)
35 Bonds of Enmity (00:42)
36 Ragman (01:29)
37 Windows (00:04)
38 Rending Aphthous Fevers (00:07)
39 Bane (01:16)
40 Living Monuments (00:22)
41 War Spoils (00:26)
42 We Can Work It Out (01:27)
43 Self-Justice Punks (00:39)
44 Incorporated Grave (00:11)
45 D.S.S. (Double Scented Shit) (00:10)
46 Sexist Society... Must Destroy It! (01:39)
47 The Last Shipwrecked (00:05)
48 Intransigent Simpathy (00:11)
49 Polizia, una razza da estinguere (00:49)
50 Cormorant (00:08)
51 Life in General (00:23)
52 Hydrophobic Web (01:23)
53 Padroni (00:46)
54 Useful/Useless (00:21)
55 More Restrictions. Why? (00:40)
56 Miniaturized Eden (00:23)
57 Something Wrong (00:12)
58 21st Century Schizoid Man (01:59)
59 Devozioni? (00:34)
60 Nothing on Earth (01:29)
61 Invito alla riservatezza/ (00:09)
62 Come é falso Dio (00:04)
63 Radije Volim... (01:08)
64 S.L.U.T.S. (00:18)
65 Grimcorpses (00:45)
66 Offensive Death (00:14)
67 My Serenity/ (00:58)
68 Dealing With a Pressing Problem (01:00)
69 Necrospore (00:11)
Cripple Bastards
Cripple Bastards are an Italian grindcore band formed in Asti in 1988 by Giulio The Bastard and Alberto The Crippler. Known for ultra-short songs, provocative lyrics in Italian/English/Croatian and a ferocious live presence, they’ve released landmark records including Misantropo a senso unico, Desperately Insensitive, Variante alla morte and Nero in metastasi.09 Reviews
