Enemy Soil

Cool to see this EP get a reissue, as Virginia’s Enemy Soil blew my mind wide open with these five songs, recorded back in 1994. Combining crazy drum machine grind, political lyrics and an energetic and memorable crust/grind sound, this band — members of which can now be found in Drugs of Faith — were creating something new and vital in extreme metal’s underground so many years ago. And it still sounds vital and enjoyable today, because, really, no band have captured what these guys did. Agoraphobic Nosebleed’s J. Randall agrees, as he wrote some glowing liner notes for this release. A few bonus tracks round this collection out but it still clocks in at nine songs and a mere 16 minutes, which is perfect for music of this calibre. This is essential not only as a piece of extreme metal history and a document of a great time in the underground but because it still sounds better than a lot of modern grindcore.