Aside from the fact that they hail from Germany, not much is known about the mysterious and enigmatic Misanthropic War. As the name would suggest, it’s the kind of band who shy away from the light, who seek solace and succour in the dark tunnels of the underworld. However, this has the benefit of bringing their music to the fore, but truth be told, they’re kind of hard to ignore. Not made for the weak of constitution, their debut album, Utter Human Annihilation, is a bombastic beast and its songs about death, war and destruction are in perfect sync with these troubled times.
There’s very little compassion to be found on this record (especially towards our eardrums), and opening blast ‘Conquer And Eliminate’ arrives like an irradiated warhead. It’s a musical pummelling, to be sure, with drums firing like bullets from an AK47, guitars grinding like tank tracks and vocals red raw and sandpapered. Yet, for all their “hate, kill, destroy” ethos, this is an intriguing listen, especially if you like your metal twisted out of shape, shrapnel scarred and hot to the touch. If an album was powered by pure visceral hate, then it is surely this; titles such as ‘Total Nuclear Holocaust’ and ‘Kill Them All’ should tell you all you need to know.
Utter Human Annihilation is not the type of album to play if you wish to make friends and influence people, it is however perfect if you wish for some dirty death punk. Musically you can trace Misanthropic War’s sound back to bands such as Venom and Warfare, whilst throwing in some Discharge d-beat, yet those bands never sounded as filthy as this. With only one of the thirteen tracks clocking in at under three minutes, these songs veer towards the succinct, yet its brevity is also its strength; the band don’t blind us with science or complicate matters, and each track takes the most direct line to what the f*ck it is all about, and with hardly any space between tracks, there’s very little respite before the band return to clobber us with some of the heaviest riffs known to man.
If you want to know what it was like being a soldier in the muddy, rat-infested trenches during World War One, then this album is your answer. Cuts such as ‘Hail Of Bombs’ and ‘Cyanide’ are mortar shells exploding near by and showering us with dirt and debris. Such is the wall of sound created that Utter Human Annihilation demands your full attention, it isn’t the type of music you can play in the background; you either get with it, or get out the way. As last track ‘Final Purge’ comes to a shuddering stop, the silence that follows is positively deafening, a gaping chasm is left, and Misanthropic War would like you to jump right in.
- Utter Human Annihilation is released via Godz Ov War Productions and is available now (from here).
Track List:
- Conquer And Eliminate
- Total Nuclear Holocaust
- Kill Them All
- Pulverization
- Siege And Incinerate
- Hail Of Bombs
- Ultimate Hatred
- Pro War
- Civilization Collapse
- Cyanide
- Spread The Plague
- Utter Human Annihilation
- Final Purge
