Wax Moth
Spiracle
Mannequin Rein Recordings
waxmoth.bandcamp.com
The debut EP, Spiracle, from Iowa City metal outfit Wax Moth is nearly relentless. Starting with the feedback and initial kicks of “Colony Collapse” till the two-minute mark of the sixth and final cut, “Of Dust and Lung,” there’s barely a moment to breath during the pummeling this quartet doles out.
“Colony Collapse” and “Drones” open the album revved up into fifth gear. Once you get past Brian Schneider’s imposing wails and bellows, the drum work of Brad Nordling is the real drive shaft. Nordling fills any gap between riffs from guitarist Brian Barr and bass player J.D. Woodell with double bass drum kicks and crash cymbal-cracking smacks. When Wax Moth is barreling along, it’s almost impossible to hear anything but Nordling’s drums plead for mercy.
That’s not to say Spiracle is a constant barrage of swift kicks to the skull, EP standout “Suborder” down shifts from the license-revoking speeds of the first two cuts. The third track kicks off with the EPs first real head banging groove (everything else up to now would snap a normal human’s neck). The more restrained pace on “Suborder” also showcases the mammoth riff work of Barr and Woodell. When instruments sink into a groove under Schneider’s growls, Wax Moth isn’t just blistering and violent, the group becomes ominous and truly frightening.
After the respite of “Suborder,” Wax Moth are burning rubber again on “Advocates of Robbery” and “Insects of the Wind.” The album’s closing track, “Of Dust and Lung,” is Spiracle’s strongest. The first two minutes shift from a crusty, hardcore attack to the bombastic, grandiose theatrics of death metal; then an about-face back to the pell-mell hardcore slam, before collapsing under the weight of its own attack into a doomy dirge. By the third minute, as the dirge crawls to a halt, a wave of feedback and noise crashes over top. Spiracle spends its final minutes in a haze of distortion and looped sound effects.
