Yellowtooth – S/T – CDEP 2008

No ArtworkYellowtooth come growling and gurning out of Michigan City, Indiana, ripping out down-tuned metal-doom with a real spicy Southern flavour (although they’re kind of from the Mid-West). Surly Hoosiers Henry on guitar, Ed on drums and Peter on bass and vocals all look like brutish inbred rednecks. Don’t be fooled, they could be gay primary school teachers, but I’d like to think they’re beer sodden ice-road truckers.

Track one ‘Is It Something I Said?’ kicks off with a great big bloody bass riff the like of which Dave ‘Dixie’ Collins oft churns out, plus whining feedback – a well worn stylistic technique that one never tires of. All the usual ingredients are here: the drop tuning; the hoarse smoke-damaged throat; the heavy coiling riffs; the pounding drums. At first listen, Yellowtooth strike me as a more metal version of Weedeater. I can definitely hear Down in there too (particularly on the second track ‘Smile In Disgust’), and most certainly Buzzoven. The low sound quality is typical old-school demo (once described succinctly by a certain punk-zine writer as ‘bumblebee in a matchbox’), so it would be good to hear something that is a bit better recorded. We all have to start somewhere I suppose.

‘John Wilkes Booth’ chugs along in a brutally bouncy fashion and shows just how well Yellowtooth can groove. They’ve certainly got the swamp-rock rhythm nailed with last track ‘Prophetic Ramblings’, which has a real NOLA type taste to it and belts along like a small beast having a fit until it just cuts off. Is this intentional? Overall verdict – this is promising enough although nothing new. One criticism – I think Yellowtooth wear their influences a little too obviously on their sleeves and need to develop their own sound. It’s a savage pre-Jurassic landscape of sludge out there in dimension myspace – a world of a thousand underground metal outfits, and only a quality handful of vicious predators survive for any length of time. Rrrooooaaaaarrrr.

Label: Self Released
Website: www.myspace.com/yellowtoothmc

Scribed by: Adam Stone