The second compilation of the Mego affiliated online audio/visual community Fals.ch. Compiled by Fals.ch heads Florian Hecker and Oswald Berthold, FB50 collects audio works by artists featured in the last 24 online "releases": Koji Asano, COH, cd_slopper, poire_z, Atau Tanaka, Ulf Bilting & Zbigniew Karkowski, *0, Pain Jerk, Runzelstirn & Gurgelstock, Martin Ng & Jim Denley, Frank Metzger and more! Also exclusive tracks by Mego artists General Magic, gcttcatt, Evol, J.O.K.E. and i.d. There are also a few multimedia goodies included in addition to MP3s: a Merzbow A/V loop, an excerpt of a Francisco Lopez performance and a cryptic file courtesy those Gescom pranksters. In fact, the Gescom file is an incredibly hilarious standalone application that makes your computer seem like it's being hijacked by glitch terrorists! Trick your friends and coworkers into believing your hard disk is being trashed right before your eyes! Fun as shit!
Okay, if you could choose anyone to make you a classic black metal mix tape, who would it be? Andee? Allan? Well, yeah obviously, but we mean what if you could choose ANYONE? Yep, we'd probably pick Fenriz too. Leader of the mighty Darkthrone, Fenriz definitely knows his black metal first hand. And his selections certainly demonstrate that. And there's even some unlikely choices that perhaps indicate some friend rock influence. But even so, this is a seriously kick ass, introduction to TRUE, CULT old-school black metal. Tracks from Blasphemy, Sarcofago, Celtic Frost, Nattefrost, Mercyful Fate, Sodom, Tormentor, Aura Noir, Destruction, Samael, Bulldozer, Mayhem, Hellhammer, Burzum, Venom and Bathory. Plus cool, funny liner notes. Recommended schoolin'.
In the realms of extreme metal, few bands have had as much impact as NOLA doom sludge legends Eyehategod. Even if said impact is based solely on the number of bands who cite them as a musical influence (read: totally ripped off their sound).�
Do you think we'd have Cavity, Mistress, Floor, Dove, Monarch, Khanate, Goatsblood, Iron Monkey, Bongzilla, Khanate, Moho, Zoroaster, Graves At Sea, Shallow North Dakota, Sourvein, Crowbar, Dot [.], Fleshpress, Marzuraan, Toadliquor, Wellington, Weedeater, Ramesses, Electric Wizard or any of about a million other downtuned doom metal sludge bands without Eyehategod? Don't think so.�
So finally, Eyehategod get their due, in the form of, a two disc tribute album, For The Sick, a massive collection of sonic prayers from various worshippers at the throne of Eyehategod. Lots of the above mentioned bands, as well as loads of other heavy headz like Cable, Bowel, Alabama Thunderpussy, Deadbird, Kylesa, Brutal Truth, Byzantine, Raging Speedhorn, Total Fucking Destruction, Minsk, Lair Of The Minotaur, Bloody Panda, Mouth Of The Architect, Swarm Of The Lotus, Kill The Client and loads more!
Most folks will want to buy this already either because they LOVE Eyehategod, and need to own anything even peripherally related, want to hear their favorite EHG songs done by some of their other favorite EHG acolytes, or they love some or all of the bands involved. Probably for most of us it's all three. Two discs, over two hours, a veritable downtuned doomsludge orgy, guitars grind, low end throbs and buzzes, riffs are glacial and soul crushing, squealing serpentine feedback all over the place, vocals are spittle spewing glass gargling, throat shredding howls, every track a tarpit dirge with pummeling pounding drums, and that strange slowed down almost-groove that seems to lurk within every EHG song no matter how slow or blown out.
Hard not to recommend this. It's slow, heavy, crushing, and it's got some of the most amazing songs ever! "Sister Fucker", "White Nigger", "My Name Is God (I Hate You)", "Kill Your Boss" (What?! No "Hit A Girl"?!) Positive vibes, not. If somehow you've managed to miss out on Eyehategod, drop everything and run out and pick up Dopesick or�In The Name Of Suffering or�Take As Needed For Pain, and then once you're properly indoctrinated into the cult of EHG, come on back and pick this up. The rest of you sludge heads already know you need this...
Originally released as a series of SUPER limited split vinyl eps, a 7", a 10" and a 12", each teaming up bizarre mysterious French black metallers Malicious Secrets with some of their more well known countrymen: Antaeus, Mutiilation and Deathspell Omega. Holy shit! You might as well stop reading right now and order one of these as fast as you can. You shouldn't even need us to tell you how totally fucking mindblowing this comp is. Antaeus offer up a short buzzing blast of ultra grim blackness, a fuzzed out blur of droning black metal, downtuned guitars, blown out lightning fast blast beats, guttural growls, the whole thing a white hot lo-fi blast of utter brutality. Then of course there's Mutiilation, who not only offer up a reverb drenched burst of atmospheric blackened buzz, also super lo-fi, blasting and buzzing, and hauntingly creepy crawly like it was recorded in a cave or at the bottom of a well, but they also do a cover of Sinatra's "My Way"! But you wouldn't necessarily know it, the croonsome orginal becoms a harsh ptichfork to the head, dripping with thick droney guitars and shrieking black howls, although it does have a super cool, riffy sort of un-metal breakdown in the middle. Most of you will need this for the final track, a brand new, exclusive to this comp 20 minute epic from Deathspell Omega, rife with impossibly obtuse riffs, weird atonal guitar skree, super complex rhythms, haunting ambeint dronescapes, weird math-metal breakdowns, and of course some of the fiercest fucked up black metal ever. Woah.
As if that weren't enough, let's not forget the three tracks from Malicious Secrets, each of their three tracks from the splits are totally dizzying swirls of ultra fucked up, BIZARRE black metal, riffs are bent and twisted into impossible shapes, blasting drums are sprayed wildly all over the place, each song is a serpentine, non-linear sonic mindfuck, a huge spastic black churning whirlpool, with little bits of riff or little streaks of blast beat surfacing now and again, while over the whole thing the vocalist moans and groans, low and haunting, each syllable stretched into long drawn out bellows, sometimes breaking into hacking coughs or throat clearing before once again returning to an utterly agonizing wail. So totally fucked up and so totally amazing!
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
SORRY.
Soundtrack to Harmony "Kids" Korine's controversial film "Gummo", featuring much in the way of underground black/noise/death/doom metal sounds, some of them previously unreleased. Some names: Spazz, Absu, Bathory, Burzum, Eyehategod, Brujeria, Sleep, Destroy All Monsters, Namanax and more. Oh yeah, AQ-pal and CMJ metal scribe Ian Christe's Dark Noerd (black metal breakbeat band) appears, and Ian's smart musical aesthetic basically sets the tone for the whole collection. Now the question is, will "Gummo" do for any of these bands what "Kids" did for the Folk Implosion?
Not sure what the theme of this compilation is, but it hardly matters, cuz holy shit is it amazing. From the art to the nearly all exclusive tracks, from a weird array of outfits from weirdo Finnish black metal to kosmische synth wranglers! Might as well just give a run down track by track...
Ghoul are up first, but instead of their usual brand of metallic mayhem, offer up a creepy ominous pipe organ intro. Yep, just pipe organ, which leads directly into a track by late great eighties Portland true (Christian) metal band Xinr, whose track of Judas Priest style classic metal KILLS, replete with deranged laughter, and badass vox that are weird and warped but so good. Local Sabbath soundalikes Orchid deliver another dose of uncanny Ozzy era Sab worship, and as always, it's a dead ringer for the original, and thus, sounds amazing! Then our favorite fucked up weirdo black metal Finns, Ride For Revenge spew a filthy primitive caveman dirge metal pound, all practice space drums, crumbling distorted guitars, growled demonic vokills, and even when they crank it up to doubletime, it's still a woozy midtempo churn. The A side finishes off with Xander Harris, and some super rad, creepy Carpenter like soundtrack synthscapery, ominous and sinister, totally kick ass retro slasher flick score for sure!
The flipside starts off with Grave Violators, who we had never heard before, and who traffic in grinding blackened thrash, with some seriously unhinged vocals. The mighty Deceased are up next with some classic metal menace, brand new, but sounds like it could have been recorded back in the day. Occultation follow, and deliver what might be one of the best tracks here, a sprawling epic of witchy proggy female fronted doom, epic and haunting and heavy, definitely need to hear more! Up next, also new to us Venenum, who kick out some serious progged out metallic Voivodisms, with echo drenched vox and some twisted arrangements, and finally, Danava finish things off, and like Ghoul, forego their usual sounds and finish things off with the perfect outro, all creepy synth horror movie madness. So good. And perfect for Halloween listening.
And incredible packaged, garish cartoony cover art, which is also featured on the A side of the picture disc, the B side an even darker creepier drawing, and as things things usually are, quite limited, only 1000 copies.
What more do you need to know!?! It's a compilation called GRIND BASTARDS. Subtitled "For The Grind Freaks". Released on the label run by legendary Japanese grinders Unholy Grave. And check out the band list. Tons of killer groups, and a whole bunch new to us, almost all heavy and brutal and kick ass: Mortalized, Insect Warfare, Butcher ABC, Unholy Grave (of course), Exgreed, Disgust, Top Breeder, Motiveless, Gods Of Grind, Little Bastard, Red, 48, Gate, Spiral and more.
Plenty of downtuned chug, furious blasts, growled cookie monster grunts, wild hysterical shrieks, insane chaotic riffing, most songs clocking in at under two minutes, many of those under one, short sharp jagged blasts of grinding fury, with some songs super well produced and heavy as fuck, others blown out almost Japanoise sounding boombox blur, a handful of crusty D-beat pounding, super varied, but super cohesive, heavy as hell, should totally hit the spot for punk rockers and metalheads alike, as long as you like it ultra heavy, ultra sick and blazing fast. The biggest surprise for us, is probably the 51 second long Mortalized track, "Nailing Descartes To The Wall", which just might be the catchiest minute of grind we've ever heard. Similar to how Jon Chang's new bands incorporate eighties metal and crazy power metal hooks into impossible complex grind, Mortalized sound a little like Iron Maiden on 78, or maybe some super catchy 3 minute pop single spun as fast as it will go, the guitars raging and soaring, the hooks undeniable, even some leads, but that main melody has been stuck in our head nonstop. The only solution seems to be listening to that track over and over again. Which we're still doing. And it does seem to be working. We just. Can't. Ever. Stop.
Packaged in cool fold out punk rock sleeve style with each band getting their own little square for artwork and liner notes.
With a title like Grind Bastards, you can safely assume that this comp is indeed directly targeted at you, the grind bastards. And we know there are some serious grind bastards among the aQ faithful. Anyone who has gone nuts in the past for Agoraphobic Nosebleed, or Pig Destroyer, or Discordance Axis, or Last Days Of Humanity, we could go on and on and on, so yeah, dig a little deeper and discover a whole world of grind going on UNDER the underground. Grind Bastards collects some of the best Japanese grind from mostly bands you've never heard of, but NEED to.
Heavy, buzzing, blasting, frenzied, frenetic, pummeling, crushing, a dizzying swirl of metal riffage, furious blast beats, grunted cookie monster vocals, inhuman blackened shrieks, hooks all over the place, and some of the heaviest catchiest under a minute shit you'll ever hear.
Little Bastards, Magnicide, Mortalized, Butcher ABC, Cortecuellos, Brob, Mangirl, Fortitude, Bleeding Humanity, D.I.E., Kutsujoku, Deadly Spawn, Zagio Evha Dilegj and of course Unholy Grave, whose label Grind Freaks released this (and who also run the amazing all black metal and grind and doom record store Grave in Japan). Dense and dizzyingly complex, next level heaviness for sure, fast and crusty enough for punk rockers, riffy and brutal enough for metalheads, and definitely a rad grind primer for the newbies.
BTW: We also have a few copies of Grind Bastards 2, which besides totally ruling as well, just so happens to feature one of our favorite grind jams ever, a 51 second grindpop gem by Mortalized (who have 2 songs here) covering pop punkers Propaghandi.
Okay grind bastards, time for round 4, another awesome collection of some of the best grind that Japan, and the rest of the world, has to offer. But like on past installments, this is not the grind you know and love, Agoraphobic Nosebleed, Last Days Of Humanity, Discordance Axis, Hayaino Daisuki, Brutal Truth, Pig Destroyer, Nasum, that's all mainstream by comparison, this is the grind underground, some names you might know, you might even have records by Unholy Grave, whose label Grind Freaks is responsible for this mayhem, or Total Fucking Destruction, and then there's a bunch of bands you probably only know from past installments of Grind Bastards like Mortalized, Fortitude, Little Bastards, and in addition this time around a there's whole new crop of bands we'd never heard 'til now: Vulgaroyal Bloodhill, Zomba Green, Disgunder, Diborce, Ada Max, Black Ganion, and more more more.
This isn't really for dabblers though, this is sort of the grind version of grim, kvlt, true, the sounds here insane and ultra aggressive, over the top, a relentless assault on the senses, a crushing barrage of grinding buzzsaw riffage, blasting hyperspeed drumming, crazed vocals that yelp, howl, grunt, screech, the songs ultra proggy, a million parts and tempos crammed into the space of a minute or two, the sounds vary from blasts of blacknoise, to groovy almost classic metal, to white hot blasts of old school grind, to twisted effects drenched grinding avant metal freakouts, to galloping fastcore, to helping almost Melt-Banana sounding hypergrind, to epic war grind, to some almost poppy grind, some seriously gurgling goregrind, a few tracks get into 3 and 4 even 5 minutes, while others blow by in seconds, furious and frenzied and frantic and fantastically fucked up, this is some of the raddest, heaviest, most brutal and inventive grind you'll hear, anyone into fast and heavy, blasting brutality, this will kick your ass big time, and like past volumes, this would be a pretty epic grind primer, and like those volumes, this couldn't be more recommended.
Killer packaging too, a massive fold out punk rock poster, with each band getting their own little panel of liner notes...
Once again, this one is for all the Grind Bastards out there, the fifth in this long running series of Japanese comps, collecting the best of (mostly) Japanese grind, released on the Grind Freaks label, run by legendary Japanese grinders Unholy Grave, who are present here, along with some other longtime faves: Mortalized, Agothocles and some others. But the best part of these comps is discovering all the weird ultra underground grind outfits you'd most likely not hear anywhere else: Red Ran Amber, Ada Max, Extreme Noise Destroyer, Hell And Hell, Easies, Fortitude, Midnight Resurrector, Naqro, Parasite and more!
Obviously, this comp is called Grind Bastards, on a label called Grind Freaks, so odds are if you made it this far you know what you're getting into, fast and furious, blasting, churning, chugging, GRINDing heaviness, frenzied beats, insane riffing, howled and screeched vox, total metallic chaos, blurry punk mayhem, short sharp blasts of super complex, downtuned intricate metallic grind. We're digging Red Ran Amber, who if all was fair would be getting the same love as say Wormrot, Pig Destroyer or any of the other grind outfits on Relapse, Mortalized offer up another minute long epic, further convincing us that they might have the potential to be our favorite grinders if they only had more material out and it was a lot easier to track down, Extreme Noise Destroyer offer up some sort of distortion drenched bit of acoustic guitar weirdness before launching into some serious downtuned devastation, the Easies spit out blasts of super blown out and in-the-red chaos, Brob offer up some seriously old school powerviolence fastcore grind, their sound thick and caustic, Parasite are almost straight up classic eighties metal, complete with super melodic harmonized guitar leads, while Naqro might be a new favorite, their super raw lo-fi sound impossibly dense and heavy, their sound swinging wildly from frantic grind to swinging almost groovy metallic churn, and Midnight Resurrector kick out the straight up hip hop, not sure if they're normally a grind band or they just have some grind cred (they do infuse their sound with some fat fuzzy bass, and some Hawd Gangstah style bellowed rapping). Already can't wait for volume six! Comes in a cool fold out punk rock poster style sleeve.
What really needs to be said about this collection? Vintage Peel Sessions (songs recorded live in the BBC studios to later be broadcast live on John Peel's legendary radio show) by some of the most legendary, and influential grind bands EVER. As well as some not exactly grind bands, and some rad obscure (to many) lesser knowns. C'mon, Napalm Death, Carcass, Bolt Thrower, Godflesh, Extreme Noise Terror, Heresy, Unseen Terror, Intense Degree... the names alone should have most heavy music freeks frothing at the mouth, granted much of this stuff has been available before, but much of it has NOT. And for $16!!??
The first three Napalm tracks here: "The Kill", "Prison Without Walls" and "Dead" are quite literally, the most perfect 57 seconds in extreme music history. We first heard those tracks on a John Zorn radio show, and immediately set out to track them down, and that whole Napalm Peel Session totally trumps (to these ears) anything else they've ever done, to this day, so furious and frantic, the recording so hot and in-the-red, seriously still possibly the most extreme sounding music we've heard. The Napalm tracks here include Peel Sessions from '87, '88 and '90. And if you don't have any or all of 'em, they're worth the price of admission alone. Then there's Extreme Noise Terror, whose sound is way more crusty and punk, bordering on grind, but still totally and fantastically punk rock. The Carcass sessions were definitely available at some point, but these too, if you've yet to hear them, they will SLAY you, crushing and heavily reverbed, fierce and totally sloppy, but so goddamn good. And Bolt Thrower, no one can fuck with Bolt Thrower, and they totally shine on their Peel Session, thrashing and crusty and blown out and totally untouchable. Godflesh pops up for a few songs too, and of course those rule too, especially the Peel version of "Like Rats" which somehow sounds even meaner and heavier.
And then there's the more obscure stuff, 38 tracks of wild, thrashing grinding metallic punk crust from Intense Degree, Unseen Terror, and Heresy, all of which are pretty excellent, ID kick out some fierce skate punk slop, UT are a downtuned grunting blast beat terror, and Heresy start out all goofy and poppy with "Flowers (In Concrete)" before launching into a flurry of off kilter chaotic grind.
Killer slipcovered packaging with tons of vintage photos, liner notes, and a lengthy interview with Mick Harris (Napalm Death / Extreme Noise Terror / Unseen Terror)...
Anyone, ANYONE, who likes their psych all spaced-out and sludgy, with guitars and (especially) effects in full, uh, effect will definitely want to wash their earholes with this excellent new space-rock comp. Compiler Mason Jones (whom you might know as the ex-guitarist of SubArachnoid Space, currently in project called Numinous) knows his stuff and has pulled together tracks from a stellar international cast of rockers who like to freak-out, drone-on, and/or toke-up. Here's who's here: Kinski, Circle, Gravitar, Overhang Party, Tarantula Hawk, Up-Tight, Vocokesh, DMBQ, Bardo Pond, Acid Mothers Temple, Yeti, ST-37, Escapade, Rubble, Abunai!, SubArachnoid Space, Numinous, Farflung, Primordial Undermind, Fuzzhead, Speaker/Cranker, and Transpacific! Whew. As you can see, with Mason in charge, of course the Japanese contingent is well-represented.
The tracks on here are mostly live recordings, and, as far as we can tell, all otherwise unreleased (with the exception of the Tarantula Hawk one, which is an edit from their now-out-of-print Live At KFJC cd-r). Pretty much a killer comp, ranging as it does from the groove of Circle to the grind of Gravitar, with some bands doin' stuff closer to stoner rawk, others more on the bliss-drone side of things. Now, I might have tried to put the more rockin' cuts towards the front end of the discs, to avoid disturbing the slumber of those of us who like to doze off listening to the more blissful stuff (or maybe left off one or two cuts) but that's just me. Overall, Hall Of Mirrors is fully droned, stoned, and ET-phoned. Recommended.
Second label sampler from Hanged Man, and like the first it's chock full of twisted noisiness, spaced out ambience and everything in between. Featuring a handful of names we know (Blue Sabbath Black Cheer, Knifecream, Crystal Hell Pool, Brain Fruit) and a bunch we don't: HT Manor, WaMu, Unnatural Ways, Forrest Friends, Overcasting, Egregor and a bunch of others. If you're familiar with the Hanged Man label, or some of the names above, you have an idea of what to expect, or maybe you don't: grim grinding black buzz, murky malevolent shimmer, dreamy kosmische drift, psychedelic electro-kraut, shrieking chaotic noise rock, skittery free jazz that transforms into dirgy metallic math rock, field recording flecked ambient blacknoise, gorgeously crooned minimal songsmithery, cinematic pianoscapes, twangy campfire desert folk, modern minimal shimmer, grim buzzing lo-fi black metal and more more more.
Fantastically packaged, a fancy printed vellum insert inside a printed J-card, with a song tile insert as well, the whole thing housed in a hand printed metallic card stock slipcase. LIMITED TO 100 COPIES!!
This is the debut release from a new Seattle label, specializing in their own murky darkly psychedelic brand of doom / folk / drone / noise, a sampler of various artists on the label as well as likeminded noisemakers from the area, with a few familiar names (Megabats, Demian Johnston and Inh Halentropy), but way more unfamiliar ones (Kristian Garrard, Karnak Temples, Josh Medina, Them,There, Nightjar, Sokai Stiljed, Thunder:Grey:Pilgrim), all of them contributing this sprawling chunk of droning blackness, strange industrial ambience and looped psychedelic mesmer, all the sonically disparate tracks woven into a collection that works almost as well as an album proper. The familiar names first: abstract avant atmospheric (sort of) black metal weirdo Inh Halentropy lays down some John Carpenter style seventies soundtrack wooziness, all muddy and murky, programmed beats and sci-fi swirl over brooding rumbles, and theremin-like high end melodies, a gorgeous creepily atmospheric chunk of lo-fi faux soundtrackery, while Megabats offer up dense swirls of kosmische synth drift, and glimmering ambient dreamdrug haze, all super blissed out and trippy, and noisenik Demian Johnston delivers some blunted blurred soft-noise, all cavernous and industrial, thick swaths of blurred crumble and greyed out crunch, all smeared into slowly undulating blackened dronemusic. The rest of the tape follows suit, super abstract creaking and crumbling mutates into gauzy almost Pop Ambient loopscaping, thick whirring melodies emerge from slow churning sheets of whirring synths and echoe-y shimmer, delicate acoustic guitars drift amidst sitar like buzz, plaintive vocal harmonies and warm lustrous chordal swells, bleak black rumbles roil ominously through clouds of ominous low end thrum, metallic ragas seem to slowly melt into oozing blackened dronefolk, and finally wild tangles of clipped vocals and shards of melody are stretched out, then layered and looped into a druggy dizzy psych-out. Killer stuff for sure, and odds are pretty dang limited as well...
This disc's compilers have enlisted five suitable bands to make sure this doom-core comp lives up to its subtitle: "74 Minutes Of Extreme Pain." Negative Reaction, Grief, Subsanity, Bongzilla, and Sour Vein all provide some lovely metallic downer dirge.
Earache, as befits their name, has always been a label known for "extreme" music, whether it be grindcore, death metal, or even gabber. This compilation, though, highlights a different sort of extreme, new bands who are hard and heavy but also melodic, with lo and behold actual singing. These outfits ARE extreme - extremely retro that is. And (as far as we're concerned) extremely cool. Heavy Metal Killers, whose cover art seems to be a nod to that of Iron Maiden's Killers, collects tracks from Castle Donnington worthy youngsters who hark back to the glory days of the NWOBHM in the late '70s, early '80s. And thus it has more in common with classic NWOBHM era comps like Metal For Muthas than it does such previous Earache anthologies like Grindcrusher and Hellspawn. And despite the NWOBHMishness, these bands hail from all over the planet, from Finland to Mexico.
Between Allan and Andee at Aquarius, we possess albums by a goodly portion of this disc's lineup, but the rest are totally new to us too. (Which brings up another subject, perhaps to be addressed in a future AQ-blog post, about all the cool records Allan and Andee order for themselves that we somewhat inexplicably never review for our website or even stock in the store!). We already know and love Cast Iron, Cauldron (who should get an award for their track's title, "Chained Up In Chains"!), Portrait, and Enforcer (whose full-length from which their track here is taken is also reviewed this list, actually), but thanks to this comp are glad to be introduced to a slew of other denim-and-leather clad, true metal torchbearers.
As with all comps, some tracks we like better'n others, but actually these Heavy Metal Killers ARE all pretty killer. We'll just mention a couple highlights, like the opening salvo from Holland's Powervice, boasting perhaps the best dual guitar harmony motif on the whole disc, damn it's catchy. Then there's the Mercyful Fate-ish mastery of Sweden's Portrait, complete with King Diamond style falsetto. And we got a kick out of the unabashed Sunset Strip style pop panache of LA's White Wizzard. Other acts here include Ram, H.O.D., Celtic Legacy, Alltehniko, Voltax, In Solitude, and Crowning Glory. Only a few of the tracks are exclusives, most appearing also on these band's albums (upcoming or otherwise) but it's not like you probably have 'em do you??? Though hopefully we soon will, we know for sure we'll be looking out for more by a bunch of 'em.
Cool that this scene is getting big enough for Earache to jump on the bandwagon. Our only complaints? This comp shoulda had San Francisco's Space Vacation on it too! And Finland's Solitaire. And... well, hopefully there's a volume II in store!
The long-awaited "stoner rock/doom metal" soundtrack to the perhaps equally long-awaited psychedelic splatter/gore flick "I Am Vengeance" by low-budget underground director Richard R. Anasky, who, inspired in his filmmaking by both '80s slasher movies *and* '80s doom metal like Witchfinder General, hooked up with Meteor City to put together this soundtrack, featuring the likes of Sheavy, Count Raven, Eternal Elysium, The Quill, Bloodfarmers, Space Probe Taurus, Naevus, Lowrider, Las Cruces, and others. I thought that doom legends Pentagram were supposed to be doing the theme song (it's on their last album), but here it's done by Doomsday Gouvernment (ex-members of Count Raven, who appear all over this comp). Anasky's liner notes seem to indicate that the Pentagram track will appear on a *second* volume of songs from the film to be released by doom label Game Two, but I haven't heard about a release date for that. Anyway, this is a fine comp of mostly-new (or hard-to-find) material by some excellent, if obscure, bands -- almost all of whom seem to have singers vying for the "Sounds Most Like Ozzy Osbourne" award!
Simply put, this is a covers album by indie-kids of '80s metal classics... with Reggie & The Full Effect doing Slayer (imagine "Raining Blood" with zippy new wave keyboards--it's amazing!), The Get Up Kids reworking Motley Crue, Jejune covering the Scorpions, and the much sought-after really weirdo experimental acoustic country rendition of Slayer's "South of Heaven" by Modest Mouse + Califone! Electric Frankenstein, Supernova, Less Than Jake, and others also contribute. Yeah, it's basically a fun, joke record, yet at moments kind of incredible (like The Killingtons' strange, unrecognizably spaced out take on W.A.S.P.'s "F**k Like A Beast"). It makes me wish that there were bands that actually sounded like this all the time! Put it this way: Allan never ever thought he'd have any desire to own a record containing a track by Modest Mouse, let alone a band with a name like 'Mephiskapheles', until he heard this one. (Mephiskapheles do a horn-free version of Celtic Frost's "Necromatical Screams" by the way).
Norse black metal pioneers Bathory are honored by some of Nordic black metal's finest bands, including Marduk (2 songs), Emperor, Ophthalamia, Gehennah, Dark Funeral (2 songs), Satyricon, and many more.
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
SORRY.
Awesome low price introduction to this new East Coast metal distributor / label. From primitive black metal to dark ambient, from Finland, Austria, Canada and the United States. Features: Abigor, Judas Iscariot, Baal, goatWAR, Darkness Enshroud, Ontario Blue,
We have VERY few of these, as in just 3 or 4, so we'll keep this brief. But holy cow, is this something else, a massive 88 page oversized soft cover coffee table book, accompanied by two cds containing unreleased recordings made at the Institute For Psychoacoustics And Electronic Music at Ghent University in Belgium, which is sort of like the Belgian equivalent to the GRM studios in France, or DIEM in Denmark. The book celebrates 50 years and includes tons of rare photos of the various instruments and their operators, as well as a pretty extensive study of the Institute's contribution to the development of electronic music, the text in both English and Dutch, the book alone would be worth the price of admission, but the cds too, featuring tons of amazing music, from some names we recognize, but loads we don't, and the sounds, wow! Insane to think how prescient some of these noisemakers and academics were, considering much of this sounds like it could be contemporary, there are wild cut up collages, whirring blurry soundscapes reminiscent of the Caretaker, woozy, warbling ambience a la Philip Jeck, lots of drones, and abstract Musique Concrete, tape music and more, all recorded between 1963 and 1999. Again, the book is incredible, the music too, dark and mysterious, haunting and wildly experimental, SUPER recommended for weird music obsessives, and fans of early electronic / tape music. There's a good chance we won't be able to get more, so order super quick if you want one of the few we have, and be prepared to wait a while for more to come in, assuming we can even get more at all once we run out...
If you're into heavy rock, psych and metal the way we are, then just one glance at the tracklist for this new compilation should sell you on it without much trouble. Yep, there's a bunch of the heavies here, for sure. Witchcraft! Witch! Pelican! High On Fire! The Fucking Champs! The Sword! and a dozen others. And quite a few of these 18 tracks are previously unreleased, over fifty percent in fact. So not a bad dealio indeed, rockers. This focuses on current indie darlings and more obscure upandcomers as well -- including several from right here in San Francisco -- so chances are you'll hear from a favorite band or two and probably get into something new too. Though the cover art (swiped from an old Metal Massacre comp) seemingly promises old school '80s metal action, that's not really what this is about. We wouldn't even classify a lot of these bands as "metal", really. There's just as much stoner psych and post rock and prog and Melvinsy dirge punk, but it IS all on the heavy side. As far as retro inspiration goes, it's the '70s and Sabbath that get the most nods. Faves? Among the Sabbathy, we already love Sweden's Witchcraft (who contribute a live version of "Queen Of Bees") and Witch (a track from their awesome album) but were also stoked to hear Portland's Danava for the first time, so spacey and rollicking. Of course Dungen's song is great (flute!) and you can't argue with Comets On Fire's blown out psych-noise either. Or with the metallic Yessisms of Diamond Nights. We also dug the unreleased cut by SF's hard rockin' Night After Night quite a bit. Heck it's hard to pick stuff out, there's a lot of cool tracks on here, from a bunch of bands we (mostly) love or soon will...
Ok, here's the fairly drool-worthy list of bands found here (asterisks indicate that they're contributing previous unreleased material): Saviours, Danava*, Big Business*, Black Mountain*, The Sword*, Dungen, Witch, The Fucking Champs*, Torche, Pelican, High On Fire, Witchcraft*, Comets On Fire*, Diamond Nights*, Wolfmother, Night After Night*, Warhammer 48K, Parchman Farm*.
Yet another entry in Relapse's Assault series, a cartographer's worst nightmare, mapping out the world according to sheer brutality, and vicious pummel. Instead of the smooth flowing lines of hills and valleys, there are the sharp crags of buzzing riffs and guttural growls. And instead of the smooth colorful shades of elevations, there is only the black of pure grinding evil. Past entries in this series have focused the Czech Republic, Holland, Brazil, Sweden and Poland, but it was only a matter of time before the scales tipped toward the land of the rising noise. Japan has an incredibly rich history of heavy music, from hard rock psych gods Flower Travellin' Band and Les Rallizes Denudes, to thrash metal legends S.O.B., to crustcore legends Gism to contemporary heavyweights like Boris and Corrupted. So of course there's gonna be a swirling pit of lesser knowns just waiting to crush skulls and kick ass with the big boys. So Relapse has hand picked their favorite four of those heavy hopefuls, and while we may not recognise any of these bands, they are pretty well known in Japan and in international underground crust circles. The first fourteen tracks come courtesy of Senseless Apocalypse, fastcore legends from Shizuoka, who spit out a venomous splatter of lightning fast grind and stuttering stop start dynamics. All the songs hover around the minute mark but are stuffed to the gills with buizzing riffs, pounding blast beats and more parts than most 4 minute songs. Muga are up next, but don't be fooled by the pretty acoustic guitar intro, as it soon devolves into crushing Neurosis style metallic fury, with soaring guitar melodies over sludgy riffs and a dual vocal attack (high and low). Next up are Realized, who tune their strings so low they're practically falling off their guitars, pouring out thick grunting death metal, with impossibly low grunted cookie monster vocals and blast beats buried under a suffocating layer of guitarrrgghhh. Finally, we have Swarrrm (yep, that's three r's) who take the grinding metal of the their Japanese Assault brethren and mix in some SST/Greg Ginn style guitar discordance, some Swedish style melody, and some bizarre almost ambient bass/vocal breakdowns. Maybe my favorite of the bunch. And just like with the other Assault comps, you'll more than likely find yourself wanting more by at least one of the bands, if not all of em!
A diverse spectrum of bands herein interpret the compositions of one of modern metal music's leading lights, the Danish singer, rock conceptualist, and Satanic philosopher King Diamond. Several Scandinavian black metallers who owe so much to the King (and his facepaint) such as Ancient and Dark Funeral participate, as do deathsters like In Aeteurnum, Usurper, and local boys Exhumed. 80's style power metallers Dentiny's End even make an appearance but aside from them KD's trademark multi-ocatave vocals generally get the black metal rasp or death grunt treatment. A fun collection but no match for the real thing.
Occasionally whilst reading AQ reviews (or elsewhere too of course), you may have run across a reference to something called the NWOBHM, a curious acronym that stands for "New Wave Of British Heavy Metal". Hopefully we explained what it meant! Or it was somewhat clear from context, describing the influences of such bands as Slough Feg, Early Man, or Circle at their most metal (who'd like be be called a "NWOFHM" band, actually...New Wave Of Finnish Heavy Metal, natch). The NWOBHM began around 1979, continuing into the early eighties, almost a reaction to and also a hybridization of both punk rock and '70s classic rock. Some famous NWOBHM acts include Iron Maiden, Def Leppard, Venom, Angel Witch, Saxon... a varied bunch to be sure. And without the NWOBHM, we'd never have had Metallica, and thus thrash, and thus death metal, and thus black metal, etc. etc.... well maybe. Anyway, in case you're, say, a fan of Pharaoh Overlord's 4 album (another "NWOFHM" release), or into grim black metal, but would like a little history lesson about the real old school stuff, this NWOBHM stuff, we've got just the thing. A three-cd set, imported from England, celebrating the NWOBHM in all its (mostly obscure) glory. 56 tracks from such bands as Trespass, Raven, Bitches Sin, Blitzkreig, Persian Risk, Satan, Heavy Pettin, Silverwing, Tygers Of Pan Tang, Holocaust, Ethel The Frog, Savage, Warfare, Jaguar, Vardis, Fist, Quartz, Cloven Hoof, Tyson Dog, Praying Mantis... the biggest names are probably Venom, Diamond Head, Angel Witch, and Samson. And believe it or not there are plenty of entries here from bands that we'd never even heard of before as well (Hellanbach, She, Avenger, Aragorn, Crucifixion, Xero, Horsepower...)!! A lot of these bands didn't have long careers, but still managed a killer single or two, which is why comps like this are treasure-troves, a NWOBHM 'best of' composed of some album tracks, 7" cuts (so many great ones on the Neat Records label) and tracks from back-in-the-day comps like New Electric Warriors (1980) and Metal For Muthas (1980). So for NWOBHM fans old and new, this is a nice collection of headbanging, party hardy METAL -- catchy riffs, wailing vox, guitars guitars guitars. Comes with a 12 page booklet full of record sleeve art and liner notes on each act, packaged in a box with the cds in cardboard sleeves.
A comp featuring exclusive tracks by AQ faves like Circle, Jesu, and Stinking Lizaveta, among others?! Heck we'd want one even if it was a tribute album to, say, Kid Rock or Limp Bizkit. (Actually those sound like they'd almost be interesting in a sick sort of way.) This IS a tribute album, it's on the tribute-o-centric Dwell label after all, but the subject is much more acceptable: '60s psych legend Syd Barrett. And though we love early Pink Floyd and solo Syd too, none of us here are quite obsessed enough to expertly critique this comp's covers of Syd Barrett tunes from that side of things... but doubtless if that's the sort of detail you want, you can find some Internet chat page all aflame with commentary on the ins and outs and ups and downs of these bands' take on the music of Syd Barrett, who was most 'correct', and all. What we can tell you is, to our ears, this is a damn cool comp!
While tributes are often quick-buck cash-ins full of no-name acts, this one's good for several reasons, excellent songs to start with, with an equally excellent selection of bands doing the tributizing, several big-time AQ faves among 'em as we said: Circle! Jesu! Stinking Lizaveta! Unearthly Trance! freakin' Pentagram!! The compilers seem to have asked bands that lurk at the swirling vortex of heaviness/psychedelia/metal/prog and persuaded some of the best to put on the paisley and do their best Syd impressions.
Here's the full lineup: Kosmos (featuring Away from Voivod), Kylesa, Intronaut, Stinking Lizaveta, Jarboe (from the Swans), Pentagram, Giant Squid, Yakuza, Jesu, Unearthly Trance, Dredg, Circle, and Zodiak. Some do their Syd HEAVY, whereas others lighten up their usual sound. Intronaut definitely display some pop talent, and Stinking Lizaveta, normally all-instrumental, surprise with an excellent vocal rendition of "Matilda Mother" - but at about 1:48 into the song their true Stinking Liz identity comes to the fore, as they turn on the searing, psychedelic guitar soloing and bass-heavy groove. Lumbering cuts from Kylesa ("Interstellar Overdrive") and Zodiak ("See Emily Play") are true to form. Amidst this lineup, Jarboe's track, a version of "Late Night" (also recently covered by Belong on their Colorloss LP) is a bit of left turn, as it's all about her whispery vocals (nice, NOT annoying as sometimes we find her) and not so much about guitar like so many of the others here.
Some other random observations regarding a few of these tracks: Ancient doom metallers Pentagram, the oddest entry only 'cause it's so hard to believe they really exist in this time and place, stick close to the original of "Flaming", Bobby Liebling singing in his weird old man voice, but with an affected British accent (or maybe it's just how he often sounds a bit like Ozzy anyway). Giant Squid do a Syd song called "Octopus", natch, and make us want to check 'em out as we sorta slept on their album. Yakuza's intense version of "Lucifer Sam" really makes us think of Voivod - except Voivod, known for their Floyd covers, never did this particular one. Speaking of Voivoid, who here gets "Astronomy Domine"? Dredg, with a sparkling rendition. Jesu brings loads of shoegazing slo-mo fuzz and echoing vocals to their take on "Chapter 24", just as you might expect. And Circle's version of "Rats" is -very- Circle sounding, in their sorta folky-mode (a la their Forest album) with Mika Ratto's acid-gobbling vocals not at all out of place.
So, listen for yourself, this is one of those rare tributes you could probably enjoy either as a fan of the bands on it (as many of you are) and/or as a fan of the subject of the tribute. We imagine a Floyd freak could wind up getting into some cool new music as a result of this comp, and likewise it'll probably turn on some Jesu fans, or whatever, to the wonders Syd Barrett's melodic, acid visions.
And it's a "legitimate" tribute, in the sense that Syd Barrett and his Pink Floyd colleagues really were one of the crucial '60s artists to pioneer and make possible the wide range of weird, spaced out music we all love today, of which the bands on this comp are all good examples.
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17 tracks from South American stoner rock bands, including Buffalo and Los Natas.
Lords Of Chaos, the definitive book on the whole Norwegian black metal scene, heavily focused on all that church burning, band mate murdering drama, that made an otherwise grim and cult a household dinner party topic, even amongst folks usually averse to metal and murder and mayhem.
This two disc companion seems the be more thematically linked to the book, featuring tracks by many of the bands, while more interestingly tracing a history of occult music from the blues to seventies prog to industrial, eighties metal to underground subversive soundtracks to the current crop of corpse painted black metal warriors. It's an awesome introduction for the black metal newbie for sure, featuring tracks from Bathory, Mayhem, Darkthrone, Emperor, Ulver, Thorns, Abruptum and of course Venom, the godfathers of black metal. But it's way more than that. The first disc especially is jam packed with haunting, mysterious, metal and occult classics. Aleister Crowley, recorded on wax cylinder, invoking Satan, Robert Johnson (he did make a deal with the devil after all!), an awesome creepy classic prog jam from Coven, of course Black Sabbath's "Black Sabbath", more amazing flute flecked prog from Black Widow, whose demonic elements seem to be more thematic, but a killer jam nonetheless, some creepy cinematic ambience from Manson Family member Bobby Beausoleil (whose remarkable Lucifer Rising 4lp box we reviewed recently), maybe the biggest surprise, an 11 minute chunk of electronic looped weirdness from someone called Mick J (we'll go out on a limb and say it's actually Mick Jagger!), that we listen to over and over, Venom's classic "Black Metal" (of course!), then Mercyful Fate, Sodom, Hellhammer, finallty some industrial stuff, Monte Cazazza, Genesis P-Orridge and Psychic TV, as well as some goofy organ music from the high priest himself, Anton LaVey.
The second disc is where you'll find all the black metal, but also a rare track from Italian horror metallers Death SS, and some other random evil occult weirdness from White Stains, Electric Hellfire Club and Peter H. Gilmore, acting high priest of the Church Of Satan. Killer stuff, super varied, and easy to enjoy even if you haven't read Lords Of Chaos. Comes with a massive book, featuring a brief history of occult rock, a bit about all the artists and performers, plenty of pix, as well as an introduction by Michael Moynihan, author of Lords Of Chaos. Definitely essential, even for someone who is well familiar with most of these artists, plays like the coolest 'evil occult' mix tape any one could ever make you.
These have been tough to get, so if we run out, please be patient while we order more from overseas, best to grab one now while you can...
First off, while B-Music/Finders Keepers have come up with some good puns before (Welsh Rare Beat ferinstance) we gotta give it up to 'em for the title to this comp. So we were already predisposed to like this, a collection of vintage heavy rock and rockin' bumblegum, all by manly bands from Manchester, England, if you haven't figured that part out yet. Also those are genres we're totally into, and besides when has a B-Music comp not delivered? Never! So this is quite recommended, 18 tracks (17 on the vinyl) by a bunch of obscure '70s Mancunian bands, most of which we'd never heard before. Rare singles and unissued demos full of fuzz guitars and sleazy horns and "hairy funk" and all that.
A person or band called Oscar starts things off, setting the mood with a stomping song about wanting a "Good Lovin' Woman", whom they'd also prefer to be good looking as well if possible. That brand of grunt continues throughout the disc, the heavier side of things represented by tracks by, among others, gritty blues bashers Stackwaddy. But it's a variety pack, ferinstance the delightfully named Greasy Bear gets a little bit country, sounding like Southern rockers on "Windy Day", while disco rears its head on the catchy "Come On In" by Sliped Disc, which somehow sorta turns into a ballad. Socrates throw down with some honkin' horns on the funkified "Johnny"; Plasma are fairly funky too, busting out with some seriously groovy instrumental prog. And freaky heavy psych is not neglected - J.C. Heavy deliver some driving, female-fronted (but still tough) proto-doom on the spookadelic, organ-laden "Is This Really Me?", which we remember well from another comp, and aQ faves The Way We Live (aka Tractor) offer up one of their classics, "King Dick II". Good stuff all around, packaged with the usual Finders Keepers informative care and colorful flair. We should list the other artists on here since some of the names are so great: Urbane Gorilla, Savoury Duck, Spider Jive, Sweet Chariot, Samsun, So On And So Forth, Grisby Dike, Young And Renshaw, & Chris Statham.
Back in September we got the first installment in what was meant to be a sort of tape of the month thing organized and recorded by two local guys, one who you all might know from his weirdo black metal band Amacoma (he also plays in Black Fiction and 3). It was a huge hit (we do have a few copies left if you missed it) and so they immediately got to work on the October installment. So we know what you're thinking, but it wasn't all our fault, just mostly. We got the October tape, right at the end of the month, but then stuff got crazy and we're only now getting around to reviewing it and it's December! But fuck it, just imagine that ten is a twelve and we'll be fine, it's just as cool and weird and varied as the first volume, with each dude taking a side of the tape, and this one like the first is essential for lovers of weirdo black metal as there's a brand new Amocoma track!
And it's a doozy, worth the price of admission alone. So buzzy and washed out, it's barely even black metal, it's more like some cavernous black ambient epic, the riffs more like throbbing pulses, the vocals hissy clouds of static, grim and fuzzed out, but because of the extreme blur and smear it's almost like black metal pop ambient. Here and there, the riffage does coalesce into extreme blackness, or splinters off into some spare clean guitar slither, but it always returns to the blossoming avalanche of black buzz.
There's a track by a band called Hash Hashish, that's a serious slab of gorgeous distorted dreampop, with some weird almost death metal vocals mixed in as well as some circusy keyboards and a dense wall of My Bloody Valentine blur. The 3 Leafs song is an awesome stretch of super spaced out druggy ambience, all whirling FX and disembodied voices, percussive thud and dark rumbling whir.
The flip side is packed with sonic weirdness, it's hard to differentiate which is which (ah, good old tapes!), but there are two tracks by Debre Damo, and two by Atom Eve, they all sort of blend into each other, but it's all awesome. Abstract electronic experimentation, bleeps and bloops, whirs and shimmers, very musiq concrete, woven into dense tripped out garagey space rock with thick guitars and pounding drums and of course lots and lots of FX. Weird alien guitar experiments are stretched out into crumbling glitchy ambience, it seems like maybe the names are just to keep it interesting as the whole side plays like a single piece.
As always, dying to hear more from all of these outfits, and keep listening to that Amocoma track over and over... ----* ----* Compilations : ----*
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Death to False Metal! say the ten bands contributing to this underground true metal compilation. As with any comp, there's some less-than-valuble tracks (like Iron Rainbow's cover of Iron Maiden's "Man On The Edge"--what were they thinking?!
Maiden wrote lots of songs worth covering, but that's not one of them!) but the traditional metal fan should get some mileage out of the rest of the disc, especially the cuts by Shine (new band of Wino from The Obsessed/St. Vitus), Deceased side-project October 31, Japan's Vanguard, and SF's own The Lord Weird Slough Feg. You'll also hear from Gothic Knights, Sorcerer, Twisted Tower Dire, Internal Void...
Looks like all the longhaired, unwashed, hesher-y heavy/psych/metal rockerz in the Mish got together to jam out, having a good ol' time, celebrating the scene - hell yes, we've still got a dirty underground hard partying heavy rock contingent in the neighborhood, ubiquitous Google busses and their techie riders be damned! This vinyl-only comp, limited to 500 copies, contains tracks by some bands aQ customers already know and love, plus others ripe for discovery. Not all cuts are exclusive, but many are. Bands include: Hot Lunch, Ovvl, Buffalo Tooth, Wild Eyes, Hazzard's Cure, Hightower, Lecherous Gaze, Solar Stoner, Hornss, Ironwitch, Chrome Eagle, White Barons, War Child, Tiger Honey Pot, and Winter Teeth. Lots of stonery, punked-out boss tunage here, which is what SF needs more of, rather than astronomical rents, parklets, trendy restaurants and brogrammers.
Rad cover art features naked witches and chopper-ridin' gorillas, with San Francisco landmarks Coit Tower and the Golden Gate Bridge worked into the background.
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Norway's most advanced "black metal" label has released a fairly amazing compilation here. Moonfog's incredibly elite roster contributes exclusive material: from the blackened thrash of Eibon (the supergroup containing members of Darkthrone, Mayhem, Necrophagia, Pantera/Viking Crown, and Satyricon making their recorded debut), to Dodheimsgard's mutation into the black metal techno of their new incarnation DHG, to the primitive country/punk black metal of legends Darkthrone (recorded at Necrohell Studios, otherwise known as their 4-track machine), to intense death/black brutality from Gehenna and Thorns, and more. 25 minutes on the cutting edge of Moonfog's vision. Absolutely essential to dedicated fans and adventurous newcomers (as well as the other way around), as this comp really runs the spectrum from classic raw stuff to sacrilegious trip-hop "black metal" 2000.
And, as a kind of bonus, you also get a second disc collecting popular cuts by Moonfog bands, compiled by users of The Moonfog Dungeon (i.e. website). They're all previously released tracks, so this can be regarded as a handy mix of some black metal faves.
We've given tribute albums a bit of stick in the past. After all, the things seem to be a dime a dozen, sometimes the result of genuine fannish enthusiasm but often just a commercially-motivated exploitative exercise. Yet, it's still hard not to be tempted by the concept, as long as the former rather than the latter motivation is in force. (In fact, our own Andee has plans for a tribute album of sorts on his tUMULt label: I'm Sorry And I Miss You, a black metal reimagining of Slint's Spiderland! So we can't bag on 'em all.) Hard to argue with a bunch of your favorite bands doing songs by another favorite, really. And those are obvious rules of what makes a good tribute: a worthy honoree (who has SONGS, not just a "sound"), and a roster of participants from whom you also want to hear. One good example, on this very list we highlight a highly enjoyable tribute to Syd Barrett that certainly obeyed all those rules.
The black metal realm has spawned a few tributes, the most worthwhile we can think of being the brilliant (and out of print) Darkthrone Holy Darkthrone. It certainly met those two basic tests of what would make a good tribute, featuring bands equally as famous and influential as Darkthrone themselves (which also made it that much more significant of a tribute, to see the likes of Emperor and Immortal bowing down to Darkthrone).
Likewise, in this case, Ulver is certainly a worthy subject. Early on, they were a true Norwegian black metal force to be reckoned with, whether in their acoustic folk mode or when doing their own tribute of sorts to Darkthrone, the brilliant Nattens Madrigal. Later, they morphed in many surprising ways, pretty much leaving the confines of black metal entirely but still somehow staying Ulver. In fact, if you put together an anthology of Ulver's "greatest hits" it would sound a bit like a various artists album itself, since their career has been so stylistically diverse, from grim black metal to experimental electronica... In some ways, it's cool to have this tribute just to provide a perspective on the wide range of Ulver's output. 'Cause one byproduct of a good tribute is to get you to go back and listen to the originals, maybe even giving some attention to songs you had previously overlooked. That said, we're also pleased to see that a chunk of the bands appearing on My Own Wolf chose to cover stuff from Nattens Madrigal...
The next question is, are the bands appearing here worthy? Well, we'll admit we haven't heard of rather many of them. It is a double cd, though, with a ton of tracks. And the ones we know, like Aidan Baker (Nadja) are all pretty interesting, kinda avant-garde metal bands that probably all really do look up to Ulver. Some play industrial-metal, others acoustic folk, everything in between and beyond, from trip-hop to psychedelia to dooooooooom, each finding at least one if not several aspects of Ulver's multifaceted career to worship, really. There's songs here from probably every Ulver release ever, including their demos! And these bands are from all over the place, a lot from Russia and France in particular, but also from Finland, Ukraine, Australia, Israel, Germany, Latvia, USA, Canada, Italy, Norway, Portugal, and Brazil!
Here's the lineup: Unfurl, Avathar, Mura Hachigu feat. Nokturnes, Smohalla, Asmodee, Selvmord, Sael, Otzephenevshiye, Wardaemonic, FB[Force], Karna, Fluoryne, Year Zero, Sinestesia, Pryapisme, Joey Hopkins Midget Factory, Aidan Baker, Panacea Enterpainment, project:a, Catapulus, Jaaportit, Wheel Of Knowledge, Zweizz, Bosque, Noises of Russia, and Ashtar.
While there's already one "official" tribute to Ulver of sorts (the remixes disc 1st Decade In The Machines) this one is perhaps more honest in its tributor-to-tributee relationships, i.e., no hipster cred required. It's certainly more "metal" but plenty of other things besides. Obviously, compared to some tributes, the lineup on My Own Wolf is drawn from far deeper underground. No A-list black metal acts here like on that Darkthrone tribute. But you have to imagine that any band interested in doing an Ulver cover is at the very least not an "ordinary" band. And, indeed, some of 'em here are pretty interesting, and we wouldn't have heard about 'em otherwise. You gotta hand it to Ulver: who else could inspire tribute from such a diverse selection of bands/genres?
Can't imagine a blackmetalhead who wouldn't consider this DVD absolutely essential. And it just might be enough to lure some unsuspecting innocents to the dark side as well. Videos from Absu, Immortal, Antaeus, Impaled Nazarene, Melechesh, Nortre Dame, Phazm, Arkhon Infaustus, Dark Tranquility, Gehennah, and a bunch more. As well as live sets from Angel Corpse, Immortal, Blasphemy, Inhume, Notre Dame and Sublime Cadaveric Decomposition. Pretty much everything on this disc is a blast, but definite highlights would have to be the two Immortal videos, the first, "Blashyrkh (Mighty Raven Dark)", features Abbath and Demonaz, in full corpsepaint and spikes, playing atop a mountain, above fjords and forests, with superimposed lightning storms, and occasional unintentionally hilarious mad dashes from peak to peak, while still rocking! The second video for "Grim And Frostbitten kingdom" has the band fully rocking out again, this time atop a glacier, again in full corpsepaint, except for fill in drummer Hellhammer, who is sans corpsepaint and wearing a frilly pirate shirt. The whole thing intercut with shots of Abbath singing through a sheet of ice. Wow. Then there's the totally over the top Notre Dame videos, especially "Scarecrows" which features the whole band strapped to wooden posts and singing from atop their perches, in the middle of a corn field. And howabout Impaled Nazarene's black metal "Smells Like Teen Spirit"-ish video for "Armageddon Death Squad." Woah. We could go on and on, but trust us, this is awesome! And for sure don't miss the bonus feature "At Home With Snowy Shaw", a goofy Cribs-like tour of Shaw's (from Notre Dame) horror movie memento stuffed house as well as a little acoustic sing along. So weird.
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There are a handful of compilations, so well thought out, so well put together, with just the perfect artists and the best songs, that function like an impossibly perfect record. If you could somehow imagine that said compilation was in fact, a record by some band it would be absolutely the greatest record ever. Never has that been more true than in the case of a couple of black metal comps from back in the nineties. One is the amazing Darkthrone tribute, Darkthrone Holy Darkthrone, an absolutely stellar comp featuring Satyricon, Enslaved, Marduk, Thorns, Emperor, Dodheimsgard, Gorgoroth. So it should come as no surprise that another 'perfect record' comp is this one right here, Nordic Metal: A Tribute To Euronymous. While we're still waiting for that Darkthrone comp to be reissued, it's no small consolation that this one has been resurrected, to demonstrate once again, that no matter how amazing bands are now and how far black metal has come, it really was never better than in 1995.
A tribute to Euronymous, the fallen leader of Mayhem, who was murdered by Count Grishnack aka Burzum, beginning the non-musical 'Lords Of Chaos' saga of Norwegian black metal that would become tabloid fodder for the next decade, this compilation was actually already in the works as a showcase for the Scandinavian bands of the time, but Euronymous ended up dying before he could release it on his own label Deathlike Silence. So it was completed by his allies at Necropolis Records (RIP) as a tribute to their fallen 'leader'.
Like that Darkthrone comp, a look at the bands should be enough to tell you that this is something special: Abruptum, Mayhem, Dissection, Emperor, Mysticum, Marduk, Thorns, Opthalamia, Enslaved, Mortiis and Arcturus. Basically every band that mattered, the bands that defined Nordic black metal. Plus these aren't just any tracks, these are almost all some of these bands' best tracks.
Abruptum's "De Profundis Mors Vas Cousumet" is still a tweaked and damaged BM classic, completely unhinged, with angelic female vocals, warbly pitch shifts, blackened blasts, and those vocals... the perfect way to start things off. Next up "The Freezing Moon" by Euronymous and Mayhem, frosty and grim, but melodic and catchy and an all time classic. The reverb drenched blasts sandwiched between gorgeously melancholy melodies. And then Disssection's "Where Dead Angels Lie", maybe one of the greatest black metal songs of all time, with a killer fucking hook and some of the most amazing guitar playing EVER. And it just goes on from there, most serious black metal fans will most likely have all of these tracks, but it's like the ultimate BM primer. If they taught a class in black metal, this would absolutely be essential listening. (And it was indeed studied intently by those of us who were working here at Aquarius back during our big black metal discovery phase in the mid-nineties, we have fond memories of this album!).
Other highlights include Thorns' "Aerie Descends", a lurching slow motion blackened trudge, with creepy circusy keyboards and weird whispered vocals, a very cabaret vibe mixed in with seriously grim blackness. Then there's a killer rehearsal version of Emperor's "Moon Over Kata-Shehr" which proves it wasn't the production or the recordings that made them so good, it's the songs. Epic and complex and fucking fantastic. There's some classic Enslaved, and even back then at their grimmest and most buzzy, they still demonstrated all sorts of prog tendencies.
Pretty much every track on here is essential. Even if you have most of these, it's like the ultimate classic black metal mixtape, and like we mentioned before, if you've been hesitant to explore black metal, this is probably the best possible place to start!
Considering that the Darkthrone tribute from a few years back was one of the best black metal records ever (compilation or otherwise) we had high hopes for this Mayhem tribute. It features all the big boys: Immortal, Dark Funeral, Absu, Gorgoroth,
Also the first few (for those of you quick on the mailorder draw) are the special limited version that comes with a fold out poster in an ultra-cheesy black vinyl pouch, intended, we suppose, to look 'leather' and 'tough' and 'scary' but instead only manages to look like the sort of fanny pack you'd find on some fat European metalhead passed out in a puddle of beer and piss at Castle Donnington.
Grind from the land of Poles, featuring Decapitated, Yattering, Lost Soul, and Dwole.
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
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Well, I suppose it had to happen. Or did it? And boy were we torn. On the one hand we really don't want to support this kind of thing. Electro versions of Iron Maiden songs?? But on the other hand, before even hearing it, we knew that we were gonna have to order a ton of 'em, and that we would ALL have to buy one. And as if to seal the deal, we threw it on the stereo the minute we got it, and within 15 seconds a customer was already at the counter telling us they NEEDED whatever we were playing. And our guess is that you're gonna need one too. I mean c'mon ELECTRO versions of IRON MAIDEN songs!! And the timing couldn't be more appropriate with the recent tragic passing of Anton Maiden, the original powerslave, who sang tunelessly over MIDI versions of Iron Maiden songs downloaded from his computer (which some of us liked even more than his singing...). And basically, this is just Anton Maiden with a way bigger budget. Which is a good thing. All those timeless riffs we love and adore played by fuzzed out analog synths and turned into buzzy alien melodies, the throbbing, unmistakable basslines of Steve Harris become burping squelches and rumbling pulses, and of course those dual lead guitar harmonies are transformed into wild squeaky squiggles. Does it work? Hard to say. It does sound great though. Funny and wild and fun and silly. We'd think they were taking the piss, but the liner notes take great pains to explain that the album 'was conceived with the greatest respect' and by having each artist pick their favorite Maiden song and album, often not the track they performed. There are a few familiar names here, Legowelt and Kitbuilders, but most of these artists are new to us (some other names: Captain Ahab, Rude 66, Maxx Klaxon, Ra-X, Imatran Voima, Luke Eargoggle...). The best track has to be Hidari / Platzgumer's Number Of The Beast, which starts so fucked up it's almost impossible to tell what song it is, and the drum programming is so fucked that the rhythm ends up being a damaged and stuttery mess of clicks and crunches. The vocals start out super vocoded and distorted, sounding quite alien / monsterlike, until the clean vocals kick in, and then the melody is sung weirdly, tuneless-y and strangely familiar a la Anton Maiden. Whatever reservations we had were definitely quelled once we heard this whole comp. How could they not be? And it's approved by original Maiden vocalist Paul Di'Anno himself. A fitting record of the week and for us, a fitting "moment of silence" for Anton Maiden. R.I.P.
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
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Another compilation (number four, duh) of fast and furious, pummelling fastcore/grindcore/metallic punk rock. Some bands you know: 324 (from their recent split with Corrupted), Ruido, Unruh, Damad, Lack Of Interest as well as a ton of bands you don't: Haymaker, I Found God, Overpowering, Self Inflicted, Progeria, Halo Epidemic, Dudman, Pretty Little Flower, Inspite, Hawgjaw, Low Threat Profile and lots more. If you like this kind of stuff, you probably gotta have this.
I don't have cable, so I don't know if the rumours are true that MTV (or MTV2?) brought the Headbanger's Ball back on the air. But if you have a DVD player you've got your own Headbangers Ball right here, and it's underground stuff that probably wouldn't get played on TV anyway. Relapse is one of the biggest and best metal labels in the country, and from their roster they've selected both new and long-time favorites to appear on this DVD video collection. From stoner metallers High On Fire (whose quite excellent video Andee does report having seen on MTV) to kinetic spazzcore heroes Dillinger Escape Plan, from the streetwise grind of Brutal Truth to the Nordic bombast of Amorphis, this ought to entertain any metal fan. Amidst the variety of metal styles and video budgets displayed here, we especially dug the rap-rock parody piss-take of grindcore outfit Blood Duster, the old-school macabre metal of Deceased, Unsane's classic skater-wipe-out video for "Sick", and Alchemist's industrial, psychedelicized channelling of Voivod. Other heavyweights also appearing: Neurosis (twice), Today Is The Day, Dead World, Benumb, Alabama Thunder Pussy, and Uphill Battle. ----* ----* In Stock, Not Yet Reviewed : ----* If you want to order one of these, just cut and paste the info into the comments area on the order form, or just email mailorder@aquariusrecords.org. A BAND "s/t" (QBICO) lp 23.00 ACID MOTHERS TEMPLE & THE MELTING PARAISO UFO "The Day Before The Sky Fell In America" (Galactic Zoo Disc / Eclipse Records) lp 14.98 AKIMBO "Elephantine" (Dopamine / Amalagate) cd 12,98 ANGANTYR "Kampen Fortsatter" (Total Holocaust) cd 14.98 ARCTOPCALYPSE NOW "Behold The Arctopus" (Epicene) 3" cd 5.98 ART BEARS "The Art Box" (Rer) 6cd 76.00 ART OF NOISE "Into Battle With The Art Of Noise / 20th Anniversary Edition" (Repertoire) 2cd 17.98 BERNE, TIM "The Sublime And." (Thirsty Ear) cd 16.98 CALLA "s/t" (Arena Rock) cd 12.98 CASH, JOHNNY "Cash Unearthed" (American) 5cd 79.00 CAVO "s/t" (Shit Jam Records) 3"cd 5.98 CHEESEBURGER "s/t" (Aerodrome Records) cd 5.98 CHICAGO UNDERGROUND TRIO "Slon" (Thrill Jockey) cd 15.98 CIRCLE TAKES THE SQUARE "As The Roots Undo" (Robotic Empire) cd 11.98 CONNORS, LOREN & ALAN LICHT "In France" (FBWL) cd 19.98 CORNELIUS "Five Point One" (Matador) dvd + cd 14.98 CRIME IN CHOIR "The Hoop" (Frenetic) cd 13.98 CROWPATH "Old Cuts And Blunt Knives" (Robotic Empire) cd 11.98 CURE, THE "Join The Dots: B-Sides And Rarities 1978>2001 The Fiction Years" (Fiction / Elektra / Rhino) 4cd 82.00 DJ SPOOKY "Rhythm Science" (Sub Rosa) cd 14.98 DMZ "s/t" (Sepia Tone) cd 12.98 END, THE "Within Dividia" (Relapse) cd 12.98 EXMAGMA "s/t & Goldball" (Daily Records) cd 21.00 FANTOMAS "Delerium Cordia" (Ipecac) cd 16.98 FIERY FURNACES, THE "Gallowsbird's Park" (Rough Trade) cd 15.98 FLASKET BRINNER "The Swedish Radio Recordings 1970-1975" (Mellotronen) 4cd 88.00 FLIES INSIDE THE SUN "Burning Glass" (Metonymic) cd 15.98 FURSAXA "Mandrake" (Eclipse) lp 14.98 GANG WIZARD "Jeckyll Loves Hyde" (Ecstatic Peace) lp 13.98 GERRARD, LISA / PATRICK CASSIDY "Immortal Memory" (4AD) cd 14.98 HUMAN TELEVISION "Orange" (Soft Abuse) cd ep 6.98 I.S.O. (Sound Tectonics) cd 22.00 IMAI, SAYAKA "Mahiru-no-yume" (Detector) cd 9.98 JEFFERSON, BLIND LEMON "Long Lonesome Blues: Lemon's Texts Revealed" (World Arbiter) cd 16.98 JOKERS "s/t" (Modern Music (PSF)) cd 21.00 KEITH, RODD "Ecstacy To Frenzy" (Tzadik) cd 16.98 KELIS "Tasty" (Star Trak) cd 16.98 KING OF BLUEGRASS : THE LIFE AND TIMES OF JIMMY MARTIN (Straight Six Films) dvd 23.00 KIRCHIN, BASIL "Abominable Dr. Phibes" (MGM) cd 16.98 KITCHEN CYNICS, THE "Parallel Dog Days" (Secret Eye) cd 12.98 LOVELY MIDGET "North Head" (Family Vineyard) cd 14.98 MOLINA, JASON "Pyramid Electric Co." (Secretly Canadian) lp+cd 13.98 MR. AIRPLANE MAN "C'mon DJ" (Sympathy For The Record Industry) cd 14.98 MY CAT IS AN ALIEN "The Rest Is Silence" (Eclipse) 2lp 17.98 NEGATIVE REACTION / RAMESSES (psycheDOOMelic) cd 13.98 NEUROSIS & JARBOE "s/t" (Neurot) cd 12.98 NEWSOM, JOANNA "Walnut Whales" cd-r 8.98 NEWSOM, JOANNA "Yarn And Glue" cd-r 5.98 NOTWIST, THE "Different Cars And Trains" (Domino) cd ep 10.98 NUMBERS "In My Mind All The Time" (Tigerbeat 6) cd 13.98 OLIVIA TREMOR CONTROL "Dusk At Cubist Castle" (Cloud Recordings) cd 14.98 ONEIDA "Secret Wars" (Jagjaguwar) cd 14.98 OPEN CITY "Birth Of Cruel" (Thin Wrist) lp/cd 14.98/14.98 OUR LADY OF THE HIGHWAY "About Leaving" (Fogsnob) cd 9.98 PALAST, GREG "Weapons Of Mass Instruction Live" (Alternative Tentacles) cd 14.98 PAPA M / CHRISTINA ROSENVINGE "Five" (Drag City) cd ep 5.98 PIXEL "Display" (Raster.Post) cd 16.98 QBERT, DJ "DJ Qbert's Complete Do-It Yourself Volume 2: Skratch Sessions" (Thud Rumble) dvd 26.00 RAKU SUGIFATTI "Futatsu" (Improvised Music From Japan) cd 24.00 REYNOLS "The Bolomo Mogal F Hits" cd 22.00 RUSSELL, ARTHUR "The World of Arthur Russell" (Soul Jazz) cd 19.98 SACHIKO M "Derive" (NAIM) cd 16.98 SAJIKI, TENJO "Den'Em Ni" (Swax) cd 38.00 SAJIKI, TENJO "Throw Away" (Swax) cd 34.00 SSIBILANCE "s/t" cd-r 9.98 SONIC FLOWER "Heavy Sonic & Flower Groove" (Leaf Hound) cd 13.98 SOUL POSITION "8 Million Stories" (Fatbeats) cd 16.98 STATISTICS "Leave Your Name" (Jade Tree) cd 14.98 STILLER, BEN "The Ben Stiller Show" 2cd 27.00 SWARM OF THE LOTUS "When White Becomes Black" (At A Loss) cd 12.98 TAPE "Milieu" (Hapna) cd 16.98 TETSUO "Ranshuo" (Shit Jam Records) cd 8.98 THE ONE "Guardian's Inhuman" (Total Holocaust) cd 14.98 THROBBING GRISTLE "TG+" (Mute) 10cd box set 142.00 TIRILL "A Dance With the Shadows" (The Wild Places) cd 15.98 UNIVERSITY OF ERRORS "Uglymusic.4.Monica" cd 12.98 UNPERSONS "III" (At A Loss) cd 12.98 UNSANE "Lambhouse" (Relapse) cd + dvd 14.98 UZ JSME DOMA "Rybi Tuk" (Indies) cd 14.98 VANDERSLICE, JOHN "Cellar Door" (Barsuk) cd 13.98 WALTER, WEASEL / KEVIN DRUMM / FRED LONBERG-HOLM "Eruption" (Grob) cd WEIRD WAR "If You Can't Beat 'Em, Bite 'Em" (Drag City) cd 14.98 YOSHIHIDE, OTOMO / PARK JE CHUN / MI YEON "Loose Community" (Improvised Music From Japan) cd 17.98 _______________________________________________________________________ ABOUT MAILORDER Please place your order via our website. [1] We will contact you to verify your order and let you know when it will be shipped. Please note that occasionally it may take a day or two for us to reply. We are not a faceless bunch of computers replying to your order -- we are human beings! [2] If we are out of some of your items and we think we will get them within the same week, we can wait to ship. Or... If it's going to be more than a few days to complete your order, we will ship what we have and then will contact you as the remainders arrive. [ note ] Due to the everchanging nature of the independent record business, we are not responsible for listed price changes (due to supplier price changes) and often cannot update our site fast enough to reflect these changes, but we will always try to let you know of any differences.
Covers comp, hailing the genius of British grindcore (grindgore?) masters, the late great Carcass. The more melodic, death n' roll of Carcass' last few albums (y'know, what the Champs sound like, when they're not doing the Thin Lizzy thing) is ignored in favor
Double cd covers comp in tribute to Andee's favorite rock band of all time, the mighty Aerosmith! The participating bands mostly hail from the realm of "stoner rock", such as Natas, Alabama Thunderpussy (who do a great "Sweet Emotion"), Atomic Bitchwax, Fireball Ministry, Drunk Horse, The Want, Core, Raging Slab, Altamont, and 18 more! As these tribute things go, a pretty good one. Furthermore, Andee sez: If this sounds even remotely appealing, you oughta order the Aerosmith cd "Draw The Line" too, which we also carry. It's probably one of the best 'rock' records ever. Aerosmith may suck now, but their first 5 records were '70s hard rock at its best; heavy and groovy and amazingly catchy. Their "Greatest Hits" were not their greatest hits. Trust me.
Road To Nowhere? No way, this road leads to stoner rock heaven. Hot shit badasses Fu Manchu, Nick Oliveri, Brant Bjork, Burning Brides, and The Dwarves share the joint (heh heh, pun intended!) with lesser known indie upstarts Big Truck, Winnebago Deal, Truck Fighters, Dig, The Sammies, In The Detail, Baby Woodrose, Leech, and locals Turn Me On Dead Man (unfortunately misspelled as "Dean Man" on the packaging -- guess spelling took a back seat to rawkin'). Oh yeah, and there's also a lil' band here called The Freeks whose lineup includes members of Kyuss, Monster Magnet, Nebula, Skin Yard and Earthless!
From the label that brought us the mind blowing blackmetalnoise of Enbilulugugal and the noise flecked Midwestern redneck black metal of Blood Cult comes a label sampler featuring a whole hellish mess of demented and damaged, fucked up and retarded, baffling and utterly brilliant metal mayhem. Rusty Axe and its stable of musical miscreants is not for the metal dabbler, or the true grim warrior, this shit is messed up, in the best possible way. Metal sure, but all drenched in goats blood, satan's semen, huge splattery gobs of noise and loads of what-the-fuck! Some of these bands are so fucked up they seem like they must be joking, others are deadly serious and are as heavy and buzzingly brutal as any black metal you've heard. Probably the most exciting band on here is Baphomets Horns, super fast and heavy grim black metal, furious and recorded so hot, it sounds like the band is spitting blood and flame right into your lap. On the other end of the spectrum are bands like Defecated Corpse, who sound a bit like Venom fronted by a lounge singer, but with loads of shredding lead guitar. They also cover the Benny Hill theme song. Yup, "Yakkety Sax". And then there's Satan's Almighty Penis, who do have a hilarious name, but their music is far from a joking matter, fucked up and furiously fast, another band that could go up against the Scandinavian elite for sure. The whole comp is pretty jam packed with the grimmest weirdest heaviest most fucked up black metal you've never heard from groups like Kill All Resistance, Wollfsschanze, Dark Energy, Sacrificial Blood, Mephistophelian, Demonic Mortuary, the brilliantly named FINISHER!, Tjolgtjar, Bethledeign, War Plague, Melkor, and loads more. We're already dying to hear full lengths from all of these bands! Fans of Benighted Leams, Rehtaf Ruo, Rigor Sardonicous, Emit, Furze, Detsorgsekalf, and all that sort of OUT black metal may have just found their new favorite label!
The world is full of massive metal labels, Century Media, Relapse, Metal Blade, each home to hundreds and hundreds of bands, lots of bands we love, but plenty we could certainly do without. There are way more tiny little metal labels doing their own thing, WAY below the commercial radar, each cultivating their own unique little scene, based on a combination of location, style, and in the case of Rusty Axe, a totally brilliant, massively fucked and utterly idiosyncratic DIY approach to metal music. Every little while, Rusty Axe release a super cheap label sampler and every time we are totally blown away by the sheer weirdness and genius of the bands they dig up.
This time around (volume 4!) there are way more familiar names than usual, but that in no way makes this comp any less appealing. In fact the known names will still seem pretty obscure to all but the most obsessive metalheads: The Wizar'd, Godless, Enbilulugugal, Black Vomit, V.A.C.K., Tjolgtjar, Marks Of The Masochist, and that's really about the only bands we know. Other until-now-unknown-to-us bands include Sermon Of Foulness, Trasher, Dead... Again, Sacrificial Blood, Talk Sick Earth, Esprit Derange, Brobdingnagian, Infinite Missiles, well we could go on and on, needless to say, for adventurous metalheads, this is the shit! Heavy on the black metal, but with plenty of doom and noise and fuzz and buzz and howl.
Highlights include: a new track from aQ faves Black Vomit, purveyors of True Sheffield Black Psychedelia, which hear means a plodding blown out wall of buzz, peppered with fucked up effects and creepy inhuman vox, so heavy and in the red, it manages to almost slip into shoegaze territory. Almost. Toil offer up some lo-fi blackness, rife with classic metal riffing, but some seriously fucked up howled vocals and some tangled confusional leads. The Wizar'd cover Witchfinder General, the drums stumble gloriously, the guitars SO buzzy and hot, the vocals like a karaoke Zeeb Parkes. Enbilulugugal don't disappoint (do they ever?) with some retro thrash, but rendered all scribbly and lo-fi with INSANE vocals that sound like a million pterodactyls. Infinite Missiles are all old school retro punky thrash, with killer riffing and shouted vocals. Gaiman offer up the 'short version' of their track, which clocks in at almost 8 minutes, a sluggish Burzumy trawl through sonic black swamps with some gurgling underwater vokills and a bit of Viking riffage here and there. V.A.C.K. offer up some maniacal basement black metal, furious drumming, buzzsaw riffs and howled hellish shrieks�Fuck, who are we kidding, all the tracks here rule, not all of them will have us running out to track everything down by the band, but in the context of this comp, they are all pretty darn near perfect, in their own totally fucked and fractured, demented and damaged way.
There are cult bands and then they are the TRUE KVLT bands. Few fit that bill better than San Francisco's Von. Von existed for a few years back in the late eighties / early nineties, recorded only two demos, and then split up and disappeared.
But that's just the sort of stuff that creates the cult, that turns a band into something more, that and an incredible collection of furious grim thrashing black metal madness. Fourteen songs, all fast and black, all quite similar sounding, almost like one long song chopped up into 2 minute movements, but like very few bands, there's just something special about Von, sure the sound, the production, the energy, but it has to be the songs too, since even played by other bands, those songs exude a strange black power, a grim malice and hellish energy that belies their simple composition.
Lots of folks have covered Von over the years, most recently SF's own Leviathan, on his split with fellow Bay Area black horde Crebain, but here we've got a whole disc of covers, most of them true to the spirit of Von, in that they are raw and primitive and buzzing, but each special in its own black way.
Very few bands here that we've actually heard of: Enbilulugugal, Black Vomit, Godless, Execrator, Beastcraft, Tjolgtjar, Raw Hatred and that's about it. Check out the names on some of the other bands: Blasphemophager, Unholy Crucifix, Godslaying Hellblast, Sermon Of Foulness, Nuclearhammer, Ceremonial Castings�
And they all sound just how you might think, carrying on in the grim tradition of Von, lo-fi, thrashing, black, brutal, buzzy, the rhythms fast and relentless, the riffing and drumming in a constant fury, the vocals in various shades of howl and gurgle, lots of the tracks peppered with wild squiggly leads, sometimes the sound is thick and caustic, a white noise blur, other times it's a tinny practice space recording, once in a while, like with Black Vomit, the song is transformed into something freaked out and damaged, but for the most part, this is one for the true, the grim, those of black heart and cursed soul.
Definitely for fans of Von (obviously), Beherit, Bone Awl, Akitsa, Ash Pool, Darkthrone and other practitioners of raw raw raw primitive black metal.
