Rytmihäiriö
Sarvet, Sorkat, Salatieteet

May 2008
Released: 2008, Sakara Records
Rating: 3.5/5
Reviewer: Luxi Lahtinen

The uncrowded Gambina-gang from Finland, Rytmihäiriö, without fail, bless us again with their relentless, and in many ways unique, ´surmacore´ that they have been spreading around since the band took their first baby steps on their self-released SURMATYÖ EP in 1990. The band has truthfully stayed loyal lyric-wise to their concept about killings done in drunkenness, and by the power of booze (or just Gambina) by all drunken and dropout Finnish brothers and sisters.



Also musically Rytmihäiriö´s ´surmacore (or just thrashcore)´ comes in as deadly and untamed as before, offering kinda ´Slayer-ish´ hardcore-thrash without too many fancy elements taken in at all. As it has always been the case with Rytmihäiriö´s stuff, straightforwardness and aggressiveness are the keywords for their uncompromising, booze-infested assaults that simply are thrown in your face without any advance warnings. It´s pretty much like listening to S.O.D.´s SPEAK ENGLISH OR DIE album, but the Finnish version of it. Well, almost - but you surely get a picture anyway.



What Rytmihäiriö has done differently on their newest output is that they have added more melody into their songs this time, plus given a more metallic injection to the songs on S.S.S. What is also kind of noticeable, they have invited a bunch of relatively known guest musicians in for this record. F.ex. the whole Moonsorrow´s clan visits the album as well as ex-Amorphis bassist Olli-Pekka Laine. Having all the Moonsorrow members on the album has also left its obvious mark when it comes to the choir sections. These choir parts in such songs as "Lupa Tappaa Humalassa" and "Gambina O.D." indeed do sound very familiar, nearly the same way as Moonsorrow do within their own folk-ish viking metal. Of course these ´viking choirs´ are meant to add some variety and color into Rytmihäiriö´s songs, but I still wanna question that fact whether they fit that well into their kind of frantic thrashcore cuts or not. Like you may have read betweeen my lines there already, not that well in my opinion, but one sucky opinion doesn´t even count amongst thousands of opposite opinions, ha!



SARVET, SORKAT, SALATIETEET, however, hits straight to the target very well again... and it hits hard. One pretty fabulous album from these unique Gambina-suckers of Rytmihäiriö here again for booze-filled nights for sure. Dig it! Suck it! Bang it!