INCH SCRAPER: HARDCORE 7″ REVIEWS OF FATAL BIRTH, NAILS, NO TOLERANCE, AND SKIN LIKE IRON

On this attention-grabbing co-released split with savage core-mongers Nails, Skin Like Iron further embrace the quasi-blackened rock n roll tinkered with on last year’s Arrival (review), which shook me harder than a teen mom. Hooky and sinister, “Disappear” should at last endear them to the metal audience. Nails, conversely, do what Nails do, which is starting to get a bit too predictable, and seems naked when positioned so close to a far more dynamic band’s sound. Groovy art, too.

It all happened so fast, Officer. There I was, minding my own business, when Fatal Birth inexplicably beat the living shit out of me. I mean that figuratively, of course, but I still urge only those with a death wish or a bloody-gummed taste for unhinged powerviolence approach this self-titled 7″ (Twelve Gauge) and, even then, with extreme caution. While it was purportedly recorded to analog tape, any trace of warmth will be hard to find on acute lightning-fast cuts like “Cancer” and “No Love.”

Sharing members with Boston Strangler, Mind Eraser and Rival Mob, ever-incestuous Beantown’s No Tolerance return more than two years after their debut with No Remorse, No Tolerance (Youngblood). Given the pedigree, only the ignorant would expect anything but this dogmatic straight-edge firestorm suited for the underground sweatboxes such groups thrive and seek refuge in. It’s a bludgeoning, but a one-note one, primarily for the Boston devotees and scene loyalists.

-GS