The Psyke Project – Guillotine

”Something is rotten in the state of Denmark” is one of the most famous quotes on Hamlet play by Shakespare, spoken by Marcellus and meaning that Denmark was a morally and politically corrupted place. The band Illdisposed from Aarhus, Denmark have released the album ”There Is Something Rotten In The State Of Denmark” in 1997 as a tribute to this quote. The Psyke Project come from Denmark’s capital Copenhagen and release their fourth full-length album with the punishing title ”Guillotine”, with a cover that brings you the chills and with eleven tracks of filthy noisy heavy music that will make you feel very uneasy.

It seems like this album was done to declare the quote above, as the Danes break the silence of four years since their latest marvellous jewel entitled ”Dead Storm”, which succeeded another great album like 2007 release ”Apnea”. Compared to these two albums which made me a fan of the band, ”Guillotine” contains a great variety of rhythms, from hardcore and crust/punk parts, to some black metal riffing here and there and the sludgy post hardcore influences hailing from bands like Neurosis to neighbours Cult Of Luna from Sweden. The title track is a heavy battering ram which is crawling to demolish the doors to the ears of untrained listeners.

Followed by two three-minute smashers like ”Death Sight” and ”The End”, you can’t help but feeling the negativity pouring from the album. Martin Nielskov screams his guts out, the production by Jacob Bredahl (ex Hatesphere vocalist) makes the final outcome even bleaker and grey, this shows a lot on ”Partisan”, a track of gargantuan heaviness which the band chose to stream as a first sample of the album. It makes you put your head down and think a while of things you take for granted in life and maybe you value more what could happen if tables turn and you are in a difficult position in the future, sooner or later.

The album isn’t tiring despite its form and atmosphere, as it lasts only 39 minutes, a lot of help comes to this because of the two short tracks ”The Mute” and ”When Man Became God” which serve more as interludes to calm the atmosphere a bit (if you can call this the calm after the dead storm, to paraphrase their previous album’s title). The fact that the final and longest track ”Menneske” is also the most cleansing one because the album ends, and then again you want to listen to it again (like you weren’t caught by the balls already) makes this opposition another great reason to dig this monster to its depths.

It took them four years (two if we count the Ebola split) to make a new album, but The Psyke Project (TPP for the diehards) made another great album. I personally expected something more, because of their two previous masterpieces. The final rating comes clearly compared to their rest discography -”Samara” (2003), ”Daikini” (2005), ”Apnea” (2007) and ”Dead Storm” (2009)- but if you listen to them for the first time, you may add half, one or even two grades more on the final rating. None will blame you and you count one more new favourite band to the endless catalogue of quality music that keeps on being released from the Scandinavian peninsula.

P.S.: The cry ”We pray for something that may never happen” on ”Partisan” is dangerously addictable, you have been warned in any case!