Vinny's Reviews

Making no bones about it, I fucking love Unstoppable Power. I loved it from the minute I first laid ears upon it. I immediately went and ordered a copy after one listen and am proudly blasting this CD (now some 4 years old) as I type this review. This is an album that showcases perfectly why I listen to extreme music. Condor had no fucks to give when making this record and it shows in bucketloads.

Unstoppable Power is under-produced and that is how it should be. Nobody listens to raw thrash metal for production values, do they? The barely controlled fury of Condor was a force to be reckoned with, but they had way more than just thrash metal in their repertoire to make Unstoppable Power a success. Incorporating those early Teutonic sounds with speed metal leads and tempos, throwing in blackened vocals style and a punky attitude for good measure made Condor as interesting as they were relentless. There are even occasions where NWOBHM gallops ensue on the record. Do you have to work to hear them? Yes, you do and so you jolly well should do! The clue is in the album title - Unstoppable Power – these guys didn’t come to write poetry.

Album opener Raised by the Evil sets the stall out brilliantly with its menacing intro and raging storm intensity levels. Listen to the inflection on Chris Sacrifice’s vocals and how he shapes words like “fire” for maximum dramatic effect without ever seeming to being striving at all, like it all just happens organically.

The main to riff to 83 Days of Radiation is stuck in my head for life. The rabid passages that they somehow try to pass off as verses are terrifying as if written by some severely unwell mental health patient on the walls of their room in blood. The lead work is done by players of obvious quality but again, there are no fucks given here either and for all the clear ability on show they just do not see the need to polish anything at all. The cumbersome nature of everything is all just part of the appeal for me. The beginning of album closer just sounds like it was thrown together in all honesty, and I am left wondering where we are going here yet still, soon enough we are drowning in that raging intensity that just will not relent.

In the liner notes in the CD booklet the band thank individuals for lending them bass amps, stepping in on gigs at the last minute and steering them clear of shitty contracts. That’s exactly how I would expect life to have been for these guys when the band was active and that harem-scarem ethos is worn proudly on Unstoppable Power.

Despite the promise shown by the title track from Scarecrow's EP, Matt Harvey & co's second release in thirteen years is average at best.  The three tracks offer little in the way of genuine bite or entertainment and although the title track has potential it is clear that this release is more like a single with a couple of b-sides added.

Desperate Hours starts like some Megadeth-like ballad with its picked string intro suggesting some technical edged thrash to appear soon.  Unfortunately, the track veers off to become some poor man's version of Machine Head and the vocals are so far back in the mix they are just laughable.  That promise of technical proficiency is soon a distant memory even with heavily borrowed from Metallica style lead work.

Closing track Victory? is a stronger effort.  It has a rampant thrashing energy that asserts some authority back to the offering but I am convinced they got the vocal mix wrong again here.  Matt's voice just sounds buried and it is a distraction to try and focus on them.  Having a plethora of "stars" from Death Angel and Exhumed does not guarantee brilliance I know, but still this is disappointing.

On a list of things I simply don't need to hear in 2021 (or any other year for that matter), Sermon of Flames are in my top three at least.  Labelled as black, death, sludge, noise on Encyclopaedia Metallum usually means 'confused' in my experience, I held little hope of uncovering a gem when going into this record. Whilst this release does actually hold more form than I expected it is an ugly and chaotic one.  Ugly is not usually a problem for me but when you have more than one Portal or Ævangelist record in your life then you have heard the squally style of death metal that Sermon of Flames play many times already.

In defence of SoF, they do offer a more grind mentality to their song structures in the main, keeping them short and not so sweet at under one minute thirty in a few instances with only a couple of tracks exceeding the five minute mark.  These shorter eruptions of violence work best out of the track lengths on offer, yet again though I must remind myself that although this is not supposed to be a particularly inventive sub-genre it has been done before on many occasions.  Even when the band go for a longer track it does not reveal anything new or all that interesting.  They pace tracks the longer tracks well enough and do avoid the jolting and grating lack of synchronicity that the likes of Portal do like to cripple the listener with, yet there is no real sense of threat behind most of the record and do not get any sense of morbid curiosity for returning to the record for repeated listens to try and peel back layers of the sound as I already know what I will find.

In so many ways, IHStL,aIWR should be right up my street but it feels like it is about ten years too late for me.  Competent though it is, I have heard it all before, and nothing about this release really stands out from the crowd.  The noise elements are sparse in all honesty and so when they do make an appearance they just irritate, causing more of a distraction and disruption with their amateurish attempts to sound menacing and horrific.  I know this is not supposed to be the most organised of music but some thought to the track listing would not have gone amiss here.  Disappointing.

It has been a while since a listened through the debut full-length from the now defunct Wodensthrone. The sound borrows more than just a tad from Drudkh to the extent that the opening of album closer That Which Is Now Forgotten – 597 borders on pure worship of the Ukrainians. The atmospheric elements contained within Loss draw a direct line to the first four Drudkh albums and similarly the charging momentum of the Wodensthrone debut matches the same impetus. Now, to have such a comparator is without question something of merit for a band who at the time were in their fourth year of existence. However, when you struggle to be able to stabilise where the influence stops and the genuine motivations of Wodensthrone begin then it is clear I have some challenges here.

With most releases (certainly most debut releases) I am looking for a band’s identity to shine through even if a plethora of influences are obvious at the same time. On Loss, I just do not get any sense of identity overall and the band come off as just combining the best bits of WITTR, Drudkh and then hark to some Winterfylleth to round things off. What I get therefore, whilst being of good quality, just is not that interesting in the grander scheme of things. In the more pagan inspired moments is where I find the greater levels of intrigue if I am honest, and as such I want to enjoy the record more than I do.

Now this is not to say that Loss is without its moments. The thundering fury of Black Moss needs acknowledging and celebrating as it is by far the most powerful and energised track on display here. It is the only track that shows enough individuality of sound to warrant notice above the other far too obviously influenced tracks. Whilst it most certainly does stray into that Drudkh hole that they continually fall into it does still standout as an individual triumph still with an acute level of intensity that is both imposing and welcome at the same time. The tremolo riffs wail on this track and the more basic riff patterns give real life to the passages. In many ways it is the most straight forward track on the album and is one whose structure they perhaps should have embraced a little more throughout the album.

In terms of quality, Wodensthrone knew how to write and play great atmospheric bm (just not necessarily own it at the same time). The level of musicianship was up there with the likes of Fen, Saor, Fuath and even Negura Bungent’s less ambient moments. However, it all just lacked an element of responsibility for the own sound and that in so many ways is an absolute tragedy.

Morbid Reality by US thrash metallers Hexx is the first release I have ever heard by the band. As usual with me, the artwork caught my eye at first and I soon found myself listening to their 1991 offering as part of my weekly rotation. I understand these guys have a penchant for changing direction/styles having started out as a NWOBHM act in their first iteration. By the time they got to album number three they appeared to have adopted some death metal elements, most notably with the vocals now being handled by guitarist Clint Bower who deployed a very harsh screeching yet gruff style for Morbid Reality.

Alongside these death metal influences the band show some technical aspects to their playing, changing pace deftly and avoiding the obvious progressions of a traditional thrash metal album. As such, I would pitch Morbid Reality as somewhere between Sadus with the strong bass presence and Metal Church with the over-the-top vocals supported by a strong riff artillery. Long term guitarist Dan Watson in no small part adds dimension to Hexx’s sound here; ably supported by Bower the guitars map an interesting if not overtly complicated ecosystem across Morbid Reality. The lead work has the rabid energy of a player with unpredictability balanced with the genuine talent required to carry such spontaneity off. Yes, there are times when the band do get a bit muddled with all the moving parts (Blood Hunter) but overall, they manage the frantic pace and almost schizophrenic structures well enough.

Frustratingly for an album with some technical prowess it does suffer in some regards with sounding a bit similar in places. Whilst my enjoyment stays solid throughout the eight tracks it is tested sometimes by the track lengths and the abominable stupidity of the instrumental wankery (Spider Jam) to close the album really does grate.

However, this is clearly an album made by an established band with all the chops you would expect from such a no-nonsense approach to thrash metal. It is more than capable without ever being exceptional, interesting without ever straying over to being innovative, challenging without ever being avant-garde.

Interested purely by the artwork on this EP I decided to see what the content was like.  Needless to say that the tracks fall far short in the quality stakes when compared with the artwork.  Oddly positioned somewhere between progressive heavy metal and industrial sound effects (albeit on the odd occasion only), Red Cain's self-titled EP is perhaps one of the most unbearable releases I have heard from a vocal perspective.  The vocalist simply does not have the same level of ability as the rest of the band who are not remarkable artists in their own right but are clearly letting themselves down with the vocalist they chose.

Whilst the instrumentation is of reasonable stature it is horribly blended together with synthesisers to impose some illusion of cosmic sheen to proceedings when in fact it just irritates the life out of me.  Trying to sound like progressive power metal is a feat only a few bands can achieve and looking at images of the band they do seem to be a classic case of design over content.  There is nothing of enough depth here to create any swell or rise, no sense of the levels of passion or heart being able to be backed up by the deliverables on show.

The melodic elements of the album are probably the stronger as they are much simpler in essence and without the vocals are much more sticky with me.  The meandering and frankly wanky sections just bore me though and if that man doesn't stop singing then it may just tip me over the edge.

In opening this review, I would like to point out from the start that Knife and their self-titled debut release are a fucking ridiculous concept. Like Midnight on crack these German speed metallers have taken on their persona and stretched it to the max, naming their album after themselves, adding in a title track of the same name and then substituting the letter “I” in their band logo for (yep, you guessed it), a knife.

In a world where knife crime continues to make the headlines it is a bold move to say the least. The fact is though that these guys are so tongue-in-cheek, I cannot help but laugh at the lengths they have taken the identity to and the depth of the sheer immersive experience they take the listener on. If for no other reason than pure entertainment, I would recommend all readers of this review just to listen to this record once before getting on with the rest of their lives.

Whilst I doubt the longevity of this record - putting the overkill of a concept aside for a minute – I cannot deny what an important release for speed metal n 2021 this is. It is like Sodom and Motorhead had a baby and let Angelwitch raise it. Perhaps the most unapologetic album of the year, Knife clearly have no fucks to give. The unhinged vocals of the vocalist sound all the more deranged with a German accent applied, making tracks like I Am The Priest twice as fun you may think at first glance. We are never far away from a catchy and anthemic chorus (in fact, virtually every track has this) and this is where the heavy metal influences really do start to shine alongside the speed metal aesthetic. The lead work harks to more of a traditional metal style as veers away from wild sonics to follow a more melodic path.

Despite being one of the more fun releases of the year, Knife suffer from a mentality that more is good. More speed, more anthems, more nostalgic heavy metal references, gruffer and scowling vocals galore that do grate towards the end of the album, all these moving parts do sadly result in some stasis on the record. That having been said, the album is not supposed to be some progressive masterpiece and does have an infectious punk attitude to its delivery that cannot fail to please.

Amidst all the typical bluster you would associate with modern day Cannibal Corpse, there is actually some intelligent stuff on Blood Red Throne's tenth studio outing.  Alongside all the groovy riffs and frenetic pacing there are some hints of expansive scoping going on, resulting in the inclusion of some bass driven runs or downright infectious blackened elements being dropped in there also.

BRT's penchant for writing "bangers" is certainly underlined on Imperial Congregation with many tracks being written with as much mocking vehemence as the album title would suggest.  Tracks like Transparent Existence are stacked full of catchy riffs that cannot fail to stick like some infesting parasite to your brain.  This brand of no frills, memorable without being melodic, death metal is hardly rare nowadays but the Norwegians do it well, using every last one of their twenty-three years of experience to punctuate these standout moments on what could otherwise be considered to be a standard enough death metal record.

The shortfalls here are mainly that it does get far too involved in itself and if you are not careful you lose sight of the bits going on around the standard dm fare.  Gundersen's bass is prominent in the mix, driving forward the sound of the band without ever becoming imposing or intrusive.  When coupled with the solid and consistent drumming of Freddy this makes for quite a formidable force to be reckoned with.  At times it feels like Gundersen is almost off doing his own thing behind those chopping riffs.  However, this is why full attention is needed here when running through all ten tracks on offer.  There is more to this album than charging pace, frantic solos and rabid riffs.

This is far and away a better album than the aforementioned Cannibal Corpse's effort earlier this year.  Imperial Congregation has a stature and confidence about it that is obvious on even the weaker tracks.  Never a band to rest on their laurels, BRT make for an intense listening experience on most of what they release and this latest opus is no different.  The lead work ranges from odd blooping time signatures to full on melodic richness and whilst scoring precisely zero points for originality, this album manages to almost impose itself on you with its unrelenting delivery and in a way just letting it take you can reap real rewards.

The final two tracks do very little for me and so the album does tail off towards the end for me, either they ran out of material or hastily put together the last two tracks.  Either way, it is reflected in the quality that these tracks are below par when compared to the other eight on show.

Death metal is one of my go to genres.  When combined with black metal it rarely takes on a form unbecoming to my battered eardrums.  One of the reasons why I like death metal so much is there is not any particular need to listen to the vocals in terms of deciphering them and understanding any deep lyrical content behind them.  Lyrics overall are of little interest to me in many ways although this does not mean I only like instrumental albums.  With dm, bm and thrash it is all about the expression for me.  It is fine for artist to write and sing about what they like of course but I do not need the details thanks.  With less extreme music the lyrics are more important as there is not always an obvious means of expression as an alternative.  I love the tales of the folk songs of bands like Panopticon, for example, however there is is even an element of cringe in some of the lyrics churned out in these circles sometimes also.  What I also do not react well to is over telling of a story through an album (or repeated overly obvious storytelling across various tracks in an album).  If you are going to engage in very forward recital of tales, myths or legends then make sure that all that is going on around it is enticing enough to enable maximum success.

1914 are very much an artist that I just do not understand the hype around.  If you like a good story I can definitely see the appeal but it is not like there is much of anything else going on to make their output that special.  Where Fear and Weapons Meet is an album full of tales of Word War I for the discerning fans who like a bit of history with their metal, but it is far too lyrically focused for my liking making me feel like I have to hear the stories as opposed to just enjoying the music.  The music just feels like a bit part player (even though the instrumentation is of a high standard).  The excerpts of historic radio (which sound created as opposed to utilising historic material) does not really influence the atmosphere for me.  The strong symphonic element to Corps D'autos-Canons-Mitrailleuses more than sets the scene without the intro being needed.  This is probably the strongest track on the whole album and does not rely on very audible themes or guest artists to drive the momentum.

If anything, I find WFaWM to be trying too hard to be authentic.  In comparison to Kanonenfieber's release from this year, 1914 come off as a very poor second place despite clearly being more accomplished musicians.  For an album themed on such a monumental human catastrophe it seems to like any real grit or heart.  More guttural gurns and less attention to detail please guys.

Darkspace member's solo output is arguably more than covered off in terms of quality by Wintherr with his Paysage d'Hiver releases.  With a lot of that discography still to discover it was on my mind to park listening to Zhaaral's single album under his Sun of The Blind logo until I had fully explored his bandmate's much more vast list of releases (the first of which will arrive on vinyl this weekend as it happens).  As I alluded to in the forum thread, Skullreader is a grower needing more than a cursory listen to fully appreciate what it delivers.

Despite me having spent numerous hours with it, I am still not overly in love with it.  If anything I find it to be great background music, which is hardly glowing praise and does sound unfair when it is obvious that there is lots of evidence of talent on this record.  This a very lush and melodic experience overall and not one that relies too much on just swooshing atmospherics to set the scene.  The repetition on the record breeds an assuring familiarity as it plays but at the same time makes it impossible to maintain the focus solely upon just the music.  It does need more atmosphere though as it is far too warm sounding (without being Hellenic) as a result of the lush and rich melodies.  Whilst I cannot fault the effort and the means behind it, I have to conclude that the delivery is off, resulting in an album that seems to just pass me by as opposed to give much in the way of snapping my attention onto it for just over forty minutes.

Zhaaral is really a victim of his bandmates success as I have heard very similar ideas done much better by Wintherr (consistently so over the cross-section of the discography I have heard) and as a result I can't help but feel Skullreader just to be an attempt to get something off Zhaaral's chest that he himself was probably over quite quickly - hence the one release only.  It isn't a bad album but it just gets a bit dreary the more you try to chip away at it to glean some sense of excitement and direction.

I have struggled to find the time to fully take in Le tyran l'Esthète in all honesty.  Its blend of black metal and more traditional metal riffs is a wonderfully melodic mix of the best of both worlds, delivering lush and vivid storylines well.  The driving rhythm that propels the Les Chants de Nihil engine forward has a rich bass sound that sits full in the mix and compliments the menagerie of activity that is going on around it.  Whether it is the tumultuous tremolo riffs, the scathing vocals, choral accompaniments or the (slightly muted) bash of the drums, the bass is always there, audible yet not imposing.

This is well written stuff folks, this cannot be denied.  There is a real sense of intrigue to what the band are plotting to deliver next as one track finishes and another begins.  That epic sense of build and tension is never too far away on Le tyran l'Esthète and if you have the time, switch off all the lights and listen to this in the dark and through headphones if you can to truly enjoy the experience.  In a year of great metal releases, I cannot think of anything else that sounds quite like this album.  Likewise, there is nothing that probably touches it in terms of ambition either.

The fact is though, despite its obvious appeal, I do not take a lot away from this album that reminds me of why I need to revisit it again.  At times it is almost too epic and grandiose for its own good.  Whilst it is playing, I am largely transfixed.  There is so much win on this album that it should process a lot easier on the old memory banks than it actually does. I can only put this down to feeling flooded when I listen to the album.  When the waters subside and I look at the wash there is very little left to focus on; as such this is an album that is very much one that is purely in the moment in terms of where the enjoyment begins and ends.  This sounds like a really fucking stupid statement, however most of my favourite albums I can play through in my head or do so on highlights at least, Le tyran et l'Esthète just has no sustainability beyond its actual play time.

I am convinced more plays will probably reward this with a revised rating come 2022.  However, with the year drawing to a close and rotation time tight as the AOTY list takes it final form this album currently sits a lot further down the list than it perhaps deserves too; on paper at least. 

W.A.S.P.’s third full-length was probably one of the first ten records I bought with my own money. Drawn by the promise of the obtuse and gory nature of the band, the sleazy album cover proved too much to resist, even if I found the content a lot less shocking than I had hoped it would be. It is hard to believe that this album is thirty-five-years old today. I was ten years old when this came out and probably not even aware of its existence until I was thirteen perhaps even fourteen.

Back in those days, money was a precious commodity. Earning pocket money by doing chores at the weekend around the house was a necessary evil. This restricting income when coupled with birthday, Easter or Christmas money was a means to get hold of whatever artwork grabbed my attention on my many trips to Music Zone or Intergames (the two main music shops in my hometown). I lost count of how many hours I spent in those two stores with no money to spend, planning my spending well in advance yet never sticking to the plan when I did have a few precious coins burning a hole in my pocket.

As a result of the lack of regular, significant funding for my music buying needs and there being no huge internet presence at the time I occasionally found myself with a record in my collection that in hindsight was not all that great. No bones about it, Inside The Electric Circus is one such record. An album that although I did not love end to end, I was kind of stuck with and so I just grew to love it with such a small collection of music to go at.

Now, this is also not a terrible record either. Some thirty-five years on from its release the songs remain relevant to some degree and despite there being some filler to overcome (Shoot From The Hip and The Rock Rolls On) on the whole the album is palatable if not lacking in some seasoning in some places. The album opening is superb though and would fill any metal fan with joy for what is to come if that menacing cabaret-style intro was to be believed. The fact is though that this album is just a much fun as the artwork suggests it will be. What it lacks in real menace, it more than makes up for in memorability and catchiness.

Tracks like Restless Gypsy are simple fares but stick in your head for days after the event and even the unadulterated sleaze of 9.5.-N.A.S.T.Y. and Sweet Cheetah still end up retained in the ears for a while after the circus leaves town once again. The covers are less of a high-point for me but they both fit the aesthetic of the record brilliantly and you cannot beat a bit o’ the Heep every now and again.

This was a step up from The Last Command though; more consistent and better written tracks adorn an album that was only eleven months on from its predecessor. Whilst I do not think W.A.S.P. have ever released a flawless album, they have also not been guilty of just releasing “collections of songs” as albums either. Inside The Electric Circus showcases that sleazy, cock-rock nature of the band well (even though its content was still well under my pervy teenager mentality expectations of the time) and is the last of such albums from the band who got more mature after this release.

It was purely the artwork that drew me to Kowloon Walled City’s Piecework. As a fan of abandoned buildings/places, the bleak and (literally) damp décor of the room on the cover of the bands fourth full-length release was enough to pique my interest levels as my mind began to wonder what history had taken place in that room. Often with such images I like to envisage the lives of those that had lived there, be intrigued by the years that had unfolded there, lament in its current empty and uncertain state.

There is by way of contrast no uncertainty in the album content. Setting an early standard, the band remain almost static throughout the album. Drifting through the seven tracks on display here at virtually the same pace of post-sludgey goodness, contemplating urban decay (which is a common theme across the band’s discography) and as such making a perfect correlation back to that artwork that first drew me in.

In exploring this theme, the band create an almost nonchalant demeanour in weighing up the subject matter. Never crashing and bashing, always calculated and poised in their delivery, the four-piece exude a maturity to their gritty and deep content that although rarely varies never gets boring. What Kowloon Walled City manage to do on Piecework is build instantly and then maintain a direction that becomes the absolute spine of the album. Most tracks do sound the same and the album tracks do all tend to blur into one. However, I cannot remember one other album in recent years where this linearity is so utterly perfectly placed (and paced). This fusion of the tracks (in my head at least) really works in making the album so successful in relaying its message. It is an album that is not adorned in any way, shape, or form with anything unnecessary or surplus. It turns up to the party with its own keg of home-brewed beer and sits, supping from its own mixture – offering pint pots of it to anyone who expresses interest, whilst acknowledging it is perhaps an acquired taste.

This stasis, the basis of the repetition and the lynchpin to the constant brooding of the album, is exactly what is needed. The inflections of intrusive and yet utterly necessary bass riffs, set against the constant swell of the melodic and yet relentlessly staid guitars, sat atop the consistent percussion of the drums, layered with Scott Evans barely charged vocals that just exude a natural sorrow all makes for a unique and strangely comforting album. The drama comes with those hanging pauses that leave you on the edge of your seat waiting for the heaviness to commence again, never quite sure if this is the end of a track or midway into the first verse of one.

In a way, Piecework embraces and epitomises urban decay as a natural and unwavering force that they manage to celebrate as a concept to some degree. As I look out of my window whilst listening to the album, into a wet and slowly darkening late Saturday afternoon, the album content seems a world away from my surroundings. However, by being so clever at painting the picture they do, that room on the album cover might just as well be down the landing.

On my occasional forays into death/doom I often get bored if I am honest; certainly, in later years when it has been done to death (pun intended) and well-done death/doom seems a rarefied breed. As such, I approached Foreverglade with the kind of pensiveness reserved for opening Christmas presents from someone who usually just gives me cash.

Thankfully, Worm have managed to not only do real justice to the ethos of death/doom but have also added some unique elements that touch other points of the extreme metal spectrum also. In doing so they manage to make Foreverglade a success in terms of both design and content. It is at its very core a death/doom album still yet it has dashes of accessibility beyond just the fathomless repetition and smothering murk that coats everything.

For a start, this is one of the most sensible use of keys on a death/doom record I have ever heard. There is no sense of someone falling on the keys for dramatic effect when the atmosphere dictates we need to plunge down some dark(er) hole. Instead the gothic melodies they exude compliments the wider stratosphere, linking some catchy riffing with some excellent lead work or more melodious guitar work in general. It is the guitars that rule on this album as well, supported superbly by the thunderous drumming of L. Dusk and the ghastly and cavernous vocals of Fantomslaughter.

It is clear that these guys have come from a black metal background in their early years, and this is never more obvious in the vocal rasps that permeate the vast atmospherics that the more traditional death/doom sustains. What this does to the album is create a sense of cohesion of influence and styles across the forty-four-minute runtime; feeling like an album that encompasses the history of Worm as a unit whilst teasing us with more progressive tendencies here and there also. At times (Subaqueous Funeral) the album has an almost conceptual feel to it made more apparent by the maturity of the lead work and patient structure building that goes on.

For an album of such gargantuan heaviness it feels very short and concise and does not outstay its welcome by any means. Worm clearly have a lot to offer but are mature enough to restrain it in one of 2021’s more intriguing releases.

The mornings are getting colder, there's an early autumn chill in the air most days and the atmospheric black metal rotation appears to just grow and grow in October in the Vinny cave.  Wait a minute though?  Andy Marshall of Falloch and Saor fame has a sophomore album out under the banner of his Fuath project (I have never heard the debut) so this would be a perfect fit for this time of year to tag onto the queue of atmospheric bm, right?

In truth, whilst atmospherics do play a key part in Fuath's sound, this album has a lot more to do with conventional black metal.  It is full of blast beats and ghastly shrieking vocals, whist also having a mining tremolo to the riffs (check out album opener Prophecies as evidence of such), all hallmarks of the cold and harsh fury of the authentic black metal genre.  This isn't to say that the keyboards are redundant here.  They are audible and effective still, albeit in a more supporting role than you would initially perhaps expect from a man responsible for the melodic exuberance of Saor.  Into the Forest of Shadows is the track on here that best showcases the atmospherics at play.  Here the keyboards take more of a central role and drive a lot of what is going on around them to great effect.  It is still an up-tempo and aggressive though and the album as whole maintains this consistency.

The fact is though that after repeated listens the album gets more than a bit blurry, morphing into stages of a similar sound as opposed to developing on a theme over five tracks.  In a way it misses out on utilising the atmospherics better, even if only to provide some variety.  It is memorable, but for the wrong reasons really as it just feels like Saor have toned down one aspect of their sound and gone a little harsher in another and all balance is somehow lost in the mix.

The short format makes this "samey" aspect more tolerable than if we had eight to ten tracks of this to contend with but I would suggest that Fuath's longevity is not the lengthiest prospect in my music library.

I let hype bring me to Sanguisugabogg in all honesty.  There definitely seemed to be a sense of outrage amongst some of the death metal community around either the amount of merch the band put out or the perceived deathcore/beatdown influences being far to obvious to allow the vast mindset of such fans to open up to their sound.  Having heard none of their output until a few months ago, I have to say they are not remarkable really by way of comparison to most other death metal I have heard over the years but that's not say that Tortured Whole is not a fucking blast.

Revulsion from some over their lyrical content is fucking laughable in a genre of extreme metal like death metal.  Shame really that the focus is on these when there are some chunky as hell death/doom riffs in here.  Yes, it doesn't all work (those fucking electronic/ambient tracks are just excess for excess sake), but even if you hate all the squealy riffage that is littered throughout the album there is still enough nods to the likes of Mortician for the fan of brutal death metal as well as equal reference to more modern revivalists such as 200 Stab Wounds to appease the retro crowd also.

I can listen to Dead As Shit all day if I am honest.  The title track rumbles along like it is the nineties all over again and the perversely titled Dick Fillet sounds every bit as hellish as the title intimates it should be.  Accept it for what it is and Tortured Whole is a fun 30 minute blast most days of the week.

In a week that has saw me spend many pleasurable hours with the latest Panopticon album it seemed logical to stay on my atmo-black theme (albeit Panopticon has strayed from that path somewhat) and pick up the latest offering from WITTR.  Straight away though this album sounds and feels very different and I guess in a way, having spent time with a clear runner for AOTY Primordial Arcana has a lot to live up to.  This review is not written with the intent for it to be a comparison of those two records, however I cannot deny that hearing ...And Again Into the Light has certainly influenced my listening experience of this record.

Known for their expansive and atmospheric soundscapes, WITTR have taken a more direct approach this time.  It sounds like there is an effort to be more accessible this time and a lot of the riffs play like straight up metal riffs at times.  The textures are still there, just hidden a more forward sounding metal front to add grit to the WITTR sound.  I will go on record as saying this works.  Primordial Arcana is an enjoyable record for sure, but that is as excited as I can get with it.  The adoption of a more robust edge whilst retaining the more familiar aspects of the bands established sound sort of leaves them in a bit of a no-mans land.

With the acknowledgment that they have not made a bad record by any means, what the record really lacks is any sense of dynamics.  Overall it just comes across as really flat sounding like we are not really sure which element is taking precedent on the album and so both the harder edge metal and the atmospherics both sit back a little in the hope that the other one will take the lead, resulting in neither really establishing themselves and taking ownership of the album.

As a result most of Primordial Arcana just passes me by, leaving me with little to grasp hold of and explore as it goes.  I get snippets of hope.  The resonating plucked string on Spirit of Lightning or the ambience of Eostre but nothing to really snap me into me giving the album my full-blown attention if I am honest.  Whilst not a bad record I still feel disappointed and very underwhelmed.  The best track for me is the bonus track (on the bonus track version, fittingly enough). Skyclad Passage has a commanding presence from the off and takes hold of a direction and stick with it.  Have it on loud enough and the atmospheric thud and rumble has the windows vibrating in their frames as the track grows and grows with each passing minute.  More of this next time around please guys.

A forum acquaintance elsewhere on the internet put me onto Martwa Aura during one of the aforementioned forumite's lengthy playlist recommendations for straight up black metal.  In his list of circa twenty albums from various bands I picked out this Polish crew's sophomore full-length from last year as one the standouts.  I would argue that Martwa Aura stray from the conventional bm tag quite often on Morbus Animus.  Yes, the core of the sound is blasting black metal done to a very high standard but these guys have a very melodic edge to their leads especially and are simply great at delivering rhythms full of pace and power to boot.

At the heart of the machine are the vocals of Grzegorz Puszkarek.  His ghastly rasps fill most tracks on the album with a demonic presence that permeates as opposed to dominates.  In the cleaner vocal moments his voice takes on a pagan/folk vibe that works really well also when balanced against that acute melody I mentioned earlier.  Guitarist Cadaveris and Sadogoat are able to take up equal space on the album with a mixture of harsh riffing and soaring melodies that make some parts of the album positively shine.  Even with these more warm sounding moments taken into consideration, the album still leaves a scathing sense of cold in its wake.  Across the five tracks on show here the majority are over the six minute mark so a barrage of blastbeats and tremolos was never going to cut it with such lengthy passages, and Martwa Aura fill the album full of variety without losing any momentum.

The strong rhythm section of O. on the drums and Saathar on the bass are the perfect backdrop to level, balance and support the raging inferno to more melodious movements and thus they are probably best credited for the consistency of the power across Morbus Animus.  Hints of Behemoth creep in with some spoken word passages and the melodies do bring to mind Mgla, but there is no worship of these acts more a respectful nod in their direction before focusing on doing their own thing.  All in all a fine discovery.

Chalking up a score on my weirdshitometer this year is the full-length debut from the UK's progressive/technical death metallers Atvm.  This record has been ringing around my lair since I first picked it up on a playlist here at MA one month.  Sporting some obscure and colourful artwork the band deploy a lot of colour in their seven iterations of death metal giving a real sense of vibrancy and expansion along the way.  The obscurity of the artwork does not really come across in the sound of the band though.  Whilst the album is most definitely progressive it falls short of being avant-garde and somehow manages to stay away from being always obviously death metal at its heart.  With the staccato riffing of album opener Sanguinary Floating Orb being a great benchmark for the rest of the album.

Just where Atvm do start to tread a more traditional death metal path there is always something very proggy not too far away to warp the linear narrative.  The busy stabbing riffs of Ⲁⲛⲋ-ⲟⲩ Ⲙⲁⲧⲟⲩ are matched by some rock sounding cuts early on in the track to put a real sense of restraint on the raging beast; the ambient picked section taking things into a much more atmospheric lull before that raging intensity is allowed much more leash to run with.  As with most of these types of albums I am drawn to the bass work and Luke Abbott does not disappoint as his strings polarise tracks nicely giving a distinct yet entertaining segregation between the more rampant rhythms and his climbing and plonking runs done seemingly on another soundscape altogether.

It is hard to put references on all of Atvm's influences but they are most definitely latter day Death than they are Scream Bloody Gore, more Martyr than Atheist and a lot less Gorguts in comparison to being more like The Chasm in their death metal credentials.  Regardless of how they got here, Atvm have made Famine, Putrid and Fucking Endless sound intriguing and challenging without being bonkers.  For an album title that sounds so dark and morbid there is a lot of positive energy spewing forth here and I cannot help but think that the album title was put in place with a wry smile on the faces of the band as they did so.  There is little in the way of music here that makes you stop and look at the speakers in horror.  Think more Critters than Chucky and you are in the right ball park of a band that is not afraid to ham it up a little whilst still retaining some authenticity to the darker side of metal at the same time.

My criticism in the main is largely the track lengths.  I mean there are times when I am ready for a track to end long before it actually does and this is despite acknowledging that the band do everything in their power to keep things interesting on nearly every track.  My brain just cannot process all of what they try to do at times and that may be my neurology being stretched beyond it's puny means all too easily for Atvm's liking as opposed to any genuine issue that they may have stylistically.  Whereas with Ænigmatum I am onboard for the whole album, I just cannot match that enthusiasm for Atvm over the ten minutes more that it runs for, it just seems to try and cram far too much in by comparison.  Still, a great find for me this year and another great opportunity for me to delve further into the realm of progressive death metal as I continue to find my feet in the modern output of the sub-genre.

I have spent a totally unplanned large amount of time this year actively keeping up with new releases.  Whilst I won't pretend that in a normal year I do not bother with any new releases, it is unusual for me to be able to put together a top ten of in year releases, let alone a top twenty-five like I am currently able to.  As I have said before, keeping up with new releases can be a thankless task and I have historically found myself just consuming music because it is new and this so often leads to disappointment on a large scale. However, 2021 has been a strong year so far and as we get into October I have started to look at washing up some of the albums I had previously missed during this busy year.

Malakhim's debut full-length has had a few spins here and there throughout the course of the year, never quite impressing me enough to warrant a regular rotational spin whilst also not completely alienating me either.  It is obvious that there is real bite here that is not blunted by the simple use of melodies or black 'n' roll rhythms; the Watain comparisons although inevitable are not entirely accurate in terms of the overall album sound.  Simply put though, having already digested the excellent release by Mork this year before I even got to Theion and similarly having had copious helpings of Spectral Wound's A Diabolic Thirst (both of which came out after Malakhim's effort), the itch that the Swedes debut scratches was already more than satiated.

In reality, Theion is just as strong as Katedralen though. In terms of authentic and accessible bm, Malakhim have this near melodic yet still frantic black metal sound nailed on.  Reminding me of a much colder latter-day Varathron in the vocal department, whoever the fuck sings on here clearly knows their stuff.  Haughty and breathy rasps accompany the tremolo picked riffs really well and a solid backdrop of thumping drums and thunderous bass complete the sound nicely.  It just lacks a slight edge of "oomph" as I alluded to earlier and this is what pegs it behind the other two albums that I mention here.  Check out though the furious opening to Hammer of Satan and tell me you are not moved in some way shape or form (and if not then please check your pulse).  It is more of this elixir that the band need to consume in order to make Theion that bit more special and be able to slug it out with the other two giant releases of the year in the same genre.

The wonderful blooping leads of Muhammed Suiçmez and Christian Münzner are a joy to behold on Epitaph, they act like some melodic palate cleanser to the stringent structures of the technical death metal that dominates the album with an almost military like presence. This presence is more NATO than hostile invaders though as I find much of the uniformity of Epitaph to be quite pleasing and almost gentle.

The riffs are almost like a melodic technical death metal in origin, and they seem to bounce off the drums and bass as they support them. The pacing of the drums is superb throughout the album also, with tracks like the title track showing the versatility of Hannes Grossmann brilliantly. His drumming acts almost as a buffer to those urgent and racing riffs.

What also strikes me about Necrophagist’s sophomore is how comfortable a listen it is in terms of individual track and overall album length at the same time. With the longest track being at five minutes there is no sense of bloated technicality on show here. Instead tracks stick around just long enough to showcase the talent on show and then it is off to the next track. All too often on technical death metal albums I find a bit of clock watching going on and having to fight the temptation to hit the skip button, however there are no such impatient impulses here. This is largely due to the time relief that is applied but also because the song writing is genuinely interesting. I cannot help but be transfixed by the penultimate track Seven and its catchy riffing and mechanical rhythms that breath organically alongside one another superbly.

Despite being more than familiar with Epitaph I was surprised to see that I did not even have a copy stored in my stream subscription (now rectified). Considering the mastery on show here it is a shame the band went their separate ways after this as there was so much promise still left to be fulfilled. However, talk about going out on a high note.

The repetitive structures that occupy the world of extreme metal (or just some non-extreme metal in fact as well) are often as much of a curse as they are a gift in my experience. On the one hand you have the punishing riff patterns of say funeral doom that layer an instant level of emotional torture at the door of the listener and subject them to a looped burden for several minutes at a time. At the opposite end of the spectrum are albums like The Last Temptation of Reid, that get lumped into the Industrial genre (quite unnecessarily) down to their seemingly endless regurgitation of punk riffs and spoken word vocals.

God this is juvenile! I mean if there is one thing that Jello Biafra should not have done in his career it is contribute anything to Lard. His Dead Kennedys legacy is all but made a mockery of here; stabbing riffs and tappy drums make for a punky urgency to proceedings but this is a piss poor attempt to try and revisit former glories on behalf Biafra. There is no entertainment value for me to Lard. Unlike The Dead Kennedys, there is nothing contentious here to make the immaturity rational or even fun to that end. It plays like a lazy (and nowhere near as talented) Jane’s Addiction record only somehow made worse by endless spoken word lyrics and predictable structures – yes there is a difference between repetition and predictability folks.

My overarching experience when listening to this album is that I just want it to stop and leave me alone. It is by far one of the most alienating albums I think I have ever heard and as such is memorable to me for all the wrong reasons. It cements for me the ever-growing notion that Al Jourgensen is one of the most over-rated artists in the history of metal. With Barker and Ward here to add more Ministry credentials to the Lard sound it all just underlines why I find Ministry so dull and uninspiring nowadays. Add to this the mindless song structures and terrible vocals and this makes for one painful listen.

Canadians Infernäl Mäjesty operate in the zone of thrash metal that is rabid and putrid without necessarily dropping into blackened territory.  Their debut album is a pretty fucking intense experience, even for a hardened thrash metal veteran like me.  It is reminiscent of Possessed in terms of the death metal like intensity it generates, but also Slayer as a reference point for how true the thrash credentials are at the same time.

The album suffers an oddity in terms of structure early on with an instrumental track immediately after the opening song.  This loses a lot of momentum from the album in all honesty and despite the big build up that goes on during track 3, Night of the Living Dead puts things back on course more from an atmosphere perspective as opposed to reasserting the intensity levels immediately.  This is a strange choice of running order - even though it is obvious to see the link with the instrumental as an intro to the horror themed track mentioned above - and one that overall I do not think the record recovers from overall.  The feeling of things being a little disjointed thereafter is not entirely shook off at any point, despite the obvious distraction of the thunderous racket that occupies most of the album.

This does not make None Shall Defy a bad album by any means.  It is clearly made by a group of young people with all the morbid fascinations of horror, comics and serial killers that you would perhaps expect from the stereotype of thrash metal bands at the time.  These dark curiosities transpose well into song writing content and provide the necessary dank sound to the frantic tempos as a reminder that whatever we are racing through there is something vile not too far away, permeating the air with its corrosive odour.

At times it does feel like a much slower version of Slayer as opposed to others where they seem to match the mad thrashing intensity of the aforementioned stars of the genre.  Vocalist Chris Bailey does remind me of Tom Araya a lot, and the looping sonics of Steve Terror (yep, I know!) and Kenny Hallman are certainly not a football field away from Hanneman and King.  I don't think drummer Rick Nemes quite matches Lombardo in the skill stakes but he still does a great job of bashing his way through the record.

Terrible artwork aside, None Shall Defy is a great old-school thrash metal record that is probably criminally overlooked by most fans of the genre.

Ænigmatum are a bit of strange one for me. I bought Deconsecrate on vinyl after one listen on Spotify which considering that I usually like my death metal more blackened and horrific as opposed to progressive and clever is a bold move for me. In the run up to this purchase I was listening to a lot of Death, specifically Individual Thought Patterns which I guess kind of put me in the mindset for Ænigmatum’s brand of bass heavy and proggy death metal.

To reference a more recent similarity though, Deconsecrate also reminds me of VoidCeremony’s debut full-length from last year. Entropic Reflections Continuum: Dimensional Unravel was another bass driven affair that referenced enough DiGiorgio style of playing to make me be like all 90s an’ shit. Brian Rush does a similar job on Deconsecrate, often playing his own thing as he does runs and plays seemingly outside of the rest of the proceedings yet somehow seamlessly connected to the very core of what is going on. The bass coupled with the remarkable drumming of Pierce Williams are the two standout performances on what is still overall a very tight and well composed record. Watching videos of both Rush and Williams perform, it is clear they are the main driving talent of the band yet neither dominate the performance. The lead and melody work of Eli Lundgren and Kelly Mclaughlin is crisp and clear, and their busy riffing style applies an important gravity to the tracks.

Now, I have very little reference points to prog-death so I am not insinuating that there is anything remarkable here in comparison to the rest of the sub-genre as I genuinely do not have enough experience to do any real comparison. What I do hear on Ænigmatum’s sophomore release though shapes up for some memorable and thoughtful performances. There is an innate sense of measurement present throughout the album, like everything is in its rightful place and each of these parts are nurtured into their slot by the rest of the instrumentation. McLaughlin’s vocals are death metal 101 really and yet they roll superbly over the riffing and rhythms without feeling like they are intrusive or trying to overbear anything else.

The pacing on the album is almost gentle at times and has an odd soothing quality to it. The death metal elements as a result can feel more melodic in origin, deploying hints of At The Gates here and there. Still though it is the climbing bass of Rush and the resolute drumming of Williams that constantly jump out at you. In the more frantic moments of the album, you end up almost caught between them and wondering which one to follow or chase after for the best. They do somehow still compliment one another though which again is testimony to the talent of the artists themselves.

I think there is more to come out of the Ænigmatum camp in the future that will captivate me for a few more records yet I hope. For all the success I have highlighted on this review there is still an element of some variety needed in terms of structure with only the instrumental that opens side B of the album being the main palate cleanser so to speak. However, this remains one of my real finds of 2021 so far and one that is liable to chart quite high on my year end list.

Mork's fifth album might just be one of the safest and yet thoroughly enjoyable black metal records of 2021.  The predictability of the abundant black n' roll elements on Katedralen is tempered by the harsh and cold bed on which they lie atop of.  Barking tremolos permeate the album throughout acting like some chain around the neck of the more accessible parts of the offering, reining them in with flashes of Burzum-like misery and drudgery to good effect.  As a result the almost groovy moments still retain this black metal authenticity that fans of the genre ache for.

I do not think for one minute that Mork are trying to hide these more catchy moments like they are ashamed of them or concerned of some backlash from the black metal fanbase.  They sound perfectly at ease with the melodic aesthetic to their sound that gets manipulated into these foot-stomping, rabble rousing moments that are littered throughout the album.  Operating in the kind of traditional metal riffing of Darkthrone alongside the savage delivery of Taake, Mork occupy a well-known yet unique niche that they carve over the forty-eight minutes that makes up Katedralen.

At the same time the band can deliver a brooding number like Evig intens smerte that shows they can use build to tease the construct of a song before adding grandeur to the same track with lush and urgent melodies over harsh and scathing vocals.  The simplicity to their riffs mirrors an influence from Satyricon most certainly and this penchant for memorable yet contextually true (to the genre) song writing is another trait they share also.  In their harsher moments, the band adopt a brevity akin to Craft to hammer home their message.  Yet, on the same track they can deliver an almost pagan gruffness to their sound as they explore all boundaries in sight.

Had Spectral Wound not released an album in the same year then Katedralen would place higher in my end of year list as being one of the truly rampant yet still unmistakably dank records of the year.  Mork do not quite hit the same heights of richness in the melodies that Spectral Wound managed and as result are pegged back slightly in the rankings list.  That should not overshadow the fact that this is a great album in its own right though.

Technical/Brutal death metal always runs the risk of going one of two ways.  Too much brutality or too much technicality almost inevitably kills off most such releases in my experience.  Dead and Dripping somehow mange to avoid either of the above on their sophomore full-length and manage to stay in between the lines for most of eight tracks on display here.  This bizarre "safe-zone" makes for an entertaining if not unadventurous foray into the world of Evan Daniele, the sole member of the band.  He does little wrong in fairness other than to make predictable patterns and all too familiar structures; in terms of references he is spot on, he is just not really doing anything new nor is he doing old-school all that overwhelmingly brilliant either.

Barring the instrumental weirdness of Eidetic Imagery of Cyclical Despair  we get pretty standard brutal vocals over staccato riffing and start/stop rhythms driven by drums that do not sound well cared for in the mix.  I can sit through the album without much of a challenge, however I am certainly not paying it full attention as it plays as the familiarity just makes me think how this has all been done before.  I am a sucker at present for a good bass player on technical/progressive death metal albums and although Evan does his best here to mix things up with the bass being more audible on some tracks that others, there is just not high enough a degree of skill to the playing to quite push the experience up there with some of the year's more interesting releases.  I almost want the bass to be doing its own thing at times but it sounds like it lacks the courage and conviction to take charge too much here and that will only get better with experience.

The brutal chug ends up distorted by the time/pace changes that seem to flood tracks in places, again like we have a level of technical proficiency that is a few steps behind the ambition that brings the effort to our attention.  If you like your Suffocation or Demilich then there is something here for you even if only for nostalgic purposes, but Dead and Dripping are a couple of releases away from quite hitting the heights of the aforementioned bands.  Being unfamiliar with the debut I cannot comment on how much of an improvement we have seen in seven months that have passed since Profane Verses of Murderous Rhetoric dropped, but I hear enough promise for me to listen to album number three should that arrive in the future.

Hard to imagine that ten years ago I first discovered Antediluvian via their debut Through the Cervix of Hawaah.  Quite where the last ten years have gone is mystery to me, but I recall at the time inhabiting the now defunct Tez forums and a few of us had a penchant for blackened, squally, death metal.  Antediluvian made discussion threads alongside the likes of Portal, Mitochondrion, Grave Upheaval and Impetuous Ritual.  This tag of blackened death metal is only half true for the majority of cases it gets used against in my opinion.  There was never a lot of black metal going on in Antediluvian's sound back in 2011 and based on this outing there hasn't been any more added in the intervening years either.

These Canadians are rooted firmly in death metal and although they make a fucking godawful racket, paying little attention to detail or construct they do not stray into Deiphago-like war metal territory at any point.  Like their Australian counterparts, Portal, Antediluvian adopt a kind of grinding and/or mining style of riffing hidden under a myriad of off-kilter rhythms and sonic chaos.  At times it sounds a little too chaotic in all honesty (and I am not just referencing The Divine Punishment here) and there has been more than one occasion when listening through an Antediluvian album where everything just moulds into a sensory overload on a much too grand a scale.  On their latest offering this remain the ongoing criticism of the band.

As a lover of the extreme end of extremity itself in my musical forays, it is hard to turn me off usually on a first listen to a death metal release.  Unfortunately, The Divine Punishment manages to do this more or less immediately as the opening track takes an age to form any discernible structure.  I spend most of this track waiting for it to start, then when it sounds like it has started I end up hoping this is not the direction for the  remaining six or seven minutes of the track because it truly is awful.  Disjointed and shapeless with no menacing allure to keep me interested, this sets the tone for the rest of the album very accurately unfortunately.  Take track three, How the Watchers Granted the Humans Sex Magick in the Primordial Aeon (yeah I know, right), there is clearly some attempt at a ritualistic edge here but the chanting is ineffective and serves to blunt the mood as opposed to enhancing it.  The drums try to take on this tribal beat but in fact sound like the drummer has a hard time keeping in time with the rest of the instruments and just comes off as being really naff.

Now, I know this is supposed to be sloppy and I am down with that, really I am.  But there are stabs of cosmic transcendence in here that are just poorly performed beyond any attempt to be kvlt.  I love extreme music that I find value in; some acknowledgement to instrumental prowess or song writing brilliance is not uncommon on most of what I listen to.  Guardians of the Liminal is both written and performed by a band who are drunk though.  If they are not drunk then they are taking the piss big time.  Even the argument that there is characterisation going on here leaning to the performances being done by some fictional being in the story (yeah, like this album has one of those) and so is open to interpretation is just not relevant here.  This is a bad album and it has nowhere to hide the fact.

Layering in atmospherics somehow adds to the problem.  The sound effects are just as irrelevant as most of the instrumentation and just add to this wall of dripping noise.  The band were allegedly on hiatus prior to this record and in all honesty I hope they revert back to such a status based on this outing.

20 Buck Spin have a seemingly endless line of impressive acts churning out some of the more extreme spectrum of metal currently in existence today.  There's rarely a month that goes by that some particularly grim and gruesome album cover doesn't grace my screen, offered on some fittingly splatter effect vinyl type bundle.  This attention to detail in the underground is paying dividends to the listener and the label I would argue as the old-school dirge of Cerebral Rot is a familiar blast of 90's death metal, incorporating death/doom, Autopsy-like values on production and musicianship as well as the squally depths of Demilich for good measure.

There's little here for me to not like in all honesty and as I write this review I struggle to remember quite why I saw fit to award their debut release a measly two-and-a-half stars (that's my afternoon sorted now).  Drummer Drew O'Bryant is a fucking animal and even on a record where he sounds like he's playing under the earth itself with the murky production job, you can hear him blasting the living shite out of his kit and adding blistering runs also.  When the tempo drops to more of a crawl, he's there again holding a more subtle yet firm line to assist the flow.  Flow is something that Excretion of Mortality has gallons and gallons of over its seven tracks.  Whilst it may not be the most technically astute death metal album of the year it is certainly put together by a tight bunch of guys.

Ian Schwab's vocals are right up my alley to.  Like a more coherent yet by no means any more accessible version of Antii Boman, they have an atmosphere all of their own really.  Their cavernous depths are matched perfectly by the mining sound of the riffs, the squealing and squally stabs of melody and the unfathomable gloom of the bass.  Nodding thoughtfully along as I listen to write this review, I am regularly distracted enough to stop typing and just zone out of the immediate surroundings and devote my whole attention to this record.  It sort of draws you in almost organically (resist album closer Crowning the Disgustulent (Breed of Repugnance) if you can and you are truly dead inside).  The album in many ways is just as ugly as the artwork suggests yet has an odd murky vibrancy that the artwork colour scheme matches also.  One of 2021's standout dm offerings so far.

Rise, Vulcan Spectre was an absolute blast.  As a sophomore album it delivered exactly what it was supposed to, building on the consistency of the debut album nicely and offering the promise of more blackened thrashing madness. Good news is that The Visions of Trismegistos fucking rips also, continuing this trend for scathing and downright evil thrash metal done with absolutely zero fucking frills.

Nekromantheon occupy the same space as Condor, Deathhammer and Inculter in terms of modern thrash metal references.  Bands who all continue to forge a bloody and unrelenting path for the future of the thrash metal genre.  This is a style of metal that I find suffers from a lack genuine attack on most modern releases that promise more of a revival of the 80's as opposed to any balls to the wall intensity.  What Nekromantheon also manage to do is give me the nostalgia value of the more vicious old school bands like Morbid Saint, Dark Angel, (early) Slayer and a tinge of Possessed too.

Of course the fact that two members of death metal monsters Obilteration occupy guitar, bass and vocal duties between them and former Deathhammer (live) drummer Christian "Kick" Holm occupies the space behind the skins is a massive help to how strong the band sound and how imposing they manage to make their sound.  This might not be polished stuff but fuck me it is well constructed and played with obvious passion.  There is a burning intensity to what Nekromantheon do; a feeling that they are putting everything into every track whether you like it or not.

There are even bits of variety thrown in as they truly capture the mythological aspect to their song content in the very climate of the album itself.  It is not however partial to any eccentric or unnecessary atmospherics and is an album that is content most of the time to let the filthy blackened edges to those riffs and vocals do the heavy lifting as they slash at and spit in your face.  This almost nonchalant arrogance is perfectly acceptable and I cannot stop coming back for more.  Vinyl copy ordered.   

Although not part of my regular death metal menu back in the late 80's and early 90's, Immolation are now a band that I class as being in the highest echelons of death metal royalty.  I struggle to find many bands within this most extreme of genres that can maintain a presence for over thirty years and are still to this day capable of delivering relevant if not all that expansive death metal.  With me having coming to the Immolation party late there are a few years of catching up to do still and having come round to their last offering it is clear to see that the guys have lost none of the urgency and menace of their debut offering over all those years.

I bagged a limited edition repress of Dawn of Possession on gold vinyl this past week and I really cannot think of a better colour to represent the standard of death metal on offer over these ten tracks.  Comparable most definitely with Morbid Angel only less sonically driven, Immolation carved a niche in death metal with scathing intensity, laser-fire leads and cavernous vocals that chilled to the bone.  That now trademark shifting and abrupt riffing style that manages to stay on the right side of lurching without becoming floundering or simply butt-fuck ugly, is here in its raw glory at the very start of the establishment of that Immolation sound.  Smilowski's drums seem to be rooted in the very earth around them on here and the mix job to allow them so much presence without ever dominating the soundscape is credit to Harris Johns.

The pairing of Vigna and Wilkinson is a devastating dual attack to contend with.  I can sort of forgive the lack of obvious lead work that is paired back to these short bursts of sonic chaos as they complement the blistering pace superbly throughout and I can only surmise that to drop lengthy, shredding solos in here would disrupt the flow way too much.  Those stabs on the end of riffs are enough compensation in the grander scheme of things anyways.

At the front of everything, the monster that is Ross Dolan growls and rumbles away like some high commander of all the seemingly unstoppable demons that adorn the album cover.  His presence is very much the overarching experience for me that I take away from any listen through of Dawn of Possession.  Like the drums, they contribute massively to the success of the album but they rightfully dominate proceedings for me, underlining all that is ghastly about extreme music perfectly.  Immolation's debut is so important because it not only kept to the playbook on extremity but allowed individual musicianship to shine also, which in turn gave Immolation identity in a rapidly expanding genre and that uniqueness remains with them to this day.

Manegarm’s fourth full-length has an accomplished sound to it. It truly blends the folk and black/Viking metal elements together well throughout its near fifty-minute run time in a solid display of powerful music. I find the inclusion of the female vocals to be a bit hit and miss but there are certainly a couple of occasions where I must admit they do add a real depth of ethereal beauty. The requisite inclusion of the cello and violin works well, and both compliment the riffs well without the sense that they are competing unnecessarily against the more aggressive elements of the album.

Structurally the album is a bit hard to follow I find though and as a result there is more of a sense of a series of similar sounding tracks being put together on a record instead of necessarily a flowing opus being delivered. I have no issue with the changing pace and tempos as they are usually done well and see the introduction of the more melodic classical strings or rumbling bassline to immediately hold the interest as the more frenetic pace ends.

When they hit their stride like on Hemfärd the band are unstoppable. Establishing a commanding tempo and stepping this down on a few occasions to let the song draw breath works well and re-energises proceedings on the longest track on offer here. I sense that overall, the album needs a couple more tracks like this to really make it shine though, instead it just feels like the true extent of the bands promise is not being fully showcased on Vredens Tid and there is some element of just going through the motions.

I can cope with clunky and cumbersome. I have listened to enough Autopsy to know that bands can make a reputation based on such basic (and base) values of musicianship. It is part of the allure of some bands but then again there are some genres of metal you can hide it better in than others. What these guys try to do here is borderline criminal though and this was an album made by a band who were way below the level of ability they aspired to.

Given that Power Metal in general is not my preferred branch of The Guardians tree there is a strong argument to say that Cauldron Born are on the back foot before I even press play on the album. Once the music started, they nailed down the lid on their own coffin in all honesty. I have better underground demos in my collection than this record to be perfectly blunt. It is like the band just skipped recording any demos or even spending any quality rehearsal time together to hone their sound and then went straight into the studio to record an album.

Their 1994 demo must be truly awful by comparison if this got recorded for release. There’s already acknowledgement galore on the site that the drums are out of time and the time changes are more like time lurches given their clunky nature, but I think the problem with this album overall is just a complete lack of maturity and accomplishment. Classic example of design over content, they wanted to be technical masters but were about a football field away from being anywhere near competent enough.

I cannot even find any allure for the effort they put in because the failure is still monumental. Barring the vocals which do have their irritating moments also I just find nothing else to even vaguely get along with here.

The clean gruffness of Helmet is an acquired taste; indeed, they are a band I really must be in the mood for. Some days I find listening to them to be a very impatient experience and I find myself wanting more urgency to proceedings. Other days (like today) I am happy enough with that lurching pace and melancholic lead work delivered against that alternative rock backdrop that the band do so well.

At times I find myself frustrated by the catchiness of Meantime like it is sold short somehow by the fuzzy mood of the guitar tone and the monotone vocals which do not do the infectiousness of tracks such as Unsung enough justice. On other occasions I really click with that half-cooked nature of such tracks and recognise how well put together that almost juxtapose of elements is. In terms of consistency though it is hard to find fault with Meantime. It walks that fine line between steady and boring well on the side of the former. It is no frills metal that really feels like the band know their niche and do not see much advantage in stepping outside of it.

The slapping sound to the drums does irritate over time though and that rolling riff that sits behind most verses certainly gives value for money over ten tracks. Still though, I cannot deny how much I enjoyed revisiting this album for the purposes of this review. Noticing the clever use of the bass to add variety to the songs is something that passed me by however many years ago it was that I last sat down with Meantime.

I guess given that my moods will shift more than Helmet’s style and sound ever will I am never going to give this a high rating. Some of that is down to me I accept and not necessarily entirely at the fault of Page and the gang. I believe reviews should capture that moment in time and so today Meantime gets a worthy yet not too exuberant 3.5 stars.

Tombstoner's groovy brand of death metal strays into core territory on more than one occasion during Victims of Vile Torture as they use a collaboration of breakdowns and borderline Swedish DM to deliver their frantic paced riffing and rabid vocal accompaniment.  I do not mind this in the slightest because despite its attempts to prove otherwise with the nasty album title and equally nefarious album artwork, this record is great fun and feels like a real romp outing.

That's not to say that it is all foot-to-the-floor delivery though.  They cleverly use pace to build on tracks like Breaking Point allowing the bass to do its own little runs during the intro.  It soon settles down into Black Breath like riffing and bouncing rhythms though and overall the band show a lot of energetic promise on their debut full-length release.  They even manage to invoke a sense of doom like menace with Dan Megill and Jesse Quinones' riff patterns weaving in some density to the darkness in the sound.  Dan's brother Thomas handles bass and vocals (along with Jesse who also does vocals) and the drumming of Jason Quinones (yes, you guessed it) is solid and tight.  As a unit there is a strong sense of cohesion in the band based on this outing in the two years they have been together, unsurprising really given that the band have literally grown up together albeit in two different households.

Whilst we are not treated to anything ground-breaking on Victims of Vile Torture the familiarity of it breeds no contempt in these ears.  Yes, it is guilty of the regurgitation of some ideas most definitely and I won't be promising weekly spins of this but as I have alluded to in other reviews before now, sometimes just hearing something done really well is sufficient enough to get some speaker time in this household.  All debut albums in death metal should hold this blistering intensity and genuine thirst for the artform that Tombstoner clearly show here.

I have listened to a lot of black metal in my time. During my forty-five years of existence on this planet the genre has been born and been split into sub-genres, diverged into more modern and accessible formats even and yet still a core of authentic, conventional and “troo” black metal bands persist in creating the more traditional elements at the front and centre of what they do. In doing so the genre has moved beyond simply taking a core sound and adding a mix of say death metal to proceedings and we have bands such as Winterfylleth who do not give us much of anything we have not heard before and seem to get by on representing an attachment to a different historical and cultural past to the glut of Norwegian, Swedish and French bands within the genre who have applied the music to their iterations of stories, myths and legends that have gone before them.

As such, Winterfylleth offer nothing new to the black metal scene beyond their detail of “Britishness” (in inverted commas because I personally find it a ridiculous concept). Now, before this starts to read like a review that is about to go off on a slur against Manchester’s finest black metal bastards, I will go on record as saying I like the majority of what I hear on The Threnody of Triumph. In terms of the wider discography, I have only heard The Harrowing of Heirdom and feel it is one of the real highlights of acoustic folk music in the past ten years, so my experience of their black metal albums is limited right now to this record. I have no lyric sheet (nor would I read it regardless) but I do not feel this is band who wish to celebrate their homeland with any sense of nationalist pride (none of the high-stepping, arm raised just above shoulder height nonsense). At its core, The Threnody of Triumph sounds heartfelt, well-written and conscientiously performed.

The problem I have is that it blurs into one long, melodic and racing black metal record broken up only by the occasional acoustic interlude (now I see where The Harrowing of Heirdom took shape from at least). I am searching for nuances in the sound; a climbing bass line, a break from the excessive tremolo-picking or a sense that tempo has at least the opportunity for variety. Instead, for most of the album there is just blasting, melodic black metal with the occasional baritone, clean vocal to offer the only sense of slippage from a very dominant theme. Again, whilst there is nothing wrong with this it just sounds incredibly tiresome over ten tracks (interludes aside of course).

A hint of atmosphere would not go amiss here guys, even to frame the melodic elements better in the grander scheme of things and lose some of the overly positive vibes from the sound. In isolation, individual tracks work well, but taken as a whole album it just sounds stifling and uncreative and I am bm fan who loves a straight up no fucking thrills blastfest but this album seems to be touting something more and yet it seems to want to follow a very basic blueprint to get there.

If proof was needed on the occasional success of music streaming service recommendations, then my discovery of Fyrnask’s fourth full-length release is testimony to the random brilliance that algorithms can throw up. The timing of this find is perfect as I have spent much time in recent months trying to rationalise the place that music (namely metal of course) has in my life alongside all the intensity and relentless pace and pressure of work, as well as the general tumult of life. In doing so, I have found the need for me to truly immerse myself in a record to truly reach the level of escapism required to isolate myself from the routine in which I find myself rolling through on most days. That sentence may sound a little too deep, but I think it sets the tone nicely for my explanation of this album and the relevance of it to that mindset I have alluded to.

 VII-Kenoma is an album I feel I can unburden myself with (and perhaps into also). It feels like that escape, a safe place that I can truly become embroiled in. There is an emotional response to most of what the band share on this album and that reaction feels instinctive and at times mandatory. It is not that there is any overwhelming sense of sadness, sorrow or melancholy (even though those things are most definitely present). Indeed, I find that I am not caught on individual parts of the record or tracks. What resonates so well is that the album has a completeness to it as it uses the atmospheres so well to frame whatever feeling I am getting from a track or a particular passage within a track. Nothing feels like it has not been accounted for, like every component to the music is considered essential to the success of the whole.

Whether it is the cavernous vocals that sound almost buried behind lush and rich riffs that create walls of sublimely menacing melodies, or even the choral elements that embed a sense of unholy communion and belonging to something dark and mysterious, VII-Kenoma is a real exploration of sound and texture. The compelling desperation behind the pacing does not lead to unrestrained gushing however and for all the many angles being presented here there is a real understanding of control eminent in the song writing. I believe it is the ritualistic nature of the songs that embed this control, the sense that each track must happen that way to complete the individual parts of the ceremony being performed.

The keening horns at the start of Nidhamykur sound like an orc army’s assembly call, filled with wailing grief for those who will inevitably fall in the ensuing battle as layers of riffs fall over the track. The vocals end up sounding lost and empty as they are decried in the face of unending futility. The dark choral beauty of final track Blótguð are haunting and alluring like some gathering of sirens designed to keep you listening long after the track itself has finished playing.

Since starting to draft this review I have managed to visit bits of the entire Fyrnask discography, and this album represents the zenith of their talents. The rest of the material sounds like a band looking for a direction and being unafraid to push at boundaries to find their path. The reason why VII-Kenoma works so well in comparison is because they set out a clear desire early on to tread a darkly emotive path that sees a careful eye for quality being deployed so that no element detracts from the ethos the band chose to go with.

Initially, Yandring sat higher in my esteem than it turns out it actually needed to be.  Whether I was over-captivated by that haunting artwork ahead of any real sense of quality in the music remains a mystery, but having spent more time with it over recent days it is clear that all is not as well as I had originally thought.  Now, this is not to say that this is a bad record.  Whilst it may be flawed, Yandring still has its successes in the fact that holds the attention and makes for an entertaining listen at various points.

Unfortunately though, the album suffers badly from a consistent regurgitation of black 'n roll coupled with the occasional dash of variety in the form of some vague folk or atmospheric dash to change the pace momentarily.  It is not even that at forty-two minutes the album is particularly overly lengthy, more that its inability to stretch its legs on any regular basis makes it feel longer than it actually is.

Vocally it is predictable and instrumentation wise it pushes no boundaries, and whilst it does conventional black 'n roll well enough this is not a sub-genre that is exactly known for captivation and longevity.  If the album could live up to that desolate artwork then this would have been a far more interesting outing, as it stands though it is a collection of black 'n roll occasionally interrupted by some surge into other realms that is does not sound entirely comfortable inhabiting.  For a more honest showing of the sub-genre I would refer you dear reader to Mork's latest offering which is an unapologetic exploration of its own comfort zone instead of this almost shameful delivery of what feels more like a guilty pleasure.

The debut from US quartet, Felled contains five songs of earthy black metal with a crude level of neo-folk layered over the top.  Having heard two of the band on a radio interview recently it was clear their focus is on nature and the very earth on which we walk, with this theme being a key driver behind their song writing.  Taking the atmospheric folk of Agalloch and then combining this with the more harsh aspects of Panopticon, The Intimate Earth has a real sense of presence.  Haunting and ethereal though this presence maybe, it is so clearly rooted in a consistent theme that it sounds really well connected to the more hoarse black metal riffs.

The folk elements here are largely defined by the violin and viola of Tiffany Holliday with clean (as well as harsh vocals) also being deployed to good affect from a cross section of the four-piece with husband and wife pairing Cavan Wagner and Jenn Grunigen sharing responsibility as well as doing guitar and drums respectively.  The mournful melancholy of the two instruments used by Holliday act as some mist over proceedings; even when in full flow you can hear the stabs of her strings or the undulating whine of them over the more up-tempo passages.  They combine well overall in the mix and are not allowed to drown out anything else.  The only criticism I have of them is that they almost feel obligatory to the songs at times and almost at odds with the guitar on occasion.  Thankfully, such occurrences are rare, however after numerous listens through I am still finding these minimally distracting from my overall entertainment.

The Cascadian style of black metal is something that I am getting more accustomed in recent years and the band clearly have a good understanding of the sub-genre and it is very easy to replicate those mountainous landscapes in your head whilst listening to this record.  Jenn and Cavan had been working on material for a number of years before changing the band name to Felled.  For the bulk of their time as a duo (Moss of Moonlight) they sang about Cascadia becoming an autonomous bioregion and country in its own right .  Fire Season on the Outer Rim is a great track that is full of such auditory imagery and is constructed superbly with a calming interlude in the middle of the song to give this true sense of peace.  The clean vocals do not always fit brilliantly I find though and they do sound a little too monotonous at times.  It is hard to balance clean vocals with such a strong black metal influence present and this is only their debut release of course so some slack can be cut here.

Bassist Isamu Sato needs no introduction really having been in the ranks of Yob previously.  His performance here is urgent yet attentive and it works really well with the equally intense and alert drumming of Jenn.  Whilst there are some improvements to be made, Felled do sound like a cohesive unit and their time together (since 2014) shows on this record.  I am looking forward to future output from them and seeing how a few tweaks here and there can really see them develop even more of that presence I mentioned at the start of this review.

Over the top vocals in death metal are kind of a read, right?  Well, I would argue that in a genre exemplified by extreme vocal performances that you still have those that standout from the rest by having something that makes them more memorable.  Within in 30 seconds of hearing Visceral Mass it is clear that vocalist Jack Scully has a decent set of lungs on him.  Possibly the mic is a little too far down his larynx at times but still his Suffocation-like style is noticeable as the driving force in Visceral Mass' one release to date.

That's not to say that there is nothing else going on here.  The guitar work (also handled by Scully) is a great example of simple riff structures hitting the sweet spot every time.  As an accompaniment to the vocals they do a great job in beefing out the sound of the EP that is a bit lacking in the drumming department it has to be noted.  The skins are most definitely there but are not allowed much space in the mix with those spewing and guttural vocals riding over those bludgeoning riffs taking up most of the available soundscape.

With the longest track coming in at just under the five minute mark, the EP does not run the risk of outstaying its welcome and in a longer format I am not sure how Visceral Mass' consistent approach to tracks would fair.  This is an EP with a demo mentality (as is much of the stuff Maggot Stomp puts out on it's roster) and as such the shortened format works well to compliment the direction of the band.  For a thirteen minute mosh you cannot go wrong with this really.  However, the longevity of it is questionable given the lack of variety on display.

Following 2019's sophomore album, Witch Vomit continue their trend for a full-length followed by an EP schedule with Abhorrent Rapture.  We get four tracks of cavernous death metal that is heavy on the Incantation vibe but still has that Swedish death metal underlying in the mix at the same time.  Sonics spiral as they dash across tracks like slashes of warped melody, but Witch Vomit are varied in their influences and kind just as easily drag tempos down to death doom-like monstrosity level as required.

Funeral Purgation staggers like a possessed coffin march to the grave for the most part, lurching in and out of different paces and dizzying the listener with frantic riffs when the foot is firmly pressed down yet still allowing for an appreciative nod along to the rhythm towards the end to lend an air of accessibility.  The short format works well for these tacks as although there is depth to them, you can just as easily leave this on in the corner for a quick blast of death metal to get the monkeys in your head all awake and ready to face the day.

Things get ugly with track three, Necrometamorphosis as a lingering sense of Autopsy's attitude permeates from the track.  Here though there is an oddly melodic and almost gothic prelude to the trademark blistering shot of sonics.  To close we get the straight up blasting fury of the title track and this is where Witch Vomit seem to be at their best, in their loudest and more extreme moments they seem unable to put a foot wrong.  Overall, they do not do anything that new or different with death metal though and this is another one of those releases that relies on little more than doing death metal well to be considered a success.