Baal - Shurado

(CD Album Review)

****

Very heavy Cybernetic Industrial!!! makes me smile!!!

Baal is a Japanese Cybernetic heavy Industrial Metal act, strives to create a sense of unlimited energy borne from a powerful living body. The band's sound is created as an original, pure art form, built upon repeated clashes of shattered programming sounds.They have been going for quite a few years now and I sadly hadn't heard that much about them. When I first got this CD I was not sure I was going to like it, the graphics were a computerized devil horned skull with flames. It looked like something you would have seen in a 90's computer graphics for a gore shoot em up.

The album open with what sounds like an emergency "Get the F**K out of Here" alarm, before it breaks into heavy Industrial Metal sounding guitar riffs that almost verge on Slipknot, Mushroomhead or American head Charge for the track 'Purge'. Yes this is a very heavy track, which even has comparisons to Fear Factory in place added with Japanese shouting vocals that could have come out of a Dir en Grey track. I really like this it's J-Metal and it's heavy and really driven at you with a great intensity. 'Chikusyoudo' keeps this pace up but then pushes the button to overdrive which is hit at you with fast drumming beats.

'Dead Sector' has a more Dancey beat to it, added again with distinctive Japanese vocals as it builds up to the beat. When it kicks in with the guitar it get's more Cybernetic which could be mixed with the early sound of The Gazette and a touch of Nu-Metal of bands like Karmic Jera. I love the futuristic heavy vibe of 'Outrage' which is like an injection in your throat of a drug of Industrial Metal, this song is not for the faint hearted. It's lucky I am not the faint hearted and I love this kind of music. 'Evil Collector' starts off with riffs that Static-X would be happy with, before it launches into a cinematic Dance / Metal chaotic track. This it's just one in your face collection of riffs, with the vocals straight in your face again. 'Tokyo Schizoid' is very similar to the track before, while 'Awake' is very 90's Metal and probably took influences from Pantera.

The beats of 'The Iron Age' are big and the vocals are crazy and would be a killer live track. The only problem I have with at this point in the album some of the tracks are getting a little similar, but they are still heavy and in your face. The album ends on two of the most different tracks and two of my favourites 'Inhuman Dimension' and 'Jado Genocide' which both
end the album in a memorable way. This is a great album and I will listen to it more, some people would find this a real hard listen because it isn't for people of a nervous disposition and it might make you irritable and on edge. But I would say that is what Baal wanted when they made the record. Cybernetic Industrial Metal is going to be big in the next few years and I think Baal will be an act that will help it get bigger.

Review by Dan Devour