“Mind” is already the fourth longplayer by this Austrian outfit which is around since 1992 already. Honestly spoken I’ve never heard about them before and given the slightly irritating name of the band expected some crude porngrind. Fortunately enough I was proven wrong since the ill-natured quartett delivers some really fresh and aggressive Death Metal with a huge Hardcore influence. Bit like a mixture between newer NAPALM DEATH and SEPULTURA – stuff, with massive groove and lot’s of cool samples thrown in. In the faster passages there are even some parallels to MISERY INDEX, with whom they also share the social awareness in the lyrics. The last track is a more experimental tune in the NEUROSIS – vein, which should not be the future direction for this band, to put it that way. As you see, MASTIC SCUM are pretty much the traditionalist’s worst nightmare, but if you’re not allergic to some mosh-parts in your daily dose of Death / Grind you should definitely give this a try. www.masticscum.com, www.cudgel.de