### Orb Of Torture: Cryogenic cleansing (four elaborations of cold)

#### 22/08/08 || theProphet

The Belgians in Orb of Torture have chosen to send us some more shit after getting such a rave (well…) review from K on their previous demo, “Stereolith”. Impressed with what I had read, and with a generally inquisitive nature (or not…), I jumped at the opportunity to review their latest effort, namely “PRETENTIOUS FUCKING TITLE”.

Marketed as an EP, “pft” is in fact not released by a real record company, but is self-released. Hey, nice try guys, but anything not released on a label is a demo in my book, this might give you some incentive to try a little harder and get signed. Then again, only releasing demos isn’t necessarily a bad thing…

But is it in this case?

Well, yes. ‘Cause Orb or Torture sure deserves the attention a self-release won’t get ‘em. But first things first, and the first thing I noticed with this here album was: THE PRODUCTION! Seriously guys, but fucking why?! The guitars sound thinner than a holocaust victim on a starvation diet, seriously, it sounds like no more than one single note is ever played at the same time throughout the entire album. It’s a damn shame because even though the production sounds like a NES soundtrack (except with really loud fucking drums… and oh, growls..) you can definitely hear some neat riffing underneath the torrent of snare hits.

Okay, so we’ve established that the production leaves something to be desired, now the premises for the rest of the review is set.

As briefly hinted, Orb of Torture consists of some mighty fine musicians and songwriters. At times, the actual songs are so well performed that I wouldn’t be too surprised if they popped up on a Nile album (not the songs by OOT but the same riffs though written by Nile, duh). The first song starts with a robot voice declaring that “these are all signs of imminent sonic destruction”, and then a fantastic couple of riffs played on one single, barely distorted guitar string. I mentioned Nile earlier, but if I had to compare this to one single other band it would actually be Job For A Cowboy. Now, I know some people will be offended by this comparison, so I’d just take this opportunity to say that I personally like JFAC. Quite much actually. Alas, being compared to them in one of my reviews is a good thing. Right? Right.

A quick mention about the vocals as well, they are sure as hell not standing as anything awesome, but they are decent enough. Nothing that would raise or lower the store, that’s for fucking sure.

The time has come to wrap this up. Regarding my earlier remarks about getting signed and releasing demos and whatnot, it’s obvious that Orb of Torture has outgrown the boots of a demo band long ago. To all of you labels out there: Refrain from that shit band you ‘re going to sign (and fuck knows you’re about to) and sign Orb of Torture instead. Then get someone to supervise the production of their debut.

Although we normally don’t grade demos here at GD, since this is an “EP”, I’ll make an exception and it gets a strong 6 out of 10.

- Information
- Released: 2008
- Website: Ord Of Torture MySpace
- Band
- Ben Olbrechts: vocals
- Lars Herbaut: bass
- Marlon Verbelen: guitars
- Tristan van Dorsselaer: guitars
- Jense Philips: drums

- Tracklist
- 01. The Initiation Rite
- 02. Frozen Hell Design
- 03. Antarctic Frequency Catharsis
- 04. Godmode