A Holocaust in your Head originally came out in 1988 and injected a dose of angry, noisy crust punk into the music scene at the time. It has been reissued a couple of times since, and in September it will be reissued on Candlelight with what appears to be half of the In it for Life EP as bonus tracks.
It doesn't really sound like there has been any remastering going on, as the production is as lo-fi and sloppy (which is a good thing in the context of the extreme punk music ethos of the late 1980s, mind you) as ever. Musically, all the tracks on A Holocaust in your Head, including the bonus tracks on the 2011 Candlelight reissue, fall somewhere between hardcore crust punk and grindcore. There are several of the stylistic features that would later characterize grindcore, such as fast tempo, short songs (not yet at micro-song level though), deathgrunt-screaming combinations and political lyrics. Still, the feature that really defines grindcore is lacking – namely, blastbeats, and most of the drumming on this release consists of extremely fast d-beats. I guess you could say that, rather than being grindcore as such, the music on this release is pre-grindcore, and really just crust punk taken to the extreme with the next step of extremity being grindcore. There is plenty of punk energy and anger-fueled aggression, but no real brutality as such.
The lyrics are highly political, and Extreme Noise Terror make no buts about their leftist take on the issues of the political landscape of the late 1980s, the lyrics on this release being pro-animal rights, anti-government, pro-vegetarianism, anti-racism, pro-freedom of thought, anti-Billy Milano, pro-Left, anti-Right and so on. This release is, you could say, the musical embodiment of the anger and frustration that a lot of people felt towards the Conservative powers that were dominant in many countries in the 80s. And in, given the re-emergence of Conservatism throughout the 2000s, I am sure that a lot of people can actually relate to the lyrics on this album today (well, you would have to read the lyrics, because the angry death grunts and screams by the band's two vocalists are virtually indecipherable).
If you like unspoiled raw angry punk music energy, and you were not around when this album first came out, now is your chance – and, despite the lo-fi and amateurish production (which, I admit, annoys me), you will enjoy the release even more if you're pissed off with the system. Fans of Discharge, The Exploited, Anti Cimex, Mob 47 and the like, you may enjoy this album, and fans of early grindcore might also find it interesting.
Track Listing:
1. Deceived
2. The Helpless
3. Bullshit Propaganda
4. Fucked Up System
5. No Threat
6. Show Us You Care
7. Use Your Mind
8. Innocence To Ignorance
9. Conned Through Life
10. Murder
11. Take The Strain
12. Another Nail in the Coffin
13. Raping The Earth
14. If You're only in it for the Music (SOD Off)
15. Intro
16. In It For Life
17. Subliminal Music Mind Control
18. Work For Never
19. Punk: Fact of Fiction
20. Cruelty to Carnivores
21. Damaging Noise
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