Killer Refrigerator – The Fridge and the Power It Holds Review

Killer Refrigerator 01Hi, I’m Diabolus in Muzaka. You’ve probably read some of my musings on metal music in this space. I come to you today not just as a reviewer, but as a man who has been affected second-hand by appliance violence. Laugh at the cover or concept here all you like, but having witnessed a close friend’s assault by an appliance gone rogue, I see Killer Refrigerator as selfless visionaries using metal to bring us this message of our pending appliance-driven annihilation.

Now that we know the message, let’s talk medium. Killer Refrigerator are labelled death-thrash, but this isn’t early Sepultura or Shards of Humanity. Rather, The Fridge and the Power It Holds comes across as a more pizza-thrash version of Vektor covering all of The Sound of Perseverance and Individual Thought Patterns, forgetting where all the riffs go, throwing them into a blender (uh-oh), and topping them off with vocals that sound like Chuck Schuldiner if he never stopped doing his “Painkiller” shrieking. It’s a ridiculous delivery that suits the ridiculous concept perfectly while managing to be enjoyable in a non-gimmicky sense too.

Although I didn’t heed the warning and continue to bathe regularly, “Shower Thrashing Death” was the song I found myself coming back to most often. The riffing is great in a mindless headbanging sense yet still fairly technical in nature, and Cody Coon’s screeching vocals add to the fun in a huge way. “Slave to the Easy-Bake” is another quality track which switches gears often, incorporating high speed pizza-thrashing, dueling guitar solos, and an aggressive chugging segment that recalls Vulgar Display of Power. There’s also a hilarious spoken word bit at the end, demonstrating that Killer Refrigerator can pen some solid tunes to back up their fun concept.

Killer Refrigerator 02

Not everything is solid though, and as much as I wanted to love “Slaystation” with engineer/programmer Luke “Java” Sackenheim’s great 8-bit interlude, the song as a whole stretches itself pretty thin via repetition and pales in comparison to the concise nature of the rest of the material. “Killer Refrigerator Vs. Godzilla” spends nearly a third of its runtime with Coon screeching sans instrumentation about the failed spaghetti bombing of Tokyo, but the music after that is fairly mediocre. I shouldn’t enjoy a funny monologue more than the song that follows it, but that was the case here. Not awful, but not something I’d often return to.

The Fridge and the Power It Holds is a good little EP made by two talented guys. Java’s programmed drums are well-done with good samples, but they’re wisely pushed behind Coon’s excellent guitar and bass playing, the latter of which is hugely present in the mix. Killer Refrigerator have given us a good teaser for the upcoming Refrigeration Plauge full-length and some good stuff to listen to in the meantime when that urge for ridiculousness sneaks up. I’d recommend rethinking your hunger for a frozen pizza though, because your oven just might try to kill you. Don’t say you weren’t warned.


Rating: 3.0/5.0
DR: 7 | Format Reviewed: 160 kbps mp3
Label: Self Release
Website: KillerRefrigeratorOfficial | Facebook.com/KillerRefrigerator
Release Dates: Out Worldwide: 04.07.2015

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