This is my first time hearing AlNamrood, and like other bands from the Middle East, I was curious to see what these guys brought to the table when it came to Black Metal. I’ve heard others from the region and most of them have been good. I was cautiously optimistic about this band, mostly because in the game of musical Russian Roulette, one of these groups eventually has to suck donkey dick, and so far none of the ones I’ve heard have chowed down on the metaphorical mule member. Thankfully, AlNamrood doesn’t suck. They’re actually pretty interesting. They’re a Middle Eastern Folk-influenced Black Metal band that has an oddly Industrial sound. The production on Heen Yadhar Al Ghasq probably has a lot to do with that. The drums have an unusual sound to them, especially the snare, which sounds like an empty oil barrel. Unlike the garbage can lid sound of most European or American Black or Death Metal bands, this has a deeper, more metallic tone. The guitars are also slightly strange sounding. They have a higher pitch, which may have to do with the Arabic Folk rhythms that they’re using in their songs. The distortion on them sounds a bit odd, too. It may be that, for once, I’m listening to a Black Metal band that doesn’t tune down or use heavier gauge strings in their guitars to sound more brutal. The combination of the odd drum tone and the guitar tones gives this a very unique sound. It takes a bit of getting used to, to say the least. Musically, this LP sounds like what would happen if you added distorted electric guitars to Akrabu or maybe the solo works of Nile main-man, Karl Sanders. It has that same Arabic Folk style that you get from a band like Melechesh, but in a more ritualistic or Industrial way. I know that AlNamrood is aiming for the Middle Eastern Folk Metal crowd, but I think that fans of more harder-edged Industrial or Industrial Metal will also find the music on Heen Yadhar Al Ghasq to be interesting enough to check out.

Turn not to those Black Metal bands who have factitious spirits, or to white wizards; do not seek them out to be defiled by them. She is Negativity our Goddess. For we wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against positivity, against happiness, against the oppressors of the darkness of this genre, against structural purity in weak riffage. A man or woman who is a musician and has a positive energy or is an optimist shall surely be put in a bundle on eBay. For Negativity so loathed this world, that She aborted Her only rotten son, that whosoever believeth in despair should not write music that sucks everlasting pipe. For there is one Goddess, and one mediator between Her and men: the band Harakiri for the Sky. Bereaved, now these are the sons of Negativity, and it doth not yet appear what they shall be; but we know that when She shall appear, She shall be into them, for their melodies are bleak as fuck. For by Her were all things created that are in Black Metal, and that are on Aokigahara, miserable and more miserable, whether they be Katatonic, or Forgotten Tomb-ish or Heretoiresque, or Tears for Fears covers; all things were created by Her and for Her. For Eklatanz himself shall ascend from “Panoptycon” with a shout, with the voice of the archdemon, and with the banner of Negativity: and the fans of SDBM shall rise first; then we who are dead inside and remain shall throw horns up together with them in the stereo, to meet the Cunt in the garage with the car running. The Goddess Negativity is not willing that any should see the glass half-full, but that all should check out this sick fucking record. That if thou shalt confess with thy keyboard the Goddess Negativity hath nursed Harakiri for the Sky from Her breast, thou shalt be saved from lame Black Metal. Have no fellowship with the unrealistic works of hope; but rather condemn them. For it is a shame even to speak of those things which are done of them in music. Negativity: the same yesterday, and today, and forever.

To coincide with Enemy of Man, the new full-length LP from Poland’s Kriegsmaschine, the band has also unleashed a compilation of demo and unreleased songs that they recorded over the period between 2002 and 2004. Naturally, the sound quality on these tracks isn’t the same as their new LP, but for something like this, it’s pretty damn good. Most of the time, demo and unreleased tracks sound pretty bad, the reason being that they were never recorded in the same quality as a serious release, especially if the band didn’t intend for the songs to be available to the public. Considering this, Prism is very listenable. The music here is on the raw side, showcasing a more stripped-down and straight-forward Black/Death Metal style. There isn’t as much Ambient/Atmospheric stuff on Prism, but the music itself has a dark feeling to it that comes from the rawness and the aggression. It has a “live in the studio” quality that makes you feel almost as if you’re in the rehearsal space with the band, listening to them go through a full set of material. Another thing that I noticed about the music on Prism is that it’s far more Punk-influenced than their full-length albums. It has an ancient Bathory feel to it that you don’t get on Enemy of Man, which has more in common with Mayhem and Behemoth. Tracks like “Goathammer Sorcery” and “Deathcult Supreme” get your head banging immediately and they’re instantly engaging. If these guys played either of those songs live, I’d put money down that there’d be fatalities. Though the songs on Prism sound considerably different than on Enemy of Man, I found that I enjoyed them almost as much, but for different reasons. I liked the rawness and Punk energy that the band has and though the songs aren’t really representative of what Kriegsmaschine sounds like today, they do what good Metal should: they kick ass. That makes this compilation worth tracking down and listening to.

Funeral for a Witch is a concept LP about the life of Margaret Aitken, a woman who was forced to confess to witchcraft under torture but was spared when she agreed to help the witch hunters by outing other witches. The story goes that she sent many innocents to their deaths by fingering them as witches - being a witch herself, she’d know another when she saw one, or so the logic went. In the end, the guilt she carried around with her eventually consumed her and drove her mad. The truth that she was a fraud eventually came out, whereupon she was burned at the stake for her crimes. On paper, this sounds pretty interesting. It was the main reason I wanted to check out this record, in fact. In practice, though, the Doom/Death Metal that Throes of Ire sets this story to isn’t very exciting. The song structures are pretty simplistic, the riffing and pacing are ploddingly slow and the songs are overly long. The lyrics, though, are great. The story is interesting and it’s well written. The delivery and the music, on the other hand, turn a rather riveting read into an exercise in drudgery. Only on “Solitary Mourning” (the last track on the LP) does the pace kick up and things get interesting - but you first have to get through eight minutes of music similar to the other songs, which were lethally boring. Even that doesn’t last very long, though. Sadly, Funeral for a Witch lacks the kind of diversity and dynamics in the songwriting that it really needed in order to make a concept piece like this work. Though this is their second release, Throes of Ire still needs a lot of development before they’re ready for the big leagues. The lyrics are up there already, but everything else is severely lacking. The songwriting is simplistic - which isn’t a sin - but simplistic structures get tedious when you stretch things out over ten to twenty minutes. The songs needed something to break up the monotony in the worst way. Even the vocals needed diversity. The only style employed on this album is the standard Death Growl, but it was delivered without passion. The vocals were dry and lifeless, which, when blended with the already dull music, did nothing to spice things up. They did the equivalent of adding dull and tasteless oatmeal to dull and tasteless oatmeal. All you got in the end was more dull and tasteless oatmeal. Though there’s a lot of improvement necessary in the sound of Throes of Ire, I hope these guys can figure things out. They have some interesting stories to tell, but their musical abilities haven’t caught up with their imaginations yet.

Silliness. Pure fucking silliness. Not this album itself, but the bullshit surrounding it. For those unfamiliar with the situation, essentially LG Petrov says that Miller Lite “tastes great,” while Alex Hellid is convinced that the American beer’s #1 attribute is that it’s “less filling.” Bandmates of nearly 30 years, the pair agreed to disagree on this matter, but things really started to boil over when Petrov went on record stating that toilet paper rolls should be placed over —the “6” formation, if you will— in the dispenser, while Hellid vehemently defends the under position. “It should be like a 9, godammit,” the guitarist recently told Metalpenisfucker.com. “A 9 is more fucking evil! Just ask King Diamond!” “Bullshit,” the vocalist fired back on Extrememusicassram.org. “A 6 is a fucking 9! An inverted 9 is even more evil, motherfuckers!” This dispute has caused a seemingly unrepairable rift in the Entombed camp, and since both gents own the rights to the name, we have this whole Back to the Front fiasco. Petrov intended on using the moniker for this LP —which was already finished and being promoted in the Fall of 2013— but Hellid apparently needs it for the carpool lane. So, after months of legal battles, now we have Entombed A.D. Doesn’t quite have the same ring to it, wouldn’t you say? What’s worse, this record is now faced with the unenviable task of overpowering the drama attached to it. For the most part, it succeeds. Look, I gave up on the hope of another Left Hand Path a long time ago. (That’d be like expecting Slayer’s forthcoming Nuclear Blast album to be another Reign in Blood. Isn’t gonna happen.) At this stage of the game, expecting another Wolverine Blues would probably be a tall order, but I wouldn’t mind another Uprising, or even an Inferno. Based on those expectations, Back to the Front not only delivers but exceeds. Basically Serpent Saints minus the goofiness, the majority of these songs charge hard and hit heavy. The patented Death ‘n’ Roll style this group has steadily been rebuilding since disastrous career-low Same Difference comes to fruition here. Tracks like “Bedlam Attack,” “Pandemic Rage,” “Second to None,” “Bait and Bleed,” and “The Vulture and the Traitor” combine stomping Punkish energy with headbobbable groove, and then there’s the left-field Thrash assault of “The Underminer.” Of course, it helps that LG sounds equal parts pissed and focused. This might be his most straightforward vocal performance since those glorious early ’90s, while guitarist Nico Elgstrand occasionally pays homage to the period with a melodic lick or two of his own. But let’s hold off on that Left Hand Path II stamp for now. It’s a fair enough compliment to acknowledge that this is the best Entombed record in 10 years, and more so that it is an Entombed record. Fuck the dumb shit.

Out of pure embarrassment and shame, I almost passed on reviewing this record. I just never seem to get Lantlos right. If I were writing a review of my 2011 Agape review, I’d most likely give it the lowest possible score after chastising myself in haiku fashion.
Stupid cokehead.
Get off Neige’s nuts.
Listen to the shit more than twice.
The clueless douche I was just 2 years ago doesn’t even mention that “Bliss” is the greatest song ever recorded! Luckily with this follow-up, Markus “Herbst” Siegenhort has delivered something even I can’t screw up. Actually, I might want to rescind that statement on the probable chance that I fail to describe how amazingly fucking perfect Melting Sun is. Melting Sun is the musical equivalent to having your balls licked during orgasm. It causes the same floating effect as the “Mr. Nice Guy” weed in Half-Baked. It’s like smelling a Cold Stone Creamery for 40 minutes while watching Hulk and Thing fight in slow motion while Alexis Texas feeds you bacon wrapped in bacon with her ass. Juvenile humor aside, this LP is completely flawless and far too beautiful for the confines of my vocabulary to do justice. When I learned that Alcest’s Neige was no longer doing vocals, and that the band had removed all traces of Black Metal from their sound, I was momentarily skeptical. But that skepticism was buried and forgotten about halfway through opener “Azure Chimes.” Herbst’s clean vocals are fantastic, often made all the more mesmerizing by backing vocal harmonization, and the music… holy shit! It’s so good I’m pissed. Crushing heaviness and airy Shoegaze delight co-exist in a euphoric paradise where darkness is achieved through light and sadness by joy. Nowhere is this more evident than on the heart of the album: “Aquamarine Towers” and “Jade Fields.” Both tracks display an attention to detail in songcraft that emotional music so often lacks. Downtuned, distorted guitars carve the flesh while clean guitars caress the brain, as unforgettable melodic passages glide around sparse-yet-incredibly-addictive verses. I remember being a teenage musician, staying up all night, trying to fill the entire page with the perfect lyrics. Little did I know that “I’ve seen you / I’ve been through the sun” could comprise something a million times more effective in its abstract simplicity. Instrumental segue “Oneironaut” gently guides us into slow and soothing closer “Golden Mind.” This shimmering lullaby is like the cigarette after sex, or in this case, aural pleasures. I can’t say enough about how excellent this is. A benchmark for Post-Rock and the Album of the Year nominee I didn’t see coming. By following in Alcest’s Black Metal-shedding footsteps, Herbst has unequivocally surpassed his comrade for now. As much as I’ve enjoyed Shelter, it wilts in the glow of Melting Sun.

Lord Dahthar started out as a side project by Dahthar when he was the keyboard player for a now-defunct band called Vision of Mara. So, quite naturally, this band has a very keyboard-centric sound. In fact, a third of this EP is just straight keyboard playing without any other instruments. Though the first and last songs aren’t specifically denoted as intro and outro tracks, that’s essentially what they are. They’re probably the most adventurous and interesting parts of this release because for the most part, anything with guitars and drums isn’t very exciting. The riffing is pretty basic, sporting a very “single chord played over and over again with occasional changeups” style. All of the intricate stuff is handled by the keyboards, though most of the time, you can’t hear them because the treble-heavy guitars and the light switch drums drown them out. I was a bit surprised by this, mostly because I expected a band fronted by a keyboard player to sound a lot like Dimmu Borgir. This might have been a better EP had Dahthar and company pushed the keyboards out in front, because there’s no faster way to annoy me than to make me listen to light switch drums and bass-free guitars. The tones on the guitars and drums were pretty bad. It was so annoying that this review almost turned into a rant about how Dahthar should have made this a keyboard-only project. It took me several listens (rather painful ones, at that) before I could get past the production issues. If the next release by Lord Dahthar has better production (turn the bass up on the guitars, get a better drum tone and bump the keyboards up so that they don’t get drowned out by the other instruments), I’ll probably appreciate their music more. The sound here really brought it down for me. Though the keyboard-only tracks were good, the other ones just didn’t have the same quality. These guys still have some growing to do, but production issues aside, the music on The Tower shows a lot of promise. Their next release will be the one that’ll tell us whether Lord Dahthar is worth following or not. If they can get a good studio engineer and put together a package that showcases their skills, they could be serious contenders.

When I thumb through issues of my old fanzine [Portrait of Defiance -Editor], so many things piss me off. Poor grammar, typos, errors, bad interview questions, bad jokes, half-assed reviews, my constant misuse of the Power Metal genre tag… I could keep going but it’s too painful. In my defense, I was as young, dumb and full of cum as a Metalhead could be, but that’s no excuse for being a semi-retarded asshole all the time. (There’s a reason that —assuming I can outlive, like, 6 people— there won’t be a soul at my funeral.) But what makes me cringe the most about those old rags is how mean I was to Incantation. And not only when I’d review their material. I’d often go out of my way to take shots at them in other bands’ reviews! I was such a bullheaded, all-or-nothing kid. If I didn’t find something instantly memorable, I’d take a Dumb and Dumber shit all over it and disregard its value altogether. Back then, I didn’t realize that an album’s feel could yield the same staying power as great songs and riffs. That vibe alone could stand the test of time, or that the menacing aura of pure unbridled evil that Incantation achieved with Onward to Golgotha and Mortal Throne of Nazarene would never be equaled, despite countless imitators. These days I can put those records on and easily get lost in a sound so ominously brutal it’s soothing, even if 20 years later I still can’t hum any of the riffs to you. The good news is that present-day Incantation is still heavy as fuck, and that whole memorable thing has been significantly ironed out. John McEntee has become quite the songwriter in his old age, and for about the last decade-plus we’ve been treated to the best of both underworlds. Dirges of Elysium picks up right where 2012’s Vanquish in Vengeance left off. A whirlwind of powerful hooks encased in blast paired with… well… dirges of Elysium. This might be McEntee’s best vocal performance since taking over the mic a decade ago. A few slight hiccups, but for the most part he revels in Old School guttural glory while even managing to be understandable at times. Some of the LP’s longer cuts tend to drag on a bit, and 16-minute closer “Elysium (Eternity Is Nigh)” is just about impossible to sit all the way through, but overall Dirges is yet another worthwhile addition to a body of work that speaks for itself.
Suggested mixtape selections: “Debauchery,” “Carrion Prophecy,” “Charnel Grounds,” “Impalement of Divinity,” and “Dominant Ethos.”

Some people lump Primal Fear in with the Power Metal bands and that’s really a mischaracterization of their music. While the band shares many qualities with Power Metal, Gamma Ray in particular, they’re really more of a Traditional Metal band. If you really get down to it, their claim to fame is being a German version of Judas Priest. Naturally, they’re not as good as old Judas Priest, but then again, few bands ever achieve that level of success and recognition based solely on their musical abilities. Judas Priest was one of those groups that got huge because they created some of the best pure Metal ever recorded. A band like Primal Fear is going to have a tough time even coming close to the edge of the monstrous shadow that Rob Halford and company cast over the Metal world. Even though they’ve augmented their sound with copious amounts of old Accept and post-Uli Roth Scorpions, they still have that glaringly obvious Priest influence. The thing that’s most striking about Primal Fear isn’t that they’re still trying to be Judas Priest (they are), but that they’re only taking the most recognizable aspects of the Priest sound and leaving out the things that made JP original. They don’t do any experimentation with weird harmonics or different styles. Their sound isn’t versatile enough to go there, it seems. Their music is rock-solid Heavy Fucking Metal, but Primal Fear hasn’t figured out a way to distance themselves from obvious clone status. To make matters worse, they haven’t really evolved much. They still pretty much sound the same as they did back in the ’90s. They’ve refined things a bit, but ultimately it’s still the same old shit all over again. Delivering the Black isn’t a bad album, but if you already own a couple of Primal Fear’s LPs, you’re really not getting anything you haven’t heard before. Maybe the guys in Primal Fear need to stop listening to Judas Priest and start listening to the bands that influenced them. They know what Priest sounds like but they don’t know what made Priest great. The range of music that Priest employed spanned from ’70s Hard Rock to Speed Metal to Thrash and everywhere in between. They could take all of that and craft songs and records that were uniquely their own. I’d like to see Primal Fear be likewise more adventurous. Cloning Judas Priest is fine if you’re in a tribute band, but after more than fifteen years and ten full-length albums, you’d think that Primal Fear would have more up their collective sleeves than rearranging riffs from Defenders of the Faith. Delivering the Black is still a solid LP of Heavy Metal music, though. It has good riffs and melodies, but ultimately all you ever do is compare it to any Judas Priest LP from Stained Class to Nostradamus. In the end, I always end up asking myself, “Is it worth it to listen to Primal Fear when I already own the Judas Priest discography?” If you’re wondering what my answer to that question is, I’m listening to Screaming for Vengeance right now.

“In a world consumed by ashes, where there’s only misery and despair, pessimism has seized the human race… Hate has aroused, accompanied by a general delirium, only survival and immediate satisfaction is looked for. There’s no judgment, no punishment, no sensibleness… neither sanity. Humanity has become an aberration, tainted and perverse, condemned to misfortune and decadence, wandering in a desolate environment without resources, weakening slowly until the breath leaves them.”
This is the concept behind Wrong’s second full-length. I chose to print it here because I wish I had written it. Truer words never spoken, just ask anyone who deals with the general public for a “living.” That’s why I say we ought to change the term Depressive Black Metal to Working Man’s Black Metal. Not only would that serve to identify the genre’s fan base, but also to expose its detractors. Anyone who doesn’t appreciate, nay, crave the sadness, pain, and unaffectedness that Black Metal bands like Deafheaven, An Autumn for Crippled Children, and Madrid’s Wrong bring to the table is enjoying life a bit too much. Should happy people be listening to extreme music? I certainly don’t think so. For me, extreme music is one of very few sources of happiness. That said, if it’s a lack of extremity and/or technical skill that has the underground masses so butthurt over DBM, Wrong might be just right to soothe the manginal burn. They are far more intense than most. After all, this is one of the dudes from Wormed. Pessimistic Outcomes is a slightly different beast than last year’s masterful debut. While Memories of Sorrow was more… well… sorrowful, this follow-up is angrier and considerably more demented. At about the 2:40 mark, leadoff cut “Thru the Grey Path to Nowhere” bursts through the gate with bereaved blasting and Phlegeton’s hideous snarl, while “His Hatred Breathes” follows with even faster frostbitten kingdoms. But where there’s anger and dementia, sadness is never far behind, and this duo always keeps Brave Murder Day in its back pocket. Dejected melody is a constant throughout, tying everything together tighter than a noose. Even the awkwardly-moving schizophrenic title track is graced with melancholy, not to mention a vocal attack sure to have Anti fans raising the horns. “Dragging My Soul Until the Sunset” has multiple personalities also, as the track leapfrogs from ambient to dreary to experimental to furious and back, with Phlegeton sounding absolutely possessed all the while. “I Thought I’d Woken” closes the LP out on a downcast note, as somber tones prepare the stage for a near-Lifelover level of vocal insanity by song’s end.
Overall, Pessimistic Outcomes does lack the immediate memorability of Memories to some degree, but both records capture the true essence of misery in remarkable fashion. What Wrong is doing here borders on hypnotism. Long songs that feel short, as the listener gets lost in dystopian soundscapes that are equal parts abstract and focused. Long live WMBM. Praise Negativity. Hail and kill (yourself).

When I see an album come into my queue that’s one track and just a hair under fifty minutes in length, I think one of two things: “Oh fuck, the label decided to combine all of the tracks together so you can’t listen to each song individually” (this happens more often than you think…), or in this case, “That’s one fucking long song!” Yes, A Etilla is one long track. That leads to the automatic second part of this, which is the question, “How painful is this going to be to listen to?” Russia’s Epic Funeral Doomsters, Ea, have been writing songs in excess of twenty minutes for quite some time now, having started in 2005 and, after four previous LPs, have honed their craft to a fine art. This might be one long track, but it’s never boring. This is an epic-length song that goes somewhere. It’s akin to listening to a combination of Turn Loose the Swans-era My Dying Bride and a Dark Ambient band. They have a heavy, more Death Metal-inspired style when it comes to their vocals and guitar tone, but with a far more integrated and developed sense of atmospherics. Instead of plodding, boring music that has been artificially stretched out, A Etilla is constantly changing. The music is dark, ominous and heavy - all of which are essential in creating awesome Doom Metal. The band uses ancient sacred texts as the basis for their lyrics, and to a degree, their music is like a spiritual journey. I’ve always found things like this to be fascinating, mostly owing to my interest in ancient mystical texts, occultism and forbidden knowledge. Of course, I’m one of those crazy kids that was playing D&D, reading H.P. Lovecraft and drawing pictures of Cthulhu in the third grade. As you can imagine, I was one of the “weird kids” that would be a Ritalin zombie in today’s school system. Ea taps into the area of my brain that likes the mystical. They use Ambient passages and choir parts to great effect, breaking things up and then segueing into a new sections, all the while keeping things moving. By the time the song is over, you’re almost exhausted because it takes you all over the place, from punishingly heavy guitars to ethereal Gregorian choirs. If you’re into Atmospheric Doom/Death Metal, they’re definitely a band to check out if you haven’t already done so.

Pennsylvanian Black Metal horde, Pact returns with their second strike, The Infernal Hierarchies, Penetrating the Threshold of Night, and it was definitely worth the wait. I liked their debut LP, The Dragon Lineage of Satan, but that was marred by a sub-par production (particularly the drum tone). The music on their debut was some sick and evil Black Metal, but it just wasn’t presented properly. The Infernal Hierarchies, though, corrects that and you get Pact screaming forth blasphemy in the way they were meant to. This LP is essentially a 45 minute ass kicking that only stops damaging your neck and head at the end of the last song. Pact reminds me of the older school of US based Black Metal in that their sound has a substantial amount of Death and Thrash Metal built into it. It harkens back to the era when groups like Demoncy, Profanatica, Masochist and Necrovore were the only bands that were legitimately Black Metal in the US during the early ’90s Death Metal boom. The production on this album probably has a lot to do with it, showcasing a more bass-heavy guitar sound. It’s pretty punishing, which is good thing in my book. The Infernal Hierarchies is a very intense record and if there’s a flaw in this beast’s armor, it’s that it’s fairly relentless in the mauling that you get. There isn’t much breathing room because the caustic and brutal music bludgeons you hard, slows down briefly to measure you and then bludgeons you again. I don’t consider that much of a flaw, though. When you’re looking for music that kicks your ass and leaves you broken and scarred, Pact delivers the goods more reliably than UPS.

If you only hunt down one Doom Metal album this year, make it Earthless. Holy fuck! This record is excellent. For those unfamiliar with this oddly-monikered act (if memory serves, it’s pronounced “doomus,” with a trve kvlt “v” instead of a “u,” just don’t ask me about that colon or the random capitalization), it’s the side solo job of Draconian guitarist/main songwriter Johan Ericson. As big a fan I am of Draconian, trust me when I say Johan saves his slowest, heaviest riffs and saddest, deepest melodies for Doom:VS (see Bill Steer, Carcass). I thought the project had been eternally put on ice given the 6-year absence since 2008’s Dead Words Speak, so it was a pleasant surprise just to see this one in print. Then to actually hear it… god damn! As much as I enjoyed its aforementioned predecessor, Earthless towers over it significantly. It’s just one of those instantly gratifying records that grabs you immediately and refuses to let go. Slow music, but by no means a slow-burner, Earthless is utter fucking Doomgasm from beginning to end. It’s like scratching a mosquito bite for 50 minutes, as a tag-team of crushing riffs and mournful melodies continually shovels dirt on hope’s rotting bloated carcass. Catchy, depressing, beautiful — in my heart, this is what Doom Metal is to me. But let’s talk about what really takes this beast next-level. The vocals. Whereas Ericson manned the mic exclusively on Dead Words Speak, this time he has enlisted the talents of Saturnus frontman Thomas Jensen to handle all harsh vocal duties. And my oh my, handle them he does. If you’re even half the fan of this man’s voice as I am (check out Saturnus’ “Starres” to hear the best Doom chorus ever: “FOR ME!!! FOREVER!!! FOR US!!!”), you’re in for a treat. You get more of his deep growl here than on the last couple Saturnus records combined. Ericson —a fine vocalist in his own right— still contributes some clean vocals —the shakiness of which, at times, being all that keeps this LP from total perfection— but by sharing some of the grimelight, he has taken Doom:VS from worthwhile to otherworldly. His morose musical mastery and Jensen’s trademark powerful roar/poetic spoken bits are a match made in purgatory. For those who wish that both Draconian and Saturnus were just a little bit heavier and perhaps a little less Gothic, Earthless is your Doom come true.

Less than a year after Steve “Zetro” Souza unleashed his return to Thrash Metal onto an unsuspecting world, Hatriot is back for a second strike. Much like Heroes of Origin, Dawn of the New Centurion is a solid piece of venomous Thrash that draws heavily on Zetro’s previous bands (Exodus, Legacy/Testament) for influence. Dawn of the New Centurion, though, is a much more diverse LP than its predecessor. Instead of being like a machinegun and hitting you fast and furious for 45 minutes straight, this goes from fast and brutal to darker and more atmospheric, incorporating some melodic guitar-work and slower tempos into the mix. The varied approach works pretty well for Hatriot, giving their songs more identity and breaking up things so you don’t get lost in a blur of blasting drums and chainsaw riffs. The slower, heavier tracks are the ones that stand out to me the most, offering memorable riffing and also some of the best guitar soloing on the LP. Lyrically, Dawn of the New Centurion is once again pointedly political. Some of Zetro’s political positions might be unpopular with a certain segment of the population (such as his pro-Second Amendment song “From My Cold Dead Hands”) but when you consider the band’s name (Hatriot is a play on the word “Patriot” after all), that he’d unload with both barrels shouldn’t come as much of a surprise. The only problem with writing a political song is that after the situation changes, the song becomes somewhat irrelevant. There’s no point in calling for the release of Pussy Riot (the jailed Russian Punk Rock band referenced in the song “Superkillafragsadisticactsaresoatrocious”) after they’ve been freed, for example. There’s a timeliness about it that gets lost as the years go by. It’s as good an incentive as anything to keep the band producing new and more relevant material, though. While I’m still not a huge fan of Zetro’s vocal style, I have to admit that he’s stepped his game up since leaving Exodus. I never felt that he was a good fit for Exodus, mostly because he was never able to come out from under the shadow of Paul Baloff. With Hatriot, though, he’s the star of the show and he’s delivering the goods. If you like Thrash, this is the real deal. It’s not Exodus but it still kills posers dead.

I don’t get a lot of physical CDs to review anymore. These days essentially everything arrives in the form of an emailed download link, either from the record label, a PR company, or the band itself. So, it’s always a pleasant surprise to see the yellow card in my PO box that lets me know a package awaits. The one this CD arrived in was big enough to contain the entire Nunslaughter discography, but so light that I thought it might have accidentally been sent empty. For reasons unknown to me, the band chose to send it Standard Post, which set them back nearly $9. Cutting away the outer paper wrapping revealed a re-purposed Priority Mail box. Opening that, I was greeted with a massive amount of crumpled up newspaper and what at first appeared to be a hollow Holy Bible - I thought that because it literally says “HOLY BIBLE” on the cover. If it hadn’t been so extremely lightweight, piquing my curiosity, I might have just re-closed the box on it and thrown the entire thing into my outside trashcan. That’s kind of a risky move on the part of the band and/or label. Pressing on, I unwrapped the ridiculous amount of plastic film and opened the “Bible,” now noticing the subtitle: Book of Three Sixes. Inside the gigantic (2.25 x 7 x 9.5 inches - who has room for that?) faux-book were a couple large bags of air taking up nearly all of the space, plus a fully packaged CD, band photo, bio, stickers, etc… Without the cardstock “book” wasting so much space and weighing down everything, this could have been mailed First Class for $2.50. Even exactly as it was, Media Mail would have only been $3.17. Yes, I fucking checked the prices. Examining the CD itself, of course I found the Disc Makers logo, as expected. If you ever want to pay twice the going rate to have physical media (CDs, DVDs, etc…) manufactured, and would like someone to hold your balls through the entire process, Disc Makers is the way to go. It’s like lighting cash on fire without the fun of watching it burn. Whenever I see a band or label waste so much money (over $6 per package in postage alone, plus the small fortune that the extraneous not-actually-books must have cost, and however much they let Disc Makers overcharge), I am forced to assume the worst about them. I’m therefore kind of happy, and in another way sad, to report that the music here is fucking terrible, only matched by the horribleness of the vocals. I suppose that this is some sort of an attempt at Industrial Metal, which makes the confusing cover of AC/DC’s “Thunderstruck” stand out, but only as possibly the worst track, which is quite an accomplishment. This album is physically painful to listen to, with very occasional extremely brief instrumental moments of okayness, and somehow manages to utterly miss every mark in all conceivable ways, except one: At least they hate religion. In the interest of fairness, the recording itself is very well done, but that’s like wrapping up a well-intentioned turd in expensive paper.

Let me apologize in advance for sounding like a broken record when it comes to Sinister. I haven’t checked the archives, but I’d be willing to wager that any review I’ve done on them in the last decade hits the same spots more often than Tom Glavine in his prime. For instance, I most likely always mention that their obscenely underrated 1998 masterpiece Aggressive Measures is in my Top 3 Death Metal albums of all time (the other 2, if anyone’s curious, are Grave’s Into the Grave and Morbid Angel’s Covenant, in no particular order). Then I probably go on to poo on the media in general for failing to recognize the greatness and longevity of Sinister’s career with the same fervor as they do other groups with a similar tenure. Then maybe something about lineup changes, solid production, Aad Kloosterwaard being a bad motherfucker, etc. And then finally I boast about how good the album is. The critique never changes because Sinister never changes. The only question going into one of their releases is exactly how awesome it’s going to be, and with The Post-Apocalyptic Servant, these Dutchmen just may have penetrated their own Top 3. This LP absolutely fucking slays from start to finish. Blistering intensity, Aad’s best vocal performance in years, and outright sizzling with early-’90s Floridian energy throughout, this beast just doesn’t let up. Something tells me they’ve been listening to The Bleeding quite a bit in Schiedam. Just check out that string manipulation on “The Macabre God” and those basslines on “The Masquerade of an Angel.” Then there’s the Deicidal feel to “The End of All That Conquers” and —speaking of Covenant— the Azagthothian hooks that punctuate the verse riffs on the standout title track. Kicking and growling since ‘88, these guys have earned the right to borrow from the elder gods because they’re one of them, and the band from the early ’90s they resemble most actually turns out to be themselves. The classic vibe of Cross the Styx and Diabolical Summoning (my #2 from them while we’re at it) is successfully recaptured, albeit with enhanced chops via the new personnel. For furthermore proof of this ’90s state of mind, score the Limited Edition for spot-on renditions of Morbid Angel’s “Fall from Grace,” Paradise Lost’s “Deadly Inner Sense,” and… …Agent Steel???

Wow. Time travel is possible through compact disc, people. Believe it. The year was 1994 (technically Total Fucking Darkness came out in late ‘93, but shit took a while to circulate in the good ol’ pre-internet days). I had been into extreme music (i.e. stuff heavier than Slayer and Sepultura) for over a year and was already starting to play in my own Death Metal band. Life didn’t suck yet. (I mean, it did… but I only remember the good times.) The Norwegian Black Metal scene was really catching fire (HA!) and while those corpse-painted miscreants were making headlines, the buzz surrounding this new band from the UK was huge. You could cut the electricity in the air with a broadsword. This demo was a big fucking deal. I was never lucky enough to score an authentic copy, but old friend/co-Adversary founder Tom Benford had one, and his Dani Filth-inspired, high-pitch banshee wail would come to define band practice in those early days. To this day, even those who despise Cradle of Filth sing the praises of the band’s 3rd demo. Listening to it for the first time in two decades… I mean, I get it… but I don’t get it. It’s good —especially for an early ’90s demo— but it isn’t “the greatest demo of all time” as so many have proclaimed throughout the years. (For me, that honor easily goes to the legendary Sadness by Avernus.) Cradle of Filth was more of a Death Metal band in 1993. They used keyboards, eerie melodies, and Doomier structures to set themselves apart, but Dani had more of a straightforward growl back then, only breaking out his soon-to-be-trademark shriek once or twice at best. The highlights here include “The Raping of Faith” and “The Black Goddess Rises.” For my money, I’ve always preferred the far more refined version of the latter that appeared on the highly-anticipated-at-the-time debut LP The Principle of Evil Made Flesh. Granted, I am an unashamed Cradle of Filth fan. Other than Thornography and their last three piece-of-shit full-lengths, I celebrate the group’s entire discography. It’s most likely the embryonic rawness and rough edges of a band some feel got too big that endears Total Fucking Darkness to so many black hearts. As a piece of history and a memory lane stroll, it has unequivocal value —not to mention a slew of bonus material from the fine folks at Mordgrimm; I’m counting 12 tracks on the 2LP version and I only remember the original cassette having 4 or 5— but hardly the first thing I’ll reach for when craving a Filth fix.

According to the information that I have on this band, the sole member of Garden of Hesperides, Vasara, wants to remain anonymous and doesn’t tell anyone his real name or his physical location. Deliberate obscurity has some appeal to it, I suppose, but it isn’t like he’s gonna get mobbed by adoring fans anytime soon. Musically, Garden of Hesperides is minimalistic Black Metal in the Burzum style, but with more atmospherics. It doesn’t rise to the level of old Emperor or Graveland, but the keyboards are fully integrated into the four songs on this LP. It’s on the slow and droning side, but not in the Doom sense. This isn’t a poor choice of styles, but there is a flaw in this particular style that is a tough thing to get around. Inherent in minimalistic music is the fact that there isn’t much going on. It’s the nature of the beast. Minimalism can quickly degenerate into tedium and monotony, especially when you’re talking about songs that are pretty lengthy. The music isn’t bad, but it just goes on and on and on and on. Three of the four tracks are over ten minutes in length, but truth be told, they could have been cut in half and you wouldn’t notice the five to six missing minutes from each one. The Frozen Garden of the Hesperides is a valiant attempt at making interesting minimalistic Atmospheric Black Metal, but as good as Vasara is at creating bleak and somber moods, the music just isn’t engaging enough for my taste. If you happen to like droning Black Metal in the Filosofem-era Burzum style, you might find this album to your liking.

It seems absurdly academic for an absolute nobody such as myself to spew out posthumous critique of the legend that is Chuck Schuldiner’s body of work, but the fine folks at Relapse have given me the opportunity to talk about a Death record in 2014, so I’m jumping all over that shit. You see, I didn’t get a chance to review Leprosy when it was originally released in 1988. I was only 9, and my discovery of Death Metal was still 5 years away (although, I was heavily into Roy Orbison back then, which I’m pretty sure qualifies as Blackened Doom). Besides, Ray wasn’t even doing Metal Curse yet. At that time, he was still frantically trying to get his memoirs about being a roadie for Beethoven published, but couldn’t get any of the majors to bite. Ironically enough, I’m still pretty much at a Fourth Grade-level of writing, so this will be somewhat authentic to the period.
I wish I could say that Leprosy was my first Death Metal album, but I can’t. It wasn’t even my first Death album. I stole Individual Thought Patterns from a Musicland when I was 14, and the rest, as they say, is history. I can’t honestly say it’s my favorite Death LP, either, although I wholeheartedly understand why so many lifers do pick Death’s sophomore outing as tops. It has “Pull the Plug.” Arguably Death’s greatest song, and inarguably one of the greatest songs of all time. However, I like to point out that on my all-time fave, Scream Bloody Gore, every song is a “Pull the Plug.” But that timeless anthem certainly isn’t all Leprosy has going for it. “Left to Die” and “Open Casket” were bona fide “hits,” and the opening 1-2 punch of the title track and “Born Dead” is pretty tough to beat. It just isn’t a perfect LP. No Death Metal band has ever closed their set with a cover of “Forgotten Past,” and I’ve always found the closing tandem of “Primitive Ways” and “Choke on It” slightly less awesome by Death standards. Still, Leprosy is far better than Spiritual Healing —the band’s most unmemorable moment in my opinion— and I probably like it more than Human, but given my unashamed worship of the final three Death albums, it lands at the #5 spot for yours truly. Not like it even matters. You should own all of them or you really ought to fucking kill yourself.
As for this reissue, the bonus material is well-appreciated, but —even for the most diehard fans— perhaps a bit much. If you get the standard 2CD version, you get 10 rehearsal tracks from 1987 (which sound pretty bad). If you get the 3CD deluxe, you also get 15 live tracks from 1988 (better sound and good for at least one spin). Then if you go Bandcamp/iTunes, you get 3 more live cuts. Geez! I love Death as much as anyone, but don’t know if I’ll ever have the time and/or desire to sit around for 3 hours listening to 5 different versions of “Open Casket.” The LP version will always do perfectly by itself. Out of respect for the immortal Evil Chuck, the excess/poor quality of the bonus tracks does not reflect on the rating.

I’ve seen Embryonic Devourment play live several times since the early 2000s, so I’m quite familiar with this band. While I’m not a huge fan of Technical Brutal Death Metal, these guys know how to kick some serious ass on stage and I appreciate that. When it comes to Death Metal, any band that can give me neck damage gets my respect. One of the problems I always have with reviewing technical bands, regardless of the genre of Metal, is that the way a band sounds live and the way they sound on a studio recording is vastly different. Seen live, Embryonic Devourment is brutal as fuck, and though they’re technical, their guitar tone is pretty punishing. On Reptilian Agenda, however, the guitars are dramatically dialed back in brutality. The recording has a lot of clarity, but that came at the price of the band’s extremity. On the plus side, you get to hear every note and riff clearly. On the minus side, it doesn’t kick nearly as much ass as it should. When I first listened to this LP, I was disappointed because I remember how the band sounds live and I expected to hear a similarly bass-heavy guitar tone here, too. Even though the group is clearly very well rehearsed and their technical chops are solid throughout these eight tracks, the lighter-weight guitar tone really took a chunk out of Embryonic Devourment’s sound. If you’re listening this album for pure technicality, you’re going to find that in abundance, but one of the key parts of Technical Brutal Death Metal is the “Brutal” element. I wanted this record to beat the shit out of me, but it just never happened. I guess that’s just a good excuse to see these guys live because that’s where they really deliver the goods.