Vinny's Reviews

Album number four from Barnsley's finest saw a continuation of their familiar blend of NWOBHM and anthemic hard rock.  Following on from their greatest moment with the previous year's Strong Arm of the Law release this album had a lot to live up to.  Whilst it doesn't quite hit the dizzy heights of its predecessor, Denim and Leather still lands its fair share of hooks and uppercuts over the course of the nine tracks on offer.

Things start lively enough with Princess of the Night , a memorable opener that sets the tone for the record well with its plodding rhythm and stabbing riffs.  As we drive through Never Surrender and Out of Control this pace continues, it gets the blood coursing nicely and sets a consistent (if not predictable) energy level for the rest of the record that rarely drops.  Oliver and Quinn's guitars weave wonderfully melodic tapestries alongside some straight-forward yet effective riffs and some tracks need these shots of lead work to perk them up a bit although sadly Play It Loud remains a sore thumb sticking out at the end of side one despite the six stringers best efforts.

Biff is on fine and familiar form, the Yorkshire twang just audible on occasion to add character to his nasal vocals.  Dawson's bass is clear as day on And the Bands Played On with its high pulse strumming dancing along with the guitars as they fire licks everywhere, the two instruments really set side two off on a driven and determined tempo that maintains the groundwork laid down on side one.  Pete Gill also delivers a consistent if unremarkable performance on the drums.  It isn't like the song structures give much opportunity for him to make huge waves behind the kit but some flurries here or there would help keep me a little more conscious of his presence overall.

I can't help but think that Saxon's golden run of albums from Wheels of Steel through the aforementioned Strong Arm of the Law came to an end with Denim and Leather.  Their classic live album The Eagle Has Landed served as an excellent dessert after a solid three course meal before it, but the studio albums never got better (or even as good as) the ones in the period of 1980-1981. 

With Dark Medieval Times, Satyricon set a high benchmark for themselves.  Not only was the album a triumph of minimalist majesty and tenebrous authenticity it really flowed also.  Following it up was always going to be tricky.  Whilst I don't believe The Shadowthrone to be a poor record in its own right, it does retain the same effortless flow and translates overall into a much less passionate experience as a result.

As such the album reminds me of all the reasons why I love the debut so much and the sense of disappointment is by no means overwhelming to the point where I rarely listen to the sophomore.  Indeed, I still find 1996's Nemesis Divina to be the crowning glory of the Satyricon discography and find it graces my CD drawer more than either of its two predecessors, but this is more a reflection of how strong an album this is as opposed to how bad the others are.  The Shadowthrone sits in some black metal no mans land, caught between two superior releases in my music collection.  It lingers most definitely in the dust of the debut in terms of retaining that majestic sound, albeit with a slightly more restrained approach, it only really feels rugged on tracks like Vikingland though and this track in particular feels a little cumbersome to get through.  The splashes of polish by comparison are infrequent and there's no real obvious hint of the fuller and more enriched tones of the album that followed this.

Due to this cumbersome edge it feels like the band are struggling to maintain the momentum built by the debut.  The ideas are all still there and I repeat again that this is not a bad album, but the execution is slightly off and my interest in the tracks wanes all too easily as the album progresses.  Even the robust and full-flavoured opening track, Hvite Krists Død can't shake the feeling that some of it comes together with a fair old amount of chance as opposed to a committed direction overall.

That having been said, the album is still full of the familiar sound of one of the genres most recognisable and well-established bands and makes a solid splosh in the dark waters of black metal.  The ripples though just don't quite stick around for me and the album sinks all too easily in comparison with others in the same discography. 

The Swedish BM scene has this glut of bands that stick with an orthodox interpretation of the genre.  With Watain being undoubtedly the most well-known of these groups there's a good few hours' worth of quality material out there from the likes of Funeral Mist, Ofermod and also Ondskapt (amongst others).  On full-length number two the Stockholm band send lush, rich and yet harrowing melodies into the air, surrounding them with dank atmospherics, ritualistic and iniquitous vocals as well as contorting structures to boot.

At times, the melodies really shine through, transported by tremolo riffs and the looming milieu on these occasions serve as a superb backdrop for that continuous undertone of egregious intent.  The maniacal and unbridled intensity of the vocals is akin to Mayhem-like delivery in terms of style and they do well to stand out against such an impressive array of sounds from the instruments without ever feeling lost or intrusive at either end of the spectrum.  Taken as a whole, the performance on most tracks feels like a constant build as songs progress to blistering levels of intensity coming from more doom-laden constructs in the first instance.  Dödens evangelium is no one-trick pony.  As an album it explores the authentic BM sound most definitely, but at the same time adopts elements from outside the genre to show a talent for song writing that is developed beyond just simple blastbeats and furious tremolos.

My only criticism would be that it does go on a bit and doesn't feel well-balanced overall as an album given that the first part of the album consists of longer songs that feel more accomplished and developed than their counterparts which occupy this final half of the record.  From track seven onwards the shorter offerings kick in and the attention to detail feels reduced.  I think these tracks would have fit better in between the longer ones (or may be even left on the cutting room floor in some instances).  They are not bad per se, they just seem a little out of context and stray close to levels of succinctness that doesn't befit their overall strengths so well.

Opening your debut album with a fourteen-minute track takes balls.  If you fail to engage me as a music listener within the first few minutes of an album, then chances are you have lost me before you even really get going.  The human attention span is actually less than that of a goldfish someone told me recently so if eight seconds is my limit then fourteen minutes is a big ask.  Thankfully though, In Midst She Was Standing is an absolute triumph.  It is majestic and dark throughout its tenure at the start of the record, drawing you in to the rest of the album and now of course one of metals best known careers.  It manages to shift as a track almost effortlessly and without falling over its own feet at any point.  Espousing progressive leanings from the start, Orchid continues to wear these prog rock influences on its sleeve for the duration of what is a fine debut.  

At the same time though the album is steeped in a haunting density, with passages of weighty atmospherics leading into subtle changes of pace to resurrect the progressive elements of the sound without ever feeling clunky or bloated either.  There is an overall feeling of melancholy that never quite leaves the ether as the album works its way through each track.  This melancholia can be heard in the twang of the bass strings, or the harrowing melodies of the lead guitar and likewise they appear via piano keys also.  The only part of the instrumentation that feels sterile, even by these ethereal standards are the drums.  They feel a bit lost in proceedings and struggle to make their presence felt most of the time.  Oddly, this lack of oomph from behind the kit doesn't detract too much from the overall experience as there's enough going on to hold the interest anyways.

Akerfeldt's vocals range from the familiar rasping death metal style that he became famed for to the cleaner more diaphanous vocals of much of the bands later output.  There is an equal mix of riffage and picked acoustics from the guitars also which change pace from urgent and busy fluency to more melodic and mellifluous sections that strike clean notes that seem to fill the very air around them.  When in full flow though the band sound like a raging beast that always has surprising awareness of its surroundings at all times and controls itself immaculately well.  

Arguably one of the most developed and expansive acts in metal at this stage of their career, Enslaved have continued their penchant for delivering thought-provoking and intelligent metal into their fifteenth full-length release.  Utgard has a real assured sound to it, despite its title suggesting we may have expected otherwise (Utgard in Norse mythology is a landscape full of danger and chaos).  Yes it has all the progressive leanings you would expect with time-changes dropping in from out of nowhere and a near constant sense of build throughout the record, but its success is more subtle than that.

There's a freedom to the flow of the songwriting, never better exemplified than on catchy riffing tracks like Sequence , a solid chug with excellent stabs of atmospheric keys and strings to add depth behind the apparent simplicity of the main driving riff.  The lead work here flutters in like butterflies at first before becoming a maelstrom of hellish fire that scorches the middle section of the track for a few seconds before a calming ambience seeps into play.  It is rare for such an array of ideas and styles to all be so comfortable alongside each other, but they pull it off brilliantly and hold the listeners interest well throughout a varied and memorable experience.

On this record Ivar relinquished most of the work he normally tried to always get through himself and delegated the labour out across the band.  The outcome is an album that feels like it has had a high level of involvement.  Even in its busiest moments it sounds cohesive and unified, no matter where a track goes to it is obvious that all band members go with it.  The clarity of roles within the band has unlocked textures in the Enslaved sound that feel tightly woven together.  At the same time they also feel like they are covering new ground and exploring new territory and structures.

Checkout the 80's pop vibe to the opening of Urjoturn that presents a dark, new-romanticism to the ears.  As unexpected as it maybe, it works brilliantly structuring a haunting and yet catchy vibe that sits on the shoulder for long after the album is finished.  Grutle's blackened vocals combine with cleaner passages that add further to the depth of the track, maintaining the bm threat of years gone by but tempering this perfectly with a musical edge to challenge their presence at the same time.

After nearly two decades Enslaved maintain an innovative edge to their music that shows little sign of abating.  Utgard is bound to be a tough listen for some, but anyone who has been following the band's output over the last fifteen years will welcome the continued maturity and progression of their sound here.  It isn't boundary-pushing as such, but it is a fresh sounding record which continues to slowly expand the sound of one of metal's longest-serving bands.

In a recent interview, Selbst multi-instrumentalist and mainman N, spoke of the myth that all South American black metal should sound bestial and primitive.  This mindset is certainly obvious in the music of the band with Relatos de Angustia exhibiting a very expansive and varied take on the more melodic yet still chaotically busy style of black metal.  It is a sound immediately recognisable to fans of Mgla, full and lush in the depth of its richness yet at the same time there is an aggression and rawness present that reminds me of a more Icelandic sound also.

I listened to Uada's latest offering before getting to this and by comparison the American's new opus sounds cumbersome and clunky.  Pace changes on Relatos de Angustia happen with an organic sense to them and tracks build into cleverly detailed soundscapes that walk the thin line between accessible and authentic.  Tracks like Let The Pain Run Through balance the searching and enquiring development of the band's style with an inherent darkness that makes the way forward suitably murky enough for the traditionalist black metal fan. The track in question drops one of the more melodic pieces of lead work heard by me on a BM opus for some time, blossoming the track (and album) into a cleaner, more clear finish from the tumult of the overall forty minutes that precede it.

The band proudly sit on the Debemur Morti label, that bastion of dark and forward-thinking black metal and death metal that boasts the likes of Akhlys, BAN, In The Woods and Ulcerate amongst its ranks.  Selbst are a perfect addition to that roster with their thoughtful delivery, natural chemistry for songwriting and cold yet welcoming darkness that offers many discoveries should you dare to explore.

This undying (sub)genre of epic heavy metal continues to offer up a handful of bands that seem to further the longevity of a style of metal that has been around now for 40 years plus.  Whether it is the flamboyant gestures of Visigoth or the more stoic delivery of Atlantean Kodex, the style keeps cropping up and the nerdiness just continues to maintain momentum somehow.  It's a niche corner of the metal market nowadays and as such one that is so very easy to fall into the cracks between exponent of a "lost" art form and a mere tribute act.  

What turns out to be Atlantean Kodex's third full-length (my first experience of them) sounds to me to be an album full of the necessary passion for true, epic heavy metal.  The outliers are all here.  Lengthy songs, chronicles in fact of heroism and monumental historic events in some far away land or world.  At its core the album sound is big!  There's enough elements of doom to fill the air with the density of the guitar tone, enough meat in the drums to pound a weighty and substantial rhythm throughout and carry that sense of majesty, pomp and circumstance that underlies most of the album.  And then there's the vocals...

I think it is fair to say that the vocalist isn't a bad as such, but it is clear to me that his voice seems to pale in significance to the rest of the instruments being deployed around it.  The fact is that whilst Markus Becker can hold a tune, he is not strong enough in the vocal chords department to hold his own alongside such huge riffs and thunderous drums.  Even when layered and/or backed, the vocals just don't cut it.  There are times when the lyrics are delivered in a very clunky (and definitely not cult-cool) manner which makes some tracks seem quite amateur if I am honest.

Still though the music does make up for it and some of the songwriting (accepting it does get bloated) is bang on in some places.  Whilst the pacing gets a little cumbersome on occasion it never ruins any track, but it does make you wish for some shorter tracks everynow and again that aren't interludes or outros.  So there's definitely work to be done still after class for these German metallers, but they certainly have the heart for it even if aspects of the delivery don't quite come off that well.

Manilla Road's sixth full-length continues their golden run of records that stretch back from a full seven years before this release.  Launching straight into a romping and glorious opening track full of haunting lead work that leaves notes hanging in the very air around you it is obvious that the band are here to pick up where they left of with The Deluge.  Not only does opening track Haunted Palace announce the arrival of the album it also sets the tone for what is to come over the next forty minutes.  

Mystification literally has me spellbound from the get go, it is instant without being mainstream and varied without ever getting tied in knots.  Tracks are well paced and the tightness of the band is superb throughout.  Shelton's trademark vocals sound a little more hoarse than on previous outings and this adds depth to the vocal's sound, giving them an almost cool edge that is oddly soothing for such a unique sounding vocalist.  His guitar work is excellent also.  Whether it is the speed metal-like riffing of Valley of Unrest or Up From the Crypt or even the classy lead work he deploys across virtually the whole album, his work is front and centre at all times.  His fret work feels emotive and full of passion for the subject matter it accompanies; it feels dark and mysterious as well as insanely vast in scope.

Mention has to be made of the superb drum work of Randy Foxe.  He is the real engine room on the record with his galloping rhythms and studious fills matching the pace of the record perfectly throughout.  They feel like a genuine accompaniment to the vocals and guitars adding to the suspenseful atmosphere of the record on the title track (for example) and although I think they are a tad too buried in the mix overall they still maintain a healthy presence throughout.  When combined with the rumbling bass of Scott Park they make quite a fearsome duo.

It's an album that makes me want to play it again as soon as it is finished (I think I am on my third play of it today at least).  Whilst not essentially full of hooks, it retains memorability for its relentless charge and urgent sounding narrative.  It combines rampant heavy metal with atmosphere and a goofy nerdiness to boot and continues a fine line of albums. It's metal that makes you want to seek more like it, creating lust for similar sounds as I hit countless "similar artist" and "you might also like..." playlists in search of more, more, more.   It's mania is infectious and it's lack of polish is utterly endearing.  It is an absolute triumph.

It's hard to review Overkill's debut as being a thrash metal album.  Rumour has it some of this stuff was written as far back as 1981 (more the likely 1983 though) and so it falls more in the category of speed metal crossed with the more obvious heavy metal influences of the band at the time.  With no money and no record deal at the time of writing most of this, by the time Feel The Fire came out it was doomed it seems to be just a collection of songs released late and therefore paling in compariosn to the releases of their peers at the time.

What we got in 1985 was under-developed and incredibly simplistic in comparison to what was to come in subsequent years.  You'd almost forgive the band for not releasing this and going straight to Taking Over, with the session that made the debut being released some years later as a demo collection for die hard fans only.  However, since they obviously had little control over their own destiny Feel The Fire was the international metal community's introduction to Overkill.  The opening salvo from the band is a poorly produced and clumsily performed record that just had to rely on the superb vocals of Blitz to lead the energetic and promising charge, trying to stifle the thin guitar sound and cumbersome drumming as best he could with his demonic range.

Fact is Ellesworth saves this record in the main, his vocals and Verni's bass are perhaps the most consistent aspects to this album.  As mentioned they act as more of a distraction from what's wrong everywhere else on most tracks but still they deserve merit in their own right.  Rat Skate on the drums often has little (if any) control of the double bass at times and it is only when the band are in full swing that he appears settled and cohesive with his surroundings.  Otherwise his timing sends tracks off into catch-up mode all too soon when trying to build momentum.

Gustafson's guitar isn't exactly on fire either and I sense this isn't entirely due to production or mix issues (I have read that his amp blew and he had to "innovate").  As I said earlier though, when the band are hitting their stride it really works well and tracks like Hammerhead remain in your head for life after a couple of spins.  Similarily tracks like Kill At Command show real promise of the true potential of the band.  Sadly though there's no amount of glitter that can cover some turds sufficiently and for all the energy and sheer tenacity to try and record something the lack of ability and maturity at the time shows all too clearly.

Whilst Feel The Fire isn't a disaster, it enters the thrash metal arena and immediately finds itself chasing the competition with confused and slightly dated ideas that hinder the bands ability to stay in touch with the lead pack.  In so many ways they have never been able to make up that ground despite their long and significant career.

Ursus Americanus is arguably where Shone truly hits his stride in his niche of industrial, droning horror and gazy and reflective electronic music.  On his 2012 release the drones become brooding in sound yet somehow no less impactful.  They rise like gargantuan beasts from deepest and darkest depths, full of looming threat and menace.  At the same time though there's tinges of emotion to proceedings that bring some personal feel to the album also.  It's like a harsh assault with a prospect of a warmish hug when you least exepct it.

When in full-on mode the record is almost unstoppable as a force.  Overwhelming the listener with a barrage of thumping rhythms and a smothering wall of sound is a risky venture (and certainly not for all listeners) but the skill here is maintaining interest in what you pitch up with, not easing people in gently to a safe place.  For all the relentlessness of his sound, Tristan is still able to maintain entertainment at the same time to the point where I find myself welcoming each wave of abrasive and punishing (pun intended) industrial madness.  Sustaining this level of intensity serves to give the albums more subtle moments a stronger impact, allowing them to fill the void of potential silence a sudden drop in drones or clatters can create with something varied yet never unexpected.

This doesn't feel like a juggling act either, in fact the whole album feels cohesive and planned to good effect.  The downside for me is more due to my own personal tastes as opposed to anything Shone does wrong; I am not often a visitor to his style of music and find myself stumbling across it as opposed to actively seeking it.  As such I don't consider myself a "fan" of this music in that I don't actually go out and seek it so repeat plays of Ursus Americanus are limited in frequency I suspect.  Still, whenever I do get round to ot again I am sure it will still please me sufficiently.

The debut release (demo?) from Paysage D'hiver captures the harsh and scathing attack of their sound superbly whilst managing to express the familiar amount of atmospheric and ambient moments also.  With Winterherr in the driving seat for everything on all three tracks, the release follows the same unpredictable format as the rest of his discography.  Tracks don't necessarily conform to any standardised structure and the degree of predictability is low with passages moving from ambient to blistering intensity in a mere second.  

This sounds off-putting to some reading this review I am sure but the fact is that this all works brilliantly as despite the sudden and caustic changes in delivery everything still sits under this thin veneer of cold and dank atmosphere throughout.  This could be down to the kvlt production values more than anything else but regardless of how you sense this it means Paysage D'hiver have their own feeling.  I sense any release of theirs beyond just an auditory experience and Steineiche which is the very start of the discography exemplifies this capability superbly right from the very start of the project itself.

I do get caught in seasonal metal listening trends (although I never describe this as consciously determined) with black metal often occupying my listening space from October through to March usually, but I find Steineiche transcends this binary system of listening patterns and is able to effectively make the warmest of summer mornings seem a few degrees lower than the thermometer would have me believe.  It's murky sounds infect the very air around me as a listener and even when the odd riff breaks through that wall of noise or muffled vocal front it only acts to further dispell the warmer tones in the air, spreading farther the icy notes of tracks like Der Baummann.

At this point in Wintherr's career he was already producing thoughtful and vast soundscapes before he ever set foot in Darkspace (as Wroth).  Anyone familiar with the astral projections of the Swiss black metallers would enjoy discovering the start of the darkness that Wintherr was delivering some four years before Darkspace was even a thing.

Sweden has this penchant for spitting out authentic and well-constructed heavy metal.  Looking at the likes of Screamer and Enforcer as well as the likes of Mystik, it is a country of many pairs of tight trousers and leather fingerless gloves it seems.  Despite having a dodgy band name, Ambush deliver an excellent bash down memory lane for anyone wanting to revisit the metal heyday of the eighties.  Big shiny band logo?  Check.  Galloping rhythms? Check.  Lot's of "horns up" band photos?  Check.  The list of reference points is virtually infinite.

Clearly raised on a healthy diet of Priest and Accept the band reinvent few wheels on their 2014 debut.  It never gets dull or repetitive though and there's more to this than just flogging a dead horse or paying tribute to days gone by.  They provide a high-energy and driven performance over nine tracks and structure an album full of anthemic and genuine heavy metal that sticks in the brain.

Opting for a consistently high-tempo to most tracks the album flows nicely and the lack of any ballads ensures the album never feels like it is straying into the hard rock territory I occasionally fear it is treading close to.  The lead work on the guitar feels measured and if honest I would like a bit more of it as although the power in the engine is the riffs there's a few licks missing for me to spice things up enough to make the album a truly standout release.  Overall though the instrumentation is solid and strong sounding giving a real sense of unison to the band's performance.

For a debut album it shows lots of promise and I am looking forward to seeing how the rest of their discography pans out as I explore it over the coming months.

Had I not stumbled across the artwork on this album via the Gallery on this site I would have missed out entirely on the existence of US speed/thrash/traditional heavy-metallers The Horde.  In what feels like a very short career the band only managed two releases, with From Empire to Ashes being classed as an EP (albeit more of a mini-album arguably).  Their equally well-adorned full-length release came three years after this with the four piece disbanding altogether in 2014.

I think it is fair to say that whilst not terrible, From Empire to Ashes does not live up to the promise of the artwork (check out Alan Lathwell’s work across various albums over the years btw).  Whilst it doesn’t reinvent any wheels, there’s enough nods to the likes of Cirith Ungol and The Lord Weird Slough Feg to keep that traditional heavy-metal feel alive through the more the thrashy/speed metal elements of the sound, with the band not afraid to slow the pace right down when required also.  It falls down really only on it being just a tad too chaotic at times, not helped by a less than perfect production job that although keeps some cult authenticity to proceedings does just sit on the wrong side of stifling.

The drums feel particularly disadvantaged in the mix, sat just that bit too far back with the vocals also seeming to be a bit muffled in there also.  There’s nothing wrong with the actual performance of either, the blackened sneers of Duncan are perfectly appropriate to the direction of the tracks if I am honest.  It is just a shame that all the component parts don’t get to shine in equal amounts really.  What the mix/production quality does do however is allow the guitars to really drive things forward.  They are competently played by both Derek and Tim with solid riffing and effective lead work both being utilised well when appropriate.

Whilst the EP/min-album won’t get masses of rotation here it will still retain a spot in the music library for the odd spin alongside the likes of Hobb’s Angel of Death, Midnight, Venom as well as the aforementioned Lord Weird Slough Feg also.  Neat find via Metal Academy number 77.

Was it just a version of Black Sabbath or an actual separate entity altogether?  Would it have survived had we still had Ronnie James Dio with us?  With the line up consisting of all four members of Sabbath’s Mob Rules album from 1981, it seems a hard sell to think of Heaven & Hell as being anything other than Black Sabbath.  Around for only four years in total the band managed only one full-length release under the name Heaven & Hell with the rest of the discography being two live records and various singles.

As you would expect from such an array of established and legendary artists the self-titled album is monstrous and accomplished in equal parts.  It is the perfect incarnation of Black Sabbath with a superb vocalist (other than Ozzy) that held mainstream appeal as well as enough familiar gloom to appease the ardent followers of - what was then - the past forty years of one of heavy metal’s most recognised brands.

There was a brooding rumble to Iommi’s riffs that accentuated the vocals of Ronnie perfectly, with Geezer and Vinnie doing their usual superb job of supporting the whole sound with that solid rhythm and percussion section that gave the tracks real depth and weight.  The foursome maintained a consistent and solid approach to the songwriting and as such all ten tracks stay in the memory but there are some huge tracks in here that clearly outshine the others.  Bible Black, Double The Pain and Follow The Tears all play effortlessly in the brain regardless of how long it has been since the record itself last got a spin.

There is an element of things sounding a tad too familiar at times over the course of the record which does limit the amount of plays it gets over the average year but still, even if considered as nothing more than a fitting tribute to one of Sabbath’s strongest line ups, Heaven & Hell is a fine heavy metal record, rooted in the fabric of the genre I have spent most of my life listening to and as such remains a standout release in the varied history of one the most iconic bands in music history.

My continued exploration of the symphonic/power metal genre gleans a mixture of both interesting and unfortunately repulsive albums as I traverse the waters.  Score to a New Beginning falls somewhere around the interesting mark initially and although it never dips away into the repulsive category highlighted above it doesn’t hold up well over the duration of the record.  Whilst there’s no doubt that the formula the band uses more than gets them to the finish line, it falls far short of warranting description of being a “winning” formula.

Despite a multitude of sounds and instrumentation being active on the record the mix for the large part is surprisingly good.  The keys and strings do feel like they are jostling for space at times but they don’t lose one another at the expense of building atmosphere and drama.  The same cannot be said unfortunately for the vocals which find themselves bobbing along in the tide and on more than one occasion ending up under the waves of clashing cymbals, stabs of keys and riffs from guitars.  They aren’t helped by the fact that although they often sound powerful enough they struggle to add an edge to things when needing to sound more aggressive and just generally more metal than rock.

The tracks themselves do suffer from a very formulaic structure of verse, chorus, keyboard solo, guitar solo and then rinse and repeat.  Not that you can fault the musicianship here, more the songwriting capabilities are questionable at best.  That having been said, there’s some genuine stick your chest out moments as you listen; where the epic structures come to life and you are cast into the theatre and drama of scenarios like the artwork.  The balance of the symphonia works well enough at times to give me hope for the record but overall the sense of being underwhelmed is difficult to fight off.

The melodic power metal of Stratovarius is not a style Macca exactly loves.  Now that is not to say that it is without merit or worthy of recognition, given nobody writes songs on the scale of Stratovarius overnight it would be a fool who simply dismissed them for being “too soft” or “one-dimensional”.  One of the main things in Nemesis favour is the consistent energy level present throughout the album.  This isn’t enough to encourage me to land it with a 4 or 5 star rating of course but it is golden thread that weaves through the album as a constant theme.  It feels like a teenage energy, like music created by pubescent youths, full of cheesy lyrics of hope and encouragement backed by widdly guitar solos and soaring keyboards.

This immaturity only carries the album so far though before the lyrics just become an annoyance and the song structures a little too predictable.  Whilst I acknowledge the effort put in to creating most of the album it lacks many memorable elements despite the amount of obvious hooks and chorus lines in there. I think this is due to there being little variety to the tracks; seemingly all following a very safe verse, chorus, repeat and then some keys or a solo (sometimes both) format, tracks soon get tiresome.  Again, it isn’t bad playing or songwriting it’s just very siloed and insular.

If I am honest, by about halfway in I am gone, the music is still playing but I am not tuned in any longer.  I still know what is coming next though such is the predictable nature of the songs and with only the album artwork to hold my attention anymore this over-accessibility to proceedings really starts to grate. 

The horn that announces the opening of this album promises a traditional viking affair full of folk elements and historic melodies and this is in the main what Falkenbach deliver on Ok nefna tysvar ty.  Retaining a good balance of riffs and more traditional sounding folk instrumentation, Vratyas Vakyas delivers his one-man band show again covering all instruments and vocals over the seven tracks.  Undoubtedly a talented chap he weaves a simple and almost catchy sound that fills the room nicely as you progress through the album.

The main problem for me is the vocal delivery.  It is very monotonous and lacks any variety whatsoever.  As a result tracks pretty soon start to sound the same and I find my myself losing interest in most of the verses, with only the instrumentation to pull me back in when it takes front seat.  Now, I am not expecting death growls or black metal vocals at any point and I do understand the vocal style more than fits the aesthetic but it does bore me at times.

The saving grace as I mention is the instrumentation.  Whilst I don't profess to know every instrument on here I do recognise that I am listening to a skilled musician who can write endearing and memorable songs, embellishing intros with occasional drama and atmospherics to build the sense of storytelling nicely and provide some variety at least.  The album artwork compliments the music in this regard; there is an etherealness to the sound here yet also a sense of the epic as the artwork suggests.

Whilst I may not entirely get on with the album, I cannot dismiss it as being poor in all honesty, I just wanted a little more variety to it.  Perhaps in my less restless moments my opinion of the record would be even more positive but as it stands it's a solid 3 from me.

Billed as Symphonic Metal, Graveshadow are more of a quandary than the simple tag applied to them may suggest.  Ambition’s Price is their second full-length and contains a mixture of traditional and power metal sounds with an (unnecessary) amount of melodic death metal applied also.  The symphonic element is by no means lost in all the variety on display but definitely feels like it is more subtly applied, and this is by no means a criticism.  The approach to the delivery and application of the symphonic elements allows the more powerful tools in use to shine and create some enjoyable moments.

The obvious star of the show here is Heather Michelle Smith’s vocal performance.  On the clean tracks and passages they are melodic and tuneful without relying on operatics to drive their power.  Whilst the lyrics do occasionally seem to be cumbersome for her to deliver she manages in the main to deliver an accomplished performance.  This is let down only by her forays into a more melodic death style growl and harsh vocal delivery that I feel showcases neither her talents as a vocalist nor the band’s style in general.  These harsher vocals don’t arrive at points in tracks that signal some change in direction of a song and as such just feel unnecessary without being forced, but if there’s nothing wrong with the clean vocals, why change them at any point?

Some of the better tracks like The Gate and Return to Me cope well enough with majority clean vocals and these tracks in particular feel like really cohesive songs written by a band all on the same page and heading in the same direction.  For the majority of the album though things feel confused and whilst this never strays to any sense of them being directionless it does impair my enjoyment of the album overall.  

As the album goes on it does feel like it gets better but the trio of tracks that I presume tells some tale towards the end of the album probably would have worked better as two tracks for me.  The other consistent element to the album is the guitar work of Aaron Robitsch.  Whilst he doesn’t go over the top with his leads I feel they are good enough to be given perhaps a little more space on some tracks to take some focus away from just the power of the vocals.  Supported by a solid rhythm section most tracks motor along well enough but they need a few more solos to get out of third or fourth gear sometimes.

In summary, although the content doesn’t live up to the promise of the artwork there’s still a lot of potential here for an artist still finding their feet.  I believe they no longer have Heather in the ranks so those may be challenging boots to fill but I will ensure I give an ear to their next release and see whether things feel more settled on the style and direction of the band.

Venom get way to little attention nowadays in my daily album listening.  As such I tend to forget how important they are in weaving the very fabric of extreme music that dominates my digital library as well as my physical copies that frequent the shelving in my lair.  By the time Venom released their debut we had already seen five Motörhead records, two Iron Maiden albums and nine Judas Priest records.  The numbers are important here, I don't just quote them for statistical purposes.  Of the seventeen albums cross the three bands mentioned, arguably Welcome to Hell was the most influential on the more extreme sub-genres of metal, taking the speed metal elements and sloppy songwriting and putting in the foundations for a whole new expansion of heavy metal in years to come.

Listen to this record and you can hear where Bathory got their vibe from; that murky sound, low production value, intense and adversarial attitude and a non-chalant, tongue-in -cheek undertone to it all.  Welcome to Hell is performed by three lads with no fucks to give, having a great laugh and perhaps unknowingly shaping the future of one of music's loudest and most obnoxious genres.  Going into this review I found a reissue with several demos, singles and outakes that takes the record to a twenty-two song Venomfest which I have gorged upon for the past two days.  Listening to some of the demo and outake tracks it is obvious that this was a band living their best life.  Writing deliberately provocative lyrics and noisy as fuck arrangements to maximise the shock factor.

And this is what needs to be taken way from the listening experience more than anything.  Forget for a minute how influential an album it is.  Put down the microscope and stop analysing what sub-genres and sub-cultures it created.  Instead appreciate it as a record full of unbridled and unrestrained aggressive metal passion, delivered by three young musicians with obvious but not excessive talent aimed at doing nothing more than enjoying a good time and not caring two shits who they pissed off in the process.

I am not a massive power metal fan, something I may have declared elsewhere in other reviews or forum threads on Metal Academy.  Beyond (some) Blind Guardian albums I struggle to find much in the way of entertainment from the genre.  A lot of this is down to a lack of any real aggression or actual power (pun intended) to most albums I listen to.  Sometimes there’s a depth and richness to the songwriting that makes up for it, like with Twilight Force’s Dawn of the Dragonstar for example.  In those instances the balance of cheesy synths and slightly more subdued riffage feels to be acceptable as long as they are held within the confines of epic song structures that deliver power to the tracks in a way other than rhythmic chugs and chops.

Persuader are perhaps one of the first bands I have heard that actually sound like how I always imagined power metal bands should sound.  On When Eden Burns the band delivers a strong and consistent performance, balancing solid songwriting with biting riffs and robust structures that combine elements of the epic power I mentioned above with the sheer power of the instruments in their hands (and the vocal chords in their throats).

I find the vocalist reminds me a lot of Blind Guardian (let’s not forget that band is probably my sole existing reference point for power metal at this stage) which is not a bad thing by any means as there’s enough differentiation on the rest of the sound to show a clear gap between these Swedes and the aforementioned German act.  The other similarity here is with the quality of the musicianship on show, which although doesn’t quite hit the dizzy heights of some of the better work from Blind Guardian, is still proof that when you get a bunch of talented musicians together then real magic can happen.

The album feels rewarding to listen to.  Like the promise of the content behind the artwork is delivered across the whole album and not just on a few standout tracks.  Although it shows variety in pace and tempo the experience is pleasantly intense feeling like you’re being given some power metal workout minus kettle bells and resistance bands.  Not being massively familiar with the band I don’t know how this album measures up to previous releases (or any that may have followed) but I am willing to bet that as I journey through the discography this will prove to be one of the stronger releases I find.

Thanatos landed on my radar earlier last year after I listened to their superb Emerging From the Netherworlds album. The Dutch deathsters managed to put together a decent run of albums over their first three releases and despite an eight year gap between their sophomore and their third release, Angelic Encounters was a fucking blast.  Sadly the band went a little off the boil for me with Undead. Unholy. Divine and this lull carried into 2009's Justified Genocide.

Although not terrible as such, album number five from the band is a tired sounding affair that regurgitates the same rhythms and riffs over and over leaving you feel trapped in a maze of torment that even Morbid Angel would want out of.  The combination of death metal and thrash metal somehow leaves for an exhausted sounding experience with the band seemingly unable to get themselves out of a rut of over-used ideas that no matter how hard you flog them just won't provide entertainment.

The result is an album that spasms with the occasional throes of life only to soon be overwhelmed by it's own repetition and lack of invention to then soon find itself in some humdrum existence that just lurches on and on.  Broken up only by a half-decent cover of Massacre's Dawn of Eternity the album otherwise just passes me by.  The album is raw and crunchy sounding but this doen't give it any cult sheen and it just sounds like a band trying to mask their innovation starved songs by hoping some good ol' fashioned brutal riffing will get them by.  It doesn't.

Album number twelve from arguably one of the most copied acts in death metal sounds like a band at a much younger and more energetic stage of their careers than the known history of the band would have you believe.  As John McEntee comes for his 51st year he continues stand astride the monstrous death metal machine that is Incantation, delivering another consistent if not predictable album that finds the band in their now very familiar territory yet somehow staying relevant still.

Coming into it, I had the expectation of how Sect of Vile Divinities sound and it absolutely lives up to those expectations in the main.  Things feel slightly more accessible on this outing though and the tracks seem more open and evenly paced.  I sense there is more groove to the riffs as well and a sense that a more structured approach has been taken with the songwriting.  It is by no means a reinvention of the Incantation sound but it is a more measured feeling album from my experience of the last couple of studio releases.  Some of this may be down to the lead work being handled this time by Sonny Lombardozzi (with Dismemberment's Luke Shively also being involved) but I think in the main the fact is that there can't be much more mileage left in the Incantation sound of a band that has churned out pretty much the same style for nearly thirty years.  Swanö's mix job is of the usual quality you would expect and you can hear all parts of the engine firing here but I think overall this is a much more considered album from the band.

Overall, songs are in the shorter format with no sign of the eleven and sixteen minute efforts that made elements of Vanquish in Vengeance and Dirges of Elysium so laborious to get through.  This album takes the shorter formats of Profane Nexus and condenses them that bit further to deliver stabs of quality death metal that say their piece and then get out of the way ready for the next track to deliver it's menacing messages.

I won't pretend this is death metal that is new in any way, shape or form.  You've heard this before, most definitely from the same band no doubt (despite the tweaks to the sound I mention above).  But there's still a nonchalant confidence here that sort of tells you to expect nothing else and if I am honest, I don't want anything else.  Pretty much for the same reason that I still look forwards to Cannibal Corpse releases, I know exactly what I am getting from Incantation.  I am not sat here waiting for wheels to be reinvented, I just want my death metal fix and I want it done well.  Box ticked.

Starting out as a thrash metal band in the late noughties, Auroch had developed into a blackened death metal outfit by the time they got round to their third full length.  With nods to the sounds of Grave Miasma, Portal and Mitochondrion through out the record, Mute Books offers a chaotic and sonic adventure into a swarming maelstrom of horror and hideous form.

Regrettably this incarnation of evil doesn't always work out that well.  There's some clunky structures here amidst the cloying madness that even given their surroundings stand out as being a little too odd at times.  The weak shouting of the ironically titled Say Nothing is one such track that is burdened with this miscalculated delivery not withstanding the fact that there are also some very unexpected and equally odd female spoken word passages added in also to add to this cumbersome feel.

The vocals range from a Benton-like, venomous spit to a cavernous almost death doom like style and the guitars deliver a tremolo picked sound that mines the tracks they span over to the point of entering your skin it seems.  They feel sharp, as does the tightness of the drum work which is one of the albums more memorable parts overall with Zack Chandler displaying his skills well across all tracks.  The production job is decent enough also, letting all parts work in unison on the instrument front whilst still allowing the vocals to lead and carry the sound forwards.

Overall it is a respectable foray into blackened death metal that just gets it's shoe laces tangled together on a couple of occasions but never quite goes flat on it's face as a result.

The dank and murky vision captured on the album cover acts as a great representation of the fetid death metal that lies within the six tracks on offer on Krypts 2019 offering.  Hailing from Finland the band retain that classic Finnish death metal style, producing a cavernous and expansive sound that seems to fill all corners of the room when listening to the album.  Far from being new to the game the band do seem to have hit their stride though on this their third full-length release in ten years of recorded output.  There’s a real sense of consistency to these tracks all showing an agility for songwriting that you’d expect from a band who have been working on material for a decade.

For an album with only six tracks the record feels longer than the thirty seven minutes that make up its runtime.  There’s a vastness to the structures of each of these songs that allows each track sufficient space to build and grow in stature without ever outstaying their welcome.  Not always sticking to an atmospheric or looming build that eventually gives way to a gargantuan riff the album shows variety in pace, tempo and structure also.  This isn’t easy to achieve over a relatively short runtime and with a sub-genre of death metal that has a particular form and sound that is so well established.  But the fact is that Cadaver Circulation delivers both in its adherence to a recognised sound and also in its innovation that stays away from the experimental side of “new” and just relies on applying that innovation in the form of solid songwriting.

I don’t think there’s a duff track on here and remarkably there’s little in the way of repetition.  Yes, there’s an aspect of similarity between most tracks (it’s part of the success of the record) but I feel you can easily draw clear divisions between tracks also and identify nuances of atmosphere and pacing at the same time.  I can’t think of many albums in recent history that have retained such memorability in my head after so few listens.  Four listens in and I can recite a lot of this in my head to the point I can write this review without the album playing and that to me is the sign of a good record.

Despite the relevance of it I am not a fan of the artwork and that’s all that shaved a half mark off an otherwise superb album.

I find that some albums get talked about in hushed tones amongst peers, internet forums and album reviews generally.  There's a catgeory of albums in most genres of music that has a label akin to "Classic Album Not Freely Recognised As Such".  Quite where these albums go to after release in terms of the recognition stakes is no real mystery when you think about it, with most of them being released around a particular boom time for a genre and them just getting lost in the plethora of qualty releases of the time only to be picked up in years to come and almost reborn in some cult status awarde by devout fans of the genre.

Malevolent Creation's second album is one such album that comes up now and again in such conversations, and whilst I don't believe it does necessarily warrant a "classic" tag as such there's still so much to appreciate about this record that it is really unfortunate that it is not up there with the regard I hold for Last One On Earth, Acts of the Unspeakable, Tomb of the Mutiliated, Legion. The IVth Crusade or Onward to Golgotha all of which landed in the same year as this record.

There's certainly a rabid edge to Retribution that matches the Deicide release quoted and there's certainly a level of intensity to proceedings that draws comparison to the Cannibal Corpse release also of the same year.  These comparisons come from Hoffman's vocals and the pummeling attack of the instrumentation in no small parts but I actually don't get on with the vocals that well.  If anything, at times I find he has too much to say and things become a little cumbersome around the delivery and flow of the tracks.  The rest of the time he's doing nothing wrong and things feel much more cohesive and structured.

That niggle withstanding (and as Ben alludes to in his review) this is actually a great death metal album that simpy gets overlooked by more prominent and more obvious classic releases from the same year.  There's nothing new here most definitey and whatever the reason may be that you find yourself coming late to the record it still hampers the experience of it because you will have already heard such great output both from the same year and subsequently over the years.  Still worthy of a spin though.

The harsh and unforgiving sound of Xasthur is in full flow on Malefic's 2007 release. Recorded on an analogue 8 track between 2006 and 2007, the usual desolate and dank ambience is blended with subtle attempts at rhythm and slow burning guitars that painfully pick out some arpeggio like tremolo sounds.  Occasionally there's the ghastly, whispered vocals polluting the ether with their foul and nefarious intent still smothered by the dense atmosphere that covers everything.

The haunting and ethereal atmospheres that comjured here do possess their own surreal beauty and entice the listener into the malignant environment of the record.  Over twelve agonising tracks the album takes you the end of a tattered and threadbare rope from which hangs all the depressive notions of one of black metal's finest purveyors of the DSBM sub-genre.  There's little in the way of comfort to be found here (unless you are in a very dark place already one would assume), tracks are almost mercilessly drawn out as they baste in their own melancholic juices slowly cooking the life out of themselves.

As difficult a listen as this is you can't help but admire the effort that goes into writing, recording and sharing such raw emotion and melancholic thought that took over a year to put together.  If it is hard to listen to imagine how the artist themselves must feel.  Amidst the dissonance and the reverberating there remains constant structure and melody, albeit it does get a little too off-kilter sometimes to sound anything other than just poor musicianship or lacking in compositional awareness.

There's more than one occasion where things just sound a little too basic - which I get is sort of the point - and over twelve tracks this does start to get arduous from just over halfway through.  I found myself wanting the album to end a lot sooner than it did.  It is not like any sudden change of style or direction is going to occur to make you want to stay engaged for longer so the predicatbility factor is quite high here.  If you like your music to feel like some wet fabric draped over you, slightly inducing a sense of panic and cloying at your throat with talons of jagged misery then this is right up your street. 

For memorable yet varied songs, the dilligent metal listener would not be disappointed with Borknagar's tenth studio album.  There's hooks galore in here, aided well by the still slightly off-kilter and cumbersome vocals of Vintersorg (and others) to add further memorability and emotional layers at the same time.  By now the black metal elements of Borknagar have all but disintegrated, with only the occassional harsh vocal passage from the aforementioned Vintersorg giving the listener some sense of the old incarnation of the band.  The album is progressive without being complex and as a result sits in the brain for days after just one listen.  I woke up this mornng with Cold Runs the River ringing around my head following its appearance on a recent shuffle playlist.  This is a great example of the content of the album as a whole, with its varying tempos, subtle time changes and solid, robust structure.

There's still a feel of folkly momentum to a lot of the tracks as well, as the instruments hit that almost medieval melody mid-flow often done so subtley that you don't notice.  At the same time there's a proficiency for the riff that is never too far away, occasionally deploying a cheeky tremolo here and there to keep the roots of the band showing.  The clean vocals drive this folk element more than anything else though with their storytelling style adding this depth to proceedings well.  Across the whole album there's this effortless flow to the compositions, even when deploying more progressive elements or atmospheric notes beneath the main tide, the album feels cohesive and the songwriting feels well thought out, emotive and expansive.

On two tracks on here, every vocalist who has ever been in Borknagar sing.  A feat that whilst not perhaps totally unique in the history of music has probably rarely been done to such great success.  The title track and Terminus standout as two of the best songs on what in essence is already a brilliant album.  For any band to still be going, ten albums into their career is a feat worth recognition, but to still be going and producing such fine and memorable material is an added layer of brilliance deserving further applause.

Rammestein were the last band I saw live at the start of the noughties before I stopped going to gigs due to a damaged ear drum.  I had befriended another metal head in a call centre where I worked at the time and we went to a couple of gigs.  I recall American Head Charge were the support act and they were actually quite good.  Rammestein though were superb, full of theatrics and drama, displaying a real passion for their art.

I never owned an album by the band, think I bought a t-shirt at aforementioned gig but that was the extent of my merchandise.  Stumbling across the band in the depths of the Metal Academy and then seeing them in the feature section for this month got me interested enough in finally sitting down and listening to a whole album by them.  I am glad I did.

A couple of things got me off-guard if I am honest.  Firstly, how riffy Reise, Reise is.  It is chock full of the beggars making the album memorable and leaving me hungry for each track.  Secondly, how well the drama and theatrics that I witnessed on stage nearly two decades ago transpose brilliantly to the recorded output without becoming showy or needless.  There’s real atmosphere here, stabs of near symphonic keys and choir-like backing vocals that all add real depth to the sound.  I was also pleasantly surprised by how the emotion of the songs comes across so well.  Considering I speak no German the passion and eloquence of the songwriting really gives a real sense of expression and of intensity being shared.

Somewhere amongst the industrial edges and no-metal musings, Rammestein deliver a heartfelt and enlightening album, balanced in pace just enough to keep it interesting without sacrificing the memorability factor.  It’s only real flaw is that it is too long and needs a trim on the track listing.

At some point (may still be his view) Luc Lemay viewed From Wisdom to Hate as the natural progression from Erosion of Sanity as opposed to appearing after Obscura.  What Gorguts' fourth album represents is a mellowing of some of the avant-garde elements that made the previous album more jarring and obtuse to some listener's ears and reverted to some more familiar atavistic death metal that has become pretty much the trademark songwriting of the band.  Whereas Obscura was at times untidy amidst the rampant entertainment value of the record, From Wisdom to Hate offered a compositionally more grounded outing that relied on good songwriting as much as it did the challenging aspect of its predecessor.

There had been a three year gap since their previous release and the bulk of that time had been spent on tour as well as (for Luc at least) some intensive study taking up non-road time.  The large gap and distractions proved too much for an impatient Steeve Hurdle and he had chosen to leave the band over the inactivity whilst Patrick Robert had vacted the drum seat for the returning Steve MacDonald after the touring life proved too intense for Pat.  Having poached Martyr's Dan Mongrain into the Gorguts' camp, Luc set about teaching him the band's back catalogue and quickly found that the guy was pretty much a natural (he learned 4 songs from Obscura in just one evening) and so Mongrain got straight onto the songwriting credits for some three songs of his own and one co-written with Lemay.  Despite some pretty significant personnel changes, the band landed on their feet with a familiar face wanting to return and some highly-skilled, new blood to flex their artistry also.

The effect is obvious as the band bridged that gap between the inventive and eccentric nature of their last outing and the more familiar hue of more traditional death metal that charged the still pioneering direction of the band with an energy that most bands struggle to retain beyond their debut.  Although arguably for me the album needs a tad more of the Obscura vibe, From Wisdom to Hate was a fine pre-cursor to the next stage of Gorguts where the real clever stuff started to happen and their ability to write structural and deeply textured songs really took off.  Hearing what the band are putting out now can have those roots traced back to their fourth outing.  As solid as it is, there's a real feel for boundaries still getting pushed, only this time it is more subtle in how it delivers that, abandoning the full-on assault approach for more strategic-based deployment of their forces.  

For me there was some danger of this release getting lost in the discography as a lot of my attention has been on the third and fifth releases from the band.  I am glad I revisited this (purchasing a CD copy along the way) because From Wisdom to Hate is an essential release in the Gorguts' catalogue.  It takes the gold dust of Obscura and blends with the promise of Colored Sands and represents a band at the turning point in their career, fully-matured like some fine wine and ready to provide richness to the already plentiful dinner table.

Parabellum are considered to be the first extreme metal band from Colombia.  They sound exactly as you would expect based on that statement alone.  This two track EP is poorly produced, badly played and lacks any semblence of structure.  Now then, let's not skip the fact that this was 1988 and Colombia was hardly a hotbed of metal releases at this time.  I can't begin to imagine the challenges this band had setting up and trying to record and distribute material.  That withstanding though, beyond the underground appeal to this there is little in the way of anything else going for it.

The vocals are the only discernable sound that come through what sounds like a thick blanket being laid over all instruments.  The occasional drum hit can be heard and the riffing when it does come through is very punky with the odd squeal of a guitar to add metal credentials where felt necessary to do so.  The chaotic playing is too much when coupled with the primitive recording equipment and the lack of production, you just can't digest anything.  Their EP from 1987 Sacrilegio is even worse by the way.

I would hazard a guess that live, these guys would have slayed.  Their sheer attitude carrying them through a live set no doubt.  There's nothing to carry them through on a recorded format though.

Incantation's debut album is probably one of my more under-appreciated death metal albums when looking at the real "classics" of the genre.  As Ben alluded to in his review, there's some elements of inaccessibility to contend with at first but once you get a few spins under your belt things really start to embed in the old memory banks.  It is an album that crawls and races in equal portions is how I best describe the experience.  The pace is varied but the sound is always heavy and unrelenting.

For a band just three years into their existence, Incantation manged a debut in 1992 that was the embodiment of death metal.  Oppressive, dark, unapologetic and extreme in every sense of the word, the liner notes on the CD booklet took the opportunity in the "Thank You" section to say "Thank you all.  Disciples of Blasphemy, together we forever reign in darkness, as our souls roam horizons lost, we indulge in spiritual Desire!"  If you're a death metal fan, those words invoke sufficient levels of nefarious excitement in you to be forever an advocate of Incantation from the off, lost in the allure of the darkness they conjure over the course of Onward to Golgotha.

It's straight into a frenzied pace from the second the album begins and as I say it will take some degree of concentration to follow the record over the 11 tracks.  Along the way you will get to the death/doom blend that many subsequent bands have replicated over the years (I mean Incantation must be the most copied band in the history of music) as Pillard and McEntee riff the very flesh from your bones.  The drums of Jim Roe and the bass of Ronny Deo the perfect backdrop to the soundtrack to the sound of the apocalypse.

As a foundation stone, the debut record sets out Incantation's stall perfectly.  What has followed since on subsequent releases has been consistent with the promise that the first offering showed in piles.  Incantation have always been death metal and  after twelve full-lengths, numerous EP's and live releases the band have never once strayed  away from their relentless style.

I often think that Gorguts grew almost too quickly for their own good.  I mean an album of the ilk of Obscura getting dropped by a band just three records into their career is mind-boggling, even with a five year gap between it's predecessor.  Already by the time the band got around to their sophomore record you could pracitcally hear the cogs whirring around in the heads of most DM fans wondering how a band could develop and mature so quickly in just two years.  The Erosion of Sanity was a real beast to have to contend with as a standalone record, let alone a follow up to an already solid and very capable debut that had heads looking at the band already.  When a band hones its art that quickly and that deftly you have to forgive those that get left behind in the fan base.  If you got stranded at The Erosion of Sanity by Obscura I kind of understand it.  I mean the second album from Gorguts is superb.  Varied, dense and technical are just some of the words you could throw in its direction but overall it is still a solid, consistent and pummeling experience for the die-hards of the scene to lap up.

Reading Ben's review earlier, he's absolutely right on the Suffocation comparison, as the influence of that band is painted all over the walls of this record.  As a result the album has a constant weight to it no matter what the frequency of the tempo being played is.  This density provides atmosphere for virtually the whole record, even on the acoustic strings that introduce the closing track Dormant Misery there is a sense of impending peril in the air.  Yet at the same time the whole record has a rabid and urgent style to it that instills a sense of nervous anxiety in the listener as they track the intense and unrelenting delivery of some fine death metal.

The technical aspect to the sound goes slightly unnoticed at the first couple of listens making this an album that rewards frequent visits to it as you start peel back the initial layer of acute brutality that you think is the sole purpose of the album to find further layers of textures beneath for you to assess and understand.  Tracks like Orphans of Sickness are what true technical death metal is all about, shifting and surging like some turgid river in the midst of monsoon season.  The song feels vile and putrid yet there's no doubt that fiendish and devilish hands were present in its construction to provide a masterful and unsettling edge at the same time.

I am slowly getting to owning all physical copies of Gorguts' discography because they are a band who have yet to put a foot wrong across a career that has seen them take a well-known genre with a distinct sound and direction and push the boundaries of it into the outer-stratosphere.  The Erosion of Sanity is when the rocket boosters kicked in and took them clear of most of the competition at the time.

This was the first of his releases that I recall saw the buzz around Tristan Shone first starting to reach the "What Are You Listening To Now" threads on the various metal forums I frequented at the time.  This and the follow up Ursus Americanus had certainly seen enough cursory glances from me on Bandcamp to warrant at least a try of the music, but somehow I never got around to it.  It wasn't until 2018's Beastland that I finally sampled some of Shone's industrial majesty, being impressed enough to retain it in my stream subscription for occasional replay.  As with most artists, I rarely start at the beginning of the discography (and I haven't even achieved that yet here with this review - there's at least a couple of albums before this one for me to catch up with) preferring to just dip in here and there and build up my experience of an artist gradually.

I sensed promise in the Author & Punisher back-catalgoue for a couple of reasons.  Firstly, the guy makes his own triggers, controllers and instruments himself from raw materials.  I find this gives the music some primitive allure.  Kind of like when as a kid you'd make drum kits out of oil drums and upturned boxes, only this is obviously light years ahead in terms of technical knowledge to engineer such machines to produce recorded output.  The second hint of hope I had for Shone and his music is the fact that it managed to bridge the gap between industrial, mechanised torture and actual, discernable songs.  Although the title of the album kind of gives away the content to some degree, this is not mindless droning or racket for racket-making's sake, it is thought out structures that cross over into the realms of drone metal just as easily as industrial metal also.  Lust for Scales for example is like a monstrous, robotic Tony Iommi riffing around the studio with the expected familiar pummeling intensity.

On the whole, Drone Machines works.  It lacks some range in terms of variety of its own varied niche in the world of music and although I acknowledge the fact that there are songs stood as structures, they don't all feel like they were bottomed out as complete ideas before being committed to tape.  Tracks such as Beginning of End are just filler unfortunately and push the patience levels in me as a listener to the point of reaching for the skip button.  But, whilst it needs a trim in a couple of places, album number three from San Diego's number one noise terrorist still has lots of legs to hold the attention for the record duration.  Its most clever trait perhaps is the ability for it to generate so much power both in terms of sound and density at the same time.  It truly "fills" your ears and your head at times, starting from some bone-jarring drone at the base of your neck that expands into auditory assault by intelligent use of rhythm and percussion alongside the more experimental noise aspects also deployed.  Check out Blue Flame for a great example of this balance and smart application of opposing musical fare.

I might be a deacde late, but I am glad I got here in the end.

The (current) middle release in the Vanum back-catalogue lacks any of the promised brilliance of the debut and feels like a half-arsed effort to just record a couple of tracks one wet weekend in March.  The endless wailing tremolos just hang like some dense smoke in the air leaving an eventual acrid taste at the back of your throat.  None of the three tracks on offer glean much in the way standout moments and so the experience just feels like a real drag to sit through - even if only for twenty four minutes.

Without anything in the way of song progression or expansion things just become staid and flat despite the melodic pummeling of the riffs seemingly trying to force some hope through the dull hue of a frankly pointless release.  A step backwards following a promising debut whose potential is still not realised by the third release also.

Life is too short for some things.  I would class the much lauded 2002 release from Portland's Agalloch as befitting this description perfectly.  I mean, don't get me wrong there's much debate to say how it is a masterpiece of post-rock/metal influenced blackened folk-metal as the album takes you through the complete tour of the sub-genre it manages to create with the release of this album.  But at the same time it is obvious (to my ears at least) that this is very niche and no matter how well it is done it is a lot to take in.

In all seriousness, The Mantle is simply too big for it's boots.  It isn't consciously trying to be too smart or clever but I feel that somewhere along the way it starts to disappear up it's own rectum.  The album feels like it is too personal for sharing with a wider audience, like it's direction could only be understood by a gifted few (who I doft my hat to) instead of any semblance of "mass" consumption.  This is of course the risk most artists take when releasing anything and I can't discount the fact that this album is more or less universally praised virtually everywhere I look, but for me the reward for listening is more way off expectations.

Instead of coming across as expansive, the whole thing feels sprawling and arduous.  The genuine feeling is that I am being burdened with something by taking the time to sit through the record and whilst that "something" is never unbearable it certainly is draining nonetheless.  I can cope usually with vast soundscapes with atmospheric sweepings and wooshes, but here things feel uninteresting and unnecessary as the record progresses.  There's no defining moments and as a result the whole thing just feels like one long-winded experience.

From what I have read about John Haughm and the demise of Agalloch this record feels like the circumstance surrounding that sudden ending to the band, uncertain and not entirely clear on what the hell's going on.

Zakk Wylde's drawling vocal style makes my shit itch.  It sounds forced and fake a lot of the time and is one of the main blockers to me exploring more of BLS' music.  For some reason though, on Mafia Wylde finds the correct blend of vocal nonsense and (albeit limited) levels of decent songwriting just enough to hold my interest.  What develops over far too many tracks is a passable attempt at some energetic heavy metal that only really falls short due to a complete lack of filter on the quality control department.

I don't profess to know much about Wylde's career beyond Ozzy Osbourne, friends with Dimebag and he likes baseball a lot.  His guitar playing style on what snippets I had regularly heard seemed to move between shredding and grooving with a lot of chunky riffs thrown in for good measure.  I don't mind his six string exploits, in fact I would go as far as to say that on Mafia they hold my interest more than anything else on display here.  I can actually remember bits of his work on the lead guitar and still have a discernable chug from the rhythm parts of his repetoire also having listened to the record a couple of times.

The first thing that starts to kill it for me is the production job (granted I am listening on stream so the rip quality might be the problem) but things seem clumsily mixed, almost to the point of distraction.  There sounds almost like there is a flimsy membrane between some of the instruments and in the jostling to get heard only Zakk's guitar stands out.  If I am honest Nunenmacher feels largely lost throughout the record and it feels like the songs are all incomplete in some regard, even in the more high-intensity moments.

Next I have issue with the tracklisting.  This album doesn't need fifteen songs (and most definitely not a Lynyrd Skynyrd cover), in fact it needs around ten as a maximum as by the time I get past Too Tough To Die I need a fucking break.  Just stopping for a minute to execute good ideas better, at the expense of a few filler tracks would have made this album a much more enjoyable experience.

Finally, there's no getting away from those vocals in the long run.  On the opening track Wylde actually just makes noises in time with the music for sections of the track which is just nonsense.  JUST PLAY MORE INSTRUMENTS INSTEAD IF YOU'RE THAT SHORT ON THE LYRICS FRONT.  Other than the poor production, the inconsistent songwriting, the overburdening arrangement and the vocals of a blues singer trapped in a washing machine on a spin cycle there's not much wrong with this.

Vanum occupy that spot in melodic black metal that doesn't rely on pushing any boundaries or branching out in any new direction and instead just sticks with an established format being done well.  These Americans have crafted their art to being assured yet only flirting with the threat of predictability.  As I listen through Ageless Fire there's a fair share of  moments that I can see coming with my eyes shut, yet they still are relevant and of value to the overall piece. 

Vanum is the brainchild of two established black metal artists.  Kyle Morgan of Ash Borer and Michael Rekevics of Fell Voices (and others) put the band together and so the credentials of the band are strong on paper and also in the reality of what gets delivered.

The melodies are almost studious in their application and successfully frame the more uptempo passages on tracks (Eternity) giving breathing space from the at times relentless charge.  When in full-flow the band has a full and enriched sound that encapsulates all component parts of the instruments and vocals.  The muffled sounding vocals feel blended in the swarming pace of the bands more aggressive moments as opposed to ever being lost and the thoughtful use of atmosphere helps to define clear start and end points over what is quite a short tracklisting.

The drums are of particular note on here but are perhaps the one aspect of the instrumentation that gets lost in the mix at times.  When allowed to they pound and pummel away, driving the attack of those tremolo-rampant guitars that spearhead the charge for much of the record.  The keys that provide that smattering of atmosphere do a great job in the sense that they are so subtle that you at first don't notice them.  When you do clock them they support the rapturous melody of the leads perfectly (Under The Banner Of Death).

All of the goodness here is supported by a very warm sounding production which almost gives the album a Hellenic feel at times yet there are a fair few temperature reducing moments of bone-chilling beauty to satiate the appetite of the more kvlt listeners out there.  Overall, Vanum deliver a solid and dependable second full-length that relies on sharp songwriting and straight forward delivery to get their message across.

So here's the thing.  For a guy who doesn't particularly like nu-metal, Deftones occupy a hefty portion of artists beginning with "D" in my music library.  I first got turned onto them after a brief drift away from metal saw me return and immediately become enamoured with Diamond Eyes and I subsequently worked my way back to the greatness of White Pony as I checked out their back catalogue.  Somehow I never got beyond Around The Fur though.  For no logical reason my sub-conscious told me that the debut album would not be for me as although I enjoyed Around The Fur it still bordered on being a little too nu-metal so by proxy the debut would be way too much.

I was wrong.  To a point.  Whilst Adrenaline clearly is dripping with nu-metal it's greatest challenge is that it is not entirely well written or composed.  Now, given the fact that this is the band's debut record some slack has to be cut, however the band had already been together (albeit with an unstable line-up) for seven years at this point and I still would expect a little more deftness in the songwriting department after nearly a decade of trying to get a debut together.  The thing that saves the record for me though is the application (be it intentional or not) of the taut emotion that broods throughout the record, occasionally peering out from the at times directionless and uniform music to show the first glimpses of what really started to take hold on White Pony some five years after this.

This recognisable trait is the saving grace for me.  Having started later in the bands's discography I can forgive it being in this raw and misfiring state as it gets drip-fed through the under-developed riffs, sterile production and lazy vocal delivery.  I know it is sub-par but it is entirely understandable as I know that they honed this primitive sack of reactive feelings and on later records used it as sentiment and sensation to deliver some meaningful and memorable records.

Taken as a standalone debut album it makes virtually no waves in my lake, but knowing the rivers it feeds further on it increases in importance almost organically.

Side projects can be hit and miss in my experience and Max Cavalera and Alex Newport's punky, industrial, thrash effort from 1994 lands in the "miss" section for me.  As much as I enjoy the thrashy elements on this record I don't think they are a million miles away from Sepultura output for the time and so don't really bring anything new to the table for my money.  By contrast the punky songs work a tad better but aren't particularly unique or that overly authentic so just come off as Max and Alex pissing about in the studio.

There isn't much direction here overall and I get that this was probably a deliberate thing but in the end the record just sounds thrown together.  I mean the attempt to break up the pace that is Sum of your Achievements just feels like it is in there for the hell of it.  The next track after it Cockroaches feels disjointed and poorly structured which makes the middle section of the album the part where I start to switch off.

For all the angst-riddled attitude on display here it doesn't come off as leaving me with an overall feeling of anger or rage being expressed, more a sense of bewilderment and confusion if I am honest.  I mean, yes my foot gets stomping to For Fuck's Sake but only for the brief occasions that it actually gets going.  The rest of the time I am looking at the screen wondering what the fuck is going on?

It soon becomes too formulaic and I just find myself skipping more tracks than I listen to as I get bored waiting for things to get going.  Not one of Max's best moments.

Following up Seven Churches was always going to be a tough ask for a band who hadn't been around all that long by the time they rolled around to their sophomore release.  In just over two years Possessed had done two demos and two full-lengths as well as extensive touring and on album number two they sounded tired, flat and uninspiring.

The argument that this was the wheel they had previously invented on their debut just turned out once more to utilise a winning formula falls short on the fact that this is not actually a patch on the debut.  It's a lifeless shell of a record that sounds like it was released just for the hell of it or to meet some contractual obligation (which I don't believe was the case).  The riffs are unimaginative and lacking in punch, the song structures are bland and repetetive throughout and Jeff's vocals just come across as lazy and frankly half-arsed.

It genuinely feels like a record that was put together under extreme duress or by over-confident individuals who thought their ability better than it was or that the reputation gained from their debut was enough to just pass out the same style with no thought to the content.  It isn't even the debut regurgitated, it is the acid reflux of releasing a  landmark album that brings bile up into your mouth and you swiftly just swallow it back down and rinse away the taste.