Review by Greg on February 19, 2023.

There are some cases where judging a book from its cover would be not only allowed, but even recommended. I mean, one look at R.O.D.'s debut Death For All, with its bleak b/w cover, song titles etc., and you could probably know it by heart without even listening to it. But now, that hashtag in the title could be a sly means to sketch a subtle concept about social media, modern age issues, possibly some social criticism? Look also at the cover... it's a second album, for God's sake! The perfect occasion to show that they are more than what heard on the debut!

...or else, maybe, just maybe, the album is titled that way to give some semblance of that, without actually changing anything. Yeah, it's probably that.

Well aware that most of my Death For All review could be reused here, let's dive into #SocietyKill.

R.O.D. are now at their second effort, and they still haven't reached 50 minutes of music overall, so that's already an amazing feat, to begin with. Their form of hyperblasting thrash metal can't honestly aim for the highest peaks of memorability of the genre. So, is #SocietyKill bad because it has barely a thousandth of all the subtleties that make up a No More Color, or a Here Lies Humanity for something closer in time? Of course not. But is it, at the very least, disappointing for being a 22-minutes sophomore album? Eh, how could it not be?

On the upside, it works this time as well. Not gonna lie, had they been more ambitious it wouldn't have hurt, but alas... the formula is still the same. Short, straight-to-the-point songs, fueled by drums at breakneck speed and hateful vocals, now with a brand new gritty, bombastic sound. The band lost two members in the meantime (a whopping 6 years from the debut), and there's a new voice taking duty of letting you know that you're a subhuman piece of shit (tough work, I know...): he brings also a coarser, at times death-esque dry grunt, given his past as a deathcore vocalist.

So, I hinted at how there isn't an underlying concept tying the tracks between each other. Of course criticizing social media and smartphones for brainwashing the masses would have been as cliché as it gets, yet R.O.D. aren't exactly renowned for their thoughtful poetry, despite the frontman change. The lyrics match the intensity of the music, to sum up: lots of violence, swear words, toughness and, for something a bit different, a sprinkle of anti-communism (very subtly titled 'Red Scum') and anti-Islam (same as before, 'Reconquist'). You gotta appreciate their transparency, if nothing else, for every target is made specifically clear. Hell, 'What the Fuck?' alone is nihilism and anti-everything-ism in a nutshell. Needless to say, my agreement level percentage with the gentlemen's message was a single digit at best.

Now, how does #SocietyKill fare, when compared to an album I defined 'appalling' from a songwriting point of view? As you may guess, not so well. It's worse by default since it's a sophomore album, but there are actually even less dynamics than before, and it was genuinely hard to accomplish. Part of this can arguably be traced back to the loss of Gumiś, admittedly the only guitarist with any sense of melody, as proved by the fact that he left to pursue a solo prog/ambient rock project (I like to picture him scorned by his ex-bandmates for such a pseudo-intellectual move). It's difficult to judge because, on musical terms alone, it's a blast. It sets its sights on a single aim (read: full-throttle bludgeoning for 22 minutes straight), goes all-in for it, and succeeds, all things considered. It all boils down to whether you consider it necessary or not.

Choice cuts: lend an ear to the opener for the best riff, 'Reconquist' for the closest to death metal R.O.D. gets, 'Kill The Pig' ditto. Then decide if it's worth going on with the rest of #SocietyKill.

Whoops, got a déjà vu... wonder why?

Rating: 7.2 out of 10