Blood Ritual - At the Mountains of Madness
I got a really advanced copy of this. It’s not even the final mix. But, I can already tell that this is a big improvement over their last demo [Cruciform Antithesis -Editor]. The intensity has been turned way up, and Tim’s vocals are considerably more interesting. Very brutal, but also more memorable than before. They are developing a more unique sound, which is a really good idea.
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Blood / Psycho (Massachusetts - USA) - split
Which do I like more, the extreme Crust/Grind intensity of Blood, or the deranged sickness of Psycho’s Grind? I can’t pick, since they both kick more ass than you’ve ever seen. Leave it to Ax/ction to be cool enough to put two such extreme heavyweights on one marbled grey 7-inch. Not for the weak of heart.
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Blackstar - Barbed Wire Soul
I didn’t really like the final Carcass album all that much, and this sounds even more like Megadeth.
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Blackmore’s Night - Shadow of the Moon
I certainly wasn’t expecting Deep Purple guitarist Richie Blackmore to deliver an English Folk album, but here it is. I’m glad to report that he has left the vocal duties to the talented Candice Night. I can’t imagine a voice more suited to these songs. But as emotional as the compositions are, I’d have to really be in the right mood to listen to this. I’m certainly no expert on this style, but no one can argue with the talent of Blackmore or the beautiful voice of Night, and I do know what I like.
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Black Pentecost - Funeral Winds in Paradise
This is a band that is clearly influenced by Black Ritual/Industrialists Abruptum. Much in the style of Abruptum, this is fairly chaotic musically and this chaotic music is accompanied by the sounds of the people in the band being tortured. Really tortured. No fake screams, no horror movie samples, no bullshit. Just 54 minutes of pure darkness and pain. Unlike Abruptum, Black Pentecost has more musical structure, but the overall effect is the same. This shit isn’t easy to listen to, no matter how you look at it. The sound is demo quality (though good demo quality) and from what I’ve heard about this recording, it actually was a demo. Gothic thought it sounded good enough to slap onto CD and I have to agree. Black Pentecost captures that feeling of darkness that most Black Metal bands of this day and age seem to forget. The only thing I had against this CD was the fact that, like Abruptum, it was just too long. This is tough enough to listen to as it is, but when you stretch the whole thing out over an hour, it gets to be too much.
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Black Ivory - A Taste of Oblivion
Where were all of these “Traditional Metal” bands five years ago? Anyway, to properly pull off this style, you really need a powerful singer, not a guy who more or less talks through the songs like this dude. Other than that, the music is great.
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Black Army Jacket / Hemlock - split
BAJ start things off with nine short tracks of brutal Hardcore, I guess I’ll call it. They like to incorporate different styles, though, sometimes unleashing a blast of furious speed or a Death growl, others slowing down to a noisy crawl. Hemlock on the other hand start things off with a freaked out revision of the venerable Iron Maiden intro to “Number of the Beast,” and then launch full speed into a couple very basic new-wave Black Metal cuts. The vocals are yelled in a old Punk/Hardcore way, though, which is an interesting idea, but not always executed flawlessly in this case. I appreciate the effort, though. Hopefully we’ll get to hear more from both of these inventive bands soon.
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Bishop of Hexen - Archives of an Enchanted Philosophy
Majestic, atmospheric Black Metal. It’s played well, is fairly memorable, and there are many slower, haunting, passages.
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Biohazard - No Holds Barred
This live disc isn’t full of all of the wannabe-gangsta-homie bullshit that has made about everybody wipe their ass with every post-Urban Discipline release by these guys. In fact, this has all of the good cuts from their 5-year-old first release on Roadrunner. This was recorded 100% live in Hamburg, Germany in early ‘97, with lots of crowd energy and stripped down, fast, and powerful renditions of everything (i.e. no gay homosexual dance remixes or other ulterior motives). I’m glad I didn’t throw this off of my 7 story balcony like I did all of their pot-leaf-emblazoned previous LPs - this is actually worth a listen.
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