Experimentation is the essence of progress. Some musicians take this to heart and always seek to push boundaries, and some are content to just fine tune what has been done before. What is worth remembering is that experimenting with no real goal or purpose probably won't yield any usable results.
My initial reaction to Downwards by Rape on Mind was something along the lines of "huh, I wonder where this is going". These notions of experimentalism were however quickly exchanged with a feeling of disappointment. Downwards starts out with some atmospheric saxophone, which I tought was pretty interesting, bringing to mind darkjazz groups like Mount Fuji Doomjazz Corporation. But I found that these fleeting moments of intrigue were few and brief. Before long the music of Rape on Mind degrades into mindless chugs with late-era Max Cavalera vocals, like a thugged-out Soulfly. To me, Downwards seems like a rancid misinterpretation of what death metal and grindcore are about, jazzed up with aweful groove-core elements.
It's not like chugging riffs are the bane of all that is holy. But chugs only work if they're used as interludes between more meaningful songwriting. Otherwise the music will just be an amorphous mass of start-stop pseudo-riffs with no real merrit. Deathcore bands usually take the heat for being too chuggy, using downtuned strums at irregular intervals at every possible climax, but at least most deathcore has climaxes, varying intensity and temper. Instead, Rape on Mind just jerks around on the floor in a half-hour seizure to the sound of a malfunctioning jackhammer, making even the simplest deathcore acts seem like gracious ballets.
Perhaps I'm being unfair. The second half of Downwards shows a more varied approach to songwriting, and bands like Portal (Which I quite like) have very little variation in intensity, and their music is exactly just an amorphous mass of riffs. But at least their music has wanderlust, purpose and atmosphere, which is something that can't be said of this Polish group. Keep in mind that I don't particularly care for this kind of music at all, so take that into consideration whilst reading this. But I think Downwards by Rape on Mind is complete rubbish. 4/10 guitars.
Tracklist:
1. Downwards
2. Remorse
3. Steps
4. ......
5. Nothing
6. Lost
7. Memories Always Burn
8. Break or be Broken
9. Question
Once the acoustic guitar intro to Frozen Realm's debut EP of the same name breaks into an orgy of flashy guitar melodies, there can be no doubt as to the nature of the Swedish band. Balls deep in the long-standing tradition of the Gothenburg sound, Frozen Realm break into full-fledged melodic death metal complete with everything the definition entails.
In that regard, the Swedish band's EP is a textbook example of the modern take on melodic death metal. And by that I mean that it has very little in common with actual death metal, save perhaps the growled vocals. The pompous drumming greatly accentuates the rest of the musical body, which consists of about fifty-fifty amounts of ill-composed melodies and mindless chugs.
The main problem with most melo-death bands is the lack of hooks. When you add substantial amounts of melody to your music it subtracts greatly from the heaviness and brutality, so you'd better make damn sure your melodies are catchy as fuck. As a result, the tracks on the Frozen Realm EP don't stand out from each other - There are plenty of melodies, though none of them are particularly catchy. The hookless compositions bring to mind a watered down In Flames, a less edge-seeking Dark Tranquility, or a less epic Wintersun.
What really sets bands such as Frozen Realm apart from the heroes they worship is their lack of flair for the flow and focus of the songwriting in itself. Where In Flames perfected the straight-to-the-point approach with groovy riffs satiated with the adding of melodies on top, Frozen Realm fool around with melodies at the helm, only relinquishing it's weak grip to allow equally uninspired chugs to take over. 4/10 guitars.
Tracklist:
1. Iceshaper
2. Thirst
3. The Pawn
4. Abandoned by the Sun
Turmoil breeds frustration and anger, which in turn breeds outlets for that frustration. South America has had a rich history dating back to the early 80s of metal bands expressing their anger through their music and lyrics, and like those legendary and trendsetting bands from the days of yore, the four-man group Asilo from Argentina presents a lyrical universe revolving around themes such as politics and the suffering it can bring, set to a soundtrack of furious and often dangerously calm mix of doom-laden drones drenched in grimey sludge.
Pure aggression is one of the mainstays of Asilo's music, of that there can be no doubt. In a hardcoresque style, lead singer Manuel Platino practically screams his lungs out to the sounds of harshly distorted bass and thunderous percussion. Comunión's structure as an album is also one of the strengths that underline the band's style. The way it fluctuates between insane cacophonies and inky pools of fragile pianos - or even saxophone at one point - is what makes listening to Comunión as an album interesting.
However, aggression necessitates some kind of structure and form. Were it not for the disciplined interludes of classical piano set regularly throughout the album to provide some sort of contrast, Comunión would appear to be a harsh collection of discord. There are a multitude of examples of bands that do this unhinged, rambling musical lunacy all too well, but Asilo lack the intensity and groove that those bands utilize.
The vocals, though wholy authentic and honest, come off as a bit too immusical to me. In grindcore, the gratingly raw vocals are an essential part of the whole expression, complete with that intense wall of distortion. But in Asilo, the vocals take up a lot of space in the mix, and needlessly so. Coupled with that is a lifeless overall sound which so lacks that concentrated emission of sound. This isn't the first time I've had the (dis)pleasure of listening to guitarless music, using instead a fairly driven bass. But to be succesful in that endeavour, you better make damn sure the bass has drive and punch enough to take the guitar's place.
The main highpoint of Comunión was, to me, Miedo y Curiosidad from the latter part of the album. This track feels somewhat out of place, although not entirely. It features the same harshness as the rest of the album, but is graciously garnished with the haunting sounds of a well-played saxophone, adding a thick atmosphere of eerieness that the rest of the album sorely needs. Elaborating on what I mentioned earlier, Asilo's first actual album since their spawning in 2010 is an honest affair where they stay true to their own values - Something that many bands could learn a thing or two from. But that particular style does nothing to me, other than fill me with a wish of listening to something else. The saxophone melodies in Miedo y Curiosidad committed that last shred of reason to the insanity that made it a more easily digestible portion, but the rest of the album remains a bothersome clutter of confusion. 4/10 guitars.
Tracklist:
1. Geografías
2. Pichiciega Fe
3. (epidemia mundial del desencanto)
4. La Paciencia del Cuchillo
5. Arquitectura del Silencio
6. (anti voz)
7. Dinámica del Cambio
8. Mideo y Curiosidad
9. (no a la vida)
10. La Ultima Voluntad
Whenever I see a band or project labeled as drone my warning bells start ringing. Much too often drone has been used as a cloak for lazy songwriting, blaspheming against great acts like Boris or Sunn O))).
Supposedly the idea behind 0 The Experient is seeing how far you can take music with just a bass. Apparently the answer to that conundrum is "not very far", because most of what Simplifying a Demon presents is a mimic of what you might as well do with a guitar in much the same manner. Disguised in a veil of treble distortion, sometimes accompanied by pseudo-jazzy bass fiddling, the bulk of the work presented might as well have been a regular bedroom black metal band. Add to that the weak nature of the vocals, and you've got yourself a long, boring album.
0 The Experiment affiliates itself with tags such as drone, black metal, minimalistic and experimental. Indeed, there are tracks that are veritable feasts of reverb and distortion delivered in an appropriate wall-of-noise manner. And black metal too has an obvious presence among the seven tracks the project's first album. It's all presented in a very minimalistic and simple manner. What I don't see is the experimental part - Experimental for the practitioner perhaps. But there's hardly anything progressive, avant-garde or otherwise experimental in nature about a guy rubbing out some mostly mediocre basslines to unengaging lyrics and unending wads of boring drone. Simplifying a Demon is really basic stuff, and "The Experiment" simply lacks the ritualistic ambience that makes black metal and drone great, without adding anything else to take its place.
Looks like the ol' warning bells were right. But then, in the midst of all this mediocrity comes the two last tracks, Demon and Ritual to Nothingness. The latter portrays a great entrancing feel of cosmic psychedelia while still maintaining an odious core of something a bit more sinister hidden away among the meldoes, while the former feels like a downright study in the bass' capabilities as a more analog counterpart to the synthesizer, bringing to mind some of Burzum's finer works in black metal and ambience in spirit. I don't particularly care for the lifeless black metal aspect of Demon, but there is still a bounty of quality to be found therein. And while the two works show great promise and showcase the diversity of the bass as a versatile instrument, the same cannot be said for the rest of the album. It baffles me that the rest of the album is such a mess of coma-inducing boredom.
Those two tracks that I have praised seem like they should be the main core of 0. With or without the help of computerized effects, the modern electric bass can provide astounding amounts of diversity... Something that is for the most part poorly expressed on Simplifying a Demon. 4/10 guitars.
Tracklist:
1. Prophet In Blood
2. Black Elf
3. D.I.E. (Death Is Eclectic)
4. I, The River
5. Waiting for Something to Die to Eat
6. Demon
7. Ritual to Nothingness
It hasn't taken long for Trou Noir to produce their first demo. Released the same year the band was formed, Echoes in Black Holes is an international effort consisting of Worbid and Monork from Russia and Dunkel supplying the vocals from France. The internet has made it possible for musicians from all over the world to easily collaborate and create diverse variations of genres that are otherwise often heavily coloured by its regional scene. Between them the three members of Trou Noir - or "Black Hole" in French - have been in at least nine bands that have collectively released in excess of fifty demos, EPs, splits and albums, meaning that this unholy trinity are at least in some way seasoned musicians.
A vital element within Echoes in Black Holes is the way they utilize ambience. Monork's arpeggiated notes form the backbone of the demo with the minimalistic drumming of Worbid providing the rhythmic coherence. The two usher in the raw vocals of Dunkel, which bear a striking resemblance to those of Varg Vikernes on Det Som Engang Var. The transitions between the ten tracks on Trou Noir's first demo are seamless and immaculate, making the whole demo coalesce with each element being consistently integrated without much effort. Each track neatly segues from cold and melancholic melodies to more ambience-laden passages with the arpeggiated notes working to add depth to the music. To continue the Burzum analogy; If the vocals are Det Som Engang Var, the music itself is closer to Filosofem or Hlidskjalf, but without opting for the same droning approach.
Any music enthusiast will know that it's hard to get riled up if the musicians delivering the music aren't engaging about their business and deliver their tunes in a convincing way. Accusing Darkspace's first demo from 2002 of being varied, extravagant or musically eloquent seems almost an insult, and yet Darkspace have become a modern day cult in themselves. Their music is droning and monotone, but it works extraordinarily with the monotony becoming the main attraction which makes it all the more hypnotic. You might be wondering why I'm talking about Darkspace rather than Trou Noir, but when it comes to spacy ambient, atmospheric black metal a band such as Darkspace automatically becomes the standard to which similar bands are held, and while Trou Noir and Darkspace have only minute elements in common, it seems as a necessary comparison to make. Trou Noir have opted for that very style, yet deliver their music with total abandon and insincerity. I can feel they're going for a trippy, psychedelic feel with the drawn out drum sequences and almost randomly picked guitar notes, but it becomes stale and unhypnotic in the execution process. There are a few good riffs once in a while, with the main riff in Black Hole Reverb being the prime example, and the vocals seem to generally be held to a higher standard than the rest of the demo, but all in all it feels like most songs are written the way they are for the sake of consistency rather than actually contributing a memorable element to the release as a whole. Their songwriting makes it very hard to remember any one moment on the demo, which in itself isn't inherently bad as proven by similar groups, but it becomes a fundamental problem when there is nothing else to remember the band or demo by.
My problem is that the demo is too long for such an ineffective delivery of stale ideas. Darkspace got it right when they released their demo in 2002 featuring 25 minutes of their trademark spacey black metal, consisting of little other than spaced out walls of distorted guitar accompanied by ferocious blast beats. Echoes in Black Holes is overflowing with poorly executed melancholy that misses its target by a wide margin. The cover art made a promise of better things - It made a promise of cosmic black metal engulfed in the cold, galactic aspects that this sound usually brings with it, but it was a promise it could not keep. The atmosphere is bedroomy rather than spacy, which is what primarily sets it apart from the great ones within the genre. Instead of going exploring within the psychedelic possibilites of their chosen style, they follow a linear path which doesn't suit their sound terribly well. 4/10 guitars.
Tracklist:
1. Funeral Echoes (Part I)
2. Defective Reflections
3. The Tree Into the Void
4. Somnambulistic Searchers
5. The Denying of Being
6. Black Hole Reverb
7. Nihilistic Moon
8. Echoes in Mirrors
9. March of Leprous
10. Funeral Echoes (Part II)
Self-proclaimed death/doom duo Apocryphal hail from Arizona in the US. Spayd and Polingyowma, the band's driving forces, have undertaken a task of making doom-laden death metal in a simple, back to the roots way. This has produced one demo, Embrace of Death, released in March 2013. Right off the bat the artwork looks killer, with some hapless zombie-victim puking gore and rip and tearing his own guts. The cover is pretty simple and gets the message across.
The music reflects the cover's concept in the way that it's elementary with absolutely nothing but the most fundamental and necessary present within it. The basic needs of death metal are met with a simple compound of growled vocals, d-beats and guitars ranging from slowly paced chugs to deep tremolos. However, this is where the similarities between Apocryphal and the old school of death metal end.
I don't think anyone would claim that death metal has to be a cornucopia of technicality or progressive ideas. It began as something simple in the 80's, and many bands have since kept it that way to great effect. Hell, some would claim there are entire regional scenes built around simplicity and going back to basics. But these bands always have something else to make their music interesting; Atmosphere, heaviness, melody, sound, whatever. But Apocryphal's first demo does not have anything. It's completely undistinguishable death metal. The songs are simply too lacklustre and dull to justify being so simple. There are definitely some really cool deep tremolos on there, but it's like they never amount to anything, with the effects just kind of dying out before anything else happens. The duo seem to not fully grasp how to utilize built up momentum in no small part due to the poorly timed drums, and as such the tame drum rolls just sort of becomes the instrument of the melody's demise.
There is an obvious lack of musical foresight - Everyone knows the feeling when you're listening to a great song and you can almost feel how the track is going to progress, but Embrace of Death is either much too obvious or not obvious enough. When they switch from one part to the next it doesn't quite have that feeling of natural progression. It's shoehorned into the death/doom tag to try to justify its lack of pacing, but death/doom doesn't necessarily have to be slow and boring. Another thing I don't get is the half-time cymbal hits that permeate the drumming of Apocryphal. Apparently this is becoming a thing, and it can bring some much needed variation to bands that only do blastbeats or d-beats, but when it's all the time I lose interest FAST. 4/10 guitars.
Tracklist:
1. Oxidized Flesh
2. Bane of Essence
3. Dissolution in the Midst of Solitude
Taking the 80's route to heavy metal is an approach many bands choose. The 80's saw heavy metal become a rather popular genre, and in that particular decade the genre underwent incredible amounts of change and innovation - Mimicking the sound and atmosphere of that decade has more or less become the new black, whether it involves organic production, a particular way of writing songs or using other contemporary elements in the music.
Hammerspace is a virtual band, meaning (as far as I know) that the sole member, Timothy Branch, has invented a sort of "fictional" band, kind of like Brendon Small's Dethklok. The band focuses on certain RPG/adventure elements, meaning that the lyrics often involve gaming, roleplaying games, adventure and the likes. This review was originally supposed to be about their first EP, "The Kings of Mediocrity", but in the light of the more recent release, the full length album "Volume 1: Reset, Repair, Restore" released by Torn Flesh Records, I decided to instead review both releases and hold them up against each other.
I found The Kings of Mediocrity to be pretty much what the name implied - A fairly mediocre journey through heavy metal scapes of varying quality and characteristic. Most of the EP was, to me at least, entirely unexciting and uneventful, with only a few moments to catch the eye. The intro for this review may seem entirely pointless, but the reason I brought up the 80's is because of the opening track, Pull the Trigger, which seems to be trying to portray the soundtracks often heard in the darker science fiction movies of the time. The problem with the opening track is the same that goes for the entire EP: It's so overdone and saturated with the concept that it becomes more of a parody rather than a homage.
Songs like The Rat with its whispered vocals and Into the Future with the harpsichordesque intro melody to me sounds like the band (or Branch, if you will) is trying too hard to fit a concept that it sort of becomes shackles chaining the band to a creed of nerdiness, which to some may be funny or interesting, but to me just seems a bit try-hard-ish.
The entire thing is a composit of thrashy nineties-like heavy metal riffs with a thing for groove, but ultimately the EP lacks edge and intricateness. The last track, Game Over, is by a long shot the best piece on the album. It is both groovier, heavier and more original than the rest, and all these things in unison make for a much more effective track than all the other tracks on The Kings of Mediocrity.
My problem with a band such as Hammerspace is that, like I mentioned earlier, the gimmicks have just completely taken over and makes it hard for me to take it seriously as a musical endeavour. Really, Hammerspace has more clichés and gimmicks than all of Batman's adversaries put together. Gimmicks don't have to be bad. Take a band like Gama Bomb: Their lyrics and concept is about video games, comics and movies too, but not to a degree where it inhibits their writing abilities.
I was hoping the full length would change my mind. When I heard Prologue, the first track, I had my doubts. It sounded like a less memorable theme song from Runescape. Considering the fact that the album is released only a short time after the EP I'm not too sure what I was expecting, but Volume 1 features the exact same weak vocals, start-stop riffs, boring melodies and cheesy songwriting as its predecessor did.
More often than not repeated listening will make something stick to your halfway melted brain, but even after having listened to Volume 1 a number of times I couldn't remember anything, maybe except for the weird last half of Dagger and Cross. When I got to this part I had to pause it for a moment. Trying to bring in a bit of a folky feeling are we? It was one of the only times I felt that Hammerspace were really trying to experiment, and it obviously had some sort of effect on me. The heavy groove riffs that make up the majority of the album (and the EP for that matter) are probably best left as background music for browser games or Babo Violent, but even so the trollish humptidumpty stuff in Dagger and Cross are a bit too weird for my tastes.
Volume 1 also sees the resurgence of the track "Into the Future" from the Kings of Mediocrity EP. It was one of the stronger (though I use the term loosely) tracks on the EP, but Volume 1 is long enough in itself that it doesn't really need to reuse old tracks to achieve a decent length.
Summing up Volume 1: Reset, Repair, Restore is simple, mostly because the album itself is simple. Uninteresting synths, groovy but repetitive riffs, uninspired vocals and songwriting of repetitious behaviour is really what's going on, and while a few songs on the album, namely Presage and Signal Strength, did manage to provide me some minor enjoyment, but the formula quickly grows stale. The entire formula lacks depth, and while listening my mind quickly wanders to other subjects, like how interesting the wallpaper is. At least it's Branch's playing is pretty tight, and the production isn't that bad. 4/10 guitars.
Tracklist (The Kings of Mediocrity):
1. Pull the Trigger
2. The Kings of Mediocrity
3. Into the Future
4. The Rat
5. To the Fallen
6. Game Over
Tracklist (Volume 1: Reset, Repair, Restore):
1. Prologue
2. Reset, Repair, Restore
3. Dreamland
4. Dagger and Cross
5. Timeline
6. Outcast
7. Into the Future
8. Signal Strength
9. Warpath
10. Presage
In genres such as thrash it's hard not to compare every new and modern band you listen to with the fathers of the genre back in the 80's. For example it's obvious that Suicidal Angels have taken a lot of inspiration from Slayer, while Trench Hell take a lot from Celtic Frost and the like. But with Dark Entropy there aren't any obvious inspirations from the 80's bands, and they're one of the few newer thrash bands that aren't revivalists. In short Dark Entropy, who formed in Chicago in 2008, is a modern thrash band with some minor groove influences.
But this does not speak for itself. A band obviously isn't good just because they don't sound exactly like one of the big four. Their hitherto only release, the 2011 Demo, offers some fairly low-tempo thrash metal with a few mildly enjoyable, but ultimately mediocre, Testament-ish riffs. They basically took the Thrash 101 and followed it to precision, making for some very predictable groove-infused thrash metal with simple verse/chorus/verse structure.
Alas, I cannot push back this subject any further. I have to talk about the vocals. When I started listening to the demo, FEAR comes on with its ponderously chugging guitar leads and I thought this was gonna be "just another thrash band". Instead I got "just another thrash band, but with terrible vocals". Not only are they poorly done in general, the singer is completely out of tune and, to me, sounds tonedeaf. I don't think he hit a single note right in the first song.
Whenever the vocals just follow a simple roaring pattern in just a single tone the vocals aren't half bad, but when he tries out some melodies and stuff like that it just falls through completely and ruins any enjoyability the track might have had.
Lyrically Dark Entropy have a long way to go. The lyrics are just so completely dull and typical that I would've preferred unintelligible, mindless groaning and screaming. The 13 year old me would probably have thought stuff like "Marching side by side, no where can you hide" was witty and intelligent, but nowadays material like that just doesn't cut it for me.
Dark Entropy is a 5-man band, but to be honest it doesn't really show on the demo. Only once or twice could I tell that there were two guitarists, and I feel that if you're gonna have two in a band you might aswell utilize it better. The quintet just don't reach the full potential of having two guitarists - They could've had a lot more variety by playing harmonics or other stuff I won't even begin to talk about, but instead it's completely indiscernable and unnecesarry.
Instrumentally Dark Entropy have their moments with some fairly powerful parts in tracks like Sins of our Fathers, but listening to their 2011 demo won't feel like the first time you listen to Sepultura or Metallica, and it certainly won't recreate the same feel of empowering invigoration. 4/10 guitars for unoriginal boredom.
Tracklist:
1. FEAR
2. Broken Night
3. Enlisted in Suicide
4. Sins of our Fathers
Black and thrash metal have always seemed to go well hand in hand, and the Colombian trio Total Desaster (named after the Destruction song) takes this old kinship and combines it, making for some fairly uninteresting blackened thrash metal. Right off the bat I could tell it would be heavily black metal inspired, but Total Desaster (formerly known as Devastation) aren't reinventing the genre.
First of all the riffs, catchy as they may seem, are incredibly short which results in incredibly monotonous and repetitive song structure. In all honesty it's just boring to hear the same three riffs over and over for the duration of a song. The drums aren't exactly helping in that regard as they're slight variations of the same d-beat over and over and over.
One thing that has a little appeal about the Warfare Noise demo is that it's raw as fuck, but unfortunately having only one guitarist this also results in some solos that completely ruin any flow they might have put forth.
I've gone rather slavishly over all aspects of the 2011 demo except the bass and the vocals. The vocals are pretty uninteresting when you can even hear them. They're just too low in the mix making them little more than background noise, and the bass really varies in quality. It fits alright in Dive Bomber, but on Armies of Death it sounds terrible with its almost off-beat picking. It could probably be compared to having your face slapped repeatedly with a limp dick.
In closing Total Desaster's Warfare Noise is a demo that just has too little work put into it. It doesn't feel like a proper effort and probably won't anytime soon dethrone bands like Deströyer 666 as the top bands of the genre. The production, while gritty, has too little warmth and sounds too much like Burzum's earliest recordings. That said, the drumset actually sounds pretty good compared to the rest. 4/10 guitars.
Tracklist:
1. Intro
2. Dive Bomber
3. Hell Attack
4. Devastation
5. Armies of Death
6. Antichrist (Sepultura Cover)
When it comes to black metal it's easy for an outsider to think all the bands sound alike, and the veritable hordes of so-called bedroom black metal bands aren't exactly helping.
I this review I will be taking a look at the Spanish black metal band Skjaersild and their first two demos, Skjaersild from 2005 and Damned Roots from 2007.
Skjaersild, the band who's name I keep misspelling, offer some fairly mediocre, slow-moving atmospheric/depressive black metal on the first demo. The two tracks, "Blinded to See the Most Inhuman Pain" and "Rotten Nature", feature little more than heavily distorted and rather simple guitars playing some moderately enjoyable riffs thick with melancholia.
The lack of drums and, well, any other instrument actually, on the first track makes the music sound depth-less and doesn't really leave much to the imagination or so to speak.
When drums are finally intruduced on the second track, the 10-minute opus "Rotten Nature", it is in companionship with the same bland guitars we heard on the previous track, only to occasionally be interrupted by what kinda sounds like the clean guitar MIDI-sounds from Guitar Pro with a ton of reverb.
When it comes to the structure of Rotten Sound the parts of the track are simply too incoherent and seemingly unrelated to each other to justify throwing them together into one long torturous track.
The fact that the cover is nothing more than the name written in capital, white gothic letters and a Mitsubishi-logo on a black background doesn't really make the demo feel more worked through or serious.
The 2007 demo "Damned Roots" pretty much features the same unexciting guitar work and, most notably, even more of those harrowing MIDI sounds that plagued the first demo. Little has changed in the two years that it apparently took to complete this 3-track demo, and pinpointing differences is almost completely impossible, one exception being the fact that the last song, "Looking at the Emptiness" actually has a couple of layers instead of just being guitar and drums. But as with Rotten Nature from 2005, Looking at the Emptiness suffers from the same problem: A total lack of coherency and continuity. It's basically just a bunch of completely unrelated bits put after one another. And these parts are everything from what sounds like stuff ripped from the Diablo II soundtrack to Burzum-inspired ambient-ish stuff, which by the way is more or less completely ripped off of Burzum's Gebrechlichkeit.
All in all both demos are very lacklustre and none of the tracks feel like they're particularly cared for or worked through, and it makes the final outcome seem unfinished and unpolished like a work in progress. It simply isn't a very wholesome listening experience. 4/10 guitars.
Tracklist (Skjaersild):
1. Blinded to See the Most Inhuman Pain
2. Rotten Nature
Tracklist (Damned Roots):
1. Looking at the Emptiness
2. Is Not a Voice Anymore
3. Go Away
Usually when I listen to music to review I like to give a few listens before I write it, but in the case of Countess' newest album "On Wings of Defiance" I had to give up after a mere two listens. That's all I could bear.
I could go on and on about what's wrong with the album... So that's what I'm going to do: First of all the guitar tone is completely atrocious, sounding more like a failed attempt to play Dire Straits à la Satan than... Well, any metal genre really. The album starts out with an 8-minute epic with insanely monotonous and single-tracked drums which begs the question if Orlok, the sole member of Countess, knows anything about drum-programming. Vocal-wise he doesn't fair much better, and half-way into the first track I'd already grown bored and slighty irritated with his generic, incessant barking.
Apparently Countess' idea of a great album is an hour long pile of completely unvaried, beginner-level black metal riffs with equally unvaried vocals and drums. The only thing that comes close to variation on "On Wings of Defiance" is the entirely arbitrary changes between Scandinavian and Mediterranean sounding melodic riffs.
Enough of the senseless ranting. Boiled down to a few sentences, Countess' 2011 album is little more than unvaried sub-standard Bathory-influenced black metal with cheesy MIDI-keyboard sounds. I remember there was a time where I thought all one-man bands were awesome, but some of my more recent acquaintances have certainly made me rethink that notion.
I admire a band that can be persistent, and Countess has released a multitude of albums over the years since its' creation in 1992, but if all of those releases are equally lacking as On Wings of Defiance things are looking grim... And not in a good way.
But it's not all bad, I actually moderately enjoyed the song Foggy Dew, the 8-minute 6th track of the 11 track album. But if I had to choose between Bathory, by whom Countess is obviously inspired, I would always choose Bathory, even if Quorthon also had his dodgy moments when it came to vocal performance. Orlok's Countess merely feels like a watered down Bathory with the same boring riffs played ad nauseum. 4/10 guitars.
Tracklist:
1. Where Eagles Die
2. I am the Infidel
3. Let the River Run Red
4. Invictus
5. At the Hot Gates I Stand
6. Foggy Dew
7. Sermon of the Devil Preacher
8. An Emperor's Stand
9. On Wings of Defiance
10. Night of the Demon (Demon Cover)
11. In League with Satan (Venom Cover)
Mostly the bands of the modern metal world can be divided into two groups: Traditional revivalist bands and modern bands. You see tons of bands that do nothing but copy their favourite bands from the 80's, and especially death and thrash metal have had a huge resurgence in the scene these last few years.
Old school Swedish death metal is no exception. There are numerous great bands who have their inspirational roots in the old Swedish bands like Grave, Dismember and Entombed, but of course there are also a lot of really mediocre bands, and even some that downright tarnish the otherwise good name of Old School Swedish Death Metal.
Putrified is more or less one of those bands. For a band that has a demo, an EP and now two full length albums on it's record you would expect them to have found a good and solid recipe for metal, but unfortunately the one man project that is A.Death's Putrified is a sad husk of uncreative 80's worship.
Allow me to elaborate; Other than being nothing out of the ordinary, "Neurotic Necrotic" from 2012 is a collection of not-too-thoroughly worked through tracks of varying quality. The guitars are way too fuzzy for a non-stoner band and doesn't leave much room for aggression or the morbid power that imbued the old death metal classics. Some of the tracks can have good bits, like a nice riff or something like that, but ultimately Neurotic Necrotic lacks flow and a climax. It's like the songs individually and the album as a whole never really get to their respective climaxes, and that's what I meant by not thoroughly worked through.
A.Death presents little to no variation and the tracks mostly sound the same as every song sound like small variations of the same riff. The vocals are terribly unvaried and just not good enough to justify not doing anything else. If I would have to mention two good things about the album it is that the slow headbanging parts are alright and some acceptable riffs now and then. But it's not nearly enough to warrant more than 4/10 guitars.
Tracklist:
1. Neurotic Necrotic
2. They Speak
3. Behold the Butchered
4. Havoc
5. A Chamber Beneath
6. The Flesh of God
7. Temple of Vomit
8. Await the Slaughter
9. The Arrival
10. Monolith
11. The Land of the Pharoes
12. These Forsaken Lands
13. The Return of Ashes
