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Reach for the crucifix and the prayer beads before you listen to Disintoxication, because this is dark stuff. The Secret, hailing from Italy, churn out a devilish concoction that could be broadly categorised under the ‘metalcore’ bracket. The album in question is a complex and dense beast. Fusing elements of noisecore, math-metal and sludge with the dark atmospheric qualities more commonly found in post-rock and black metal, the resulting cacophony is an impenetrable wall of noise with a largely buried sense of dark, brooding melody.

Imagine, if you will, Knut-esque onslaughts of chugging dissonance paired with the breakneck speeds found on Converge’s Petitioning the Empty Sky. Throw in some soundscapes that might have been sculpted by Neurosis had they been brought up on harsh black metal instead of hardcore punk. Finally, add abrasive monotone screams preaching cryptic mantras over the top. You should now have a firm idea of the template that The Secret use on this album. The biggest problem here, really, is that they rarely stray from said template. There is, admittedly, a valiant attempt at dynamic variation, such as on “Umea” where they bring down the pace a little. The songs, however, lack discernable structure and appear to be slightly directionless - there are no particular standout moments, meaning that when the aural assault finishes, nothing memorable lingers in the brain.

Disintoxication’s other major flaw is that it isn’t entirely original. There are some good ideas here, but many of them have been ripped, for example, straight from the little book of Knut (a band who, truthfully, pull off the ‘dissonant chaos’ formula a lot better than The Secret do here). Nevertheless, this remains a smart and complex album, and if you’re craving a metalcore fix, you could do a lot worse than intoxicate yourself in its fumes.

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Reviewer: Ned Chambers Added: February 25th 2008