What Are You Listening To Now - The Horde Edition

So Christopher Bowes, the dude behind Alestorm and Gloryhammer, is back at it again with another hilariously over the top and slightly questionable band called Wizardthrone who seem to specialize in a slightly Gloryhammer-esque brand of Melodic Death Metal about mathematics, hyperdimensional space wizards, and a ton of other very long and bombastic words. It's not great, don't get me wrong, but I expected much, much worse. It's definitely fun for a few spins here and there. I want to believe this release exists in the same world as the current Gloryhammer story but there aren't any references that I've picked up on. 

So Christopher Bowes, the dude behind Alestorm and Gloryhammer, is back at it again with another hilariously over the top and slightly questionable band called Wizardthrone who seem to specialize in a slightly Gloryhammer-esque brand of Melodic Death Metal about mathematics, hyperdimensional space wizards, and a ton of other very long and bombastic words. It's not great, don't get me wrong, but I expected much, much worse. It's definitely fun for a few spins here and there. I want to believe this release exists in the same world as the current Gloryhammer story but there aren't any references that I've picked up on. 

I read the titles of these songs and just about spit out my tea. I'm not expecting much given my recent success with Alestorm/Gloryhammer, but I'll check it out regardless.

So Christopher Bowes, the dude behind Alestorm and Gloryhammer, is back at it again with another hilariously over the top and slightly questionable band called Wizardthrone who seem to specialize in a slightly Gloryhammer-esque brand of Melodic Death Metal about mathematics, hyperdimensional space wizards, and a ton of other very long and bombastic words. It's not great, don't get me wrong, but I expected much, much worse. It's definitely fun for a few spins here and there. I want to believe this release exists in the same world as the current Gloryhammer story but there aren't any references that I've picked up on. 

This came up on a playlist just now.  Like you say, even though several things point to this being terrible, it is palatable enough if not instantly forgettable.

Bolt Thrower - "Realm Of Chaos" (1989)

Revisited this old friend for the first time in many years this morning. It was my introduction to Bolt Thrower around 1989/90 & I would go on to purchase the album on cassette a short time afterwards. "Realm Of Chaos" showcases a band that was starting to find their sound but was still waiting for their technical skills to catch up with their ambition because the production & performances are pretty sloppy but this doesn't take away from a gloriously pure death metal atmosphere. There's a much stronger grindcore influence to this album than you'll here on Bolt Thrower's later material with early Napalm Death & Carcass clearly having been an inspiration along with "Reign In Blood" era Slayer. You'll get the odd hint at those signature Bolt Thrower melodies here & there but the catchy song-writing is already in full effect despite the rawer faster & more blast-beat driven approach. This is still a very solid death metal record that possibly hasn't aged as well as some which has subsequently seen me rating it behind later releases like "The IVth Crusade", "...For Victory" & "Those Once Loyal".

For fans of Benediction, Hail of Bullets & 90's Napalm Death.

4/5

Epiphanic Truth - Dark Triad: Bitter Psalms To A Sordid Species (2021)

I've been sinking my teeth into this one for the past week and really enjoying myself, it's the kind of Progressive Death Metal that really keeps me interested no matter how drawn out the tracks can be. I think the songwriting on the 22-minute closer could have been stronger which is what is keeping me from absolutely raving about this one. It gets a bit too repetitive around the 15-minute mark and doesn't fully reward the listener for sticking with it the full way through, but there's still a ton of great moments, especially in the first track, that keep me coming back. 

4/5

Steel Bearing Hand - Steel Bearing Hand (2015)

I decided to go back to Steel Bearing Hand's debut album this year after spinning Slay In Hell into dust all through 2021. These guys even started out strong, with this one being Death with a side of Thrash Metal rather than Slay In Hell's Thrash with a side of Death Metal. Just that small change makes this one an interesting look back into what Steel Bearing Hand may have sounded like if they didn't swap over to a more Thrash oriented style. There's still plenty of aggression even though the production is a bit more muted, but the song lengths are a bit too extended for what they're worth, but these guys are a fantastic underground find.

Inanna - Void of Unending Depths (2022)

Chile continues to deliver with some excellent Death Metal that leans towards the progressive side of things, exactly how I like it. Very close to being a perfect example of the kind of Death Metal I'm most interested in, but the riffs and percussion lacks some punch from the mixing and production sometimes. Definitely interested in checking out their 2012 and 2008 albums as well, these guys might be one hell of a hidden gem.

Immolation - Close To A  World Below (2000)

A couple of days ago I was having a look at the Academy charts and thought I would start listening to some of the albums I haven't heard yet, starting with the current #1 and ...holy fucking shit!! I may well have finally found my all-time favourite death metal album right here, hiding in plain sight at the top of the Metal Academy all-time chart. I can't think of another album that sounds so efforlessly evil as this motherfucker. As much as I have found some great albums during my early death metal discovery project and also discovered several through monthly features etc, such as Incantation's Mortal Throne of Nazarene, this inhabits a whole new level. I am unable to summon a half-decent review just yet as I don't think I can do it justice, but it seems to feature the best of the old-school alongside later ideas and smashes a wrecking ball through what I understood death metal to be.

5/5 - but is one of those exceedingly rare albums that gives me the feeling I need to revisit all my other death metal ratings and drop them all at least half a star as the bar has just been irreversibly raised! Added it into my Top 20 at #15 initially (my top death metal release if you don't count Opeth), causing Ahab's Call of the Wretched Sea to drop out.

There are a ton of Metal classics that I've missed since I tend to gear my listening more towards newer releases, and Close To A World Below was one of them. I'm usually pretty torn when it comes to renowned, "indisputable" classics since I never want to psyche myself out and be amazed by it because, well, of course it's going to be good. I mean, I've listened to a ton of modern and quite a few classic Death Metal albums, so what could Immolation have done back at the turn of the century? 

A whole lot, it turns out. This album is an absolute beast and is worth all the band wagoning. 

4.5/5

Acephalix - Theothanatology (2022)

Meat and potatoes death metal from the San Francisco horde.  Nothing to set the world on fire here and not a lot of difference from what has come previously in all honesty.  The riffs and vocals are quite predictable and they have in fact lost some of the darkness that they exuded on previous releases.  Still prefer the vocalist Dan's work in his other band, Vastum but there is nothing wrong with Theothanatology other than it just being very predictable.

3/5 

I bought this Children of Bodom live bootleg CD earlier today, and it's quite killer. Though the original 2001 edition had 9 tracks, the edition I bought that was apparently from two years later (2003) adds 4 more live tracks not heard in any other available edition; "Downfall", "Needled 24/7" (probably their first time performing that track), "Children of Bodom", and "Everytime I Die", all of which are really kick-A. I still miss this amazing guitarist/vocalist Alex Laiho. RIP

4/5

Entrails - The Tomb Awaits (2011)

I often overlook Entrails for their more renowned Swedish compatriots, but the fact remains that had the band been happier with their demo recordings back in 1990 (they were not and so released nothing for 20 years) they could have made a bigger splash in the Swede-death scene.  Whilst perhaps not as much of a "go-to" option as say Entombed or Dismember, Jimmy and co are still an absolute machine of riffs as you would expect from any band present at the inception of the sub-genre back in the 90's.  Of the few albums I have heard of Entrails' (Obliteration is on CD somewhere from memory), The Tomb Awaits is perhaps the most powerful one I have heard.  Crowd pleasers such as Crawling Death and Undead are monster tracks that cannot fail to get the blood pumping.  Between Jimmy and Mathias there are enough riffs here to fill your house and still have enough spare to occupy the garage also.

Dan Swanö makes a guest vocal appearance on Eaten by the Dead and he was also responsible for mixing and mastering the album - and as usual does a fucking sterling job. Adde Mitroulis stamps his d-beat credentials all over tracks such as The Slithering Below and he and bassist Jocke share vocals on the album also.  What you end up with here is twelve tracks of solid and highly consistent in quality Swede-death that easily holds a candle to the likes of Dismember and Entombed.  Don't worry about eating your greens to grow up big and strong.  Eat these riffs instead and you will end up built like a brick shithouse!

4/5

So Christopher Bowes, the dude behind Alestorm and Gloryhammer, is back at it again with another hilariously over the top and slightly questionable band called Wizardthrone who seem to specialize in a slightly Gloryhammer-esque brand of Melodic Death Metal about mathematics, hyperdimensional space wizards, and a ton of other very long and bombastic words. It's not great, don't get me wrong, but I expected much, much worse. It's definitely fun for a few spins here and there. I want to believe this release exists in the same world as the current Gloryhammer story but there aren't any references that I've picked up on. 

You're kidding.  I just heard a bunch of his early novelty albums on Bandcamp.

As for now, since I've heard so many non-metal albums today, I'm limiting myself to 1 new metal album today, and I'm starting with a band I've been curious about for a while.

Esoctilihum - Eternity of Shaog

This has a perfect and evil slightly unique atmosphere.  Despite not being an atmo-black metal piece, its monstrous presence has an ambiance about it that makes it just as tame as it is maniacal.  And the range of different kinds of black and death is matched by the range of different vocal styles, even varying between either one of black or death metal.  Some of these songs seem a little drawn out, but it's pretty obvious that this is a very meditative album, so it's not a big problem, especially since the album has a tendency to throw enourmous surprises at the listener.  This is the kind of extreme metal album I've been desperately looking for.  It mingles the violence of Suffocation's Human Waste with the beauty of Alcest's Souvenirs d'un autre monde, while keeping a diverse background on par with that of the best works by Oranssi Pazuzu.  99/100.

Sentenced - North From Here (1993)

I was looking for something to provide accompaniment on my Friday morning woodland dog-walk and landed on Sentenced whilst perusing my "bands I need to check-out" list. A quick bit of research seemed to indicate that the only Sentenced album that is really required listening is their sophomore "North From Here" and so here I am. I have never listened to Sentenced at all before (at least knowingly) and I found this to be pretty good to be honest. It has a blackened take on melodic death metal with most of the "blackness" coming from Taneli Jarva's vocals (who is nowadays bassist with Albert Witchfinder's Friends of Hell - circles within circles!) They also like to throw in the occasional nod to tech-death for a bit of variation, but this is mainly a bludgeoning deathly assault with a keen blackened edge. It has some nice solos and decent riffs and I do like the vocals, so this gets a big thumbs-up from me. I'm not sure if I'll be checking out too much more from them in the near future though, going by the commentary of the consensus.

4/5

Morbid - Year of the Goat (2011)

I paid a mint for an original CD copy of Morbid's seminal December Moon demo a few years back, but it is also available here on this comp of Morbid's demos and a couple of live sets. Whether you enjoy this is dependent, I suppose, on how you feel about listening to demo and bootleg quality material. Personally I don't have a problem with it, but I understand if people do. Unfortunately Morbid, who featured legendary Mayhem frontman Dead before he joined the black metal legends, never released any official studio stuff, so this is pretty much the sum total of the band's output. The sound on the four opening tracks, which comprise the December Moon demo, is pretty good and give an indication of what great potential the Swedes had, especially considering this was recorded in 1987. The sound quality of the rest of the tracks is not so great, but if you are conversant with 80s demos and bootlegs you will have heard far worse! The remaining six tracks on CD1 are rehearsal recordings of December Moon's four plus a short instrumental, Citythrasher, and the track Deathexecution which  was the opener on an earlier cassette only demo, Rehearsal 07/08/1987. All these tracks are great examples of the melting pot that was underground metal of the mid-to-late 1980's with thrash metal mutating into the bastard twins death and black metal and bands being unafraid to explore new realms of extremity.

The live material is taken from two shows, the first from a show at Stockholm's Birkagarden recorded in late October '87 (this show is available as the 2000 album Live in Stockholm) and the second was recorded earlier in the year, in April, at the Ultrahuset also in Stockholm. The sound isn't great and the crowd noise is obtrusive, but these two shows give an insight into the early Scandinavian extreme metal scene and it is always great to hear a Dead live show (if you know what I mean)!

So, as a record of an important underground band that was influential in the very early years before the explosion of Scandinavian extreme metal, this is interesting stuff and, despite any qualms about the quality, these six or seven songs are fucking awesome. To be honest, I kind of love this dodgy-sounding crap to hell so I'm like a pig in shit with this sort of thing.

4.5/5

Torture Rack - Primeval Onslaught (2023)

Primeval Onslaught is an unpretentious old-school death metal assault. Whilst not implying that Torture Rack operate on the same level as previous death metal titans, the album summons up the foetid rankness of Autopsy, combining it with the vitality and intensity of prime Morbid Angel and the brutality of Suffocation to produce a release I found to be both exhilharating and supremely satisfying. I would be the first to admit that, when it comes to extreme metal, be it death, black or even thrash, my tastes are quite conservative and I would much prefer an album of uncomplicated, old-school, brutal beastliness to the more modern focus on experimentation and diversification that has flooded the extreme scene over the last twenty-odd years. Luckily (for me anyway) that is exactly what Torture Rack deliver - and they deliver it in spades. Primeval Onslaught is a glorious celebration of old-school death metal that is well and truly up my particular death metal alley.

The riffs are thick and muscular, hitting like a jackhammer to the temple, with the rank production seeming to hang everything with strips of torn flesh, making the album sound like a veritable bloodstorm. The soloing, such as it is, consists of short, sharp shocks that are thrust at the listener like a stiletto between the ribs. Bass and drums thunder and batter away, driving the quicker material along whilst imbuing the slower sections with a dark ominousness that looms over the listener like gathering thunderheads. The vocals are suitably deep and gutteral growls guaranteed to set the hairs on your neck on end as they vomit out their gross-out lyrics of death, torture and cannibalism, the very creed upon which death metal lyricism was built. There is sufficient variation in the tracks with some mightily memorable riffs, "Impalement Storm" and "Forced From the Pit" being cases in point, to guard against accusations of saminess.

So, what I'm trying to say is that Primeval Onslaught is built on the solid foundations of old-school death metal brutality, to a tried and tested blueprint, that won't surprise anyone with more than a passing interest in death metal, yet is of very high quality. If the purpose is to reproduce the peak nineties death metal sound, then Torture Rack are to be commended for a job well done and to bemoan it's lack of experimentation and criticise it for what it isn't would be more than a little disingenuous and unfair to a band that, to my ears at least, deserve better.

4/5

Edge of Sanity - Crimson (1996)

Edge of Sanity are completely new to me and I have only come to Crimson via a project I am running on RYM. My time is a bit limited at the minute, so I have only given it a solitary listen yet, but this has very definitely grabbed my attention. Although I am a massive fan of progressive rock, there are only a few prog metal albums I rate very highly. Often the metallic version of prog leaves me cold, but this was great. At times it's death metal chugging has me desperately yearning for a good headbanging session (neck injuries notwithstanding), whilst at others it's touch is far more subtle and emotionally engaging. There are even sections of the sole forty minute track that take me back to my old gothic rock worshipping times, with the vocalist doing a more than credible Andrew Eldritch impression. Musically interesting, without resorting to excessive technicality or avant-garde pretensions and whilst still engaging the primal headbanger in me, this is scintillating stuff and although I don't have time for replays just yet, this is absolutely a release I will be returning to and hopefully will be able to deliver a full review for.

I'm going to assign a provisional 4/5, but suspect this may increase when I give it the time it so obviously deserves.

Besides listening to Time II, I was also checking out one of Jari Mäenpää's demo albums from the massive Time Package boxset. In case you didn't know, the Time Package includes 5 albums of early demos recorded by Mäenpää, dating back to the 90s. There's also a planned 4-album series to follow up from Time II that is said to only happen with the help of fans. We don't know if that upcoming 4-album series will be just re-recording of all those demos, but that's what I'm hoping for, fingers crossed. Anyway, Fantasy Metal Project was written and recorded by Mäenpää between 1998 and 2000. The songs remind me of Wintersun's debut, and I'm sure there's one band that would come to minds of many Finnish E-tuned folk/power/melodeath listeners, Ensiferum. This was back when Jari was still with Ensiferum before he left to focus on Wintersun before the release of both bands' 2004 albums, so he had a lot of fantasy in mind when making his own separate material. One thing to note is, of the 10 songs here, only half that amount of songs have vocals. I think it would've been better if a couple long instrumentals, specifically "Hunters of the Misty Forests" and "Raise Your Swords", had some lyrics. Created by me, maybe? So yeah, Wintersun fans should definitely listen to this offering and support Jari in making his future 4-album series a reality!

4/5