Torture Chain [2012] Time Is but a Doorway to the Incinerator

Hailing from somewhere in the United States, Torture Chain is a (possibly solo) USBM outfit that breaks past the raw shitty stereotypes that comes with USBM and completely destroys. Acting as the band's fifth demo release, Time Is but a Doorway to the Incinerator is a 21 minute track of pure chaotic evil, and while I have yet to explore this group's back cataloge, from what little researching I've done it seems like this band has yet to release a bad demo. But enough talk, does it make Satan's balls explode?

The simple answer is YES. Starting off with a score from The Thing, the orchestral buildup is beyond intense and as soon as the music hits you're flung into 21 minutes of just gnarly black metal. With dueling guitars there is just a mountainous wall of noise bombarding you at once and with the occasional synth there's just so much to be heard. And with ACTUAL DRUMS that range from crust punk to grind to straight up kvltness there is diversity out the ass in this. The riffs are just endless on this, ranging from bulldozer chaos to fist pumping leads to just all around good frostbitten abrasiveness. The vocals for the most are an ugly, raspy gurgly black hole that when layered sounds like something straight from hell. There is almost no down time in the entire release and it's exhausting to listen to, for there is never a dull moment and things are permanently stuck on 10. The cool thing is how it all ties into itself, you get so much pack and variation in this that you never seem to hear the same thing twice, and considering it is 21 straight minutes that's a whole lotta material. Just when you've had your dose of crusty Satan worship you're flung into a calmer beat and some faint, however lethal, leads that sound like asteroids falling from the sky, you're pushed back to somewhere else inside another cold cruel nightmare. There are even soft ass Opeth like interludes on this that throw you off your game and provide for quality buildups and depth.  This shit is just good.

The mastering is good, especially for a demo. It's raw yes, but everything was properly set up to be captured and is layered in a quality setting. The guitars are just distorted the fuck out, but clean when they need to be. The drums are constantly in the back keeping pace and the vocals just continuously drag you across the musical grate, leaving you shredded beyond recognition.

SHIT QUALITY: GOOD