REVIEW: Get the Shot – Infinite Punishment [2017]
Artist: Get the Shot
Album: Infinite Punishment
Congratulations—you’ve earned yourself a seat in the infernal depths of Hell itself. A lifetime of gluttony, greed, selfishness and sheer disregard for the well-being of others has lead the reward mankind, in all its ignorant bliss deserves: an eternity of Infinite Punishment. Crafting a devious and deadly display of heavy hardcore by the same name, Get the Shot serve as figurative harbingers of humanity’s fate. This crushing Québécois quintet combine sharp, thrashy riffs straight out of the late eighties with contemporary, cruel-and-unusual brutality to create their most mature and intense album to date. Spending the better part of an hour dismantling the listener piece by bloody piece, Infinite Punishment stands true to its name, inflicting pain and drawing blood with precision and passion both. While it might sound torturous, for fans of heavy hardcore, beatdown hardcore, or good ol’ fashioned loud-and-pissed riffs, Infinite Punishment contains just as much pleasure as it does pure, skin-shredding and blood curdling pain.
Aligning themselves with the likes of the United Kingdom’s heavyweights, Malevolence, Get the Shot clash riff-driven metal with raunchy hardcore loud’n’proud. Once the haunting echoes and eerie cries of “Purgation” fade into the furious and scathing salvos of “Faith Reaper” or “Waging Death,” this becomes abundantly true. Immense, loud percussion reigns supreme as the roaring, quickly thumping heart of Infinite Punishment, oscillating between relatively simplistic but strong patterns in “Waging Death” or “Demon Stomp” to ferocious, staunchly metallic segments of scathing speed and devious technicality on “Blackened Sun” or “Hellbringer.” Confidently striding the line between death metal and heavy-handed hardcore, Get the Shot’s percussion is an unshakable foundation for the band’s beefy, bold bass guitar—serving to amplify the awe-inspiring heaviness of slams and breakdowns in “Demon Stomp” or the closing seconds of “Den of Torments,” while working quickly to keep up during the more anthemic metal-influences and thrash You sequences of “Hellbringer.” The opening portion of “Den of Torments” sees yet another style employed by the gritty and dense bass—atmospheric, working somewhere between the cantankerous drums and soaring guitar to provide ethereality, drawing Infinite Punishment to a close in a truly haunting fashion. While the bass and percussion creates a solid foundation and snappy, sinister low end, it is by the hands of Get the Shot’s two resident riffsmiths that Infinite Punishment is able to truly stand out from the works of their peers. Combining old school death metal, twangy thrash metal and modern, murky brutality, Infinite Punishment is an immense release defined by dreary, dismal moments of dense heaviness and fast, furiously fretted riffs and solos that add soul-stripping, skin-flaying shred into the mix. “Waging Death” sees the group combine their many styles as fluidly as really any other track—with catchy, two-step friendly segments that give way to gritty breakdowns or great solos at the drop of a hat.
Where Get the Shot’s instrumental dynamic is a curious and crushing blend of old and new, the group’s vocal element is just as provocative. A predominantly shrill and sharp shriek, Infinite Punishment’s vocal stylings sound almost as if Bryan Garris from Knocked Loose was having a really bad day—at least for much of songs like “Waging Death.” Meanwhile, the group’s love of thrash and old-school death metal remains as true as ever with the roared singing and immense gang-chants on more metallic anthems like “Blackened Sun.” Where Get the Shot let loose with mostly shrill, higher-register screams and shrieks, the group aren’t without a more guttural element, heard holding down the closing portion of “Waging Death,” and during the grittier moments of Infinite Punishment—like “Demon Stomp” or “Profaner.” The group may not bring heaps of vocal diversity to the table, but their tried-and-true yell is more than enough to adequately complement most of Infinite Punishment, and where it doesn’t quite cut it, mid-range yells, chants, hoarsely sang portions and low, grisly growls dominate to keep things from getting stale.
Infinite Punishment is a powerful and pissed testament to the integrity of several things—the heavier strand of hardcore/thrash crossover, heavy music in general, but most importantly, Get the Shot’s ability to continue improving and refining their sound. With their 2017 release, the group prove that they can appeal to veteran metal heads or metal elitists just as easily as they can light a fire in the hearts of the spin kicking, breakdown obsessed youth. Sharp and catchy, yet blunt and bold enough to inflict trauma, Infinite Punishment condemns the listener to forty-something minutes of pure fury that holds as much bliss as it does brutality—if the listener can stomach it.
9/10
For Fans Of: Malevolence, Desolated, Knocked Loose, Easy Money
By: Connor Welsh
