SCREAMS FROM SOMEWHERE.

S.H.I.V. — short for Self-Honed Instrument of Violence — come out of Dallas, Texas with a sound rooted somewhere between old-school death metal and hardcore. On Screams From Underground, though, the death-metal side overwhelmingly takes control. The band have built their identity around darker philosophical themes, drawing inspiration from writers like Fyodor Dostoevsky and exploring guilt, despair, morality, violence, and the uglier sides of human existence.

That concept gives S.H.I.V. something potentially interesting to build around. Unfortunately, the music doesn't always communicate that individuality. Screams From Underground is undeniably heavy, dark, and occasionally nasty, but it spends too much time relying on familiar death-metal ideas without developing enough personality of its own.

The first thing that hits you is just how dense this EP sounds. The guitars are low and thick, the bass carries plenty of weight, and the drums frequently settle into slow, deliberate patterns that create an oppressive atmosphere. S.H.I.V. clearly aren't interested in making something flashy or technically excessive. Their goal seems to be creating something miserable, uncomfortable, and heavy.

They succeed at the “heavy” part.

The problem is that heaviness alone can only carry a release so far.

The slower sections frequently rely on repetition without creating enough tension or payoff. A riff can sound genuinely nasty the first time around, but when the band continues sitting on essentially the same idea without developing it, that initial impact starts disappearing. Instead of becoming hypnotic, some sections simply begin to feel stagnant.

There are good riffs buried throughout the release. “Guilty No Matter What” establishes the band's low, oppressive sound effectively, while “Sisyphus” leans further into the slow and crushing side of their approach. These moments demonstrate that S.H.I.V. understand how to create a dark atmosphere, but the songwriting doesn't always provide enough movement underneath that atmosphere.

The rhythm section has similar inconsistencies.

When the drums lock into the guitars, the band can sound genuinely powerful. The slower fills add to the feeling of dread, and the bass provides a welcome amount of low-end thickness. Unfortunately, there are also moments where the playing feels noticeably loose. Some of the kick work doesn't sound completely locked in, and certain transitions between sections feel awkward rather than intentionally chaotic.

That distinction matters.

Rawness can be incredibly effective in hardcore and extreme music when it creates urgency. Here, the looseness occasionally comes across less as aggression and more as the band needing another round of tightening up. The songs would benefit considerably from a rhythm section that hits with more consistency.

Interestingly, the shorter and faster material tends to work better.

“Three Brothers” gets moving much more quickly and doesn't overstay its welcome. The song is blunt, aggressive, and direct, and that approach makes the band's strengths more obvious. It also reinforces the fact that, despite S.H.I.V.'s hardcore influences, this release is fundamentally a death-metal record.

If you told me Screams From Underground was simply an underground old-school death-metal release without mentioning hardcore, I probably wouldn't question it.

The hardcore influence is certainly present in the attitude and stripped-down approach, but the guitar work, vocal style, pacing, and overall presentation are much more firmly rooted in death metal.

The vocals fit that sound perfectly. They're deep, guttural, and appropriately nasty, giving the music the kind of ugly vocal presence you'd expect from this style. Unfortunately, they're also one of the areas where S.H.I.V. begin to lose some of their potential individuality.

There isn't anything particularly wrong with the performance. The problem is that the vocal approach is so familiar that it doesn't add much personality beyond reinforcing the heaviness. When the vocals enter, some of the more interesting instrumental characteristics can disappear underneath a relatively standard death-metal delivery.

That's especially frustrating because the band clearly has more going on conceptually.

The Dostoevsky influence and focus on darker philosophical themes give S.H.I.V. an opportunity to develop an identity beyond simply being another heavy underground band. The themes of guilt, despair, morality, and human ugliness could potentially translate into much more distinctive songwriting.

Right now, however, the music mostly communicates “this is heavy and dark.”

It doesn't always communicate “this is specifically S.H.I.V.”

There are flashes where that begins to change. “City of the Possessed” contains sharper guitar work and a stronger sense of momentum, with faster drums and deeper riffs giving the song a more confident feeling. The writing feels more purposeful here, and the band sounds less like they're simply repeating a formula.

The Cro-Mags cover “Age of Quarrel” also provides some of the better energy on the release. The sharper guitar work, thick bass, and more aggressive forward momentum give the EP another welcome burst of life. It also demonstrates that S.H.I.V. can sound much more immediate when they allow the songs to move instead of constantly settling into slower grooves.

The production itself is fairly solid. There's enough clarity to hear the guitars, bass, drums, and vocals without completely removing the weight from the recording. The low end has plenty of presence, and the guitars maintain the thick quality that the band's sound depends on.

It's not the production that's killing this release.

It's the songwriting.

Too many transitions feel awkward, too many riffs blur together, and too many sections seem to end before the band has figured out how to properly connect them to the next idea. S.H.I.V. occasionally hit on something genuinely effective, only to move away from it before they've extracted everything they could.

That makes Screams From Underground feel like a collection of promising ideas rather than a fully developed statement.

The EP also suffers from a lack of variation. The band clearly knows what kind of music they want to make, but they stay within such a narrow range that the differences between songs aren't always significant enough. When “Three Brothers” or “City of the Possessed” speeds things up, the change immediately becomes noticeable because so much of the surrounding material operates at a similar pace.

That's probably the biggest lesson S.H.I.V. could take from this release: don't be afraid to move.

The band already has the weight. They don't need to constantly prove that they can sound heavy. What they need is more contrast — faster riffs, stranger guitar ideas, more dynamic drums, more memorable vocal moments, and transitions that feel deliberate rather than simply moving from one riff to another.

There is absolutely potential here.

The bass tone is strong, the guitars can be genuinely nasty, the production is competent, and the band clearly has a darker vision behind the music. When all those pieces line up, S.H.I.V. sound like they could become a legitimately interesting death-metal/hardcore crossover act.

But Screams From Underground doesn't consistently reach that level.

It isn't a terrible record. There are enough good riffs and heavy moments to make it worth checking out, particularly for listeners already invested in underground death metal. But I kept waiting for S.H.I.V. to give me something that separated them from the countless other bands operating in this territory.

Screams From Underground is heavy, dark, and occasionally pretty damn nasty, but the repetitive songwriting, loose rhythm section, awkward transitions, and familiar vocal approach prevent it from becoming something truly memorable.

S.H.I.V. have the foundation.

Now they need to build something on top of it.