The return of Lithuanian black metallers Poccolus! Well, not so much a return, as these guys split up a while back, but we're super psyched to hear more from these guys. Their Supernal label full length was a huge hit with the metalheads around here, gloriously thrashy keyboard drenched, post rock flecked Pagan blackness, originally released in 1996, but reissued a couple years ago. The tracks on Ragana date even further back than that, 1993 and 1994, with a couple live tracks tacked on as a bonus, originally released as a super limited cassette in 1997.
Here, Poccolus sound even more raw, and strangely more melodic. The guitars offering up classic metal sounding harmonies, locked in with the drums, pounding way down in the mix. Shades of Iron Maiden, and at least one of the tracks musically is a dead ringer for Slough Feg, that is until it slips into grim blackness, the bellowy reverb drenched croon, switching to harsh hellish shriek, but even then, the music continues to lope along all mournful and minor key, with plenty of keyboards, although here they're buried under the buzz and lo fidelity hiss. The opening track is so melancholy and catchy it's almost not even black metal. More like some gloomy gothy slightly blackened hard rock, but whatever it is, it's pretty excellent.
In fact, as we dig deeper, all the tracks here are barely black metal, although they're buzzy and heavy enough to keep metalheads' attention, the sound is much more raw and old school and classic sounding, the vocals are the blackest element, but even those shrieks and howls just as often revert to clean-ish croons. And it sound like this was mastered from a cassette, so it's all a little warped and warbly, giving it a haunting woozy off kilter vibe, which only adds to the band's unique sound. One track does actually get super grim and blasty, but that's after about 6 minutes of super minimal rumbling drones. The record closes with another strange only sort of black metal jam, lurching, mid tempo, the guitars warbly and minor key, the keyboard drifting like a haze in the background, the melodies getting more and more grand and epic, the band whipping their lo-fi stumble and buzz into something truly majestic sounding.
The live tracks are way more raw and fierce, lo-fi, but still plenty blown out and brutal, but even then, the weird melodicism of the proper tracks still creeps into the bands grim buzz. The Pagan element is also more present on these later tracks, the overall sound sitting somewhere right between the more polished Pagan crush of the full length, and the warped lo-fi classic metal of the demo tracks included here.
All hail the lords of Baltic black metal. Ummm... really? Yep, really. Poccolus are, according to Supernal, the best black metal band (and most likely the first!) ever to come out of Lithuania (out of, according to the Encyclopedia Metallium, a total of 96 Lithuanian BM bands). And who are we to argue, especially since we've actually only -ever- heard 2 other black metal bands from Lithuania.
Even so, Poccolus are awesome, and just the sort of gloriously twisted blackness we've come to expect from Supernal. Originally released on a tiny Korean label over a decade ago, this record now gets the wicked deluxe reissue treatment, complete with all new artwork, the booklet and tray card printed on cool leather-like textured paper, lyrics in both English and Lithuanian, remastered sound, and pressed on an extra fancy gold cd.
But what does it sound like? A gloriously buzzy black thrash to begin with, but laced with all sorts of unlikely musical randomness, bizarre epic swaths of grandioseÔkeyboard, lots of long stretches of weird post rocky folk with arpeggiated steel string guitar, loping rhythms and folky arrangements, thick washes of murky drone-y Burzumy buzz, strangely melodic, with bits of epic Viking melody, strange sound effects, big drums, thunder, lightning, and of course some insane vocals, that go from high pitched shriek to banshee like wail to monstrous growl to chant like moan, all over a constantly shifting black metal weirdscape of blackened wah guitar, droning drifting buzz, and thrashing percussive blast.
We were first turned on to Poison Ring by the guys in Sutekh Hexen, and managed to meet the man responsible on a recent trip to Seattle. We were initially not sure what to expect. The tape packaging, while beautiful, evokes something else entirely, something maybe more gothic, and Mr. Poison Ring himself is quite elven, in appearance and attire, but instead of some gothic renn faire flutter, we were treated to something much more intense, dark and atmospheric, a hazy, faded landscape of woozy soft focus murk and buried melodies, a sound that definitely had us thinking of Philip Jeck and The Caretaker and Tim Hecker. While it's impossible to tell exactly what's producing these ghostly sounds, it does sound like a handful of dusty old turntables, spinning lazily in some giant abandoned ballroom, a series of gauzy melodies, and slowed down samples, layered and woven into softly undulating blurs, melancholy and mournful, imbued with a introspective otherworldliness, the perfect haunting lullaby for nights beneath pitch black skies, devoid of stars, a gorgeously abject drift into some other/underworld, laced with moments both sinister and ominous, but those moments seem to always eventually unwind, the sound eventually and inevitably diffusing into another stretch of blessed out somnambulant ambience.
On some of the tracks, the source does seem to be obviously old records and broken down turntables, and yet, instead of taking away from the mystery, it simply adds more color and depth, often some sort of disembodied rhythm, reminding us again of Jeck, but also Strotter Inst, especially in the stretches anchored by electronic squelches and distorted pulses, like some alien, haunted house music, an industrial creep that manages to evoke a strange tension, while still remaining otherworldly and lovely. The flipside spends much of it's time lysergically loping through fields of murk and pitch shifted melody, an achingly wistful sprawl of dreamdirges and waking sonic feverdreams.
Housed in a beautiful handmade slipcover/sleeve, with a built in mini booklet, printed on vellum, each copy hand numbered, LIMITED TO 89 COPIES!!
First we've heard from this French instrumental math / post / noise rock combo, and holy shit, these guys push all our musical buttons, channeling the spirit of Polvo and Pitchblende, all droned out atonal guitars and wild mathy rhythms, mesmerizingly hypnotic metallic grooves and soaring layered sonic sprawls, the perfect post / math rock hybrid, fusing loping super melodic mesmer with gnarled dense near metal crush, but somehow managing the near impossible, making all of this weird mathiness insanely catchy, the sort of rare band that can conjure up swirling intricate landscapes of chugging and churning and soaring and droning, all manner of shimmer and crunch, pummel and pound, into something that you may find yourself humming hours later. Fans of outfits like Psychic Paramount, Dazzling Killmen, Laddio Bolocko, Phleg Camp, Don Caballero, Bastro, Breadwinner, Drive Like Jehu, Rodan and the like will flip. A new favorite band for sure!
These masked mysterious weirdo death metallers just drifted through town, their show, like their sound, a grim, almost dada-esque twist on classic death metal, a swirling chaos of gnarled buzzing riffage, blasting loose limbed drumming, and the creepy grunts and growls of hooded front man 'The Curator', the whole band masked and draped in black, spewing huge swells of twisted sonic malevolence.
All three Portal full lengths were huge favorites around here, every one a dizzying assemblage of warped blackness and fractured death metal fury, murky and muddy and washed out, frenzied and freaky and gloriously fucked up. Visually and sonically like a metal Faxed Head, Portal's death metal bears only a slight resemblance to regular death metal, which is precisely why it's so appealing.
This super limited picture disc 7" compiles 2 of the 3 songs from Portal's 2006 demo tape Lurker At The Threshold, and while re-recorded versions of both these songs found their way on to the Outre full length, these older, more raw (believe it or not) versions are well worth checking out. "Omnipresent Crawling Chaos" explodes in a blast of murky metallic grind, frenzied and frantic, but so blurred and smeared as to render it a strange shadowing deathmetalscape, all lurching and lumbering and blasting, a swirling black sonic cloud. "13 Globes" is another chunk of blown out grinding metal crush, but with some cool woozy warbly minor key melodies, stuttering start stop rhythms, and insane tangled riffage, all wrapped in a melted murky lo-fi blacknoize gauze.
LIMITED TO 500 COPIES! Pressed on super thick 70 gram vinyl, super striking picture disc adorned with creepy Lovecraftian artwork, either already out of print or darn close, so get one while you can...
Record number two from these mysterious Australian technical death metal weirdoes, whose sound, as we mentioned in our review of their debut, Seepia, is anything but traditional death metal, instead, the grunted vocals and crushing downtuned riffs and all the traditional death metal tropes are completely subverted, tangled and mangled into damaged and demented squalls of chaotic blackened noize, having plenty in common with a band like labelmates Wold, as well as old school DM legends like Gorguts, Suffocation or Immolation�
The sound on Outre is a murky buzz drenched sonic swamp, riffs buzz and blast, but are so doused in effects, so dripping with muddy distortion, they appear to be nothing but droning streaks of downtuned sound, until once in a while when they surface to chug briefly, offering up some brief dynamics before being swallowed up again by the band's relentless blur. The vocals are a subsonic demonic gurgle, barking, howling, growling and mewling, but again, so buried in fuzz and hiss, it just sounds like another layer of black buzz. The melodies are dark and twisted, like some vile black weed, the production is dense and thick, the sound druggy and seasick, warped and warbly, the whole thing sounding a little like some cross breeding experiment gone wrong. Gorguts, Wold, Black Flag, Faxed Head, all melted down and heated up and then poured into your cd player, a similarly noxious downtuned buzz oozes from your speakers, a distillation of Portal's convoluted and cracked take on death metal, a sound black enough to be black metal, noisy enough to be noise, and fucked up enough to be, well to be anything this fucked up sounding.
Strange swaths of synth, atonal detuned guitars, simple industrial plods, monstrous slow motion doom, blasts of speaker shredding ultranoise, billowing black ambience all pepper the proceedings, but at its heart, the sound of Outre is most definitely blasting brutal death metal, but the sort of death metal we always wanna hear, warped and twisted and damaged and filthy and crusty and noisy and buzzing and blackened and doomy and completely fucked.
Packaged in a super deluxe mini gatefold jacket with printed inner sleeve, and including super intense band photos, each band member (Aphotic Mote, The Curator and Horror Illogium) wearing a black hood (or what appears to be a mangled witches hat pulled all the way over the face), all standing in front of an old piano, each photo faded and sepia tone, one wielding a violin, the other clutching what appears to be the horn from a Victrola, the third empty handed, but with a noose hanging from his neck. Weird.
Latest from these Aussie blackened death metal weirdos, and like all the records before, Vexovoid is another exercise in twisted sonic psychosis, the sound here weirdly polished and well produced, but that's really relative, as older records sounded like they were recorded in a subterranean icestorm. And at times sounded less like a metal band and more like some mysterious noise group. But here, the sound is seriously heavy, the riffing less blurred and indistinct, which would seem to be disappointing, but instead, makes this a way more satisfying listen. The opening track "Kilter", named we can only assume for the fact that it's about as far from off kilter as any Portal song we've ever heard, starts off all chugging and churning, frenzied and frenetic, looped and woozy, a dizzying swirl of downtuned riffage, and and avalanche of chaotic drumming, all wound into a tight, taut, gnarled sprawl of tranced out hypnometal crush. When the song finally kicks in proper, the vocals come in all murky bellow, and the riffs blur and smear and ooze, into a washed out, psychedelic buzzscape, that is somehow crazy catchy, as well as being baffling and brutal, and when the sound slips back into that opening churn, totally mesmerizing.
And so goes the whole record, the band either consciously going for a different sound, or just stumbling into what for them probably seems weird in comparison to their normal sound, not the other way around. In some ways, Vexovoid seems the most faithful to their country's metal heritage, oozing the sort of slo-mo death metal vibe of their forebears (Albeit not really slow at all, but somehow it FEELS slow, sludgey and filthy and dirgey, even when it's blasting away at lightspeed), most notably diSEMBOWELMENT but of course, for all of the polish here, this shit is still way demented, when the music drops out, the vocals are harrowingly hellish, and then the riffs, are fantastically droned out, the arrangements dizzying in their complexity, this is warped tech-death insanity that seems to get weirder and more out there as the record progresses, lurching from death metal pound, to woozy, atonal dirge, to tripped out, psychedelic guitarscapery, to doomic pound, to spare spacey drift. Might be our favorite Portal yet, but then it seems we say that about every one...
Iceland's third most popular band after Bjork and Sigur Ros! But they don't sound a whole lot like either of those artists, as Potentiam aren't pop or electronic, but a black metal band! Now, this isn't a new release, but it's a favorite of ours and we've
Maybe they were sick of being told that they sounded a bit like Sigur Ros or something, 'cause this new disc from Iceland's Potentiam dispenses with the cinematic soundscapey stuff in favor of fist-in-yer face metallic mayhem. Their previous album from a few years back, the now-out of print Balsyn, was a weird mixture of Viking black metal and ambient atmospheres, full of things like recordings of crackling fires and a melodic almost-pop trumpet dirge. But Balsyn's long-awaited follow-up Orka I Myrkri strikes us a somewhat different beast, way more riffy and technical than what we remember. They've been woodshedding perhaps. Ripping, powerful, even kinda hooky black metal a la Satyricon, Opeth, latter Emperor... It's not Balsyn Pt. 2, but with Orka I Myrkri we definitely remain Potentiam fans!
As we mentioned in the Horna review a while back, we're pretty obsessed with Finnish black metal. There's something super distinctive about the sound, about the feel, you can almost tell within seconds that a record is Finnish. Horna, Baptism, Vordr, Satanic Warmaster, Uncreation's Dawn, Incriminated, Gestapo 666, Pest, Warloghe, Sargeist, Behexen, and then there's the other side of Finnish BM, the sort of fractured fucked up damaged side: Circle Of Ouroborus, Dead Reptile Shrine. Needless to say, that list of bands alone should be enough to convince you of the power and majesty of Finnish black metal.
Another name that belongs on that list is Prevalent Resistance, another revered Finnish horde with a Finnish pedigree that reads almost like the list above: Baptism, Circle Of Ouroborus, Vordr, Alghazanth, Unveiled, Trollheim's Grott, Black Death Ritual. And don't let the presence of Atvar from Circle Of Ouroborus mislead you, this is not some avant acoustic stumbling black dirge fucked up weirdness, this is much more in line with Horna, Baptism and Behexen, blasting melodic blackness, slipping between frenzied thrashing, and more midtempo almost-grooves, with the occasional flurry of freaked out black chaos, but for the most part his is dark solid, super heavy well produced blackness, taking elements of Burzum, Darkthrone, the usual suspects but running it through that distinctive Finnish sonic filter. Even the noisiest and most frenzied parts are infused with plenty of melody, making them soar majestically, before slipping back into something more martial and maniacal, or something more buzzing and midtempo.
This is again an instance where it's not the sound alone, but also the songs, which are surprisingly catchy, like lots of Finnish black metal, and anyone who has been digging recent Horna, should probably check this out as well. We were definitely digging this even after only a few quick listens, but weirdly enough we've found ourselves returning to this over and over again. Another seriously kick ass slab of Finnish blackness.
We had never heard of Greek black metallers Primeval Mass before, they were recommended to us by Roman Saenko, the man behind numerous bad ass Ukrainian black metal hordes: Hate Forest, Drudkh, Dark Ages, Lucifugum, Blood Of Kingu, needless to say, his recommendation was definitely enough for us, and we're glad we checked these guys out. Total classic old school black buzz, frenzied and frantic, insectoid riffs and blasting beats, raw and reverb soaked, heavy as hell but still lo-fi and a little fucked up, when the band is blasting full bore, it totally reminds us of early Immortal or Satyricon, that sort of chaotic black buzz infused with buried melody, a swirling maelstrom of raw Norwegian style blackness, that impossibly manages to be catchy even though it's essentially a furious black cloud of sound. But Primeval Mass add their own vibe to the proceedings, incorporating lurching stretches of Burzumic dirgery, bits of creepy spoken word, woozy droned out guitarscapes, little bursts of lo-fi practice space crunch, super primitive effected guitars, all phaser and flanger, but it all contributes to the glorious black mood and ambience, and the songs, for all their little bits of weirdness, spend most of their time buzzing and blasting and thrashing exploding in grim black gouts of true, kvlt sonic fury. Fucking AWESOME.
Epic Irish black metal band's fourth album. Quality stuff, totally heavy and majestic (with a few acoustic detours) that fits in stylistically with the likes of Enslaved and Opeth and Emperor, and even reminds us a bit of Albion's kings of mythic doom metal, Solstice (with whom they share their producer, and a similar mood). Primordial's varied vocals (from clear, sometimes overwrought tones to wretched rasps), dynamic songwriting, thunderous drumming, and folkish melodies conjure up a world of ancient Irish metal fantasy, from storming battle scenes to ponderous, sad laments. We found their previous album "Spirit The Earth Aflame" (perhaps their masterpiece) to be more immediately thrilling, but this one's good too.
Empires fall, Rome burns, and the heathen tribe that is Primordial sing a gallows hymn, both grim and grandiose, from their rugged emerald isle... gosh and begorra, these Irish metallers have outdone themselves on this, their sixth album. It's sweeping, weeping, epic wall o' metal, some serious shit indeed. You can get a good idea of the mood To The Nameless Dead conveys just by perusing the song titles, several of which we referenced in the first sentence of this review. Ancient pride and the sadness of loss mix masterfully on this album, the barbarians at the gates of the fallen empire knowing that their pagan glories too are fated for ruin and doom in the end...
Primordial are a band that doesn't fit neatly into any category. Perhaps black metal comes the closest, with a folky vibe and a fair share of aggression. Primordial's vocals are sometimes clean and melodic, sometimes quite harsh, always super emotive and stirring -- as is their music. They're certainly heavy, so let's just call them an Irish extreme heavy metal band that can stand tall next to the likes of Scandinavia's Opeth and Enslaved.
A lot of the time the black metal we recommend is all about being the quote unquote most fucked up ever. But once in a while, tribute must be paid to a band like Primordial whose massive and melancholic art -isn't- brutally primitive or inadvertently avant garde, but is just plain excellent, from writing to performance to production. In all respects, powerful.
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
SORRY.
Limited to 200 copies, each hand numbered, already out of print at the label. We only got a handful...
TWO brand new releases from this Santa Cruz psychedelic black metal one man band, one a haunting slab of oceanic dark ambience, the other a mesmerizing collection of drone drenched buzzing blackness.
Over the course of 10+ full lengths, Night, the man who is PV, has explored both sides of his sonic personality, the buzz of raw depressive melancholic black metal, and the drifting shimmer of ambient and dronemusic, often blending the two, into hazy blurs of blackened soundscapes and moody buzz and blast.
On Convoy (Pt.2) (we're pretty sure there wasn't a part one), Night offers up one of the more metal and aggressive releases we've heard from PV, there are still definitely moments of drift and shimmer, but this is definitely black metal, right off the bat, first few seconds, a frenzied blur of buzzing guitars and pounding programmed beats, with some insane inhuman, so processed they just sound like creepy machine like scrapes and rasps, the music looped and mesmerizing, the drums relentless and motorik, a mournful melody lurking within, the recording strange, wreathed in effects, reminding us quite a bit of the various EEE un-black metal projects, where the textures and timbres and the production are as much a part of the sound as the music itself, the black and the buzz fade away, leaving the drums to pound on, gradually changing shape until they too disappear, leaving just a keening high end drone, draped over deep rumbling low end tones, and haunting ghostly voices, before the blackness erupts once again, and that hissing metallic snake voice returns, and we're plunged back into more of that harrowing blackness.
And so it goes over the course of Convoy, doomy and dirgey and black and depressive and warm and fuzzy and washed out, the vocals that alien metallic rasp, the melodies languorous the drums solid and unswerving, very circular and meditative and entrancing, the whole record droney and dark. Once we get further into the record, the sound definitely sprawls and expands, from deep shimmery drifts of reverbed clean guitar and lilting moodiness, two mechanized strum and almost jazzy drumming, to swirling woozy shoegazey metallic whir, to dense soaring waves of epic blackness, not necessarily metal, but strangely heavy and dramatic, to near static almost looped sounding blackened grooves, to thick caustic almost abrasive black soundscapes, riddled with ominous thrum, brittle crackle, and more of that reverby moonlit guitar, but those bits all set within a landscape of harsh howling blackness, roaring smeared minor key buzz, roiling rhythmic crush, and swoonsome sorrowful melodies.
Latest bit of black mystery from this mysterious one man band from Santa Cruz, who constantly blurs the line between gorgeous black ambience, and blissed out buzzing blackness.
Deathwanderings finds PC in a contemplative mood, eschewing all buzz and blast, and instead offering up some hazy soft focus dronemusic, channeling folks like Andrew Chalk, Jonathan Coleclough, through his blackened sonic filter.
Most of the tracks here are reinterpretations of pieces by Chopin, Satie and Schubert, stretched and blurred and smeared into soft streaks, gauzy shadows, hushed whispers, the music of breezes and flowing streams, organic and fluid, each track a hazy outline, the actual sounds within fluttering and fleeting, transitory and barely there.
Weird to hear such gentle beauty and subtle sonics from someone capable of kicking up a serious black buzz, but this is fantastic, utterly understated, and completely mesmerizing.
Nothing else to say really, other than metalheads steer clear. This is for the drone obsessed out there, those fascinated with the mystery of and majesty of minimal murk, explorers looking to delve into the heart of the drone. This is it. Right here.
LIMITED TO 100 COPIES.
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Procer Veneficus are another band we've dug for a while, but are only now getting around to reviewing. A one man band from Santa Cruz of all places, PV, over the course of a handful of releases, has wandered between buzz drenched psychedelic black metal fuzzscapes a la Velvet Cacoon and dark lugubrious murky ambient acoustic folk, a gorgeous and bleak black soundworld, equally mysterious and hypnotic, whether in the form of tranquil drift or buzzing blast.
Ghostvoices is the former, all acoustic, just guitars, vocals, everything wreathed in a murky, muted black atmosphere. The vocals are hushed, like harsh ghoulish whispers, the sibilance drawn out into another layer of shimmering ambience. The acoustic guitars sound like they're playing slowed down black metal riffs, pulled apart until they more resemble some sort of hellish Appalachia. Or an incredibly sinister Loren Connors. Notes drift, often coalescing into swirling tendrils of dark drone, the background ambience is full of creaks and rumbles, haunting whirs and distant barely audible melodies, everything lit by the light of some black moon, greys fading to black, heavily shadowed and indistinct. It's almost like some acoustic black metal pop ambient record...
A perfect slab of dark and lonely, blackened, blissful late night drift...
A brand new, sprawling collection of celestial darkness and buzzing black ambient drift from this black metal / black ambient master. As we've mentioned in the past, more often than not, PV will dedicate a whole record to either side of his sonic personality, sometimes it's a disc of swirling and dense blackened black metal buzz, other times it's gorgeously bleak and minimal ambient dronemusic, but in both cases, the man behind Procer Veneficus is able to conjure up gorgeously sinister sounds and nightmarish atmospheres, be they buzz or drift, blast or shimmer.
How The Heather Moonlit Shivers, is, as the legend on the back of the record makes clear, "Dedicated to Her", and judging from the black sonic mystery within, the 'Her' in question either broke his heart, or is the object of a seriously grim obsession, or both. Extended stretches of layered black drift, Philip Jeck style crackly loopscapes, muted subterranean pulses, thick swaths of distorted crumble, processed ghostly vox, swirling soft focus effects, minor key steel string folk dirges, keening streaks of fragmented melody underpinning slowed down voices, haunting reverb drenched avant Appalachia gives way to abject post industrial black ambience, which gives way to dense clouds of low end bellow, laced with melancholic finger picked acoustic guitars.
Elsewhere thick walls of guitarbuzz dirge lumber and throb, but are infused with subtle bits of melody, transformed from brute force crush into something moody and soothing and beautiful, while spidery guitars wrap their tendrils around long stretches of layered voices and alien harmonies, while here and there, fragments of voice, or a bit of guitar, will be doused in reverb and echo and delay and sent spinning into the aether, creating a dizzying looped out dronescape.
The record closes with a 10+ minute interpretation of an Amber Asylum song, complete with strings, the strings along with languid steel string guitars, and swirling ambient background shimmer create a sort of droney, depressive otherworldly chamber music. There's also an Espers cover (a cover of a cover oddly enough), which is equally beautiful, but a bit more tripped out, a sort of druggy heavily effected space folk, but both covers fit perfectly amidst the equally evocative and hauntingly beautiful PV originals.
Folks who ONLY like the black metal side of Procer Veneficus, may be disappointed, but anyone into mysterious dark soundscapes, cinematic blackened drone music, and creepy sinister black folk, will be immediately and inexorably ensorcelled.
Packaged in a super swank and thick matte finish gatefold jacket, pressed on thick red vinyl, LIMITED TO 406 COPIES, each one hand numbered.
TWO brand new releases from this Santa Cruz psychedelic black metal one man band, one a haunting slab of oceanic dark ambience, the other a mesmerizing collection of drone drenched buzzing blackness.
Over the course of 10+ full lengths, Night, the man who is PV, has explored both sides of his sonic personality, the buzz of raw depressive melancholic black metal, and the drifting shimmer of ambient and dronemusic, often blending the two, into hazy blurs of blackened soundscapes and moody buzz and blast.
Unlike the heavy buzz and blast of Convoy, Saltwater & Glassmoon is all ambient, a bit of a concept record about the sea, the sound meant to emulate a submerged orchestra, to evoke the epic undersea kingdom, and the mystery of the deep.
The whole first half of the opening track is built on the sounds of crashing surf, gradually layered with gentle tinkling chimes, whirring wind, subtle processing and effects, before finally, a shimmering moody low end melody emerges from the deep, haunting and sorrowful and slow motion, drifting like dark shapes just below the surface of the sea, truly haunting and mysterious, and quite beautiful. The follow up sounds like the first track, only with the hiss and buzz of the crashing waves stripped away, leaving just strange minor key drones and barely there melodies, lots of swirling low end, suspended in wide open expanses of distant rumbles, very minimal, but still deep and ominous.
Most of the rest of the record sounds like movements of that same piece, a slowly sprawling world deep dark dronemusic, pretty and delicate, but always with a slightly sinister edge, the only dramatic deviation being the nearly 12 minute "Amaranth And Liqueur", which lets that slow smoldering drift build and build into a glacial wall of muted low end, a black cloud of SUNN-like shimmer, before once again, dissipating, laving ghostly traces and barely there shadows.
Quite dark and lovely, minimal and moody, might be of more interest to the cd-r experimental drone crowd than the black metal massive, but as far as we're concerned recommended to both!
Hot on the heels of the recent double disc box set from Santa Cruz based black metal alchemist, comes this ultra limited cd-r of, as the liner notes describe it: "Music for summoning ghosts in the dead of night." And in case you're still not sure of what you're getting into, these tracks were recorded "after the clock struck twelve" and the liner notes also offer this sage warning "In the shadows you are followed by ghosts."
It all sounds strange and mysterious and creepy, but it all makes sense once you're familiar with the haunting and hushed sonic world of Procer Veneficus. His discs are evenly split between, blissed out shoegaze-y black metal buzz, and gorgeous smoldering, super minimal black ambience, sometimes both on the same disc, but just as often a whole disc dedicated to one or the other. The aforementioned box set, featured a disc of each, accompanied by some incense and dried leaves (he is from Santa Cruz after all).�
We won't go into too much detail on this one, as it was strictly limited to 100 copies, and we only got a handful, which will be gone in no time... Fans already know they need this, and probably haven't even bothered to read this far, instead clicking on the add to cart button and moving on, that's the sort of fanaticism this band elicits, the music is so emotional and personal, so spiritually charged, that once you're inducted into PV's sonic tribe, it's for life, and you find your self hunting for more of this soothing sonic balm, as well as the more abrasive blackened buzz, which is also in its own way quite soothing. The Cold Gloaming sounds like exactly that, the distant shimmer of cold wintery winds at dusk, the dark whisper of nightfall, a world teeming with life, lurking just out of sight, just out of earshot, a gorgeous expanse of warm whir and muted grinding guitars, echoing the the sound of the surf, the pull of the moon, the cycle of life and death, light and darkness. A dark midnight ritual, the nature of sound, a lost world of drone and drift, slowly fading away as the sky brightens and the darkness retreats. So totally gorgeous.�
And as we mentioned, LIMITED TO 100 COPIES. Each disc hand numbered. Packaged in a gorgeous full color sleeve...
When we first put this on, the aQ death metal experts were convinced this was some old DM classic reissued. We were hearing Deicide, Slayer, Darkthrone, but a bit more on the grind side, hints of Circle Of Dead Children and Phobia, but the more we listened, the more it sounded too dense and heavy, too furious and frantic, and even though it definitely borrowed from the classics BIG TIME, it sounded too modern. This is in fact the latest record from a band called Prosanctus Inferi who hail from Columbus, Ohio, and who recorded this festering chunk of buzzing black sickness just last year!
These guys definitely know their shit. Spewing a relentless stream of furious snarling blackened buzz, relentless and filthy, the production incredibly dense and suffocating, the guitars massive, no tinny insect like buzzing, the riffs here ROAR, the drums blast and pound, the sound is definitely rooted in black metal, but is definitely on the blackened side, and most of the songs veer into short stretches of tangled grind, shades of early Carcass, but whoever they're borrowing from, PI whip their various influences into a total head spinning black death workout, shifting gears every few seconds, riffs splintering apart, brutal blasts slowing down into doomy grooves, then exploding back into some static death metal pound. Another online review described this record as "virgin hammering goat blasting black death metal" and who are we to argue?
LIMITED TO 100 COPIES, already nearly sold out at the label. Swank two sided silkscreened sleeves, the back side just a half sleeve revealing the lp inside.
We've had this disc before, in a home-brewed version released by Sir Proscriptor McGovern himself (he's the drummer for the amazing Texas occult metal band Absu). That version was cheap (packaged in a paper sleeve, no jewel case), and is now gone. But now "The Serpentine Has Risen" rises again, getting a 'proper' release via the Dragon Flight label. So if you didn't pick up the original, now you can get this one for only a few bucks more -- likewise, you could get it again if you have the old version but would prefer a jewel case and more 'pro' packaging (but, the tracks are the same).
Here's some more info for those who aren't 100 percent Proscriptor-savvy: this is the follow-up to Proscriptor's first bizarre solo record "The Venus Bellona". As we said when listing the earlier version, those who have heard "The Venus Bellona" know that Proscriptor's solo stuff is hardly black metal, it's more like an experimental soundtrack to his personal magickal / historickal mythology. This disc follows suit. As the liner notes put it, in such a way as to give a sense of his aesthetick that our own description never could: "Not only has Proscriptor composed euphonic concoctions of oscillation experimentations, pre-to-post wave art musicology, and folklore prestige, but also has expressed his ancestral customs from Glenorchy District to the Prioma Materia of Thoth once again." And we challenge any music critics to dispute that! As with his main band, Proscriptor never steps out of character, everything is always mysterious and arcane (even his emails to us appeared to be translated from Latin!). Just a glance at this album's credits will confirm his dedication to such weirdness: guitars and basses are always referred to as "six-fold bows" and "four-fold bows", and we find Proscriptor and his conspirators credited with the likes of "blaze illuminations" and "infrequent voices that are unseen" as well as "unicursal hexagrams" and "symmetrical tartan designs". Of course, none of this would matter if the music wasn't equally odd and evocative, and it is. Apart from the very rock n' roll "Devil Woman" cover, that is (which is the one brief moment, as with the Flock of Seagulls cover on his previous disc, that tells you that perhaps this guy isn't ENTIRELY serious...but then again, maybe he IS and that's even scarier!!)...
Incredible, Magickal, Historickal ritual soundscape new-wave solo concept album, created by the drummer for the Texas occult metal band Absu. A beautiful digipak with music unlike anything else. It tells a story set in Medieval Scotland but is influenced less by Black Metal than by the Art Bears (so Proscriptor claims) and Flock of Seagulls (the album closes with a cover of their hit "I Ran", paradoxically the most metal moment on the disc...) Highly recommended! Listen to this alone at night with candles burning.
As much as it hurts us to say, it might just be time to give up on hoping for a new Absu record. That bizarre Texan horde is responsible for some of our favorite weirdo black metal ever. But it's been years since we've heard from them, collectively that is. We recently reviewed an electro record from Absu guitarist Equitant. Not metal electro, but real, squelchy, house-y electro. Cool stuff, but nothing we ever imagined hearing from any of the Absu guys, no matter how weird they were. So here we have the latest recording from Absu drummer Proscriptor, who in the past has dabbled in some serious weirdness outside of Absu, with a handful of strange ambient recordings, but this, this is so far out we thought at first we must have put on the wrong record. But as with most things Absu it didn't take long for us to become completely and utterly smitten.
Packaged in a mysterious silver sleeve, with bits of strange numerology and symbology, including an appropriately black metal Proscriptor logo with bat wings and candles and flames. So side one begins with tinkling new age chimes, very tranquil and serene, when suddenly very intense male female vocals, harmonizing, singing of the 4 Horseman, very haunting, almost cheesy, when the band kicks into a fill on rock jam, BIG drums, crunchy guitars, throbbing bass, heavy riffing, wild guitar solos... and then back to the weird dramatic vocals. It doesn't sound so much like metal as it does some sort of bombastic musical. Over the top with a through-the-roof WTF factor. But after a few listens, we sort of WANTED it to actually be a musical, we could imagine some sort of Bat Out Of Hell super stage show, with Proscriptor and his lady battling the Four Horsemen. So it was on to side 2 and if we thought it couldn't get any weirder, well, we were WRONG! Groovy almost Southern rock, but with harsh black metal vocals and bizarre female back up vocals, the whole thing sounding like a metallized Rocky Horror Picture Show. Some impossible mix of Venom and ZZ Top and... wait a minute, we suddenly recognize the song, the cover says it's called "Epod No Sknup Etihw", but it sounds, suspiciously like... THE TUBES. Holy shit! It's a cover of the Tubes "White Punks On Dope"! Again, WHAT THE FUCK?!? Sure, it's amazing, demented, tweaked, bizarre, but this is the drummer from Absu!!! Who would have thought?!?! Only makes us love him more. And for some reason we can't stop listening to either of these tracks...
Cool packaging, metallic silver jacket, printed inner sleeve, and pressed on the THICKEST white vinyl ever!!!
The demise of legendary doomlords Reverend Bizarre had two strange but positive after effects, first, there seemed to be a flood of posthumous RB releases, more we think than when they were actually a band, a from-beyond-the-grave release schedule to rival Biggie or Tupac, as is further demonstrated by yet another new Reverend Bizarre release reviewed elsewhere on this week's list! The second outcome was the more inevitable one, a whole slew of new projects from RB mainman S.A.Hynninen (aka Albert Witchfinder), whose voracious need to rock would obviously need a new outlet, and thus we have The Puritan and Opium Warlords. Both born of Hynninen's newfound obsession with ultra doom, with sludge, especially of the Japanese variety, Boris, Corrupted, Solar Anus, Hynninen set forth on a mission to create some serious Japanese style ultra doom sludge. We'll have the Opium Warlords disc for next list, but for now, we shall celebrate The Puritan, and Lithium Gates, which compiles two previously released, now out of print vinyl lps, one of which we never had, the other which we had in extremely limited numbers.
We've become convinced, that Hynninen must be somehow related to Circle's Jussi Lehtisalo. They're both Finnish, they both front or fronted kick ass heavy rock bands, and both have totally twisted senses of humor, which finds its way, however subtly (or not) into their music. So while the Puritan was originally inspired by Japanese doom and sludge, by the time it worked its way through Hynninen's cracked Finnish filter, it had been transformed into something else entirely. Something heavy and brutal, but warped and far out and brilliant.
This is no ordinary doom. And is far removed from the doom of Reverend Bizarre. Although on first listen, maybe not so far removed after all, beginning with the first Puritan lp, The Untitled, the sound is ultra heavy, downtuned, spaced out, melodic, with a distinctly classic strain of classic doom running through it, the opening intro could indeed be the opening salvo from some doom classic, and the follow up too does not sound that far our, awesomely epic and troo vocals over a lumbering slow motion dirge, but then the record shifts gears, and "The Sulphur - Coloured Clouds Are Hurrying Through the Lithium Gates" explodes like some nineties noise rock juggernaut, loping bass, crumbling guitars, jagged riffing, only to gradually slow to a nearly complete halt, before slipping back into slow motion ultra doom dirgery. "The Sepulchral God Holding a Speech for the Moribund" sounds almost like some extra heavy slowcore, with some dramatically crooned Slough Feg like vox, before a strangely haunting outro, with clean guitars, whirling ambience, mysterious sampled voices, including a classic Charles Manson rant, all hovering beneath thick washed out guitars and lilting sweetly sorrowful melodies. Then it begins to get even weirder.
The second half of Lithium Gates contains the entirety of The Black Law, the second Puritan lp, which begins with some old timey organ, wheezy and lo-fi, some lost in time parlor music, lilting and melancholy, until everything is flattened by a massive wall of downtuned guitars, exploding into a plodding doomic dirge, which is not really funereal, or even all that slow, a plodding lurching doom that reminds us of Midwestern pigfuckers Killdozer more than anything, which as far as we're concerned is good news for sure. The chuggy midtempo crunch pounds and churns while the vocals howl and bellow, there's a distinctly AmRep / Touch And Go vibe to the doom on display, the main riff locked into a loop that seems to go on and on and on, giving the proceedings a sort of Gore vibe as well. The riff eventually gives up the ghost leaving a tranquil, almost ambient fade out, all soft streaks of feedback, delicate melodies, distant slabs of slow moving sludge, all smeared into a weirdly dreamy drift.
From there on out, the record continues to devolve gloriously with some bizarre gnarled super distorted guitar weirdness, completely panned so it careens from speaker to speaker, ear to ear, until the riff finally kicks in, a big ol' filthy doomy dirgey riff, the drums and guitar locked tight, while in the background, the WHOLE time, the moans and groans of a lady seemingly in the throes of violent passion(!), the whole track endlessly looped and cyclical, the only variation being the woman's voice, here the Gore vibe is undeniable, a killer riff, just pounding away, over and over, very hypnotic and strangely minimal, but that's only the first track. The second revolves around a muted chug, spread out over a layer of seemingly constant buzz, with more deep crooned dramatic vocals, the production reverby and very new wave sounding, a little like Joy Division or the Cure but way heavier and dripping with doooooom, the wind-down at the end laced with bursts of super epic and melodic drama, turning the outro into some sort of doomic Godspeed.
Needless to say, fucking awesome! And essential listening for any one into sounds slow and low, doomy and heavy, fucked up and far out.
Avid readers of the list will no doubt be familiar with Pyha, the Korean one man black metal band, and his record, The Haunted House, which was recorded when he was just a teenager, and eventually, after much digging and emailing and tracking down, released on Andee's tUMULt label. Still ranks as one of our favorite black metal records ever. And as we proclaimed in the review of that record: "The essence of pure inspired ultra personal musical expression. Powerful and intense, blown out and buzz drenched, depressive and melancholic. Totally in the red, digital distortion, crumbling and furious. The vocals anguished wails and tortured howls, the drums simple programmed beats, weirdly clipped and processed, also wreathed in distortion, keyboards offering up more buzz and shimmer. Total bedroom lo-fi production, but completely idiosyncratic and inspired." We sold tons, and it inspired much worship from the aQ grim black hordes and rightfully so. The ultimate slab of genius outsider blackness, created with little knowledge of the genre, relying more on passion and creativity and ingenuity, and the results were more inspired and more inspirING than 90 percent of the black metal out there. If you've yet to experience that record, check out the review, listen to the sound samples, and GET ONE! You will NOT be sorry. But if you're already a fan, and perhaps, like us, listen to that record like crazy still, and wish you had more, well then this is your lucky day. Ours too! We had no idea this was even happening. There ARE several other actual Pyha records, but according to Pyha himself, this is actually a collection of sketches, rough drafts recorded between 2006 and 2007 for a new album that never materialized, originally intended to just be given out to friends, but then Korean label Misanthropic Art heard it and decided to release it, which makes sense cuz this stuff is KILLER.
Definitely well removed from the sound of the Haunted House, obviously since it was recorded years later. But in many ways it has the same vibe, the same energy, the guitars still buzz, and we're talking BUZZZZZ, but this time the bass is a driving force, thick and heavy, the tempos mid to plodding and doomy, the sound is last black metal and more dark blackened buzz drenched dirgery, the actual playing is definitely improved, the sound more melodic and less textural, at least on the opening track. But then the follow up, titled in Korean, is way more blasting and buzzy and black, the sound in the red and totally and fantastically blown out, but the bass here too, adds a cool melodic component, that makes the song sound more poppy than it is, but also more melancholy. The vocals are processed and seriously sick, but all woven together, it's darkly depressive and strangely pretty.
The next track is even more drenched in buzz, a white hot wall of white noise buzz, the vocals still harsh and demonic, but here the drums are weirdly loping, and the main melody manages to come through, again giving the song a distinctly lilting feel.
The further into the record you get, the more strange and experimental it gets. The next track is some sort of gloom pop, a thick crunchy guitar melody draped over a sea of static buzz, and some strange dueling vocals, clean and chantlike vs metallic shriek, it's almost like a blackened sea shanty, or some traditional folk number transformed into black metal. The following song is more of the same, more distinctly black metal, but again, crooned clean vocals, woozy bass and mournful melodies all woven in, and finally, the last track, the sound is much more murky and muddy, the sound blurred and warm, with some really cool guitar melodies wound into the otherwise droned out blackness. It's actually almost shoegazey at times, like M83 or MBV, the guitars washed out and hazy, and a main melody that's all spidery and wistful, transforming the buzz into some sort of blackened dream pop.
The bonus track is a nearly 14 minute stretch of black ambience, all deep drones, and whirling abstract shimmer, laced with bits of glitch and shards of electronics, the song is peppered with woozy synths, processed demonic vox, more a growly whisper, some disembodied piano, the sound shifting from tranquil to ominous to intense and finally back to tranquil again, eventually drifting off all meditative and understated. Incredible.
Sad to think that Pyha no longer makes black metal, but it's quite a blackened sonic legacy he's left behind, with more hopefully to be unearthed and released in the future...
Unbelievably grim and blown out Burzumic black metal buzz from a Korean eighth grader! Recorded over a couple years and finally released when he was 14 years old! It's true. tUMULt has been trying to get this out for ages, and it's finally here. Black metal record of the week? The year more likely. Perhaps maybe EVER.
It took almost two years to track Pyha down, and then almost four more to sort out the eventual release of this grim depressive black masterpiece. Here's how it started:
Longtime aQ pal Steven Schultz (he of Puny Humans and Stalin Claus Superstar infamy) was studying in Korea and bought a bunch of records. None of them really impressed him that much, except for one mysterious disc, by a 'group' called Pyha, which in Korean means 'ruins'. He later discovered that Pyha was the work of one man, er, kid actually, a 14 year old eighth grade black metaller! Needless to say, WOW. Anyway, on returning, Steven passed the cd on to Andee who was BLOWN AWAY. Completely floored, so much so that he knew he had to release it. More people HAD to hear this. So the hunt was on. How to track down a 14 year old kid in Korea. Pre-internet it would have been impossible. But another aQ pal, Jason, was actually living part time in Korea, weirdly enough he's a minor television star there, and offered to try and track down Pyha. Which miraculously he did, and we then discovered that there were in fact 4 albums, all recorded when Pyha was between the ages of 14 and 17! All of which are amazing, and all of which should eventually be released on tUMULt.
But this is THE ONE. The essence of pure inspired ultra personal musical expression. Powerful and intense, blown out and buzz drenched, depressive and melancholic. Andee sent a cd-r of the record to a writer at Terrorizer, who was so impressed, he reviewed the sans-art home burned cd-r in that magazine and gave it a TEN. It's that fucking mind blowing. We mentioned in our recent review of the Wrath Of The Weak record that it was maybe the buzziest black metal record ever. Well, it has nothing on Pyha. Totally in the red, digital distortion, crumbling and furious. The vocals anguished wails and tortured howls, the drums simple programmed beats, weirdly clipped and processed, also wreathed in distortion, keyboards offering up more buzz and shimmer. Long stretches of creepy ambience, samples of speeches and warfare, of wailing weeping mothers and children, all woven into Pyha's buzzing black tapestry. Total bedroom lo-fi production, but completely idiosyncratic and inspired. No blast beats or furious thrashing, instead, the tracks are either midtempo, or no-tempo, with some tracks eschewing drums all together, just a wall of ultra distorted riffage all tangled up with demonic howls. But it's not just howling and screeching, the vocals sometimes emerge as a weird wailing croon, other times as a hushed whisper, while other times a mumbled moan. In fact, a few of the tracks almost sound like some weird black metal Sebadoh, super lo-fi and dripping with distortion, the vocals weary and worn, buried beneath swirling squalls of blacknoise. Others have a distinct shoegaze quality too, that is if you can imagine a shoegaze Abruptum, the drums loping and laid back, the guitars washed out and blurred, the vocals SO distorted they swallow up all the other sounds and become another layer of super saturated sound. Sometimes they even morph into fucked up harmonies, so loud and lo-fi they crackle and splinter, without losing any of their alien beauty. There are long stretches of ambience too. Crackling campfires, crickets, warm whirring synths way off in the distance, ghostly gurgled disembodied voices, whipping wind, all interwoven with tape hiss and buzzing synths, creepy noises, and all manner of sonic detritus.
Three of the tracks here are bonus tracks, recorded later, and manage to fit perfectly with the original disc. One is especially of not, as it's maybe the most melodic of the bunch, thick keyboards drift over a sea of pulsing cymbal sizzle, and barely audible guitar, the drums buried way down in the mix, the vocals growling and hissing and howling, the whole thing very dreamy and drifty and otherworldly. Until the end, when everything drops out leaving just shimmering synths, and the sounds of war, speeches, soldiers, sirens, weeping mothers, crying children, so intense and anguished and moving. Which brings us to the lyrical content. Pyha is staunchly anti-government, anti-war, anti-military, he's a pacifist and an anarchist, and has chosen black metal as the medium to express his message. The packaging is covered in images of Korean wartime atrocities, all of which is even more ironic and sad, when you learn that Pyha (now that he's old enough) is currently in the Korean Army, as military service there is compulsory.
The record closes with one of the most powerful tracks on the record. A seven+ minute blow out, as black as anything else on the disc, and definitely the fastest, as close to a blast as Pyha gets. But it's still loping and woozy. The drums and cymbals are recorded super hot and lay a gauzy layer of hiss over the proceedings, keyboards pick out a delicate minor key melody, hovering weightless like ghosts over the roiling blackened churn below. It almost sounds like Wold at times, as if there was some old 78 playing beneath the wash of black buzz. The track gets heavier and heavier, the vocals more and more demonic and monstrous, the intensity building and building, the main riff, remaining impossibly haunting and majestic as it sinks deeper and deeper into the sea of noise drenched blackness, leaving more and more of that mysterious underlying melody, to drift off and eventually fade away.
Rare is the record, black metal or otherwise, that evokes such intense emotion, that gives the listener chills. Beyond the blackness and the buzz, lies a record of impossible depth, full of emotion and passion. So much so, that it's easy to forget that it was conceived, composed and recorded entirely by a little middle school kid!
Gorgeously packaged in a 6 panel gatefold digipak. Brown and gold sepia toned, with metallic ink, the outside a tranquil Korean landscape, inside a garish gallery depicting the human cost of warfare.
After all that, it might seem like overkill, but this is, without a doubt, THE BLACK METAL RECORD OF THE YEAR. And for some of us, one of the best black metal records ever. What the fuck were you doing when you were 14 years old?!
First we've heard from this particular group called Pyramids in quite some time (though we did wait for the cassette version to appear before reviewing it - the cd and lp formats of this actually came out earlier this year, which we're also now belatedly listing). Pyramids' self-titled record on Hydra Head garnered a lengthy (and quite favorable review) from us back in 2008 for its avant-black weirdness. On A Northern Meadow, Pyramids once again confound anyone thinking they've settled into a sound. The presence of Colin Marston (Gorguts, Krallice, Dysrhythmia) and Vindsval of Blut Aus Nord, and the fact that this release is (with the exception of the cassette) on Profound Lore might give you an idea of what you're dealing with here, but that idea is probably wrong! Shoegaze dreaminess, strange vocals that alternate between straightforward reverbed-out cleans and strange black metal wails, and bizarre drum machine rhythms (provided by Vindsval, obviously) are all blended to something that resembles Blut Aus Nord without the black metal ferocity.
This is a doozy of a release, and one that seems custom made for aQ. Weirdo black metallers Pyramids sent songs and sounds to a bunch of bands to rework, reinterpret, remix or reimagine in any way they saw fit. The list of bands alone should havemost aQ folks frothing: Tenhornedbeast, Fear Falls Burning, Windy & Cark, Wereju, Burial Hex, Yen Pox, Josh Lay, Black Seas Of Infinity, Encomiast, Bones Of Seabirds, Nicholas Szczepanik, Rise Of Because, Jeremy Bible, Amber Asylum, Bass Communion, Hoor-Paar-Kraat, Light Of Shipwreck, Mamiffer, Ulan Bator, Across Tundras, At The Head Of The Woods, Blood Fountains, Oakeater, Neuntoter Der Plage, Rabbit Girls, Wicked Messenger, Sigullum Dei, Black Roller Crop Rotation, 9922, Exit In Grey, The Spirit Dies, Luasa Raelon, Wyrm, Sin Of A Higher Strain, Drowning The Virgin Silence, Paradin, Bjerga/Iverson, Fences, Le Knell, Andrew Weathers, Mystified, Nils Helstrom, True Colour Of Blood, Teeth Collection, Great Falls, Hiroki Sasajima, Offthesky, Ala Muerte, Romance Of Young Tigers, This Will Destroy You, Ghoul Detail and Lunar Miasma. Phew. Instead of going through the whole collection song by song, group by group, we'll let you suss it out for yourself, the sounds are all over the map, noisy, heavy, pretty, ambient, rhythmic, brutal, psychedelic, some of the tracks sound like remixed Pyramids, others you'd never know, it's an epic and sprawling collection, that for the most part is pretty fucking great. The packaging is incredible too. SIX HOURS of music of FIVE TAPES, the tapes red, printed in silver, all housed in one of those plastic clamshell cases, like for language courses, but his one has a custom stamped placeholder in the otherwise empty sixth tape slot, and is covered in a full color printed glued on cover. Inside is a black on silver metallic printed insert, and all of this is housed in a red cardstock slipcover, sealed with a metallic silver wax seal! WOW. Limited to 300 copies, we're taking pre-orders for this, we're only getting as many copies as we get orders, so if you want one don't dawdle...
As much as we love that Hydra Head sound, huge churning riffage, pummeling drums, crushing metallic dirges and all things heavy heavy heavy, we're becoming more and more obsessed with the releases that don't fit so comfortably on HH, don't necessarily embody that classic Hydra Head sound. Although that's not necessarily fair, as the more bands HH sign that sound different, the more diffuse and varied that HH 'sound' becomes, which renders this whole theory moot. But whatever, stick with us for a second, there is a point. It's sort of how we were with Sub Pop, sure we loved Green River and Soundgarden and Mudhoney, THAT sound, but we got crazy obsessed with stuff like Rein Sanction and Hardship Post, the stuff that stuck out, that sounded WEIRD, maybe almost more than the regular Sub Pop stuff.
It might be just that for a band to kick someone's ass SO much, that they're willing to release a record by them, even though sonically it's a whole different ball of wax, means that the record in question is that good, that fucked up, that unique, or could be that we just like to be contrary. Either way�
Whatever. We love Isis and Cavity and Pelican, but lately, we, like a lot of you, have been obsessing over Jesu, Hayaino Diasuke, Austerity Program, Torche, Pet Genius and now Pyramids, who hail from Denton Texas, and who sound like nothing on Hydra Head. If we had to pick one band, it might be Jesu, but even then, the similarities are minimal. Pyramids are blissy and fuzzy and gauzy and pretty, almost ambient at times, drifting dreamily, their sounds shimmering and glistening, everything blurred and washed out and totally fucking gorgeous, BUT, they do have some surprises up their sleeves. And it's those surprises that make this record such a mind blower.
But let's start at the beginning. The first three tracks here are totally lovely, guitars are wisps, vocals are fluttery shadows, melodies are delicate and fragile, the production is warm and sun dappled, rhythms are muted shuffles, effects swirl and sway, here and there, the sound thickens into something almost heavy, but never quite gets there, remains on the pretty drifty side of heavy. It's like a more avant freaky version of Mazzy Star or Galaxie 500, that same sort of windblown washed out blissy vibe. Until the fourth track.
Beginning with some minimal guitar buzz, amidst a whirl of chiming harmonics, shortwave interference, and blown out buzz, the drums kick in, and the riff locks into an insectoid buzz, and suddenly the Pyramids are some sort of black metal band, still bleary and blissy, but with pounding drums and buzzing guitars, eventually vocals come in and it's like a metalgaze Sigur Ros, which is most definitely awesome.
The next track too offers more of the same, a sort of swirling chaotic shoe gaze-y black metal, and in fact the rest of the record continues on in that vein, each track a twisted convoluted take on blissed out black metal, sometimes grinding and furious, but even then swathed in a warm sonic glow, sometimes more poppy and swirly, like a more abstract Swervedriver. As you can tell, it's pretty hard to describe. Not sure it's really black enough to appeal to black metallers, it's more like some shoegaze ambient metal pop band just borrowed some black metal tropes and wove them into their gorgeous blown out soundworld.
There's a second disc too, of remixes, by the likes of Jesu, James Plotkin, Loveliescrushing, Birchville Cat Motel, Blut Aus Nord and more, and we would have assumed that remixes by those folks, of this sort of music, would just render them more blissed out, but instead, at least the first two, transform the songs into furious blown out black jams. The first, remixed by Toby Driver of Kay Dot, Ted Parsons of Prong and Swans and Colin Marston of Behold the Arctopus, begins all soft and swirly, but by the end has added super distorted drums, and all manner of fried buzz. The Plotkin remix up next, strips away most of the bliss, and leaves a seriously fucked sounding lo-fi in-the-red black metal blast. The Jesu remix sounds just like you might imagine, a gauzy slowcore drift, with the vocals jacked way up, soaring through the ether, a fluttery falsetto. The two Loveliescrushing mixes bring out the soft blurred ambience of the originals, making them even more tranquil and serene. Birchville turns his mix into a virtual BCM track, using bits and pieces of the original, creating a thick slow growing drone, that builds to a buzzing crescendo before fading back into a dark moody drift. Blut Aus Nord is the most fucked up remix. Not sure if they added tons of stuff, or just did some crazy mix, but the guitars groan all dizzy and woozy and angular, the drums, pounding and machinelike, the vocals a hissy evil howl, the whole track a lurching black lope. All the mixes here are amazing, utterly transforming the originals, but in doing so hewing to the spirit of the original record, which was already pretty schizophrenic and all over the amp as it was.
Way way way recommended. A new aQ favorite for sure...
Super limited one sided collaborative lp from avant metal weirdos Pyramids and blackened noisesmiths Wraiths, featuring Clay Ruby from Burial Hex on piano. It's a sprawling 25 minute side long single track, that starts out all dreamy and drifty with female vox over pounding reverb heavy piano, before the song kicks in proper, big chiming distorted guitars, and martial drumming, which instead of launching into blasting blackness, devolves into some strange glitched out droniness, all crumbling distortion, and crooned almost chant-like vox, and that piano from the opening few seconds. The sound is almost liturgical, certainly ritualistic, and for the next 10 minutes, the track drifts woozily, those female vocals return, the piano drives the haunting ambience, a funereal dirge of sorts, that finally explodes again at about the 15 minute mark, the drums, the bombastic crashing chords, but again, the song quickly devolves, this time into a blurred blackened squall of smeared noise and crumbling heaviness, obviously the work of Wraiths, who pull the song apart into a roiling tangle of grinding heaviness and blurred blacknoise, the whole thing laced with weird effect-ed guitars and the occasional stray melody, before, settling into a weird outro, all distant feedback, blasts of feedback, strange electronics, minimal percussion, and that haunting female voice, intoning some strange incantation, as the noise gradually dissipates leaving only emptiness...
Pressed on clear vinyl and housed in a gorgeous vellum sleeve with super striking artwork from tattoo artist Simon Erl. LIMITED TO 350 COPIES!!
Got us a kick ass split here, bringing together a band we had yet to hear (and can barely pronounce), Pyrifleyethon, and aQ faves Ophidian Forest (counting the man behind tUMULt's Botanist as a member!).
First up is Pyrifleyethon, hailing from Greece. We're told pretty much everything we need to know within the intro "Ignipotence", where guitar fuzz takes on the sound of a portal opening up into hell before launching into full on blasts of black metal fury with "Powers of The Second Sphere". Our favorite track from this horde is "Underneath", where the band expertly utilizes melancholy melodies with croaking troll vokills and machine gun riffery with all kinds of queasy runs up the fretboard. The final song, the perfectly named "Hades Landscape" begins with a spooky guitar melody and rides it for a good 5 minutes as a midtempo dirge before shifting gears and launching into full on black metal insanity.
Pretty bad ass stuff from Pyrifleyethon, but Ophidian Forest have no difficulty in staking out their own crazy identity on this split. OF's previous albums, which we gobbled up like crazy, gave us a roadmap for where things *might* go, but goddamn if this band hasn't upped the ante for totally confusional, totally fucked black metal mayhem. Given the band's international makeup and method of creating albums via file swapping, we wonder how these three manage to produce stuff this bizarre while still sounding completely together and musical. No doubt the most immediate reaction is to the keyboards, which almost sound like a jazzy organ at times. In terms of how they are worked into the mix, think maybe of Beherit's Drawing Down The Moon. The songs have a strange sepia-tone quality to them, and it sounds like they could be the soundtrack to some lost Jan Svankmeyer film. On "Never Wish To Sleep", the keyboards buzz about nefariously like a poison fog while the vocals sound like something creeping out of an underground bunker. The song is weird and hallucinatory with a cool end of the world vibe that we can definitely get behind. "The Tower" makes great use of the aforementioned "jazzy" keyboards, thrown in with guttural riffs and uber metal drumming. The song is almost proggy at times, like something Van Der Graf Generator might have made if they were a three strangers from disparate parts of the globe instead of a bunch of old English nutters. Ending with "Paladin Of The Blackest Heart", OF conjures elements of industrial sci-fi craziness and even hints of folk (we think anyway) while still sounding like... well, only themselves. Quite a feat, and highly recommended!
It may be difficult to believe at this point, but we don't actually love everything from Finland. Nor do we love everything from Japan. And what might be equally hard to believe, is that we don't love every band with a crazy name, a monicker equal parts ridiculousness and ultraviolence, Lord Of The Rings and Star Wars, medieval and futuristic. Nor does the presence of flute supersede all other sonic considerations. And being chaotic and damaged and heavy and downright baffling is not, on its own, enough (although it's very very close).
But, and this is the very big BUT we must concern ourselves with here, we do love EVERY SINGLE band we've heard who hail from Japan, via Finland, with an awesomely over the top super metal name, who are heavy and noisy and mathy and fucked up and sort of black metal, and have tons and tons of FLUTE. But then again, there's only one band that fits that description. Japan's Quest For Blood. Released on Jussi from Circle's Ektro label, championed by Reverend Bizarre's Albert Witchfinder (who also did the artwork and wrote the band's bio on the Ektro website), who create a dizzying complex bombast of proggy heaviness, of complex arrangements, of blackened metallic majesty, all gnarled riffing, furious drumming, riffy and groovy and buzzy, and flute everywhere, and it's the flute that defines the sound of Quest For Blood, whose sound is both metal and some sort of jazz, equally composed and abstract, black and buzzy, epic and deliriously dense, heavy yet folky and free. Quest For Blood began life as a slightly more traditional black metal band called Magane, but after a chance meeting with Yukihiro Isso, who had in the past played with Tatsuya Yoshida and Keiji Haino, the band changed direction, and blossomed into something else entirely, creating a sound never really heard before, and a sound that we now realize is one we had been fantasizing about for ages, black metal, Japanese folk, wild free flute, blast beats, weird chanted vocals, well, okay, we -would- have fantasized about it, had we ever imagined a band like that could actually exist. Well...
If you're anything like us, you'll be hooked after the first track, which begins with what sounds like Jew's harp and marimba, before launching into some blackened post metal riffing, over which a flute flutters and soars over the top, at once intense and melodic, but also airy and ethereal, it's like super dense metallic math rock meets black metal meets jazzprog, until suddenly the band drops out, leaving just solo flute, for 2 plus minutes, wild free jazz fluttery, folky, freaky, the melodies chaotic and complex one second, gentle and lilting the next, squeaks, skronks, wheezes, whistles, the sound falling somewhere between traditional Shakuhachi folk music and manic free jazz. Until finally, the band return, with some Japanese chanting, and epic Viking style riffery, the flute flitting right along, in its own way as aggressive and intense as the riffing beneath it. The second song follows suit, a roiling churning melee of riffs and blast beats, of serpentine riffing, of buzz and crunch, the flute again weaving dense tangled webs of melody draped over everything, a constant fluttering flitting sonic presence, relentless and breathless and truly dizzying.
The whole record is truly relentless, the flute in full on wild solo jam mode continuously, as the band wind and weave various metallic frameworks underneath. And while the sound is dynamic in its own way, it's also utterly ferocious and unrelenting, occasionally allowed some space, when the song unwinds and the flute is left to drift in long stretches of abstract shimmer, or the band slips into something slightly less manic, but for the most part, this is a gloriously mind blowing progjazzmathmetal onslaught.
As if the record wasn't already weird enough, it gets even weirder, and more varied, near the end, as the songs become more dynamic, the arrangements more stop / start, the various woodwinds offering up underwater gurgles and squiggly manic melodies, than more traditional flute sounds. "Yayema" sounds almost gospel-y, very melodic and dramatic, a little over the top, the melodies major key and majestic, but of course peppered with bursts of furious blasts and wild squall of flute freakout. "Uchina" begins like many of the other tracks, a jazz metal blow out, this time with raspy creature-like vocals, and some pounding piano, until the band drops out, leaving just drums and flute and vocals, reminding us a bit of a more freaked out version of that Dave Lombardo plays Vivaldi record, but with far out chanting, distant raspy vocalizations, all very tribal and weird, with a definite Ruins vibe, before launching back into full on metal mode, now with wailing guitar leads all tangled up with the wild flute.
The final track begins with solo flute, before the band joins in, all rough and raw and lo-fi, pounding out a simple mesmerizing riff, almost Circle style, the drums a murky thud, the flute ethereal and transcendent, eventually, the drums sputtering into some wide open space, before getting all wound up with streaks of scrabbly off kilter guitar in some sort of Ginn-ish guitar drum duel, laced with atonal piano pound, fiery flute and crumbling noisy chaos, finally finishing off in a blaze of metallic murk and abstract black jazz whatthefuck.
So awesome. And confusionally genius. Some seemingly impossible mix of black metal, free jazz, Italian prog, traditional Japanese folk, math rock and noise rock; a mind bending, ear melting mash up of Osanna, the Ruins, Absu, Solar Anus, Rahsaan Roland Kirk, Comus, Cromagnon, Ghost, Finntroll, Jethro Tull, Circle, Xynfonica, and who the fuck knows what else.
Needless to say, or perhaps worth saying over and over and over. WAY RECOMMENDED. And another contender for metal (or whatever) record of the year.
Got a whole bunch of new releases from the Universal Consciousness label, a new lp of twisted experimental black noise from Kilt, the final release from shoegaze black metal one man band Wrath Of The Weak, and the latest slab of twisted blackened weirdness from Lord Time. And then there's this, some seriously fucked up outsider bedroom blackened doom folk from the Pacific Northwest, which is even more twisted than that sounds. Imagine intensely strummed acoustic guitars, fluttering flutes, cardboard box blast beats (or maybe it's someone slapping their palms on a table), add some raga like drones, and some seriously harsh blown out vokills, some weird samples, and holy shit, you've got the unpronounceable Quloelfi, whose sound is a seriously demented strain of blackened bedroom weirdness, the sound slipping from furious ACOUSTIC black buzz, to droned out ritualistic psychedelia, to distortion drenched 4 track folk, apocalyptic and menacing, the vocals are sick, a hellish monstrous shriek, that when draped over even the dreamiest folkiness, transforms the sound into something abject and demonic, but even with that shrieking, the band sometimes add a second clean vocal, a twisted counterpoint that only makes it all that much weirder and cooler. Some tracks the drums do sound real, and the guitar does sound electric, but even then, it's got this weird, stumbling low fidelity home brewed bedroom vibe, that makes it super twisted and super unique, especially when the band whip up some seriously majestic black buzz heaviness, using elements that are obviously not typical. We can honestly say we've never heard anything like this, and thus we're sort of obsessed, and think anyone into twisted outsider heaviness, and warped experimental weirdness, will likely be as smitten as we are.
Disturbing, verrrrry disturbing.
You might expect that something from Circle and Pharoah Overlord members going under the names Krypt (Jussi) and Rudimentor (Janne) might be sorta metallic (especially after that Krypt Axeripper ep reviewed last list). This silver-on-black screenprinted package certainly looks dark and evil: the illegible logo, the band photo (long hair, spiked armbands), the song titles -- there's just two of them, "Transylvanian Error" (17:45) and "Ultimate Sword" (16.34). And the album title is a nod to Jussi's favorite '80s "metal" act, Jesters Of Destiny.
But we also know to expect the unexpected from our Finnish friends. So while this IS dark and evil, there's not a metal riff in sight. Rather, this duo utilize percussion, voice and effects to create a psychologically sick, rhythmically fucked drone-zone. The two long tracks are black, bottomless abysses both, caverns echoing with monstrous processed vokills and clattering pipe-fights, awash in a dense, drifting electronic miasma.
The label press info references Z'ev (the percussion), Faust (the weirdness), Wolf Eyes (the noise), Darkthrone (the evil) and we hear all that for sure. We'd further compare Rakhim's improvised blackness to black metal experimentalists (and AQ ROTWer's) Abruptum, with some of the screaming sounding like the insane-asylum inmates from a Staalagh record! Maybe like Staalagh on a broken boombox, being played the the corner of a room where spaced-out Circle side project Dr. Kettu are jamming with the Black Boned Angel.
Actually, last year we reviewed an expensive Qbico import LP by Rakhim (weirdly enough, we still have a few copies, if you act fast...) and ever since experiencing the mesmerizing psychedelic murkiness of that debut we've been wanting to hear more.
Disturbing, yes. But we like being disturbed like this!!
This hitherto unknown Russian black metal band has quickly gained some converts here at Aquarius with this disc. Of course, we're suckers for folky, flute-heavy pagan forest metal! You might laugh at the jig-dancing potential of this disc, and sure, we like it
How much do we love Oaken Throne magazine? It is easily one of, if not THE, best metal magazines going. Considering how many we sell, you all must agree. But what's a writer to do when the magazine he writes for comes out so infrequently? Well start a new magazine of course. But if you're John Mincemoyer, one half of the team that produces Oaken Throne, you don't just start any old magazine, you come up with something weird, and cool, ad gorgeously designed, and pretty much unlike any other magazine you've ever seen, thus we have the first issue of Rape & Honey, and besides being named after one of the best Ministry records ever, it also just so happens to have a pretty odd concept. First off, it's a microzine, and is all of three (3) pages. Second of all, the entire thing is about ONE band. Just one. And it consists of ONE review, and ONE interview with said band. Cool. For the first issue, Mincemoyer focuses on blackened thrashers Razor Of Occam and their record Homage To Martyrs. We had never heard of Razor Of Occam, but it hardly matters, the review is great, the interview is super interesting, as much about philosophy and lyrical content as it is about music and metal, even more so, and of course, gorgeously laid out, an oversized cardstock gatefold, with a full color cover, inside there's a vellum envelope, with a letter and introduction from Mincemoyer, also a review of the RoO record, printed in full color on a mini transparency, all sealed up in a plastic bag. Cool stuff for sure. Definitely might hold you over until the next Oaken Throne, or at least the next Rape & Honey which will feature Funeral Mist!
Finally, a new issue of Rape & Honey, the miniature metal magazine, that has taken the place of the now deceased Oaken Throne, easily one of the best metal periodicals ever. But when OT was retired, John Mincemoyer, one half of the Oaken Throne editorial team, decided he still wanted to do printed zine, but with a twist, that twist being that each issue is focused on a single band. Lovingly laid out, gorgeously designed and printed, well written and extremely interesting, Rape & Honey is almost like lengthy articles pulled from a magazine and transformed into their own slime volume, and like many of our favorite mags, it almost doesn't matter who it's about, it's great reading, and more often than not, you'll be dying to hear the band after reading all about their history, their beliefs, and most importantly their music.
The first issue focused on the relatively obscure black thrash outfit Razor Of Occam, issue two was all about aQ faves Funeral Mist, and now along comes #3, this time it's all about Weapon, whose Drakonian Paradigm record we raved about not too long back. Bangladesh via Canada, a killer mix of grim blackness and classic metal, with wild solos, loads of harmony guitars, actual melodies, weird production, extreme stereo panning, you can read our review on the aQ site, but you should also grab one of these and dig in. Besides all the interesting stuff in the article, the presentation is superb, this time it's up to 12 pages (not long before it becomes a proper magazine perhaps?), full color, with a super nice center spread, and as always, there are some inserts, a Rape & Honey postcard, and Ajna Offensive ad/insert, and a small printed transparency with Mincemoyer's review of Drakonian Paradigm!
If you read Terrorizer, and Decibel, and used to read Oaken Throne, then there's no reason you shouldn't be reading Rape & Honey!
Oaken Throne is dead. Sad but true, that beloved magazine chronicling all things black and grim, dark and sonically adventurous, has been laid to rest, a labor of love for sure, but it got to the point where no amount of love could sustain the amount of labor that went into producing each issue. So sad. We still have copies of the last few issues, so do grab them while you can, and while OT is gone, one half of the team behind OT, John Mincemoyer, is forging ahead with his own idiosyncratic magazine, Rape & Honey. Not so much a magazine as a broadsheet, it's a handful of pages, each issue focused on a single band, we still have a few copies of issue one, which was all about Razor Of Occam, but this second issue, expanded to nearly twice the size of number 1, might be of even more interest to most of the aQ faithful, being as its focus is on longtime aQ favs, the mighty Funeral Mist.
You can read our rants and ravings about Funeral Mist elsewhere on the aQ site, we gushed about pretty much every FM release, even going so far as to make Maranatha our Record Of The Week a while back. But Rape & Honey Takes you even deeper, incorporating interviews, background, history, reviews, musings, plus Mincemoyer is an excellent writer, and Funderal Mist are indeed fascinating subjects. 8 pages, 8 1/2" by 11", full color, plenty of illustrations, with two printed full color inserts, as well as a Mincemoyer penned Funeral Mist review printed on a cool colored transparency. A great read, and a killer object de' metal art, WAY recommended, to fans of the band of course, but also folks who read Terrorizer and Oakan Throne and Decibel and the like, plus it's super cheap! Skip a cup of coffee and read all about one of our favorite bands...
Like the Depths tape we reviewed on the last list, this is another blast of true underground grimness, Ravendawn however is in fact two Iowa teenagers who reviewed this slab of sonic sickness way back in 1997, and which has never been released until now. And it's a doozy, especially if you like your black metal raw and primitive, and like your fidelity fucked up. This is total practice space / basement / subterranean cavern sound, the guitars a muddy insectoid blur, the vocals a super distorted rasp, the drums total cardboard trashcan lid pound and bash, but all woven together into some seriously fierce black heaviness. And some tracks manage to be weirdly atmospheric dialing back the buzz, letting the guitars weave weirdly tense minor key drones, the drums loping and spaced out, the result sort of cinematic and trancelike, surprisingly progressive for the time certainly, and the weirdness/coolness is only enhanced by the warped recording, cuz when the blown out blasting drum damage swoops in toward the end of the track, that combined with the weirdly woozy psychedelic atmosphere makes for some seriously tripped out sonic radness.
Ravendawn do a pretty great job of fusing those too sounds/vibes, they're at their best when it's a dizzying concoction that can't seem to decide between atmospheric and psychedelic or grim buzzing and black, usually opting for both simultaneously, which results in something fucked up and weirdly original, but still plenty raw and grim and true to keep the metalheads satisfied. Fans of other Universal Consciousness stuff will definitely dig (Harassor, Moonknight, Wrath Of The Weak), and again, if you dug that Depths tape, this one will most likely hit the spot too.
LIMITED TO 100 COPIES, each one hand numbered, the covers letter pressed on super thick textured cardstock.
Right up front, we'll go on record and say this is likely the best cd you'll EVER buy... that comes packaged in a diaper. Prove us wrong. We dare you. But until someone does, revel in awesomely monikered Rebel Wizard, another project by the mysterious madman behind Aussie blacknoise one man band Nekrasov. And unlike the Nekrasov record reviewed elsewhere on this list, where you'll find said man indulging his face melting, amp shredding, ear drum destroying harsh noise tendencies, Rebel Wizard goes just as far in the opposite direction, whipping up a frenzy of classic metal riffage, harmonized leads, galloping drumming, a hybrid of old school black metal and NWOBHM maybe? Hell, the diaper even displays the legend NWONM, scrawled in sharpie, alongside a drawing of what looks like a dead eyed stick figure metalhead. And yup, it stands for NEW WAVE OF NEGATIVE METAL!
It's just blackened enough, the vokills just harsh enough, to give this the negative edge, but the stretches without vocals, it could be some lost demo from some obscure UK band from the eighties. But this shit is so good, a band like that wouldn't stay obscure for long. Any metalhead worth his salt and with a halfway decent record collection while find these tracks push all their very metal buttons, eminently headbangable, super melodic, epic, majestic, but also plenty grim and fierce and fucking heavy. We won't go on at length, since we have less than 10 copies, and these are the very last of an extremely limited run of just 50 copies, needless to say, highly recommended, and for the few of you who will manage to nab one of these, you will not be sorry.
And yeah, these are in fact housed a (unused!) diaper, complete with polka dots, and little cute cuddly animal pictures, and those sticky tabs holding it shut. LIMITED TO 50 COPIES, each one numbered on the inside, each one hand adorned with the record title, the NWONM legend, and the aforementioned dead eyed skull thing. Also includes a printed insert with the track listing.
This is not really new, but it's one of our favorite freaked out black metal records, and it was reissued last year (originally released in 2002) although we only now managed to get in touch with the label (they also released the Vorak, reviewed elsewhere on this list) but now finally we can list and review, this amazing slab of bizarre blackness.
Those familiar with the Rev. Kriss Hades, probably know him as the guitar player for Aussie black death metallers Sadistik Exekution, who while weird in their own right, are pretty much furious grinding blacknoise, a sort of sloppy psychedelic black mess, awesome by the way, but more simple and fast than freaked out and fucked up. Which is why this first album from Sadistik guitarist Hades is such a mind blower. This is super abstract, noisy, buzzy, outsider experimental black metal, peppered with stretches of black ambience, industrial soundscapes and plenty of whatthefuck heaviness. This record has been described as a mix of Einsturzende Neubauten, Beherit and Pink Floyd, and while the sound here is probably much closer to Beherit than the other two, their are definite moments of tripped out psychedelia and industrial grind and whir.
But from the first song, it's easy to tell this is some freaky mind blowing stuff. Beginning with haunting acoustic guitar, weaving mournful melodies amidst whipping winds, when the band kicks in, instead of launching into blasting blackness, it's more a sort of murky blown out buzz, the guitars super washed out, the riffing just a blackened smear, underpinned by epic swells of super dramatic keyboards, the drums a buried blast, WAY down in the mix, while over the top the vocals are a confusional pile up of grunts and growls, of shrieks and howls, mumbling and singing in tongues, the whole thing smeared and seasick, buzzing abstractly, almost more experimental black ambience than metal, but there are riffs, and drums blasting away, reminiscent of Wold and Velvet Cacoon in some ways. The first track finishes off with more acoustic guitar, this time though draped delicately over muted black riffing.
And the weird thing is, that's about as metal as the record gets, that first track, from then on it gets more and more unhinged, more psychedelic, less riffy and definitely less 'metal', but no less heavy. The next two tracks are reinterpreted Sadistik Exekution tracks, and while we're not that familiar with the originals, these versions definitely twist the originals into new shapes. The first is a blazing black blast of buzz, but beginning with a tripped out psychedelic assemblage of backwards guitars and processed vocals, then the song itself is super convoluted, riffs slipping and sliding everywhere, squiggly leads, a total damaged black psych freakout, while the other is a sort of blissed out ambient Godflesh / Pitchshifter thing, all industrial rhythms, the riffs, way down in the mix and doused in FX, haunting vocals and all manner of swirling shimmer and crumbling drones...
Right after that is the super brief "Luciferion", a super distorted, ultra fuzzed out shred fest, just guitar, buzzing riffs and wild leads, the whole thing blown out and in the red, followed by "Meditation Of The Midnight Candle Practice" an extended soundscape of warped distorted guitars, strangled effects, huge washes of glacial guitardrone, super affected leads, glitched out minimal rhythms buried way down in the mix, drifting lo-fi ambience and super tweaked studio sounds, all woven into a seriously cracked world of black sound. The record finishes off with a creepy haunted house horror movie church organ jam that morphs right at the end into a super thick corrosive deathdronedirge...
A seriously demented slab of damaged psychedelic black buzz. Which obviously means WAY recommended.
The reissue includes a thick booklet with lyrics, photos, an excerpt from an interview with Hades, and lots of Hades' super intense artwork...
The most unhinged band in metal, Canada's Revenge, somehow manages to even sound more insane on this, their fifth full-length record, despite the departure of founding member Pete Helmkamp (Angelcorpse). The aural equivalent of being dragged to hell, also the aural equivalent of any of their trademark abject 3-word album titles. One of the few bands left still pushing extreme metal further!!!
Comes with sick patch.
There's actually a goodly number of black and/or death metal releases on this week's list, and they wouldn't be here if we didn't like 'em. But if what you're looking for is something that's *really* evil-sounding, shredded, distorted, blackened, and fucked up, well, like they say: dude, Revenge is sweet. (Forget about the best served cold part, though.) Seriously, Canada's Revenge sure as heck here have made one of the noisiest, nastiest black metal records we've heard in a long time. Their second full-length, Victory.Intolerance.Mastery (how's that for an album title?) is, uh, extremely extreme. Utterly so. Roaring, rumbling, raw. Not for those concerned with such sophisticated niceties as polished production, or melody, or even, well, music. Nope, this is purely over-the-top hellish thrashing mayhem. Clattering drums, belching vocals, screaming guitars, all recorded past-the-point-of-pain. Really, we thought that Aufgehoben No Process was the Anaal Nathrakh of noise-rock...but now we think that Revenge are the Aufgehoben No Process of black metal...does that make sense? Truly cult stuff. What else to say? Well, this blasting brutality boasts the, ah, talents of bass warrior Pete Helmcamp (Angelcorpse, Order From Chaos), whom along with the other guy in the band (one J. Read on "bloodhammers" and "actrocity commands") is one of the reasons that our pal Drew from Matmos just came in and bought this disc -- he thinks these guys are cute! Bet that's the only time someone purchases this cd for the cuteness factor. Another selling point: Revenge have such a nice, spikey, negative-space logo.
We first heard about Italian one man outsider black metal band Rhuith, via the Hammer Smashed Jazz blog, one of our favorites, a blog that doesn't offer bands' music for free, instead highlighting cool releases and directing folks to places where they can buy em. So this band Rhuith, were apparently a killer weirdo black metal band from Italy, who besides crafting grim twisted outsider buzz, also has a serious obsession with dark pop and classic eighties music, which most definitely found its way into the band's sound, but also meant that he would often cover music from that era, as well as offering up blackened versions of distinctly non-metal tracks, Depeche Mode, Portishead, Placebo etc. Our kind of band for sure!
So we finally got in touch, and small world, ends up, Rhuith is a long time aQuarius mailorder customer. Which sort of makes sense, considering his twisted take on black metal and the fantastically unlikely hybrid that is Rhuith. So we managed to get a whole bunch of his most recent release, Voormithadreth, a four song demo, LIMITED TO 66 COPIES! Which just so happens to include two bonus tracks from another out of print releases, one of which is his Portishead cover, which is worth the price of admission alone.
SO what does Rhuith sound like? Imagine a super lo-fi take on classic black metal, the riffing frenzied and buzzy, the drums way down in the mix, pounding away, but the vocals, holy shit, so over the top and out there, slipping from long slow reverbed mooooooans, to effects drenched shrieks so loud they blow out the whole song. Another track sounds all swampy and garage-y, midtempo and groovy, the vocals even more freaked out, with some strange dubbed out effects, so it almost sounds a bit like a black metal Butthole Surfers. The 48 second long "The Owls" is a furious bit of primitive blast and buzz that leads into the loping Burzumic dirge that is "The Son, The Lion And The Phoenix", a keyboard flecked bit of creepy black doom, with more crooned vocals, and a second half that's all warped and twisted guitars, and swirling distorted effects, weirdly pretty.
Two bonus tracks, the first a gorgeously poppy bit of blackened jangle, a killer main guitar part that sounds straight out of the Breakfast Club soundtrack, but super distorted, the sound crumbly and raw, the vocals a hissy demonic shriek, a killer combo of harshness and pure eighties pop, peppered with some super creepy minimal breakdowns, all spoken word and low slung drones. And then the Portishead cover, an amazing version of "Over", no drums, just super blown out downtuned guitars, playing that main riff over and over, the vocals deep and emotional and dramatic, this could easily be a Rhuith original, and dare we say it adds a whole new vibe to the original, and the more we listen to this, the more we just might like the Rhuith version better. Dark, and haunting, and hypnotic, just today, we've probably listened to that one track 10 times. Can't wait to hear what he decides to cover next. But it's not just the covers that make Rhuith so special, he has definitely cultivated a unique sound, one that touches on lots of stuff we dig, but twists it all up into something new and bizarre and bad ass. It's rare to be digging a record so much, that you find yourself ALREADY looking forward to the next one, but that's exactly how we're feeling with Voormithadreth!
Packaged in a dvd case, with a black and white cover, and inside a xeroxed insert, both the cover and the disc itself hand numbered.
It's been a while since we've heard from Italian one man black metal band Rhuith, who had a penchant for strange covers, including Depeche Mode, Placebo and Portishead. On this brand new tape, he teams up with fellow Italian noisemaker Rotorvator, for a truly twisted and brilliantly tweaked chunk of abstract industrial pop flecked blackness. The opening track sets the stage, with its simple motorik drumming, swirling shimmery atmospheres, bizarre howled vocalizations, and blasts of blown out industrial crunch, which eventually leads into the second track, a much more metal proposition, but still weirdly industrial and also seriously twisted, the guitars murky and buzzy, the drums mechanical and super distorted, the vocals a buried in the mix monstrous growl, the whole thing laces with weird almost techno sounding synth stabs, the vocals getting more and more croaky, over the churning trancelike rhythm, the sound shifting from muted and muddy, to bright and brittle, everything hazy and washed out but still distorted and seriously heavy.
The rest of the record spirals into creepy depressive dirge, spidery minor key guitar melodies, hushed haunting falsetto vox, clomping percussive thumps, thick squalls of psychedelic blacknoise, an ultra distorted noise drenched blackened pound, infused with wild shrieks, detuned guitar crumble, and swirling buzz, which slips into a murky gurgly drone, before exploding again into some super distorted, raw and frantic black metal pound, the guitars in-the-red, the vocals super hot and WAY up in the mix, the drums a robotic programmed d-beat. Eventually the sound slips into something more spaced out and synthy, even a little new agey, the sounds panned hard careening from speaker to speaker, laced with stuttery chopped up rhythms, deep growled vox, chiming harmonics, streaks of effects and glitched out electronics, the tape speed constantly in flux, the distorted sounds growing more and more distorted, the bass woozy and pulsing, a sort of low slung new wave that quickly transforms into a hysterical noise metal plod, that pounds and pounds until the tape runs out.
So bizarre, and bafflingly brilliant, noisy and sort of poppy, rhythmic and atmospheric and just totally far out. But sadly CRAZY limited. We got about 10 copies, and will NOT be able to get any more. Comes in a cool black and white fold out poster sleeve.
