Y'know, the Melvins have been one of our favorite bands for so long we practically take 'em for granted. But when a new album comes out, it's still pretty exciting. Almost like it must have been in the '60s when, like, a new Beatles LP would be released, that's what it's like for us and the Melvins... except heck the Melvins have been around now for, like, 100x as long as the Beatles' whole career lasted.
So, yes, yah, yay, it's a new Melvins! Again on Ipecac, which means it's yet another Melvins cd with the front cover on the back and the tracklist on the front. You think they'd be over that by now, but the Melvins are all about being quirky now aren't they? Well, being quirky and HEAVY. And we're pleased to report that Nude With Boots is plenty heavy! As expected, though with the Melvins you also have to expect the unexpected too. But from the get go, Nude With Boots hammers it down, maybe a bit more uptempo rockin' than typical, lead-off track "The Kicking Machine" being just that, ass kicking that is, a hooky slab of classic rockin' riffola. Replete with chunky guitars, catchy vocal choruses, and splattering percussion to spare. The next track up, "Billy Fish" is another big, bangin' number. And then when track three, "Dog Island" hits, though, it's CRUSHING. And you realize that the album's only getting started. That song's 7 and a half minutes of herky-jerky slo-mo heaviness, creeped out and melodically fist-waving too. Yep, this is shaping up to be a quite satisfying Melvins experience, one that so far stacks up with the likes of Houdini. No kidding.
How do they do it? The Melvins have such an *authoritative* sound. Heavier than thou for sure. Distinctively untouchable. It's like they have access to better stuff than anyone. Stuff? Dunno, gear, drugs, organic vegetables, whatever it is that makes them sound like they do, the Melvins are in a league unto themselves.
One not so secret weapon: Buzz's always amazing, melodic yet gritty vocals, which we realize sound like Gene Simmons crossed with Ozzy Osbourne. And, as well, his usual cryptic, imagistic lyrics.
Furthermore, there's simply so much geetar badassitude on this album, Buzz blasting riffs and sweet licks all over the place, and of course Dale's drum fills are sweet (and punishing) too. We defy you to try to listen to this album and not a) air-guitar b) air-drum or c) at the very least, headbang. Maybe even sing along! If you can figure out the words that is.
Of course, along with the rippin' rock, this also has its copious share of abstractly wacked weirdness, ambient interludes like the 1:05 "Flush" ferinstance. Or the atmospheric moody SUNNO))) styled murk of the cleverly titled "Dies Iraea". Or the bizarre bludgeon n' scrape of "The Savage Hippy" and the even more out there "It Tastes Better Than the Truth", a twofer in the extreme tradition of Melvins album-enders, the latter practically sounding like a chaotic Khanate on a ketamine bender. Or Wildildlife...
So, sometimes it almost sounds like this is a uber-produced Ozzy or Alice Cooper album from the '80s or '90s that's been taken over by the real inmates of one of the padded cell insane asylums that those two cartoon characters always were checking into/outof (on the album covers anyway, rehabs in real life), hard rock pop that's been utterly warped and weirded out...
Maybe it's just as well that Melvins never got as huge as pals Nirvana during the Grunge years. They had a major label dalliance, yes, but survived it, and are still with us to crank out what's simply the classic rock of our generation (with a heavy dose of weirdness). Nude With Boots makes you remember, oh yeah, ROCK MUSIC. We love rock music. Damn, it's good. We've been really into the rejuvenated Harvey Milk lately, a Melvinsy band for sure, but you've gotta give it up to the originals, the one and only Melvins. All hail.
Well, they're here. Melvins fans, giddyup. Seriously, what to say? The four classic early Melvins records newly reissued on these two double lp sets (why'd they do it like that? dunno) are all ESSENTIALS. Back on (remastered) vinyl for the first time in 15 years, they're too old to have much in the way of reviews from us previously, when originally released, so we figured we'd have to write new ones, and we could, heck we could go on and on about 'em. But really, most folks who are likely to buy these already know what they're all about, right? And if for some reason you are a fan of sheer heaviness, and buy records, and these AREN'T in your collection, then, well, all we can keep it simple and say YOU MUST BUY THESE!
Ozma, from 1989, is the one that first turned us on to the genius of this band. Nonsensical lyrics, Black Sabbath meets Black Flag heavosity like nothing heard before (yeah, Flipper, yeah Gore, sure but Melvins took it to another level). Dale's drumming, Buzz's vocals, sheer brilliance. Bullhead, from 1991, was maybe even better, and heavier, really, somehow. Among other great tracks, it's got the song "Boris", which inspired a certain band from Japan. 'Nuff said.
Includes download! Which has a bonus track!
Well, if you're a Melvins fan you know that not only do these weirdos still make awesome albums (their most recent, The Bride Screamed Murder, we raved about when it came out a year ago) but they also still utterly slay live. With, what, almost 30 years of experience, they are as potent as ever. We just saw 'em live the other day, on the first evening of a two-night stand here in SF, doin' songs from Houdini, Lysol, and Eggnog, and boy their current 2 drummer line up sure packs a wallop. And guitarist/vocalist Buzz still looks striking in his mumu and outlandish 'fro. The Melvins are a heavy band of world-historical stature and we expect 'em to keep on rocking for at least as long as their forebears KISS!
So, as fans, of course we're curious about this new live album, and expectations are met, performance-wise they're on top of their game. The real question surely any fan has, is just what songs get the Melvins/Big Business treatment, there's 13 tracks here mostly showcasing the best of their more recent material but also digging into their massive discography for a few old faves. The first five tracks are Big Biz era stuff, from 2008's Nude With Boots (this recording comes from that tour) and 2006's Senile Animal, then they reach waaay back for an epic rendition of "Eye Flys" from 1986 opus Gluey Porch Treatments, followed by "Tipping The Lion" from 1996's Stag (a good choice, just 'cause we hardly ever pull that one out to listen to, but this makes us want to), and then it's back to Senile Animal stuff, four in a row, before, wha? a voice and drums version of "The Star Spangled Banner", that's right. They were feeling patriotic, apparently. Or just wanted to fuck with people, more likely. Then, for the grand finale, they offer up an anthem of their own, a crushing, extended version of "Boris" from Bullhead (1991), which will remind you why the band Boris chose that name!
If you're a Melvins fan from way back, but haven't acquainted yrself with their modern double drummer incarnation, this should convince you it was a good idea, and that they've still got songs to compete impressively with past "hits", a few a which you get to hear here as well. And if you're not a Melvins fan, well obviously live albums like this aren't intended for you anyway, so why are you still reading this review?
Has it really been two whole years already since the last Melvins long player, the supremely rockin' Nude With Boots? They've been around so long and yet remain so vital and prolific and reliable, it always seems like they just put something out the other day, yet each release is a marvelous surprise. This is their third album since they recruited bass/drums duo Big Business into the band, and this phase of the Melvins' storied career has been a fruitful one.
The first minute or two of the first track "The Water Glass" starts off sounding very much typically thunderous heavier than thou Melvins... but woah, hey, it then takes a MAJOR turn into, what, a rhythmic marching band drumline thing (why not, they've got two drummers), with call and response vocal chant, the Melvins as cheerleaders or drill sergeants gettin' pumped up and ready to go. We're smiling like fools, and confused, what IS this? It's somehow like the MC5 or Dictators meet the Boredoms or go-go music or, we dunno, it'd be awesome and hilarious to see this live. Wow. All right, fair warning, this is clearly the Melvins getting weird on us, something of course they've have always had a knack for. Nude With Boots had its experimental moments, as all Melvins records do, more than moments sometimes, to varying degrees of accessibility, and this one ups the ante, coming closer in WTF?-ness to their recent radical remix album Chicken Scratch... and this time in ways that we don't think we've heard from them before.
All the while keeping it damn catchy, and HEAVY too, at least some of the time. Right on cue, track two again kicks out the jams in old school Melvins style... but a percussive breakdown isn't far away. Neither are cinematic keys, herky jerky prog parts (Ruins-esque, even, or Nomeansno-ish), quirky POP, frenzied metal, and plenty more random what the fuck weirdness, as warned. Such as a ploddingly odd, semi-abstract cover of "My Generation", ferinstance, or the lonely harmonica and hymn-like a cappella of the album's final track, "PG X 3" (and that's not even what's weird about that one). As always, they're part Kiss and The Cars, heavied up and punk rocked, and now we're realizing that Sparks just might be another big fave of theirs.
So, go along for the ride, trust us. And them. Ok, maybe "Hospital Up" is a bit of a throw-away (random improv scatter there). But otherwise, we're sold. And maybe it's the frequent vocal holler, echoing with chorus effect, or the double drummer bombastic battery, but this album sounds particularly triumphant. As well it should. One of the best bands ever, once again deliver the goods. And it can't be easy, after, what, 30 albums??? All we know is, THE MELVINS RULE. End of story.
A Melvins album without Dale Crover playing drums? What's next, is Buzz gonna get a normal haircut? Well, wait a sec, let's explain. On their latest, Tres Cabrones, Dale moves over to bass (no prob there, he plays guitar in Altamont, and played bass long long ago in Fecal Matter with a pre-Nirvana Kurt Cobain) letting one Mike Dillard take over the drum stool. Mike Dillard having such rights 'cuz he was in fact a founding member of the Melvins, leaving the band long before they ever made a name for themselves. Now (temporarily, we assume) he's back, and the band gets to hang out with their old buddy and pretend like it's 1983 again (that's why it sez "1983" on the back, or is it the front, speaking of which, why just one goat, shouldn't there be three?). But they're not playing old songs, at least, it doesn't sound like it. Sure, there's a bit of juvenile silliness (such as, a truncated cover of "99 Bottles Of Beer"!!) not that the Melvins don't always often include some silliness on all their records. But mainly it sounds like the usual solid Melvins music they've been making for decades, heavy and catchy and all that good Melvins stuff, topped with Buzz's distinctive vocals. They once again display their brilliant ability to meld off-the-wall weirdness with classic sounding, hard rockin' riffage, so there's plenty of new tunes here that any Melvins fan will be fully stoked on, whether it be the chugging slow-and-low creepy-crawl of something like "American Cow" or the distorto-glam stomp of a track like "Doctor Mule", among many highlights here. As "reunions" go, a total success!
What's next, we wonder? We guess when you've made sooo many albums (this is, like, their 22nd) to such a high standard of quality, you wanna keep things interesting and challenging and find ways to be different. Hence of late Los Melvins have seemingly been approaching each recording session as a stand-alone concept/project, what the all-covers disc that preceded this, and the Melvins "Lite" album that came before that (with Mr. Bungle's Trevor Dunn on bass), etc., etc. Heck whatever works for them, we're just happy they're still going and going strong.
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
SORRY.
Just got this in TODAY, no time to really "review" it, no need to either, as we only got a handful and it's limited edition vinyl from the MELVINS after all. Here's the facts: "A limited edition three-track 12-inch EP from MELVINS featuring a long version of "Dies Iraea" and a remix of "It Tastes Better Than The Truth" on the A-side, and a 9-minute version of The Wipers' "Youth of America" on the flip. None of these tracks have appeared on vinyl prior. Limited to 2,000 copies (with 1,500 for distribution) pressed on silver/gray vinyl, with artwork by Steven Parrino".
NOW ON VINYL!! What we said about this great Melvins album when it came out on cd last year on Ipecac:
Folks have been chomping at the bit for months since it was first announced that the kings of sludgy goofy heaviness were to team up with the master of creepy, sinister ambience. And we do mean 'team up' as in write and record together, not a split record or anything like that, a good ol' collaboration! So here it is. The first track is a creepy slithering dark snippet of sound, super minimal and slowly shifting. So much as we thought, the only way these two behemoths of the underground could cooperate and have it work would be for it to be a drone record. Well the second track blows that theory out of the water. A wickedly fierce, super dynamic barn burner, with a KILLER riff, and some spooky drone-y breakdowns complete with a haunting little melody played on the strings above the neck, and then some serious shredding leads. Maybe the best Melvins song in forever!! But what excatly is Lustmord doing while the Melvins rock? Maybe he strapped on a guitar and joined in the riffing. Or more likely, he supplied the track with all of its weird little sounds and murky background noises. Either way, who cares? It's an incredible track. The next track is a weird tribal workout done Melvins style, with exotic tribal percussion over rumbly drones and distorted guitars providing the melodies. Sounding not unlike a way heavier Muslimgauze! The centerpiece of the record though has to be the 20+ minute title track which sounds like the perfect hybridization of the two bands. Massive slow rolling drones slip and slide through clouds of machine like whirs and muffled outer space sounds, distant clatter and swirling sonic splatter. Eventually the guitars roll in like a huge crushing wave of sound, very Earth-like before it slowly develops into another killer riff, repeated over and over and over, bombarded on all sides by strange effects, swooping chunks of sound and strange, clipped 'almost-vocals' before trailing off into a slowly decaying barely there minimal hum. The rest of the record sort of seesaws back and forth between pounding and churning classic Melvins style sort-of-metal riffing, and really haunting otherworldly minimal dronescapes. VERY reminiscent of Old Man Gloom's drone / dirge combo. But hey, you can't argue with more drone or more dirge or more sludge or more Melvins or more Lustmord. Not at all. When all is said and done, Pigs Of The Roman Empire sounds like someone took a really great Melvins record, and a really great Lustmord record, and sort of chopped them up, and mixed and matched and made the perfect hybrid of the two. Which when you think about it is pretty awesome. We've thought of doing that all the time. Earth and George Winston, Bjork and Thuja, Squarepusher and Jandek, Motorhead and PJ Harvey, A Minor Forest and Keiji Haino (well that one's mainly to piss Andee off), and the list goes on and on and on.
If you were going to create a comic book that would appeal equally to fans of Harvey Pekar (American Splendor) and punk metallers the Melvins, Brian Walsby's Manchild would be it. It IS it. Autobiographical, confessional comix about his life, love, and music. Lots and lots of music. Much of this is devoted to stuff about indie/punk/HC/metal, back in the day... Especially for anyone of a certain age, with nostalgia for the '80s and '90s underground rock scene, this is a must! Walsby is a good artist, and writer, and in fact almost each and every panel found on these many, many pages (this is thick!) is packed with text you'll need to squint a bit to read, but it's worth it.
We haven't read the whole thing yet, but we can tell you that in this issue, there's a bunch of stories about bands he's been in (ferinstance Walsby played drums for Snake Nation, with CoC's Woody Weatherman and Mike Dean, and he was also in Shiny Beast, wow, we had no idea) and stuff about his life now, like how he met his current girlfriend, who has a toddler, what what that's been like.... He illustrates some other folks' tales about quitting their jobs, there's a two-page piece about Jason Newsted, all sorts of random, cool shit, usually pretty funny or weird or interesting, sometimes really something to think about.
In addition to the longer stories, there's plenty of one-page and half-page bits, good laughs like the one about reformed '80s hardcore bands, renamed: 700 Seconds, Middle Aged Threat, Adult Brigade, Youth Of Yesterday, Post-Adolescents, Semi-Negative Approach... Or the one about Jimi Hendrix in Heaven, getting pissed that he's required to "jam" with every other rockstar who dies and goes there after him (he's like, "I finally get Janis and Jerry off of my back... and then I have to play with this...'Dimebag Darrell'?").
The comic book would be worth it by itself, but sweetening the deal, this is shrinkwrapped with a LIVE MELVINS CD! Entitled Pick Your Battles, it's about 50 minutes long, presenting 15 tracks taken from two shows, Berkeley back in 1989 and Boston 2008. True Melvins fans want this, even if they don't like comic books, but why wouldn't you like comic books, especially this one?
It's a comic book! It's a Melvins cd! It's pretty darn cool is what it is. Cartoonist Brian Walsby spoofs and skewers various icons of old school punk/alt rock culture, and puts his own personal family history on the page too ("My Old Man!"). It's mostly subversively funny, sarcastic stuff. Lots of chuckles for those with a bit of nostalgia for the good ol' days of '80s punk rock for sure!! One of our favorite comix in here is "Whatever Happened To You Favorite Eighties Hardcore Mascots" which imagines the DRI "thrash guy" finding a new career as a school crossing guard, and the Black Flag bars being sold to Hank Williams III who "dropped one bar and used the rest for his new logo." Some of the other pieces in this fairly thick book include an illustrated article celebrating TV's SCTV, a Walsby/Melvins 2006 tour diary, a memoir entitled "How I Survived Grunge", "The Rules Of Young Rock Bands" (which include holding the microphone like a glass of wine, and combining two kinds of bad singing: whiny, nasal and hysterical screaming), several comic strips about The Dios (a la The Osbournes), a tribute to Cheap Trick, and much much more. If you like stuff like Peter Bagge's Hate or Chunklet magazine this is for you.
This book makes a perfect team up with Walsby's old pals, wise ass scene vets the Melvins, who contribute a 20+ minute cd to the package, entitled "The Making Love Demos". These eight songs are DIY four-track recordings from back in '87, from the Buzz/Dale/Matt lineup, several of which later wound up in re-recorded form on their classic Ozma album, and some you've never ever heard before. Wow. Melvins fans are gonna be stoked. Heavy grinding nastiness, perfectly filthily home-recorded, that's way more punk than grunge.
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
SORRY.
Boy, did we get lucky. We heard about this and at first wrongly assumed it was Mike Patton with the Melvins. And as much as we love Mike Patton, we were pretty tickled to discover that in was in fact, Patton Oswalt, one of our favorite comedians, sharing this split with the Melvins.
The thing is, this was never technically available to stores or distros. But we did manage to track a handful down for our AQ faithful. Unfortunately, because of the scarcity and the fact that technically they weren't available wholesale, the price ended up being a bit steep. But hey, $16 from us is is a whole heckuva lot better than $75 on eBay!
So act fast, these will disappear in a blink of an eye.
As with all Chunklet stuff, gorgeously packaged with killer (and hilarious) Jay Ryan cover art, screen printed onto thick cardstock sleeves.
And like with all ultra limited stuff, only one per customer please...
Melvins LITE? What? That makes no sense. We want our Melvins HEAVY.
Well don't worry, 'cause the godlike Melvins, despite their many many years and many many albums, never ever disappoint (unless perhaps deliberately, as with 'difficult' stuff like Prick and Colossus Of Destiny). So of course Freak Puke is heavy. 'Tis their usual (unusual) blend of rockin' heaviness and utter weirdness. They're just calling themselves Melvins Lite on this record because it's a trio this time, with Buzz Osbourne and Dale Crover joined by bassist extraordinare Trevor Dunn (Mr. Bungle, Fantomas, etc.), rather than being the four-piece unit that has constituted the Melvins as of late. However, their dual-drummer lineup, with Buzz and Dale and the two dudes from Big Business, is just on hiatus. Apparently Buzz and Dale thought it would be interesting to pull a temporary lineup switcheroo and record with their old pal Trevor, who plays a stand-up bass and thus brings in some 20th century avant-garde string-scrabble elements to the lurching, lumbering mix, particularly on track 2, "Inner Ear Rupture". Elsewhere, ingredients include gloom-doom atmospheres, mathrock dynamics, druggy grunge, AND uptempo noise pop catchiness, as you'd expect from these guys. Plus all the UNexpected stuff you'd also expect. With Trevor's upright bass getting in its licks all right.
Opener "Mr. Rip Off" has an oddly spaced out, loose '60s/'70s Floydian psych feel (in a way), with dreamy droney vox and distorted guitar. That vibe recurs, among plenty of 'Melvinsy' twists and turns throughout the disc. Oh, and they do a cover of "Let Me Roll It" by Paul McCartney and Wings!
For fans of any of these folks (possibly including Paul McCartney), Freak Puke by 'Melvins Lite' is an interesting detour / change of pace that's not so different, really.
Latest (third, I think) release by this Swedish band who are heavily influenced by the dark, epic, doom metal of countrymen Candlemass, circa '88. The chugging riffs, melancholic lead guitar, and the lamentation of their singer (whose soaring and sad wails are not quite as over the top as those of former Candlemass vocalist Messiah Marcolin, but close) all fit that doom blueprint, and will meet acceptance from fans of Solitude Aeturnus, Memento Mori, and the like as well.
While we've definitely dug the last few records from Canadian blackened neo-folk duo Menace Ruine, we were initially a bit confused by their shift from grim, psychedelic, experimental black metal, to their newly minted neo-folk incarnation, and while much of the mood and musical ambience remained, some of us still longed for the group's previous incarnation. But over the course of the next two records, we grew to dig their witchy, mystical sound, one that shared seemingly everything but sound with the black metal that birthed them, sinister and haunting, abject and ritualistic, it's no surprise that they continue to be embraced by the BM scene, even though they had essentially ceased playing black metal long ago. But on Alight In Ashes, their blackened strain of neo-folk has definitely drifted even closer to the great black abyss, the sound already grim, but here even more cloaked in shadow, the soaring dramatic vocal incantations, the perfect foil for the roiling blurred riffage and muted power electronics that churn underneath. In fact, the music sounds like slow motion black metal, blurred into sinister swells of smeared riffage and buried rhythms, it makes for a fantastic combo, when coupled with the vocals, which we've seen compared to Nico, but we still hear Jex Thoth or Blood Ceremony or Christian Mistress, and in places, the vocals sound remarkably like a female Mike Scalzi from Slough Feg. The vibe throughout, much like the record before it, continues to be haunting and harrowing, very much like these are in fact mysterious rituals, and arcane incantations, the music often building to dense, near psychedelic crescendos, or slipping into hushed mesmer, the opening track might be the most black metal thing we've heard from Menace Ruine since they shed their black buzz, a sprawling, dynamic expanse of murky metallic churn and smeared shadowy psychedelic shimmer. Elsewhere, the sound shifts to something much more medieval, that ancient music simulated by electronic buzz and minimal percussion, or the music groans and heaves, like a symphony of moaning strings, even sans vocals, the music here would be some fascinating collection of blackened electronic ragas, but with the vocals, the sound is transformed into some sort of divine doom-ed blackened medieval folk, and we find ourselves no longer missing the black buzz one bit.
What to make of a black metal band that has releases on both the Alien8 (Nadja, Merzbow, Acid Mothers Temple) and Tour De Garde (Ash Pool, Marblebog, Tomb Of..., Uno Actu) labels? That they're probably pretty weird? They are. And intense too. This is some sick stuff. Also beautiful, if you, like us, have fallen under the spell of this most extreme aesthetic, if you're someone whose eyes/imagination can scan the soot-blackend skies of an apocalyptic otherworld, and still spy flights of swans and stars beyond.
Menace Ruine, from the "frozen north" of Quebec, are the mysterious male/female duo of S. de La Moth and Genevieve. This James Plotkin-mastered Alien8 release is their debut album, after one demo (being reissued as a cassette on Tour De Garde). MR's original black metal art really made an immediate impression upon us despite how easily jaded we can be with the glut of black metal out there. It's the unholy layering of sometimes melodic feedback-sculpted ambient drone howl, with machine gun blasting... long stretches of atmospheric synth heavily infiltrated with sheer noise and distortion, scattered further with clanging industrial raw rhythms. There's almost 20th c. avant-garde moments of majesty, like some Romanian electronic composer gone insane in his or her sound laboratory, and others that with the occasional female vox bring to mind Wolves In The Throne Room wandering in another dimension. Or simply blaze with the burning black metal fires of not mere churches but whole civilizations.
For Alien8's first foray into the troo cvlt world of black metal, they couldn't have done much better, with a release that's indeed (oc)cult and true but also experimental, and not something that we've heard already a thousand times before, a rarity indeed! Fiercely recommended.
We reviewed the debut cd from this boy / girl black metal duo from Canada, a few lists back, released on the not typically black metal label Alien8, and gushed appropriately about its gorgeous drone drenched minimalist black buzz. We mentioned then that they also had a release on Tour De Garde, the label run by the guys in Akitsa, and we've now finally managed to track down a bunch of copies of that first tape.
If anything, this one is more metal (but in parts just as experimental), less minimal, with a sound much more intense, drums and vocals the focal point. The sound less blissed out and atmospheric. It's a strange sound, one that changed pretty dramatically for their next record, but we ended up digging this as much as the Alien8 release.
It's both the drums and the production that make this record so intense, the sound is super hot, the recording vivid and loud without being blown out, and the drums, programmed we assume, are furious and LOUD and pretty much drive all the action. Way up in the mix, pounding relentlessly, peppered with flurries of double kick and blasting fills, the guitar alternately unfurling clouds of harmonics, or grinding riff for riff right alongside the drums, turning the metal into something more looped sounding and trancelike, eventually exploding into a weird processed dronescape, all glitchy buzz, and streaks of hiss, whirring electronics, and bits of crumbling distortion, drums still there, buried now underneath this churning slab of fuzz and buzz and blur, until those drums lurch up of the murk, and the guitars lock back into a strange static riff, the rhythm more sparse, with dark throaty female vocals, suddenly the sound is some black gothic doom, still the guitars grind and soar, chunks of jagged melody are hurled back and forth, the sound is just so good, so intense, and so strange. This is so unlike any other black metal we've heard. Listening to this tape has us wanting to go back to the Alien8 disc and dig deeper into that one too.
Later on, the band dabble in huge trudging black doom, the guitars so processed and blown out, they emanate a warm fuzzy aura, the programmed drums monstrous and pummeling, making the rhythms sound almost like dance music at times, while sounding like a less lo-fi Nadja at others. Distant howled vocals, throbbing distorted low end. This shit is just so crushingly heavy but not at all in the way we're used to. Hard to describe. But we've listened to this tape about 4 times in a row now, and have no plans to stop�
Packaged in beautiful textured paper sleeves, some blue, some red.
For their sophomore full length, Canada's Menace Ruine return not exactly as the heavy noise inspired black metal band you know and love, but as a neo-folk, noise-rock powerhouse. You may be wondering like us: did we miss something? And what exactly is the link? Well, maybe it's the misanthropic, anti-humanist ethos shared by both neo-folk and black metal artists that somehow ties them together. Or maybe it's the fascination with all things medieval. Or maybe it's the general brooding and ever-present sense of darkness. Could it be written off as a shared love of sonic tension? Wait, wait ... there is a difference between them somewhere, right? As the label astutely points out, in the wake of both Leviathan and Nachtmystium covering Death in June, this sort of explicit crossover makes tons of sense. And really, it might be a tad reductive to simply say that this sounds like a black metal band that wrote songs for Der Blutharsch, but it's not too far off the mark. Menace Ruine probably couldn't escape their uber-noise tendencies even if they wanted to, but other than that, the comparison essentially holds true. It is also worth noting that the label mentions an upcoming Merzbow collaboration. Woah! Man, you know a record is good when it isn't simply good, but it leaves your head spinning trying to figure out what just fucking happened, and if you've read this far then you've seen all our questions. This is what you'd hear if Moss, The Dead C, and Douglas P were caught in the middle of some bizarre, church burning audial orgy. Potential fans of something that could convolutedly be described as tortured, grim, militaristic folk-noise will absolutely want this. And if that doesn't scream recommended, then we're not really sure what the hell does.
Not quite black metal, though doubtless Menace Ruine would happily bask in the smoldering embers of a charred church somewheres up north. Not exactly militaristic neo-folk either. Nor are they a noise band. Well, maybe noise. But that's only part of it. Their dark, distorted drone textures are also often adorned with witchy female vocals, a la Jex Thoth. So, three albums in, this Quebec girl-boy duo of Genevive and S. de la Moth are still quite hard to define, though we know we like 'em, and the Menace Ruine music they make (indeed a mix of noise, drone, folk, and black metal moves) is grim as well as sometimes quite gorgeous, that is if you're like us and can find the beauty in ten-minute long tracks of misanthropic sonic miasma. Perhaps it's the way the ceremonial lamentation of Genevive's gentle singing merges with the slowly churning electronic extremes of intense, dense distortion and feedback... Certainly this new release via Aurora Borealis (following previous efforts on Alien8 and Tour De Garde) is a fine continuation of their unique post-black metal noise-folk aesthetic. If you liked The Die Is Cast that came before this, you'll probably like this too. And fans of bands as diverse as Burial Hex, Dead Raven Choir, Velvet Cacoon, Current 93, Wolf Eyes, and Alcest, among others, ought to check out Menace Ruine if you haven't already.
We've reviewed a few records by ultra heavy metallic math rock duo Reflector, so we were curious to hear Mental Terror, the grindcore side project of 1/2 of that band, and while we were expecting something super heavy, dense and ultra metallic, instead, it's super fucked up, ultra lo-fi, wildly chaotic, and totally damaged, sounding more like Mick Barr crossed with Faxed Head, stumbling, dizzying blasts of unhinged heaviness, that seem to be crumbling into something akin to a metal Shaggs, the vocals a wild, hysterical shriek evolving into a demonic howl, the songs super tangly and proggy, but loose and on the verge of collapse, totally what the fuck outsider grind, that is leaps and bounds better and weirder than we expected. It's seven songs on one side, so it's short, but so brain meltingly sweet, pushing all our demented music buttons, not even metal or grind enough to only appeal to those folks, in fact, it's so fucked up, metalheads might be severely bummed, instead, this is way more recommended for anyone into damaged weirdness and ultra confusional avant grade heaviness, which is probably most anybody who digs stuff on the Rock Is Hell label. Fucking GREAT!!
Pressed on transparent green vinyl, one sided with a cool silkscreen on the other, visible through the vinyl, LIMITED TO 150 COPIES!!!
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German stoner/doom, ex-Shepherd.
Another 7" slab of New Wave Of Finnish Heavy Metal weirdness from our pals in Circle. We're pretty sure it's them, it must be, that's Jussi on the cover with his hair in his face, posing in front of a dilapidated barn, and it sounds just like all the other NWOFHM acts they've invented that we so enjoy, like Steel Mammoth and Krypt Axeripper and Tractor Pulling and Motorspandex! And also quite a bit like Circle's own Katapult album come to think of it.
Bright burbling yet somehow metallic guitar riffage churns forth, amidst a warm swarm of distortion and synthy sounding FX. It's a lofi, catchy quasi-metal pop music, head bobbing if not banging, perfect for the rasping vocals crooning cryptic stoner hippie/hessian poetry: "One way road / down from the hills / straight to the cave of skulls / computer of yesterday" Huh? Or: "Stay with the rainbow / eat the dreams / burn the talent / fight the spirit / listen to soul". Brilliant.
And although this isn't black metal by a long shot, despite its Scandinavian origins, they did come up with one of the truly grimmest song titles ever: "We're Getting Old"! There's four songs here, 2 per side, the other titles being "Let's Eat Fire", "Agitation Evil", and "Kingdom Together".
Wonder if this band will someday do a full-length or if, as with most of their NWOFHM comrades, one 7" is all we get. Based on this, we'd be happy to hear more. Or, just more from the next new "band" these guys come up with!
Some of us were lucky enough to go to the Stella Natura festival recently, and one of the bands we were most excited to see was Hell. Longtime readers of the aQ list no doubt remember reading reviews of the first two Hell lps, both oozing blackened ultra-doom, and live, they were awesome, especially the drummer's backwards-pig vocals, but then a strange thing happened, a Hell related band ended up stealing the show. This band in fact, Merkstave, who take the already depressive doom of Hell, even further into the ether, self described ' cosmic funerary drone', Merkstave deliver three epic cosmic crawls on this, their debut lp, which finds the band reworking some tracks from earlier and impossible to find demos. And their sound on record, like live, is stunning, achingly mournful, the first few minutes of the two part nearly 30 minute epic "Lament For Lost Gods", is a woozy sprawl of slowcore creep, lots of space, the notes suspended in air, the drums minimal, the whole sound delicate and tenebrous, even when the heaviness kicks in, somehow the sound remains spare and spaced out, the guitars distorted and crumbly, brittle and blackened, the vocals, a monstrous bellow, the notes ringing out, the sound at times almost choral, especially when the clean vocals join the grim vokills, reminding us a bit of Bell Witch, the same sort of heaviness meets slowcore beauty. Although Merkstave's sound is by far more grim and abstract, depressive and harrowingly haunting. Then suddenly, about 10 minutes in, the song explodes into full on black metal blast and buzz, the vocals transformed into a super dramatic shriek, the sound blurred and blackened, a smeary expanse of furious churning heaviness, before slowing down again and slipping into some tarpit ultra doooooom sludge, the vokills shrieked, the drums flitting from caveman plod, to weird motorik pound. The second movement/part opens up with more clean guitars, draped over simple rhythmic drum pound, the vibe her more trad doom, super melodic, epic and majestic, before transforming again into a churning, chugging classic metal workout, replete with pinch harmonics, and some seriously murky riffage. The final track is a dense sprawl of crumbling doom / sludge that oozes ominously, and is laced with some soaring melodic guitars, the sound almost psychedelic, with the occasional clean part, super melodic interludes interspersed between the downtuned doomic bombast, and then finally, a haunting piano outro. The cool thing about Merkstave is the sound versus the sound, as in they've crafted this majestic, uber epic ultra doom, but the recording is really raw and low fidelity, the guitars brittle, it's an idiosyncratic heaviness that perfectly suits the bands strange sonic brew.
As with all Pesanta Urfolk releases, the packaging is stellar, heavy vinyl, full color heavy sleeves, the whole record mastered, produced and recorded completely analog. And who knows, probably pretty limited too...
The list can get a bit frustrating, in more ways than one, but we're constantly frustrated by too many records and not enough time, which means inevitably, some badass band that we love somehow never makes it onto the list. It happened with noiserock mice-fits White Mice finally reviewed elsewhere on this list, and it happened with French black metallers Merrimack, who are on full length number three, and who are only now making it onto the list for the first time. What can we say, we do our best, and as far as Merrimack is concerned, they rule, you should definitely buy this new one, and if you dig it as much as we think you will, you should buy the other two as well.
Why you ask? Cuz there's just something about French black metal. Something special, a definite vibe, a certain sound, although Grey Rigorism sounds very modern, and very Scandinavian, which is not a bad thing at all, but don't be expecting insane gnarled blackened weirdness or fucked up freaked out damaged black metal, Merrimack are super tight, their songs are dense and grim, slipping easily from midtempo pound, to furious blast, to almost industrial sounding stop start lurch, these guys would definitely have been right at home on Moonfog, along with Khold and Satyricon and other super slick sounding buzzing black hordes.
There are some strange moments here for sure, a couple tracks where the band lock into some doomy dirge while some mysterious French sample plays over the top, and the lengthy closing track, a multi parted epic that finds the band slipping from frantic blast to loping post rock to slow lumbering doom, there's some strange female spoken word part too laced amidst the howling vokills, but for the most part, Grey Rigorism is some super tight, well produced black buzzing grimness, and we dig it.
Features members of other elite French BM hordes Ancestral Fog, Corpus Christii, Glorior Belli and Morte Incandescente, and killer artwork by Seldon Hunt...
One truism gleaned from any given Cormac McCarthy novel is that the desert is a good place to dump a body. The lore about the desert outside of Las Vegas makes the claim for shallow graves dotting the landscape as the handiwork of mobsters and psychos. There's probably some truth to that; but at the same time, the land also holds a sacred beauty to many of the citizens who live in such environments and respect that land not only for the desert beauty bloom but also the simple fact that the desert can kill you and swallow you up without much of trace left behind. William Fowler Collins and Raven Chacon make their homes in New Mexico; and they draw heavily on the atmospheres, ghosts, and general vibes of the desert for their Mesa Ritual collaboration. Collins is a character who we've championed over the years for his hauntingly morose drone-works; and Chacon - a member of the Dine' nation - has performed in various guises over the years, including the brutalist black noise project Kilt. Every track minus one, produced for Aaron Turner's Sige Records, is a numbered "Procession", alluding to an animistic, ritualized vision quest for Mesa Ritual, with their accompanying soundtrack building from crunched low-end drones and rumbled tones that are conjoined to rhythms of amplified heart beats and drum-skins. While these low-frequency structures are similar to those of Thomas Koner, there's an oppressive tension which underlies the work of Mesa Ritual, highlighted through the albums finale that roars to a conclusion with a thunderous blast of infernal distortion. This is a very dark record, even in comparison to the shadowy productions that Collins has offered forth previously; and it's a very effective one at that! Limited to 230 copies or thereabouts.
Cyberetic sci-fi Swedish metallers return with this long-awaited full-length, which combines the most brutal vocals and heavy, twisted grooves with some totally off-the wall sounds, particularly in the sometimes almost jazz-fusion guitar department. Some song titles: "New Millenium Cyanide Christ", "The Exquisite Machinery of Torture"...the latter possibly a good description of this band.
If I was in a technical death metal band, or a technical band of any sort, I think I would absolutely shit my pants every time Meshuggah released a new record. Or played live. Or even walked by me on the street. These guys are so good. And so heavy. It's really scary. Ultra precise riffing, drumming that makes the rest of us drummers wither up and run home to practice, shredding leads that sound like a quadruple neck guitar played by a four armed guitarist, and song structures that require a degree in calculus to unravel. So what do you do when you have out-tech'ed every band in the world? Well, you write a 20 minute song, that is so complex and technical, it's like the death metal version of 40 Agoraphobic Nosebleed songs strung together. But it's not just technical for technical's sake. No, this is definitely a song, granted a long song, with melodies and hooks, and catchy bits. They just all happen to be draped perilously over the churning jagged musical machinery of these Swedish shredders. So fucking good.
If you are already a fan of Meshuggah (and why wouldn't you be) then the main question you probably have with their long awaited new record would be, how could they ever top Chaosphere. Well, the answer is simple. They couldn't. Or can't. This is nowhere as good as Chaosphere. But that said, Nothing is a wicked slice of hyper-technical /extremely fucked / rhythmically confusing death metal. Not sure if their recent stint on the Ozzfest and their favor with Jack Osbourne is the cause for the occasional nu-metalisms, but those minor hiccups are only a slight distraction from how fucking unbelievably INSANE this band is. This record is way more midtempo than Chaosphere but there's still plenty of 5/4 and 7/8 and 9/16 to keep all the tech geeks wetting their pants, and totally impossible guitar shredding from axeman Frederik Thornendal to keep the guitar geeks slack-jawed and just enough bounce to keep the nu-metal pit hopping and hopefully, for once, to see a -good- band get some MTV time and some MTV dough. If you aren't already a fan, get Chaosphere and have the way you listen to heavy music changed forever.
Collection of odds and ends from these Swedish masters of super-technical death metal. If you've never heard Meshuggah, start with their 'Chaosphere' masterpiece. But if you're already a fan, then this might be of interest. The original 3 song mini lp (originally released in a pressing of 1000 copies) appears for the first time on cd, as does their demos (which vary in quality).
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Found a few of these lurking in our closet that we'd never listed!!! It's part one in a five-part cd-r series, here's what we said about the only one we did list, part 4, that pretty much goes for this one too:
There's something strangely addictive about the skull crushing, mind numbing effects of harsh, droning nooooise. And while avant-noisemakers Skullflower and Hototogisu are perfect examples of some folks who do it best, Metal Rouge is quickly establishing themselves as likely contenders for the noise/drone throne.
Limited to only 50 copies, we managed to snag a few, and we're glad we did. Seems like the duo is heading into more damaged, blown out territory, abandoning their quieter improv-y ways for blistering, electric melt-downs and cosmic sizzle.
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The pros and cons of Metallica's new album, pretty much off the top of our heads:
Pro - It's literally AT LEAST a million times better than their last album, St. Anger.
Con - Of course, that might not be saying that much, since St. Anger was absolutely one of the worst albums ever made.
Pro - It's also much better than Load/Reload/whatever else they've done since the Black Album.
Con - That also didn't take much.
Pro - It's actually metal, which is what a Metallica album should be!
Con - James' singing is still still pretty 'chain wallet' though.
Pro - There's guitar solos this time around, they actually let Kirk play his guitar!
Con - They're still letting Lars play drums. And boy does he sound tired on some of this.
Pro - Produced by Rick Rubin.
Con - Rick Rubin producing Slayer in 1986 is not the same as Rick Rubin producing Metallica in 2008.
Pro - Definitely some decent riffs here. Parts of "The End Of The Line" are pretty badass ferinstance. We're also digging how chunky and speedy and thrashy the likes of "My Apocalypse" and "All Nightmare Long" get, amongst others.
Con - Lots of 'meh', sensitive dude parts too.
Pro - The digipack packaging is really nifty, with a die cut cover and cd booklet that gives a 3-D effect to the coffin shape depicted in the cover art.
Con - "The Unforgiven III". That's right. III.
Pro - Like old Metallica, most of the songs are at least 7 minutes long.
Con - Most of the songs are at least 7 minutes long.
Ok, enough. We were just trying to be funny with the last one.
Lots of pros, cons too. And maybe Metallica, with Napster and Some Kind Of Monster and Load and St. Anger and haircuts and everything, have made it impossible to be objective about them at all.
Basically, one reaction is that, hey it sounds something like old Metallica, and at this point, that's something to be thankful for! Of course, also at this point, if you want to listen to old Metallica, chances are you're gonna just put on Master Of Puppets or Kill 'Em All, or one of their other albums that are all pros, pretty much no cons...
Basically, the diehard '80s Metallica fans here at AQ are never gonna truly be happy with these guys again, unless Cliff comes back from the dead, but heck at least the average radio-listener, record-buyer is getting something fairly metal out of the deal, more metal than Metallica has been in a looooong time. If we're gonna get a new Metallica shoved down our throats, it could have been a whole lot worse. (They've proved it in the past.) Now, if they'd have done another Diamond Head cover on here, we really might be calling it a comeback. That would have been sweet. In the meantime, we WILL be spinning Death Magnetic, mentally weighing record review pros and cons but also unconsciously air guitaring and headbanging... whoops, were we doing that? To the new Metallica?? Shit, maybe we DO like this!
Oh and here's another pro: it's cool that Kirk is still rockin' the long hair, like he's still in Exodus or something, even though maybe he shouldn't. Getting close to the dreaded "Gallagher!"
Well, easily the best Metallica record of the last decade or so...of course, it's all covers, one disc of old stuff (including, the classic Garage Days Revisted and Re-Revisted eps) and another disc of newly-recorded cover versions, everything from Sabbath to Nick Cave, from Misfits to Mercyful Fate.
Seems like a bad idea, sure (the band playing with the San Francisco Symphony Orchestra). But surprisingly some of this actually works. They start off with a Morricone cover which segues perfectly into their instrumental opus "Call of Ktulu." The slow ones work best seeing as they are basically slowed down Wagner played on guitar. The fast ones are a mess. I (Andee speaking here) was there, and I can tell you it was worth it just to see a shirtless metalhead ejected for stage diving at the symphony.
We knew that we had to take the "return to Master of Puppets thrash" hype about this record with a massive grain of salt, but it kinda does sound like they were making an effort to be especially heavy and aggro and thrashy. Unfortunately they forgot that along with the chugga chugga guitars and violent drumming, you need to write songs! After six years (and at least two disappointing albums previous), it's pretty clear that the emperor has no clothes -- and some major complexes. Did they really have to bump the release date of this up a few days just to thwart bootleggers? Is the 22 million Metallica albums sold between 1995 and 2000 not enough? Lars bashing aside, this really is weak. I mean, it sounds like a mediocre local band (actually, they ARE a local band, but what we mean is that the production and songwriting are not up to snuff). There's a Metallica *influence* (especially in the vocals!) but it doesn't really sound like the "real" Metallica. Apparently they wrote this in the studio with the tape rolling, in an attempt to capture a raw hardcore immediacy, which instead seems to have resulted in an unfinished and almost demo-like album. Did anyone hear any guitar solos? And what about those lyrics? Sounds like James took a semester of Rhyming 101. Ugh. Sorry we have to slag this off so heavily, but man it sucks. Jason did the right thing. Comes with bonus DVD of live in the studio performances, while supplies last (which they probably will).
Dethklok is back!!! Our favorite animated purveyors of apocalyptic metal destruction have returned to face their demons both mighty and petty. In season two, they venture into the horrors of fashion, P.R., detox, the dating scene, state politics, as well as staging the largest public criminal execution of all time and of course botching it big time. This season they are faced with new mortal enemies from the Tribunal (one voiced by Malcolm McDowell), as well as an army of disfigured and damaged former fans called The Revengencers. Can Dethklok finally release their new record to save the World Economy, or will they be crippled by their childish infighting and developmentally challenged destructive behaviors? We never listed the first season, but we were all pretty much OBSESSED. The music is amazing, so good it's hard to believe they're not a real band, and the band members various accents are SO impossible to understand which almost makes it funnier and will probably have you turning on the subtitles, and the carnage, oh the carnage, so much blood...
Brutal!
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You have to be pretty darn metal to get into this band, and that's as it should be: no poseurs allowed!! Metalucifer are Japanese metalheads (some from the cult black metal combo Sabbat) paying tribute to the glory days of '80s true metal, a la Maiden and
