Call to Action #Feb24: Protest at Congressman Tom McClintock's Modesto Office, February 24th at 10 am “Nobody elected Musk” #3E #USprotests

Stuck in the Filter: February 2024’s Angry Misses

By Angry Metal Guy

Ah yes, February. Wait, what? It’s almost MAY!!! Who approved this two-months-late bullshit?

Oh… right, that would be me. Shit.

Well, you know, sometimes life gets in the fucking way, you know? It’s been rough days, and I know I’m not the only one struggling. With 2024 on such a rocky start, it should come as no surprise that we grasp desperately for media to help us escape and find solace in the art of others. Unfortunately for my Filter minions, they don’t get to escape from the mire and muck of the neglected filtration system from which we find what could be generously described as “art.”

Undeterred, we soldier on. And as we do, we find those nuggets of goodness-but-just-shy-of-greatness which help us survive one more day in this unforgiving world. May you find something in these selections that helps you survive, too!

Kenstrosity’s Murdery Deathkillers

Aesthetic // An Enigmatic Creation [February 16th, 2024 – Self Release]

Spanish melodic death metal troupe Aesthetic have been kicking since 2000, but the aptly named An Enigmatic Creation is only their second LP. This record is one strange beast, because for almost anybody with working ears, myself included (ostensibly), it’s almost unlistenable. Entirely the result of a production that makes the album sound like it was recorded with copper instruments inside an oversized tin can, An Enigmatic Creation tests the boundaries of human enjoyment by way of unforgivably boomy drums and guitars, far too forward vocals, and a snare tone that for all intents and purposes is the equivalent of smacking the lid of an aluminum trash can with your palm. However, with the exception of one cringe-worthy, spoken-word travesty entitled “A Strange Encounter,” every song offered here is a straight-up banger. Vivacious Bal-Sagoth/Kull riffing meets Brymir‘s adventurous spirit, a tidal wave of blackened tremolos, and a chorus of melodious bells, all filtered through a nautical-sounding aesthetic reminiscent of Sulphur Aeon’s Gateway to the Antisphere. Songs like the titular opener, “Vanishing Memories,” “Flashes of Clarity,” and “This Neverending Nightmare” prove that Aesthetic know how to write killer tunes with tons of variety and myriad points of interest. It’s a shame An Enigmatic Creation’s bewildering production almost ruins it, but the artistry behind these compositions leaves me stunned and thirsty for more.

Volucrine // ETNA [February 16th, 2024 – Inverse Records]

Finnish progressive death metal group Volucrine caught me by surprise this year. If I remember correctly, I first encountered third album ETNA while scrolling my Bandcamp feed, attracted by its unique and captivating cover art. A fellow Discordian then reminded me of it in passing, leading me to spin it almost nonstop for an entire day. Progressive death metal with potentially divisive and idiosyncratic vocals lands Volucrine in the same camp as bands like The Odious and Omnivortex circa Diagrams of Consciousness, rounded out with a gentle twist of Coheed and Cambria’s bright earnestness (“Old Friend”). Fortunately, Volucrine’s songwriting flexibility helps ETNA stand out. Early hits like the thrashy “Riptide,” the In Mourning-esque “Combatant,” and “Scarred Earth” function successfully as an impressive portfolio of Volucrine’s talent and skill. While this means ETNA’s first half contains much variety, it compromises cohesion to meet that quota. However, the back half, featuring killers like “Bloodsport,” “Godsized,” and “Escapist,” prioritizes continuity above all else. An interesting strategy, honing in on developing steady and consistent momentum in the back allows ETNA’s forty-seven minutes to feel more like an even forty, thereby making revisits effortless. ETNA’s unorthodox packaging, combined with Volucrine’s twisting and unpredictable songwriting, results in one seriously creative, interesting, and entertaining record!

Atoll // Inhuman Implants [February 23rd, 2024 – Unique Leader Records]

Phoenix, Arizona five-banger1 Atoll chug along at a brisk pace, releasing new LP’s with remarkable velocity over the course of their short decade of existence so far. Clocking in for its shift as Mambo Album No. 5, Inhuman Implants is yet another relentlessly brutal, slamming death metal assault. Doing absolutely goddamn nothing differently compared to anything else in their discography, this record will beat you to within an inch of your life, infect you with virulently memorable slams, and then leave your bruised and battered body in the gutter (“Autonomic Autosarcophagy,” “Vomit Altar,” “Missionary Opposition”). Chunky rhythms (“Berdella of Blood,” “Primordial Rage”) and swaggering beatdowns (“Husks”) allow this record to retain a notably smooth momentum from start to finish, which in turns makes this respectably tight twenty-nine minutes instantly replayable. But of course, this wouldn’t be a slam record without slamples, and Atoll deliver here as well. Album highlight “Gay for God” earns its highlight status in part due to it’s incredible It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia to South Park to It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia-again triple-slample that I’ve got officially penned in my handy-dandy notebook as a… [checks notes]… certified banger. If you should need any further information on Inhuman Implants, you may send your request to my boot on its trajectory to your curb-kissing jaw.

Tales From the Garden

Monkey3 // Welcome to the Machine [February 23rd, 2024 – Napalm Records]

Monkey3 has been around a while. Over 20 years on the market, with a discography running 7 studio albums deep today, the Swiss quartet’s impact has remained modest. Listening to Welcome to the Machine, I have to wonder why. The market for instrumental bands is a bit limited, granted, but not many bands can strike the balance between free-form space rock jams and colossal tidal wave post-metal riffs this well. The slow build on the first half of “Rackman” is superb, growing in gravity as it collects orbital detritus while holding fast to a solid central core, but the second half shifts gears and sounds like it could dual as a soundtrack for Blade Runner or Cyberpunk 2077. If there was any doubt the album title referred to Pink Floyd, the opening stretch for “Collapse” contains some clever, tasteful nods to “Time,” and the incredible wealth of solos strewn across the running time draws from Gilmour and contemporaries alike. It takes a lot to get me invested in a guitar solo these days, but Monkey3 shows incredible expertise at keeping solos interesting through great performances and captivating songwriting. An all-around masterclass at instrumental space-rock, every prog fan owes themselves a spin of Welcome to the Machine.

Dolphin Whisperer’s Twelve-Step Tee Off

Crippling Alcoholism // With Love from a Padded Room [February 29th, 2024 – Self Release]

If a song by the forcefully titled Crippling Alcoholism popped into a playlist when you weren’t looking, its jangly post-rock leads, melancholic refrains, and rock steady rhythms may not register right away as the air-sucking void that lurks about the unpredictable turns throughout With Love from a Padded Room. Its title serves a snippet of the album’s theme: the reimagining of a prisoner’s story as told from solitary confinement. Though a few tracks feature the back and forth of a distant guest vocalist, a majority of this hour’s worth of snarling, pitch-shifted, starkly-reverbed, and dead-faced diatribes feature as an unkempt solo breakdown to maintain the unsettling mood. Stylistically a melange of spearing-synth depressive rock (“Otessa,” “Rough Sleepers”), modern Murder Ballads goth shuffles (“Evil Has a Babyface,” “Sav”), and metal-fringed left-field swings (“Red Looks Good on Him,” “Mob Dad”), With Love avoids striking twice in the same lane to give each character its own space to fester and boil over. And, if you listen with just a little bit of attention, you can make out how truly horrifying Crippling Alcoholism has crafted these vignettes. Whether you come for the music and stay for the macabre or latch onto to the bloody details and nightmare fuel cover despite this hard-to-tag adventure straying away from the comfort of riffs and solos, Crippling Alcoholism can find a powerful hold on your musical journey if you let it. Pairs well with meth., King Woman, Sunrise Patriot Motion, and extended dissociation.2.

Dear Hollow’s Blackened Booty

Nocturnal Sorcery // Captive in the Breath of Life [February 9th, 2024 – KVLT Records]

From the cover to the moniker to the record label, you can probably guess what Nocturnal Sorcery sounds like. Captive in the Breath of Life, the Finnish trio’s second full-length since 2011, offers the bounty of blackened arts in nearly the exact form that you expect it sound like. Cold and raw tremolo, manic shrieks, and blastbeats are all unholy partakers in this trinity of second-wave worship, but thanks to formidable composition, powerful performances, and a willingness to focus on what they can control, Captive in the Breath of Life is everything you love (or hate) about traditionalist black metal. While Nocturnal Sorcery is bloated in a few too many interlude tracks and fluff over its forty-nine-minute length, tracks like “Oath at Mt. Hermon,” “Cry of the Wounded Heaven,” “Joyless Dance in the Shadow,” and “Beyond Salvation” are blackened rippers that toe the line between punishment, catchiness, and frigidity – solidly written flow between blazing riffs and passages of slower reverie with jagged teeth bared. More patient epics take the cake, tracks like “Captive in the Breath of Life,” “Damned by the Law of the Stars,” and true closer “Lucifer’s Shade.” Sure, it’s black metal, but its bulletproof compositions don’t pretend to be anything more, so Nocturnal Sorcery offers a grim ‘n cold occult trip to the 90’s with Captive in the Breath of Life for those interested.

#2024 #Aesthetic #AmericanMetal #AnEnigmaticCreation #AtollInhumanImplants #BalSagoth #BlackMetal #Brymir #CaptiveInTheBreathOfLife #CoheedAndCambria #CripplingAlcoholism #DeathMetal #Deathcore #ETNA #Feb24 #FinnishMetal #GothicMetal #GothicRock #InMourning #InverseRecords #KingWoman #Kull #KVLTRecords #MelodicBlackMetal #MelodicDeathMetal #Meth_ #Monkey3 #NapalmRecords #NocturnalSorcery #Omnivortex #PinkFloyd #PostRock #PostMetal #ProgressiveDeathMetal #ProgressiveMetal #ProgressiveRock #PsychedelicRock #Review #Reviews #Rock #SelfReleased #Slam #SpanishMetal #StuckInTheFilter #SulphurAeon #SunrisePatriotMotion #SwissMetal #TheOdious #UniqueLeaderRecords #Volucrine #WelcomeToTheMachine #WithLoveFromAPaddedRoom

AMG’s Unsigned Band Rodeö: Save This Utility – 亡失 Deprivation

By Dolphin Whisperer

“AMG’s Unsigned Band Rodeö” is a time-honored tradition to showcase the most underground of the underground—the unsigned and unpromoted. This collective review treatment continues to exist to unite our writers in boot or bolster of the bands who remind us that, for better or worse, the metal underground exists as an important part of the global metal scene. The Rodeö rides on.”

New year, same ol’ Rodeö! As the inaugural unknown-spankin’ event of 2024, we shall take a moment to recognize the bands who put up the best fight in this unforgiving clown show. Texas doomsters Slumbering Sun may not have snagged first, but they did end up listing, a rare honor in these halls! However, despite that one enthusiastic supporter, Greek proglodytes Conspiracy of Zero stole the show with higher consistency in their Quo Vadis meets Cynic with a regional flair outing Ahthos Arouris. Haven’t checked it yet? Lucky you, now’s as good a time as ever!

But for our main course today, we have something different—something admittedly far more weird and avant-garde leaning. Perhaps if you’re familiar with the brand of brutal prog interwoven with experimental death metal and tasteful lounge jazz passages that unheralded Japanese act 五人一首 [Gonin-ish] pushes, you might feel a little at home with SAVE THIS UTILITY. This fledgling Kyoto-based troupe, though, seems to have their own inspirations, with a bassist whose seven-string prowess explores dutifully the realm of poppy Idol music and a guitarist who moonlights as a pumping rawstyle DJ. You might be wondering what this all adds up to in the context of a website that allegedly reviews metal. Well, read on if you dare. 亡失 Deprivation might just surprise you. – Dolphin Whisperer

SAVE THIS UTILITY // 亡失 Deprivation [February 5th, 2024]

El Cuervo: Save This Utility is about what you would expect from a Japanese band self-describing as avant-garde: weird as fuck. Deprivation pulls together unusual influences into an unexpected and unfamiliar release. While the unpredictable song structures and varying time signatures are pure prog, the guitar leads have a crunch and angularity drawn from mathcore. Likewise, the deathly roars lend things an extremer metal fringe, while the production has a clinical edge that tonally (if not musically) recalls industrial. And plenty of piano and synths paper over the cracks of the frantic song-writing. Inventive musical ideas are scattered throughout but the spectrum of sounds amalgamated is too wide for a cohesive, purposeful release; even for a novelty EP that only runs for a shade over thirty minutes. Similarly, those individual moments are fleeting and not constructed into compelling songs. As inventive and unexpected as everything is, I’m not left with an over-arching sense of the substance of this release. Can I recall a particular track? A particular riff? A particular melody? A particular emotion (other than bafflement)? The answer to each is no. Deprivation prizes style over substance, which leaves little to compel repeated listens. It does a lot, but doesn’t say a lot. 1.5/5.0

GardensTale: I tried, okay? I really, really tried. Iceberg waxed lyrically about this utterly confounding blob of free form jazz death so much, I felt like there had to be something there. I clawed my way through spin after spin of clashing melodies, weird throaty shouting, riffs going the wrong way, piano flourishes in random spots, repetition where you don’t expect it, the repetition stopping when you expect it to go on, a variety of synthy sounds inserted sideways and unlubed, and I can now say at my most confident that this really is not for me. I have an upper limit of jazz, and this is too much jazz. I recognize the talent of the musicians, and there is a certain dissonant allure to the weird bendy noises coming out of my speakers. But I can’t say I enjoy listening to the whole thing in one sitting. This is one you’re going to have to try for yourself; my score and my recommendation are going to be as useless as a review of the taste of grass, and only you can decide whether you’re a herbivore or not. 2.5/5.0

Dolphin Whisperer: Every now and then you stumble upon a piece of music that is as original as it also is a smart integration of various influences. 亡失 Deprivation somewhat mystified me at first but as I continued to dig through its layers of rich piano and synth melodies, understated but hypnotic rhythms, frolicking and popping bass runs, and marathon harmonic resolutions, I started to understand SAVE THIS UTILITY as the music-lovers they likely are. The peaceful yet powerful crescendo builds that these longer-form songs prance toward remind my ears of various Japanese math rock/post rock hybrid groups, like jizue or mouse on the keys. But also the kind of oscillating synth work from resonant patches, that imitate sounds similar to a vibraphone or a Rhodes piano, cross about soaring and searing guitar leads in a big prog Gonin-ish fashion. Even further these qualities intensify as SAVE THIS UTILITY ascends to clashing, warbling vocal harmonies that burst against bright instrumental peaks in an epic, whimsical tryst. On their previous debut full-length, some of these builds arose in a more melodeath-like fashion, with the harsh-clean trades feeling akin to late, experimental Dir en Grey work. And the synth composition felt incidental and circus-y—wacky video game music, perhaps. While this new EP still hosts an ominous growl against tension building chords, that death presence has grown from intrusion to atmosphere, which helps the hard-to-connect dots of each track’s individual pieces come together as a dream-like whole peaking in the fifteen minute closer “網目 Web.” And, as such, SAVE THIS UTILITY not only continues to command the tag ‘interesting’ but also ‘captivating.’ 亡失 Deprivation isn’t perfect by any means, but that wouldn’t be any fun now would it? 3.5/5.0

Iceberg: You remember that scene in the old Willy Wonka (1971) with all the psychedelic visuals where Gene Wilder keeps shouting “the danger must be growing?” SAVE THIS UTILITY’s EP Deprivation takes me right back to that sequence; terror and wonder, all wrapped up in a bad trip. If you can imagine a witches brew of The Mars Volta-flavored mathcore, Schoenbergian atonality, Sketches of Spain-era Miles Davis, and the instrumental noodling of Frank Zappa you might begin to get an idea of the world on display here. This amalgam of genres should be a jumbled mess—and I imagine many will think it is—but if you duck beneath the sound and fury there’s masterful structure and skill to be found. The tension of cluster chords1 and disjointed ostinati given release by crystalline synths in “Hollow,” the end of “Abandonment” draining melodic material into a horrifying black hole of noise and aleatoric rhythms; there’s magic written all over this album. All roads lead to the whopping 15 minute closer “Web,” a tour-de-force in long form writing that leaves me in awe every time I revisit it. This track wields dissonance and consonance like weapons, tearing apart traditional structure and tonality at will, only to piece it back together by it’s close. The only thing that bothers me here is a slightly muddled mix, but it hardly matters with this level of musical material. Fans of challenging and grotesque music should absolutely give SAVE THIS UTILITY a shot: this band is destined for great things. 4.0/5.0

Mystikus Hugebeard: 亡失 Deprivation, the newest album by Japanese avant-garde progressive metal act SAVE THIS UTILITY, is my initiation into the AMG Rodeö, and completely broke my brain the first few listens. At its core, 亡失 Deprivation is an album of complex, gritty textures, a jarring arrangement of music that falls into the “love it or hate it” category. The more transitory passages are the most fascinating to my ears; there are some compelling soundscapes to be found within the tense, dissonant guitars of “廃祀 Abandonment,” or the Glass Hammer-esque keyboard noodling and jazz pianos of “網目 Web.” My enjoyment breaks as the music grows heavier, and exponentially more chaotic. The zig-zag of the guitars is incongruous with the rhythm offered by the drums and the vocals, which alternate between brutal-death gurgles and shrieks. To the album’s credit, the conflicting layers of sound create a curious and novel musical texture that I would liken to sandpaper, but it becomes ear melting during the keyboards’ fire-alarm shrieking above the already cluttered heavy parts of “廃祀 Abandonment.” 亡失 Deprivation does have a nifty puzzle-box quality to it that I imagine some will enjoy picking apart and unraveling, but overall I find it just a little too obtuse to emotionally engage with. 2.5/5.0

#2024 #AngryMetalGuySUnsignedBandRodeo #AngryMetalGuySUnsignedBandRodeo2024 #ArnoldSchoenberg #AvantGardeMetal #Deprivation #DirEnGrey #Feb24 #FrankZappa #GlassHammer #GoninIsh #JapaneseMetal #JazzFusion #jizue #MathRock #MilesDavis #mouseOnTheKeys #PostRock #ProgressiveMetal #SaveThisUtility #TheMarsVolta #WillyWonka #五人一首

Sleepytime Gorilla Museum – Of the Last Human Being Review

By GardensTale

It must have been 2005 or 2006 that I first came into contact with Sleepytime Gorilla Museum, one of the most beautifully bewildering bands to ever grace the globe. Constructed around a narrative of a fictional dadaist and futurist performance troupe, the one-of-a-kind group from Oakland gained a loyal cult following over the span of three records. After seeing half a show in 2007,1 I took home a T-shirt, and I still have a vivid memory of getting the most mind-blown reaction from a fellow fan in a random hallway.2 Sadly, the band dissolved before finishing their fourth album, Of the Last Human Being. Its members went on to other projects, like Rabbit Rabbit Radio and Free Salamander Exhibit, many of them good, none of them scratching the same itch. Until last year, when the band decided to pick up where they left off and finish the album with a little crowdfunding assistance.

And indeed, Of the Last Human Being sounds like the band never left. But what that sounds like beguiles description for the many people not privy to Sleepytime’s history. An absurd mixture of instruments, some of them home-made, conglomerates into a surreal nightmare, tethered to reality tenuously by the dulcet tones of mad preacher Nils Frykdahl and hissed insanity of Carla Kihlstedt, who often sing in duet to truly maddening effect. At turns you may be reminded of Mr. Bungle (“Save It!”), UneXpect (“S.P.Q.R.”) or the most unhinged tenets of Diablo Swing Orchestra (“We Must Know More”). Most of the time, it won’t remind you of anything at all. Kihlstedt’s violin frequently duels with the guitars in riffs and leads that always sound unnatural, but never sound aimless. Quieter moments conjure unease with xylophones and wind instruments while the lyrics hang around in the venn diagram where schizophrenic manifesto and poetry overlap.

Structurally, though, Of the Last Human Being is less beyond the pale, and it helps balance out the plethora of wildly imaginative textures and flourishes. “Salamander in Two Worlds” is a powerful opener, working its way up from hushed vocals and brass to a feverish, almost sludge-like cacophony with atypical, ricocheting percussion and tremolo riffs, yet featuring an actual chorus. “S.P.Q.R.” is even more frenzied, Frykdahl and Kihlstedt shouting an unhinged lecture on Romans in tandem, but repeat stanzas guard the track’s cohesion. This high energy stands in stark contrast with the quietly sanity-unspooling creepiness of “Silverfish,” featuring Kihlstedt quavering between bouts of shrill violin, or the sardonic grandstanding folk of “Old Grey Heron.” Even the shorter tracks and interludes spin bizarre imagery and leap from sad to surreal to sinister.

Though Sleepytime Gorilla Museum only has 3 prior albums to its name, it’s worth measuring Of the Last Human Being against these, if only to see whether the intervening years have done anything to diminish the troupe’s unique qualities. I‘m happy to say that they largely haven’t, though this comes with a few liner notes. Just like before the hiatus, this is heady music, and whether you’d call it pretentious is entirely dependent on your tolerance for theatrical excess, specifically with its dadaistic influences on full display, like a minute and a half of ringing bells serving as an interlude. Though, to this I should add, this might still be the most accessible album Sleepytime has ever made. In the context of all the weird, offbeat, and characteristic songs in the tracklist, “El Evil” sounds almost normal. I must admit I’m not terribly fond of “Hush, Hush,” and instrumental closer “Rose-Colored Song” could have done the same in half the length. But when you’re talking Sleepytime Gorilla Museum, lavishness has a tendency to become a virtue, and it’s still ever so pleasant a nightmare to wallow in.

Apparently, it’s an infectious stance, as I find myself writing with more color and more abundance and abandon than usual. Perhaps it’s the part of me that never believed I’d get to write this review. As a longtime fan, I am beyond thrilled that not only is Sleepytime Gorilla Museum back, but its music still has the same unique apocalyptic quality, even if it feels just a tad safer than the band’s prior output. As a reviewer, I am just as happy to be able to share my love for this band with thousands of readers, and tell you all with full conviction: step into the Museum of the Last Human Being, for it is an experience unlike any other, and a fantastic return for a most unique, extraordinary ensemble of musicians.

Rating: 4.0/5.0
DR: N/A | Format Reviewed: Stream
Label: Avant Night
Websites: sleepytimegorillamuseum1.bandcamp.com | facebook.com/sleepytimegorillamuseum
Releases Worldwide: February 23rd, 2024

#2024 #40 #AmericanMetal #AvantGarde #AvantNight #DiabloSwingOrchestra #Feb24 #FreeSalamanderExhibit #MrBungle #OfTheLastHumanBeing #RabbitRabbitRadio #Review #Reviews #SleepytimeGorillaMuseum #Unexpect

Record(s) o’ the Month – February 2024

By Angry Metal Guy

The common wisdom about February in Sweden is that it’s the dreariest month; it’s long, it’s gray, it’s cold and it’s only standing between you and spring. At least in November you can look forward to Christmas, but February is just a long, bitter slog. I carried this attitude over to metal releases from the early winter months, as well. However, as I showed last month, January’s reputation for being slow appears to be incorrect. The same is true of February, apparently, if my lists are anything to go by.

In contrast to January, February seems to either hit or miss, with less in the middle range. February proffered, for example, few Honorable Mentions (just Frozen Dawn in 2023 and Ad Nauseam in 2021) and fewer #(ish)es (only Beyond the Red Mirror in 20151), while the only other February release that I ranked under #4 on my Top 10(ish) was Steven Wilson’s The Raven That Refused to Sing which came in at #9 in 2013. The top 4, on the other hand, has been flush with great February releases. Behemoth’s best album (yeah, I said it), The Satanist, was released in February of 2014 (and ranked at #4) and we first met Kvaen in February of 2020 and they, too, ranked at #4 at my RotY list in 2020. The highest ranked February record is the reigning Record o’ the Year from 2023, Carnosus’ brilliant Visions of Infinihility. But what struck me was that fully 30% of the #2s on my end of year list between 2013 and 2023 were February releases: Fleshgod Apocalypse’s uaaaautastic King (2016)2; Black Sites’ excellent debut record In Monochrome (2017); and Soen’s brilliant Lotus (2019).3

February 2024 was pretty fucking tedious and trying for me, at least personally. With another stint on the IL from an innocent little cold that turned out to pack a wallop and that knocked me down for nearly 3 weeks,4 there was plenty of time to passively assess the collective output of the metal scene via AngryMetalGuy.com. So, will any of these make it back around in December? Or is being miserable an insurmountable bias in my listening process? I guess only time will tell.

Borknagar, celebrating three decades of influence in black metal and beyond, continued to captivate fans with their latest album, Fall [February 23rd, 2024 | Century Media Records (Bandcamp)]. These Norwegians’ unyielding dedication has ensured a surprising consistency in quality throughout this time, with each lineup change resulting in a new record that belongs in the band’s pantheon of ‘bests.’ Fall revisits the band’s roots while maintaining their signature expansiveness and melody, and masterfully blend black metal ferocity with serene, atmospheric passages (like on “Summits” or “Moon”). And, as is often the case, it’s the contrasts between brooding melodies and aggressive riffs that makes Fall stand out from the crowd, both heavy and rich. And it’s just that, Fall’s diversity—from the heavy to the harmonious—that exemplifies the band’s well-balanced journey through time and genre. Borknagar continues to successfully blend the harsher elements of their past with the matured sound of recent years to great success. As our own Dr. A.N. Grier exclaimed, “After repeated listens, I still find something new in each of Fall’s songs. When compared to 2019’s True North, this release has more elements, greater progression, and better continuity.” It’s just a darn good record from a legendary band.

Runner(s) Up:

Necrowretch // Swords of Dajjal [February 2nd, 2024 | Season of Mist | Bandcamp]: Nearly four years after their fourth album, The Ones from Hell, French blackened death metal band Necrowretch has returned with Swords of Dajjal. This album, inspired by the Islamic mythology of Al-Masih ad-Dajjal, marries the band’s death metal roots with a more pronounced black metal influence. The result is a vicious, bestial sound, highlighted by the gravelly, sepulchral vocals and the rage and enchantment carried on the guitars and in the rhythm section. Swords of Dajjal retains a concise 37-minute runtime, avoiding the trap of over-indulgence while exploring epic themes and this is one of its best choices. Each listen requires a re-listen, each time it ends you are left wanting more. As Carcharodon gushed, “One of the first things to really hit me in 2024, Necrowretch made a real step up from The Ones from Hell. More maturely and consistently written than that last record, Swords of Dajjal has a flow and intensity to it, which gives it an epic feeling of grandeur that belies its tight runtime.”

Counting Hours // The Wishing Tomb [February 23rd, 2024 | Ardua Music | Bandcamp]: Counting Hours, born from the legacy of Finnish melodic doom band Rapture, has returned with its follow-up album, The Wishing Tomb. This record weaves a tapestry of sadness, despair, and melancholy; masterfully blending influences from the early days of Katatonia, Dawn of Solace, and the core essence of Rapture itself. Counting Hours is like the Platonic Ideal of sadboi Finnish doom metal. It’s heavy, yet infused with mournful guitar work and poignant vocals that capture the essence of darkness and sadness and which complement melancholic leads, harmonious riffs, and the occasional crushing doom onslaught. The Wishing Tomb is both beautiful and heartrending and finds Counting Hours showcasing their profound understanding of the genre conventions, yet delivering the fresh takes on familiar themes as so few bands really ever do well. As scene veteran and undeniably Sadboi Druhm opined after his most recent crying jag, “Counting Hours have the perfect formula and know exactly how to get to the heart of Steel.” It’s not often that the Druhm himself breaks the counter like some kind of overrating overrater. Heed him.

#2024 #AngryMetalGuySRecordSOTheMonth #ArduaMusic #Borknagar #CenturyMediaRecords #CountingHours #Fall #Feb24 #Necrowretch #RecordSOTheMonth #SeasonOfMist #SwordsOfDajjal #TheWishingTomb

Lionheart – The Grace of a Dragonfly Review

By El Cuervo

Lionheart has tracked an unusual course. Beginning in the 80s as one of the next-in-line groups to follow the big AOR bands of the day, things stalled and they disappeared into the annals of time with just one full-length release under their belt. The 2010s saw a quiet return with Second Nature and latterly The Reality of Miracles, both being rose-tinted if middling summaries of a sound from nearly 40 years prior. 2024 sees the third record of Lionheart 2.0, entitled The Grace of a Dragonfly. A distinctly British WW2 concept album, Dragonfly promised something a little more poignant with an anti-war message while commemorating historical sacrifices made.

Anyone already familiar with the most popular, debatably metal bands of the 80s (Def Leppard, Whitesnake) will understand what’s going on with Lionheart. Big power chords in the verses, big vocals in the choruses, crunchy but accessible riffs, and an overly of keyboards that sometimes take the form of a piano and sometimes something synthier. Dragonfly largely makes for an upbeat, easy-going sort of listen. Anyone also already familiar with the work of Lee Small will understand that his vocals are the buttery-smooth gel holding everything together. His simple, clear style which can also deploy dramatic flair where necessary is a coup for a band like this. It’s this that makes the general preoccupation with gang vocals in the choruses – immaculate Leppard harmonies these ain’t – so baffling. The more time spent with Small, and the less time with other vocals, the better. Music like this thrives on catchy melodies, so the best moments are those with memorable vocals and guitars. The guitar lick bridging the end of the chorus on “This Is a Woman’s War” is marvelous, and the urgent lead carrying “The Longest Night” likewise excels.

However, these moments otherwise prove the rule that Dragonfly is marked more by competence than excellence. There’s very little essentially wrong here, from the solid riffs to solid melodies to solid songwriting. It’s remarkably consistent as a coherent group of songs orienting around their concept in four-five minute segments. But it lacks much that’s outstanding other than Small’s vocals which do a lot of heavy-lifting. Its predecessor had higher highs (“Overdrive”, which remains a certified banger) and also lower lows (“The First Man”) but also greater variety in its integration of different sounds as I described in my previous review. Dragonfly is more consistent but less exciting and varied.

The brevity and pace of the songs progress the album briskly. But the back half travels through a low ebb as “Little Ships” and “Just a Man” lose my interest. They do nothing that isn’t done elsewhere and better; here, the record’s tonal and stylistic consistency is detrimental as I question the presence of these tracks. By contrast, the two tracks beyond this contain some of the best material, so Dragonfly would improve with some of the fattier meat trimmed. I also query the inclusion of the introductory sequence on the opener (“Declaration”) and the brief closer (“Remembrance, Praying for World Peace”). Each stands separate from the songs they’re a part of or next to. I understand their value to the record’s concept, but musically they’re extraneous and should have been integrated better. In particular, the closer would have been better served as a full track because what’s here rushes too many ideas into a space that’s too small, including an interesting orchestral edge.

I’m left with a sense of talent that hasn’t yet been fully realized in Lionheart’s modern era. While Dragonfly benefits from repeated listens as some of the initially unremarkable melodies sink deeper over time, it nonetheless struggles to push beyond just average. Despite Small’s big voice and the occasionally great guitar hooks, I can’t warmly recommend Dragonfly. It’s an adequate album of adequate songs with adequate melodies. Fans of the 80s could do much worse but also much better.

Rating: 2.5/5.0
DR: 8 | Format Reviewed: 320 kbps mp3
Label: Metalville
Websites: lionheart-music.com | facebook.com/lionheart
Releases worldwide: March 15th, 2024

#25 #2024 #AlbumOrientedRock #DefLeppard #EnglishMetal #Feb24 #HardRock #Lionheart #Review #Reviews #Skyscraper #TheGraceOfADragonfly #Whitesnake

Hecatoncheir – Nightmare Utopia Review

By Dear Hollow

On the advent of the release of Nightmare Utopia, Hecatoncheir posted a series of poetry and stories attached to each of the forthcoming songs on social media. The journey begins by following a dark silhouette, each installment describes surreal and dreamlike landscapes, strange characters, and objects—with monolithic importance attached in the strange way that dreams do. In the latter tracks, ever-vigilant eyes watch from the stars and assume a more horrific face as they emerge from the darkness as the cruel pelagic and empyrean deities and monsters among Lovecraft’s multitudes. Hecatoncheir’s uniquely dreamlike take on chthonic horror, balanced by its ambitions in liminal spaces, set one hell of a precedent for the music contained herein.

Slovakian trio Hecatoncheir, named after a trio of hundred-armed, fifty-headed allies of the Olympians in Hesiod’s Theogony, blurs the borderlands between its influences—making this quite the feat for an act with limited experience in the scene.1 Throughout Nightmare Utopia’s thirty-two-minute runtime, you will hear the familiar wail of dissonant stylings, the cold saturation of black metal, the brutality of death metal, the megaton weight of sludge, and the patience of doom—influences of Our Place of Worship is Silence, Portal, Thantifaxath, and Mass Worship all have a hand in laying waste to this hellish landscape. Hecatoncheir weaponizes riffs and atmosphere that not only conjure a journey through the uncanny valley but wield enough firepower to overthrow the Titans with the fists of chthonic gods in the act’s debut.

Humbly self-described as a “mid-tempo juggernaut,” the dichotomy of punishing density and menacing atmosphere is what makes Hecatoncheir stand out. Each track assumes an identity of its own, with a common thread of crystalline dissonance coursing through its jagged movements. Fiery tremolo gives way to thick riffs seamlessly, while monolithic doom sludge gives way to skull-crushing riffs, overlaid by simple yet effective plucking and dissonant leads. You would be forgiven in thinking that opener “Dreamless” introduces the next Thantifaxath album with its blastbeat and tremolo-guided trek, because after the brief ambient track “Nightmare Utopia (I. The Falsebound Kingdom),” the formidable and monolithic “Nightmare Utopia (II. Him in the Gulf)” hits with a Mass Worship-like sludgy intensity, portraying Lovecraft’s idiot god Azathoth with a deserving hugeness. “Sefirot of Understanding” capitalizes upon the Our Place of Worship is Silence influence in its thick and sticky chugs, balanced by dissonant passages and a blackened edge.

While the common thread courses through the sludge, black, and death metal passages throughout the first half of Nightmare Utopia as it maintains remarkable balance, it reaches its apex with its three closers, “The Crowning Horror,” “Madness of the Stars,” and “The Watcher, the Witness,” dragging the previous relatively safe compositions to an unforeseen depth. “The Crowning Horror” offers a central Portal-esque crawling riff atop vicious blastbeats with a nearly thrashy blaze tossed in, combined with an unforgettable melodic interlay that adds a needed jolt in context to the mid-tempo pummeling of “Sefirot of Understanding.” “Madness of the Stars” then proceeds to walk the path of Hierophant and Nightmarer with the thickest and most pummeling riffs of the album and a thickly distorted blackened closing, before “The Watcher, the Witness” revisits the uncompromising sludge of “Him in the Gulf” with a minimalist spin, focusing on its plucking and sprawling sludge, nearly-drone chords atop contemplative blastbeats.

“I am everything. The light and the darkness, the left hand and the right hand, the sun and the flesh, the beginning and the end. The creator and the destroyer.” I am reminded of these final words in Hecatoncheir’s poetic commentary on closer “The Watcher, the Witness.” Nightmare Utopia certainly dwells in far darker places than much of the metalverse, but it’s much more than that. The themes of forbidden knowledge, horror, and violence are balanced by the trio’s emphasis on liminality, emptiness, and patience. While listeners may see influence disparity as a lack of commitment, the sudden out-of-the-blue closing passages of the three closers jarring, or the unwavering growls monotone, Hecatoncheir’s ambition and the seamless blend of black, death, sludge, and doom balances atmosphere and punishment as deftly as a debut can get. As you find yourself in the fog, follow the faint silhouette of the man, slightly darker than his surroundings—he’ll guide you home.

Rating: 4.0/5.0
DR: 6 | Format Reviewed: 320 kbps mp3
Label: Total Dissonance Worship
Websites: facebook.com/hecatoncheir.sk | hecatoncheir-sk.bandcamp.com
Releases worldwide: February 29th, 2024

#2024 #40 #AleaIactaEst #BlackMetal #BlackenedDeathMetal #BlackenedSludgeMetal #DeathMetal #DissonantBlackMetal #DissonantDeathMetal #DoomMetal #Feb24 #Hecatoncheir #Hierophant #MassWorship #NightmareUtopia #Nightmarer #OldTomb #OurPlaceOfWorshipIsSilence #Portal #Review #Reviews #SlovakMetal #SludgeMetal #Thantifaxath #TotalDissonanceWorship

Drain Down – Toxic Society Review

By Cherd

While scouring the howling existential void we call the promo pit for a review to cleanse my palate after the 70 minutes of prog death I tackled in my last outing, the words “cross-over thrash” called to me. What could be more cleansing than some fast riffs and gang-shouted choruses? I even bemused aloud to the other writers that it might be fun to get some beef-witted, Victory Records circa 1996-style stomps. Why I thought that would be fun, I don’t know. It wasn’t even my style of choice when I was a ’90s hardcore kid, but I guess a couple of weeks pouring over prog death will do that to you. Toxic Society, the sophomore full-length from German hardcore/thrash band Drain Down, turns out to be everything I stupidly asked for. Am I angry and aimless enough to pick up what these Teutonic terrors are throwing down? Are you? Join me in the pit for some enthusiastic arm-flailing and high-minded discussion.

The two most immediate features of Toxic Society’s sound are its buzzsaw guitar tone and Ferdinand Panknin’s gruff vocal delivery. The former is appropriately scuzzy, but it’s a touch too far forward in the mix, and the entire production job is surprisingly scrubbed. As for Panknin, his limited range is squarely in the “tough guy hardcore” trope, where every word is shouted and clipped short like he’s being punched in the gut. While there’s certainly a thrashy component to the riffs and solos, especially on the blazing “Scams” and the hard-grooving “Political Animal,” this record leans heavily toward straight hardcore, especially in the verse/shouted chorus/verse structure. Case in point, the tough guy stomp of “Toxic Society” and “Stultus Populus” overpowers any thrashy nuance guitarist Heiko Kratz brings to the table.

This is a shame, since Kratz’s work throughout Toxic Society is precise and confident, whether it’s the halting, almost robotic riffing of “Zero Tolerance” or the ’80s-tastic widdly-widdly solo in “Toxic Society.” Taken alone, his riffs are effortless and varied, equally successful as thrash or hardcore. Unfortunately, once you hear Panknin stumble in like someone who has had just enough liquid courage to finally grab the mic at hardcore karaoke night, it’s hard to focus on anything else. I’ll admit that the style he goes for is one I’ve never enjoyed personally, but even within that style, his range is exceptionally limited and monotone. A more dynamic vocalist could really bring some of this material to life, but as things are, any energy the instruments bring is dampened significantly.

When it comes to content, I usually give some benefit of the doubt to non-native speakers and cut them slack for uninspired lyrics in English. Unfortunately, the songs and sentiments of Toxic Society are so on-the-nose for the style Drain Down plays, that it comes across like parody music you’d catch in the background of a video game or TV show. Bad things: society, politicians, social media. Right on, guys. I’m with you. What would you say is bad about these? “Corruption.” Cool, cool, yeah, but like, what specifically? “Uh… corruption.” And that’s about as deep as any of it gets. Even their incorporation of swear words feels canned and weirdly sterile. The chorus of “Political Animal,” which goes “Politi-cal ani-mal, greedy bastard pigs, politi-cal ani-mal, fat sadistic dicks, politi-cal ani-mal, spread your nasty lies, politi-cal ani-mal, well Je-sus fu-cking Christ,” drones over and over until you can’t wait to change songs.

Musically, Toxic Society is solid, if not always dynamic. As I’ve said, a different vocalist could change the impact of this drastically. Lyrically, if this was a car and I was a mechanic, I’d encourage the owner to sell it for 500 dollars to a scrap yard and start over with a new one. As for my choice of promos, be careful what you ask for, because you might get exactly that.

Rating: 2.0/5.0
DR: 5 | Format Reviewed: 320 kbps mp3
Label: Black Sunset
Websites: draindown.de | facebook.com/draindown
Releases Worldwide: February 29th, 2024

#20 #2024 #BlackSunsetRecords #CrossoverThrash #DrainDown #Feb24 #GermanMetal #Hardcore #Review #Reviews #ThrashMetal #ToxicSociety

Skuggor – Whispers of Ancient Spells Review

By Dear Hollow

Skuggor is exactly what you expect it will sound like. Gothic font and grainy nature photo with themes of darkness, mist, and myth? You betcher ass it’s atmospheric black metal. “But I’m sure there’s something unique here, Hollow,” I can hear you say. Have you heard atmospheric black metal? You don’t listen to this shit for the neatest thing since Deftones. You listen cuz you want to be sucked into arcane and forlorn woods of ancient magic and nature untouched by human hands. I mean, duh. It walks the way of Judas Iscariot’s greatest hits and nods to the raw heroes of Evilfeast and Paysage d’Hiver, and hell, that’s not always a bad thing.

Skuggor’s greatest asset is its patience. Its sole member Matthew Bell offers this trait throughout his storied catalog of acts like Forlorn Citadel, Autumn’s Dawn, Mjältsjuka, and myriad others. Each offers nature-themed black metal unafraid of its more abrasive tendencies but relying on the soothing ambiance and contemplative tempos to do the talking. In this way, Whispers of Ancient Spells is an overwhelmingly safe album, smartly composed with a solid foundation of grim progressions, percussive plods, and shrieks upon which Skuggor builds its melodies. Across a reasonable thirty-two minutes and five tracks, expect this patient songwriting and pleasant melodies to take center stage in an album that does nothing to hurt or help atmoblack’s toothless reputation.

Skuggor’s patient songcraft makes songs perhaps feel longer than they are, which can be a good thing in this case. Firmly rooted in the depressive school of thought in sprawling strums with subtle tremolo flares and a plodding dirge-like pace, each track is built around a raw and grim chord progression, with some percussive and tremolo picking flare and a synth that never feels too much. Likewise, songs like the opening title track and “Silent Cry of the Forests Embrace” feel like a cleaner Evilfeast at a ColdWorld pace, with a solid undercurrent of double bass providing a palpable energy—necessary for this more contemplative breed of black metal. Starting with a glacial and unbearable pace, “As Fog Reveals the Path of Despair” and closer “A Forgotten Past” slowly grow across their respective runtime to include punkier beats then concluding with the only two appearances of blastbeats, all the while solidly anchored by chords and keys. “Shadows Echoing Through Time” is also a notable inclusion, due to its epic scope in the fusion of atmosphere and grimness.

The glaring issue with Whispers of Ancient Spells is that it refuses to take any risks. This makes Skuggor’s sound pleasant in its grimness but little else, as each track follows the same reliable but well-trodden path: loud drums and grim strums, shrieks, frosty keys, quiet passages with an overlay of plucking, repeat—in that order. The rapidity of the chord progressions and drum patterns are the only tether that keeps the album running at a pace other than contemplative, such as the quick interchanges of “Silent Cry of the Forests Embrace.” While this centerpiece is the most energetic cut of the album, it also simply drags on for too long due to its nine-and-a-half minute runtime, the passages growing weary by its dead-horse-beating end. Because of Skuggor’s more thoughtful compositions in adherence to the atmoblack a la second wave, no song particularly stands out: Whispers of Ancient Spells is a brief and pleasant hum that takes a multitude of listens to discern its undercurrents and movements beneath.

To his credit, Bell makes some solid atmoblack in the Skuggor project. This is cearly the work of a veteran, Whispers of Ancient Spells embodies the older interpretation of the style that feels distinctly cold and grim—spitting at the textured and warm palettes seen in more contemporary offerings of the same ilk. That being said, with how smartly and neatly it is composed, it loses a certain gusto by a certain point because of its stubbornness in not taking risks. Each track balances atmosphere and grimness with energy, but none of the above truly stand out or will impact your opinion of the style. If cold and traditional atmoblack a la Evilfeast, Paysage d’Hiver, Judas Iscariot, or Midnight Odyssey are your jam, then check out Skuggor. If not, you’re not missing much.

Rating: 2.5/5.0
DR: 10 | Format Reviewed: ~190 kb/s mp3
Label: Naturmacht Productions
Websites: skuggor.bandcamp.com
Releases Worldwide: February 23rd, 2024

#25 #2024 #AtmosphericBlackMetal #AutumnSDawn #BlackMetal #Coldworld #DSBM #Evilfeast #Feb24 #ForlornCitadel #JudasIscariot #MidnightOdyssey #Mjältsjuka #NaturmachtProductions #PaysageDHiver #Review #Reviews #Skuggor #SwedishMetal #WhispersOfAncientSpells

Hand of Kalliach – Corryvreckan Review

By Eldritch Elitist

I loathe the unspoken limitations of genre qualifiers. I am telling you right now that I’m presenting you with a specimen of melodic death/folk metal. As you read that phrase, your brain probably immediately jumped to Ensiferum. I can’t say I blame you, as Ensiferum was one of the first and arguably the best at hybridizing melodeath and folk music. But that same presumption might lead your expectations towards Hand of Kalliach astray. A Scottish husband and wife duo, Hand of Kalliach is self-described as melodic death metal that is interwoven with Celtic and Gaelic folk music and has been making wholly distinct music defying implied genre confines since 2020. Their yet-brief existence has already spawned an independent EP and LP, and now a sophomore full-length under the Prosthetic Records banner. Swift underground successes and unique sonic signifiers are all well and good, but when it comes to Corryvreckan, does innovation translate to a worthwhile listen?

To some of those expecting more traditional melodeath thrills, the answer may well be “no.” Yet as someone who traditionally prefers melodeath when it sticks to the hits, my answer is nonetheless a resounding “fuck yes.” Hand of Kalliach plays what I can best describe as atmospheric melodic death metal—hammer-on licks dance with crunchy, utilitarian death metal riffs amidst backdrops of ethereal vocals, to borderline hypnotic effect. If I allow myself a crumb of reductiveness, this approach sounds like a hybrid of Amon Amarth’s instrumentation and Sojourner’s spellbinding, Summoning-adjacent aesthetic. Hand of Kalliach nailed this approach with 2021’s Samhainn, and Corryvreckan enshrines the formula as well as any sophomore record ever has. Its writing feels tighter, song-to-song quality is more consistent, and in general, it gives me exactly what I wanted coming off of the preceding Samhainn: more.

While Corryvreckan provides exactly what I hoped, I can’t deny its potential for further refinement. This record may excel through consistency, but in retrospect, Samhainn had brighter highlights. That record’s best songs (“Beneath Starlit Waters” and “Each Uisge”) remain Hand of Kalliach’s most ambitious; Corryvreckan’s “Three Seas” and “Of Twilight and the Pyre” aim for similarly lofty heights, but take a bit too long getting to the point. Corryvreckan’s strengths, then, lie in its short-form material. “Deathless” and “The Cauldron” are masterfully condensed attacks at three minutes apiece, with the former’s knuckle-dragging, fighting game-ready riffs making it my favorite cut of the record. If those superficial thrills were spliced with Samhainn’s towering epics, Corryvreckan could have been the superior record. As-is, I find the two records on equal footing, with differing areas of specialization.

Much of what makes Hand of Kalliach so compelling lies in the contrasting vocal talents of Sophie and John Fraser. The former’s airy, Celtic folk-derived melodies imbue the proceedings with a downright mystical quality, while the latter’s full-throated death metal roars add a significant edge to the already substantial core execution. Together, they make one of the best “beauty and beast” vocal duos I’ve heard. While the vocals are typically lauded as one of Hand of Kalliach’s primary strengths, their engineering jobs are more divisive. Though sorely lacking in dynamism, I kinda love the way this record sounds. Its melodies feel grounded in landscapes and myth, and yet the drums and guitars feel unapologetically synthetic, with the latter’s blunt, sawing tones giving the record a nearly industrial metal vibe. This dichotomy of nature and electricity adds yet another intriguing wrinkle to an already fascinating soundscape.

Bands like Hand of Kalliach are vital to the metal ecosystem, those acts that take a somewhat avant-garde approach in style and songcraft while simultaneously delivering traditional immediacy and pure aggression. I have minor nitpicks with their songwriting – primarily, I wish they’d learn how to end songs in ways that don’t involve an abrupt cutoff – but I remain content, yet ever-curious about how the Frasers’ singular project will evolve going forward. Since I first heard Samhainn, I’ve believed that Hand of Kalliach has a masterpiece tucked away within their craft that will inevitably be unlocked by time and resilience. Corryvreckan may not be revelatory, but it is still a vital step in Hand of Kalliach’s creative journey and solidifies them as one of the most exciting metal bands working today.

Rating: 3.5/5.0
DR: 6 | Format Reviewed: 320 kbps mp3
Label: Prosthetic Records | Bandcamp
Websites: handofkalliach.bandcamp.com | facebook.com/handofkalliach | twitter.com/HKalliach
Releases Worldwide: February 23rd, 2024

#2024 #35 #AmonAmarth #Corryvreckan #Ensiferum #Feb24 #FolkMetal #HandOfKalliach #MelodicDeathMetal #Review #Reviews #ScottishMetal #Sojourner #Summoning