Flub – Dream Worlds

I’ve enjoyed Flub quite a lot when they dropped their self-titled debut release. But it’s been a 4-year gap since then, in which I’ve had the time to be bombarded by tons of gnarly albums and artists ranging all across the extreme metal spectrum, although technical and progressive death metal still seem to remain the main preference for me. Having been through all that, I was quite curious to see whether the new EP “Dream Worlds” would still be able to strike me as strongly as the debut.

To be honest, it’s not the most impressive tech-death release, at least not at first glance. But I think the length might have to do with that more than the content. Because a lot of things I enjoyed are still there, and as far as I can tell, they’re delivered to the same level of quality. The band is undoubtedly skilled when it comes to the technical performance of each member. The songs are incredibly fast, heavy, and dynamic, and I feel they strike a nice balance between what the old-school death metal fan and the more modern prog and tech-death oriented types would enjoy. They managed to do that through a well-executed mix which puts the sound quality slightly lower on the clean production spectrum, allowing it to sound more organic, filthy and gnarly. Vocalist Michael Alvarez sure plays a huge part in that with his very filthy vocal texture falling somewhere in between what you hear in raw death metal and what you hear in deathcore. He can hit the low growls as well as some high, spewy screams and he does it all with a particularly nasty edge. The technique is clearly noticeable and the frequency of syllables he can churn out on certain passages is truly amazing.

Flub – Leaves of Gold

The instrumentalists aren’t exactly slacking either. The drum performance displays some furious blasting and intertwines the machine gun delivery with sick, head-bangable grooves as well as more wobbly, chaotic sections. The modern tech-death aspects come through strongly on the bass and guitar performances. The riffs are often sliced or very dynamic, which creates a very infectious and groovy effect, and some lead melody is almost always present. Guitarist Eloy Montes knows how to hit the right balance between aggression and melody and he also steals the spotlight on a couple of moments. The guitar solo on the closing track, ‘The Wasteland’ and some of the clean guitar parts sure made his performance stand out from the drilling heaviness of the overall soundscape. Same applies to Andrew Kim’s bass delivery, which is mostly rumbling along with the riffage but also jumps forward with some fluid runs for a few brief moments, and is also given some time to breathe when the guitars go silent (check out ‘Leaves of Gold’). Another moment I really enjoyed was the playful and groovy guitar and drum kick-off to ‘Paracosm’.

Flub – Paracosm

On top of the full death metal mix, there is also a layer of orchestration. It is by no means overbearing and dwells in the background for the most part, setting a dark, mysterious and creepy tone which allows the music to sound much more serious, despite the fact that for the most part, I actually found the melodies and grooves to be quite a lot of fun. Overall, Flub haven’t lost their edge and they continue to deliver high-quality melodic tech-death with a sound unique enough to avoid becoming a cliché. The main problem with this release has to be the length. With only 4 songs revolving around the 3-minute mark, it’s done before you really start to get into it. The positive part to that is that you can always hit repeat. So, I suggest you check this one out! After all they packed so many notes in these songs that you might as well think their 13 minutes are a compressed half an hour!

Track List:

1. Leaves of Gold (03:35)
2. In Soil Sleeps Secrets (03:16)
3. Paracosm (03:36)
4. The Wasteland (02:54)