Daniel's Forum Threads
Wormrot - "Voices" (2016)
Extreme metal fans generally frothed over 2022's fourth full-length "Hiss" from Singapore grindcore masters Wormrot but I have to admit that I didn't think it was quite as special as most punters seemed to claim, despite being a pretty enjoyable listen. And one of the reasons for that is that I'd already been really digging the trio's excellent third album "Voices" for six years by that stage so my expectations were very high. You see, "Voices" is a step up from "Hiss" in my opinion. It may not see the band experimenting quite as much with outside influences but there are still plenty of change-ups to keep me on my toes. The differentiator is in the execution though as "Voices" is a brutal-as-fuck exercise in extremity that's been stunningly produced to leave the listener with the perfect sound for hardcore-based music. Oh, the wonderful guitar crunch of Rasyid (Marijannah) & Vijesh's (Code Error) ultra-powerful snare sound! What a pleasure they are to hear while the musicianship is also outstanding for grindcore music. Former Code Error front man Arif's psychotic vocals are simply devastating most of the time with plenty of variation thrown in to ensure that this doesn't drift into mindless blasting territory but it's Vijesh's drumming that's the clear highlight here as his style fits right inside my wheelhouse. I've long thought that "Voices" might be one to eventually crack my Top Ten Grindcore Releases of All Time list & what do you know... I was right! It's probably Wormrot's finest hour for mine.
For fans of Insect Warfare, Nasum & Pig Destroyer.
4/5
Here's my revised Top Ten Grindcore Releases of All Time list:
01. Nails - "Abandon All Life" (2013)
02. Nails - "You Will Never Be One Of Us" (2016)
03. Discordance Axis – “The Inalienable Dreamless” (2000)
04. Pig Destroyer – “Prowler in the Yard” (2001)
05. Pig Destroyer – “Terrifyer” (2004)
06. Wormrot - "Voices" (2016)
07. Nasum - "Helvete" (2003)
08. Atka - "Untitled Album 1" (2018)
09. Terrorizer - "World Downfall" (1989)
10. Repulsion – “Horrified” (1989)
https://metal.academy/lists/single/149
Bohren & der Club of Gore - "Black Earth" (2002)
After my incredibly successful revisit to 2000's "Mission Sunset" album recently, I thought I'd pull out my old "Black Earth" CD too & have been rewarded to an equally mind-blowing extent. These guys are quite frankly playing on another level to the rest of the dark jazz scene & I now have to speak of them in terms of being one of my very favourite musical artists overall. "Black Earth" is even deeper, darker & more stripped back than "Mission Sunset" was & sits right up my alley from a stylistic point of view. I think I'd give its predecessor a slight edge over it in terms of overall consistency these days though but there's very little in it as both are pretty much perfect. I challenge any doom metal fan to tell me that this jazz is not their bag.
For fans of Dale Cooper Quartet & The Dictaphones, The Kilimanjaro Darkjazz Ensemble & Mount Fuji Doomjazz Corporation.
5/5
Negură Bunget - "OM" (2006)
I first encountered Romanian black metallers Negură Bunget through the tape trading scene back in the mid-1990's with their 1996 "Zîrnindu-să" debut release not doing very much for me to tell you the truth. I wouldn't encounter them again until Ben introduced me to their fourth full-length "OM" upon my return to metal from a decade-long hiatus in 2009 & I have to admit that I initially found it to be a challenge for a few reasons. Time saw me warming to it though & I now find myself returning to "OM" semi-regularly, if not claiming it to be the masterpiece that many punters would have you believe it is.
"OM" possesses a very clear personality that's all its own with its array of different sounds & influences being presented in a fairly coherent way throughout & the main attraction being the full, lush synthesizer sounds of front man Hupogrammos (Dordeduh/Sunset in the 12th House) & fellow guitarist Sol Faur (Dordeduh/Sunset in the 12th House). Hupogrammos' vocal performance is passionate & authentic too which fits the requirement nicely. Unfortunately, all is not roses though with the thin rhythm guitar tone & weak snare sound leaving a little to be desired & not doing a very good job at masking the instrumentalist's obvious technical limitations. The six-string performances of both men are fairly sloppy at times while drummer Negru's blast beats are an absolute rabble that should never have been attempted on the evidence presented here. Thankfully though, the atmospherics on display throughout "OM" are generally quite stunning which allows the album to overcome those deficiencies reasonably comfortably. It certainly helps that the opening three tracks are nothing short of marvelous & it's a little disappointing that the quality dial never quite reaches those heights again for the remainder of this lengthy 67-minute release. Progressive folk metal number "Hora soarelui" is the only genuine disappointment included though with its bouncy folk melodies being a little too much for this battle-hardened extreme metalhead to cope with.
For all its failings, I find "OM" to be an endearing listen these days, as well as being the clear career high-point of Negură Bunget's inconsistent recording career overall.
For fans of Dordeduh, Marțolea & Darkestrah.
4/5
Ministry - "The Land of Rape and Honey" (1988)
I introduced Ben to these Chicago industrial metal legends through the more popular tracks from their classic 1992 fifth album "ΚΕΦΑΛΗΞΘ [Psalm 69]" shortly after it was released & those experiences saw him racing out & purchasing the CD post haste. We both went pretty nuts for that record for a long while afterwards & Ben would subsequently go about picking up a handful of other Ministry CDs in the coming months, including 1988's excellent "The Land of Rape & Honey" third album which is the centre of this discussion. It was the first Ministry record to see mastermind Al Jourgensen's signature sound starting to take shape with songs like the brilliant high-octane industrial metal anthem "The Missing" & the very solid industrial rock/metal hybrid "Deity" being closest to the mark. "The Land of Rape & Honey" is very much a story of two halves though with the B side being dominated by more of an electro-industrial sound like we'd heard on a chunk of Ministry's more-than-decent 1986 sophomore album "Twitch". For this reason, I'm gonna suggest that "The Land of Rape & Honey" feels a little like a transition record as it hasn't quite committed to its sound as yet but is still full of high-quality industrial music. Thankfully, I'm more than down for some well-produced electro-industrial material, as evidenced by how nuts I've gone for the powerful dancefloor number "You Know What You Are" this week which I'm pretty devastated I never considered dropping into my club sets while DJing during the 2000's. The quality does fade a little over the last couple of tracks though with electro closer "Abortive" in particular sounding like a bit of a mess.
I'm sure there's probably a bit of a nostalgia factor with how much enjoyment I've gotten out of this release this week but I'm gonna suggest that it's a slightly better record than 1996's highly regarded sixth full-length "Filth Pig" or the previously mentioned "Twitch", even if it doesn't reach the upper echelons of Ministry's potential like the incredible trio of "The Mind is a Terrible Thing to Taste", "In Case You Didn't Feel Like Showing Up (Live)" & "ΚΕΦΑΛΗΞΘ [Psalm 69]" did during their 1989-1992 heyday. Any Ministry fan worth their salt should definitely be well versed in "The Land of Rape & Honey" though because Al hasn't produced anything of this quality for well over three decades now.
For fans of Skinny Puppy, Front 242 & KMFDM.
4/5
Parnassus - "In doloriam gloria" (1995)
Ben picked this debut album up on CD back at around the time of release & seemed to like it quite a bit from memory. I traditionally used to struggle with it though so I haven't returned to it since but I thought I'd give it another chance to impress me this week. Parnassus was a one-man solo project from a Swedish gentleman going by the name of Fredrik Söderlund who you may also know as one half of martial industrial act Puissance. "In doloriam gloria" sees him presenting us with a clear musical direction that's built around some fairly unintimidating & positive sounding keyboards that have been consciously brought right to the front of the mix with the lightning-fast, tremolo-picked guitars & continuous bombardment of high-velocity (not to mention quite repetitive) drum-machine blast-beats being left at the back & sounding pretty thin for the most part. The atmosphere is undeniably centred around fantasy with that Lord of the Rings style feel being pretty easy to buy into. Personally, I find most of this to be far too high on lightweight melodies for my taste so I only really find myself enjoying a couple of the eight tracks on offer, namely the half-decent "Void of All Desires" & the hypnotic instrumental interlude "Cum trist issimo dolore". The rest of the tracklisting is more or less none of my business but I'd be overstating things to call it low quality. It's just designed for a fairly niche audience that I'm not associated with so, on this occasion, I'm gonna have to leave Ben to galivant around his bedroom in his Parnassus undies all on his lonesome (not that I'd ever consider joining him in that undertaking anyway because... let's face it... I don't have a plastic Viking sword & helmet worthy of the exercise). After my initial experiences with this debut, I steered well clear of Söderlund's 1997 sophomore album "Let the Stars Fall & the Kingdom Come" so I have no idea how it compares with "In doloriam gloria".
For fans of Dies Irae, Eldrig & Tartaros.
3/5
Gojira - "The Link" (2003)
I think the 2003 sophomore album from these Frenchmen is probably the least impressive release I've heard from them to tell you the truth (Note: I'm still yet to experience 2021's "Fortitude" album), although I was still very close to awarding it an additional half-star as Gojira are undoubtedly a class act. "The Link" just lacks the genuine highlights required to get it there & the tracklisting fades a bit over the last few tracks in my opinion. It's a highly complex record in terms of rhythm & is way more of a progressive metal album than it is a death metal one. In fact, I'm gonna suggest that a death metal primary is misguided here actually as the majority of "The Link" simply doesn't feel like death metal. The groove metal influence that Gojira are known for is definitely evident though. There's some very solid stuff on this record. I just don't think there's enough to make it essential listening.
For fans of Meshuggah, Mastodon & Strapping Young Lad.
3.5/5
Chelsea Wolfe - "Birth of Violence" (2019)
I've intended on exploring some of Wolfe's solo material in more detail for a long time now (ever since falling in love with her collaboration with Converge "Bloodmoon: I" back in 2020 actually) but haven't gotten around to it until now, although I have skipped through her 2015 "Abyss" record on occasion. "Birth of Violence" is Chelsea's ninth full-length & sees her combining gothic country & dark folk to brilliant effect. Her voice is incredibly powerful yet super-sweet at the same time & I have to admit that I've somewhat fallen in love with her talents over the past week. This record is dark & introspective yet still devastatingly emotive & dynamic & I can't help but feel that it's been heavily underrated as I consider it to be nothing short of classic.
For fans of Emma Ruth Rundle, Jay Jayle & Darkher.
4.5/5
Just finished season 10 of "The Walking Dead" &, while I did enjoy it, I think it was a little poorly structured & a bit long. They should never have ended it with an historical episode that really didn't do anything to leave me hanging for season 11 either. It's one of the show's weaker series in my opinion.
Dark Tranquillity - "The Gallery" (1995)
I wasn't much of a fan of this Swedish melodeath pioneer's 1993 debut album "Skydancer" but was impressed enough by their follow-up "The Gallery" to purchase it on CD upon release. It's interesting that I thought it was pretty great at the time but haven't felt like giving it a revisit in decades which is telling really. It shows that I had perhaps overrated the album's appeal & that was proven this week as it can't compete with the most elite releases from the subgenre in my opinion. It's certainly very consistent in its quality with no week tracks included & the compositional & structural work is quite ambitious. It's just that I don't connect with the more overtly Iron Maiden-inspired melodeath as much as most extreme metal fans (at least not in modern times) & "The Gallery" is a prime example of that sound.
For fans of In Flames, At the Gates & Insomnium.
3.5/5
Here's my adjusted Top Ten Melodic Death Metal Releases of All Time list:
01. At The Gates – “Slaughter Of The Soul” (1995)
02. Stortregn - "Finitude" (2023)
03. Carcass – “Heartwork” (1993)
04. Sentenced – “North From Here” (1993)
05. In Mourning – “The Weight Of Oceans” (2012)
06. The Breathing Process - “Odyssey (un)Dead” (2010)
07. Unanimated - "In the Forest of the Dreaming Dead" (1993)
08. Amorphis - "The Karelian Isthmus" (1992)
09. Amorphis - "Tales From The Thousand Lakes" (1994)
10. At The Gates - "Terminal Spirit Disease" (1994)
https://metal.academy/lists/single/147
I have been on an exploration of The Fallen clan releases from 2010 and sound found myslef back with Wolvserpent also:
Wolvserpent - "Blood Seed" (2010)
In terms of my exploration of The Fallen clan, one sub-genre that is noted as “not for me” is drone metal. Unable to fathom the appeal of Sunn O))), Earth or Khanate despite numerous attempts, I soon got to the opinion that this was never an area of music that I was going to gel with. Then I remembered Wolvserpent. I recalled how I had become lost in the ethereal beauty of their Perigaea Antahkarana and Aporia:Kala:Ananta releases from over a decade ago. How the haunting strings of violins played by a seemingly melancholy soaked set of troubled spirits had soothed my frantic thoughts before a crashing riff came in to wipe away any lingering fears in my soul.
As soon as I put Blood Seed on recently, I quickly found myself in the exact same space. This is the debut from the now defunct duo, from back in 2010 when the pair had been around for five years prior as Pussygutt. Brittany McConnell handled the drums as well as that tormented violin sound and Blake Green covered guitar and vocals. Not that vocals play a big part in the debut (or indeed any other release from Wolvserpent), the band have always been about the music, and this was set out very clearly on their first release. Side A is a single track, ‘Wolv’ and the ‘Serpent’ track makes up side B. I can imagine a wolf or two padding around some dark forests, hunting for prey, searching for signs of life to take from unsuspecting animals to the first track. The choral style howls and guttural gurns perhaps imitating the language between the menacing pack of predators (or maybe the screams of the victims?). At over twenty-two-minutes long, this track requires attention to fully embrace the magic of it, yet I find this a very easy ask to comply with.
‘Serpent’ lands a little shorter in duration at the eighteen-minute mark. Straight out the blocks, I can envisage a coiled snake, slowly unfurling itself to the nightmarish atmospheres that open the track. Brittany’s violin is accompanied by some distant howls (the ‘Wolv’ I suspect) courtesy of the guitar of Blake and a tense atmosphere permeates between the instrumentation. You may have noticed by now dear reader, that for someone who opened this review by remarking how little they like drone metal, I have managed to wax lyrical about a drone metal release for over two paragraphs thus far. In my defence, I think Wolvserpent are a different offering to any of the other bands that I mentioned above. They have more obvious “sections” to their tracks, incorporating varied elements of sludge (around the six-minute mark of track 2), doom, dark folk, chamber music as well as drone also of course.
Although repetition is still a mainstay here, there is enough going on at any given time to keep me focused entirely on Blood Seed, which is the similar experience that I have of their other releases I am familiar with. In short, all of drone may well not be a write off for me after all.
4/5
Converge - Love Is Not Enough (2026)
Genre: Metalcore
Considering that I'm trying hard to diversify my 2026 chart more and I've already heard a good deal of metal for the year, there aren't many metal bands I'd break the rule for. But this year's got a couple banger bands I'm already huge on. This: it's a CONVERGE album. Even this late in their career, are we to expect disappointment? It's doing surprisingly well with the metalcore community, even nine years after their last studio album (not counting that collab in 2021). Having said that, this album is made up of many of the same elements that many previous Converge albums are driven on. We get the sludge, the crossover, the mathcore, and it manages to be some of the heaviest shit you'll ever hear without going into black or death, yet again. With every song feeling different from the last, this short and sweet album delivers the full Converge experience, which means the band is still in good form. However, what is the SONGWRITING quality in comparison to like albums from the past? Still good. Inspiring even, but like The Dusk in Us, it's more simplistic and less surprising overall. Of course, one interesting surprise was that 2.5 minute dark ambient track in the middle, which stands out from the choice of genre alone but is relatively just a somewhat interesting midtro to the album and intro to the track Amon Amok if anything. But despite this, all other aspects of Converge, including the ability to write completely different songs with the same identity, as well as their indomitable heaviness, remains the same. In their efforts to remain Converge, they've lost none of their identity. I may even put this in EXACTLY the same league as The Dusk in Us.
92
Roland Kayn - "Tektra" (1984)
Now, this release was a serious challenge given its enormous 292-minute run time which takes up 6 LPs or 4 CDs. It's taken me a full week (or more) to get through three full listens but the effort was thoroughly rewarded with one of the most forward-thinking, ground-breaking releases I've ever encountered. If you like drone then look no further because most of this material is utterly transcendent. I find it to be utterly ridiculous that "Tektra" was released way back in 1984.
For fans of Bernard Parmegiani, Eliane Radigue & Alvin Lucier.
4.5/5
Black Lodge - "Covet" (1995)
Ben & I jumped onboard with this one-off album from an obscure Norwegian doom/death outfit back around the time of release & both really enjoyed it. Black Lodge were a six-piece band that included female clean vocalist Monica Pedersen (Sirenia), bassist Halvor Larsen (Ljå) & drummer Frode Gundersen (Twin Obscenity) among others. Their sound was quite dirty & authentic while offsetting that filthiness with the beautiful vocals of Pederson whose contribution reminds me quite a bit of The 3rd & the Mortal. My Dying Bride were clearly an influence but Black Lodge give "Covet" their own unique flavour which is contributed to by the production job which features a guitar tone that wouldn't have seemed out of place on an Autopsy record. Highly recommended.
For fans of Paradigma, Unholy & Mindrot.
4/5
Oh it's a rabbit hole for sure there's an entire gigantic iceberg chart dedicated to it:
https://www.reddit.com/r/IcebergCharts/comments/1466qe1/experimentalavantgarde_metal_iceberg_500_entries/#lightbox