HAMMERS are a group of musicians hailing from Manchester with an original approach to creating brutal crust-laden hardcore. I wanted to include 'metal' in the synopsis, but as soon as I use the words hardcore and metal together my whole body cringes. It is crusty in that it projects gritty bass, low guttural voice and stampeding tempos.. all driven along in an adventurous early Dischord-era style where technical prowess and unpredictable structures aren't sneered upon.
The first track 'Casting Spells' oozes dark feedback(y) mess all over my ears, before spitting out a pristine sounding riff that instantly cuts through the layers of vicious feedback...From black metal to early Baroness in the flip of a switch. The titles of this album almost remind me of the chapter names of some prophetic book out of the middle ages; encouraging a bewildered sense of awe. A similar feeling most have experienced through attempting to read 'Dante's Inferno' when they were 17...intriguing nevertheless.
The kind of head-nodding (cause there are 'kinds') it gets out of me is a kind of blend between the focused jarring approach induced by math rock and the head-down-to-the-ground shake techniques regularly seen at your local thrash gig. Its easy to say Hammers envelop many styles in their music, it is hard to determine exactly how due to the fluency of it. A track that sticks out to me lasts a timely :23 secs named 'Endoteric'. Mainly because I have a great big mushy soft spot for grimy doom but secondly for that chord at the end of the riff; sounds like an orchestra of electric bass guitars all playing the same note in a massive expansive auditorium.
