[engl] Game returns after their 2019 full-length No One Wins with the Legerdemain EP. Piercing the listener with nonstop aural carnage, the EP would be an apt soundtrack to the armageddon. Part Venom, part Death Side, all live and loud, Legerdemain offers no restful moments. An instrumental masterclass with blistering drumming from Jonah Falco, weird and wonderful guitar melodies conjured up by Cal Baird, and a rumbling and decapitating buzzsaw bass by Nicky Rat, the release's finishing move is an ever-changing vocal tone by Ola H. Legerdemain can be a rewarding, or punishing, aural journey depending on your perspective. The new release, which was recorded and mixed by Jonah and mastered by extreme music legend Arthur Rizk finds Game leaning heavily into their metal influences, with sounds of early 80s UK steel given extra ferocity through the lens of Japanese hardcore punk from the same era. Having toured multiple times in Europe and North America, Game, which features members of Fucked Up, Arms Race and Violent Reaction, is equally comfortable playing to punks, metalheads and everyone in between. ‘Legerdemain’ is a magician’s term meaning sleight of hand, a key skill of deception. The term is used as a metaphor for our current post-truth society where governments, technocracies, and financial institutions use smoke and mirrors to create a farcical and bewildering existence where one cannot know if something is real or not in order to cover up social injustice and mechanisms that drive inequality. As Legerdemain progresses, one is being continually dragged along towards an apocalyptic ending on "Release", which reflects on this current predicament as a nuclear explosion approaches with nothing left to do except give into the madness. There is a constant cycle of rising again, fighting against wrong doing, exhaustion, and endings. The lyrics in Polish, English and a sprinkle of French, represent the multinational members of the band, who feel culturally in a no man’s land, which in fact is everyone’s experience in 2021. Legerdemain tries to answer this anomie with urgent metal punk that is hauntingly relevant.

[engl] At long last, the follow up to 2017’s "Who Will Play?" flexi has materialised in the form of "No One Wins" on the LP format. With influences and membership that span the world of hardcore punk, both stylistically and geographically, this platter sports 10 tracks of pummelling hardcore punk that incorporates metallic elements drawn from the near and far reaches of mid 80s international hardcore and thrash to the simplicity of domestic HC pestilence. Blended with a great finesse that is both tasteful and potent - which seems to be a rare feat to attain this day and age - and buttressed by a top notch mastering job by the great Arthur Rizk (SHIT "What Do You Stand For," Impalers "Cellar Dweller”, Power Trip ‘Nightmare Logic’) which only feeds the fire that is the base of these already enormous tracks. GAME is the conduit. Relatively new but sending sickening sounds into the New Wave of British Hardcore collective, decimating any and all willing to be destroyed. Seek further advice on Game's sound via the precedent set by Gastunk, Celtic Frost, Sacrilege, Death Side, and the Execute. Members of Arms Race, Fucked Up, Career Suicide, Shrapnel, Violent Reaction and Subdued.