SUFFOCATION: “…OF THE DARK LIGHT”

 Album Reviews  2 Responses »
Jun 072017
 

 

(In this post TheMadIsraeli reviews the new album by Suffocation.)

If you ask me, at the end of the day there’s only five bands in the technical and brutal death metal circles that truly matter: Dying Fetus, Anata, Spawn of Possession, Martyr, and Suffocation. Suffocation is such an anomaly that it’s like the cosmos decided to manifest through humans the perfect mix of atonal grime, neoclassical melody, pulverizing groove, and eviscerating speed, all under the command most prominently of Frank Mullen, who in my book is THE death metal vocalist, and Terrance Hobbs. who writes some of the most intricately crafted incantations of despair and death on this planet when it comes to riffs.

Suffocation had a really fucking strong outing their last go around with Pinnacle Of Bedlam. It was their most energetic record to date, with a much more melodic focus than anything before it, while maintaining the proper amount of disregard for human value or opinion with some atonal off-road expeditions. It also contained a monolith of a closing track with a stellar re-recording of “Beginning Of Sorrow”, which worked better as a closing song than on the album it opened. Continue reading »

GODEATER: “OUTERSTELLAR”

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Jun 072017
 

 

(Andy Synn prepared this review of the debut EP by the Scottish band Godeater.)

Although the band clearly haven’t fully found their own sound/voice/identity quite yet (these three tracks are positively littered with strands of DNA sequenced directly from all the usual suspects – The Faceless, Soreption, The Black Dahlia Murder, etc.), it’s impossible to deny that Outerstellar, the debut EP by Glaswegian Tech-Death tykes Godeater, is certainly a striking opening statement – in both ambition and execution – from a band with a hell of a lot of potential. Continue reading »

ÆTHER REALM: “TAROT”

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Jun 062017
 

 

(DGR reviews the new album by North Carolina’s Æther Realm., which will be released tomorrow.)

An almost four-year gap between albums isn’t too unheard of these days. Metal, when it wants to, moves at a glacial pace, and as much as we love to assume everyone runs on the two-year cycle, there are always going to be a bunch of outliers. Æther Realm are one such band, with the gap between their debut album One Chosen By The Gods and the group’s soon-to-be-released sophomore disc Tarot being close to four years — though the band themselves have alleviated that a bit with a very healthy bit of touring, show playing, and a slow drip of singles that has actually made the time seem to disappear faster than one would think.

A sophomore disc can represent a huge shift for a band, especially one like Æther Realm, who had a very succesful first disc — one that really did prove the concept behind the band in one go and contained a healthy grasp of really catchy songs. For a band that at one point jokingly had as part of their online bio “We are not from Finland”, it certainly wasn’t hard to draw conclusions as to which groups the Æther Realm crew really, really loved and drew a ton of inspiration from. A second album of the same style, though, no matter how good the band might do it, becomes a harder sell, and with Tarot it seems like even Æther Realm recognized that. Continue reading »

ARPHAEL: “ANCIENT”

 Album Reviews  2 Responses »
Jun 052017
 

 

(We present TheMadIsraeli’s review of the new album by the Ukrainian one-man project Arphael.)

I’ve always agreed with Andy’s assertion that at the end of the day, Meshuggah is a death metal band. They created their own nebula of brutality, especially when Nothing came out, pushing the sonic limits and revolutionizing the very concept of groove in extreme metal as we knew it. Meshuggah, a top-10 band for me, have always been about a defiant, transcendent minimalism that hits you like an asteroid to the soul.

While we saw the djent movement come and go, mostly a flash-in-the-pan phenomenon that produced very little quality music with staying power, more extreme-minded death metal bands have tried to take what Meshuggah did to the next level. In-Quest and their phenomenal last record Chapter IIX – The Odyssey of Eternity was a great attempt at a Catch-33-style, super-long song that saw the band adding new elements of intensity and stylistic diversity around the Meshuggah framework. At that point, It was the best I think Meshuggah had ever been riffed on by someone else.

But then this guy came around, this fucking lunatic Ukranian who goes by the name Arphael. Continue reading »

EIGHTEEN VISIONS: “XVIII”

 Album Reviews, Exceptions to the Rule  2 Responses »
Jun 052017
 

 

(Andy Synn reviews the first new album by Eighteen Visions since 2006.)

So here’s the thing… although I count myself among that rare breed of people who has faithfully (if not always happily) followed OC ‘core crew Eighteen Visions through all the ups and downs of their career, even I’m willing to admit that the band’s dissolution in 2007 – at the height of their perceived commercial viability and creative bankruptcy – was probably for the best.

For a band who had, up until that point, been famous as much for their devil-may-care attitude as they were for delivering bone-crushing breakdowns, their increasingly desperate attempts to break into the mainstream (and steady decline towards toothless, alt-rock senility), were a clear sign of a group increasingly unsure of their direction or place in the world and undergoing a painful (and ultimately fatal) mid-life crisis.

But it seems as though the group – whose line-up has been reduced to a three-piece following the sad demise of bassist Mick Morris in 2013, and the inability of guitarist (and founding member) Ken Floyd to participate due to other commitments – must have felt they had unfinished business left to attend to, as now they’re back with a new album, XVIII, which many (quite possibly including the band themselves) must be hoping will retcon their previous, self-titled, album out of existence.

So what’s the verdict? Continue reading »

MARYLAND DEATHFEST 2017 — A REVIEW (PART 2)

 Concert Reviews  3 Responses »
Jun 032017
 

 

I expected to get this second installment of Maryland Deathfest 2017 impressions finished before now, but have been caught up in other commitments since posting Part 1 (here), which is part of the price paid for being spirited away for five wonderful days in Baltimore.

In the first installment of these reminiscences I sort of cut to the chase, naming what I thought were the best sets of an event that (by my lights) was a rousing success overall. But those five days in Baltimore were filled with other memorable moments, both on-stage and off, and I’ve collected more of them in this concluding segment. I’ve also selected more of my not-professional photos to go along with the batch in Part 1. Continue reading »

NOVEMBERS DOOM: “HAMARTIA”

 Album Reviews, Exceptions to the Rule  2 Responses »
Jun 022017
 

 

(This is Andy Synn’s review of the new album by Novembers Doom, released in April.)

 

This past weekend in Baltimore I was… well, “harangued” might be too strong a word… by DGR for failing to produce a review of this album, something which I’d apparently promised to do several times over the last couple of months.

So, suitably admonished and abashed, here’s my attempt to fulfil my obligation, starting with a little bit of historical context for those of you who enjoy that sort of thing. Continue reading »

BODY COUNT: “BLOODLUST”

 Album Reviews  4 Responses »
Jun 022017
 

 

(This is TheMadIsraeli’s review of the new album by Body Count.)

 

Say what you want, but in concept the mixing of rap/hip-hop and metal is something that makes complete fucking sense. A lot of music from both genres encapsulates a lot of the same angst, rage, and darkness, depending on where you look. I don’t know if I can explain why nü-metal to many people was an abomination of a music genre, although I think it’s the cornball excessive whiteness of it, how much it diluted down the metal aspect to relatively inoffensive minimalism, and how faux edgy it was. Thing is, early nü-metal was experimental and ambitious and found a good middle ground between the two styles. Rage Against The Machine is a favorite band of mine actually, and I think they’re the primo example of this being done to its maximum potential.

Body Count is the other most notable example. I like Body Count’s entire discography and I’ve always felt they were shamefully unsung heroes of thrash/metallic hardcore. I think it’s interesting that in the fifth track on this album, a pretty fantastic cover of “Reign In Blood”, there’s a monologue by Ice-T preceeding it where he talks about Suicidal Tendencies having a gang-banger from the streets vibe about their music and how it influenced Body Count. I’ve always liked hardcore that had this same vibe, which is why bands like Biohazard come to mind, who unashamedly had this vibe going in a way that was authentic. Continue reading »

THE SYNN REPORT, PART 85: MEMFIS

 Album Reviews, THE SYNN REPORT  No Responses »
Jun 012017
 

 

(We present Andy Synn’s installment of THE SYNN REPORT for May, gathering together reviews of the discography of the Swedish band Memfis — who are on Facebook here.)

Recommended for fans of: Burst, Intronaut, Extol

Much like last month’s edition of The Synn Report, today’s post is a day late (and a dollar short) due to, well, me being busy living my life and enjoying myself. That’s right, I do in fact have a life outside of NCS sometimes. Who would have thought?

Still, I’m back in the game, and back in the saddle, now, so how about some “new” music for you all, in the shape of Prog-Metal epicurists Memfis?

The Swedish quartet made some small, but stylish, waves with the release of their debut album The Wind-Up way back in 2006, offering an intriguing and characterful conglomeration of progressive melody, metallic energy, and occasionally outlandish technicality, all topped off with a healthy helping of heartfelt, Hardcore-tinged emotion.

Unfortunately, legal complications ended up interfering with and delaying the release of their second album, meaning that the band were unable to capitalize on the burgeoning momentum gathered by their debut, and have been in something of a liminal state ever since – with the five-track Silva EP in 2013 being the only subsequent sign to date that things are still ticking away in the background.

Now, apparently the group are currently hard at work on album number three – and have been for some time, in fact – but there’s still no title or release date announced, so we’ll all just have to wait and see how things unfold.

Thankfully though, the two albums, and one EP, featured here should serve to whet your appetite in the meantime! Continue reading »

GOATWHORE: “VENGEFUL ASCENSION”

 Album Reviews  3 Responses »
Jun 012017
 

 

(Here’s Wil Cifer’s review of the new album by Goatwhore from New Orleans, which will be released on June 23rd via Metal Blade Records.)

Seven albums in, and the swampy metal machine known as Goatwhore continues to press forward with a formula that would have gone flat for other bands a couple of albums ago. I am not sure when they have had the time to record anything, as these guys seem to be constantly on the road, so the fact they squeezed these sessions in is impressive in its own right.

This album is not a wild deviation from their sound, but the songwriting has sharper focus and, with their sound man producing, it plays off their strength, which is the energy of their live shows. This might also be one of the band’s most melodic albums, despite the fact it also seems to be Goatwhore fully embracing their death metal side.  Normally their sound is characterized by being a hybrid swirl of sub-genres. Here, beginning with the first track, the aggression locks in everything in such a way that the hooks are shoved down your throat. Continue reading »

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