One of the few outfits from United Arab Emirates, although made by middle eastern/eastern expats just based in Dubai, NERVECELL had their debut "Preaching Venom" seen as fresh water in the MESHUGGAH spawn, but saw a bit of decline in the following more ordinary and tasteless "Psychogenocide". Two years have passed and here they are with their latest third LP "Past, Present ...Torture" out for Lifeforce Records.

Today NERVECELL offer us an intense and powerful record: Khazaal (vocals, bass) unleashes brutal vocals over a virtuoso ultratechnical very math oriented performance by Rami and Ribeiro (guitars). Biggest limit to their efforts might be their narrow target focus on already followers and big math and fractional tempo fans.

Songs like stampede "Aadvent", "Proxy War", "D.N.A" and "Treading Beneath" less mathematically extremist tracks, will engage even "outsider" listener, with Khazaal vocals violently dragging them one track after another: on the other hand, tracks like the tryptic "Habitual Deceit", "Maqabre" and "Tree of Lies" will easily tire and bore the less trained and, viceversa, will nurture math heads with extreme riffs high on out of the world rhythms. In between, middle eastern influences and elements will give added value to the track, especially in the end of "Dawn of Decimation", one of my faves of the LP due to this aesthetics and the transcending vocals.

PAST, PRESENT ...FUTURE is a specific product for specific receivers: all is planned scientifically, with the vocals-induced turbulences are a byproduct that will blow listeners away; if followers of the band and fans of this genre will likely more appreciate this clear design, what will catch the interest of the less prepared audience will be the hot and violent sandstorm of continuous heavy riffing and stampede drumming. The record is well engineered and produced and well deserves at least some attention.