I don’t know if this self-titled release can be rightly considered an LP or not. There are only two songs, but the whole thing clocks in at over 35 minutes in length. That’s longer than your average Deicide LP. The first track, “Tidi Kjem Aldri Att,” is an instrumental, and the other, “Dei Absolutte Krav Og Den Absolutte Nade,” has vocals. Of the two, I found the first song to be more interesting because while it was fairly repetitive in nature, it had a bleakness about it that was almost mesmerizing. I kept imagining abandoned buildings and factories (Detroit, essentially…) while listening to it. The last time I had visions like that in my head was when I first heard Streatcleaner by Godflesh. Altaar may not be as mechanized or as heavy as Godflesh was on that album, but the two have a shared atmosphere of bleakness and despair. “Dei Absolutte Krav Og Den Absolutte Nade,” while not as bleak as “Tidi Kjem Aldri Att,” is still pretty dark and tortured. It starts off on the Ambient side with minimalistic spacey keyboards but eventually evolves into some pretty punishing Black/Doom Metal. If I have one complaint about this LP, it’s that it isn’t long enough. I would have liked to have maybe one more song, even if it was another instrumental track, because when “Dei Absolutte Krav Og Den Absolutte Nade” ended, I was disappointed that it was over. I guess I’m going to have to wait for the next release by Altaar to come out so that I can string things together.

Writing reviews for Chthonic albums is always a tough thing for me. I imagine that they’d be a hell of a lot easier to write if I just based my reviews on how hot I thought bassist Doris Yeh looked in the band’s promo photographs. Of course, if I wanted to review albums based on how hot one or more of the group’s female members are, I’d work for a K-Pop website and all I would review would be releases by 4Minute, G.Na or Girl’s Generation. Chthonic is more than just Doris and their music isn’t brainless Pop bullshit. I hate doing reviews of their albums because it’s so fucking hard for me not to give them a perfect score. I’ve already done it twice. I loved Takasago Army because it kicked my ass in all the ways I wanted it to. I even loved the live DVD/CD, Final Battle at Sing Ling Temple, not because it was flawless, but because it had flaws that I associate with a legitimate live recording. How many of us have gone to a concert where everything went off perfectly and nothing had to be adjusted? The flaws in the live release told me that they didn’t go into the studio and rerecord anything. That was how they sounded that night and it was a great concert. In a rather roundabout way, this brings us to the new Chthonic album, Bu-Tik. Chthonic has always been the Asian version of Cradle of Filth/Dimmu Borgir, but they’ve been emphasizing the Asian aspects of their music. They aren’t Tengger Cavalry, but they do deliver a substantial level of Asian musical elements into their Symphonic Black Metal. I like it when bands bring something different to the table. I’d much rather hear a band bring their own perspective to the genre as opposed to blatantly aping another scene’s style. If you’ve been listening to Metal for any length of time, you’re sure to have heard groups from South America playing Viking Metal, or Norse-style Black Metal played by dudes from Malaysia. What Chthonic does is integrate European Symphonic Black Metal with traditional Chinese Folk music to produce some truly epic stuff. The atmospheric element that is usually present in Chthonic’s music is a bit blunted by the fact that the band decided to focus more on the guitars this time around. Bu-Tik is primarily a guitar-based album. The keyboards are more in the background and while this reins in their symphonic parts a bit, it does more to increase their ass-kicking factor. And this album does kick your ass. Aside from the brief atmospheric interludes, this is as brutal of a stomping as they’ve ever delivered. It’s a reminder that they’re a Metal band, and that you, the listener, shouldn’t forget that - despite the intricate and atmospheric keyboards or the symphonic elements that are present. There is one flaw, though, in their otherwise perfect armor. The production in places is such that the drums sometimes overpower even the guitars. With the keyboards pushed further into the background, the two dominant instruments are the guitars and the drums. When drummer Dani Wang is in full blast mode, he rides that snare like a Kennedy on a cheap hooker. The net result is that Jesse Liu’s guitar gymnastics are lost underneath the sound of Dani pounding his snare like it owes him money. Thankfully, this doesn’t happen very often. It’s enough to call attention to itself, but I don’t consider this a serious detraction. It keeps this from being flawless, but Chthonic is still a highly recommended band and this is still a highly recommended album.

This is the non-Geoff Tate incarnation of Queensryche, for those keeping track of all of the drama surrounding the band(s). For those in the dark about it, longtime vocalist Geoff Tate split and started up another band using the Queensryche name. The remaining three original members, Eddie Jackson (bass), Scott Rockenfield (drums) and Michael Wilton (guitar) are also still using the Queensryche name. The reality is that both current incarnations of Queensryche don’t sound all that much like the original lineup. Without Chris DeGarmo, they really don’t have the same technical prowess and Progressive Metal style. This self-titled LP is more straight-forward Hard Rock/Heavy Metal without a lot of frills. The riffing is solid and the songs are pretty rocking, but without DeGarmo’s influence, it sounds kind of generic. I thought that Alpha Tiger (also on Century Media) would have trouble differentiating themselves from Queensryche because their vocalist sounded a lot like Geoff Tate, but now that I’ve listened to this album, I’m having a hard time telling the two bands apart. Queensryche went the “Ripper Owens” route and got ex-Crimson Glory vocalist, Todd La Torre, who is also a Geoff Tate clone. La Torre sounds so much like Geoff Tate that if you didn’t know better, you’d swear that it was him. I know that you need someone with the same range as Geoff to pull off their early material. The fans want to hear the good stuff and someone without the right range wouldn’t do the early Queensryche songs justice. Todd La Torre really doesn’t bring anything to the table that wasn’t already there, though. Neither does the rest of the band. Todd is content to be Geoff Tate Lite and Queensryche, the band as a whole, is content to go through the motions. Face it, this isn’t the same band that did Operation: Mindcrime. It was a masterwork. I’m not expecting that kind of greatness. That album caught lightning in a bottle and they were never able to replicate the success it had or even come close to being as musically awesome after that. Still, I expected at least something different and interesting from them. This isn’t the abomination that Geoff Tate’s Kings & Thieves LP was, though, which is something that I’m profoundly thankful for. I don’t think I could handle another shitty album like that. Maybe these guys should go back to calling themselves The Mob because without Chris DeGarmo and Geoff Tate, it’s almost like listening to Judas Priest without Rob Halford and K.K. Downing or Black Sabbath without Ozzy (or Dio) and Tony Iommi. While this LP is unadventurous, it doesn’t suck. It’s good Rock & Roll but it just doesn’t feel like Queensryche anymore.

Ah, Space Doom. You don’t see too much of this out there. Musically, it has a lot in common with other disciples of Black Sabbath, but there is a strong “deep space” vibe going on with this band. The impression that I got was that they were going in a psychedelic direction already, but one day the guys decided to trip balls on LSD and somehow ended up watching a marathon of Carl Sagan’s Cosmos at the same time. It’s kind of like a reinterpretation of Pink Floyd’s Dark Side of the Moon by Black Sabbath. The music flows very much in the same way as Dark Side of the Moon and the vocals even have a similarly “spaced out” feel. Naturally, the lyrics are all about esoteric scientific stuff like fractals and space/time. One thing that struck me was how “retro” this LP sounded. If I didn’t know better, I’d swear that this was from the ’70s. Maybe it’s the Hammond organ sound that they’re using that does it. I kind of wish I heard this band three or four months ago when I was on my ’70s Hard Rock kick. I was listening to bands like Pink Floyd, Rainbow, Elf and Ozzy-era Sabbath almost every day (when not reviewing stuff for Metal Curse, of course) so it would have fit in perfectly. A note to fans of this band’s earlier work: Necrocosmos is nothing like any of their previous releases. These guys used to play Funeral Doom, but they’ve changed directions and sound like a completely different band now. If you go in expecting something in the same vein as Ego Sum Censore Deuum, you’re in for a shock. I liked this LP for what it was, mostly because I’m a fan of good Doom and old Hard Rock, but I have to admit that I liked their older stuff better. It was heavier, for one thing. I also tend to like Funeral Doom more than Psychedelic Doom. The psychedelic stuff is a bit weird and it takes a lot longer to get into it without the necessary drugs. If you like Pink Floyd, and Dark Side of the Moon in particular, you will probably like this LP. If you wanted more of what Gallileous was doing before, this will likely disappoint you.

This is my first time hearing Italy’s Azrath-11, and my first impression of the band is that they love old Morbid Angel and Behemoth. I know this is kind of redundant because Behemoth pretty much worships at that old Morbid Angel altar, too. Face it, early Morbid Angel is still some of the most brutal, soul-tearing Black/Death Metal ever created, and though it’s been ages since Altars of Madness and Blessed Are the Sick, those two albums still run circles around most of the releases out there to this day. As for the Behemoth aspect of this band’s sound, that mostly comes through in the production. Ov Tentacles and Spirals has that Vader/Behemoth sound with powerful, driving guitars and somewhat artificial triggered drums. The way that Azrath-11 tries to differentiate themselves from the hordes of Behemoth clones is by going back to the source and incorporating more old-school Floridian Death Metal into their riffing. That helps them a little bit, but the net effect is that they sound like Behemoth doing Morbid Angel songs, and in fact Azrath-11 does cover “God of Emptiness,” slightly retitled, ov course. I know that the Vader/Behemoth sound is really, really good, but if Azrath-11 wants to stand apart from the clones, they have to find something new. Maybe a different studio or a different engineer might make the difference. Their music is pretty good, and while not wholly original, it does kick some ass. They just need to find a sound that is uniquely their own.

This band was one of the founders of the Bay Area Thrash scene, having formed back in the very early ’80s. Geoff Thorpe has continued to record and release albums with a veritable who’s who of the scene contributing. Still, even with all of that talent lending their support, Vicious Rumors has never achieved the kind of success they theoretically should have had. Electric Punishment, much like previous recordings, is a pretty solid Thrash album. It isn’t a great Thrash album, but it doesn’t suck, either. That’s essentially the story of Vicious Rumors in a nutshell. They’ve gotten to a respectable status around here, headlining shows at the locals clubs and maintaining a respectable following, but they’ve never broken through to the next level. Their albums are good, but none of them are legitimately great, let alone legendary. Even with top-notch players in Vicious Rumors (Thaen Rasmussen of Anvil Chorus plays guitar on this album, other past luminaries include ex-Heathen guitarist Ira Black and current Death Angel drummer Will Carroll, among many others), the band’s output hasn’t surpassed the sum of its parts, or even equaled them. I guess the generic answer to the problems Vicious Rumors has breaking out of their rut is to bring some new blood into the song writing team. Electric Punishment will satisfy longtime fans, but I doubt that they’ll win many new converts. It’s Geoff Thorpe doing what he does best, but ultimately, that’s just not enough to write home about.

Even within the realms of Death/Grind, a compilation CD of all of a band’s work that is only eight songs and twenty-two minutes in length is an oddity. A band that plays more on the Death Metal side of things would have a longer playing time, and a band that was more on the Grind side would have way more songs. The U.K.’s Black Mass is somewhere in the middle, playing a form of stripped-down Death/Grind that sounds more than a little bit like old Dismember. The best way to describe Black Mass is to say that they’re just like Dismember, but without any frills. There are no guitar solos, melodic riffs, breakdowns or technical parts. It’s just in-your-face Death/Grind that pulls no punches and it’s about as pretty as getting beaten to death by a steel pipe-wielding psycho. Of First and Last Things hits you hard and it hits you fast. It’s a maelstrom of blasting drums, brutal riffs and corrosive vocals. There are times when I don’t want to dwell on anything other than Metal music that kicks my ass. During those times, something like Of First and Last Things is ideal. It isn’t original or groundbreaking. It doesn’t try to be anything different or unique. It just beats the shit out of you for twenty-two minutes and then leaves.

Back in the late ’80s, I heard about Vulcano through a friend of mine who was a tape trader. In those days, there weren’t too many brutal Thrash (proto-Death/Thrash) bands out there, and Vulcano was one of them. They were quite possibly the only one out of Brazil at the time. Remember, these guys were around pre-Sepultura and Sarcofago. While they were decidedly second-tier underneath bands like Slayer and Exodus, they still caused enough havoc to gain a cult status, especially amongst the developing Death and Black Metal scenes in Europe and North America. Fast forward to 2013. Vulcano is back again with a new album, and while things sound cleaner, the music is definitely old-school. This is some fire-breathing, high-velocity Thrash Metal that doesn’t dwell on technicality but just exists to kick your ass and snap your neck. It still sounds lower-tier, though. Even after almost thirty years, they still lag behind the legendary bands. This isn’t to say that the music on The Man, the Key, the Beast doesn’t get your head banging. It does. It just doesn’t hold a candle to Reign in Blood, Infernal Overkill, Kill ‘em All or Bonded by Blood. It sort of has the same appeal that bands like Dekapitator or Nocturnal Breed have. It pays homage to the greats, but as hard as they try, they can’t best the legends. I would love to see Vulcano live, though. The music on this LP is sure to cause some serious carnage at any venue they happen to be playing at. It’s the kind of Thrash that is sure to whip a crowd into a frenzy and damage necks and skulls all over the place. It isn’t horribly original or different, but it does get the blood moving and the adrenaline burning in your veins the way good Thrash should.

A band featuring both Sakis (aka Necromayhem) of Rotting Christ and Magus Wampyr Daoloth (aka The Magus) of Necromantia can only be awesome, but Thou Art Lord never achieved the level of recognition that they should have gotten. They’ve released a number of albums over the years, but aside from a cult following, they’ve always remained in the shadow of both Rotting Christ and Necromantia. When you consider how active Rotting Christ has been over the years, I’m honestly surprised that Sakis even had the time to spare for Thou Art Lord. The band has returned, though, with a revamped lineup and a new album. Vocalist Gothmog is back in the fold and they’ve recruited some new members in the form of El (guitars & keyboards) and Maelstrom (drums). This time around, the driving force behind the band seems to be El, who either wrote the music himself or split the duties with either Sakis or MWD. As with old Thou Art Lord, The Regal Pulse of Lucifer draws heavily on Rotting Christ as the musical influence. A lot of folks who’ve heard this LP say that this could have easily been a Rotting Christ release if Sakis had done the vocals instead of Gothmog. This is a valid point because the guitar playing here is very much in line with the traditional Rotting Christ sound. Still, that’s nothing new where this band is concerned. Even if you go back to their earliest material, they’ve always sounded like Rotting Christ to a greater or lesser degree. If anything, The Regal Pulse of Lucifer is a throwback to the older (Non Serviam era, maybe?) Rotting Christ sound with a bit of Necromantia thrown into the mix. While some folks out there haven’t been too keen on the newer Rotting Christ material (the last two albums have been in the love-it-or-hate-it category), most longtime fans should like this. There’s no weird shit, no Folk Metal or tribal drumming. This is just straight-out Black Metal in the Greek style. While I did like the last couple Rotting Christ records, I find myself liking this new album by Thou Art Lord a bit more. It’s not as polished and it has a darker, more evil sound to it. That’s what I’m looking for in Black Metal and this has it in abundance.

This is my first time hearing England’s Lychgate (formerly known as Archaicus), though I have heard guitarist/keyboardist Vortigern’s other band, The One, before. Having heard The One, I was expecting something more in that vein, but Lychgate sounds completely different. It’s still Black Metal, but it comes from the opposite end of the spectrum. Where I was anticipating something in the more raw and dirty Darkthrone style, this LP surprised me by being very clean and structured. Unlike The One, Lychgate is very technical. I’m not generally a fan of technical music, but I appreciate skillful playing when I hear it, and these guys are definitely good at what they do. I also like that while this is technical, it never degenerates into pointless guitar masturbation or weird-for-the-sake-of-being-weird navel-gazing Progressive Metal. The music is dark, melodic, and though it isn’t slow, it has something of a Doom atmosphere. My only real gripe is that the songs don’t have any memorable bits in them. It’s possible to be technical and memorable at the same time, but it’s not an easy thing to pull off. Having a hook or something that the listener can latch on to makes the song stick in your head. Lychgate doesn’t have any of that here. That being said, you really can’t remember any of the songs from this LP after it’s done playing. If these guys can work in some memorable bits, their next release could be lethal. As it is, this LP is still an interesting listen. If you like technical Death or Black Metal, you will probably enjoy the music that Lychgate is making.

I’ve read some extremely negative reviews of this album, which I find puzzling. What else could anyone expect from Broken Hope other than brutal Death Metal? And of course this is exactly what is delivered here, on the band’s return after a 14 year absence. Maybe I’m biased. I’ve always liked these sick bastards (and possibly every other Death Metal band in Chicago). I’ve got their demo tapes, my old band Adversary played some shows with them nearly two decades ago (never forget The Thirsty Whale!), and I’ve otherwise seen Broken Hope perform countless times. Not recently, obviously. Over the years, their 1991 debut, Swamped in Gore (supposedly the first-ever all-digitally recorded/mixed Death Metal record!), has emerged as my favorite of their albums, because although not the most brutal, it is hands-down the most memorable, especially the amazing title track and “Bag of Parts.” I had hoped that Omen of Disease would somehow combine the intensity and extremity of the band’s other albums with the slightly more straightforward approach of Swamped…, and that’s more or less what they did, wrapped in a clear-yet-thick production. And, when I say “they,” I mean mastermind Jeremy Wager, who reunited with bassist Shaun Glass (who was only around for two albums back in the old days: 1995’s Repulsive Conception and 1997’s Loathing), and recruited some unknowns (to me, at least), Chuck Wepfer and Mike Miczek, to fill out the guitar and drum spots respectively. Maybe Jeremy has spent the last decade-and-a-half training these new guys (when he’s not writing books), because they sound like old pros. No one could ever replace the late Joe Ptacek (rest in peace, brother) and his legendary bestial esophagus, but Gorgasm’s Damian Leski does his memory proud with monstrous bellows, roars, and growls. While not quite flawless, Omen… never goes too long without impressing. Check out the awesomeness about 2:20 into “Ghastly,” the opening riff of “Rendered Into Lard,” every second of the show-stealing “Give Me the Bottom Half,” and really most of the rest of the album. There are a few misfires, however. Maybe a riff here and there that doesn’t make 100% sense to me. And the hammy spoken-word final minute of “Rendered Into Lard,” which I assume is supposed to be creepy, but goes on far too long and is almost instantly eye-rollingly goofy. Anything else is just nitpicking, but that’s what keeps great albums from being perfect, and this is a great album. The “limited edition” digipak comes with two bonus live tracks (only about four-and-a-half minutes combined, and hopefully a live CD/DVD is coming next, anyway), and a “history of Broken Hope” DVD, which unfortunately I haven’t seen. It might be interesting, but it’s almost certainly a once-ever viewing even for me, so I don’t know if it’s really worth much extra money.

When I first heard Satyricon back in the days of Dark Medieval Times and The Shadowthrone, they were considered one of the leading voices in the post-Euronymous Norwegian Black Metal scene. While I never considered them to be top-tier, Satyr and Frost did produce some good music. After their third LP, Nemesis Divina, I started losing interest in them. They were going a different direction and I wasn’t much interested in the music that they were putting out. It’s been a number of years since I last heard Satyricon (outside of the odd listen to one of their first three albums), so when I saw this LP at my local record store, I decided to see what they sounded like now. Let’s just say that I was more than a little bit disappointed. Compared to previous Satyricon releases, this new LP is pretty bland. Satyr and Frost have gone back to a more orthodox Black Metal sound, but they’ve incorporated some slower traditional Heavy Metal riffing in with their worship of old Bathory. It’s more melodic and though the riffs are more memorable, the plodding speed and lack of intensity make this really hard to get excited about. I went back and listened to my old Satyricon albums for comparison purposes and the differences were pretty stark. Satyr and Frost sound positively sedated here. I used to criticize Frost’s playing because he tended to stick to only one speed: Warp Ten. Now, I wish he’d get fired up and start blasting away because I know he can do it. It almost sounds like they lost their fire. Even though the music is note-perfect, the lack of feeling or intensity sinks this. I actually felt sad while listening to it. And not because the music was so morose that it evoked that emotion. I felt sad because the music on this LP was so empty. It was like listening to a band that’s just going through the motions. They don’t have anything to prove to anyone. Satyricon made their mark on the scene years ago. I’ve heard this LP described as the band’s most introspective work ever. If it is, they obviously looked inside themselves and discovered that their souls were missing. I haven’t completely written Satyricon off, though. If they can find their lost intensity and put some feeling into their next LP, it might just be legendary. This one, though, definitely isn’t.

Iraq isn’t what I would call a hotbed of Black Metal activity. Most Muslim countries don’t take very well to this kind of music and the lyrical content that Seeds of Iblis has. Unlike your average anti-Christian Black Metal band, Seeds of Iblis is anti-Islamic. You don’t see too many of those bands, particularly from the Middle East. Saying “Fuck Jesus,” or burning a church in Iraq won’t get you killed. Saying “Fuck the Prophet Mohammed” will likely get you decapitated, though. Blasphemy is usually a capital offense, just ask Salman Rushdie about it. He wrote Satanic Verses ages ago and he’s still in hiding because that fatwa on his head is still in effect. Given that threat hovering over their heads, it’s surprising that a band like Seeds of Iblis can exist. Musically, Seeds of Iblis has kind of an interesting sound. They’re a raw and dirty Darkthrone/Burzum-inspired band that also incorporates a lot of Middle Eastern/Islamic elements to their music. I’m sure that their local mosque doesn’t appreciate them using Muslim prayer and other samples in their songs, particularly ones with names like “Islamic Lies.” I was initially turned off by the extremely raw sound on Anti Quran Rituals, but something about the atmosphere on this LP keeps me listening. It’s dark and twisted, going from raw, droning Black Metal to some echoing acoustic guitar with accompanying anti-Islamic prayer/chanting. I’ve always liked looking for obscure bands from oddball places in the world because every now and then, I’m rewarded with an LP that gives me a new twist on something familiar. Anti Quran Rituals does that for me. It stands out amidst the sea of generic Black Metal, and when you consider how oversaturated the marketplace is, that’s quite an accomplishment.

Live albums seem to be all the rage in the Power Metal scene these days. After enduring two hours and twenty minutes of Iced Earth, I discovered that Axel Rudi Pell had a live album, too. Live on Fire is their 2012 set from Essigfabrik, in Cologne, Germany. [The retail CD/DVD sets have a second disc featuring the band’s performance at the 2012 Rock of Ages festival.] In a way, this live set reminded me of listening to the Dio at Donington UK 1983 & 1987 live album in more ways than just one. I’ve always thought that vocalist Johnny Gioeli had a voice that was eerily similar to the late Ronnie James Dio. This is especially noticeable live. They have comparable accents and intonations. It always made Axel Rudi Pell sound like a Power Metal version of Dio to me. The other similarity between the Dio live CD and Axel Rudi Pell’s is the extensive use of medleys. In order to compress a whole array of songs into a short set, Dio would often play several songs mashed up together. I always hated that and wanted to hear the complete songs. A truncated version of “Holy Diver” never did it for me because I thought the whole song was awesome. It made portions of the live show seem like a DJ set instead of a concert. I might just be weird like that, but it gets my goat. Such is the case here on Live on Fire. The medley of “The Masquerade Ball” and four other songs was pretty good, but I would’ve preferred that each song get its own time instead of including a drum solo, keyboard solo and a jam session in the middle of “Carousel.” I’ve always found drum solos to be a waste of time (unless you happen to be Neil Peart of Rush) because they’re pretty uninteresting even by drum wanker standards. The one on Live on Fire is eight minutes of intermission. It’s enough time to go to the bathroom or go to the fridge for some food and still get back in time before the next actual song (“Mystica”) starts up. Maybe it’s more exciting on the DVD version of this (the label, as usual, only sent us the audio portion for review, and just half of even that), but I can’t see how it would be. The keyboard solo is marginally better, but it was still pretty pointless. The playing on this album is essentially spot-on otherwise. If you’re a fan of Axel Rudi Pell, you’ll definitely like it. As with most of my live album reviews, I always recommend getting the video version if there is one available (and there typically is one). The visual element adds a lot to a live recording. Concerts are as much about the visual aspects as they are about the music. When you just listen to the audio, you miss out on half of the show. If you’re a fan of the band, this is definitely worth it for the most part. The sound is great, and outside of the obvious filler material (the drum and keyboard solos), this is a solid release.

I haven’t listened to Clandestine Blaze in years. I got hold of their 1999 debut LP (Fire Burns in Our Hearts) when it first came out and I found it to be disappointingly predictable. Face it, if I can pinpoint exactly when the generic keyboard intro will end and the Lo-Fi generic Necro Black Metal begins without ever hearing the LP or the band before, that’s just fucking sad. Harmony of Struggle is the latest by Clandestine Blaze and I felt that enough time had passed for the band to have improved, and most importantly of all, to have discovered their own sound. Sadly, it often takes a band several albums before they find their identity and start producing quality music. Harmony of Struggle is far better and more original than their debut, which is always a good thing to notice right off the bat. They’re still a bit on the underproduced side, but the music is definitely worth a listen. Clandestine Blaze has gotten a bit slower and heavier on this release and the net effect is that they sound more like De Mysteriis Dom Sathanas-era Mayhem than Darkthrone. This is particularly evident on “Face of Granite.” Other tracks have a similar vibe, though the influence isn’t quite as noticeable. The use of keyboards and atmosphere add a lot to the music, too. There are moments when things are genuinely dark and brooding, like a creature locked in your attic that’s biding his time until he can catch you unawares. What keeps this LP from absolute awesomeness is the production. Harmony of Struggle has a snare tone that sounds like a metal garbage can lid. Also, the guitars could have been more powerful. They needed to be up in front and in your face, assaulting you like you owed the band money. Instead, they’re kind of in that middle area where they’re louder than the average “we sucked all of the bass out of our guitars” Necro Black Metal band, but they’re not quite loud enough to get out from underneath the garbage can lid snare drum when the speed kicks up. I hope Clandestine Blaze continues to go in this direction because this is some seriously good stuff that only needs a recording/production that will allow the music to kick ass to its fullest potential.

Researching Acherontas for this review was quite interesting. Though the band is from Greece, they don’t really have much in common with other bands from that area. Their sound was more in line with the old Norse Atmospheric Black Metal style (Emperor, Dimmu Borgir, etc.), though they were quite adept at weaving melodic guitar-work in with the keyboards. Amenti is quite different than any of their previous works. The Black Metal parts are still dark and melodic, though a larger portion of this LP is devoted to more Ritual/Ambient sections. One of the main reasons I wanted to listen to this is because Scorpios Androctonus (Crimson Moon/Akrabu/Sabnack) recently joined the band (in late 2012, I believe). This is his first album with Acherontas and you can see his influence. Scorpius is big into the whole Messo-Arabic Ambient/Atmospheric stuff and there is definitely more of that on this LP than ever before. There are parts of Amenti that sound straight out of an Akrabu album. The Ritual/Ambient elements of this album were particularly interesting to me because while the Black Metal was good, the ritualistic stuff gave this album more of an identity. Atmospheric Black Metal bands, while rarer than in the mid-’90s, are still fairly mainstream in the Black Metal scene as a whole. The incorporation of more ritualistic, Messo-Arabic sounds to the Acherontas style has made them far more unique than they had been before. This band had an already impressive back-catalog, but of their releases I like Amenti the best. It’s their most unique offering to date and the one that I end up listening to the most.

I was a fan of Aborym in their early days, particularly back when they had Attila Csihar (Mayhem/Tormentor) on vocals. Attila has such an evil voice that he can make even the most generic Black Metal sound unique and absolutely twisted. Aborym was already working the tag of “Industrial Black Metal” back then, but that came mostly in the form of mechanized drumming and some Industrial keyboard-work. Their post-Attila output was less than stellar, but still there were parts of Psychogrotesque that I liked. This album shows Aborym pretty much ditching the traditional Black Metal sound and going for a more Goth/Industrial approach. Now, I’m fairly open-minded when it comes to expanding the Metal sound. I’ve heard bands incorporate all kinds of different music into Metal, and while most fail miserably, there are some ideas that take hold and eventually grow into their own sub-genre. What I don’t like is when bands go bat-shit crazy and start incorporating weird shit just for the sake of adding weird shit. This is what Dirty sounds like. It’s Aborym being weird just to be different. Listening to this was hard because it took multiple attempts just to figure out what the fuck was going on. In a nutshell, this is Aborym trying their best to sound like a harsher version of Nine Inch Nails. It’s all Techno beats, effects-laden guitars and vocals, oddball sound effects and keyboard stabs. The Goth crowd might find this more appealing, but longtime fans of Aborym will likely find themselves scratching their heads and wondering when Trent Reznor joined the band. Another difference between old Aborym and what’s on Dirty is the lyrical direction. Where previously their lyrics were always Satanic, there is definitely more Anarchist political rhetoric and blatantly sexual stuff on this LP. I don’t know if this is because the musical direction has changed or if it’s because the band wants to find new fans from amongst the so-called disaffected youth who want something different because they want something different. Obviously, the band wants someone to like this LP, but that someone just isn’t me. Guys, you’ve lost me. I’ll always dig the old stuff, but this new LP is just irritating.

This LP is somewhat of a departure from this band’s earlier works. Previously, Finland’s Shade Empire was more straight-forward Melodic Black/Death Metal with keyboards, sporting something of an Industrial edge, owing mostly to the “human doing his level best to sound like a drum machine” percussion. That was before. Now, the band has decided to instead focus more on the atmospheric and symphonic elements that they’ve always had, putting additional emphasis on the keyboards. The music is much more orchestral this time around, having a sound resembling a Death Metal version of Cradle of Filth or Dimmu Borgir. The keyboard parts, while always prominent before, have gone beyond providing basic atmosphere. They’ve become more complex and layered. That goes for everything else the band does, too. The guitar playing is also more intricate and melodic compared to Shade Empire’s previous output. After going back and researching their older material, it’s almost shocking to see how different Omega Arcane is in comparison. If you want to know what the distinction is between Atmospheric Death Metal and Symphonic Death Metal, all you have to do is listen to any of Shade Empire’s previous releases and then listen to this album. The old stuff was Atmospheric Death Metal. This is Symphonic Death Metal. This is some seriously epic music. While I liked this band’s previous material, Omega Arcane is my favorite LP by a wide margin. I don’t know how much further these guys can push their sound, but I’m definitely down to see where they go next.

A friend of mine describes albums like Apnoe by using the acronym “NVM,” which stands for “Not Very Metal.” At one time, Germany’s Todtgelichter was a standard Black Metal band. Their music was pretty basic, mostly referencing old Bathory, Darkthrone and Burzum for the majority of their songs. I had their first album, 2005’s Was Bleibt…, but I found it to be generic and unadventurous. I’d pretty much written them off after that, skipping their next two LPs altogether. Apnoe sounds nothing like they used to. Compared to their old material, this LP is far more original and different. That being said, the change wasn’t for the better. A lot of the songs on Apnoe are so passive that they make Barry Manilow sound like Extreme Noise Terror in comparison. It’s like they decided that playing Black Metal was too mainstream, so they included a lot of limp-wristed lounge music to sound different. And it does make them sound different, but calling this Black Metal is insulting to Black Metal. Even calling this Post-Black Metal doesn’t really describe how un-Metal the bulk of the music is. I’ve honestly no idea which segment of the Metal market -or any other music market- that this album is aimed at. I don’t know which genre’s fans would like this, other than those oddball hipster people that listen to strange shit just because it’s outside the mainstream. As general music, this doesn’t suck, but it’s so far away from what I want to listen to when buying a record that, knowing what’s on here, I wouldn’t even think of picking it up. This album does literally nothing for me other than make me pissed off that I wasted so much time listening to it. I know a few people will want to check this out because morbid curiosity is a powerful force, but I’d advise against it. You were warned.

Svartsyn has technically been around since 1991, starting up under the name Chalice, but essentially having the same basic line-up. Ornias, currently the sole member of the band, has remained on the peripheries of the Swedish Black Metal scene for the better part of two decades. While this band has put out LP after LP (Black Testament is album number eight), mainstream recognition and acclaim has been elusive. In a scene as overcrowded and as saturated as Black Metal, getting recognized and breaking out from the pack is a tough thing to do. Still, Svartsyn has garnered a fair sized following over the years. Picking up where 2012’s Genesis of Deaths Illuminating Mysteries EP left off, Black Testament starts with your basic tuneless violin intro and things descend quickly into Hell from there. While the playing is sometimes choppy and the transitions between riffs are hit or miss, particularly in “Revelation in the Waters,” the general tone of the album is positively vile. Svartsyn has a sound that reminds me somewhat of old Marduk or maybe Triumphator in terms of speed, but with a more droning Black Metal song structure. While it isn’t musically all that original, the combination of Ornias vomiting forth some of the most rancid Black Metal vocals this side of Purgatory, and the dark and churning guitars makes Black Testament work. I swear, Ornias has a voice that is so evil sounding that he could probably make a One Direction cover into something dark and twisted. In spite of the obvious flaws, I find myself liking this LP anyway. This band reminds me a lot of old Beherit in that while the music may not be perfectly executed, it has an abundance of feeling and atmosphere. That more than makes up for the shortcomings on Black Testament. This is definitely one to check out.