Cenobite Cenobite demo cassette
Beaming in nightmares from space (a.k.a. Chicago) is CENOBITE, whose sci-fi hardcore evokes a visionary heftiness that calls to mind—hear me out—TIMEGHOUL, if they veered more punk than death metal. I rarely think of world-building outside of fiction, but there is a sort of mythological aspect to this demo due to its inventiveness and bleed-over into tinges of deathrock and industrial-adjacent noise that distorts (mutates?) the DNA of what would otherwise be a straight-ahead hardcore project in terms of energy output. This pummels, but it’s goddamn weird, too. The overall production tends to deprioritize the low end without neutralizing the weight of the riffs. The guitar is cranked through all kinds of cyberware that aids the overall dystopian paradise vibe. All in all, this is a ferocious and thrilling new project—one of the best demos I’ve heard in a while. Check it out, jack in, and blast off.