Deadened Nerves announces TORTURERS' LOBBY's arrival with devastating punctuation. A metal record for metal people, the band's first full-length doesn't kowtow to genre conventions - death metal, black metal, thrash, and even juiced-up traditional metal all get diced and sliced into their cranky cauldron - nor does it get overly "clever" and pay lazy lip service to a please-everybody middle ground. No, TORTURERS' LOBBY simply go for the throat quickly and without compunction, rushing forth with an urgency of approach and physicality that's tangible - truly, this is a whole band playing together instead of punched-in parts - but soon twist the knife in myriad ways. And that's perhaps the trump card of Deadened Nerves: violent and off the rails it might often be, but there's a diabolic logic to the angular shapes TORTURERS' LOBBY throw, a strive to elevate songwriting to something at once palpitating and mind-bending, careening and in control. RIFFS are aplenty, and the production's thick and scuzzy yet fully pro, and Shaw's vocals keep apace with acerbic annunciation.