God damn, do these guys want to be Vader! Amazingly, aside from lacking their unparalleled rhythmic dynamics, they pull it off. It’s quite an accomplishment when you consider how unique and original the techniques of the long-running Polish masters really are. Even Kevin Bedra’s vocals are a dead ringer for a young Peter Wiwczarek. That alone is really saying something! This drummer is no joke, either. He might be able to fill in for the real Vader. You might hear some critics calling this unoriginal for the overtly obvious stylistic inspiration, but Funeral Age has impressed the fuck out of me. Next time your band gets together for practice, you try sounding like Vader. Let me know how that goes. It’s even more impressive when you consider these guys are from the US. A record deal is not far from these guys, in fact, it wouldn’t surprise me if they were signed already.

This is the second release by “The True” Frost and musically, not a lot has changed since their last outing. The only real difference is that the sound has become rawer and dirtier. Invoking the Aeon of Satan, their first release, had a much clearer (though still a bit on the raw side) sound than this. Open the Portals to Darkness has a lot of similarities to Transylvanian Hunger in that it is very raw and aggressive, yet the sound levels for the various instruments were still balanced so that no one instrument drowns out everything. This is “grim” Black Metal in its better variation. A lot of bands forget to add some bass to their guitar sound, making the guitar thin and annoyingly high-pitched. Frost has pretty much followed the formula from their first release and kept the guitars thick and also kept them up in front. The only gripe I have with this CD is the fact that the drum tones need work. The songs are fairly straightforward Darkthrone/Burzum/Von inspired blasts of Black Metal that sticks to the mid-paced realms of speed. There are no guitar solos, no technical stuff and no frills. Frost isn’t going to win medals for originality, but I will give them credit for writing an album that has aggression, feeling and fairly memorable songs. I liked the production on their first album better, but at the same time, Open the Portals to Darkness doesn’t disappoint either.

While Frightmare is certainly capable of delivering the sickness, their brand of Horror flick-inspired Death/Grind does little to set themselves apart from the growing crop. When you’re dealing with the Razorback camp, the footsteps of standouts like Lord Gore, Ghoul, and Machetazo just to name a few, are not easy to follow in. It’s not as if they do anything poorly, and I’m not saying they don’t have a timeless classic up their sleeve, this just isn’t it. Brutal and drenched in gore, but the most memorable moments of Midnight Murder Mania are unfortunately the samples.

God damn there are a lot of stupid bastards in media journalism. I have not seen any positive press for this album written anywhere, and it makes me sick. What the hell is wrong with this album? A couple filler tracks, fine, but a dismal failure? Not by a fuckin’ long shot. This band essentially is Earth Crisis as far as I’m concerned, and a bit in the vein of Slither (which I also liked, by the way). Albeit with the groove toned down a little and melodic singing introduced. The playing is tight, Karl’s barking is razor sharp, and who could forget the choruses to the title track and “Throwing Rocks at a Drowning Man?” And lyrically, we filthy meateaters and smokers are finally spared in favor of much deeper content. Things every person feels. I find little to complain about here. (And while I’m at it, Freddy vs. Jason was an awesome movie, and In Torment in Hell features some of the best Deicide songs of all time. Stupid fucking critics!)

This NSBM band hails from Russia, a place that is starting to look like Poland when it comes to the number of NS bands emerging from there. Obviously, from the music, Forest is heavily influenced by Burzum (at least, early Burzum). Their sound isn’t a blatant copy of Varg’s early material, though. Forest roughly sounds like the crossing of Burzum, Darkthrone/Isengard and Akrabu, the Dark Ambient side-project of Vampyr Scorpius of Crimson Moon. The main influence, however, remains Burzum. Yes, Forest is fond of creating long, minimalistic (to an extent, anyway) songs filled with droning riffs and tortured vocals. The last song, “Winter Howl,” is perhaps the longest track and is more reminiscent of Akrabu in that it is mostly acoustic guitar and vocals. The production on Forest is also reminiscent of Burzum. It is raw, yet at the same time, the levels of the instruments in the mix are such that you can hear things fairly well. The drums provide a solid base and everything else sort of goes on top of them. Forest is a raw, hateful album that never degenerates into being under-produced or even stereotypical. This band sounds like they were influenced by Burzum, but they never actually clone the Burzum sound. I really like that about them, and it really makes this album more interesting.

Nonstop Death/Grind devastation from beginning to end! And a re-recording of “Holy Pedophile” to finish off the onslaught! What more could you ask for?

Apparently you can’t judge a CD by its cover, either. From looking at this one, I thought that Flamethrower would be some kind of terrible Stoner Rock, or something, but that’s not the case at all. Actually this band is a weird Punk/unknown hybrid, I guess. The second song on this disc, “Coked Up,” even, umm, “borrows” a bit from the Suicidal Tendencies classic “Suicide’s an Alternative.” Not all the tracks are quite that cool, but the guys do invoke the name of Lemmy in the track “I Want It All,” so, that’s something.

Another completely uninteresting homemade CDR of boring beyond belief Death/Thrash. Jesus, was this recorded on one track? The drum programming is a joke, the guitars are barely audible, I don’t hear any bass. The music is jumbled, chopped, and totally void of direction. Every song has a different mix with varying levels and a different vocal style. Hey, Fiend, I don’t mean to be a dick, I know what your aspirations are, but do you really think that a living soul is going to give a shit about your sub par underdeveloped free-time noodlings? You’re not ready yet! So don’t put anything out until you are. I got shit to do.

In a sickeningly desperate effort to appeal to everyone, and thus “convert” and “save” everyone, this pack of blind followers incorporates all the musical styles they can think of from Hardcore to various kinds of Metal to Emo to whatever Meshuggah is supposed to be. I should have asked Jack to review this so that you could be reading the lyrics to a Deicide song or something right now!