Tuesday, December 31, 2024

Cathexis - S/T Demo




    Sometimes you don’t need a plethora of technical riffs and complex arrangements to make a profoundly compelling extreme release. The debut self-titled demo from Cathexis is a prime example of how taking savage crust punk mixed with some ruthless sounding metal elements can lead to a ferocious listening experience. 


    Cathexis is a one-man project that recently put out this debut demo on cassette via RoachLeg Records. The demo is a conjuring of raw punk elements that reminds me a bit of gritty old school crust acts like Amebix and Extreme Noise Terror, but then you also have this deafening primitive metal side that I thought sounded a almost like the early Hellhammer demos. Overall, the music is utterly intense and comes rushing out of the speakers with this supercharged level of adrenaline pumping distorted energy. The vocals paint these haunting and bleak dystopian scenarios as the riffs thunderously chug away. Throughout demo I felt that the music was very consistent sounding, yet the tracks never come across as painfully repetitive, which I would attribute to the feverishly relentless raw energy.


    There are four songs featured on the demo, and all of them are merciless sounding cuts of unapologetic chaos. Upon hearing the opening drum part on the song, “Revulsion,” as well as the guitar chords cutting through the rhythms with such malice, I knew instantly that I was going to be thrown into a maelstrom of ruthless punk/metal aggression. Also, the vocals during the song perfectly match the bellicose sounding instrumental compositions, thus creating a very hostile sounding nightmarish landscape. On the second track, “Xenogenesis,” the mastermind behind this project known as the, Neuromancer, continues to offer up these blistering rudimentary thrash/punk riffs that evoke an old school sound that I feel you hear rarely expressed these days on most modern records. Sometimes over produced releases can take away from what the artist is trying to express, so I'm glad that this demo found a way to preserve the anarchistic and chaotic musical mentality. 



    The third track, “Nightfall,” was a very unique sounding track that featured some sharp sounding chord strikes as well as these science-fiction like noises towards the end. I liked the creativity that went into this track, as the overall recording definitely stood out from the previous two. The final song, “Deadly Reign,” was an utterly abrasive conclusion to an already decimating demo. This track definitely contained some fearsome headbanging riffs and the rough production made for a killer old school sounding extreme piece of music. 


    After listening to this demo from Cathexis, I am eager to hear more given what was presented on each of the four tracks. The raw and unyielding energy that was displayed on this demo can definitely be used to fuel the flames of a future release, so I look forward to that potential creation. To me there are a ton of riffs and musical ideas that can be explored further, which is something most artists should strive for when creating a demo, as it can serve as the beginning of more complete musical vision. In the end, I highly recommend checking out this demo and keeping an eye out for more music from Cathexis. 



Check out the full demo below from the Felopunk Youtube Channel:




RoachLeg Records Bandcamp:

https://roachlegrecords.bandcamp.com/album/demo-27


Cathexis Bandcamp:

https://cathexis646.bandcamp.com/album/demo-2024

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