June is behind us, July lies ahead. Here in the U.S., we’re about to start the long weekend leading up to Independence Day, when Americans celebrate the birth of the nation by buying explosive ordinance wherever fine explosive ordinance is sold and lighting up the night sky (in addition to blowing the shit out of objects and sometimes themselves). People will also be exposing unsightly parts of their bodies wherever sun can be found and eating large quantities of health food prepared on outdoor grills. Our Founding Fathers would be proud of what they wrought!

Because the last month has ended, that means it’s time for another installment of METAL IN THE FORGE, in which we collect news blurbs and press releases we’ve seen over the last month about forthcoming new albums from bands we know and like (including occasional updates about releases we’ve included in previous installments of this series), or from bands that look interesting, even though we don’t know their music yet. In this series, we cut and paste those announcements and compile them in alphabetical order.

Remember — this isn’t a cumulative list. If we found out about a new album during May or preceding months, we wrote about them in previous installments of this series. So, be sure to check the Category link called “Forthcoming Albums” on the right side of this page to see forecasted releases we reported earlier. This month’s list begins right after the jump. Look for your favorite bands, or get intrigued about some new ones. And feel free to tell us about how we fucked up by omitting releases that we overlooked.

ABORTED: “Death metal psychopaths ABORTED have entered Hansen Studios in Ribe, Denmark with producer Jacob Hansen (INVOCATOR,HATESPHERE, VOLBEAT) to begin recording their seventh full-length album, “Global Flatline”, for a late 2011 release via Century Media Records. 15 tracks of “the most brutal and intense material the band has written to date” are laid down for the effort, with 12 tracks set to appear on the regular CD and the rest to be used as bonus material.”

ABORYM: “Legendary Italian industrial/post-black metallers ABORYM have inked a worldwide deal with Agonia Records. The band’s sixth album will be released in 2012 and it will coincide with the group’s 20th anniversary.”

ADRENALINE MOB: “ADRENALINE MOB, the new band featuring former DREAM THEATER/AVENGED SEVENFOLD drummer Mike Portnoy, SYMPHONY X frontman Russell Allen, guitar virtuoso Mike Orlando (SONIC STOMP), bassist Paul DiLeo and STUCK MOJO/FOZZY axeman Rich Ward, has posted audio samples from its upcoming debut album on the group’s Facebook page (you must “like” the page in order to hear the samples).”

ALL SHALL PERISH: “Oakland, California extreme metallers ALL SHALL PERISH will release their fourth full-length album, “This Is Where It Ends”, on July 26 (North America) and July 29 (Europe) via Nuclear Blast Records. A pre-order package containing the new CD, an official ALL SHALL PERISH “party tech” 34 oz. mug and shot glass, a new ALL SHALL PERISH shirt, and five ALL SHALL PERISH condoms is now available for “only $32 dollars.” A press release states, “For the price of two CD’s you can get drunk, have safe sex, and still support an incredible band. What are you waiting for? ”

AMON: “Former DEICIDE members Eric Hoffmann (guitar) and Brian Hoffman (guitar) recently resurrected their pre-DEICIDE band AMON with Jesse “Jecheal” Jolly (PROMETHEAN HORDE, DIABOLIC, SUCCESS WILL WRITE APOCALYPSE ACROSS THE SKY, AFTER DEATH) on vocals/bass and and Mike Petrak (LEPROSY, SUCCESS WILL WRITE APOCALYPSE ACROSS THE SKY) on drums. The Florida-based quartet entered RedRoom Recorders in Tampa on December 10, 2010 with producer Mark Prator to record its new album, entitled “Liar In Wait”.”

ANIMALS AS LEADERS: “ANIMALS AS LEADERS is currently recording its second CD with drummer Navene Koperweis handling production duties. A fall release is expected.”

BLUT AUS NORD: “”777 – The Desanctification”, the eagerly awaited second part of BLUT AUS NORD’s “777″ trilogy, is currently being recorded and will be released via Debemur Morti Productions this coming September.”

CADAVERIA: “CADAVERIA, the Italian band featuring former OPERA IX vocalistCadaveria and ex-OPERA IX drummer/NECRODEATH vocalist Marçelo Santos (a.k.a. Flegias), has issued the following update: “Well, we can say the new album is almost done! We are finishing the mix and refining the last tracks and, during the next week, we will begin working on the mastering. It is now early to talk about an official release date for CADAVERIA fourth full-length. However, we can assume it could be in stores before the end of this year.”

CHIMAIRA: “A 43-second video teaser for “The Age Of Hell”, the new album from Cleveland, Ohio metallers CHIMAIRA, can be seen here. The CD is due in August in North America, South America and Japan via eOne Music.”

CIPHER SYSTEM: “Nuclear Blast Records has announced the signing of the Swedish futuristic and extreme metal act CIPHER SYSTEM. 15 years after the birth of the band, CIPHER SYSTEM returns with what has to be described as a masterpiece in a genre where innovation has become sparse, putting their murderous machinations on public display, forged with fearsome skill and precision: “Communicate The Storm”. Packed in the rapturous art of a true genius of darkened visuals, Seth Siro Anton (SOILWORK, PARADISE LOST, SEPTICFLESH), and with a mix once again stemming from the hallowed grounds of Studio Fredman, this colossus of an album is sure to send tremors throughout the scene when it hits the street on September 9.”

DECAPITATED: “Polish technical death metal band DECAPITATED will release their fifth studio album, “Carnival Is Forever”, in North America on July 12 viaNuclear Blast Records.”

DENIAL FIEND: “Horror metal supergroup DENIAL FIEND will release its second full-length album, “Horror Holocaust”, on August 2 via Ibex Moon Records. Recorded at Mana Recording Studios in St. Petersburg, Florida, the long-awaited follow-up to 2007′s “They Rise” is the band’s first CD to feature DENIAL FIEND‘s current lineup of drummer Rob Rampy (D.R.I.), vocalist Blaine Cook (THE ACCUSED), bassist Terry Butler (DEATH, SIX FEET UNDER, MASSACRE) and guitarist Sam Williams (DOWN BY LAW).”

DESCENDING: “After a long period of intensive work in Greece and Sweden along with producer Fredrik Nordström (IN FLAMES, DIMMU BORGIR, ARCH ENEMY) at Fredman studios, Athens, Greece-based death/thrash metal band DESCENDING has completed work the follow-up to its debut album,“Enter Annihilation”, which was released in European and Japanese markets in 2008-2009. The new CD, “New Death Celebrity”, will be made available on September 23 via Massacre Records. A single, “How Much This Life Weights?”, is now available for free download at this location.”

THE DEVIL WEARS PRADA: “Dayton, Ohio Christian metalcore band THE DEVIL WEARS PRADA has set “Dead Throne” as the title of its new album, due in the U.S. on September 13 via Ferret Music and one day earlier internationally through Roadrunner Records.”

DIR EN GREY: “Japanese rockers DIR EN GREY will release their eighth studio album,“Dum Spiro Spero”, two years and ten months after “Uroboros”, which garnered overwhelming support as the strongest and the maddest record resonating across the globe.”

DOMINANZ: “DOMINANZ, the atmospheric metal band from Norway, will release its new album, “As I Shine”, in Europe on August 19 via Industrial Silence Production and Rock N Growl Distro/Cargo Records. The CD was recorded and mixed at Conclave Studio by Bjørnar E. Nilsen and Roy N. Mathisen and mastered at Earshot Studio by Herbrand Larsen.”

DOWN: “DOWN guitarist Kirk Windstein has confirmed to Radio Metal that the band is planning to release four separate EPs over the course of the next couple of years. “We’re going to do four EPs, and they’ll all be different,” he said. “We have many elements to our sound, so each one will have its own characteristics. Like, for example, this one we’re writing right now and are about to start recording will be really hard, with heavy DOWNstuff. Then we’ll have a mellow one, then a doom one — you know, slower and doomy stuff. A little bit of everything.”

DYING FETUS: “Maryland-based extreme metallers DYING FETUS will enter the studio in November to begin recording their new album for an early 2012 release.”

EAST OF THE WALL: “Technical metal subversives EAST OF THE WALL have completed the recording process for their upcoming third full-length, The Apologist, the highly anticipated opus set for release this October on Translation Loss Records for the CD and digital release, and on Antithetic for the vinyl release. The album’s official release date, track listing and more will be announced within the next few weeks.”

GENERATION KILL: “GENERATION KILL, the crossover metal outfit featuring EXODUS frontman Rob Dukes, has set “Red White And Blood” as the title of its debut album, due on September 16 in Europe and September 27 in North America via Season Of Mist. A digital single containing the CD’s title track and a cover of the NINE INCH NAILS classic “Wish” will precede the full-length effort on July 4.”

GHOST BRIGADE: “Finnish metallers GHOST BRIGADE will release their third album, “Until Fear No Longer Defines Us”, on August 19 in Europe and August 23 in North America via Season Of Mist.”

GOJIRA: “The GOJIRA EP (Sea Shepherd) is tentatively scheduled for release in September, with a new full new album to follow later. Regarding what the new GOJIRA material sounds like, Duplantier said, “It’s GOJIRA but wiser and heavier.”

GORGORTH: “”Under The Sign Of Hell 2011″, the re-recording of GORGOROTH’s third album, will be released by Regain Records and has had it release date pushed back to August 29 from the previously announced June 20 due to “manufacturing problems.” On the LP, Pest and Infernus repeat their roles as vocalist and guitarist/bassist, respectively, from the original 1996 recording, while Tomas Asklund handles the drums.”

HACKNEYED: “German death metal lunatics HACKNEYED will release their third album, “Carnival Cadavre”, on August 22 in Europe and August 30 in North America via Lifeforce Records.”

HATESPHERE: “Danish thrashers HATESPHERE have entered Antfarm Studio in Aarhus, Denmark with producer Tue Madsen (SICK OF IT ALL, THE HAUNTED, GOREFEST, MOONSPELL) to begin recording their new album for a September release via Napalm Records.”

INSOMNIUM: “Finnish melodic death metallers INSOMNIUM have set “One For Sorrow” as the title of their new album, due in October via Century Media Records. The CD was recorded in Gothenburg, Sweden with sound engineer Daniel Antonsson (also bassist in DARK TRANQUILLITY and guitarist in DIMENSION ZERO) and at Fantom studios in Tempere, Finland, where the album is also currently being mixed by Samu Oittisen.”

LANDMINE MARATHON: “LANDMINE MARATHON are recording the follow-up to 2010′s “Sovereign Descent”. Once again, the band’s as-yet-untitled fourth CD is being tracked at guitarist Ryan Butler‘s Arcane Digital Recording Studios, where he’s recorded past efforts from the band, as well as those by MISERY INDEX, PHOBIA, THE FUNERAL PYRE and many more. LANDMINE MARATHON is about to enter the mixing stage and is aiming for a late fall release.”

LEVIATHAN: From the Profound Lore label — “We will be releasing the next full-length from the cursed U.S. black metal enigma LEVIATHAN in the late stages of the fall (if all goes accordingly to schedule). Recently the notorious Wrest has tracked the new album with Sanford Parker at Engine Studios in Chicago and will be laying down the final touches to this hateful, wretched piece of tormenting dismal black metal art soon enough. Beware…”

MACHINE HEAD: “San Francisco Bay Area metallers MACHINE HEAD have set “Unto The Locust” as the title of their new album, due in late September via longtime label Roadrunner Records. The CD was recorded at JingleTown Studios in Oakland, with frontman Robb Flynn producing, and it is sure to level anything and everything that happens upon its path.”

METALLICA: “Producer Rick Rubin, who is also co-chairman of Columbia Records, tells Billboard.com in a new interview that METALLICA is “about to start writing” material for the follow-up to 2008′s “Death Magnetic” album, Rubin‘s first collaboration with the group. “I had a meeting with [METALLICA drummer] Lars [Ulrich] in San Francisco… to explore what the focus was going to be this time around,” Rick says.”

NIGHTRAGE: “Multi-national thrashers NIGHTRAGE have set “Insidious” as the title of their fifth album, due on September 27 (one day earlier internationally) via Lifeforce Records. The CD features guest appearances by Gus G. (OZZY OSBOURNE, FIREWIND), Tomas S. Englund (EVERGREY), Apollo Papathanasio (FIREWIND, SPIRITUAL BEGGARS), John K (BIOMECHANICAL) and the band’s former frontman Tomas Lindberg (also known for his work with AT THE GATES, THE CROWN and LOCK UP).”

PUSCIFER: “PUSCIFER, the project ringleader Maynard James Keenan describes as “‘Twin Peaks’ in the desert,” will release “Conditions Of My Parole” on October 18 via Puscifer Entertainment. “Man Overboard”, the first single from the album, will be available via iTunes and other digital service providers on July 19.”

RINGWORM: “Cleveland, Ohio hardcore heavyweights RINGWORM will release their fifth album, “Scars”, on July 19 via Victory Records. Twenty years after its 1991 birth, RINGWORM “rise above with the brutal new release to remind fans why they are the pioneering visionaries of the hardcore genre known as ‘crossover,’” according to a press release. ”

SKELETONWITCH: “Athens, Ohio’s SKELETONWITCH has set “Forever Abomination” as the title of its new record, due in the fall via Prosthetic Records. The follow-up to 2009′s “Breathing The Fire” is being recorded at a Los Angeles studio with producer Matt Hyde (SLAYER, MACHINE HEAD, KREATOR).”

SOULDRAINER: “Swedish death metallers SOULDRAINER have inked a deal with ViciSolum Productions. The band’s second full-length album will be released in the fall. . . . SOULDRAINER previously decribed the new material as “beautiful, evil, slightly more aggressive and heavier” than that on “Reborn” (2007). The band added, “Prepare for an epic death/doom album so heavy it will blow your face off.’”

SPAWN OF POSSESSION: “Drummer Henrik “Morris” Schönström of Swedish technical death metallers SPAWN OF POSSESSION has entered Pama Studios in Kristianopel, Sweden with engineer Magnus “Mankan” Sedenberg to begin recording the band’s new album for a fall release via Relapse Records. The CD will contain nine tracks plus an instrumental intro.”

SPINEFARM ALLSTARS: “Finnish record label Spinefarm Records will celebrate its 20th anniversary by organizing a “summer camp” in July where members of various bands signed to the company — including those from SHINING, MOONSORROW, SWALLOW THE SUN, FINNTROLL, MEDEA and ENSIFERUM — will collaborate with each other in creating and recording new songs. The resulting album, tentatively titled “Spinefarm Allstars”, will be released before the end of the year.”

TESTAMENT: “San Francisco Bay Area thrash metal veterans TESTAMENT have just entered the studio with British producer Andy Sneap (MEGADETH, ARCH ENEMY, NEVERMORE, MACHINE HEAD) to begin recording their new album for a late 2011 release.”

YOB: “Doom metallers YOB will release their sixth album, “Atma”, on August 16 via Profound Lore Records. The follow-up to 2009′s “The Great Cessation” is described in a press release as “dirtier and sludgier than ever before.” The CD features guest appearances by NEUROSIS’ Scott Kelly on the tracks “Before We Dreamed Of Two Mastered” and “Adrift In The Ocean”.”

I think I’m in love.

Okay, maybe I’m not really in love. Maybe I’m just in lust. Not with a person, but with a voice. With the voice on DyNAbyte‘s new album 2KX. Which will be released on Sunday — two days from now.

You might think Sunday is an odd day for an album release, but only until you realize what Sunday is. It’s 10-10-10. There’s probably a name for dates like that, but I’m too lazy to track down what it is. We’ll have two more like it in the next two years (11-11-11 and 12-12-12) and then we’ll have to wait until 2101 for the next one. Somehow, I don’t think I’ll be here to see that one.

Fuck, come to think of it, I may not be here to see the one next year either.

There’s probably some Mayan astrologer who predicted the world would end on 10-10-10. I doubt that will happen, but we’re not there yet, so who knows? It’s safer to just blow it all out for the next two days. That’s my plan, at any rate. Better to ask forgiveness than to ask for permission.

Where was I? Oh yeah — the new album by DyNAbyte. They’re from Italy. They’re also giving a big Italian “fuck you” to all the usual distribution channels for music (at least for now). They’re releasing their album exclusively on a USB key, which you can order only from them.

Why bother?, you may ask. Well, that’s the point of this post, idn’t it? To tell you why to bother. Because you should. Because of that voice (among other things).  (more after the jump . . .)

I first took notice of DyNAbyte on one of my ridiculously random MISCELLANY forays, because the band is fronted by a woman named Cadaveria, who I’d heard about from her adventures with Opera IX and a second band that bears her name, and because DyNAbyte also includes bassist Killer Bob from Necrodeath (and Cadaveria). The final member of the band is guitarist L.J. Dusk. Their previous album, the debut Extreme Mental Piercing, was released six years ago.

At first, I heard only a song from the forthcoming album called “The Mummy”. I liked it. Because it was part of a MISCELLANY foray, I would have written about it even if it turned out to be shit. But it wasn’t. And one thing led to another, and Cadaveria gave me the chance to hear the rest of the album in advance of the release.

And, although the deck was stacked against me liking this album, given the peculiarities of my tastes in metal, I’m fucking nailed to the wall by the music. 2KX is a marriage of cyber-industrial convulsiveness and futuristic-yet-Gothic melodies that works, even for our extreme tastes in metal, and Cadaveria’s vocals are simply a tour-de-force that shouldn’t be missed.

Why was the deck stacked against 2KX on the poker table of my tiny brain? Well, because at a 10,000 foot level it’s a marriage of Goth-rock, cyber-metal, and industrial aggro (in the vein of bands like Fear Factory, Ministry, and Sybreed). I do like those bands named in the parenthetical of the previous sentence, but only in short doses, and the cyber/Goth thing? Not so much.

So, what’s different about 2KX? Well, let me count the ways: L.J. Dusk and Killer Bob have a knack for executing riffs that bend your body to their will. They relentlessly hammer and chug and pulsate and grind. Combined with the programmed drum tracks, they lay down rhythms that compel movement, sometimes closer to the techno/dance end of the scale (as on “Normal”, “Artmix”, and “Cold Wind of Fear”), sometimes smack in the middle of Fear Factory-style industrial pummeling (as on “Hereditary Neuronavigation” and “Stones”).

On “The Mummy”, the riffs and rhythms effectively create the image of a horde of linen-wrapped, red-eyed Boris Karloffs lurching forward, arms extended, hungry for your embrace.

Is that riff-mastery the difference? Well, not really. It’s cool, it’s good, but it doesn’t set DyNAbyte distinctly apart from those other bands I mentioned above.

All the songs are laden with varying degrees of electronic samples and effects: futuristic game-techno keyboards at the outset of “Equilibrium”, sci-fi shimmering and skittering in “Normal” and “I’m Not Scared”, 8-bit pulsing at the beginning of “Cold Wind of Fear”, and tinny, robotic pinging in the intro to “Blinded By My Light”. And to greater or lesser degrees, all the songs are infected with machine-generated tones, pulses, and ambient noise.

Is that the difference? Not for me. All the cybernetics that infuse 2KX are essential to DyNAbyte’s musical identity, and they increase the density of the aural effect, but cyber-metal ain’t really my thing. Too much tech runs the risk of sapping all the soul from music.

No, for me, the two features of 2KX that enable it to overcome the deck-stacking in my poker-table brain are the songwriting skill and Cadaveria’s voice. In my book, much industrial metal falls prey to the defect of sameness — there is a tendency for the songs to become indistinguishable and ultimately monotonous. DyNAbyte largely avoids that risk. Despite the general stylistic uniformity in DyNAbyte’s sound, each song has its own identity.

For example: Interleaved with the industrial hammering and the techno dance beats, you’ll find in “F.T.L.” a dramatic anthem with a melody that emerges from the hammer-and-crash and rings in your head long after the song has ended; and “Hereditary Neuronavigation” is ominous and dark, with a mix of rapid, groaning riffs and bursts of high-pitched guitar squeal. I don’t love all the music on this album, but listening was never dull, because some new surprise waited around the corner of every song.

And that brings me to the real difference-maker on this album: that voice.

Cadaveria has the ability to sing in a multitude of vocal styles. Her natural “clean” voice is in the alto range, and reminds me of The Pretenders’ Chrissie Hynde, but she has great upward range. Her clean singing is powerful and clear, but she can also turn up the intensity dial and belt out the lyrics with grit and soul. And that’s not all. Cadaveria can deliver death-metal style howls, growls, and gutturals that are the equal of the world’s best-known extreme metal vocalist, Arch Enemy‘s Angela Gossow. And on almost every song in 2KX, to varying degrees, all of Cadaveria’s diverse vocal styles are on display, both the clean and the harsh. Cadaveria is what keeps the soul alive in DyNAbyte’s sound — even though at times, it’s a very dark, cold soul.

Here’s the first single from 2KX. See what you think, if you didn’t catch it the first time around in our previous MISCELLANY post:

DyNAbyte: The Mummy

More about that USB music-delivery device: According to the band, it will include the 12 songs on the album, both as high-quality cross-fade wav tracks and also as high-quality mp3 tracks; an exclusive DigitalBooklet Flash animation; lyrics; high-quality band photos and logo; wallpapers; readme files; and a “How-to-navigate the DigitalBooklet Flash animation” tutorial.

For 13 Euro, you can order the USB device from the band at the official DyNAbyte web site (here), where you can also get a sneak peak about how that animated digital booklet works.

It’s been a few weeks since we did one of these MISCELLANY posts. In case you’ve forgotten, or you’re new to these pages, here’s how it works: I make a random list of new music or new videos from bands I’ve never heard before, but look interesting for some reason, and then I go check ‘em out. I don’t know in advance whether the music will be good or bad, and occasionally I get head-faked into listening to music that turns out not to be metal at all.

But whatever happens, I create this log of what I heard and saw, without filtering out anything. Sometimes, it becomes a vehicle for discovering gems. Sometimes, we blunder right into dreck — though most of the time the music has at least been passable.

On this particular venture into the musical unknown, I checked out DyNAbyte (Italy), King Giant (U.S.), and Darkness Rites (Canada).

DYNABYTE

I saw a blurb about this Italian band on Blabbermouth earlier this week. It said that the band featured a female vocalist named Cadaveria, formerly of the band Opera IX, as well as Necrodeath bassist John (aka “Killer Bob”). Those names “Cadaveria” and “Opera IX” rang a bell in my cobwebbed brain, and eventually it came to me.  (more after the jump, including music and video . . .)

Our occasional guest contributor Steff Metal, who operates her own excellent web site (here), wrote a column for us back in March about women in metal called “No Clean Chicks Singing”. She featured that Opera IX band as well as Cadaveria’s follow-up project called, uh, Cadaveria. Those were/are black-metal bands, but DyNAbyte bills itself as industrial metal.

So, with that background, I was curious. The Blabbermouth blurb reported that DyNAbyte has a new album called 2KX scheduled for release in October (the cool album cover for that is to your right) and has made available a song from the album (called “The Mummy”) for free download (here) in exchange for your e-mail address. So I bit, and downloaded the song. That was my first stop on this MISCELLANY tour.

The music is a pretty far cry from what we usually cover on this site. It’s got a cool synth introduction and then bolts into a hammering industrial groove, with Cadaveria’s clean vocals coming over the top — but in the chorus she then shifts into a raspy growl that’s more our style. The song progresses through more shifting back and forth between vocal styles, between melody and hammering. It’s pretty fucking catchy (and it includes bass drops!). Here’s what it sounds like:

DyNAbyte has one previous album to its credit, Extreme Mental Piercing.  The band’s official web site features a video of a song from that album. I watched it — and because I did, it goes in this post. Here’s DyNAbyte’s video for “I’m My Enemy”, which includes only a snippet of Cadaveria’s raspy vocals near the end:

DyNAbyte’s MySpace page includes a link for a free download of Extreme Mental Piercing, so go get it if you like what you hear.

KING GIANT

The next item on my list was a brand new video from a Virginia band called King Giant. The song is called “13 to 1″, and it’s from an album called Southern Darkness that King Giant self-released about a year ago. I got a press release about the video that described King Giant’s music as “groove-heavy Southern doom rock” for “fans of Corrosion of Conformity, Kyuss, Clutch, and Down.”

I like me some of that Southern doom every now and then, and I’ve been a fan of Down for a while, so I thought, why not? After all, I am originally from the South and I do occasionally feel doomed.

That song “13 to 1″, like the DyNAbyte song, isn’t the kind of music we usually cover on this site, but it’s about as far from DyNAbyte as you could get and still be within the loose boundaries of metal. It’s heavy and sludgy and bluesy — slow and nasty, with whiskey-soaked vocals and big, rounded, beautiful guitar tones, not to mention the unusual tinkling of a banjo during the first 45 seconds. (We need more banjo in metal!)

I thought the shit was cool, and the video is good, too — a cautionary tale about what can go wrong if you play poker with good ol’ boys you don’t know in a West Virginia roadhouse. Here’s a hint: It don’t end well.

Here’s King Giant’s video for “13 to 1″:

For more info about King Giant, their MySpace page is here and the band’s official web site is at this location. They’re working on a new album for release in 2011. What the hell, here’s their ReverbNation widget, too:

DARKNESS RITES

Darkness Rites is a band from Ottawa, Canada. We got a MySpace friend request from them a couple weeks ago, not long after we frothed at the mouth over another Ottawa band (Immersed), and I’ve been hanging on to their name until I had time to give them a proper listen.

My first stop was at the band’s MySpace page, and what greeted my eyes was a photo of some pretty young-looking dudes. On the other hand, in that photo they’re wearing band shirts from Behemoth, The Haunted, Slipknot, Down, and Cryptopsy. Well, I thought, who knows whether they can play worth a damn, but they do have good taste in metal.

I played the first song on their MySpace music player — “Systemic Human Massacre” — and it jerked me upright, like a marionette on a string. It’s a thrash-paced offering of modern, melodic death metal. The sound is sharp as knives and the musicianship is first-rate — a nice blend of rhythmic pummeling, galloping riffage, and unusually attention-grabbing melodic solos. The mid-ranged howling vocals are also quite good.

In short, “Systemic Human Massacre” hit my sweet spot. These dudes may look young, but they sound like they know the fuck what they’re doing.

That song comes from the band’s second release, an October 2009 album called The Accuser, which was produced by Cryptopsy’s Chris Donaldson. Here it is, with a montage of band photos from various live shows and tours.

Here’s the Darkness Rites ReverbNation widget, which includes one more song from The Accuser, and more songs are streaming on the band’s MySpace page.  And here’s the link where The Accuser is available for purchase.

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That’s all for today’s MISCELLANY post. We had a good run of luck today, and hope you liked what we found, too. Whether you did or didn’t, leave a comment and let us know what you thought. Hasta la vista.

[Today, we're pleased to feature a post from our occasional guest contributor from the Antipodes, Steff Metal (whose usual site you can find here). We wish we had at least thought up the wicked title to this post, but that was hers, too. And the rest of post is also pretty damned wicked. Prepare yourself to be entertained, and to discover some new music in the process.]

I went to a Cripple Mr. Onion gig. During setup I was nursing my bourbon and cola at the bar when I overheard a couple of dudes discussing Arch Enemy.

“She’s alright to look at,” one said, “but she can’t growl for shit.”

“Yeah,” his friend agreed. “Chicks can’t do extreme metal. Every extreme metal band with a chick vocalist is crap.” Therein followed a heated discussion of what chicks should be doing instead of playing extreme metal, which I’ve omitted due to the rules of common decency.

Resisting the urge to punch them both in the face, I drained my glass and wondered if I could prove his claim false. Surely there must be extreme metal bands with decent female vocals?

It’s a long-held belief among metalheads that girls can’t do extreme metal. Extreme Metal is probably the most aggressive, angry, violent form of music there is, and every study ascertains its audience as overwhelmingly male. There’s a kind of “lost boys club” surrounding extreme metal, a sort of grymm forest treehouse with a badly handwritten sign on the door: NO GIRLS ALLOWED.

I think the lack of decent female extreme metal musicians has more to do with simple maths. Hardly any girls listen to extreme metal, and of those that do, hardly any play instruments. There are hundreds of thousands of men playing in metal bands and about twenty-two girls (seriously, I counted), and if 80% of all metal is crap, then that’s only … 4.2 decent female extreme metal musicians.

No I just have to find them.  (and find them she did — read on after the jump . . .)

Exhibit A: Opera IX

I’ve never thought of Italy as a hotseat of black metal, much less black metal fronted by extremely pissed-off, growly chicks, but here’s Opera IX to prove the Italians are better at more than just clogging up the Alpine passes with suicidal drivers.

Here they are black metalling it with “Born in the Grave”:

I also found this video of Opera IX covering “Rhime of the Ancient Mariner”. This is actually really cool (the non-growly vocals are from Cadavaria, their former vocalist).

Exhibit B: Cadaveria

Cadaveria was the original vocalist of Opera IX, and having listened to some of their older, more Cradle of Filth sounding stuff, I prefer their new vocalist, but Cadaveria’s got her own band now: the vocals are quite raw, but it’s clear she can also sing.

From the album In Your Blood, “AnagraM”. I’m actually really digging this.

Exhibit C: Severed Heaven

I saw these lasses on an atrocious reality TV show “Singing with the Enemy” a couple of weeks ago, where they had to record a collaboration with a cock rock band. Although the cock rock / death metal song sounded like shit, Lauren’s vocals impressed me.

Exhibit D: Enter Chaos

There’s Polish death metal, there’s female vocals. The vocalist is quite cute, too. It’s all good.

Exhibit E: Adorior

I love a Myspace page that begins with: “Spawned of slut and abattoir semen in the festering pits of the UK”. Adorior spew forth an orgy of deranged intensity. I love the production on these tracks, which really allows you to hear Melissa’s vocals.

Exhibit F: Merlin

Mary, the vocalist from Russian death metal outfit Merlin, has a rare vocal range from contralto to soprano, which might have let her into the famous Moscow Conservatoire without need of sitting the entrance examinations had she not decided to form a brutal death metal band. She borrows heavily from John Tardy’s vocal style:

Exhibit G: Thorr’s Hammer

I think these are some of the best vocals I’ve heard. Ever. Thorr’s Hammer are death / doom from Washington, DC, but their vocalist, Runhild, is a tr00 Norwegian lass. They only released one demo, and they broke up in 1995, which is the saddest thing I’ve heard while researching this article (and I heard Black Thorn).

Yes, that is a female vocalist. She’d have Angela Gossow running for the hills.

Of the above tracks, I dig the Opera IX and Cadaveria songs the most, and I think Runhild from Thorr’s Hammer has the best vocals. I think all of these bands have merit, and I do believe I’ve proved that girls don’t suck at no clean singing.

For metal fans – who demand the utmost in honesty from their music – the true question is, how can you tell if a band is good in the truest musical sense, as opposed to a band you simply pay more attention to because they’re doing something different. Can we ignore the un-male-ness of these musicians and dissect their songs with the same rigor we apply to male musicians? Should we? Or is their womenliness part of their performance, part of the overall effect of the music? Should we stop saying “she’s pretty good, for a chick” and start saying “she fucking slays.” As a friend and lead singer of an all-female metal band once said. “Fuck, girls get angry too.”

So, I leave the verdict in your hands. Do we girls growl, rasp, screech and howls as good as you blokes?

Steff Metal