ZeroSymbolic7188's Reviews
Doing this review on reccomendation from user Shadowdoom9.
Let me begin by saying that this is objectively good music. It's catchy, it has a lot of memorable moments. It fits well on hard rock/metal radio stations. Most people that hear this are going to have a pretty decent time with it. I had a decent time with it myself. This might not be music that I would seek out but it's also music that I wouldn't mind coming on the radio or at a party, and it's probably very good in a live setting as well. I have some critiques, but don't get the idea that this is a bad album. Spin it and it'll be at worst just OK, and you might love it.
For me it's a bit over produced, and a bit over polished. I wish that the bass was a little heavier in the mix, and that the basslines didn't follow the guitar quite so closely. The crash symbol is also plagued by compressed production this is common on early 2000's rock and metal releases but this album is from 2011 and this should've been caught and fixed. The vocals are well done and have their heavy moments but for the most part are a little bit too clean for me.
The final package hits me like a lighter, more friendly version of Lamb of God. I prefer LoG, but this is a solid offering.
I was 13 in Mr. Byke's (thats Bi-Key not Bike) art class-the first class of the day, working on a paper animal. You know that project where you glue tissue paper to a balloon to create an animal? That one.
Anyway up to that time I had lived on a farm in the deep rural areas of Nebraska, along the Kansas Border. If you need a clearer picture do a quick google of Inavale, Nebraska and understand I was still 20 miles south of THAT, so my musical understanding consisted of 90's pop courtesy of KQKY Hits 106 (105.9)-the only radio station with a signal that would reach us, my dad's collection of OLD time country like Hank Williams Sr, Marty Robbins, Waylon Jennings, ect., and my mother who was a fan of opera, musicals, and symphonies. We did have VH1 so I got pretty acquainted with the 80s as well. I had lived a hard life out on the farm and had a lot of scholastic struggles related to a chaotic homelife. This isn't a blog about my life, but an album review so I will leave it at that. I do have point in mentioning it...
Mr. Byke was a fan of classic rock and he would bring in various mix tapes he had made and play them as we worked on our art projects. On this particular morning, one of those tapes changed my life and I remember it vividly; I'm 35 now and I can transport myself to that time and place as if it's happening right now.
THUMP... THUMP... THUMP... THUMP BROOOOWWWWW--oooooooWWWWWWW "I AM IRONMAN!" BROOOOOOOOOOOWWWW-oooooooowwww... and then what I consider to this day to be the single greatest piece of audio ever recorded, the iconic riff from Tony Iommi. I stood up and forgetting where I was exclaimed "HOLY FUCKING SHIT, WHAT THE FUCK IS THAT!?" Mr. Byke promptly handed me a detention slip but I was to serve this one in his office rather than the usual detention room. I did not mind at all to stay and have Mr. Byke tell me all about Black Sabbath, and it's wild front man Ozzy Osbourne. I also heard Randy Rhodes play "Crazy Train" that day. Ironman is this story about a man who is used and rejected by mankind, and sets on a path for revenge-it was the first time I heard lyrics that I related to-"You mean other people are unhappy too?"
That was pretty much it-I knew what I was gonna do with the rest of my life. Play heavy Metal.
And that's the impact a single track from this album had on me. There are 8 on this album. Need I say more?
I was introduced to SubRosa by word of mouth from another user here at Metal Academy called "Sonny". I decided to try out the highest rated album-this one, More Constant than the Gods.
What I got was the usual thick production that one comes to expect in a doom metal release, but this one had some stand out elements. There is a lot of orchestration in addition to the traditional doom band set up and it's done well here. The atmosphere here is crushingly beautiful melancholy. Rebecca Vernon is reminiscent of Jefferson Airplane's Grace Slick, and she uses her voice to supplement the music and enhance that atmosphere and I think that a lot of the psychedelic feel to this album comes down to her voice. "Cosy Mo" is a stand out track with strong guitar riffs, and it earns a slot in any heavy metal fan's mixed play list.
This one is not quite on the level of my absolute favorite doom metal offerings, but it is undeniably a very good doom album with many strong features.
There you have it, the pride of Salt Lake City Utah, Subrosa.
This is a good album mostly because it just unapologetically rips off Black Sabbath and Jethro Tull, in the best possible ways, and I'm not just saying that because of the presence of a flute. One of these tracks is literally all the riffs from "A New Day Yesterday" played slower and in a diferent order. If you're gonna steal, steal from the best. That's what they did here and yup it works.
YES! I fuckin' love W.A.S.P. This album, the Last Command, The Crimson Idol, and Headless Children. All fucking great! Blackie Lawless for President!
For the unaquainted, WASP is everything great about Sunset Strip sleeze. Imagine the absolute best of Motley Crue. Now imagine that it's heavier, meaner, and sleazier. That's what WASP is. They are the fuckin' gear. They will even sometimes throw in some southern rock for you. WASP is a party in your speakers, go to the party, drink some Jack, Snort some coke, bang some hookers in the back of a limo. That's what WASP sounds like, and if you just listen to them you can have all that fun without the hangovers, rehab, or STDS! That's a fuckin' win isnt it!?
I understand that Phil Lynott is beloved by many, but goddamn this album is not exciting. It just blurrs into itself, and I just want it to end honestly. Like it's the worst kind of music, because it's not awful. If it was awful I would have something to say about it, but it's not good either. If it was good I would be enjoying myself. I'm not. This is just a slog. This is some music that exists. This is a tall glass of room temperature water, and I'm not even thirsty man. This is a particularly flavorless protein bar, you CAN eat it, and it will sustain you, but it's not tastey. Is this enough metaphores? Have I gotten the mediocrity across? CAN I GO HOME NOW?
I'm going to save you a lot of time here. "Sails of Charon" fuckin' rules, and the rest of this album doesn't. I'm not the biggest Scorpion's fan in the world to begin with but this album is very uninspired and boring outside of Sails. That's it. That's all I can muster. Put "Sails of Charon" in your playlist, and then move on from this. There is no other gold in these hills.
Iron Maiden, Judas Priest, and Saxon.... Yeah one of these things is not like the other ones is it? That's a pretty distant third place. Now despite being a long way behind those legends, Saxon did carve a name for themselves, because every once in a while they had a "747-Strangers in the Night", "Denim and Leather", "Wheels of Steel", "Princess of the Night" or "Crusader" songs that are just so damn good that the band could punch far above their weight, and actually hang with the big boys on occasion, but you know what all of those songs have in common? None of them are on this album. Here you just get Saxon in their essence, which is a mid-tier throwaway NWOBHM band, and I'm still salty as fuck that they didn't play "Crusader" when supporting Priest on the Firepower tour.
Calling your band Satan is something that immediately puts me off, it just seams so try hard and edgy. I mean, bit on the nose innit? This was going to have to do something spetacular to shake the stink off of that. Album starts with over a minute intro with no metal in it-->At this point I'm not even mad just disappointed. Anyway eventually we finally get to the music, and it was a lot better than I expected. It wasn't good, but it was better than I thought it would be. What you get here is a poor man's Mercyful Fate. Now if you like most of what Mercyful Fate does but you can't get past King Diamond's falsetto, then this might be something to look at, but while you will lose the falsetto, you ill also lose a lot of polish. The band is trying their damnest-this is isn't suffering from a lack of effort. They just can't quite pull it off. The end result is somewhere between Diamond Head and Mercyful Fate, but it's not as good as either of those bands. They squeeze a 2.5 out of me here by surpassing expectations, and while it doesn't work for me, I think it will for a lot of people. This isn't going to be anyone's favorite album but it's going to be a welcome addition to a lot of playlists.
No seriously, this sucks. It's fuckin' weird to listen to, because you can hear little flashes of the Piratey stuff they would become more well known for later on. I don't like that shit either for the record. There's also something just strange about the production on this that I can't put my finger on. The best way I would describe this; Venom but without the committment to the bit that Venom had. I wasn't there in 1984, so this is just my conjecturing, but this sounds like an album that was made because the band felt they had to make it. They just don't sound into it, or like they were enjoying themselves. It's lyrically full of satan stuff, and that's not who Running Wild are. You can hear the lack of genuinity. I don't think they had fun making it, and I damn sure don't have fun listening to it.
This is mediocre speed metal but I raise it above 2.5 because it's played with such piss and vinegar. There is a certain joyous energy on this album that is infectious. I wish that i enjoyed listening to it as much as they enjoyed making it, but I just don't. Ironically my favorite track is "Feel the Same" and it feels the most bummed out of all the tracks-it sounds like something from a Scott Weirich project, and I love Scott. Seriously listen to that and picture it with Scott on the vocals it's a lost St. Vitus/Obessesd track.
You know I'll tell you why this doesn't work for me. It's got no edge. I'm the problem here. This album is just too much fun for me. I party in hell (Venom, Slayer, etc), this parties in a bar.
Right, so here we get 6tracks, and 33minutes. That's not a lot of room for error. They better all be bangers right? Well, here's what else you get: Ronnie James Dio, Ritchie Blackmore, Cozy Powell, Jimmy Bain, and Toney Carey. Yeah everybody here is a badass and in top form. I run into that familair problem now of "what to say". I mean this really is epic music that speaks better for itself than I ever could. I could describe it as classic rock or classic metal, but it's a lot more than that, it's like classic+. I could compare it to similar artists, but there really isn't anybody similar. Look, it's some of the best musicians to ever play this kind of music firing on all cylinders. Go listen to it.
I hate Queensryche, and I have always hated Queensryche. This album did not change my opinion. This is a collection of boring tracks that bleed into one another, never do anything interesting, and go on for way too long-like every Queensryche album. I have no idea how on earth this band got to level that they did, and I think it will forever be a mystery to me. Somebody's got to comment below and explain to me what I'm supposed to like about this. I made it through the hour run time but it was painful. Never again fam. Never again.
Yeah I don't know what's going on that album featuring Ozzy Osbourne and Randy Rhoads is sitting at 3.5. Bob Daisely on the bass is also very excellent and underespected.
This album has "Crazy Train" that alone is worth high merit, but it also contains "I Don't Know", "Suicide Solution", and "Mr. Crowley". All songs you've probably heard as they are classic rock radio staples and live concert mainstays. They've all also been covered several times by several people, "but Zero, what about the tracks that weren't hits?"
Fair question, let's take a look. "Goodbye to Romance" is a pretty good ballad. "Dee" is a short and sweet instrumental noodle. "No Bone Movies' is admittedly pretty mediocre but it's still got Rhoads playing some cool stuff. "Revelation/Mother Earth" is kind of a Sabbath throwback with it's slower tempo and apocalyptic warnings. "Steal Away the Night" is "No Bone Movies Again"-mediocre song slightly elevated because of what Rhoads is doing.
So yeah there are some less than legendary entries, but even those are solid enough, and the big hitters on this album are VERY BIG. This is an important album and every metalhead should have it in their collection.
I was pretty excited about this one. I had never heard it before, and the album art just tickles my brain in all the right ways. Love at first sight? Maybe let's see how the date goes...
Yeah I didn't get catfished with this one. What you have here is something like ManOwaR meets Manilla Road, but the production isn't quite as good as what you might find on albums by those bands-and that works in it's favor. I love music that sounds like this. It's a little bit messy and a little bit muddy, but not raw. It's the sound of a very nicely done demo-tape, and I absolutely love that. Like next time your band is rehearsing and your listening to the standards like ManOwaR, Manilla Road, Metallica, Iron Maiden, etc, you can pop out your copy of Omen's-Battle Cry and hit em with something a little bit diferent but equally awesome. It's that kind of buried treasure album. Lyrically mostly medievel fantasy stuff, executioners, dragons, blades, battles, the usual stuff.
All that being said this is a 5 star from me, because it just gets "the formula" right for me to do that. Another person might listen to this and find nothing special. Listen to it and form your opinion, but for me it's a banger that I'm going to come back to time and time again. It's in rotation.
I am a die hard Motorhead fan. Lemmy Kilmister is the father figure I never had. This is the band and the man that got the coveted BIG BACK PATCH on the battle vest. It's just bangers from start to finish, and an absolute monster of an album.
You get the greatest three piece Rock and Roll band that has ever existed; ON THE DRUMS PHILTHY ANIMAL TAYLOR! ON THE GUITAR FAST EDDIE CLARKE! and ON THE BASS AND VOCALS LEMMY KILMISTER! THEY WERE MOTORHEAD AND THEY PLAYED ROCK AND ROLL. NEVER FORGET THEM!
An album of fast and furious boogy-woogie rock, covering such topics as Western Movies, Gambling, Chasing Women, Life on The Road, and Rock and Roll itself.
It's as perfect as rock music gets. The fury of this band can not be described just experienced. Go experience it!
My soul small bugaboo is that it's not a metal album. Lemmy was steadfast and consistent in his feelings that Motorhead were a rock and roll band. I've read and watched everything about the man that I can get my hands on. He always maintained that while the metal and punk rock communities absolutely embrassed them-Motorhead were a straight up fast Rock and Roll band, and when I go back and listen to his inspirations: Eddy Cochran, Little Richard, etc. their influence really is quite prominent in Motorhead's music. At it's core Motorhead play that old school rock and roll, but they play it faster and meaner than anybody else was at the time, and more importantly BETTER.
For once I'm not the odd man out. This album seams to strike everyone else about the same way it strikes me. The title track is something very special, but the rest of the material never quite measures up. It's an utterly mediocre album with a couple of bright spots. "Beyond the Black" is a solid enough opening. "Gods of Wrath" is cool once in a while, title track kicks lots of ass, and you get a cover of "Highway Star" that I have dubbed "the cocaine version" because of the speed and manic vocals Metal Church put on it. It's good but nothing super special.
Some people don't like this album. SOME PEOPLE HAVE LOST THEIR MINDS!
What you get with Mercyful Fate is all of the things that you love about Iron Maiden or Judas Priest, but more evil. Dualing guitars, high (high AF in this case) vocals, thumping bass, pounding drums, it's all here. It's just that subject matter is now centered on satanism, the occult, and black masses. These are not topics that appeal to me, but this is the kind of album where I can put on my halloween costume so to speak and get in on all the evil fun! I will come to your black mass as long as there is badass heavy metal somewhere between the orgy and the virgin sacrifice, and if Mercyful Fate is the church band then I know it's gonna be there.
So for a guy like me, this is a 4 star album, but if you really like the added satanic themes then it probably ticks all your boxes for a full 5.
Look, I know that ManOwaR is a polarizing band, but I've never understood why. Eric Adams is right there with Halford, Dio, and Dickinson in the realm of mind blowing lead singers. Scott Columbus is a barbaric cannon of a drummer that suits the whole ManOwaR theme to the T. Ross the Boss can shred the paint off the walls, but he can also write catchy battle riffs, and Joey DiMaio is simply the fuckin' man on the bass. I truly believe people that hate ManOwaR just hate fun, and want everything to be sinister and serious all the time. Yes, ManOwaR are incredibly fucking cheesy-that's the point!
I read the other reviews for this album, and I thought it was odd that people were sighting the production (or lack thereof) as a negative, as some of those people champion some of the rawest black metal albums made. "The bass is too far forward in the mix". No it's fucking perfect. It's the thunder of the Heavy Metal army marging into battle! I am a sucker for the kind of cliches and cheese ManOwaR leans so heavily into; Metal as an Army, Battle Hymns, Barbarians, Swords, The Riddle of Steel. I love all of that shit! I think the production on this album actually makes it ManOwaR's heaviest offering.
Then you have the frosting on the epic cake this album is: "Bridge of Death".
The story of Bridge of Death is about a man who goes down into hell itself and walks across the titular bridge to confront the Horned one himself, not to fight him, but to become the most powerful demon in the universe. It's fucking awesome! I cap all of my workouts with this song, because when you're very tired the opening is slow and lets you catch your breath and summon strength for that final confrontation-that final set.
If nothing else you need to hear that track. The whole album is fantastic, but Bridge of Death is just a whole other level of kick ass.
Many stand against us, but they will never win! 5/5
Firepower Tour 31 March 2018 Masonic Temple Detroit MI.
The openers were Black Star Riders-basically Thin Lizzy minus Phil Lynnot, and Saxon who did not play "Crusader" that night. WTF Bill?
Judas Priest used "War Pigs" as their play on Track and the crowd was fuckin' locked in from start to finish. The whole band kicked ass, Rob Halford really does sound still sound like that. The visuals were on point. It was everything you can ask for in a live show. I would absolutely encourage anyone to catch Priest Live. Just like I would absolutely encourage anyone to listen to not only this album but everything in their discography.
METAL GODS!
Look even diet Iron Maiden is still pretty damn good, and that's what this is. I would say the music is slightly more aggressive, and that the vocals are slightly worse, and the Steve Harris bass is completely gone. It's fun, you are going to have a good time with it, but absolutely nothing in here is going to blow your mind, and there is nothing in here that Iron Maiden didn't already do better. Throw it in your mix, and it's a nice visitor every once in a while, but listening to it as a start-to-finish album will wear out it's welcome.
The "Air Raid Siren" Bruce Dickinson on the vocals.
The twin Guitar attack of Dave Murray and Adrian Smith.
The Powerful and progressive drumming of Nicko McBrain.
and of course arguably the most influencial Heavy Metal Bassist of all-time, the galloping thunder of STEVE FUCKING HARRIS!
"Aces High", "Two Minutes to Midnight", the title track, and the EPIC "Rhyme of the Ancient Mariner" are all on this album. Look man, I play heavy metal, and I'm a bassist. I fucking love Iron Maiden! If you haven't heard Iron Maiden, just stop reading this and go put it on right now. If you have heard Iron Maiden (you know 99.9% of you given where we are), then you already know this is the cream of the crop. That's it, there isn't much to be said; if you haven't heard this you should be listening to it right now, and if you have heard it you know how awesome it is. This leaves me with very little to do. Now I have some very important top secret bass guitar business to tend to that supercedes any need you might have for this here review.
"Stand up and shout" doesn't do much for me, but it's a fine opener and sets the tone for the upbeat, and fun power metal that's coming. This is just metal of the highest quality, it's got catchy hooks in every instrument whether it's the galloping bass on "Holy Diver" the keyboard riff on "Rainbow in the Dark", or the abundance of great guitar riffs everywhere throughout. It's all capped off by Ronnie Jame Dio's vocal delivery and I think it's well-known that he's one of the best to ever do it. Lyrically this is largerly a positive and up-beat affair about believing in oneself. Look, I don't have the gift of gab to do this justice. This is legendary and for good reason.
Yeah yeah I know. If I just listened to this again, it's all gonna click on try number 1,648. Here's the deal, I've revisited this album more times than it deserves since I discovered them by way of Garage Inc in 1998. It's 2024 so I've had 26years of this to form my opinion, and my opinion is that it sucks.
I think that "Am I Evil" is a monumentally overrated song. I've never understood it's appeal, and at least state-side to my knowledge nobody else did either until Metallica covered it.
I am also not a 12 year old turbo-hormoned boy. I am a 35year old grown ass man (married for 7 of them) so the appeal of a 7minute ode to fellatio is lost on me. I just don't need that brother.
Those are the album standouts. The rest is mediocre to bad filler stuff. Seriously even people who rate this album higher than I did just talk about those two songs primarily, because nothing else on it is remotely interesting.
If you like it, crank that shit up, but don't do it around me or I'm taking away your AUX privileges.
This is tough, because I like the music quite a bit, and I kept going back and forth on Tim Baker's vocal approach. I ultimately decided that there had to be somebody who could have done it better. There are a lot of good riffs, melodies, and grooves in this album, but you have to deal with Baker just being obnoxious. There are cases where not having the "best" vocals works out for a band. I don't want anyone other than Cronos singing in Venom, and if I'm listening to Manilla Road, I want Mark the Shark. Tim Baker does not have that charm, he's just annoying. I ultimately decided that the music is a 5/5 but Tim's vocal is a -2.5 penalty and put this thing right in the middle. No disrespect to Tim, it just doesn't work for me-it grates.
So yeah in short; really great classic heavy metal here, tainted by an aggressively agitating vocalist. If you can tolerate Tim, you'll really love this.
You come to this album for 1 reason, and that's the title track.
"Angel Witch" by Angel Witch, from the album Angel Witch is one of the best metal songs ever recorded. It is a masterpiece of a song and a mandatory listen. However, the rest of this album is painfully mediocre, verging on boring. Unfortunately "Angel Witch" is the first song on the album, so you spend the whole album longing for the band to do something that good again, and it just never happens. It's like in Space Jam where the aliens sap all the talent from the NBA players. Those same aliens visited Angel Witch after recording that opening track. It's a shame really. So this is a 2.0 album that I am raising to a full star on the merits of that song alone.
How much you enjoy accept is going to have a bit to do with how you feel about Udo Dirkschnieder's vocal appraoch. He's got a high nasal timbre that's like a slightly more aggressive version of what Brian Johnson does for ACDC. Personally I am fine with it but there are better out there.
The album is top heavy, throwing the haymaker that is "Fast as a Shark" right out of box, and it is the heaviest thing on the album and a classic track. You also get the title track and "Shake Your Heads" in the first half. The rest of the album up to "Princess of the Dawn" is just filler, but Accept's filler is still better than most bands filler. These other songs aren't bad just not exceptional in any way.
"Princess of the Dawn" is a pretty good song but it's just a tad bit long for what it is. Accept is not a progressive enough band to be doing 6+ minute long songs.
All in all if you like metal or 80s hard rock you're going to have fun with this. It's a good album if not quite legendary. The stars on it shine very brightly.
Reviewing this because it is on the home page. It's the summation of everything that I hate in metal. Opening track is 3+ minutes of absolutely no metal-Imagine for a moment that you bought this for $12 bucks, ready for some metal, and then whole first track just pisses in your face like that? NICE!
When we finally hear some metal it's of the most generic shit imaginable. Vocalist has no defining character in his voice, just a generic half-assed grunt that sounds like he's trying to push out a... you get the idea. Then somewhere during the 2nd track the grim reaper of heavy metal-the blackest of all black angels: Soft feminine soprano comes in and Zero taps the fuck out like he's in the goddamn sharpshooter.
This is metal for people who likeEvanessence but want to feel edgy while they listento their shitty mall goth rock. An absolute warcrime.
Yeah, I like this so much that I named myself after it.
If you've seen my review of "The Sound of Perseverance", many of the same things I said about that album also apply to this one. It's very hard not to do a copy and paste job here.
The long story short is that Chuck Schuldiner means an awful lot to me. I consider every Death album to be peak metal. The only reason I don't simply put all of their albums in my top 20 (and very possibly 1-7) is because I have to give other bands a chance. Each one is a different flavor of awesome, and I mean awesome in the literal sense "extremely impressive, and inspiring great admiration". The one that becomes your favorite is going to come down to personal taste, for me this is #2, but for many people it's the #1. I wouldn't even argue with that.
so, like I said copy+paste job, everything about this album is perfectly done. The mix, the vocals, the lyrics, the musicianship-everything is perfect. I mean don't rely on my limited vocab and poor grammar to get this thing across. Seek it out, turn it up, and let is speak to your soul. Listening to this album made me a better, more compassionate, spiritual, and contemplative man. Perhaps it can do some or all of that for you...
Or maybe its just really damn good music to throw into your mix. You can get spiritual about it, and many people do, but you can also throw it on and just rock the fuck out! This isn't Pink Floyd after all, this is METAL!
If you have the opportunity to see DEATH TO ALL live, absolutely do it. You're going to see really damn good musicians preserve Schuldiner's legacy. I saw them a couple days ago at time of post, and it was the greatest live experience of my life by a long way, and I've seen an incredible amount of live shows.
This album marks the end of my North Clan challenge, and with hope unlocks my 4th clan!
Forget about black metal, this is a beautiful masterpiece of music. This is the rare kind of music that emotionally moves me. Prior to this I listened to and reviewed Anno Domini from Tormentor and that was going to be a very difficult act to follow, and I expected to feel a bit flat at the end of the journey. Yet, here is Ulver with an absolutely gorgeous musical landscape, and an interesting story told-this is a concept album that tells a Scandanavian folk tail.
Sometimes in life, you have to realize when it's someone else's time to shine; The best way to hear this album for the first time is with the aid of Ben's review of it found here: https://metal.academy/reviews/651/285 . Ben has broken down each chapter of the story told in the album and done a better job of describing its contents than I ever could.
I usually find this kind of emotional response in funeral doom, but Ulver has done it here in the abbrasive, dissonant, and harsh world of black metal. Truly an astounding achievement and wonderful conclusion to the North Clan challenge. May the flame of black metal continue burning eternal, lighting our way through the harsh frozen wilderness of life.
Oh yeah this is reallly fantastic. It sounds like Slayer's Show no Mercy meets Bathory Under the Sign of the Black Mark. Blistering riffs everywhere, blast beats and some good ol fashioned thrash metal drumming, and the vocal prowess of Attila Csihar. PRE-Mayhem! Have I sold you on it yet? Full-Volume, No Skips. Lryical variety. I do wish the bass was a bit higher in the mix but you can't have everything-it isn't absent I just want more. I have theory that if a black metal band/album contains a reference to Elizabeth Bathory it will be great. Gonna test that later. You absolutely must listen to this album WOW!
BTW, there are three versions of the album I am aware of. I reviewed based on the 1988 studio version. There was a remaster in 2005, and the album art shown here is of a live recording that I think is from 2018.
Satyricon is a band with two distinct eras; the thin blasty variety found on this album which sounds like most things in this genre from that time, and the Black N Roll era of the music they play today.
What's that outside? Holy shit it's a bunch of corpse paint-clad purists marching on my lawn because I like the Black N Roll stuff better.
Adjectives: Low-fi, blast beat, tremelo guitar, raspy vocal. Did I get everything? No? There are medievel instrumental ambient passages in here too? Do they score extra points for that? Not from me.
It's the same monotonous drivel again, and this isn't Nemisis Devina, so you don't even get "Mother North" for your troubles.
Before I listen: I'm pretty excited to hear this one, because I know it's legendary. It's one of those icons that got away from me until now. I remember watching BANGERtv a couple years ago, and Sam Dunn was very insistent that Sarcofago should be considered as a black metal founder. He got voted down by his co-hosts and the viewers if I remember it all correctly. He seamed pretty dejected about this but he accepted the verdict. Let's see what Mr. Dunn was getting on about.
Well, it's fine. It's again of the overwhelmingly satanic breed of black metal. The vocals are at times a little bit lower than standard for Black Metal-dipping into death metal-esque growls. As a bonus, if you absolutely need a man to describe cunnilingus and fellatio in fairly vivid detail "Ready to Fuck" is the song for you! Personally, my own love life is such that I don't need somebody else to sing that to me. The odd thing about that song is that their actually isn't any fucking, just foreplay. You see they aren't fucking yet, just getting ready to fuck. I'm milking this one right now because it's the only departure from black metal cliche's on the album.
Anyways, history is doing them a lot of favors if this came out later nobody would talk about it. The thing is it wasn't even the most extreme thing of it's time. That's a misconseption. If you want the real roots of black and death metal I would point you in the direction of Medellin, Columbia as early as 1983 (4 years prior to this album) and encourage you to see what bands like Parabellum, Reencarnation, Blasphemia, Astaroth, and Pyrokenisis were churning out. Sorry Mr. Dunn.
It's a little bit better than dumpster fire tier, but it's nothing remarkable either.
My rating for this album is proof that I do put the music first. Samael biblically is the husband of Lilith, and the king of demons, and this album art may be a reference to the crown of thorns, but it also has a possible second meaning. You see my wife is one of the proud and few members of the Sphere-our resident Industrial clan, and fans of industrial music are sometimes reffered to as "rivet heads". I think the cover might be a clever double entrendre. Please do confirm or deny if this has come up in an interview somewhere.
With all the Satanic/Anti-Christian stuff I would usually be ripping this thing apart, but here's the thing. When the music is this fucking good, I don't give a shit what's being sung about. Black Metal meets Industrial Metal in a fairly uncommon marriage here and you get 30+ minutes of riffs and grooves, and every single one of them is top-notch. The production is still definitely black metal, but it's cleaned up a little bit more than most of the releases of this era. and my favorite feature of all; the bass is not only audible but capably played!
I don't think that you have to be a fan of black metal, or heavy metal at all even to enjoy this-which means some edgy basement dwelling purist is going to throw a grown man temper tantrum about how this isn't TRVE black metal. Yeah, Fuck that guy. TURN IT UP!
That band is called Rotting Christ. The album cover is a goat with a pentagram and then a depiction of 3 crucified figures. What could possibly be the subject matter of this?
Yup it's "cold beet", "small town", "dirt road" black metal again. This time the relentless blast beats have melody... sort of... I mean I guess. This type of thing really does only make sense to me through the lense of a pre-teen edgelord. If I think about being that age and wanting to piss off authority figures then I somewhat see the appeal of this, but all of that appeal is in the album art. Lyrically it appeals to the lowest common denominator (demonator?) of black metal fandom, and sonically it's half baked. Put it on your wall if you must, but keep it away from your turn table.
This is it. Possibly the most famous Black Metal Album of all time. How big is it? Well, I teach in a place where the primary artists among my students are SadaBaby, SexyRed, TGrizzley, and other tons of Detroit based trap rap, but they know this album. Is it coasting off of controversey or is there something to it? Let's find out!
It's actually really damn good. The bands gorey history might get a decent audience in the door, but all of that stuff happened in the early 90's, we would not talk about it in high regard 30years later if there was no substance. It has a unique production that somehow satisfies both fans of polished production and the ultra-raw stuff. It's got the blast beats, the razorsharp tremelo picked guitars, and atmosphere for days. It also has Athila Csaer on the microphone, and he's a force of nature. He actually performed this whole album accompied only by a smalll string ensemble, you can find this on youtube, and it's worth seeking out. You even get audible basslines!
Every track is great here, a no-skips affair for the black metal crowd. It's all just very tight, diabolical in all the right ways, and though Sathanas is in the album title, it doesn't lean on explicit references to Satan and hell, or take cheapshots at Christianity. Instead of hearing about Satan explicity, you just feel him everywhere in this album, like he's in the corner of the room behind you the whole time. Lyrically you get poetic descriptions of sinister forces; a fog that moves through a village and kills all the trees in it's wake, contemplation and committment to suicide only to die unremarkably and unremembered, a ghost that haunts the icy forest forever following the freezing moon, etc.
It's all far more frightening than anything by the overtly satanic bands.
In medieval times certain intervals of music were prohibited because it was believed to summon satan. I don't believe in such a thing, but if it were possible to summon the dark lord by playing music this would be a good album to do it with.
This was a new one for me, and I'm glad I found it. It's an absolute banger.
The music on this album is so good that I was compelled to look up the translations. To my pleasant surprise it's not just a bunch of satan slop. The lyrics here are definitely occult, but not outright satanic and that's the diference to me between mundane and interesting. You can find them here: https://ultimatemetal.com/threads/masters-hammer-english-language-translations.522936/ Good job lads!
Sonically, it sounds like Bathory mixed with the first two Metallica albums. Though it is never as fast or tight as the Kill 'em All or Ride the Lightning, that's part of the charm here. Instead the riffs have some room to breath, and this gives the album some grooves that remind me of traditional doom metal in a bizarre way.
Saving the best for last. the vocalist on this album is František Štorm, which I hope is pronounced something like "Frantic Storm", because that's his vocal approach. He throws every black metal technique you can ask for at the wall in this one. He is a fascinating man, a Czech born guy that likes to spend his time in India, and he's also a teacher, as I am. I would absolutely love to pick his brain. His voice has a very unique timbre that's hard to describe-something of a Black Metal Goblin. It's either going to put you off, or it's going to be the most fun voice you've heard in the genre. I'll leave you with a picture of the handsome devil: https://cdn.xsd.cz/original/e64695d280c8355a8ca284ca97f5a2a5.jpg
Now go enjoy this album. I certaintly did!
I love anything having to do with vampires. I also love SDBM, and this seams to be the prototype for that! This is absolutely sublime! I'm even going to give that silly ass cover a pass here.
You only thought early black metal had raw production values. This very well may not have had any production values. Where as a lesser band would just buy a cheap casette recorder, put it down in the middle of the room and press record, these guys went the extra mile by taking that recording, playing it through a telephone, and then recording that. I'm not even being satirical here, that is what the production sounds like, and it works. It works extremely well. The drums were made with just a bass drum and a pair of hitstix: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hit_Stix. Seriously, I had some as kid, they sound exaclty like the drums here. The guitar tone is nothing special but it sounds a little bit diferent again because of the production values, it's just unique enough to stand out. I'm spending a lot of words on the production because it is the engine that makes this whole album go. If this was polished, even a little bit the whole thing would fall apart.
There are a couple of other secret weapons here. Despite claiming to have made a "fuck you" record, I actually think they cared quite a bit. The lyrics occasionally do venture into satanic territory, which I insist is a crutch in the sub-genre, but it's not the identity of the album. What this album is really about is gothic atmosphere, and feeling like a vampire-like something that looks human, but is so horribly twisted on the inside that it really couldn't be farther from human. To get that across in lyric form is not easy to do, but it has been done expertly here. The guitar rifs as lo-fi, distorted, and harsh as they are, are also very catchy and memorable-again not the product of a musican who didn't care. This was carefully constructed thoughtful stuff-but at a time where a black metal musician didn't dare say as much.
