First of all, I give this band serious props on their name. Whenever I think about them, I hear a chorus of "Ring Around the Rosie" and I get a faint mental picture of a bunch of Medieval kids dropped dead in the street, still holding hands. There’s nothing to CODC’s sound, though, that makes you think of kids. Heavy and crushing, The Genocide Machine is a 17-track block of grindcore at its most metallic.

I guess that grindcore is differentiated from "plain old" death metal by its use of effects/electronics (as on "Isabellas Henchmen"), and its more varied vocal style. The lead singer, J. Horvath, does the signature death metal growl, and he does it well, but he also does this great NWOBHM/King Diamond-esque shriek. And on "Ctrl*Alt*Delete", he does a plain old voice-over, which I think works quite well.

What makes an album like The Genocide Machine more accessible to those of us who aren’t necessarily extreme metal fans are the elements of hardcore and crust punk that the band uses throughout the album. "Cremation (Become the Flame)" opens like new school hardcore, then erupts into an onslaught of literally crushing noise. And then, of all the shocking things, they slow it down, letting the song dissipate into feedback and distortion. All in the space of one minute and 32 seconds!

That’s another thing I really appreciate about CODC: their timing is impeccable. Oftentimes I find black metal difficult to listen to because the songs are five minutes of blast-furnace aggression with relatively little dynamism, variation, syncopation or any of the other things that keep things interesting. CODC keeps it short -- most of their songs fall well below the two minute mark -- and bitter.

Out of curiosity, I visited the band’s website to read their lyrics. Honestly, I never would have known that these songs were political indictments akin to early Dead Kennedys or AFI (although definitely more esoteric). I’m not sure how well grindcore works as a political vehicle, but I liked the album a lot, regardless.