"Diablo Demo" Self Released © 2004

The Venting Machine - "Diablo Demo" 01. Neverending 02. Make It Die 03. Pica 04. War Paint 05. Ichy Blood 06. Pottymouth 07. Clean 08. Grapholagnia 09. Stage 3 10. Jettatura 11. Serum 12. The Venting MachineNevada's Grace

4 (out of 10)

Hailing from Southern California, the aptly named Venting Machine cranks out 12 redundant slabs of processed angst on their full length demo "Diablo Demo". Everything from the recycled death-metal guitar riffs to the frantic growl/warbled croon of the vocals sound like all those songs you’ve heard before but you can’t quite place. It’s hard to take them seriously too. The chorus of “Neverending,” the disk’s opener, consisting of the line, “I want you to feel this!”, is whispered with all the conviction of a monster in a 50’s horror flick…for kids. Sadly, this almost laughable tone persists throughout the majority of the album.

One of the two redeeming tracks is “Stage 3”, a down-tempo quasi-ballad filled with spacey, jangling guitars and ethereal crooning vocals which would sound like (the Deftones’) Chino Moreno if Moreno could actually sing. Following “Stage 3” is the second exception, “Jettatura”, a dreamy instrumental set in the same atmospheric mood. Aside from these two, however, the disk is a slice of filler, perfect music to vacuum the house by.