In keeping with genre conventions, none of the ideas here have been polished or developed in the slightest. The buzz-saw guitars may as well have been recorded in a garage, the mixing is (probably intentionally) amateurish, and the 17 songs barely last half an hour. Each hyper-speed riff, screamed lyric, and pounding drum hit arrives on the scene, whizzes past, and is never heard from again.

That's why so little of this record is particularly memorable -- unless you're a true grindcore fanatic, it's rather difficult to tell which song is which. (Once, this kinda-sorta Pig Destroyer fan didn't even realize he was listening to the record on shuffle until halfway through.) Some of the guitar riffs are inventive, and every now and then singer Mike Williams manages to belt out a few words in a catchy rhythm, but other than that, it's all an impressively loud but highly grating cacophony. When the band goes into half-time for a few bars (a songwriting technique it employs often), it usually feels like a relief rather than an interesting change of pace.

Extreme music works only when there's something for the ear to grab on to -- and Arson Anthem doesn't give us a whole lot. When the singer screams, the guitars produce as much noise as they do riffs, and there are no other instruments to provide melody, all you're left with is the groove. Pig Destroyer has groove to burn (which is why I'm a kinda-sorta fan); Arson Anthem can pull it off, but not well enough to make this record worth the time investment it requires -- you won't even begin to make heads or tails of it until at least five listens in.

All of that said, Arson Anthem lets us hear Phil Anselmo play guitar, and Hank Williams III play drums, in a grindcore band. That's kinda cool, no?

-- Robert VerBruggen is an associate editor at National Review.