Album Review: Warbrain - Void Of Confusion

18 July 2013 | 5:26 pm | Mark Hebblewhite

This thing is an absolute monster: killer riffs, uncompromising lyrics and attitude up the wazoo – even the cover art is stunning.

There's something in the water at the moment – well at least the H2O being consumed by members of Australia's punk and hardcore community. Veterans like Toe To Toe and Mindsnare are tearing up venues across the country, Vigilante, Outsiders Code, Cold Ground and Rust Proof have dropped superb new efforts and the likes of Higher Power and Hostile Objects have unleashed highly promising demos. As if this wasn't enough, Melbourne's Warbrain have gone and created one of the best things heard all year with their debut LP, Void Of Confusion. This thing is an absolute monster: killer riffs, uncompromising lyrics and attitude up the wazoo – even the cover art is stunning.

Featuring members of Iron Mind and Carpathian, the quintet take their musical cues from across the board, with echoes of Slayer, Throwdown, Madball, Sacred Reich and Terror (and on the second half of the record the skin-crawling cerebral stylings of Dwid and the Holy Terror movement) in their brutal sound. Suffice to say there's not a weak moment on the LP. From the opening strains of the frantic Forced, right through to the unrelenting chug of album closer, Scarred, this is the rarest of commodities – an album that manages to fully engage your interest and refuses to let go. I'm not going to bother listing the highlights here – quite frankly I'd have to describe all 12 tracks. Instead I'll just say this – if you have any interest in hardcore you owe it to yourself to check out this record – it's as good (if not better) than anything on the international stage and an indicator of just how accomplished the local hardcore scene has become.