review by: Brandon Strader

Angel of Eden is led by Roger Staffelbach, who’s mainly a member of Artension. The End of Never will knock your socks off by the second song if the first song hadn’t already.

To clarify here, Angel of Eden is not one of those large prog projects with a multitude of guest spots. However, you wouldn't know it wasn't if someone told you otherwise. The sound is masterful with talented, quick, neo-classical guitar solos and interesting rhythms. These are complimented by the equally impressive keyboards provided by Giuseppe Iampieri, who has previously worked with Bruce Dickinson and others. This is a bit beyond the scope of what you would expect from Dickinson, yet it definitely has that traditional heavy metal feel despite being a more neo-classical style of power metal.

Of course classical music doesn't lend itself to a lot of diverse interpretations. People seem to recreate the main popular structures of classical music, and as a result, neo-classical bands all step on each others' feet at one time or another. What separates Angel of Eden from every other neo-classical metal band over the years lies mostly in their compositional style. Neo-classical musical usually tends to take a specific direction, and although Angel of Eden does dabble in the expected, they can also go above and beyond.

For example, they go into darker sounding territory that bands like Adagio have been known to dwell in. The classical style solos on "Return of The Pharao (Pt. I)", an instrumental track, are nothing short of extraordinary. Angel of Eden changes mood a lot between songs, and they don't just stick to one tried and true theme. They mix it up a lot and keep it interesting, and also throw in a kind of rock 'n' roll joy and enthusiasm to their presentation. The End of Never is ultimately satisfying and very thoroughly crafted. Neo-classical power metal fans will love this. (8.5/10)

review by: Pal Meentzen

Condom of Hate must be some product of deliberate bad taste, what with a classic Sovjet-style design, a self-proclaimed "bulldozer fuckin’grind core scum band" style, and song titles like "Experiment With Excrement," "Rectal Spit Into the Soul" or "Antichrist Super Star" (cliché, cliché).

review by: Chaim Drishner

review by: Roberto Martinelli

review by: Roberto Martinelli

review by: Roberto Martinelli

review by: Mladen Škot

Apparently, Blackwinds is a project currently including Infaustus and Lord Mysteriis (Setherial) but you'd be hard pressed to find ANY traces of Setherial in it. Oh, one moment... there is one... the hatchet Mysteriis is holding in the picture on the back of the booklet is the same one he held on the front cover of Hell Eternal. But the music...

Okay, we don't expect a Setherial member's side project to sound like Setherial. But there are some standards we expect... like writing diverse songs and being convincing. None of that here. Basically, in 50-something minutes you get typewriter-sounding continuous two bass drums or the time-tried and tested Darkthrone beat. The riffs, if they can be called such, consist of two chords for the verse and three for the chorus, and the vocals enter too soon and just do the nursery rhyme thing or whatever you've heard Swedish black metal screamers do a million times before.

Occasionally, there will be a very subtle and completely unoriginal underlining guitar theme, or a similar thing done by keyboards. A quiet break somewhere around a half of the song. And all of that somehow stretched into ten songs. We wonder if Blackwinds themselves can tell them apart.

Flesh Inferno sounds like someone pressed the "standard Swedish black metal album" button and the machine got stuck. (3.5/10)

review by: Chaim Drishner

review by: Mladen Škot

Cease.and.Desist are helpful in saying that their music is "Ministry fucking Slayer" or "Mysticum playing death metal"... that's actually true. The death-industrial blend of styles on their debut is very coherent, in spite of outside influences, but then you could say the same about Slayer's or Ministry's music, each in its own right.

Cease.and.Desist's riffs are fast, varied and technical, the programmed percussion is cold and merciless, and the songs are extremely short, giving them almost a punk feeling... just get in, get things done, and get out.

Electronic sounds and samples fly in and out where necessary, as do the vocals. Alhough, after a while it's hard to stay concentrated: The guitars have a distorted yet hollow sound, just like the vocals, so the only "full" element is actually the bass drum. And the songs, be they slow or fast, are over before you actually begin to appreciate them. In 30 minutes there are 10 songs, a quiet interlude and an outro. If Bliss had to sound aggressive, cold and dehumanized, it succeeded. But also it ended up sounding a bit like pieces of an apocalyptic soundtrack, rather than being a full thing. (6.8/10)

review by: Roberto Martinelli

review by: Avi Shaked

review by: Pal Meentzen

These days there are many who dismiss Gothenburg melo-death as a passed station or a brand of metal that’s totally commercial and insincere. Browse search results for "sick of melodeath" and voilá, "if you're sick of melodeath like everyone else, you curse the clones, if you're on a (insert genre here) binge, you'll probably have more tolerance for bands that aren't really doing anything new but do it very well."

Indeed, their sound isn’t totally overwhelming or like a massive golem ready to crush anything that dares cross its path. It is not to say that something that hasn’t been handled by Fredrik Nordström can’t be noteworthy. The album was self-produced, mastered by Peter in de Betou from the renowned Tailor Made studios. As such, it has surely become a well-balanced, quality product.

review by: Pal Meentzen

review by: Chaim Drishner

review by: Roberto Martinelli

review by: Roberto Martinelli

review by: Pal Meentzen

review by: Mladen Škot

We're not gonna go the Elvis fanatics' route. We admit we haven't seen Quorthon's dead body, nor have we read the coroner's report. But we're quite sure that he is as dead as can be. And we swear, if we ever start seeing his face on potatoes, clouds or sweat stains, we'll seek help. Promise.

However... damned if this Ereb Altor isn't Bathory. From this writer's favorite era, the epic Viking one. Although, whoever is singing here, sings better than Quorthon (that's "better" for unbelievers who say Quorthon couldn't sing), without so much trembling and more in tune. Surely, Quorthon's mistakes can't be repeated by anyone else and at least that aspect of Bathory's charm has not been matched on By Honour. But everything else — literally, sonically and emotionally — has.

Instead of waves crashing and wind blowing, the intro is a piano theme with a hardly perceivable string section. It's four minutes long, and it's simple. And it is not in the least boring. Melancholic, evocative and endless, it is. And after that...

Yes! Waves crash, winds blow, sword in hand and distant shores at the horizon. Not to mention the choirs of long-deceased ancestors, mystical forests, the heaviest slowly-pounding riffs this side of Valhalla and absolutely grandiose melodies. The guitar sound is rough and glorious, the drums are obviously triggered, and even more obviously Bathory, all the way to the trademark accentuating guitar melodies by tom rolls.

The best thing about By Honour is — although it could be Nordland 3 or Hammerheart 2, you have never heard any of these riffs, guitar and vocal melodies before, but you can instantly identify with them. And don't forget they are still melancholic, evocative and endless.

Ereb Altor don't try to hide their influence: The only two links on their website lead to Bathory (and while you're there, their debut EP is available for free download). Apparently, live Ereb Altor shows are a possibility as well, so the lucky ones among you will be able to check if any of the two Swedes looks like Quorthon. Until then, we'll have these six songs, ranging from seven to ten minutes, each different, and each starting, going on and ending monumentally.

After listening to By Honour more than 20 times, we haven't found a weak spot on it. Whether we know, believe, or just want to believe, it is irrelevant. We are glad we have it. (Bathory/10)

review by: Chaim Drishner

review by: %%name= Mladen Škot%%

review by: Brandon Strader

Following such incredible rock opera releases we've heard in 2008, Expedition Delta has appeared with a self-titled rock opera with a bunch of special guests. Some names you may recognize are Gary Wehrkamp, Richard Andersson, Erik Norlander, Joost van den Broek, and a bunch of others for a total of 21 individuals! This really is more of a rock opera than the many other releases that actually have a lot of pure metal thrown in.

Expedition Delta is, for the genre it’s in, much more mellow. Sure, there are some heavier guitars here and there, and some double bass, but at the same time these parts are smothered with soft keys, high vocal performances, and key changes that come straight from a child's lullaby.

review by: Mladen Škot

Fall of the Idols' greatest asset are the three guitars, giving the standard doom riffs some additional color. They were careful enough to barely ever let them all play the same thing at once. So, with the slow palm-muted riffs you'll generally hear an accompanying melody playing a similar thing, and during solos there'll be another guitar line giving accent.

In that context, the Finnish band's second album is an adventure. But the songs aren't such an enterprise — most of the time they simply work, and without full concentration The Seance, Fall of the Idols’ second album, isn't bad. But then, try to pay attention and there'll be hardly a thing you haven't heard before. It is heavy, strong and appropriately composed, but in the end just adequate old-school doom.

The vocal lines are there (of a fragile, melodic kind) but not particularly emotional or striking, and the drumming is just sufficient. All in all there's not much to say except that The Seance is good, but, if you want to, you can get doomed in a much more inventive or emotional way. (6/10)

review by: Mladen Škot

review by: Mladen Škot

If by "international" you don't expect "professional," then it's reasonable to assume that you'll find a few interesting things on Folkearth’s Father of Victory. On this one, there are 20 musicians from six countries. With that many people scattered around, it's hard to expect a coherent piece of work.

So there you have it: From lo-fi black metal to acoustic ballads, there are twelve songs, and each of them is a story on its own. Some are good, some bad, some clumsy and some elegant. They all sound bad and under-developed. Nonetheless, there is something endearing about all of them. Except one. (See the end of the review for more on this)

The funny thing is, in some songs there isn't much "folk" on display. If the song is black metal, it is predominantly black metal — with ridiculous fuzzy guitar, hollow shrieks, programmed or human-played triggered drums and a "loudness" production job (too much bass and treble)... the folk elements sound as if they are artificially implanted. The fact that they are too loud and sometimes not really in the same room as the metal parts doesn't help.

It's as if this assembly of Folkearth was trying to prove that they are indeed folk. Still, there are a few melodic parts in each track and a few riffs hinting at folksy grooves. But there are no real folk guitar melodies. In effect, the biggest part of Father of Victory is more "metal plus folk" than "folk metal."

The non-black songs or parts of songs are a bit better. Ballads like "What Glory Remains" or the title track are proud and solid, and the vocals sound powerful. Still, they aren't folk ballads, and poor Elio d'Alessandro is singing his own kind of English.

Finally, looked at as a whole, Father of Victory has a few things to offer — don't think of Folkearth as a supergroup but as a hobby project by skilled musicians, done in a rush, and it gets by. Especially if you can pretend that it is an obscure tape from the ‘90s. (6/10)

P.S. I owe you an explanation for "Except one"? Look - Folkearth is a project combining the non-Christian ancestral and cultural influences of its members, but there is a Trojan horse on this CD, namely a crappy BM song called "Charles Martel," glorifying his victory in the battle of Ambleve, in 716.

Now, if the song was about how that Christianizer of Europe stopped the Muslim invasion at the battle of Tours, we'd let Folkearth go. However, in this battle Martel defeated his Neustrian and Frisian rivals who were led by King Chilperic II, his mayor Ragenfrid, and Radbod (or Redbad), Duke of the Frisians and the last Pagan ruler of Frisia. So, singing about Christians killing Pagans, huh? Dubious. A word to Marios Kotsoukos from someone who recorded an album about Redbad: die.

review by: Chaim Drishner

review by: Avi Shaked

review by: Chaim Drishner

review by: Mladen Škot

Other than not being thoroughly mind-blowing, Conqueror leaves little to complain about. Surely, if a band is trying to re-invent the Dio-era Black Sabbath, it's easy to fail in a number of aspects, but it seems that The Gates of Slumber aren't aware of them: Throughout their third album, you can just listen and give them a nod of approval for everything... whether good or not-so-good, they have chosen it, stuck with it and made the best out of it.

For sure, Karl Simon isn't the best singer out there, and some of the vocal lines are just naive. They are made even worse by his voice, somewhere between Ozzy and Blaze Bayley on a bad day. But the man sings anyway, and, once you are used to him, you have to give him credit and actually like his mistakes and off-key moments. Why? Because, simply, you can believe him. Whether he's singing something smart or cliched, he puts his heart into it, and it's all that matters.

But, if his vocals are an acquired taste, his guitar playing skills are another story. Simon is one of those old-school freaks unaware of current trends, arpeggios and digital-sounding playing. When not playing hard rocking riffs, he's playing ominous ones, and the special treats always come when The Gates of Slumber decide to go for a long instrumental part — almost as if improvised, but no — always a perfectly elaborated solo of the best, natural kind. You might have heard more modern sounding ones, but you haven't heard Iommi or any of the Iron Maiden trio play such good classic solos lately.

Another key figure is the bass player, Jason McCash, and when not enjoying the bass sound, you can enjoy his grooves. Given the nature of the sound, with all the three instruments clearly separated, there's no place for muddling through, but it's not a problem for McCash. The man always has something to say or add. There's only one more member, "Iron" Bob Fouts, and he's responsible for all the percussion necessary, including the omnipresent snare and tom fills. Let's just say that you can listen to the drums only and still have a good time.

So yes, Conqueror isn't highly original. Who cares? The instruments have slightly too modern a sound, but it depends on perspective. The melodies are outdated but they work. And when's the last time you've witnessed a classic metal band do a 16-minute closing song, like the four-part "Dark Valley Suite" - and get away with it? These three Indiana residents probably live in a heavy doom time warp somewhere in the wider Indianapolis area and do what they do, for their own enjoyment, on their own terms. And you are advised to check them out. (7.7/10)

review by: Roberto Martinelli

review by: Pal Meentzen

review by: Roberto Martinelli

review by: Roberto Martinelli

review by: Mladen Škot

When you hear a singer in a Satanic black metal band screaming "I bless you," you know you're in for something good, right? And Storming Darkness’ Sin-Thesis is. As orthodox as this Russian band's debut may be, the feeling is completely, nastily (in)correct, as if Storming Darkness exactly knew what they are trying to do and they stubbornly persisted in making Sin-Thesis in order to hold one's attention in their bloody, spiked hands all the way through.
 
If the music is only slightly more elaborated than Transylvanian Hunger, the sound is way better and the riffs are slightly less memorable. Adding this up, the end result is interesting. Although there's not much to remember afterwards, each consecutive exposure to Sin-Thesis is equally pleasant. Also, Storming Darkness could be just about any black metal band from anywhere in the world, but this one doesn't have a web site, doesn't reveal anything except their faces (and that's only on their label's website) and war names, and delivers their intentions so good that having Sin-Thesis in your collection feels like rediscovering underground black metal from the old days. If you don't exactly see the blood and the spikes, you can sure as hell visualize them. For a night of raw, blasphemous and proud black metal, you don't need much more than that. (7.5/10)

review by: Mladen Škot

Finally! We've had our share of power, progressive and heavy. Some good, some trying so hard you had to give them credit, some trying too hard and failing, some just plain bad, but this... Be Gone is another story.
 
How about "things flying all over the place"? Small wonder when each member of Pharaoh is so good at knowing his instrument inside and out that only the bass player doesn't have his own webpage. Take for example this guy, Matt Johnsen - you wouldn't believe it. Whenever he's not hammering, bending or pinching, he's swirling, looping or doing whatever-the-hell acrobatic movements exist out there. That would be the guitar player. We're not talking about a blacksmith or a pilot. And in all this vertigo, his playing makes perfect sense. What others who are "trying hard" turn into wankery, Johnsen just destroys, and still the songs maintain a perfect flow. Most of the time it's hard to believe that there's just one guitar doing all this, but believe it. A few times there will be a second guitar, admittedly, but those are the places where other bands would need three.
 
You might know this other guy, Tim Aymar? Rings a bell? Yes, when he was recruited by Chuck Schuldiner for Control Denied you might have heard of him as a "man with 1000 voices," and on Be Gone, he probably uses 998 of them. Never too much, always good, and with songs, melodies and choruses like these, he had every chance to use whatever he has. Let's just say that, at the moments when you're able to catch up with what's going on, you can do your usual grimacing, mimicking, posturing and air-punching. There's energy everywhere. Since this is Pharaoh's third album, we wonder if the other two were this good. 
 
The rest of the line-up is a Double-Chris affair with Kerns playing the bass, barely audible, but perfectly synchronized with Johnsen and the other Chris, Black (Nachtmystium, Dawnbringer, Superchrist). Is it enough to say it could be the "man with 1000 beats"? Or just "man with four arms and three legs"?
 
Sometimes you need a good dose of the stuff usually described as "listening to someone doing what no one else can't." So, stop listening to whatever "melodic," "progressive," or "heavy" you're listening to right now, and get Be Gone. Don't try to do any of this at home, just be thankful that someone else is capable of it. (8.8/10)

review by: Mladen Škot

How the hell does a bunch of 18-year olds get more than two million views on their MySpace page? For comparison, a bunch called Mayhem has had more than four hundred thousand, which is still amazing and completely earned through years of hard work. Something tells us that this CD doesn't quite belong to this publication, but since it's here, let's see what Ruin is about.

It's core. You'd probably call it technical metalcore, or shorter: mathcore. This UK quintet is extremely good at it. We're no longer surprised by what the musicians of this day and age are able to perform, and even so, Ruin is an exhausting affair. There's considerable groove involved, in almost any given instance, and these instances are too numerous to count. There's no rest for the vocals, either, this shouter never loses breath and in all this cacophony obviously knows where his parts are. So, shouts, choir shouts, melodies, noise, mathematical beats, blastbeats, breakdowns and a devastating clear sound, all is here and sounds brutal.

Now the things Architects have forgotten: Even if you're 'core to the core, it doesn't mean you have to give away some emotions. We don't mean romantic ones; negative feelings will do just as well. But, trying to decipher anything from Sam Carter's shouts leaves you blank - it's just brutal to be brutal.

The music isn't any more revealing, either. Architects can play; great for them. Architects can't make a memorable part; bad for them. The tempo doesn't change much throughout the 12 songs, so it's even harder to hold on to something. All you're aware of are parts, parts and more parts coming and going. There was considerable effort involved in joining them in different ways, and making them as random as possible, but they sound considerably interchangeable as well. In the end, Ruin is listenable, even all night long, but we don't see the point.

Obviously, Architects, in the outside world, enjoy some success. Again, good for them. But most of you don't even want to be a part of a world where mechanical, mathematical, soulless and clinical are better than meaningful and evocative. Do you want art or gymnastics? (5.8/10)

review by: Mladen Škot

Disclaimer: this writer has never heard the legendary 1993 Focus album. Anything that is labeled as technical progressive jazz or fusion doesn't sound appealing and won't make me run out and get it. And, after listening to Cynic's comeback album, I still don't think I will go and get Focus.

Seriously, what is this? Sure we've heard "progressive metal," but damned if Traced in Air is metal at all. First, the vocals - we won't try to invent clever wordplays here: this singer is wimpy, wussy, sleepy, almost whispering and completely non-metal. He would be too impotent even for pop. Just disgusting.

The guitars aren't bad, but aren't metal, either, and if they were ever progressive, today we have hundreds of bands doing it better. Here, it’s just staccato notes and a few arpeggios and solos. It sounds hollow. Even for jazz, they are just plain boring. But this can't be jazz, either. If there's a bass guitar on Traced in Air, we haven't heard it.

The drummer isn't bad, following those staccatos by precise tom rolls. Good for him. He knows the songs very well.

But the songs suck. Thirty-few minutes, nothing catchy or memorable, and they are gone. There are traces of atmosphere, or maybe just a hint at the progressive feeling, but Traced in Air sounds like someone told Cynic to just play progressive, and then told them what exactly "progressive" is. But, if it is progressive by the numbers, it's no longer progressive. So... Traced in Air isn't progressive, either.

What is it then? Who knows? Sounds like an exercise. Focus must have been better than this, to achieve the aforementioned legendary status, but now, 15 years later, what Cynic are doing isn't much more than a short collection of gutless attempts at... whatever. (2/10)

review by: Roberto Martinelli

Mladen speaks the truth: Cynic’s Traced in Air is largely a mess. It is better than he thought, but then again, there’s a lot of room from a 2/10.

The drums are probably too loud (while the toms sound good, they’re so awkwardly prominent that it gets annoying). The guitars provide little to nothing to grab on to both from being too quiet / playing parts that don’t stand out at all.

Worse still, the vocals are obnoxious, being almost wholly done in a clean voice that has some sort of chorus effect on it — it might be a flanger, it might be something else, but whatever it is, it makes the voice sound like it’s played through a cheap keyboard and it’s way, way too much. Cynic might have gotten away with a couple parts here and there on the record, but considering it’s like 95% of the time, this is terrible. And no, just because these vocals were done on the first Cynic album doesn’t make them good.

To "mix things up," the horrid "clean" vocals are backed up fairly regularly by hoarse screams, which aren’t very good either and get old almost as fast. The very rare times when the voice is able to come through un-effected is some sort of relief, as are the parts with the simplest instrumentation — no drums, and just clean guitar.

These negative impressions are most felt when listening to Traced in Air on a low-quality stereo. In this case, the mix is a nightmare: the drums and vocals are too loud, and the other instruments are indecipherable not so much because of their complexity, but because of their difficulty in being heard.

On a good-quality stereo, Traced in Air is a much better experience. More of the instrumental depth can be appreciated. The drums are still a bit too much, the vocals are not so awful as they are one-dimensional, and the banality of the guitar parts is revealed to be a result of the compositions.

"Fifteen years in the making," and all we get is a 34-minute album whose songs essentially are the same level of "meh"? Don’t believe the hype. Traced in Air is a silly album. Its claims of being a prog album are acceptable in the timing of the music, and the structures of the songs, but when those songs are all the same shade of tedium, who cares? (3.5/10)

review by: Mladen Škot

Maybe we should just forget about "true Norwegian black metal" for a while? Face it - we've lost Emperor, Burzum and Immortal, we have two Gorgoroths (the gay one and the cocaine one), Darkthrone are nowadays a punk band singing about graveyard sluts, Mayhem released an album only two people like (if you're the other one, email me) and whoever else was there in the beginning, now does something entirely different and probably mellow. Why? Maybe because Norway is the country with the highest standard of living in Europe, and people who live there have nothing to complain about except boredom, six months of darkness and snow per year and extremely high prices of alcohol.

Reading Lords of Chaos from a different perspective, could it be that the whole black metal movement arose because some of those teenagers were simply bored? And yes, religion is as strong as ever, but while the rest of the world complains on how many genocides are being done in the name of it, the Lords of Chaos crew just went on about how they are strong while Christians are weak. Sure, if you live in a rich and civilized country and you're feeling too comfortable to look around. So now that the church-burning momentum has gone, what's there to inspire Norwegians except the landscapes and the Viking heritage?  

For Enslaved, it seems that the inspiration has gone. It's not that their tenth album is bad, it's just superfluous. Vertebrae continues where Ruun left off, but while the major complaint about Ruun was the mellow sound, on Vertebrae everything is so mellow it actually becomes offensive. So you have the growls, and they sound plain and boring.

There's way more clean vocals this time, and they sound sleepy. What they should be is trance-inducing, but they simply aren't. They sound as if someone doesn't feel like getting out of bed. The lyrics are quite understandable, but the only moments when you notice them are when they are generic and repetitive. If the guitars were better, it still might have been something, but in the vast choice of riffs only two kinds remain in (bitter) memory - the "I've heard those on the earlier albums" ones, and the "that's not even a riff, that's just playing for the sake of playing" ones.

Of course Enslaved's experience shows, and the songs are diverse, and properly assembled. There are many highs and lows, tasty solos and effective fills on all instruments, but throughout all of the eight songs the listener is on the edge, waiting for something. Something to blow him away, to make a connection, to put him in that bloody trance he expected. And nothing happens.

Listening to Vertebrae, one has to wonder whether the feelings he had for the earlier Enslaved albums were caused by the actual music, or by the preconceived hype. So, after having heard Vertebrae about twenty times, we've checked out some of the earlier ones. We're relieved to say that they still work, most of the time. It's only Vertebrae that fails more than it delivers. Admittedly, you can't be a genius all the time and after nine (mostly) good albums, one had to disappoint. But the biggest disappointment is that right now, in Norway, the most exciting black metal thing to witness is probably the landscape. (5.5/10)

review by: Roberto Martinelli

review by: Chaim Drishner

review by: Mladen Škot

What "spiritual nation"? Where? This DVD is a fraud!

First, we expect a black metal DVD. Okay, there is some live black metal footage, a few videos, discography, biography... but that's about it. The rest...

One part of The Spiritual Nation Born is a lengthy interview with the hugely overweight singer Bart. Featuring some very old live recordings, back when Hermh were probably an average band (meaning: better than now), it's almost interesting to watch. You get to see the five-year school he attended for six years, and hear about the old tape-trading, letter-writing days.

Also, you are informed how Hermh were formed at roughly the same time as Behemoth. Due to this or that circumstance, they had split up, reformed and now are back on the road while Behemoth are where they are now. You won't hear anything about vampirism (like, their main inspiration?), reasons for playing symphonic black metal or pretty much anything to do with music. Except that it's something like a hobby, something to help them get away from everyday life.

The biggest part of The Spiritual Nation Born is taken by three "tour reports," giving you a chance to see what a "black metal" band does when on tour. If we really must talk about it, it's retarded toilet humor, genitalia, asses and an occasional glimpse at the singer's belly (it's hard NOT to see it). In-between drunken giggles you also get to see some live video shots, but the sight of spikes, corpse paint and headbanging to all the same songs isn't much better than the lame gay-related jokes that follow them.

Such a long and complete DVD full of nothing. Don't be fooled by the breasts on the cover. There are no women on The Spiritual Nation Born. The breasts are probably the singer's. (3/10)

review by: Mladen Škot

When you buy cheap pretend-Coke from the supermarket, although the color and taste are just approximately the same, it's still liquid. It quenches thirst and it's still equally damaging to the organism.

But, if you buy pretend-Dimmu Borgir from a CD shop, the risks are greater: The price is usually the same, the color might vary and the taste can range from "better" to "whatever." It seems that the latter is the case with Polish vampiric symphonic black metal band Hermh.

After the Fire - Ashes is an EP, with ten songs on it, and most of them sound superfluous. To begin with, the opening four tracks go by as one, in the same tempo and with a similar vocal rhythm. The musicianship is adequate, but it seems that all the instruments are there as a background to the growls, and the growls really aren't much. Imagine listening to one of the more recent Dimmu Borgir albums, but with even less diversity.

One instrument does stand out — the huge swathes of keyboards are fairly inventive and even a bit scary, but in the end it's like listening to a local band, one with musicians gathered from various directions in metal, but agreed to pursue one and only direction. With an extremely talented keyboardist.

Four new songs aside, Hermh's thrashing cover of Venom's "Black Metal" is merely adequate, and the Goth-techno repetitive abomination called "Red Blood Running" is best forgotten. The final part of this release is occupied by four live recordings, songs from their 2006 full-length, Eden's Fire, and they sound just like the new tracks but with, admittedly, some extra power gained through less clear sound. But really, Hermh could do with some more diversity, and by that we don't mean more cover or techno songs. (4/10)

review by: Pal Meentzen

review by: Chaim Drishner

review by: Roberto Martinelli

review by: Mladen Škot

During the faster parts of The Incurable Tragedy, you'll half-expect Chuck Schuldiner to enter screaming, "He... is... the pain-kill-er..." or "Scavenger!!! Of human sor-row!".

Speaking of dead people, Tim Roth, the guitarist, drew inspiration for this album from the deaths of his father and two close friends from cancer. And he won't let you forget it, as the lyrics are so blatantly simple that you could have written them yourself in 30 minutes, and the tell-tale pulse beeps aren't the most innovative idea ever.

Between the good and the bad, there's a bit of everything, mostly thrown in at random. It does and doesn't work: Through the loudspeakers, while you're doing something else, Into Eternity's fifth album sounds quite exciting, with all the double-kick assaults, diverse breaks, soaring high vocals, thoughtful progressive bits and endless uses of staccato melodies. Into Eternity are really firing at you from all available weapons, ranging from power to death through ballads and bonded by progressive.

And of course there had to be a "but." Or many of them. Some concentration applied, and the songs disappear — sure, the parts are hard to play, and it is especially hard to shift them around with such ease at these speeds. But (first) they don't communicate to each other — you could take them, separately, and randomly shuffle and organize them into new songs, and they would be just as good as these.

The vocals are diverse but (second) the high pitched ones are irritating, the screaming ones (probably by Roth) not bad and the clean ones sometimes make a good chorus. But (third) all three singing styles together, plus a few low growls, just add to the general mess. Also, although the musicianship is superb, the sound doesn't do it justice: The hi-hat strokes have probably been artificially replaced with one and the same sample, just like the kick drums... the whole kit has a plastic feeling to its sound. The guitars aren't bad from a distance, but (fourth) look closer and they are hollow and detached... and you'll sometimes hear where the parts are joined together. And the solos all sound like one and the same solo.

Still, The Incurable Tragedy isn't what its title suggests. We're definitely sure there are people who'll enjoy it as it is, as with all the shortcomings there's still plenty of energy around, and good ideas shining through. But (last), if the parts were shuffled and recorded in another way, the songs could have been better. (6.5/10)

review by: Mladen Škot

review by: Mladen Škot

Kataplexia could be just about any Suffocation clone. No personality, no memorable riffs, not a single stand-out song, let alone a song as such. When they kick in, they just play, develop, twist, and end up somewhere completely different, yet this "completely different" sounds pretty much like any other part of, Supreme Authority, their third album. Tons and tons of thundering, technical, punishing noise. Actually, great.

Maybe in this case "no personality" and "no memorable parts" aren't such a bad thing. For example, when Supreme Authority arrived, we started listening to it, and after a while we wondered how they managed to put 90 minutes of music on an ordinary CD. Actually, the CD player was on "repeat" and the reviewer failed to realize that he was already listening to Supreme Authority for the third time. So, if you're a death metal diehard, this Finnish crew (founded by two guys originally from Brazil and El Salvador) presents a worthy listen. Don't expect catchiness as in Cannibal Corpse or Morbid Angel, but if you're willing to drown yourself into an endless barrage of arpeggios, blastbeats, pinched harmonics, awesome sounding palm-muted, speed-picked guitars and undecipherable growls, delivered at inhuman speeds and twisted into songs with hardly any repeating parts, go for it.

We've heard equally technical bands equally going nowhere, but Kataplexia throws too many things, too fast, and with too much energy, at you to notice. Recommendable because Kataplexia might be just another Suffocation clone, but plays like three of them at once. (7.8/10)

review by: Chaim Drishner

review by: Mladen Škot

All that Lake of Blood have, they put to good use. Heed the Primal Calling, their debut EP, consists of four tracks with a total of 20 minutes playing time, but expect to hear as much as you'd hear in some full-length CDs by other black metal bands.

Whether playing melodic blackened thrash (see: Immortal) or just deciding to lay some sheer black noise in front of you, they succeed. It's hard to decide which is more appealing. If it's melodic black, it's not just one guitar you have to pay the attention to — it's both of them. At times you have to wonder if they are in the same band, but quickly they'll resume playing those punishing riffs, and always making them just as slightly different as needed to make you stay with them. Considering the abovementioned 20 minutes, this means that you're getting no time to start thinking of anything else, like the drums. And those are great too, actually. Most of the time you have to work hard to hear the snare, but it's there, just like the other parts of the kit being hit all over the place but always in a different way.

All of that would still be easy to follow were it not for the raw, punishing sound. It's not of the underproduced kind, but rather of a "let's make each instrument sound as midrange-aggressive as possible, and then just record them." They aren't actually blending in, at all, but the way they are used still makes Lake of Blood's music coherent. So, the singer could be screaming like this, full throat, on any other CD and still he'd be equally alien on any of them, but on Heed the Primal Calling he fits in perfectly by not fitting in at all. Great.

It's not melodic black thrashing or black grinding all the way, either. These Californians do make their music sound fluid, but often insert miniature breaks in key moments, making the music even more aggressively stuttering. Whatever ensues gets more attention and basically shines with new life.

The only things to complain about could be the fact that none of the riffs are colossally awesome, and the songs lack a bit more tempo changes, or deliberate structures. Maybe even emotions or atmosphere, which bands Lake of Blood are compared to, like Emperor or Immortal, knew how to provide. But since this is just their debut, we can say it's pretty great and we can't wait to hear more. (8/10)

review by: Pal Meentzen

According to our zine editor, practically any release on tUMULt is bound to become a classic (instantly, or at some point in time). Although the tUMULt Leviathan release Verräter is clearly falls under that assessment, it’s nonetheless a bold statement. One thing for sure, tUMULt is a label that is prolific in releasing stuff that’s off the beaten track. Like a Kind of Matador’s Halfway to Dangerous is one such release.

review by: Roberto Martinelli

review by: Roberto Martinelli

review by: Chaim Drishner

Not even the acoustic passages could redeem this clichéd and burned-out effort at melodic and ambient-charged black / Viking metal. Its annoying repetitions of the same sweet and empty melodies and lack of singularity — manifested in the watered-down riffs, dispassionate vocals and jolly songs — doom Hostmakter to be forgotten rapidly in the annals of black metal, a stylistic approach to metal that once and again proves to have become stagnant, stale and devoid of ideas. Morker's album is a stark specimen of that fact.

Never-the-less, the cover art that depicts natural scenery at dusk is beautifully dark. Although it's almost as cliché-sounding as the musical contents of the album, still, one cannot escape the beauty and power of nature depicted on that photo. (4/10)

review by: Pal Meentzen

Nifelheim immediately stand out for their much better production. Musically too, and although Nifelheim are no less retro with their thrashy bombardment in the style of classic Bathory Under the Sign of the Black Mark, with fast songs at breakneck speed and nervous guitar solos they seem a little less of a joke. The guttural intro scream of bonus track "Insulter of Jesus Christ" may be a terrible cliché, but it works as what follows is vile and black. And horns up to Damnation, of course.

review by: Brandon Strader

Initial impressions of Palace Terrace's debut are very mixed. The heavy rhythms are highly simplistic, and there seems to be an underlying foreign influence in melody, not to mention the space rock elements. Opener "The Tenth Dimension" feels very disjointed and disorganized, like a high school rendition of a play based on Space Oddity.

The keyboards are a great touch to the overall sound, yet they seem over-the-top at times. The tubular bell sound works, but seems a bit silly. Most of the time the keys are used as a backing to help increase the density of the basic structure. Sadly, the simplistic rhythm guitars do little to quell the cries of this damsel who is seeking some satisfaction. The sound is a bit... impotent.

Also, many of the transitions feel far too sudden. It sounds as though each section of the song was glued together in an editing program instead of the band actually playing through each section. The sheer disjointed nature of the music makes Flying Through Infinity a hard record to become familiarized with and enjoy.

review by: Brandon Strader

After a hard day of being emasculated by your co-workers and / or loved ones, it's good to sit down with some violent noise and unwind. Remasculate's Perversemonger is the perfect remedy for your gore-grind addiction, and may cause you to be filled with a fulfilling feeling of masculinity. As soon as you wake up and realize you're just a pathetic weakling, you can listen to it again. Trust me, it works.

As with most grind albums, the best experience is gained from loud volume usage. You can't tell what the vocalist is grunting, and a lot of the guitar work is chaotic. Chaos in grind is all too relative. The genre in general borrows so many riffs from each other, it's like the punk of the metal scene. And Perversemonger isn't really different in this case.

Seeking originality in the gore-grind scene is like trying to find a piece of Eden, yet Remasulate succeeds for a couple of reasons. First off, they pursue and accomplish the cartoony nature of grind in general. Not saying the genre is a joke, but it definitely seems so in a majority of instances... With song titles like "Toilet Paper Cut," and "Flaturbulence," Remasculate is acknowledging the funnier side while still, musically, keeping it incredibly brutal.

Possibly the most impressive aspect of the production is the guitar tone. It has a loud presence in the mix, which itself isn't gratuitously muddy. On the brief occasions when you're able to just listen to the tone on its own, you can hear how grand of a job it is. It's thick with a low-end that works great with the bass to solidify the lower frequencies perfectly. The tone is very heavily distorted, but has been recorded or mixed in a fashion that doesn't grind (no pun intended) on your nerves after a while. This is something you could really listen to at a loud volume and enjoy rather than punish yourself with scratchy pain. (7/10)

review by: Chaim Drishner

review by: Chaim Drishner

It might be difficult to share in the label's sense of revelation, because it’s hard to identify anything remotely unique in this cheesy and tedious band that, at best, offers nothing but the pinnacle of heavy metal cliché, from beginning to end. From the weak vocals to the weaker-still song writing skills, there's hardly anything too engaging in this band and album.

review by: Brandon Strader

RPWL started out as a Pink Floyd cover band, and for the most part you can still recognize those influences in the band's sound. They also incorporate synthesized sounds, keys, and drum loops. The overall presentation of The RPWL Experience is more similar to bands like Porcupine Tree — it's not quite progressive rock, but you can obviously hear a lot of prog influences in the band's sound.

The title The RPWL Experience does sound like something a preteen thought up for their garage band (that probably consists of the kid on vocals / toy keyboard and his dad playing the toaster as a musical instrument), yet despite the utterly ridiculous title, The RPWL Experience is really a nice collection of enjoyable songs that are far from any idea of silliness. It's actually entirely serious.

"Breath In, Breath Out" had a music video created for it, as it is probably one of the more "commercially acceptable" songs on the album. The band's website states that during the recording process, an artist made a painting for each song for the art booklet.

Cheesy, clunky, or unintentionally hilarious titles seem to be the order of the day for this seemingly clueless, dorky band. Brandon pointed out the album title, but every time you read this band’s name, are you not also thinking "Rupaul" and "The Rupaul Experience"? As far as we know, however, there are no appearances by flamboyant, obnoxious transsexuals.

review by: Chaim Drishner

review by: Brandon Strader

Shocking. You might not be able to tell Shadowside has a female vocalist. Dani Nolden sounds like the female version of Dio. Though despite the unique vocals, the remaining fact is that Theatre of Shadows is generally overdone and uninteresting heavy metal.

"Vampire Hunter" is one of the more interesting tracks. It has a constant flow of tremolo guitar similar to power metal, soaring vocal lines and layers during the chorus, and even keyboard synth. "We Want a Miracle" also has a power metal (or punk) influenced chorus, and a heavy use of older-sounding synthesizers. "Illusions" is one of the faster power songs with nice, heavy rhythms and plenty of synthesizer. If more of the songs shared these kind of elements, the CD would be so much greater as a whole. The wah-wah solo over the funky guitar chugs half way through the song are just perfect.

Theatre of Shadows is Shadowside’s debut album, and it sounds like the band is trying to find their niche and create a sound of their own. They are definitely on their way. The production sounds like that of a more dated metal record, which could add to the nostalgia element. To say the least, Theatre of Shadows is unique if only for the vocal performances, but the music itself doesn't bring much more to the table and leaves a lot to be desired. (5.5/10)

review by: Chaim Drishner

Epocha could have been a good album had it not fallen in to the usual black metal clichés that have made this subgenre of metal a truly uninspired one in recent years. Great riffs in the d-beat punk vein being time and again slaughtered by redundant blast beats that kill the music, as well as tremendously formulaic basic black metal one-trick-pony gyrations that not only copycats the originals shamelessly, but actually rips off the copycats themselves.

review by: Brandon Strader

Another solid debut on Progrock Records, Soul Secret bring a heavier progressive metal sound than the label's norm, while still displaying the synth elements and pleasant key changes that seem like a characteristic point of interest of these bands. Despite being progressive metal, Flowing Portraits is very easy to listen to.

There are so many great elements to this album. In a way, it sounds like the alternate sound Dream Theater would have had if they ultimately would have decided to keep a Rush-style vocalist. Mark Basile's higher range vocals are similar to those from The Mars Volta. Apart from Dream Theater, you can also sense a lot of power metal influence in the music, mostly in the compositional choices, yet the songwriting isn't as fast or stuffed as your average power metal.

Their website lists a great list of influences: Dream Theater, Pain of Salvation, Pink Floyd, Vanden Plas, Liquid Tension Experiment, Symphony X, Spock's Beard, Tool, etc... You can definitely hear these influences in their music. There's a break on "Dance of the Waves" with piano and the bass taking the main focus above the drums that sounds totally inspired by Pain of Salvation. Soul Secret have taken these influences and have crafted and refined them in a way that would fit their own identity and forge their own sound. Apart from being creative, it also has great re-playability.

"Regrets" is a nice ballad, but the air sounds are freakishly loud. It also sounds like Basile lets out a breath onto the mic sometimes. It's a strange way to compress the vocals that takes you out of the experience of this otherwise beautiful song. "Tears of Kalliroe" is the epic piece that starts out with three minutes of orchestration before going into a laid-back jam with clean electric guitar and a saw lead synth. The song is a spectacle crafted in the fires of prog for those who dare experience it, and it ends the album with a dark, sour note.

In a world saturated by hordes of progressive metal bands, it is great to finally see a new band get it so right on the first try. Continuing from what they've unleashed with Flowing Portraits, Soul Secret are certainly going to make a name for themselves in the prog community. (8.5/10)

review by: Brandon Strader

You may remember a little rock act from the ‘80s called Billy Idol. If you ever wondered where these guys are now, guitarist Steve Stevens has Memory Crash, his third solo album, and has recently toured with Billy Idol. It's a blast from the past, and who would have thought you could really want to ever hear those songs again after hearing them on the radio every other day for the last decade and a half?

The major appeal of Memory Crash is the fact that this is an almost fully instrumental classic rock album. Seems odd to call it classic rock as it is so modern, but that is the easiest way to distinguish it from the horrible Nickelbacks of our time. Dug Pinnick provides vocals for "Day of the Eagle." Apart from that song, it's all fantastic, enjoyable, and original rock.

Granted you probably envision something a bit more drab and boring when you consider an older musician with such a long career that started with, of all projects, Billy Idol. However, Memory Crash is by no means a CD you can sleep to. It's not boring and it never loses steam like so many instrumental CDs do. There's always something that keeps your interest. Stevens is a talented guitarist and these compositions are incredibly detailed.

This is very close to being progressive rock. The jams are sweet, the keyboards are epic, and the bass chops could slice through a pineapple with minimal effort. It may not have as much virtuoso tomfoolery held by bands like Liquid Tension Experiment, but the compositions definitely have the same kind of adventurous feeling to them. It sounds refreshing and has a lot of personality in the songs and performances. It seems an old dog can learn new tricks. (8/10)

review by: Brandon Strader

Artemisia breaks out with some incredibly middle-eastern influenced prog metal, and soon begins to switch between a regular heavy prog and soft breakdown spectrum. "Lyre's Harmony" introduces some great, emotional movements — especially in the chorus.

review by: Mladen Škot

Melancholy:

Apparently, things are going on. Some things. Somewhere. Around. Not much to hold on to, though, but there are instances, here or there, when something springs out and brings something into the focus. It might be strong or weak, bringing discomfort or false security, and sometimes, briefly, real security.

Or is it actually real? Or it just feels real at this moment... and what are feelings anyway? Can we measure them and tell their real direction?

See, this would be our definition of melancholy written in a sloppy, stream-of-consciousness way. Makes more sense than "a feeling of thoughtful sadness" (yes, we've used our thesaurus quite often for the reviews in this issue).

Now apply the definition — or both of them — to music, and you get Starofash. The second album by Heidi Solberg Tveitan (aka Ihriel or... you know who she is, dammit, or just read the interview here) is called The Thread and once again, she has done everything according to her own taste. There was some help by a number of session musicians, but it doesn't matter that much.

The Thread is as coherent and as logical as it can be, since we're still talking about melancholy with moments of surrealism. On the surface, it's mostly soft keyboards sounding like an antique crappy piano playing under water (please interpret this sentence in the nicest possible way) playing the main driving sequences. Then, there's the incredible sounding bass guitar: If you can imagine a bass guitar breathing, this would be it. The percussion is mostly organic, but even the few programmed bits don't matter. It's the way everything blends, changes density and plays with the listener's attention. If it matters, there are a couple of actual songs, but the rigid structures have been pushed aside in favor of doing what had to be done. Fleeting, but controlled. Dark, but composed of light elements.

The Thread is a perfect companion for a late night melancholy session, whenever you feel like having one, or if it just comes by itself. Still, this writer has one complaint: Since the singing parts are so few and precious, why did some of them have to be wasted on male vocals? Whoever is singing this (probably Kristoffer G. Rygg), it's not his fault, but he just doesn't belong here. Or maybe it was done on purpose, as an anti-climax? But yes, admittedly, even in real life things sometimes go astray to an unwanted direction. (8/10)

review by: Mladen Škot

Something has gone wrong with the majority of Norwegian black metal bands. It’s their lack of conviction and credibility. Take Svartahrid, the band that featured that guy Ilvastar (who broke into a crematory, desecrated bodies, and took one head home). To Svartahrid's credit, they don't mention the idiot anywhere on their MySpace page (no official website), but still it seems that they're trying to get by just by being Norwegian. If they were from another country, no one would pay attention.

Darkthrone beat... again. But with a bad, thin, fake drum sound. Sparse and inoffensively distributed screams. Single-note riffs with a too thin and polished guitar sound to be taken as anything but biting. Choruses consisting of two bass drums and an added keyboard layer hinting at "symphonic," but just playing another few notes. All the usual riffs and chords, at all the usual places.

Even like this, Svartahrid's fourth album could have been listenable, but since they settled with having unadventurous song structures as well, the biggest adventure for the listener is merely making it to the end of Malicious Pride. (3.5/10)

review by: Mladen Škot

If there were nothing on Milžinai but the bonus video track, "Thunder Take me Away," it would be a clear 10/10. If there's any of the romantic warrior feeling in you, go to Youtube right now, find it and watch it. Your humble writer watched it for maybe 10 times in a row. Sympathize with the young warrior, see him lay in the dungeon and recollect the memories of his departure, battle, defeat and imprisonment. Witness his execution and symbolic resurrection. Admire the subtle acoustic guitar work, amazing vocal nuances, wonderful bass sound and a tremendous chorus. Yes, it's a ballad. A classic one. Best one in ages.

Then, there's the bonus... sorry, we mean the rest of the album. But comparing to that video clip, the music part of Milžinai ("giants") sounds like a bonus. Some tracks with lyrics in Lithuanian might make you half raise a fist, but Thundertale's second album is just standard. Standard as in... there are many ways to create a heavy / power metal song, and Thundertale apply them, but with no big surprises. One unique point is an occasional use of something called "hornpipe," yet the way it is played is too non-metal, like someone trying to spoil Judas Priest by playing clarinet along with it.

We don't know what the prices of CDs are like in your country. We wouldn't give money for Milžinai in any but one circumstance — if it were our last money. Just to get that one track and play it repeatedly as a soundtrack to suicide. (5.8/10)

review by: Mladen Škot

"Tystnaden" is either Swedish for "silence," Italian for "Evanescence," or Maelstromese for "irritating." Enough said?

Just to explain — Tystnaden is an Italian band with a Swedish name, claiming their influences are Dark Tranquillity, In Flames, Dream Theater and Amorphis. In reality, there is some of the modern Swedish melodeath approach, primarily in the thrash parts and electronic bits going on most of the time. There's also the male vocal doing not-so-brutal growls — sometimes — and a female singer who tries to look like a red-haired thug and sing in an over-affected fashion — all the time.

At first glance, it's all diverse, technical and bombastic, maybe even suitable for fans of Evanescence looking for something harder, or Nightwish fans looking for something progressive and non-romantic.

From a distance, In Our Eye is listenable. It sounds bombastic, and it is well played. The female vocal lines are clearly present. From closer up, In Our Eye is directionless. All the diverse parts are crammed one after another, sometimes with little care as to whether they fit together or not.

The thing that should be the most important issue here is missing: pop sensibility. None of the parts are really memorable, hummable or emotional, and if Tystnaden want to succeed in this style they should at least try to write a hit. Yes, a hit. With a nice melody, some feelings and such things, like everyone else does. Not just punching the air wearing expensive gloves and hoping they hit something.

And also, pay more attention to the lyrics, how about it? Say something real, starting with the album title. What does "in our eye" mean, anyway? You plucked someone's eye out and the six of you couldn't decide who's gonna keep it? Or maybe Tystnaden are a blind band, except one member who has one eye? And if so, is there some foreign matter whose extraction will require Visine? In that case, let us know and we'll raise the rating by 0.1. We're not cruel. (4.4/10)

review by: Chaim Drishner

review by: Pal Meentzen

review by: Pal Meentzen

Sovereign Nocturnal is the first release of Illinois collective Velnias, who focus on blackened folk / doom metal. Their name comes from ancient mythology, from the Baltic region in eastern Europe, where in Lithuanian language ügVelniasüh is a figure of the bestial god of the natural world.

review by: Avi Shaked

review by: Daniel Walker

Italian power metal, especially, has been the thorn in the side of many metalheads for years now. Perhaps the nail in the coffin was when Rhapsody used way too many voice-over parts on their Dark Saga album. This was seen as one step too far for a band and a genre whose musical ambitions far exceeded the ability to write music that only the most ardent geeks could enjoy.

Fast forward to 2008, and fellow Italians Kaledon, with their fifth album of the Legend of the Forgotten Reign saga, Chapter V: A New Era Begins.

The very first noteworthy thing to be found about Chapter V is the story listed in the first two pages of the liner notes. It's actually a continuation of the longstanding story created for Kaledon’s first album, and is intriguing because the characters and storyline are 100% original. There are no references to such legends as King Arthur and Robin Hood, which have some historical basis. Sometimes bands will take a time-honored tale and put their own spin on it, but this wholly authentic approach is more satisfying.

The plot concerns a young man named Daeniel who became the new king of some fictional land named Kaledon and is trying to thwart the fiend Azrael's plot to conquer it. Some wise dragon is also involved in helping Daeniel and Martin, the new general of the troops, to realize their potential. This is a decent summation of the story, but sufficeth to say the full version is superior, so buy the album.

You want cheese? You got it, but it's not the garden variety. The whole execution of the album sounds generic. Marco Palazzi's vocals may be lackadaisical and lack raw power, but he has a very charming storybook tone. Also, there are lots of neat effects going on all over the place, some of them reminiscent of the prog rock from a few decades ago. This is all the sorcery of Daniele Fuligni, who plays Hammond, Minimoog, Arp 2600, and keyboards. He has masterful control of his arsenal, often using pulsating bleeps in contrast with louder swaths of sound. The guitar is also well done, maintaining a light, flowing tone.

Without a doubt the best thing about this album is the story, but this is spoken from the lips of a dragon lover. There's nothing too groundbreaking here, but the imagery of the music and the story makes for an entertaining and rewarding listen. (7/10)

review by: Mladen Škot

Many thanks to Epidemie Records for sending this CD, for which it took us 15 minutes just to decipher the album title, but we're not going to review it. Others have been there, and apparently failed. According to Aarni's MySpace page... "Some sources have described Aarni's music variably as 'almost orthodox doom metallish Lovecraftian-Jungian Kalevala avant-bard,' 'progressive doom metal,’ 'Yanni with distorted guitars,' 'savantgawd submusic,' 'primitive black metal,' 'underground progressive rock,' 'shit,' 'space doom metal,' 'repulsonic metametal,' and 'original as fuck.'" The band itself occasionally uses terms like "Chthonic Hybrid Musick," '"Antinomian Music," "Maybe Music," "Noise for Futants," "Functional Music," "Dream Torrent Music," "Bizarro Musick," or "Musical Manure for the Mind" or "preferably no description at all."

Lovely. And what are we supposed to add here? That it starts like My Dying Bride, and after five minutes it's something completely different (yes, it's the larch). There's talking, singing through auto-tuner, solos (sort of), narration, loathsome singing, breakbeats, children crying, jazz in "gentle" clean moments, and who the hell knows what kind of instrumentation isn't there. Probably everything that can be played slowly, except that it is random and twisted. No, wait. Even if "twisted" and "backwards," it sounds normal. We mean, normal to Aarni's standards. And Aarni has no standards. Everything goes. Aarni doesn't care where it goes, but it goes, and after Tohcoth is over, it ends. What a brilliant description, no? Almost makes you feel like you're listening to Aarni?

And we don't know what to say about the artwork, either. Something Cthulhu-like and some faces on the front. And in the booklet... ummm. A band drawn like comic strip characters, one holding a winged cat, the other looking like a housewife, and the third like... eh... a member of ABBA? And there's a blue hippo behind them, standing there in high heels with a pyramid on his head and four hands, holding... not sure what, but one is a mushroom. Bloody hell.

Inside (a dildo and some symbols aside) just the lyrics. Let's take a peak. Errrr... let's check out what Aarni say instead: "Some of the themes in Aarni's music may be A) Finnish folklore and paganism as the band views them B) occultism and world mythologies, brain-change, Discordianism, collective & personal liberation and theories of analytical psychology (especially those of C.G. Jung) C) The Cthulhu mythos as described by H.P. Lovecraft and fellow authors (sometimes possibly handled with a slight tongue-in-cheek approach) and D) Topics not included in the above categories." All clear?

You know what? This review sucks. So does Aarni's second CD. And damned if we don't love it for that very reason. Also, we're adding another failed attempt at describing it to the list: how about "Monty Python metal"? (8.7/10)

review by: Mladen Škot

Rituales Interiores is so original it might take you a while before you realize what you're listening to, but once you get into it, it's quite addictive... but with all the side-effects addictions usually bring.

It's not really healthy. When you "get" Reino Ermitano's doom metal, it, in turn, gets you. There aren't many positive feelings on this, their third album. To start with the guitars, the sound is metal. But where others use steel, Reino Ermitano use lead. After a dozen listens, the riffs come out as fairly simple, but the melancholic heaviness and excellent composition make their pounding their misery deeper and deeper into your head until they are buried so deep they can't get out. They aren't even slow - it's mostly Black Sabbath tempo with some lucid thrashing moments and hallucinating guitar wails, but all of them are damn fine, and, as a whole, new. Or just employed in a new way, creating a gloomy convicting force? Whichever it is, there's something unholy, desperate and absolutely self-sufficient about them. Shortly, great songs, but sometimes you'd wish you had never heard them.  

But that's life. Real. And Reino Ermitano are as real as can be. Just read this statement: "Reino ErmitaZo is, for me, a concept that has to do with poetry, existentialism, nature, magic and inner change. It's about personal isolation from what's common and socially expected/accepted. The name of the band (Hermit Kingdom) leads to this idea of a kingdom of solitude, a fortress of fortitude in an urban, modern society while living beyond its rules in an unviolent way."

review by: Mladen Škot

"This is a product of Sweden," the booklet from Jennie Tebler’s Out of Oblivion’s Till Death Tear Us Part proudly says. No kidding? The guitar sound can hardly be anything else, as its downtuned crunch suggests, and the music thankfully isn't another At the Gates or In Flames worship attempt. If a parallel has to be drawn, it would, maybe, be Edge of Sanity and what they were doing in the ‘90s, more precisely the gloomy, moody, introspective and still heavy parts.

And who is Jennie Tebler? A little research shows that she is Quorthon's younger sister, but the real surprise was when this writer realized that her voice was the one behind "Lady Rosenred," a Lake of Tears track released way back on A Crimson Cosmos. That was a really sweet and haunting song, and listening to a CD with nothing but THAT voice ought to be good. And it both is and isn't. But we're willing to tip the scale to "is." Call us romantic fools if you wish.

It seems that for every "this is great" on Till Death Tear Us Part, there's a "but why did they use it like this?" question. For example, Tebler's voice is still great - nothing to complain about the range, and the color is amazingly suggestive. It actually causes compassion. And then you realize that the lyrics are so prosaic that they sometimes border on embarrassing: love, abandonment, sorrow, enchantment, and one killed rapist all found their place on this CD, described in the most simple of ways. Then, the vocal lines are nothing but excellent, well elaborated and sung with such ease that you almost don't realize what a mess someone else would have made trying to perform them.

Tebler's voice is strong enough to carry anything. Yet, sometimes you have to wonder if "anything" was what the rest of the band settled for, as long as it follows the voice. So, when the band goes for simple chord progressions, it is barely adequate, and when they start experimenting, it never lasts long enough. On the other side, the songs themselves never last long enough for you to start complaining. Thus, the ten of them are over before you notice.

Which leaves the question "but did they leave anything behind?" Yes, they did. Although Till Death Tear Us Part sounds like it was done in the ‘90s, as a project done by a number of session musicians back in the day when everyone played with everyone and ideas flew all around, there is only one session musician here, the drummer. Maybe this explains why his parts are overdone, underdone and everything but "well done." But, as for the rest of the band, they show promise.

If we keep in mind that this is Out of Oblivion's first album, there are more good than bad things to be said about it. Obviously, there is some emotion involved, and more than some talent. Now it's up to Tebler and crew to refine them, focus them and add some more aggression and the next one should be excellent. (6.9/10)

review by: Mladen Škot

So, there are good originals, bad copies, bad originals, good clones... and now there's a good-sounding copy cloning boring parts of decent originals. What follows explains this statement.

Quadrivium are Norwegian, and Adversus is their debut. To cut the long story short, if you like early Arcturus (Aspera Hiems Sinfonia) and mid-period Dimmu Borgir (Godless Savage Garden), try to imagine a combination of those two and Adversus would be it. The singer does a great job at sounding like Shagrath, who usually does a good job at growling slo-o-o-wly, trying to sound mystical and powerful, and the clean vocals aren't far from Garm's. The drummer isn't exactly Hellhammer, and those waltzing slow beats could have been done with more invention, but since the music relies on slow powerchords and an awesome sound, he probably didn't feel like he had to contribute.

The keyboardist has also mastered his sweeping symphonic swathes and neo-classical tinkling but after three songs... damn. Can we just say, "boring"? Actually, there are some rhythm changes around the fifth song, but Quadrivium always return to the "mystical-menacing" waltz too soon. 

Adversus feels like listening to one and the same song over and over. The same tempo, the same vocals and the same non-existent riffs. If only it was actually a good song, but hell, no. Our advice would be to stick with the originals, whatever you think of them. (4/10)

review by: Mladen Škot

Striborg sometimes does wrong, but not here. The two parts of the Black Desolate Winter / Depressive Hibernation release were recorded in May and February 2005, and for all the difference in approach, they complement each other perfectly. It's almost as one wouldn't be complete without the other. And, alas, for anyone obsessed with collecting everything that this Tasmanian forest dweller ever recorded, this CD is a must have. Sin Nanna knows no mercy. 

Black Desolate Winter is closer to what you'd call "classic" Striborg. Apart from a cloudy, threatening intro and outro, it is just one, title track. To anyone but the initiate's dismay it is half an hour long - and it's nearly majestic. As the rules of misanthropic black metal command, the playing is totally careless and the sound is abysmal - most of the time it's hard to make out what the guitar is doing, the bass is sloppy and shamelessly loud, and the murky growls sound like they were just unearthed from a forest grave, and now, slowly waking up, wonder what innocent soul they should possess.

Concerning the drums, two things spring to mind. First, how did Sin Nanna manage to make an obviously electronic drum kit sound this dirty? And then, damn him, almost all the time there's constant, high speed double bass kicking - any normal drummer would have collapsed and died half way through. The song itself is a gem - there is one riff to remember, and the rest of the time it's mere wondering, on Striborg's as well as on the listener's side. It might look peaceful and serene from afar, but the winter is cold, deadly and unpredictable.

Depressive Hibernation is another side to the story. You wouldn't believe the sound - let's just say that the amplifier feedback Sin Nanna sometimes lets reverberate sounds more pleasant than the actual guitar sound. The riffs are extremely simple, the drums even more. If you have necromasochistic tendencies, Depressive Hibernation is pure, hallucinating, mesmerizing bliss. And this time, the vocals - as with the general sound itself, Sin Nanna didn't fail here either. These are the most insane, hysterical, demonic and inhuman screams anyone has ever done, including the Striborg mainman himself.

And then, a problem occurs. As always, Striborg makes music for the outcasts, those who - at least sometimes - want to shut out the outside world and just wish a quick death and disintegration to anything man-made, materialistic, pretentious and self-righteous. Nature doesn't need Man or any of his products. It has existed before, and it will exist after. But, once you hear those screams, in your glorious misanthropic solitude, feeling as one with Nature, you'll wish you had some friends around, just to play Depressive Hibernation to them and see the looks on their miserable faces. (8.5/10)

review by: Mladen Škot

Admittedly, 2000 and 1998 aren't "distant, legendary history" in black metal terms, and no stories are being told about those glorious days. To qualify for that, the recordings on this re-release would have to be, say, five years older. But, after the 1997 Cold Winter Moon demo, these two are the earliest Striborg recordings. As such, they are already a must for any fan. And wait until you hear how good they are...  

The only glitch on In the Heart of the Rainforest is the fact that the five songs don't quite sound alike so there must have been more sessions. But who cares? In a way, it just means you get more. 

Misanthropic Isolation is even harder to listen to. What a surprise. Even this early, it's Striborg as we know it (or him), through and through. Nothing new, but nothing "old," either. Compared to Striborg's more recent output, the guitar sound loses nothing in the intensity, except that all the harsh distortion was achieved in a much less sophisticated way. Simply, it's the classic "angry wasp in a tin jar" sound, but the rest of what you hear makes Misanthropic Isolation a classic Striborg. You have the endless blasts, the recognizable screams and the sloppy drums. Of course, when you realize that, while being fast or slow, simple or complicated, they are equally sloppy, the joke is on you. Sin Nanna just did it the way it was supposed to be done. The bass is quite silent, but it matches the guitar in the careless, convicting insanity. Ranging from hypnotic to conventional black metal, Misanthropic Isolation is actually well above something you'd consider a mere demo, a showcase of one's possibilities, and not at all unlike mid-period Striborg.  

review by: Mladen Škot

Does Janvs read Maelstrom? If so, they must have been concerned about the 4.5/10 rating they received last year from yours truly for their previous effort, Fvlgvres, and did everything possible and impossible to keep what was right, and fix what was wrong. Let us remind you: "whether they go for tremolo picking or alternate picking between notes of the same chord, it sounds pulsating, natural, distorted, but easily discernible rhythmic throbbing" but also "you'd just wish for them to finally unleash one strong, memorable, blazing part instead just doing black metal by the numbers." So you can imagine that, when Vega arrived with twenty other promos, it was the twenty-first CD this writer listened to. But, once we felt merciful enough to give it a chance it became the twenty second, twenty third and on, and on, and on.

Best riff ever! The very first second, and we're blown away. The sound is still there, and we are thankful for it, but the whirlwind of a riff, followed by more stellar insanity raging in previously unimaginable directions made us take the CD out after 30 seconds and check out if this REALLY was Janvs. And it was. A Janvs we never expected to hear. A Janvs with the same melancholy, but the intensity AND personality you'd usually ascribe to, well, any classic black metal release ever. Janvs are blazing as if their lives depended on it, and overdoing it wherever possible without losing the coherence. So, when "Torri Di Vetro" slows down, it is done in such a way that you barely notice, as the melodies are so good that even Italians seldom make them like this. And then, one-two-three, a short filler, which didn't even need to be there, but when it is succeeded by the opening riff, it gives it a shifted meaning. On "Saphire," the second track, there are some (presumably guest) clean vocals, and the melodies are still stellar. By now it's clear that Vega is one of a kind, and from then, it seems like Janvs can do no wrong.

If you're wondering about the vocals, they sound like the vocalist's throat was severed before he took the microphone in his bloody hands. Not the greatest scream ever, but as convincing as anything. That's what counts. 

And just two more songs to go, the title track, with an endless vocal melody in a dialogue with the raw vocals… but not the kind that hints at pretentiousness, rather the classical lyrical kind. A poignant Italian voice might not be the first thing one would associate with black metal, but there it is and "Vega," in its eight minutes, never makes you forget this is still a black metal album. Small pieces of ambient magic and the feeling of splendor make this the best "black metal ballad" you're ever likely to hear.

review by: Mladen Škot

What a mess. This Canadian quartet has obviously never heard a straightforward song in their lives. Beneath the Massacre don't have a clue about being subtle, careful, elaborate, moody, even memorable. But they do have a clue about destruction.

If you have a tapping arpeggio sequence lasting 13345 notes with this band, or 13346 notes with another band, no one cares, this is not a competition. If one band makes a song out of 412 rhythm changes, and another makes a song with 413, does the other one win? Who cares? And then, if the drummer plays at 6000 or 6001 blasts per minute, is it relevant? Nah. Just forget it.

So there you go - Dystopia, Beneath the Massacre's second album, is as brutal and as furiously technical as possible. The sound isn't deafening or blurry, it couldn't be any clearer and you can try to catch whatever you want to, but after 30 seconds, it's pointless. For a brief moment, when there is actually a groovy part it seems that Beneath the Massacre sound like Meshuggah. Other than that, it's endless cascades of notes and blasts. The vocals are a bit monotonous, mainly because of the color of the singer's voice, which always stays the same. The poor guy probably doesn't have enough time to elaborate on his expression, he's probably lucky that the rest of the band lets him in at all.

review by: Mladen Škot

Try this: say "thump." Or "thud." Or "dummm." That should sound approximately something like a bass drum sound. Now, say "tsk." That's not it, right? Just what we thought. The sound of ten people maniacally kissing a typewriter isn't the sound of a decent drum kit, nor is it a death metal sound. Ah, those Nuclear Blast producers.

Psycroptic once were a decent death metal band, and now they are a Nuclear Blast death metal band. Probably one of those they'll advertise just barely, and then you'll see them on discount in a few months. Even then, it's hard to imagine someone would bother checking them out. The reasons are obvious after 3-4 songs. First, the sound is clinically accurate and thin as a really thin thing. The vocals and the playing style suggest that Ob(Servant) is targeted at The Haunted audience wishing for something faster, and if listened to casually, it delivers.

If someone is capable of playing the things these Australians are, they usually make complicated riffs and incorporate them into progressive rhythms, but Psycroptic do it one-dimensionally. Like someone who is essentially old-school but is trying to do the "new" things - in other words, a standard riff in a standard rhythm, but spiced up with some pyrotechnics near the end. No matter how furiously and accurately it is done, after you've heard a few dozen of those, it feels like an average speed metal album. 

review by: Mladen Škot

Tell you what, this poppy blend of Goth and metal isn't half bad. As a matter of fact... should we say it? Or not? What the hell. Let's blaspheme. If the songs from Gloom is a Trip for Two were played by another band - say, Enslaved, it would be a smasher. Just imagine Grutle growling instead of this heavy-accented Moonspell-sounding German, then pretend that there are Nordic landscapes on the cover, and finally imagine that the lyrics aren't about "Seductora," "Her Dive Into Midnight," or "My Life is a Lie," and there you go. A worthy successor to Ruun. Trust us, no one would complain.

But is it just rubbish, something for the stupid Goth metal audience? Not exactly. It makes you headbang, it makes you play air guitar, it evokes emotions and it's exciting from start to finish. The riffs are heavy, driving and always managing to sound fresh, even though they are mostly just a support to the vocal melodies. However, the vocal melodies are so good that it doesn't matter whether it's them or the riffs that do it. As a whole, they work. Taking also into account expert solos, emotive keyboards and all the diversity you can expect from such a band, there's hardly a dull moment. The twelve songs seldom stray away from the standard clichés but hey - if the same thing done by HIM sounds embarrassing, when Beyond the Void do it it's actually dark, warm... and even seductive.

Gloom is a Trip for Two isn't their first album, and Beyond the Void display all the experience one should demand from a band in any genre. And for all the Goth-themed Seductora songs you also get titles like "Nihilism," "Hateworld," or "Rid of the Earth." In essence, Gloom... is what you make of it. Our advice would be to check them out - why deny yourself some quality music just because it's not meant for whatever type of audience you consider yourself to be in? This way, if a Goth ever tells you he or she knows a great band you'll know what that person is talking about. (8.5/10)

review by: Mladen Škot

To our British readers:

You can relax now. England, finally, has a formidable black metal band again. It has been a long while, but Winterfylleth's debut is here to satisfy most of your expectations. As the title says, The Ghost of Heritage is an expression of pride in being British, and you don't even need to read the lyrics to realize that.

If you have forgotten about things such as the Battle of Maldon in 991 AD, or about Excalibur ("Forging the Iron of England"), it's time to remember. The stories will be told through distant screams and warrior wails, thundering drums and a never too-high tempo, always maintaining the exact speed necessary to draw the attention to the storytelling component, never being just about destruction. There's nothing nationalistic about Winterfylleth's music, it's simply a reaction to the modern times where history, heritage and an empty sack are worth as much as an empty sack.

Now, if you're British, please stop reading this review, and check Winterfylleth out. Or go to the next review.

To our non-British readers:

You see, for a proud British band, Winterfylleth sound suspiciously too much like a German band, namely Nagelfar. Listening to The Ghost of Heritage feels like listening to all the slowest riffs off Virus West, simplified and watered down. The sound isn't as aggressive, and rightfully so, because there's not much blasting going on. But the riffs, the atmosphere, the vocals (both screams and clean), the acoustic parts and the rhythms are quite there. But, just as very few drummers can drum like Alexander von Meilenwald, very few bands can be better than Nagelfar.

review by: Mladen Škot

Okay, we know times are tough, and the market has its demands, but listen: the next band we catch using sound replacement for the hi-hat (no doubt our editor will know the exact technical term for this abomination) will have their CD promoted to a beer coaster, and the remains of the booklet will be used as pretend-snow in a Lego recreation of the battle of Stalingrad. Clear?

Really, if we're listening to doom, we like to be able to appreciate the atmosphere, the feelings, the actual doom. If the songs are good the sound itself shouldn't pose a problem, but if the major annoyance on Mourning Beloveth's fourth album IS the sound, then to hell with it. This "sss-sss-sss-sss" thing sounds like Chinese water torture. You can't be doom if you don't sound at least a bit natural, otherwise it's not cruel destiny haunting us, it's the machines. And where would this take us? Note: the production was done by Markus Stock (The Vision Bleak, Empyrium) and the last time we've heard his work in this role it was already suspicious. Obviously, the man is learning fast.

Hi-hat sound aside, Mourning Beloveth's riffs definitely have a noble feel to them. There is a solid number of them, evenly distributed into five songs. They are highly melodic, they sound crushing, but you've heard them before, if not on other doom albums then on this one because Mourning Beloveth tend to repeat them too many times.

Briefly, you have a mass(ss-ss-ss)ive sound, huge riffs going from the start to the end of a chosen track, in the same tempo, with the same groove, and with monotonous vocals. Twenty years ago, A Disease for the Ages could have been a solid doom metal album, but today it's somewhere between "standard" and "average." From a distance and without full concentration, it's not bad, but unfortunately you don't spend money to buy music and then try not to listen to it too carefully. (4.5/10)

review by: Mladen Škot

It's hard not to recommend a CD like Herald of Twilight, seeing that Forevers' Fallen Grace have released it themselves, and sell it for six dollars through their website. The cover is extremely good looking, the artwork has a certain do it yourself, but very well thought out appearance, and the music is worth the full price of CDs in regular shops.

As Herald of Twilight is the Massachusetts crew's third album, it's no surprise to hear well elaborated songs, but for today's epic doom standards, they are even a few marks above. That's not to say the compositions are perfect, but whenever there's a flaw on one end, Forevers' Fallen Grace make up for it elsewhere. So, if some parts seem overly stretched and self-indulgent, just be patient and the rewards will follow.

And it's interesting - obviously you'll hear some Candlemass, My Dying Bride or Anathema - but suspiciously there's also some Mercyful Fate, Machine Head and new age keyboards. Actually, one part could even have been a Stratovarius virtuoso part. And no mistake about it, it's still doom metal in various shades.

review by: Mladen Škot

The older we get, the lazier we get. For example, this writer thought that mp3 was a very practical format until he realized that it's too damn troublesome to find a particular album amongst tons of others on a generic CDR amongst 100 others in a bunch of faceless spindles. It's easier to find an (alphabetically sorted) original, pop it in the stereo and just play it. With time, this ritual reached new levels of laziness - now he doesn't even bother changing the CD if it's good, so he plays it twice, three or four times. Of course, if it's actually good. And the product of this way of thinking is the following conclusion - if a CD, as well as the writer's (de)concentration, can withstand a night of continuous replaying, it's good. No matter how retarded it might be, or appears to be.

So, this one. Vargh-kogh-ar-ga-smal, then. It couldn't appear more retarded than it does, beginning with the name and ending with the self-proclaimed genre of "wooden metal." How can the same thing be metal and wood at the same time? It can be metal and be heavy, or metal and black (or grey if you use titanium nitride coating), or metal and power-ful. But then, we also have death metal and thrash metal, so we'll close one eye. "Wooden," as it appears, relates to the non-distorted nature of this one-man recording. So it's not "unplugged" as the instruments - guitar, bass, keyboards - are actually electric (yes, electric guitar - another oxymoron, coming to think of it) - are actually plugged into amplifiers, but not distorted. Now, electric guitar wasn't supposed to be distorted back in the ‘50s when it was invented, and you haven't heard the musicians of that age referring to their music as "wooden blues" or "wooden rock," have you?

Still, in its own peculiar way, Drowned in Lakes doesn't sound like reinventing the wheel, nor does it sound like something that could have been done in the ‘50s. It's definitely metal, through and through. You have actual, solid riffs of the metal kind, from doomy ones to up-tempo folk ones, and they work. They bring excitement, they make the listener smile and they are persuasive. As much as the guitar tone loses in not being distorted, it gains through making the percussive element of the sound an important factor. And, this way, you can witness a new thing in the world of metal-ness. Non distorted metal, but still metal. We're not talking ballads here.

So, he's either too lazy to learn his songs properly or he simply knows what does the trick and what doesn't. We'd bet on the latter. There's no feeling of listening to a retard trying to play simple songs. You're listening to a lunatic playing while talking a walk somewhere between his forest cabin and a nearby lake, with all the obstacles, but also with all the joy of being surrounded by Nature. Trying his best to describe it, but never to disturb it.

review by: Mladen Škot

If you like your blastbeats and screams well done, and you wouldn't have it any other way, it's time to reconsider. Amid its Hallowed Mirth is such a treasure that it can make an innocent bystander think that doom is all there is, there's nothing better than doom to play, or listen to, or live.

This release is a collection - it consists of Novembers Doom's 1995 debut, two bonus tracks and the complete, unedited Scabs demo way back from 1990. Even though its nature might seem scattered, this CD is frighteningly coherent. We all know the contemporary British bands, My Dying Bride, Paradise Lost and Anathema, but there are some (such as this ashamed writer) who haven't heard of Novembers Doom until now. Thanks to The End Records, this failure is now remedied, and for all similar cases, this is the one to start with. Yes, great doom can be, and is, made in America too.

Novembers Doom are from Chicago, but listening to Amid its Hallowed Mirth, thirteen years later, it's placeless and timeless. Although some compare Novembers Doom to the Peaceville Three, the truth is that the only things they share are the era and the inspiration. Basically, apart from "playing slow and growling" nothing else. Paul Kuhr's voice is just plain amazing - obviously nothing has been done to enhance it, and listening to it laid before you is an experience to remember. It's deep, raw, guttural, yet still emotive, understandable, and perfectly natural. No traces of machismo or overdoing it, just sorrow and misery, done in such a way that you have to believe it.

It's hard to point out any favorite riffs because all of them are candidates. With a perfect sense of balance, Novembers Doom knew where to just deliver them, and absorb themselves into them, like being trapped inside a slowly storming gust of negative energy, and where to embellish them with barely audible guitar melodies. About the guitar tone... read the part about the vocals. The same. Fitting. Perfect. As well as the drums. We swear we have heard some beats we've never heard before, and it feels stupid knowing that someone out there played them 13 years ago... just like that. Everywhere, without ever losing ideas or energy. It seems that Joe Hernandez only played on Amid its Hallowed Mirth, and nowhere else again (at least according to The Metal Archives), and it's a tragedy.

review by: Mladen Škot

The second Novembers Doom re-issue, originally released four years after the debut - in 1999 - doesn't seem to have aged so well. There is progress all around - but to anyone attached (or converted) to Amid its Hallowed Mirth - it brings too many steps in different directions. For starters, it is much more aggressive and direct, but the new-found straightforwardness took away the romantic feeling of the debut. Some might beg to differ - after all, there are WAY more clean parts, and Cathy Jo Hejna's vocals appear in much more places. But... well...

There are the songs, you see. Obviously the musicianship improved, with more emphasis on melodies and less on heavy riffs. The guitar sound "improved" as well, with a clear and powerful crunch. The bass lines are clear, and melancholic. Paul Kuhr still used the same natural, emotional and clearly understandable guttural vocals, and also started using his clean voice. The production is good, even for today's standards. But the songs are just forgettable.

It doesn't necessarily mean "bad," but it does mean that in spite of all the effort and variety, not much stands out. If it does, it doesn't stay long enough, and most songs are over just when you start thinking they are about to take off. Then, Of Sculptured Ivy and Stone Flowers, as a whole, is just a tiny bit too fast to really be expressive. There is groove, and the groove isn't slowly crushing, but mid-slow pounding, almost rocking. And there are those thrashing parts, probably trying to be as convincing as Paradise Lost, but sounding anonymous. And those legendary vocals, more often than not, rely just on simple, straightforward narration. While they are clean, it works. When they go guttural, it bores.

review by: Roberto Martinelli

review by: Daniel Walker

review by: Daniel Walker 

review by: Ignacio Coluccio

Why do all metalcore bands sound the same? Really, it's not like the genre is intrinsically bad. You could go for a really angular metalcore version of Dillinger Escape Plan or an instrumental metalcore version of Iron Maiden or something and it'd probably sound cool if you paid enough attention to the actual music and not just to how much you appeal to teenage girls. The term "metalcore" is ambiguous enough for you to go, rock shit and get teenager fans while actually sounding good, but that's too hard and all that energy is better spent at getting groupies and all that, right?

Another Kind of Death is a metalcore band, or, rather, it's every metalcore band. You know those tests where they give you Pepsi and Coke without telling you which one's which and you have to guess? Comparing Another Kind of Death to every single other metalcore band in existence is like that: same thing, same taste, only with (not so) different chemicals. The difference? Pepsi and Coke actually taste good.

It's not fun, it's technically just decent, the songs are full of idiotic breakdowns, and pretty much nothing grabs your attention. The riffs are sometimes (just sometimes) good, angular, what-the-hell kind of riffs, but most of the time they are just pointless babbling. The vocals are just what you'd expect from a Norma Jean / Converge rip-off, except that, unlike those two, they are nowhere near good vocals for the whole record. If that part-by-part dissection doesn't convince you, maybe this will: fuck, no.

Just no. (2.4/10)

review by: Ignacio Coluccio

As much appeal as a label like "freak folk" has, and as much as Blake/e/e/e sounds like freak folk (or experimental folk, actually,) know that they don't sound like freaks.

Call them "free folk." That's what they show and what it feels like: freedom. The problem is, that genre label is already used and it has nothing to do with actual freedom, but more to do with the free jazz concept of freedom.

But let us not get carried away. Technical details aside, Border Radio is a folk album, but with a certain throwback to the Sunshine pop era. Without the cheap melodies, that is. While it does adhere to folk's simplicity, it doesn't adhere at all to its usual lack of instrumentation. The percussion is developed enough so that Border Radio doesn't feel like a bedroom demo, and the guitar playing is actually good, not just random chord strumming. At the same time, it doesn't strictly follow folk guidelines: there's a dub intro, a Residents-ish track and a Venus in Furs-like song, "The Thing's Hollow," that doesn't really fit the album.

The problem is, their experimental and folk tracks are just too good for you to care about the rest. "Holy Yes to the Sunny Days" and "The Great Rescue Episode" are mind-numbingly good, while the aforementioned "The Thing's Hollow" just breaks the atmosphere. Dub-Human-Ism deserves a whole paragraph or two, but just know that it's the first dub-folk-Baroque pop epic in history. And it's too damn good.

In the end, Blake/e/e/e shows a whole lot of talent, but not enough music. The album's short and two of the tracks are pointless, but the rest ranges from great to beautiful, and even on unfitting tracks it doesn't disappoint, quality-wise. So, besides those strange choices, Border Radio is a really strong album for fans of the stranger side of folk, freak folk, or anything guitar-based. (7.3/10)

review by: Ignacio Coluccio

Picture this. You're The Cult. You bathe in dollar bills and eat gold for breakfast. You were right at the top of the most commercial hard rock bands ever some twenty years ago, but then you realize that no one really remembers any of your songs. They just remember you as "that band that had some famous songs some years ago." So you want to get your fame back (or maybe just money) and you decide to reunite and record a new album. All bands do that, right?

Naturally, you decide to drop any desire of recording an actually good album and follow every single band that failed's way. What will you record? I hope you guessed "huge fucking stadium rock choruses and the easiest, simplest, most accessible songs you can come up with."

Born Into This is that, just humongous stadium rock choruses with some utterly forgettable riffs (riffs? scratch that - "low-level arpeggios and powerchords") and some of the most hilarious "manly" vocals this side of Wesley Willis.

Where other stadium rock bands offered some redeeming qualities (most notably, Queen's Brian May), The Cult offers you a total sum of zero redeeming qualities, zero originality and zero innovation. Really, you'd think they'd be able to, you know, spend some time actually composing songs. They didn't even try. Their music is absolutely straightforward, to the point of the listener being able to accurately guess the rest of the album based on the first two songs.

The worst part is not Born Into This sucking, it's that you know that it's just a cashgrab by a band that's recorded decent stuff oh-so-long ago. And it'll hit you right in the middle of the face: Post-reunion albums usually suck this bad and the musicians playing on them couldn't care less about producing listenable music. Born Into This is just an exercise in brand marketing, nothing more.

If you're into stuff like Velvet Revolver but with even less talent and more filler, then go for it. After all, The Cult needs your money, right? (1.9/10)

review by: Ignacio Coluccio

The worst part about reviewing this kind of album is that you just forget to actually review it. Really, twenty minutes into it is the first time you’ll realize you’re listening to it, let alone the whole "writing about it" stuff. That should tell you much more about Voices From Within than actual analysis would tell you.

Anyway, if you pay enough attention, you'll realize just how empty this Distorted album is. The generic riffs are, well, little more than accompaniment (if that) and that's precisely what we always expect from bands boasting a female singer, as if the songs depended only on that. And even if the girl's good, the only parts where you'll actually notice the music is when the male vocalist starts grunting. Not because he's especially good, but because the band then breaks out of their "but there's a girl singing, we can't be agressive!" stance for the far better "fuck it, we're a melodic death metal band" one. Sadly, that's 99% less common than it should be, meaning that, at most, Voices From Within has about three parts like that.

About its shortages, they are too obvious. Voices From Within is a 100% pop-oriented "gothic" (liberal usage of the term) almost-but-not-quite metal album, with just two or three actual metal parts. The rest is just fluff. Not even The Gathering's mid period too-catchy-to-say-no fluff. Hell, not even fun fluff. Just bad fluff. Don't expect anything near Theatre of Tragedy, since Distorted are way too in love with their own female vocalist to care about playing more than just a few riffs repeated ad eternum.

Technically, Voices from Within is correct. Not something to make you have fun, even remotely, but at least it doesn't sound off and they don't sound like they rushed it. In fact, it's like they really did put some effort into making music so utterly generic that it doesn't stand out at all. They just don't grab your attention in the whole record, so even if they were good, you wouldn't care, because it's just a vocalist with a backing band hired to never, ever take not even a little bit of attention away from the singer.

If you think a good female singer outweighs the music being mind-numbingly boring, then you'll like it. Also, whoever randomly decided that this is a "gothic / oriental" band: stop doing whatever drug you were doing while categorizing bands. Thank you. (3/10)

review by: Ignacio Coluccio

It's surprising just how many Napalm Death worship bands exist out there while Terrorizer has gone unnoticed for so long. Terrorizer's World Downfall is far superior to pretty much everything Napalm Death has ever done, but it's obviously easier to copy Napalm Death than it is to copy a slightly more technical and much more developed band. The worst part is that when we do get Terrorizer clones, they are usually boring. G.O.R.E. is one of them.

It's not that it's bad or that it's not heavy enough, it's that it's just a goofy Terrorizer worship band. Instead of going either for complete goofiness or complete punk attitude, they went for a 50/50 approach, something that fans of neither side will care for so much. Mainly because neither side is developed enough, you're stuck with some good riffs and some crazy parts, but nothing seriously brutal or totally weird. Just... in the middle.

The guitars are OK, the vocals are too deep for the punkier-than-usual grind, the bass is the usual guitar clone that you can't hear at all, and the drumming is decent. The songs are pretty much all the same, a mid point between World Downfall's faster songs and its punkier songs.

Never Sober Level is neither a classic grind or a modern grind album, being, again, in the middle. G.O.R.E. obviously decided to play it safe, as the "funny" parts are just pointless skits, and the supposedly weird vocals are just annoyance in an otherwise decent album.

Only if you love Terrorizer, Napalm Death's demos or early Brutal Truth, might you get some minutes of fun out of it. Or not. (4.7/10)

review by: ~Eternus~

review by: Ignacio Coluccio

Long Distance Calling comes to occupy the space between Red Sparowes, Pelican and post-rock. It sounds plausible because it is logical that someone eventually would do it. Well, they are that someone and they did it wonderfully.

But it's not just a matter of copying and pasting some other bands' styles: Long Distance Calling works because it’s not just a carbon copy of anyone. Sure, their influences are obvious (if you don't notice the Pelican resemblance, you should be declared legally deaf), and their structure is clearly derived from post-rock (Mono comes to mind) but they don't go only for the slow buildups. They use those, too, but there are quick changes of pace too.

You could say that it's a metal-centered post rock album... and be about 99.9% accurate. It's just that there are many subtleties that aren't ever present in metal. Some counter-punctual developments are far above your typical so-called "post-metal" band, and their rhythms are much more cohesive than Red Sparowes'. At the same time, Long Distance Calling’s melodies are just a little bit more forgettable - sometimes even cliche - and some things are repeated too much for their own good. That's when it hits you: Satellite Bay is a debut album… of course it's gonna be immature at times.

Still, Satellite Bay is up to the standards of those well-known post-rock bands, even when they are doing their own thing. It's a great atmosphere builder, but it's also fun and, *gulp,* accessible, even if sacrificing some variety for it.

The production, often bland for these records, emphasizes the highs and lows just like it should instead of making it all as loud as possible. They've found the right sound, now they just need to polish it. Even so, Satellite Bay is a great album for those into the heavier side of post-rock, or even for those into the more adventurous side of metal. (7.9/10)

P.S.: As a side note, that one track for their split with Leech that they have on their Myspace sounds way better than any of their stuff here, showing a more developed style and a more refined distortion usage.

review by: Ignacio Coluccio

Let's get something out of the way. Julie Christmas is the best female "extreme" music vocalist ever, period. She's varied, she screams like a banshee when she needs to, but sounds like the girl from Yeah Yeah Yeahs when the situation demands it. She even sings for a post-rock / post-metal band, and it works wonderfully (sometimes, even better than Made Out of Babies does).

One would think that a band with such a frontman would be just Julie and friends. That could never be more wrong. Made Out of Babies isn't scared to just accompany her sometimes, but more than once, the rhythm section takes the lead and rocks out, and they build up tension in ways that a vocalist-centered band would never be able to. In fact, her vocals are used much more like an instrument than they were in the crazier, less post-rock oriented early albums.

The Ruiner is the culmination, so far, of their sound. A melodic but angular, crazy but controlled enough, post-rock-but-not-really monolith of sound. The songs are self-sufficient experiences, their sound is much wider, but at the same time, far more cohesive than anything they've done until now, and there are no real faults.

Dissonance is well-managed, as is the "she's gonna go crazy any moment now" feeling of the vocals. And when she does go crazy, it sounds like she'll rip your spinal cord off. Post-metal has never sounded this good and developed since those Enemy of the Sun-era Neurosis albums, and it never got this scary.

Addictive, fun, complex, atmospheric and rocking, The Ruiner has set the post-metal bar much higher without really limiting Made Out of Babies to post-metal or sludgecore. Regardless of their genre, they sound inhuman here. Hell, even if you hated them, Julie Christmas' vocal work is just too good for you to ignore this. (9.4/10)

review by: Roberto Martinelli

review by: Roberto Martinelli

review by: Roberto Martinelli

review by: Ignacio Coluccio

Grindcore, pure grindcore, has always been quite inconsequential as a genre. It's fun, it's sometimes heavy, sometimes crazy, but artistry has never been found in the genre past some low level, ever. That is, unless you count the heavily post-hardcore-oriented Pig Destroyer and Nasum. Generic grindcore bands have always adhered to the same formulas, and while they work for some people, they’re not particularly interesting past novelty value either.

Rubufaso Mukufo, whatever that means, displays the same ideas you're used to. Sure, they sound good enough, they are fun and they are brutal, but they are just nothing new. Basically, if "nothing new" is good enough for you, then their side of the split is great. Their riffs, while pretty ground level, are entertaining and show some groove here and there, their drummer is great (especially when compared to the drum machine most bands use), and their vocalist is, while not varied, the textbook example of a good goregrind vocalist. You likely won’t find a better run-of-the-mill grind band. The really sad part about all this is that Rubufaso Mukufo was founded by Cerebral Turbulency members. Yes, the awesome Cerebral Turbulency.

On the other hand, Opitz manages to be coherent with everything grind has been up until now, and still adds some quite interesting quirks, namely, an acoustic interlude, more angular riffs, less structured songs, a small but noticeable sludgecore influence (Neurosis-styled vocals here and there) and actual melodies. The fact that Opitz's lineup is full of Contrastic members should tell you something, that something being that they are not gonna play precisely what you expect. However, they didn't play the weird card as often as they did in Contrastic, but at least it's a pleasant change of pace after the continuous blast-blast-blast of the other side of the split.

While this split doesn’t work as an actual collaboration (it actually feels like two EPs by completely unrelated bands put together), the fact that Opitz plays here means you should get it. And, if you're a more conservative fan, because there's never been a better

generic grind band than Rubufaso Mukufo. Ever. (Rubufaso Mukufo: 6/10, 9.6/10 if you love generic grindcore. Opitz: 8.0/10, 6/10 if you can't stand non-generic grindcore.)

review by: Ignacio Coluccio

Planets produced one of the purest math-rock discs ever. While more often than not math-rock means complicated post-rock or complicated metal (or both, see Don Caballero), few have gone the Tera Melos way of playing math-rock that sounds like math-rock.

Now, you might be confused about what math-rock means. To tell you the truth, math-rock doesn't mean much, it's just a way of saying "this particular brand of rhythmically complex, harmonically weird instrumental rock." Whoever doesn't acknowledge math-rock as a genre these days is just oblivious to reality, though.

To summarize math-rock most succinctly, check out Planets' "O People." Planets hasn't made the best album ever, but they are virtually untouchable technically and their sound is what you'd expect out of a good math-rock band. It exemplifies the genre perfectly without falling into cliche territory. It's chaotic but controlled enough that it sounds like music, but it certainly isn't something recommendable for fans of "normal" rock music. So, yeah, if you're looking for the least traditionally melodic, most complex and rhythmically developed math-rock around, Planets should be your next stop.

The problem is, Planets depends too much on being "math" and not enough on being "rock." It all sounds great you might wish you too could play even with half the technical proficiency they show here, but the songs have no real cohesion. Sure, it's all complex and it all sounds angular enough; the bassist is absolutely amazing and the drumming is impressive, but it's lacking the certain oomph in the guitar that made Tera Melos' self titled as glorious as it is, and that certain sense of evolution that tied its songs together.

Planets is a great effort; it's rhythmically out of this world and almost every song is carefully crafted, but they haven't crossed the line yet, and it doesn't help that it's just 25 minutes of music. Now, when they do cross that line, with the rhythm section they have, we'll be talking about a mindfuck of an album instead of an album with astronomical potential but without the development it deserved. As it is, it works but it won't split your brain in two, and it is mostly recommended as a gateway album for people already into avant-garde. (7/10)

PS: Awesome handmade packaging, too.

review by: Chaim Drishner

Here and there, some abandoned and godforsaken melodic, semi-acoustic passages occur, adding more weight to the already melancholy-drenched recording. There are no black metal clichés here, even if the style and influences are something one may have heard many times before; it is darker, more advanced and intellectually-biased, more gripping and hateful than most black metal.

review by: Chaim Drishner

review by: Chaim Drishner

This is hard hitting music, and it's not even THAT heavy nor outstandingly fast. In fact, Hinterland may very well be Blodsrit's most tamed, slow (hardly any blasts here) and melodic recording (what with the emergence of clear, semi-operatic vocals and a hint of female vocals as well, flaking the otherwise robust and stern façade). However, the music's monolith uniformity leaves no place for a sonic haven to relax upon; the choosing of an evidently non-black metal sound (a production more fit to dark rock than to black metal) and the many innuendos towards other realms of music (gothica, post-punk, dark rock, avant-garde rock and even a wink towards the ‘60s; just listen to the guitar sound in the opening track, a la the Blues Brothers); all these dichotomies — although done craftily well — are at constant war with each other throughout the album.

review by: Chaim Drishner

review by: Chaim Drishner

review by: Ignacio Coluccio

The problem with most metal genres is that, usually, gateway bands are either horrible or completely unrepresentative of their genre. Job For a Cowboy, Dimmu Borgir, newer Sepultura, and, right, Salt the Wound, usually work for people who know nothing about those bands respective genres, and then they discover that the genre itself is much better than those bands and realize just how boring they were.

Well, Salt the Wound is obviously another one of those gateway bands that are worth little but help people get into actual death metal. As a highly generic but also quite metal influenced metalcore / deathcore band, Salt the Wound is the product of the whole "metalcore is cool!" movement of these last years that would be best off forgotten. And, while it's praiseworthy if it gets people into metal, Carnal Repercussions is just too boring and mindless to even be considered as something to listen to willfully.

All the songs on the album sound like the sound engineer just copy-pasted three or four different segments to make a song, and then copy-pasted the song until it was a full length. Those three or four parts are decent on their own, but together they make a tedious crash course through the lack of compositional abilities of most deathcore bands. It isn't lack of technical ability or even lack of knowing what sounds good and what doesn't, it's just taking the easy way and not even going for anything but releasing an album the fastest, easiest way possible.

Without considering the humongous differences in compositional ability, Salt the Wound sounds like a more deathcore, mid-period In Flames. Right, just like every single other deathcore band in existence, but instead of trying, they just did whatever came effortlessly. And that lack of effort is as obvious as their penchant for instant appeal. Now, for the novice listener, Salt the Wound will sound so awesome that they'll need to go buy their album at Hot Topic, but the experienced listener will discard it in favor of actually decent bands. Or, at least, not terrible ones. (2.8/10)

review by: Ignacio Coluccio

Even if bike messengers aren't as cool as they think they are, Sean are far cooler than they think they are. Their sound seems kind of off (in a good way) at first, but that's until you read the booklet where it says "keyboard on ‘piano’ preset with a noisegate and guitar amplification." Then you realize that it's off because it's a piano playing distorted guitar parts! How awesome is that? Way, way too awesome. Now, that gimmick doesn't make an album, but talent does, and Sean has lots of that too.

It's (almost) instrumental, and it's really short, but Bike Messengers Aren't as Cool as They Think They Are is just brilliant. Pinpointing it is impossible, mainly because their compositions are just too weird. Kinda melodic, too. On one hand, they are metal because of the riffs and licks, or, at the bare minimum, noise rock, but their overall sound is not normal. On the other hand, metal has never sounded like this, and metal fans will probably hate it.

It might remind you of how a melodic Orthrelm without the extensive usage of repetition would sound, since their riffs are vaguely like those: fast and pummelling. But they are not as atonal. In fact, most aren't really atonal for the most part. Or maybe even a non-electronica-influenced new Hella with a less mathematical but more chaotic feeling.

Maybe it's just that the structuring doesn't exist at all here, so it all sounds like a collage of totally freaking awesome things. And, oh, God the amazing drumming. But really, it's not something explainable, Sean is just an original, fun, jawdropping band full of great ideas.

If you enjoy things like Hella or even no-wave bands like Theoretical Girls, you'll enjoy this for sure. Maybe you’ll dig it if you like the weirdest side of grindcore (mainly for the Discordance Axis-ish last track) or free jazz. It doesn't really sound like them, but it shares some principles. Namely, the "kicking ass" one. (9.2/10)

review by: Ignacio Coluccio

It's always surprising to find an album that bases itself on really normal genres to create a mess of an album. Sirhan Sirhan’s Blood is like what Dead Kennedys would play if they were going through an especially traumatic event, or what Botch would play if they, for some reason, decided to use nu-metal and stoner rock influences. But it's pointless, Srhan Sirhan isn’t like anything else. Rather, it is too crazy to be like anything else.

Before even bothering listening to the record, ask yourself: "Do I like psycho music?" If you do, go ahead because you'll love Blood no matter what. Otherwise, don't. Sirhan Sirhan are a bunch of crazy guys forced to play punk at gunpoint. That's why they are so good, and that's why they are a little bit limited.

They are good because who doesn't like listening to an album and feeling like the vocalist is going to appear out of nowhere running through your house, destroying your furniture with an axe? And they are limited because they obviously rely on the craziness to just say, "fuck it" to actual composition, and it's clear that they aren't so serious about the punk stuff. Their songs are just roughly done collages of amazing parts, but roughly done collages nonetheless.

Their sound is surprisingly catchy for such a particular band. Even when technically, everything's quite simple, the atonal riffs are perfect in context, the vocalist's work here is outstanding, and the drumming adds that extra dose of what-the-fuck-ness pretty much all the time. And it is punk, but it's nothing like what you'd call punk. It's rebellious, it's angsty, but it's rebellious and angsty like people in mental institutions often are, not like teenagers are. It's aggressive, but it's not your usual mindless tough guy aggression, it's aggressive like Jack Nicholson in "The Shining" is.

Particular, quirky and a little bit over-reliant on craziness, but great anyway. Blood's short, sweet and to the point. As a fun album, it works perfectly. As a statement, maybe a little more work is needed. This might be metalcore's future. And it is welcome. (7.9/10)

review by: Ignacio Coluccio

You know shit's gonna hit the fan when you see the booklet / promo case / whatever and it says "melodic hardcore." No, really, it's not that melodic hardcore's bad as a genre (seriously, there's been great hardcore bands, like Minutemen, that weren't scared at all of melody), it's just that many horrible bands go under that banner. Like "metalcore," like "rap/metal," like "gothic," it's not the genre, it's the cliche and their marketing schemes that make most of these bands cringeworthy.

So uh... yeah, Stick to Your Guns. There's no melody at all here. There's no hardcore at all here. It's just your typical alpha male, screaming dude with his band of oh-so-manly powerchord bashing friends. Holy fuck, you've heard this album four hundred times already. We know you're angry, we know you can't stand the system or whatever you're grunting about, but come the fuck on, at least play some music without reminding us of how retarded hardcore has become.

No, really, what the hell happened to hardcore bands that didn't abuse downtuning and epic breakdowns (and by "epic," we’re talking "horrible") and totally freaking terrible one-note, E-string bash riffs?

By God, try not to sound like My Chemical Romance in your breakdowns next time, you're supposed to be badass, or something. (And, as sad as it sounds, those My Chemical Romance-like breakdowns are the best part of the album… err, rather, the least worst).

Comes From the Heart really doesn't deserve much analysis. If you like whatever you’ve been made to swallow as "melodic hardcore" for the past five years, then by all means, get it. If you like music with a little bit more substance, then I'm sure those $10 will be better spent anywhere else. (1/10)

PS: Also, Meshuggah-like riffs work better when you don't play them the same every single time, in the same key. Seriously.

review by: Ignacio Coluccio

As far as brutal death metal goes, you'd be hard pressed to find original bands releasing stuff these days. Probably because there aren't many ways of sounding brutal. Really, besides blastbeats, riffs full of pinch harmonics, "slam," ultra-low / pig squeal vocals and so on, can you name many more? So it all eventually comes down to how heavy you sound, how inhuman your vocals are and how fast your drummer can go at it.

So, if we were to judge just by that, then Terrordrome scores a perfect ten. It's heavy, but not just heavy. The drums are the fastest they can be without sounding (too) incoherent, and the guitars sound just like chainsaws. Technically, every single song is, lack of variety aside, complex and attention-grabbing. Nothing at all feels out of place, not even the samples, which are usually retarded on brutal death albums. Hell, it's even short and to the point!

Of course, Terrordrome is no more than a brutal death metal album, even if their level of detail and complexity is far above your typical band of the genre. There's little to no variation in the riffs, and even if they sound totally heavy, they can get boring after a while, too. While their songs aren't as one-dimensional as most bands', they are still of an indecipherable structure, and as such, you hear them as something extraneous… not because of its complexity, but because of its, well, clusterfuck of sounds. Now, this is not Terrodrome's fault, it's the genre's fault.

So, if you like brutal death metal, then forget the shortcomings and go buy Vehement Convulsion, because it's some of the best brutal death metal to come out in these few last years. (8.1/10)

review by: Ignacio Coluccio

For as long as I've been into art, I've been hopelessly in love with the Dada movement. Even when art is so much more "modern" nowadays, and even though art, as a whole, is five times more conservative now than it was 90 years ago, the Dada movement represented the perfect disconnection between reality and art. That freedom, that artistic nihility, was what most people hated. "But art must represent reality and / or feelings!", and stuff like that.

In opposition, Dadaists proposed an anti-art art, a new step towards complete artistic freedom, and the complete absence of traditional logic. Such a rotund statement was a little bit too hard to digest, and the world decided to accept Surrealism's controlled craziness over Dadaism's rebellious yet intellectual craziness.

So here we are, 2008, and only some select few unofficially play music under Dadaism's banner. Won James Won is one of them. We have many weird bands, many original bands, and many more anti-art bands, but not many who can be called Dadaist. The live, improvised and sample-based The Hollow Grail is about as close to modern Dadaism one can get without being Marcel Duchamp's reincarnation.

Won James Won’s use of feedback, samples, melodies and synths are mixed randomly; atmospheres are created seamlessly and even pointlessly; the rhythms are not precisely normal. It's a deconstruction of noise rock, lounge, drone, pure noise and punk. The fact that The Hollow Grail is mostly improvised is obvious: there's no logical development here. It's all about chance and playing something unexpected. Instruments come and go with little to no reason as to why, the vocals are there just to give an illusion of there being songs, and everything is replaceable, but also integral to the experience. In a way, The Hollow Grail is a Cagean experiment in noise rock.

Deep inside, Won James Won plays rock music. It just doesn't matter anymore. Even the normal parts are corrupted and disorient the listener. Instruments are rarely ever used in conventional ways. And the weirdest part is that the album feels complete.

If total incoherency appeals to you, then get it. If you're afraid of listening to something unlike anything you've ever heard, don't. (9.2/10)

review by: Chaim Drishner

review by: Chaim Drishner

review by: Chaim Drishner

Majestic Downfall, a one-man-band from Mexico, offers an insipid brand of doom/death hybrid of the melodic kind. It’s an absolute waste of time, for there are so many outfits out there doing the very same thing, but most deliver a much improved blend of doom and death metal than Majestic Downfall's three long and tedious tracks, filled with the very best of melodic doom clichés. The artist behind the name offers nothing new, be it personal, passionate or singular, and adds nothing to the doom pool, so-to-speak. He treads the same traveled roads and bores the listener to death by doing so.

review by: Chaim Drishner

review by: Chaim Drishner

review by: Chaim Drishner

review by: Daniel Walker

review by: Daniel Walker

Before even hearing a note of this album, you might be turned off by the cover art, thinking the music would be too weak, goth-pop, and emotional. But then you'd miss all the killer grungy riffing to be found on here.

review by: Daniel Walker

This trio of Mexicans have crafted a heavy, thick sound awash with an arcane presence we usually don't see in the prog metal genre. Opener "Summoning Accursed Gods in the Grave of Agony" suddenly explodes into a dizzying keyboard attack at the hands of Victorino Perez. His style of playing is what really places this more in the prog/power metal camp. The album has the prerequisite darkness and harsh vocals to fit in somewhere else, but the clarity of the clean vocals and the synth showboating put the band closer to a morbid Royal Hunt, than say, Old Man's Child.

Second track, "Celestial War" bleeps on like the neverending war between good and evil, but not in a negative sense. When the keyboards take center stage again for the chorus, the melody has a timeless and danceable quality to it. It's almost like a theme song for an RPG like Chrono Trigger, which sounds a little cheesy, but metal is inherently cheesy, anyway.

Third track, "Infernal Blood," stands out with a candid, lush chorus with strings and a slightly dissonant interlude, which has become a favorite with prog bands in recent years. It has the effect of sporadic, descending half-steps down the musical scale that disorients you some, but it still sounds damn cool.

Finally, the title track begins with a cartoonish clink that sounds like it was culled from slapstick comedy before erupting into a vile black / thrash riff, finally settling for a relaxed mid-tempo for the rest of the song, with nice pockets of adept keyboard shredding throughout.

Divinitus is a very talented band who know how to write songs that listeners can latch on to, maintaining a deft balance between bright and dark. Also, their enthusiasm is contagious, judging by how many exclamation points they put in their lyrics. These guys could really be big in the metal community, or at least write music for video games. (8/10)

review by: Avi Shaked

review by: Roberto Martinelli

review by: Avi Shaked

review by: Mladen Škot

So, Zimmers Hole is supposed to be fun. Okay, we're not so ruthlessly metallectual; we get jokes. Lordi are fun. Manowar? You can laugh at them and take them seriously at the same time, right? We can laugh at power metal, black metal, thrash metal, Gorgoroth, Satanists, Pagans, Jesus... and now we have Zimmers Hole and we're thinking that we have lost touch with the world.

What is that Dethklok thing? And are there still people who think burping and farting are funny? And, as jokes go, how many times can you listen to the same one? Listening to an illiterate person trying to read is fun, maybe in an episode of a sitcom, but as a part of a CD? Hmmm.

Let's skip to the music. Yeah, it's powerful. Now that Strapping Young Lad is put "on ice" by Devin Townsend, the remaining members have decided to continue where they left off and make Zimmers Hole their main band. Not surprisingly, it sounds like SYL meets Judas Priest, with up-tempo double kick songs exchanging with mid-tempo fist-punching headbangers. The singer's vocal range is absolutely amazing, the guitars are clear and punchy, and the drums were played by Gene Hoglan, so, to complete the recipe for a perfect metal album one doesn't need any more ingredients. Still, it fails.

The music is good... once. Listen to it twice, or more, and it leaves us blank. Admittedly, some of the lyrics are funny, but after the joke wears thin you're left with just the music and it's actually cold. No emotions come through, just precise execution through great sound. If it was another band and you ignored the lyrics, it would still be a standard heavy/thrash album with more diverse tempos, but not many memorable riffs or surprising turns.

Since the most memorable parts of this album with a long-winded title are actually the pig oinks or whatever "funny" sounds Zimmers Hole decided to throw in, we're afraid that only the MTV / PC / Playstation / whatever generation of kids (American, at that) could like something such as this. (5/10)

review by: Mladen Škot

Sludge = "Any thick messy substance." No, that’s not entirely fitting. Thick as hell it is, but there's no mess in Zozobra's sound. The guitar is clean, strong, and literally heavy. The overdriven bass sounds awesome, straight in your face and grinding... so maybe it is grind?

Grind = "Reduce to small pieces or particles by pounding or abrading"... now we're closer. Although obviously hardcore, and grinding, Zozobra aren't "grindcore." The grinding they do is of the slow, controlled, deliberate and precise kind.

Although barely 30 minutes long, and with no blasting present, Bird of Prey is exhausting. Riff upon riff, it's like Caleb Scofield (Old Man Gloom, Cave In) never runs out of directions from which he can drop another ten-ton riff or ominous melody.

The songs have quite a simple construction, but the directions in which they take are always different, so much that you have to wonder where all these riffs have been hiding until now. The session member, Aaron Harris (Isis) almost sounds redundant, but the man simply has the talent to drum where he has to, the way he should. So, since Zozobra is only Scofield's second attempt at showing that he can write songs outside of his other bands, it wouldn't surprise us if the man had even more of this in him.

Maybe we should be thankful that the duration of Bird of Prey is so reduced, as already at one half of it there are chances of nausea and nose bleeds.

Heavy = (this is the one!) "Characterized by toilsome effort to the point of exhaustion; especially physical effort" or "Slowly as if burdened by much weight" or "Of great gravity or crucial import; requiring serious thought" or "Of great intensity or power or force" or "Marked by great psychological weight; weighted down especially with sadness or troubles or weariness" and especially "Of comparatively great physical weight or density."

There was no "Zozobra" in this writer's thesaurus, but the three other words were quite enough. (8/10)

review by: Mladen Škot

"I lift the blood-filled chalice towards the sky, and drink in the honour of my master of the deep. I kneel before the black altar of Satan and the sign of the Baphomet. And command the dark forces to come forth..."

Sounds stupid? Maybe it does. And if we told you that there's more of it, seven full songs of endless Satanic nonsense in every possible and impossible verbal combination, you would probably look elsewhere for good music.

But, just as Setherial were capable of writing approximately 1,000 lines similar to "The rise of the ancient dragon, from the darkened depths. The seventh gate is open and Satan rules the world..." without repeating the same nonsense, they were, at least on Hell Eternal, also capable of making 1,000 insane riffs. Without repeating the same song. Hell Eternal, is the best and most brutal that Swedish black metal has ever offered.

Okay, obvious comparisons to Marduk or Dark Funeral will pop up. Screw that. In the same year, Marduk released Panzer Division Marduk, and this writer went to see them live. While buying the ticket, I also noticed the Hell Eternal digipak and bought it as well. Marduk were... okay. Boring. Nothing special, after 15 minutes just the same-old, even though I was in the first row. And when I came home, ears buzzing, legs and neck aching, I just tried Hell Eternal, at low volume. WHAM! Blown away. It was marvelous, and still is.

Concerning Dark Funeral... nothing they have ever done belongs in the same sentence as Hell Eternal.

The digipak in question looks what every true black metal digipak should look like: black. On the front: the logo, a shield, the title and two figures looming from the darkness. One holding a spiked club, the other an axe. And the one with the spiked club had the weirdest corpse paint: splitting his forehead in half. Open it, and you're threatened by more of them, almost as if they are displayed on a fantasy war figures exhibition.

Open it some more, and on one side there are some credits and hails. On the other side, someone, in their infinite black metal wisdom, confused the left and the right side of what was to be folded downwards, so you have to read the right page first, and THEN the left page - if you want to follow the lyrics. Kvlt.

And, oh, there's the music too. Seven songs, forty minutes and forty seconds. The production, done by Tommy Tagtgren at the Abyss studio, was impeccable. Play it low, it's thundering. Play it loud, it's bloody scorching. The drums have the best sound this side of De Mysteriis Dom Sathanas. The guitars are fairly clean, but the clarity is of little help when you take into account what they are doing. Almost always there's the classic deviant black metal rhythm guitar, blazing as if there's no time for small talk. If it wasn't grandiose, it didn't end up here. Obviously, if we're talking Armageddon, there's no point in using small words.

And the lead guitar adds three or four other dimensions. When you are able to notice what it is doing, that is. But if you do, you'll be rewarded.

Armageddon... that's the word. No intro, just instant blasting, a ferocious scream, and the listener is in. No mercy. Except for the subliminal ride cymbal going at half the tempo of the snare drum, the rest are ubiquitous blastbeats of the most merciless kind, and the regular eight beats per second seem to be able to go on forever. The riffs are ascending and descending from everywhere, Wrath's vocals are magnificent and quite understandable, and the music is just beyond comparison. The levels of brutality are so high, yet so gloriously outrageous, that, once you get used to Hell Eternal, you will actually consider the songs NOT starting with a scream "weaker tracks." And even though one, title, track, does indeed have an intro... when Setherial kick in, the snare drum blasting is so loud that it deafens everything else.

Hell Eternal is not an album for the weak. Most people would complain about the lack of variation, but those who know will cherish it. To this day, we haven't heard anything like this: fast all the way, brutal all the time, endlessly insane and with no indecisive moments. And catchy as the aforementioned hell. Listen closely and stop complaining about how it hurts, and you'll realize just how many sweet and outstanding moments this all-out noisefest has, and you'll keep returning to it for years to come.

Want an example? "Towards Thy Realm" has a moment when the singer growls, and not screams, "Satan." And yes, that's a great moment, just as is the closing moment when the song slows down a bit and the vocals threateningly command "Creation: Reverse." But you have to hear it to believe it.

"Shadows of the Throne" screams "best song ever" — just the beginning holds an explosion and a moment where everything stops, slams down with full force three times, and continues at full speed. Then, what else... ah, it has the best riff ever, then another best riff ever, then another... and then a double-bass drum part where it feels like you're ascending into the freezing night sky, and if there ever was one moment in music history saying "THIS is black metal," listen to it between 4:21 and 4:35 and this would be the one. Did we forget to say that we've never heard tom rolls and cymbal crashes being used like this?

The title track manages to sound even MORE brutal and the way the guitar follows the scream through the "flame, my dark delight" part of the lyrics damn right feels like some flames are being thrown at you. And listen closely, you'll notice one of the noblest melodies ever written passing you by as if it's nothing special. Somewhere around 3:30, Alastor Mysteriis also goes for the "fastest kick drum ever" and it sounds as if he's resting on that part. Actually, the drums are, as a whole, played with so much careless speed, precision and variation that... oh damn it. We're out of superlatives.

"The Aeschma Deava," besides having the best riff... damn. Another best riff, just like any other riff on this album. We're already regretting having started to write. If this was a regular review we'd just write 10/10 and instead of reviewing give you the links to every CD shop in the world where you can buy Hell Eternal. If you can't get the digipak, there is good news: Napalm Records has re-released it in 2008, as a double CD, so in the same case you can get Hell Eternal and Nord. Get them.

And yes, "The Aeschma Deava" actually slows down. Then the drumming gradually speeds up to one and the same riff (yep, best ever) and you're exposed only to total blackness and an annoying cymbal playing with your nerves until everything explodes back into blasting. Then Setherial go progressive, and we promise to let you know what "The Sign of Wrath Awaked" is about as soon as we figure it out. It sounds like it was played backwards, but it isn't. No idea how they came up with that, and learned that thrashing interlude either. It doesn't make sense.

What does make sense is the more straightforward follow-up track, "The Nightwinds," and by that time, even though it's easier on the nerves, all you'll be able to remember is "Satan... in hell awaits..."

Finally, "Guardians of the Gates of Flame" ends as abruptly as Hell Eternal started, and this one is so twisted that we can only tell you that the chorus consists of "Rahhhh!!! Rahhhh!!!" and it repeats twice. The parts in-between sound like Empe