UK has a tradition in bands that lives in the frontiers between Hardcore, Crossover and earlier Grindcore (when it was clearly more Punk / Hardcore than Death Metal orientated), and honoring these roots, the insane quartet SATANIC MALFUNCTIONS comes with their new album, "Them".

Obviously, it Hardcore in its purest essence, but you can feel some Metal influences coming from inside, so we can see as a "Metalized Hardcore", and it's full of energy and life, and the aggressiveness blows off from your speakers.

The sound production is harsh and with that necessary dirty feeling that Hardcore bands must have (please, clean Hardcore is like having sex with a sex doll, but fell free to consider other forms of doing Hardcore. Or sex...), but without having the felling of hearing a mass of guitars, vocals and beats without coherence. It's clear, but just dirty. And the artwork just put in visual what their Hardcore influences are up to.

Musically, "Them" is a fine piece of Hardcore aggression, having their finest moments in "Nothing New", "Them" (fine drumming here), "On Your Knees" (great vocals!), "Gospel Truth" (this oiled bass sound is very good), "Trappings of Faith", "Dealing Out Death" (some riffs really show how Hardcore entered in Metal some years ago), and "On the Cusp". But as I said above, the entire album is good.

These crazy guys surely can do best, but they're good in this shape.