Bigmouth strikes again. Like last post, I’m doing a bit of Housecleaning here, trying to clear the deck(s) before the Real Madness starts. I think these were written during the course of issues 042 to 048 – thus, roughly the past year. Guess it’s important to know where I’m coming from if I’m to figure out where I’m going, right?
And yes, I know Thurston Moore’s now in Twilight: again, these are snapshots of the zeitgeist. Well, kinda. Or maybe my zeitgeist.
FLUSH…
FOSCH
RAIS
NATURA MORTA EDIZIONI
Although there’s no shortage of black metal there, when it comes to the very best of Italian BM purity – I’m primarily thinking Imago Mortis, Sytry, and perhaps Near – there’s a yawning ‘n’ yearning melancholy that characterizes it, or in the case of the brawnier and equally recommended Janvs, a certain windswept-unto-invigorating quality. There’s a bit of melancholy to Fosch as well as a bit of brawn, but together Rais is less than the sum of its parts, rather evoking yawns with its workmanlike, we-don’t-try-harder/we-just-try aesthetic, just blasting away unmindful of whether anyone’s paying attention. Reminds of Handful of Hate, and that’s not a compliment.
2/6
HYPOMANIE
A CITY IN MONO
SUN & MOON/ VALSE SINISTRE
Short, sweet…bittersweet! As you can maybe guess from that descriptive in this magazine from this writer, we’ve got some shoegazing (post-?)black metal on our hands here. But hark! No vocals? Alas, pretty difficult, then, to qualify this as BM-anything, but it does manage to take the usual BMish tropes and turn them gorgeous, skyscraping and (of course) shoegazing. Lotsa peaks and valleys here, but also lotsa predictability, as this quasi/sub-genre’s been packed to the gills lately and the song trajectories are able to be detected a mile away. A niche victory, so take that how you will. I’ll take it heavenward.
4/6
LAKE OF BLOOD
AS TIME AND TIDE ERODES STONE
HUMAN JIGSAW RECORDS
Compared to Servile Sect (reviewed elsewhere), this is “outsider black metal” I can get down with. Maybe it doesn’t go that much "out there" as said band or other loose(r) contemporaries – y’know, folks who have negative Cult Points – but Lake of Blood possess a subtle, claw-raising mysticism and a self-composed raggedness that, in a more-just world, would be praised to no end by the same folks who get boners for anything Black Twilight Circle-related. Vinyl-only release and thus two LP sides, two (LONG) songs or maybe three, but winds and wends through the imagination more than enough to (ahem) take you out there.
4.5/6
MOLOCH
ILLUSIONEN EINES VERLORENEN LEBENS
GLORIOUS NORTH PRODUCTIONS
Warning klaxon ring: this Ukrainian’s got nearly as many albums as Drowning the Light. Similarly one-manned, similarly shambling and blown-out, at least this Moloch’s got something resembling “songs,” or at least BM tropes slightly higher on the evolutionary scale than “sketches.” Wisely, dude keeps ‘em short, the best stuff evoking a sense of vertigo (but just barely…) through gnawing-yet-strangely-noncommittal tension. Last track, too, is a Filosofem’d synth piece that stretches 22 minutes. As a first introduction, Illusionen… might convince you - but again, just barely. Oh, and prolly three more albums out by the time you finish this sentence.
2.5/6
SERVILE SECT
REALMS OF THE QUEEN
ECSTATIC PEACE
Ecstatic Peace is the label of Sonic Youth’s Thurston Moore. This is a sorta-black metal record. Do the math and figure out why he’d release something like this rather than, say, a Proclamation record. As such, the first side’s a slow-builder of circular, ambivalent textures but eventually manages something halfway-menacing by the end: no BM there. Then, along comes the second side, which is nearly all BM: neither-here-nor-there Leviathan worship for the first half which devolves into some pretty cool psych-out. Would be interesting to hear them incorporate the two approaches together, but they also have two LPs preceding this so…
3/6
SXUPERION
SATANIC IDOL WHORESHIP EP
BLOODY MOUNTAIN RECORDS
Selfsame solo-project from the drummer of the amazingly ambivalent Valdur…and it’s bestial?! And, like, bestial metal from the otherwise-barren-for-that-style ‘90s!? Indeed, Satanic Idol Whoreship is far closer to Demoncy’s godly Joined In Darkness or other nasty, turn-of-the-millennium Havohej progeny Sacreligious Torment, Burning Winds, and Thy Feeble Saviour – unapologetically basement production but in an unselfconsciously fuck-off way, topped off by sonic maneuvers cribbed from nascent grindcore – rather than the latent homos pretending to be into Satanic powerlifting who otherwise comprise the modern “bestial” scene. Crucially, too, Sxuperion lathers the swampy, sickening pulse with loads upon cumloads of spiraling lead-guitar: total vertigo, total support.
4.5/6
CLOAK OF ALTERING
THE NIGHT COMES ILLUMINATED WITH DEATH
HUMAN JIGSAW RECORDS
That boy Mories: he’s quickly becoming the new Shatraug, always juggling a thousand projects at once. Mind you, a couple of them – namely Gnaw Their Tongues and De Magia Veterum – already have discographies vast/absurd enough to challenge Drowning the Light or Striborg, but recently the Dutch noisenik has been spreading his creative wings under a greater variety of monikers…even if those same wings flap a fairly similar way. If his most renown “wing” (GNT) has been exhibiting a Blut Aus Nord jones as of late and, in kind, his other main “wings” (DMV and Beast of the Apocalypse) have grown inextricably closer in their vision of black metal, here in Cloak of Altering he lets fly that BAN influence. The crux of this assertion? How those wobbly dubstepping beats stutter for a bit and then it’s jet-fucking-propulsion into outer space and thus spooge forth those dissonant-yet-twinkling (dissonantly twinkling?) melodies that are as much Vindsval as they are Mories; it’s a wild ride, but it’s wildly familiar. Still, if Shatraug can do it…who am I to argue?
4/6
FORTERESSE
CREPESCULE D’OCTOBRE
SEPULCHRAL PRODUCTIONS
Talk about November coming fire: Crepescule d’Octobre finds a Forteresse with a fire lit under their asses! As much as I loved the woozy, Disintegrating spread of preceding LP Par Hauts Bois Et Vastes Plaines, I can really get onboard and get gone with this. The production’s raw yet full, cold yet warm, really laying the foundation for these songs to take flight. And take flight they do, most of ‘em anchored by the Fenriz blast (y’know: that trademarked galloping blastbeat) but deftly shifting speeds and thus dynamic contours as the raging riffing swells and swells, the mysticism cresting as a clean(er) guitar figure is overlaid and a majestic melody is driven into your cranium, soul, psyche, wherever…whew. Like I said, it’s a rush. Ironically enough, aside from the two-minute intro, two of the songs here are seven minutes long and the other three top nine, so it’s a very good thing those riffs/melodies are as involved/involving as they are; they’re perfect for just laying back and letting go or, conversely, getting up and going away. …Someone give me a smoke…
5/6
SEGES FINDERE
PROCLAMATION OF BLOOD VENGEANCE + MASSACRE SUPREMACISTA
OLD CEMETERY RECORDS / DEATHCAMP DISTRIBUTION
The lads in Seges Findere saw my recent review of their Terrorist Warfare collection and thought I could do better, so here we are with their most recent full-length, Proclamation Of Blood Vengeance, and a reissue of their first, Massacre Supremacista. Actually, I had reviewed that debut LP upon its initial release, and a couple years later, I’m finding it much better than I remember it: moving between hammering goatgrind and miasmic D-beat, kinda like if Ugra-Karma-era Impaled Nazarene sprung forth from the womb of Brazil (yes, Seges Findere are Brazilian), the production thick and luxurious – at least for something so gnarly – and drawing forth every red-eyed/blackout nuance (again, relatively speaking). Strange, then, that Proclamation is more “normalized” despite being much more monomaniacally one-dimensional. It’s as if the duo decided to get with the game but really didn’t now what the game was – canned old-school Brazilian blackness? speedy ‘n’ sterile black/death? primitive elevation that’s not even reaching? – the production really doing them no favors, just flat and mechanistic in the pejorative sense(s). Or put another way, it all sounds “aggressive,” but it doesn’t have the fire of its predecessor. A couple keepers in the bunch, though, and a cool (albeit short) noise track. Again, I still stand by the opinion that those first five (BONKERS) songs on Terrorist Warfare are the band’s best – Seges Findere, I’ll be keeping my beady eyes on you.
2/6 + 3.5/6 respectively
SORGELDOM
…FROM OUTER INTELLIGENCES + VITHATTEN
FROSTCALD RECORDS
So, last year’s Inner Receivings turned the heads of this writer and many others, and now we’re presented with two newly released Sorgeldom full-lengths. Of the pair here, …From Outer Intelligences is far closer in sound (not to mention visually: the color and non-BMness of the album cover vs. the monochromatic cultness of Vithatten’s is strikingly parallel to the band’s preceding pair of LPs – sonically speaking, too, but there’s some truth here…ANYWAY) to the widescreen splendor of Receivings. Melodies hang dreamily and then dissipate or alternately bubble up from the frantic, near-chaotic clatter to soften the surge of the wreckage, only to whisper of memories to come (or long gone), the spiral tight but not tense; or put another way, it’s a far more “balanced” version of its predecessor, an assessment which might go either way, depending your vantage point. Vithatten, going back to that “truth” I just mentioned, goes the unapologetically purist route, both in songwriting and production: the former forest-bound but stressed-out and yet more than a bit mystical, the latter very “live” and “in the garage” but also lively and sacrificing not one whit of clarity. It’s interesting to note that Intelligences was written/recorded over the course of a year and a half while Vithatten was accomplished in merely a day…can’t argue with such diabolical creativity, innit. Put together, then, nowhere near as immediately awe-inspiring as said 2010 tome, but jointly there exist plenty of riches to be plundered.
4/6 for both
GRAFVOLLUTH
LONG LIVE DEATH!
REGIMENTAL RECORDS
If this were an actual vinyl record – y’know, so that you could drop an actual needle on its playing surface – and you dropped the needle at various points on either of its sides, you’d be within reason to think it was a pan-genre compilation. A gorgeous solo-piano elegy, lay-back-in-sun shoegaze, mulching PE, squelchy tribal pulse, old-school Polish BM – actually, alotta old-school Polish BM inna most Infernum stylee – and then lots of varied approaches within that…Grafvolluth’s got it all. And surprisingly enough, play Long Live Death! from front to back and the synthesis is nearly seamless, the rise and fall (and rise again) quite dramatic for black metal of such a seemingly purist nature, the journey winding and windy, wobbling and wobbly. It’s crazy to think, though, that this is driven by hatred (or general negativity: whichever) as so much BM is. Hatred is such a black-and-white thing that no other colours are allowed in the spectrum, and this record – sorry, CD – encompasses many colours. So either the dudes behind Grafvolluth are Rainbow Warriors (prolly the most “‘black metal” thing one could do/be – y’know, anti-life) or their conception of “hatred” is a perversely colorful one or they merely have a mischievous sense of (musical) humor…I can’t figure it out. And frankly, I don’t want to: I’m really digging the freedom Long Live Death! is affording me.
4.5/6
DEMONCY
ENTHRONED IS THE NIGHT
FOREVER PLAGUED
Ok, disregarding that Enthroned Is The Night took nearly a decade to see release after its initial announcement (alongside Empire Of The Fallen Angel, which was released back in 2003) and all the bitching from the secret-squares who otherwise pass for the Black Metal Public that this is no Joined In Darkness Pt II, this once-mythic record is actually really fucking great. I was NOT expecting a Joined In Darkness Pt II because that’s utterly unrealistic; few albums, past or present, will be able to touch that record, by and large the birthplace of “bulldozer burl” in BM. I was expecting a record with more uniqueness or at least more personality than its aforementioned Blah City sorta-counterpart, and Enthroned definitely delivers on that front: ritualistic in its hypnotism, kinda bulldoze-burling but more so slithering in a manner most Necromantia-ic, mainman Ixithra’s Ledney-referencing whisper-unto-hiss vox superbly complementing that aura of sewer-dredging sin. And taken in one sitting, that aura’s engrossing and arguably puts this record as the runner-up in the Demoncy discography. But repeated listens? Too samey in structuring, length – no distinct songs vs. somebody like, say, Inquisition (Bulldozer Burl Royalty right there). Get in the right mood, though, and this can work six(-six-six) wonders.
4/6
ALARIC/ATRIARCH
SPLIT LP
SEVENTH RULE
Sometime last year, maybe earlier, I was calling for a moratorium on the use of “deathrock” by/in the metal press. The word was being thrown around all willy-nilly, by dudes who’d never heard a proper deathrock record in their sheltered-journo lives, as shorthand for “I think I heard Neurosis’ cover of Joy Division’s ‘Day Of The Lords’ or something.” Yeah, something: step aside, posers. Anyway, the record that really got under my skin on that very topic was Atriarch’s debut album, which was supposedly “deathrock” but most certainly was not – not bad, just blackened doom and nothing to really write home about. Well, I’d like to write to you, now, that the first of Atriarch’s two songs here is honest-to-goodness deathrock, reminding of Screams For Tina hypothetically covering Rudi-P: pretty massive, and pretty fucking sweet. Their other song’s a swirling, push/push/push psych-BM epic, and that’s pretty fucking sweet, too. And Alaric? They can do no wrong, as their Laughter Of The Crows was one of last year’s very best albums. Here, their three songs take a decidedly more somber approach, and all the better for it. Altogether? Essential.
5/6
P.H.O.B.O.S.
ATONAL HYPERMNESIA
MEGATON MASS
After two miasmic smokestacks of visionary industrial-doom, cracks are starting to appear in the greater smokestack of P.H.O.B.O.S. It’s starting to show its age and wear, and the rust that once made it so visionary/visual is now eating away at its foundation, weakening its ability to pump out billowing, bilious clouds of pestilence. It’s odd, Atonal Hypermnesia: it sounds (and looks) like P.H.O.B.O.S., but there’s something disconcertedly off here. All the same rudiments are in place, and it’d be inaccurate to say that the one-man wrecking crew of Frederic Sacri no longer sounds like the shock to the system he did with Anoedipal and especially the Tectonics debut…but it might be getting closer to the truth. The biggest problem here is that, unlike the similarly styled Author & Punisher record reviewed elsewhere in this issue, the more pronounced use of space seems lazy at worst, ill-conceived at best: it’s just kinda there, filling space rather than creating any, going nowhere, and slowly. And while the sound of apocalyptic inertia was once thrilling in the hands of Sacri, he’s definitely got better in him – at least, I hope.
2.5/6
PINKISH BLACK
S/T
HANDMADE BIRDS
Ok, so you know how I’m calling for that moratorium on the use of “deathrock” in/by the metal press? Here’s one where not only does that (very specific) subgenre tag get thrown around in the press release, but thee immortal Birthday Party are also referenced. Should I throw a shit-fit? Y’know, since I could animatedly talk your ear off (without you even asking, mind) about what anal-retentively constitutes a “Birthday Party-influenced” band? I won’t, and will simply say this: do not believe it, comrades. However, as a band influenced by Birthday Party-influenced bands? Definitely yes. A more hyperactive/less locked-in The VSS quickly comes to mind, and also an all-male JAKS, or any other gothy post-HC bands from the mid/late ‘90s (Spanakorzo, Ink & Dagger, Party of Helicopters, Song of Zarathustra, Death of Marat, an all-male Love Life, pre-gypsy Get Hustle, pre-Blues Hammer VUE, super-early Hot Hot Heat…I’ve got all day!). To Pinkish Black’s credit, their synths are more swarming, the stuttering thrust thicker yet sinewy; their songs are spacey yet lacking sex, but still strong. If I didn’t know any better – and again, I rarely do – I was back at university. Score is VERY relative to how soft a spot I have for this sub-subgenre: proceed with caution.
4.5/6
EREVOS
DESCENSUS AD INFEROS
ORKESTRAL PROMENADE
The thing with (even-vaguely) symphonic black metal is, it’s gotta either be gritty, possess some truly otherworldly vibe, or at the very least grandstand with Very Metal values. The first two routes have given us some great sympho-BM over the years while the lattermost route ultimately gets you an identikit Festival Tent band that wants to be post-Deathkult Dimmu but, try as they may, only on a far-smaller scale. After some nearly gritty demos and single, Greeks Erevos mostly arrive at that Lattermost Route with the nevertheless-well-executed Descensus Ad Inferos. A bit of it has an “otherworldly vibe” if you close your eyes, but open ‘em and you’re in a Eurofest tent…and you’d rather be elsewhere.
2/6
IN GOLDEN TEARS
UNDERNEATH THE BALANCE 7”
HUMMING/ROUGH TRADE
For those of you reading between said lines (or referencing my Grave Babies review elsewhere), I’ve been pretty forthright in my admittance of/predilection for new music that sounds like old music: in this case, post-punk. Post-punk or no, though, a song like “Underneath The Balance” should be absolutely fucking HUGE. It should be played on the radio, in malls, at football matches – fucking EVERWHERE – and it wouldn’t lose a whit of importance/impact; it’s positively gorgeous, a continuous cascade of heart-throbbing guitar and rhythm. Then again, I thought stylistic forefathers Interpol should’ve been huge, so maybe you see where I’m coming from…. A nearly perfect single either way.
5.5/6
MYSTERIIS
HELLSURRECTION
HEAVY METAL ROCK
Everything about this initially screamed Bargain Basement: crappy title, clunky label name, identikit cover, zero discussion about it amongst Respected Folks, etc. Well, imagine my surprise when “Nazarene Shall Fall” kicked in after a bombastic, soundtrack-worthy intro. Ascending-the-spires riffery, orgasmic soloing, a subtle fog of synths, crazy-ass drop-out drum-fills, a shimmering surge worthy of second-gen Hellenic BM…absolute excitement! The rest of the record stays fairly honest to that template, but that kind of black metal really gets my blood boiling, and taken as a whole, Hellsurrection maintains a serviceable balance between medieval ‘90s BM and trashier constructs (a Patria member’s involved). Return voyages await.
3.5/6
TELOCH
DESCENT-ASCEND
DESCENDING TOWARDS DAMNATION
I know I have a serious bias toward Finnish UGBM, but seriously: when black metal’s this good, and so consistently so from one country, how can you not support that bias? Firmly within Finland’s new(er) breed of mystical, stargazing BM (Verge, Rahu, Cosmic Church et al), Teloch not surprisingly feature a couple ex-Verge members, and their sound’s not entirely dissimilar in its blearily emotive surge. On this MCD, that surge generally takes the form of a patient, simmering down-tempo or a more standard Finn-filthy gallop; their ability to mix ‘em up within an equally engaging soundfield is sterling, but the slower sections really kick the misery past 11. More, please!
4/6
BURNING LOVE
ROTTEN THING TO SAY
SOUTHERN LORD
Chris Colohan is hardcore’s Renaissance Man. From the most authentically vicious straight-edge crew (Left for Dead) to crusty metalcore at least a decade before that got played out (The Swarm) to the first band that did Swedeath-gone-D-beat (Cursed) – which is, of course, still being played out – the man looks set to create some new trends here with Burning Love. I’d never heard Burning Love’s debut album, but knowledgable sources say that Rotten Thing To Say is leagues beyond that. From the first note in, there’s no mistaking the direction: grimy, gritty Motor City ROCK as played by HC veterans. Now, I know our boy Cormac O'Síocháin will argue the Poison Idea-via-Turbonegro angle, but their Laughing Hyenas cover on a preceding 7” says volumes about the bad-time/broke-down aim here. And from there, they rock the fuck out, stripping r 'n' r of any fun, good cheer, just any bullshit and drive straight into the heart of darkness with the force of nine-pound hammer (see what I did there?). Granted, Rotten Thing To Say is not without precedent in the hardcore world (Jesuseater nearly a decade back, and The Hope Conspiracy were sorta going in that direction before they split up), but here, I think that Burning Love just might’ve perfected the form. And I know Colohan’s a straight-edge lifer – and maybe the rest of the band are, too? – but such down-on-the-street depravity really can only come from nights spent out on the drink/drugs. Or maybe clean-living folk are more in touch with their degeneracy than we suspect?
5/6
DROWNING THE LIGHT
THE OBSCURE WORSHIP CHRONICLES (PARTS 1-4)
VERSETS NOIR
This will likely be sold out by the time you read this, but you really ain’t missing much. Much as this writer’s become quite obsessed with DTL post-2009, and as much as I’d like to hear mainman Azgorh tackle more purely ambient tracks, this is mostly an unlistenable mess. But that’s prolly the point: much like the Black Legions Projects after which most of this is patterned, Azgorh goes nuts with all manner of sound, mostly from manipulated synth and voice. At times, a glimmer of bittersweet melody creeps in with a sepia-toned hue, the triumphant-yet-forlorn note-choices suggesting a deep-seated understanding of classic NES music. But other times – which is to say, most of the time – the explosion of tones and the twist of knobs (and patience/pain thresholds) seems to be Azgorh’s guiding principle. Or maybe it’s just me? Dunno, but don’t go expecting DTL’s characteristically cascading black metal, because this is far, FAR away from that – and also far, far away from Stock Black Metal Album Intro territory. Listen to it enough and you can certainly pick out some clusters worth keeping.
2/6
BLOOD RED FOG
DEATH CULT I + DEATH CULT II
SATURNIAN PRODUCTIONS
Arguably Finnish black metal’s best-kept secret (the other: Rahu), Blood Red Fog return with two tape mini-albums, Death Cult I and II. Their by-now-characteristic template’s firm yet focused – rolling, tumbling rhythms buttressed by spiraling-into-sadness lead-lines and nearly-as-spirasling howls from caverns unknown – with the recording dually raw yet robust, those melodies imbued with a darker hue when transposed onto such a gritty(er) soundfield. Some uptempo moments abound, but otherwise it’s a return to misery + comfort. Would be interesting to hear them let said lead-lines really shred in an ‘80s way…personal request anyway. Together, hardly a watershed moment, but a strong holding-pattern release nevertheless.
both 4/6
DRUG CHURCH
S/T 7”
NO SLEEP
The accompanying press-material referenced Jawbox, Kerosene 454, and maybe Bluetip, which was more than enough to set my heart racing. Sure enough, I can hear all those, and more, in Drug Church’s post-hardcore rock. But want an even-more-enticing soundbite? (that is, if said bands haven’t mystified the lot of you enough by now) Hypothetically, think later Naked Raygun fronted by Choke from Slapshot. YES! It goes down a storm, too, the stutter ‘n’ thrust grooves kicking copious non-metal ass in strict-yet-fluid lockstep. But it’s “Latham Circle” which is personally the Hit Of The Summer – go check it out on their Bandcamp. If you have any taste at all, you won’t be able to stop playing it.
4.5/6
EKADZATI
S/T
MILAM
It’d be not entirely inaccurate to say that this tape is one of the worst things I’ve heard in a while. Really, this sounds like any of the thousands of one-man black metal “bands” who clogged up Myspace during the mid-Noughties: guitar barely in tune, feebly “surging” and aimlessly, looking for a “riff” (or some semblance thereof) in the dark but without even a flashlight, bargain-basement Midi for “drums,” and vocals similarly run through a laptop mic. In other words, total kiddie poof that simply annoys (half-point if that was indeed the aim). The accompanying press-material says that this “hint(s) at the rattling darkness of esoteric Buddhism” – do not believe it, comrade.
0.5/6
NORDOR
ERGA OMNES
DEATHRUNE
What the hell happened here?! After the inscrutably idiosyncratic monument of black/death mysticism that was 2008’s Honoris Causa, we get…THIS?! It’s like a completely different band, one completely shorn of its ancient Hellenic roots: well-played, well-produced, but utterly devoid of soul (again, in the context of said roots) like Regain-era Grave, where they’re trying to catch up with the modern DM zeitgeist rather than setting their own. Seriously, if you had told me this was the Greek Nordor, I would’ve slapped you for blasphemy. Just a shame…some wires surely crossed. For what it’s worth, though, cool intro by Chris from Septic Flesh.
2/6
SHIA-IXA
CHAOS VOODOO MAGICK
PAVITRA KUNTA
A tape of elevated-consciousness primitivism from this new Finnish horde. Imagine a mad(cap) blender of the best/worst excesses of Vondur, Havohej, Gonkulator, early Countess, even a spiritual whiff of Vampyr-era Black Funeral - sounds pretty enticing in theory, right? And in practice, it mostly works: lotsa eerie/unsettling clanging ‘n’ buzzing, vox ranging whispers to shrieks to gurgles to chants, instrumentation (relatively) varied for black metal but always in service of ritualism. Yet, methinks that any longer than the 16 minutes here and it’d be too much of TOO MUCH. Chaos Voodoo Magick is a fitting title, then, and I look forward to further spells.
4.5/6
ARCTIC CIRCLE
TO MANIFEST
SELF-RELEASED
The last time I checked in with Arctic Circle, 2010’s Fur & Feathers, I was feeling a bit blasé about their blackthrashing miasma; possessing more unreleased/rare demos of this band than is imaginable, perhaps I was a bit spoiled. But time has been kind, to both these enigmas and especially my appreciation thereof, as this self-released album is sounding particularly fresh despite simply consolidating AC’s characteristic strengths: riffs that hum ‘n’ buzz in a not-quite-major-chorded way but too blissed-out to be qualified as “dark,” rhythms that chaotically cycle through both blackthrash and the tribal, and song-structures that disintegrate subtly but then explode back into being, difference here being more Metal Moments, albeit subverted in a sly-but-never-smirking manner. There’s really no one else out there who sounds like Arctic Circle (still!), so that should be celebrated infinitely. Cover kinda makes sense, too.
4/6
DEAD RIVER RUNS DRY
WINTER 2012
SELF-RELEASED
New black metal band here featuring ubiquitous Aussie Dan Nahum (Azmoth, Greed & Rapacity, Bleakwood et al) and guitarist Byron Struck, of the late/great Oracle of the Void. Like Nahum’s other crews, there’s a recoil/release/rewind approach to songcraft here that drives its potency. Difference this time, though, is that there’s a diabolical swing to their attack, a certain lilting/levitational buoyancy despite its obviously aggressive, blastbeaten nature. Characteristically, enviable chops are utilized but always in service of the song: “The Weapon Black” indeed. Kinda makes up for Greed & Rapacity’s recent, rather-naff Loki Bound – nice one, Dan!
5/6
GRAVESIDESERVICE
MASTERS IN LUNACY
SELF-RELEASED
I want to like this…and for the most part, I can get down with it. High drama, of the Hammer horror variety, is the watchword here. Musically, imagine a hell-spawned abomination of mid-period Mortuary Drape, pre-detour Master’s Hammer, and demo-era Cradle of Filth, but bumbling ‘n’ stumbling and oscillating wildly. There’s songs here, sure, but said wobbliness hinders or helps depending on the task at hand – lotsa piano, as well, which is nice. So, GSS seem to have their (unique) identity in place, but just don’t know how to express it mostly effectively yet; I’ll be paying attention. Oh, and Xasthur plays bass here, too, oddly enough.
3/6
