Daniel's Forum Replies

I've been across "The Karelian Isthmus" since it was released three decades ago Andi. It's not a bad death metal record either & has been on my radar to revisit for a while now. I'm very familiar with everything that Amorphis released between 1991 & 1997 but I'm pretty sure that's where my knowledge ends. I've been digging my teeth into this month's feature release this morning though & should be in a position to voice my opinions tomorrow.

Here's my review:

By 1992 I found myself firmly entrenched in an underground metal landscape that was continually pushing the threshold of what extreme metal could be. The death metal scene had taken off in a major way & would shortly reach its peak while the second wave of black metal was about to take the world by storm with less abrasive styles like thrash retreating back into the underground to take cover. This had a lot to do with global grunge boom as heavy music fans & musicians were heading out into more aggressive territories to look for alternatives to the continual stream of melancholy & flannelette shirts they were being presented by the media. In many ways it was the perfect time for a band like Los Angeles four-piece Fear Factory to make a statement that would see the opposite factions being unified on some level with their debut album “Soul of a New Machine” possessing a crossover potential that few realized the death metal scene could achieve at the time.

My initial experiences with Fear Factory were through the late-night Sydney metal radio programs that I’d religiously tune into. “Scapegoat” & “Martyr” had very quickly become essential weekly inclusions & had grabbed my attention due to their fresh new sound that didn’t exactly fit into my usual taste profile but left me somewhat intrigued to find out what else they had to offer. I didn't hesitate in picking up the “Soul of a New Machine” CD from the local record store & quickly went about acclimatizing myself with it with an enthusiasm that only a 16 year-old can muster. What I found was that there were more strings to Fear Factory’s bow than I’d first realized. The more popular & accessible tracks I was already familiar with were offset by a much more extreme sound that bore its roots in the underground tape trading scene & this drew me in further than I'd initially anticpiated. I think it’s fair to say that “Soul of a New Machine” was never going to feature in any of my best-of lists but I definitely found myself enjoying it purely as a point of variety.

As I mentioned, the early Fear Factory sound contains several major components. To start with you have the industrial metal base which combines the dissonant, almost factory-like sounds of Godflesh with the brand new mechanical, machine-gun style staccato riffs that Fear Factory would make their calling card across their entire career. It’s hard to imagine where bands like Strapping Young Lad or Meshuggah would be without this element to tell you the truth. The second component is the strong use of groove-based riffs which was likely borrowed from bands like Pantera & Prong but sounds closest to fellow Californians Machine Head who undoubtedly drew influence from Fear Factory. And finally we have the inclusion of genuine extreme metal components with the tremolo-picked death metal riffs of Bolt Thrower & the blasting deathgrind chaos of Napalm Death being the most obvious influences. When you combine these elements with a vocal performance that takes a number of interesting directions you get a very original & highly engaging sound that possibly drew me in a touch more than “Soul of a New Machine” deserved in all honesty.

Front man Burton C. Bell’s performance is multi-faceted. Unlike later Fear Factory releases, his standard delivery is a gruff death metal grunt but he regularly swaps between a more accessible version & a deeper & more guttural interpretation that sounds very similar to Napalm Death icon Mark "Barney" Greenway. The really interesting part comes when Burton opts for a clean singing style during many of the more captivating choruses though. He manages to create a dreamy & transcendent atmosphere that made Fear Factory quite unique at the time & would see them further expanding on the concept with future releases. Despite my obvious tendency towards the more deathly side of Fear Factory’s sound, I actually find many of these clean-sung parts to be the highlights of some of the tracks & it’s not hard to see why that component of the band’s sound would go on to become so influential on the global metal scene as it opened the band up to a more mainstream audience than had ever been afforded to a death metal(-ish) band before. Guitarist Dino Cazares & drummer Raymond Herrara work in complete unison with their predominantly rhythmic attack being just as influential as Burton’s vocal contribution. I’m not sure we’d heard a metal band using guitar purely for rhythmic, percussive purposes to this extent before (not even Pantera) & when combined with Herrara’s super-precise kick-drum work it makes for a compelling musical statement that will likely see your body succumbing to the infectious grooves on offer.

But, even though Fear Factory had undoubtedly touched on a new & interesting sound that would have a significant impact on the global metal scene, I will always regard their debut as a bit player in my early 90’s story. You see, despite recognizing all of the new & interesting ways that the band had changed metal forever (just take a look at the nu metal boom & tell me that had nothing to do with Fear Factory), I can’t help but find myself left a little short-changed when reaching the end of what is a very ambitious seventeen song tracklisting. Literally none of the tracks reach classic status for me personally & I think that has a lot to do with my not being the biggest fans of groove metal to be honest as most tracks contain some pretty simple, chuggy riffs that will never breach my upper scoring echelon. There are no weak numbers included as the album is generally fairly consistent but the tracklisting does tend to fade at the end with a string of less significant grind-influenced tracks closing the album out. I can’t help but feel that some of this stuff could have been culled in the interest of quality & it might have seen my rating being bumped up a touch as I really wasn’t all that far away from going a little higher.

Still, it’s hard to be too critical of a record like “Soul of a New Machine” given its importance & impact. It was perhaps more of a scene-setter for Fear Factory’s coming piece-da-resistance in 1995 sophomore album “Demanufacture” which would see the band achieving a far more complete creative vision but it’s a worthwhile record to explore nonetheless. In truth, I strongly suspected that my score would end up where it has as the album has never been one that I've found myself wanting to return to as regularly as many others from a particularly strong year in metal. In fact, I doubt it’d even make my top 20 from 1992 in all honesty but that’s more of a reflection of just how much I was in my musical element than it is a representation of the merits of this ground-breaking release.

3.5/5

I was well onboard with everything Amorphis did up until their 1996 third album "Elegy" but then let them go completely after that for some reason, even though I really like "Elegy". I think the only record I've heard from them since is the 2010 re-recording album "Magic & Mayhem: Tales From the Early Years" so I'm actually quite curious to hear this one. I've just added this release to my May playlist.

The godfather of death metal hard at work on Death's 1998 tour for the "The Sound of Perseverance" album.

Here's the feature release roster for June:

THE FALLEN: Sonny, Ben, Vinny, Daniel

THE GATEWAY: Andi, Saxy

THE GUARDIANS: Morpheus Kitami, Xephyr

THE HORDE: Vinny, Ben, Daniel

THE INFINITE: Xephyr, Saxy, Andi

THE NORTH: Ben, Vinny, Sonny, Daniel, Xephyr

THE PIT: Ben, Sonny, Vinny, Daniel

THE REVOLUTION: Daniel, Andi

THE SPHERE: Andi, Daniel

May 2023

01. Liege Lord - "Eye Of The Storm" (from "Master Control", 1988)

02. Ария [Aria] - "Не хочешь, не верь мне" (from "Кровь за кровь", 1991)

03. Helloween - "Rise Without Chains" (from "Helloween", 2021)

04. New Horizon - "Call Of The Underground" (from "Gate Of The Gods", 2022)

05. Gatekeeper - "Shadow & Stone" (from "From Western Shores", 2023)

06. Satan - "The Blood Ran Deep" (from "Earth Infernal", 2022)

07. Herzel - "La flamme" (from "Le dernier rempart", 2021)

08. Air Raid - "Edge Of A Dream" (from "Fatal Encounter", 2023)

09. Avantasia - "Draconian Love" (from "Ghostlights", 2016)

10. Powerwolf - "Sainted By The Storm" (from "Interludium", 2023)

11. Iron Maiden - "The Loneliness Of The Long Distance Runner" (from "Somewhere In Time", 1986)

12. Manilla Road - "Return Of The Old Ones" (from "Out Of The Abyss", 1988)

13. Ravenous E.H. - "Astral Elixir" (from "Hubris", 2021)

14. Frozen Crown - "In A Moment" (from "Call of the North", 2023)

15. Galneryus - "Let Us Shine" (from "Between Dread & Valor", 2023)

16. Mercyful Fate - "At The Sound Of The Demon Bell" (from "Melissa", 1983)

17. Dio - "One Night In The City" (from "The Last In Line", 1984)

18. Hammer King - "Battlegorse" (from "King Is Rising", 2016)

19. Scanner - "Retaliation Positive" (from "Hypertrace", 1988)

20. Nightfear - "Breakout" (from "Drums of War", 2015)

21. Dream Evil - "The Chosen Ones" (from "Dragonslayer", 2002)

22. Smoulder - "Dragonslayer's Doom" (from "Violent Creed of Vengeance", 2023)

May 2023

01. Re-Buried – “Smoldering Remnants” (from “Repulsive Nature”, 2023)

02. Carcass – “Rot ‘n’ Roll” (from “The Heartwork E.P.”, 1994)

03. Carnosus – “Castle of Grief” (from “Visions of Infinihility”, 2023)

04. Amorphis – “First Doom” (from “Tales From The Thousand Lakes”, 1994) [Submitted by Daniel]

05. Edge of Sanity – “Until Eternity Ends” (from “Until Eternity Ends” E.P., 1994)

06. Dark Heresy – “Engines of Torture” (from “Abstract Principles Taken to Their Logical Extremes”, 1995)

07. Autopsy – “Flesh Strewn Temple” (from “Morbidity Triumphant”, 2022) [Submitted by Vinny]

08. Benediction – “Forged In Fire” (from “Dark Is The Season” E.P., 1992) [Submitted by Vinny]

09. Amon Amarth – “Burning Creation” (from “The Arrival of the Fimbul Winter” demo, 1994)

10. Entombed – “Supposed To Rot” (from “Left Hand Path”, 1990) [Submitted by Vinny]

11. Drumcorps – “Style Transfer” (from “Creatures”, 2022)

12. Tentacult – “Aberration Sphere” (from “Lacerating Pattern”, 2023)

13. Mitochondrion – “Pestilentiam Intus Vocamus, Voluntatem Absolvimus (I. Plague Evockation)” (from “Parasignosis”, 2011)

14. Hyperdontia – “Nauseous Hallucinations” (from “Deranged”, 2023)

15. Astiferous – “Blinding The Seven Eyes Of God” (from “Pulsations From The Black Orb”, 2023)

16. Entheos – “Absolute Zero” (from “Time Will Take Us All”, 2023)

17. Decapitated – “Spheres of Madness” (from “Nihility”, 2002) [Submitted by Daniel]

18. Enemy Soil – “Obsequious” (from “Enemy Soil/Pg.99 split E.P.”, 1999)

19. Nightmarer – “III: Stasis (Obliterated Shrine)” (from “Monolith Of Corrosion” E.P., 2021) [Submitted by Vinny]

20. Misery Index – “The Great Depression” (from “Retaliate”, 2003)

21. Gigan – “Transmogrification Into Bio-Luminoid” (from “Quasi-Hallucinogenic Sonic Landscapes”, 2011)

22. Deiquisitor – “Humanoid” (from “Apotheosis”, 2023)

23. Disfiguring The Goddess – “Sleeper” (from “Sleeper”, 2012)

24. Cerebral Incubation – “Bubbling Rectal Cum Fart” (from “Gonorrhea Nodule Mastication”, 2012)

25. Coffin Nail – “Strangling Gallows” (from “The Hanged Man”, 2023)

26. See You Next Tuesday – “Day In The Life Of A Fool” (from “Distractions”, 2023)

27. Machetazo – “Banquete Funerario” (from “Trono de huesos”, 2002)

28. Suffocation – “Souls To Deny” (from “Souls To Deny”, 2004) [Submitted by Daniel]

29. Sulfuric Cautery – “Torrential Regurgitation” (from “Suffocating Feats of Dehumanization”, 2023)

30. Katalepsy – “Evidence of Near Death (E.N.D.)” (from “Autopsychosis”, 2013)

31. Defeated Sanity – “Perspectives” (from “Passages Into Deformity”, 2013) [Submitted by Vinny]

32. Rotten Sound – “Sharing” (from “Apocalypse”, 2023)

33. Gorgasm – “Stabwound Intercourse” (from “Stabwound Intercourse” E.P., 1998)

Here are my June submission(s):

Mouthbreather - "Born Dead" (from "Pig" E.P., 2017)

Here are my June submission(s):

Wargasm - "Humanoid" (from "Why Play Around?", 1988)

Cacophony - "Where My Fortune Lies" (from "Speed Metal Symphony", 1987)

Slaughter Lord - "Destructor" (from "Thrash 'til Death 86-87", 2000)

Hobbs Angel of Death - "House of Death" (from "Hobbs Angel of Death", 1988)

Death Angel - "Road Mutants" (from "Frolic Through The Park", 1988)

Here are my June submission(s):

Sadness - "I Want To Be There" (from "I Want To Be There", 2019)

Here are my June submission(s):

Temple Nightside - "Fortress of Burden & Distress" (from "The Hecatomb", 2016)

Fleshgod Apocalypse - "Sophistic Demise" (from "Oracles", 2009)

In Flames - "Bullet Ride" (from "Clayman", 2000)

Slaughter Lord - "Taste of Blood" (from "Taste of Blood" demo, 1987)

Here are my June submission(s):

Cacophony - "Savage" (from "Speed Metal Symphony", 1987)

Here are my June submission(s):

System of a Down - "Streamline" (from "Steal This Album!", 2002)

Here are my June submission(s):

Coffinworm - "Of Eating Disorders & Restraining Orders" (from "IV.I.XIII", 2014)

Lake of Tears - "Come Night I Reign" (from "Forever Autumn", 1999)

Theatre of Tragedy - "Aoede" (from "Aegis", 1998)

Tiamat - "Alteration x 10" (from "A Deeper Kind Of Slumber", 1997)

Grindcore, thrash metal & melodic death/black metal combined into a screaming metal maelstrom from New Jersey, USA.

Hayaino Daisuki - "The Invincible Gate Mind of the Infernal Fire Hell, or Did You Mean Hawaii Daisuki?" E.P. (2010)

When I returned to metal following a decade of electronic music indulgence in 2009, I went on somewhat of an extreme metal marathon in order to catch up on everything I’d missed since leaving the scene behind back in 1998. Death metal, black metal, extreme doom metal, thrash metal & grindcore received my full attention & while undertaking that process I came across a deceptively-titled & little-known US side project called Hayaino Daisuki which included vocalist Jon Chang (Discordance Axis/Gridlink/No One Knows What The Dead Think), guitarist Takafumi Matsubara (Gridlink/Takafumi Matsubara/Guilty Connector), bassist Teddy Patterson III (Burnt By The Sun/Gridlink/Human Remains) & drummer Eric Schnee. In classic grindcore fashion, Hayaino Daisuki released just the two short EP’s in their eight year existence in 2008’s debut effort “Headbanger’s Karaoke Club Dangerous Fire” & their 2010 sophomore record “The Invincible Gate Mind of the Infernal Fire Hell, or Did You Mean Hawaii Daisuki?” with the latter generally being the more highly regarded of the two. Neither received enough of my attention to warrant me attempting a review or even a rating at the time as my mission didn’t allow me to invest too much of my attention on a single release unless it was absolutely belting me but I do recall quite enjoying “The Invincible Gate Mind of the Infernal Fire Hell, or Did You Mean Hawaii Daisuki?” in particular so I thought it might be time to give it a return viewing.

Hayaino Daisuki’s second E.P. is the shorter of the two with its four tracks coming to a total run time of just 12 minutes so it doesn’t require an enormous investment of your time. None of the four tracks included really stand out from the other three as the quality is very consistent throughout but the band leaves no stone unturned in their efforts to pulverize the listener with a whirlwind of high-velocity activity. You shouldn’t expect a blastathon though as the blast-beats are used quite sparingly for a grind-related release & I do say "related" because Hayaino Daisuki are very hard to pin down into any one subgenre. Their sound seems to pull together over-the-top grindcore screaming with consistently up-tempo & thrashy riffage, the melodic focus of melodeath/meloblack & some very exciting & shreddy Slayer-style lead guitar work. This combination of different techniques works nicely too as all of those components are well integrated into a cohesive sound that doesn’t need to jump around too much in order to showcase all of the available elements.

The production job is very effective as it provides a good balance of raw intensity & clarity with each instrument being easily decipherable through the face-melting metal maelstrom. Perhaps the bass could have been a little higher in the mix but there’s not much to complain about really. The guitar solos I mentioned are the clear highlight for me personally with their tone being high in mid-range which enables them to comfortably pierce through & ride on top of the wall of sound. Jon Chang is a rabid, psychotic mad dog of a front man & you suspect that the short run time has allowed him to simply go for broke without the fear of blowing his voice out through over-exertion. If I’m being honest, it’s the more melodic material that keeps Hayaino Daisuki from breeching my bank of higher scores though as I’m not the biggest fan of an overtly melodic focus in my extreme metal & there's a surprising amount of that on offer for a grind record.

At the end of the day, “The Invincible Gate Mind of the Infernal Fire Hell, or Did You Mean Hawaii Daisuki?” is an enjoyable blast of fun that’s probably unlikely to change many lives but will no doubt enhance some for short periods. It serves its purpose nicely as I can definitely see a few people throwing themselves around their bedrooms while playing air guitar frenetically & screaming violently. I’d suggest that its consistency is also it weakness though as it's lacking the one or two highlight tracks required to stop it from flying past in somewhat of a blur, an entertaining blur it has to be said but a blur none the less.

3.5/5

Death Angel - "Frolic Through The Park" (1988)

Second tier San Francisco Bay Area stalwarts Death Angel are an interesting one for me personally because I’ve never quite felt that they were deserving of all the praise they’ve received over the years. I discovered them fairly early on in my thrash metal journey through their highly celebrated 1987 debut album “The Ultra-Violence” (3.5/5) which was a super-raw thrashfest that built its reputation on the band’s youthful energy. The pitchy vocals were a bit of an obstacle for me & it could have done with a little more time & maturity in my opinion but it was a promising start to the young band’s career & has gone on to be regarded as a thrash classic by many fans. When I subsequently explored 1988’s “Frolic Through The Park” sophomore album though, I found some significant obstacles that weren’t present previously & didn’t feel up to giving it the time to sink in. I basically dismissed it as being none of my business & that opinion didn’t change with a brief revisit more than a decade ago now but I have to admit that the much more positive views of many social media personalities have eventually gotten to me. Was I too harsh on “Frolic Through The Park”? Have I been too quick to rule a line through it? Let’s find out.

There have traditionally been a couple of major talking points with “Frolic Through The Park” & both are worth discussing here. The first is the poor production with the whole record sounding wishy washy, thin & even a little sickly at times. This is interesting because the band had once again co-produced the record with Davy Vain (the front man from upcoming San Francisco glam metal band Vain) but the results are vastly different. I really struggled with this element back in the day but I think I’ve managed to finally look past it on this revisit as I've found myself more open to hearing what the band is pushing from a creative point of view. The second element worth mentioning is the incorporation of an array of external influences including hardcore punk, alternative metal, funk & progressive rock into the band’s exciting thrash metal arsenal which is seriously surprising when you consider that none of the band members were older than 21 at the time (drummer & co-producer Andy Galeon was still only 16 years old for fuck’s sake). This has certainly proven to be a divisive point of discussion over the years with some people finding it refreshing & others finding it to be a creative misfire.

The album kicks off pretty well actually with the first two tracks being the thrashiest & best of the eleven on the CD & leading into a pretty enjoyable crossover thrash track in “Why You Do This”. Things crash & burn pretty quickly after that though with the remainder of the album being noticeably hit & miss. Personally I find the quality levels to drop in direct correlation to how far the band steps furthest away from their thrash roots. You could say that this is simply a matter of taste but I don’t think that’s it. Despite hinting at the sound that fellow San Francisco thrashers Mordred would take in the coming years, the funk-infused numbers like “Bored” & “Open Up” sound like a band that’s lacking any sort of direction. The more complex & progressive material lacks cohesion & seems to fight against the flow of the song-writing while the inclusion of a cover version of KISS hard rocker “Cold Gin” sounds waaayyy out of place & sees the tracklisting grinding to a temporary halt. I mean, how much does the awful progressive/heavy metal number “Confused” remind you of a poor man’s version of Scatterbrain’s 1990 radio hit “Don’t Call Me Dude”?! The four or five more traditional thrash tunes on the other hand (think Testament, Exodus & Metallica) are actually quite good with the riffs showcasing a clear pedigree & a surprisingly strong technique for such young musicians. Front man Mark Osegueda is still pretty patchy at times though & I greatly prefer it when he simply tears shreds off your ears by screaming his guts out. Some of his choruses are lacklustre at best which sees some really strong lead-up work going to waste (see “Mind Rape” for example).

Is this Death Angel’s worst record? I think it might be actually. Much like Overkill, I find Death Angel to be one of those bands whose albums I generally always like but rarely love so I try to check out each new release. While records like “The Art of Dying” & Killing Season” may not be anywhere near classic, they certainly offer a stronger level of consistency than this effort & I’m not surprised that the band have tended to disown “Frolic Through The Park” over the years.

3/5

Hobbs Angel Of Death - "Hobbs Angel Of Death" (1988)

Following on from my having revisited the Slaughter Lord compilation last week, I felt like it’d been too long since I last revisited another legendary underground Aussie thrash enigma in 1988’s self titled debut album from Melbourne’s Hobbs Angel of Death. This record made a huge impact on the local scene when I was first becoming involved with extreme metal & it would have been hard for me to avoid becoming well versed in the unapologetically thrashtastic approach that Pete Hobbs & co. took with it. I have to admit though that I've never quite understood the heights of some of the praise that gets heaped on “Hobbs Angel of Death”.

Band leader & guitar-slinging front man Pete Hobbs was originally a member of a highly influential & important Melbourne heavy metal band called Tyrus who never got past the demo stage but developed a really strong following & significant notoriety through the Metal For Melbourne record store which put on some of the initial metal gigs in this country. Another band to benefit from these gigs was Nothing Sacred who would go on to become known as one of the earliest thrash bands in Australia, a claim I deny as I've always thought of them as being closer to heavy metal personally. Hobbs would initially recruit three ex-members of Nothing Sacred to record a couple of demo tapes that would see him signing a recording contract with legendary German metal label Steamhammer Records. Guitarist Mark Woolley was the only one of the three who would still be onboard by the time the album was recorded with bass player Phil Gresik (who would later go on to play for other notable Melbourne extreme metal acts like Bestial Warlust & Destroyer 666) & drummer Darren McMaster-Smith completing a four-piece line-up.

The production job on “Hobbs Angel of Death” is one of its strongest attributes as Steamhammer had brought in renowned producer Harris Johns who already had widely praised releases like Kreator’s “Pleasure To Kill”, Voivod’s “Killing Technology” & the first couple Helloween records under his belt. You can easily hear why the label paid the big bucks as this is far from your average under-produced, demo-quality 80's thrash debut. Gresik's bass sound is particularly impressive & suits his Tom Angelripper-esque style very nicely. The performances are highly professional too with the band sounding really tight & professional. The are a few acoustic guitar sections included which do tend to sound a little out of place given the metal-as-fuck, Satanic image that Hobbs seems to be trying to portray with his vocals, lyrics & imagery. The lengthy “Marie Antoinette” is the most atmospheric example of that.

I really enjoy Hobbs’ aggressive vocals & clever use of Satanic themes in his lyrics. It’s a bit of fun more than anything else but it works. The thrash-at-all-costs instrumentation is a suitable accompaniment for him too as the band pulls few stops in presenting themselves in as metal a fashion as possible. A lot of people will have you believe that Hobbs Angel of Death were right up there with the Slayers & Dark Angels as far as intensity goes & they certainly have their moments but I’d argue that they were nowhere near as consistent with it. Sure, a song like “Lucifer’s Domain” sounds very similar to Sodom & there are plenty of Slayer references scattered across the tracklisting but the riffs don’t quite have the edge of the top tier thrash gods as they're a little too basic in structure which also makes them sound a bit generic at times.

There’s no denying Hobbs’ consistency though as none of the ten tracks on offer (eight if you’ve got the vinyl version) come close to being weak. I just don’t think the band have achieved a genuinely classic thrash tune here though. “House Of Death” (my personal favourite) & “The Journey” are certainly very strong examples of their type but they never come close to the top tier in my opinion. At their best Hobbs Angel of Death compete with the likes of Canada’s Infernäl Mäjesty but more often sit closer to England’s Deathwish or fellow Aussies Mortal Sin due to a lack of sophistication & x-factor in their composition. Don’t get me wrong, Australia has certainly produced a pretty decent thrash record here. I’m just not sure it’s deserving of the cult status it seems to enjoy amongst old-school Aussie metalheads & I'd probably take Slaughter Lord's "Taste of Blood" demo or Mortal Sin's "Mayhemic Destruction" over it if I had to choose. Who said I'm biased towards Sydney?

3.5/5

BUCK-TICK - "悪の華 (Aku no hana)" (1990)

 Visual kei/New Wave from Japan.

Concrete Blonde - "Bloodletting" (1990)

Alternative rock from Los Angeles, USA.

Are you going to limit the criteria at all Morpheus? I feel that if you simply go about listening to every full-length on Metal Archives chronologically then you're destined to never get out of the mid-1980's as there are literally thousands of releases from that decade alone.

My Top Ten Metal Releases of 1987 list:

01. Bathory - "Under the Sign of the Black Mark"

02. Anthrax - "Among The Living"

03. Metallica - "The $5.98 E.P.: Garage Days Re-Revisited" E.P.

04. Candlemass - "Nightfall"

05. Exumer - "Rising From The Sea"

06. Sepultura - "Schizophrenia"

07. Sodom - "Persecution Mania"

08. Sacrifice - "Forward To Termination"

09. Destruction - "Release From Agony"

10. Sacred Reich - "Ignorance"

https://metal.academy/lists/single/215

Sadness - "I Want to Be There" (2019)

Given my newly acquired taste for the niche blackgaze subgenre, I thought it might be time to reassess the very popular “I Want To Be There” album from Mexican-expat & one-man extreme metal producer Sadness who now resides in Illinois, USA. I’m not across all of his extensive back catalogue as he’s extremely prolific but I’ve tended to keep up with all of his major releases & this one (unbelievably something like his seventeenth full-length) is widely regarded as being amongst his best.

I suppose the Deafheaven comparisons were inevitable when you take a look at the pink cover art & it’s hard to imagine that it wasn’t an attempt to tap into the same market when you see the similarities in colour but I actually find the image to be quite attractive & to be a very nice representation of the music which is a common theme with Sadness. A quick look through his artist page will show you that he treats his artwork as an extension of his music & has made somewhat of an artform of it. The only caveat is that you need to let go of your black metal illusions & treat his offerings purely as art which is very much what they are.

“I Want To Be There” is a 40 minute album including just the six (generally pretty lengthy) tracks. Damián Antón Ojeda traverses a few different sounds here but the result comes across as fairly unified regardless, mainly due to the general commitment to dreamy atmospherics regardless of which genre is being explored. The main component is obviously the blackgaze one with fuzzy walls of glistening guitars, crashing cymbals & layers of noise being the order of the day. Damián’s screamed vocals are kept towards the back of the mix which makes them completely indecipherable & they remind the listener of the tortured howls frequently used on depressive black metal releases. The general positivity of the instrumentation never allows the audience to be led into sheer hopelessness though & feels far more palatable to me. The other major element of the Sadness sound is that of post-rock & I find myself reaching for comparisons to Sigur Rós quite regularly during the more epic moments in particular. There’s a greater level of melancholy here than the Icelandic post-rock gods would likely want to muster though & Damián’s moniker would seem to be quite an apt one, despite the uplifting nature of a lot of the material.

There are a couple of very strong tracks included here & they open either side of the record (see “In The Distant Travels” & my personal favourite “I Want To Be There”). I don’t think there’s any surprise that those tend to be the tracks that veer closer to the black metal path with slightly less overtly positive themes. “I Want To Be With You” seems to be clearly the most popular track on the tracklisting & this doesn’t surprise me either as it’s a pure post-rock number that’s completely free of black metal shrieks with a choir of children being used instead. The regular use of extended post-rock sections are outstanding but I struggled with the short ambient noise wall piece “Moments” & also the second half of “You Dance Like The June Sky” which takes me a bit further outside my comfort zone than I’d like. Despite these blemishes, the positives easily out-weigh the negatives & I was pleasantly surprised by how much I got into some of the more whispy, dreamy & almost trancey sections. Damián certainly never goes as far as an artist like Trhä or Mesarthim might have with the uplifting synth-driven stuff, choosing to stay in slightly more introspective territory.

At the end of the day a record like “I Want To Be There” is probably never going to float my boat as much as the more aggressive Deafheaven material or the child-like nostalgia of Alcest but I can’t deny its appeal nonetheless. I may be mellowing in my old age or perhaps I’m simply better able to separate this sort of sound from my beloved black metal scene but Sadness definitely has its place in the extreme metal marketplace alongside artists like Lantlôs & White Ward as it’s a well-composed & executed example of the post-blackgaze sound that may not offer anything drastically different but is polished & professional enough to keep me entertained regardless.

3.5/5

Here's my new Top Ten Blackgaze Releases of All Time list:

01. Deafheaven - "Sunbather" (2013)

02. Woods of Desolation - "Torn Beyond Reason" (2011)

03. Deafheaven - "Roads to Judah" (2011)

04. Deafheaven - "New Bermuda" (2015)

05. Alcest - "Kodama" (2016)

06. Deafheaven - "Ordinary Corrupt Human Love" (2018)

07. Lantlôs - ".neon" (2010)

08. Alcest - "Écailles de lune" (2010)

09. Sadness - "I Want To Be There" (2019)

10. Asunojokei - "Island" (2022)

https://metal.academy/lists/single/204

Nice review Daniel and a real insider's view of a little-known, albeit influential, act from days gone by. It's great to get a picture of such an underground band from someone who was a contemporary of theirs. I, in common with many others I suspect, had never heard of them before.

Is that release on u-toob?

I'd suggest trying Ode & Elegy's self-titled album from last year Rex. I've found it to be a real grower of a post-metal record that totally took me by surprise.

This nomination has been posted in the Hall of Judgement.

Slaughter Lord - "Thrash 'til Death 86-87" (2000)

Back in the very late 1980’s & early 1990’s when I first became a part of the underground metal scene there were several local bands that sat beyond reproach as the very pillars with which the Australian metal scene was built on. Given how isolated our country is to the rest of the world (far more so back then), the vast majority of these artists were completely unknown in other parts of the world outside of a select few who were lucky enough to have well-informed contacts down under but the legends of these early metal acts have lived on still to this day. Mid-80’s Sydney extreme metal band Slaughter Lord sit at the very pinnacle of this ideology given that they tick pretty much every box required to ensure maximum notoriety: Only released a demo & some crudely recorded rehearsal tapes? Tick! Provided members to various other important bands? Tick! Had a sound that was ahead of its time? Tick! Were highly influential on some major players in the global metal scene? Tick! That’s right. What we’re talking about here is just as much an enigma as it is an artist selling their wares so it’s worth putting thing into perspective before we move ahead & get all analytical but at the end of the day I believe in reward on merit so there won’t be any free stars being awarded for influence alone from this ol’ metalhead.

Slaughter Lord formed 1985 in the Blue Mountains just outside of the Sydney metropolitan area & their reputation is built on a single poorly-produced three-song demo tape called “Taste of Blood” that was released some time in 1987. I encountered this release very early on in my tape trading days & it certainly got my attention. In fact, I’d suggest that it made a bigger impression on me than Mortal Sin’s legendary 1987 debut album “Mayhemic Destruction” which is saying something for any Sydney-sider. I wouldn’t say that I regard "Taste of Blood"as a classic though as Slaughter Lord still sounded like a work in progress more than a finished product with their sound jumping around a bit & the recording quality & performances still needing a fair bit of work. That didn’t stop “Taste of Blood” from changing to face of metal in ways that very few people are actually aware of though.

In 2000, band leader & drummer Steve Hughes (who is now a world-renowned stand-up comedian) contributed to a project that would see the majority of the Slaughter Lord recordings being re-released on a compilation CD called “Thrash Til Death 86-87” which includes a couple of additional studio tracks & four crude rehearsal recordings of non-demo songs. I hadn’t heard any of that additional material until this week as Slaughter Lord split up a couple of years prior to me first venturing out to my first local metal gig but my interest was certainly high given my familiarity with the demo & the aura of mystery & adoration around the band. I certainly became pretty closely affiliated with the bands that the various band members would go on to play with though & they all command a similar level of respect from myself & my peers. Hughes would do time in Mortal Sin, Sadistik Exekution & Nazxul, founding guitarist Mick Burke would play for Mortal Sin & his accompanying axemen Sandy Vahdanni & Anton Vasquez would both do stints in Sadistik Exekution too so you couldn't wish for a stronger resume than that when it comes to the Sydney extreme metal scene.

"Thrash 'til Death" opens with the two additional studio cuts in “Destructor” & “Slaughter Lord”, both quality tunes in their own right & sounding like they might have been recorded after the demo due to the greater level of sophistication in the composition, performances & production. “Destructor” is a very fast & aggressive thrash metal number that sounds like classic Dark Angel with Mille Petrozza from Kreator behind the mike. I really dig it & it’s one of the highlights of the release. “Slaughter Lord” sounds more like the demo tape with the brutal thrash metal sound being diluted with something more sinister. You see, what made Slaughter Lord so notorious in the global underground was the nastier blast beat-driven death/black metal component. In fact, it baffles me as to why the band aren’t spoken of as one of the founders of the war metal movement because a lot of this stuff is undeniably worthy of that tag with the death & black metal influences being thrown at the listener in a heinous mess of barbaric violence. “Slaughter Lord” isn’t quite as strong as “Destructor” but it’s still a really decent inclusion nonetheless.

“Slaughter Lord” flows nicely into the “Taste of Blood” demo even though the production jobs are vastly different because that war metal component is evident on all three of the demo tracks, particularly the first two. One of the reasons I feel that Slaughter Lord’s sound was still a work in progress though is because the demo tracks all include some pretty standard Slayer/Kreator-worshipping thrash parts & you get the feeling that they hadn’t yet decided on which way they wanted to go, almost like they were still in transition & the next release might be the one that defined them. All three demo tracks are worth listening to though, particularly the title track “Taste of Blood” which is the one that maintains the war metal savagery for the greater majority of its run time. I’ve always wondered how an extreme metal band could manage to release a demo where the guitar tone is lacking in distortion like it is here though, particularly the frantic solos which definitely suffer for it. The vocals are nothing short of savage & sit somewhere between Kreator & Bathory. Hughes’ blast beats are particularly brutal for the time & take their queues from the South Americans as much as they do from grindcore. It’s easy to see the influence that Hughes had on a young Morbid Angel when you look back now & I’d go so far as to suggest that “Altars of Madness” would have sounded a bit different if not for the influence of “Taste of Blood”. The same can be said of Bathory’s classic “Blood Fire Death” album actually as some of the relentless thrash included sounds so similar to the faster thrashers on that particular record & I know that Quorthon was a big fan along with other major players like Sepultura & At The Gates.

The rehearsal recordings are unfortunately where “Thrash Til Death” runs out of steam though. All four are fairly standard thrash tunes that have been recorded poorly & offer nothing additional to the legend the band has created. I do like closer “Cryptic Terror” quite a bit but I struggle to sit through the three that precede it which is ultimately what makes releases like this one more of a novelty than an essential testimonial to a unheralded champion of the global scene. This doesn’t diminish the impact of the “Taste of Blood” demo but it does highlight the fact that Slaughter Lord really built their reputation on a very small body of work & mostly through their own tape trading network (which is kinda cool, isn’t it?). While the band was no doubt a critical player in the Aussie metal scene, I’d suggest that they’re more influential than they are essential but would recommend "Taste of Blood" to anyone that likes the idea of the brutal thrash metal of Necrodeath & Morbid Saint being crossed with the death metal insanity of Sadistik Exekution.

3/5

There are a number of The Horde subgenres that I'm not crazy about. Thankfully there aren't all that many releases from niche subgenres like gorenoise, death 'n' roll & cybergrind so I've already included most of the more significant material. Melodeath is a challenge for me a lot of the time but gorenoise would have to be the one I struggle with the most.

Hmmm.... it's an interesting idea. Personally I think that members of The Gateway are best positioned to decide on whether a release fits inside that clan rather than Non-Metal. For example, if you only know extreme metal then you may think that ANY heavy metal release isn't metal for example (which may sound silly but I've definitely encountered those people before). Then again, a move to Non-Metal is one of the rare examples where we have a vote that includes not only a move OUT of a clan but also a move INTO another category. We would usually do that in two votes unless it would leave the release in limbo without a clan at all but when it does happen it's not dissimilar to what you're suggesting.

What does everyone else think?

Pink Turns Blue - "If Two Worlds Kiss" (1987)

German post-punk & gothic rock.

Clan Of Xymox - "Clan Of Xymox" (1985)

Dutch darkwave/gothic rock.

In Flames - "Clayman" (2000)

I haven't heard Swedish melodeath gods In Flames' fifth album since around 2009 so I thought I'd fill this gap in my understanding of the band's back catalogue with an informed rating. This release is known as the band's last full-length before steering away from death metal altogether but I've always struggled with the concept of In Flames being labeled as death metal to begin with to tell you the truth as this stuff is just so unintimidating & easy-listening compared to my own concept of what the genre represents. The album gets off to a strong-ish start with the two best tracks kicking off proceedings but things descend fairly quickly from there with only the pretty decent title track showing any sign of resurrection. At their worst, In Flames sound oh so commercial to my ears. They're certainly a talented bunch but I need a bit more grunt in my death metal. I'd no doubt take In Flames most celebrated release "The Jester Race" over "Clayman" but there's not a lot in it as neither are really my cup of tea. If you're a die-hard At the Gates, Dark Tranquillity & Soilwork fan then you may get a lot more out of "Clayman" than I have although the first two of those bands always did this stuff sssoooo much better in my opinion.

3/5

Vinny, I just noticed that we both nominated Suffocation tracks for the May playlist. I'll include your Suffocation nomination on top of your other submissions in the June playlist as I only have half as many submissions as you do this month.

Tiamat - "A Deeper Kind Of Slumber" (1997)

The infamous follow-up to 1994's classic fourth album "Wildhoney" represents the point in which the Swedish gothic metallers stepped away from metal altogether yet still managed to produce another highly engaging & universally captivating piece of creative experimentation. I'd describe it as a combination of gothic rock & Pink Floyd-inspired progressive rock for the most part although you'll also find a whole bunch of other influences scattered across the tracklisting including world music, psychedelic rock, trip hop, darkwave, new age & downtempo along with a couple of metallic tracks to remind you of past glories. It's a fascinating listen from a classy artist & I'd recommend that all of the Moonspell/Lake of Tears/Paradise Lost style gothic metal fans out there should still check it out as there are definitely enough familiar traits for you.

4/5

Ben, can you please add the 1981 self-titled debut E.P. from Australian heavy metallers Taipan? Its was released in a 12" format.

My brand new Top Ten Live Metal Releases of All Time list:

01. Leprous - "LIve at Rockefeller Music Hall" (2016)

02. Slayer - "Decade of Aggression: Live" (1991)

03. Boris with Merzbow - "Rock Dream" (2007)

04. Ozzy Osbourne - "Speak of the Devil" (1982)

05. Opeth - "The Roundhouse Tapes" (2007)

06. Slayer - "Live Undead" E.P. (1984)

07. Isis - "Live II 03.19.03" (2004)

08. Morbid Angel - "Entangled In Chaos" (1996)

09. Exodus - "Another Lesson in Violence" (1997)

10. Iron Maiden - "Live After Death" (1985)

https://metal.academy/lists/single/214

Theatre of Tragedy - "Aégis" (1998)

I was surprised by how much I enjoyed ToT's third album actually as I'm sure Ben would remember our conflict over the band's merits when it came to their earlier material back in the mid-1990's. I can't recall whether I've ever heard "Aégis" before but found it to be significantly less cheesy than I was expecting. It's certainly a much better record than the Lake of Tears album I checked out yesterday. The massive seven-piece lineup works nicely with the dual vocals being incorporated quite well, even if Liv Kristine isn't the talent that some of her gothic metal contemporaries might be. There's a strong Paradise Lost influence throughout as well as many of the big names of the 80's gothic rock scene although I have to admit that I fail to see how anyone could tag this album as gothic rock as it's clearly a metal-based release. I'd suggest that a decent description would be the gothic doom of Draconian meets female-fronted bands like The Gathering & The 3rd & the Mortal. There are a couple of flat tracks in "Cassandra" & "Poppaea" but the rest is quite engaging with the highlights being "Aoede", "Sirens" & "Bachante". This is one of the better gothic metal releases I've heard actually.

3.5/5

My updated Top Ten Gothic Metal Releases of All Time looks like this:

01. MonumentuM – “In Absentia Christi” (1995)

02. The Gathering – “Nighttime Birds” (1997)

03. Tiamat – “Wildhoney” (1994)

04. Type O Negative – “October Rust” (1996)

05. Paradise Lost – “Icon”

06. The Gathering – “Mandylion” (1995)

07. Type O Negative – “World Coming Down” (1999)

08. Paradise Lost – “Draconian Times” (1995)

09. Swallow The Sun – “Emerald Forest & the Blackbird” (2012)

10. Theatre of Tragedy - "Aégis" (1998)

https://metal.academy/lists/single/136

Lake of Tears - "Forever Autumn" (1999)

I hadn't heard anything Swedish gothic metallers Lake of Tears have done since their underwhelming 1994 "Greater Art" debut album when they were still a doom/death band but if this is the best they can do then I'm not sure they're for me. "Forever Autumn" is generally tagged as a gothic metal/gothic rock hybrid but there's no goth rock here that I can see. The majority of the tracklisting is made up of a pretty unintimidating form of gothic metal with the remainder of the album being comprised of stripped back acoustic progressive rock outings with a strong synthesizer component. Think Tiamat & Paradise Lost meets Pink Floyd & 90's Metallica & you won't be too far off the mark, particularly given that front man Daniel Brennare seems to want to clone "Load"/"Reload"-era James Hetfield pretty closely. There are a few enjoyable tracks here but I find the majority of the album to sound pretty flat.

3/5

P.S. Some of you might find it interesting that guitarist Magnus Sahlgren was a part of this lineup at the same time that he was in legendary Swedish death metal establishment Dismember.

Cacophony - "Speed Metal Symphony" (1987)

Another highly influential guitar shred record from my past. I bought this album on CD some time in the very early 1990's after discovering both Marty Friedman & Jason Becker individually & it's fair to say that it left me completely awe-stricken. With their debut collaborative effort, Marty (24 years old) & Jason (astoundingly just 17 years old) absolutely slay in what must surely be one of the heavier guitar virtuoso efforts of the time. Five of the seven tracks are vocal which suits me nicely with singer Peter Marrino's tone being similar to Blackie Lawless from WASP which I don't mind. Musically though, this is very much a take on Yngwie Malmsteen's early records & combines heavy metal, speed metal & progressive metal within a neoclassical context. The neoclassical structures are the predominant feature here though which makes "Speed Metal Symphony" a true neoclassical metal release for a change. I'll be putting through a couple of Hall entries to have heavy metal & speed metal removed as genres as they're used more as tools than as base genres. In fact, it's kinda ironic that there's only one genuine speed metal track here to be honest. "Speed Metal Symphony" may not be as strong a record as either of the boys' solo debuts or any of Yngwie's 1980's efforts but it's still worth a few listens, if only for the dazzling technical displays.

3.5/5

Motörhead - "Everything Louder Than Everyone Else" (1999)

Another very high quality live release from the London legends, this time documenting an entire 110 minute Hamburg show from 1998. It may not top 1981's classic "No Sleep Till Hammersmith" live album but it's still a top five Motörhead release as far as I'm concerned with the tracklisting & performances being everything you could hope for.

4/5

Ben, please add Adelaide brutal death metal outfit Oni's 2023 "Incantation Superstition" compilation CD.

FYI Bjorn has done the mastering for the upcoming Neuropath demo compilation CD i.e. my old death metal band. Did a splendid job too just quietly.

I shot Bjorn our reviews too & I’m sure he’ll be stoked. He told me that he was personally responsible for the recording, mixing & mastering of the album & he definitely has a knack for creating atmosphere. I was a bit worried when going into the album as it could have gotten awkward if I didn’t like it. I was prepared to simply not review it if that was the case but I’m really glad it wasn’t.

Sonny, Ben & I were waiting for your review as we both knew you’d love this one.

Fleshgod Apocalypse - "Oracles" (2009)

I can still very clearly remember my mindset upon returning to the metal scene in 2009 after a decade of electronic music indulgence. I’d grown tired of the club scene in a similar way to how I’d done with the metal one around 1997/98 & just wanted to hear something genuinely brutal again so my first moves were to see what my beloved brutal death metal subgenre had been up to since I’d last been involved with it which led me very quickly to the Italians who were making the most brutal music the world had ever heard to the time (well… shortly after checking out the latest efforts from old faves like Suffocation & Dying Fetus anyway). One of the releases that particularly blew my socks off was the debut album from Rome’s wonderfully named Fleshgod Apocalypse whose debut full-length “Oracles” offered some of the most relentless music I’d ever encountered, only with a twist or two along the way. Fleshgod Apocalypse would go on to make some fairly significant musical adjustments that would see them becoming more & more of a challenge for me in the years to come but “Oracles” excited me & saw me giving it regular spins every time I needed an adrenaline rush over the next few months. It’s been ages since I’ve listened to it though so let’s see how it’s aged.

Perhaps the biggest feather in the cap of “Oracles” is its presentation. I simply adore the cover artwork which utilizes a striking colour scheme to enhance an already attractive image. The production job is equally impressive though, perhaps even more so given just how hard it must have been to achieve this sort of clarity amidst some of the most relentless blasting you’ll ever encounter. Sure, bassist Paolo Rossi isn’t done any favours by the mix which is hardly unusual for a death metal release but the guitars are presented with supreme precision. Legendary extreme metal drummer Mauro Mercurio’s drums are certainly heavily triggered & do sound a obviously artificial when isolated in the mix but it works well for a release that’s as technically demanding & high paced as this one is.

Some of you would likely be aware of Fleshgod Apocalypse through their bombastic symphonic death metal releases from the 2010’s, particularly their popular 2011 sophomore album “Agony” (which time has seen me quite liking after overcoming some initial concerns) but the band kicked off their recording career with a couple of releases that sound a little more traditional & can now be seen as somewhat transitional even though they were Fleshgod Apocalypse’s first proper releases. What we receive from their initial effort is an extremely brutal & extraordinarily relentless release that keeps a foot in both the technical death metal & brutal death metal camps in a similar way to bands like Hour of Penance, Nile or Origin while also throwing around some neoclassical influences without fully taking the plunge like they’d do over the next couple of years. There’s not anything especially symphonic in Fleshgod Apocalypse’s metal material at this stage in their evolution but there’s definitely some attempts to use classical music as a compositional tool from the guitarists with the solos being entirely neoclassically focused. There are also four or five quite accomplished classical interludes positioned at key locations within the tracklisting & these serve a very definite purpose given the aural battery the listener is subjected to via the metal material.

So how does it all work? Well, I’m a big fan of well executed brutal death metal so I find the flat-chat, pedal-to-the-metal stuff to be nothing short of exhilarating. Hired gun Mercurio (Hour of Penance/Hideous Divinity) is unbelievably fast & his endurance is almost super-human so for someone that’s obsessed with elite-level extreme drumming “Oracles” almost falls into the novelty category (although admittedly band leader Francesco Pauli would one-up him on the next album with arguably some of the most savagely brutal drumming ever recorded). The limiting factor here though is that I find neoclassical guitar work to be at odds with the intended aura of the death metal sound. There’s just something that doesn’t sit all that comfortably with me which sees most tracks including parts that aren’t exactly as I would wish. Still, there’s a lot to love about “Oracles” with Pauli’s crushing death growls & precision riffage being combined with Mercurio’s mind-blowing fury to create some of death metal’s most over the top material.

Fleshgod Apocalypse would push the neoclassicisms one step further on their 2010 “Mafia” E.P. before cruising head-first into symphonic territory for 2011’s “Agony” sophomore album & have never looked back. Personally though, I still find this debut album to be the most appealing inclusion in the band’s back catalogue & it’s always serves me very well indeed when I’m looking for the ultimate dose of adrenaline-fueled intensity.

4/5

The Cult - "Love" (1985)

Post-punk/gothic rock from London.

Great review which very much sums up my own feelings. There's a new Hall of Judgement entry for this release if you'd like to participate too Vinny.

This nomination has been posted in the Hall of Judgement.

This nomination has been posted in the Hall of Judgement.

System of a Down - "Steal This Album!" (2002)

When I first made the decision to fill in the gaps in my understanding of Californian alternative metallers System of a Down’s widely respected back catalogue a couple of months ago, I think I subconsciously expected each release to sound drastically different from each of the other four. I mean, I’d found SOTD’s two strongest album’s (2001’s “Toxicity” & 2005’s “Mezmerize”) to sound so fresh & original when I first encountered them with the band’s quirky, avant-garde edge not sounding much like anyone else at the time so it was the obvious assumption given how wacky & infectious some of their musical excursions tend to be. It never occurred to me that SOTD could fall into some kind of comfortable groove that would see each album sounding relatively similar but that seems to be the way the chips have fallen to an extent. Don’t get me wrong, they’re such a talented bunch of musicians that they’ve never really come close to releasing anything subpar but neither have the three remaining albums lived up to the expectations set by my first SOTD experiences.

Anyway, that being said, 2002’s “Steal This Album!” record is the last of System of a Down’s five full-lengths that I’ve chosen to explore & it could be forgiven for sounding relatively similar to 2001’s “Toxicity” given the circumstances around the release. The material included on “Steal This Album!” is essentially a bunch of leftovers from the “Toxicity” sessions that originally saw the light of day through unofficial means when rough demo versions of the songs hit the internet under the “Toxicity II” title. This apparently disappointed the band enough to see them quickly engaging producer Rick Rubin to produce an official release that includes a full sixteen tracks that the band have always maintained are of a similar quality to “Toxicity” but didn’t quite fit the concept for that album. Given that information, it’s really pretty impressive that SOAD have delivered a record that can stand on its own two feet alongside the band’s other full-lengths.

Unsurprisingly, “Steal This Album!” sounds a little less cohesive than the System of a Down's stronger records & the inclusion of a full sixteen tracks seems a touch ambitious in all honesty. A little trimming wouldn’t have gone astray here & could have led to a more consistent product in my opinion. The tracklisting starts off brilliantly with two of the best & most memorable songs on the record before continuing at a reasonable level of quality for the remainder of the A side. Things start to get a bit shaky from track nine though with three or four filler songs being tossed out in relatively quick succession before things are rapidly resurrected at the end with the other two best inclusions closing out the album. I tend to get a touch lost during weaker material like “36”, “Pictures”, F**k The System” & “Ego Brain” to tell you the truth so it takes me looking at the album holistically for me to get an accurate gauge on my feelings.

I’d suggest that “Steal This Album!” is a slightly less intense record than some of System of a Down’s other works with full throttle opener “Chic ‘n’ Stu” being the obvious banger. There are a few more stripped back numbers included (like the excellent acoustic number “Roulette”) & it’s easy to see how those particular songs may not have fit into “Toxicity” as a creative statement, despite still being strong material. The band sound as tight & talented as ever here so, even though I’d suggest that this is the least impressive of System of a Down’s five albums, it’s not far behind the self-titled & “Hypnotize” in terms of general quality & easily keeps the Faith No More’s & Dir en Grey’s of the alternative metal world on their toes.

3.5/5