Dungavenhooter
Fucked Into Nonexistence
Fiadh Productions
OK, I think the album title and cover have turned or scared off pretty much everyone who’d cause us trouble. Now let’s get into some really wild radical shit…
“Dungavenhooter emerges from the cold woods of Portland with Fucked Into Nonexistence — 8 tracks of reptilian death metal and grindcore to smash you into a fine dust with his powerful tail, and snort up your powdered remains,” the album’s unhumble press release reads. “Let this be your warning: the forests and coasts of Maine are not yours to exploit and he will defend it with vigilance and hate.”
Dungavenhooter is the nom de guerre of musician, songwriter and producer Patrick Hasson, who played all the instruments on this self-produced debut release. We’ll get to the record in a minute.
Hasson named this effort after the dungavenhooter described in Fearsome Critters, a “field guide” to dangerous creatures purportedly found in lumberjack folklore, published in 1939 and written by Henry H. Tryon, with equally fantastic illustrations by Margaret Ramsey Tryon. (Do yourself a huge favor and page through the entire thing online courtesy of The Lumberwoods, Unnatural History Museum, a deep rabbit hole of delightful forest fantasy and fuckery).
In Tryon’s telling, this beast, having hidden with “Satanic cunning” behind brush, is said to leap out and smash its prey with its thick tail “until he becomes entirely gaseous, whereat he is greedily inhaled through the wide nostrils.” But if a dungavenhooter were to be in a hurry for some reason these days (e.g., a fast-approaching feller buncher, which is an all-too-real thing), one supposes a quick snort of logger dust would also do the trick. “Rum-sodden prey is sought with especial eagerness,” Tryon notes — for their intoxicating effects, no doubt.
Fucked was released last month by Fiadh Productions, a New York City-based antifascist, vegan, female-run record label dedicated to “all that is wild & enchanting.” So yes, this is grindcore you can get behind politically. Which is to say, apolitically, because woods don’t give a damn who’s in office, and neither do forest defenders in the eco-anarchist underground.
This Dungavenhooter absolutely would scare the shit out of anyone who encountered it in the wild. Hasson makes unrelentingly ferocious music played at punishing paces with vocals stuck in that half-comprehensible, low demonic register one can reach by exhaling or inhaling. It is not, however, unmelodic. Just as you can understand the lyrics with a close listen, you can fairly easily pick out notes half-buried in the layers of staticky chugging guitar.
If you’d prefer to slide into this hellish hot tub gradually, start with “All Eternity Will Rot to Slime,” which rides a more conventional metal riff to great heights before the gruff barking and aggro time signature kicks in (your face). Or just say fuck it and dive into the opening title track, which also starts with an anthemic melodic run, has a furious fit for a minute or so, and ends in a classic super-heavy groove.
“Sokath, His Eyes Uncovered” alludes to another fascinating rabbit hole with a revelation inside. The line is from a 1991 episode of Star Trek: The Next Generation, in which Captain Picard tries to communicate with an otherworldly race whose language, being allegorical rather than literal, cannot be translated by the Enterprise’s alien-language app or whatever. When Picard begins to understand how the Tamarians communicate, the one he’s talking with exclaims this track’s title.
Now your eyes have likewise been uncovered! Behold, they reveal a mysterious underground of forest-worker folklore, antifascist grindcore, radical eco-militarism and endless imaginative possibilities…
