Edison Lot and Rams Head photos by Levan TK by Levan TK. Follow Levan on Instagram at @levan_tk
Soundstage photos by Blair Hopkins
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In my first Maryland Deathfest write up I expressed a collective disappointment with the festival’s setlist. I saw people complain both in discussions on the internet and observed firsthand in Baltimore. I don’t share that sentiment completely. On Friday May 27, at least, the festival was stacked from 3pm to 1:30am. So stacked, in fact, that Friday cast a shadow over the remainder of the weekend.
Many of Friday’s big draws played on one of the two large Edison lot stages, with bass-heavy mixes meant to carry their sound over long distances while audiences watch in sweltering heat. It’s a tough stage to succeed on. But Horrendous did. Their throwback take on old school death metal centers on the sound of Death, and guitarist/vocalist Damian Herring does a great Chuck Schuldiner impression. In fact they pull off the Death sound so well that I felt free to not check out Gruesome later at the fest. Their set focused on their critically acclaimed recent album Anareta but still made room for “Ripped to Shreds” from their debut album The Chills.
Similarly retrospective, Centinex played the first of many Swedish death metal sets of the weekend. Their fast, hooky take on the genre inspired the first large circle pit I saw that weekend, and they made a decent splash with new songs from their upcoming album Doomsday Rituals. “Sentenced to Suffer” in particular went over well.
Novembers Doom had a tough time following up. Their longer and gloomy gothic metal songs might have gone over better at Rams Head. It’s tough to take a song like “Rain” seriously while watching everyone around you’s skin peel in the sun. For a band that writes excellent ballads, the choice to only play “Just Breathe” might have been a missed opportunity. The crowd seemed more receptive to its lovesickness than other attempts to out-rumble the previous acts.
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The award for exceeding expectations goes to Spain’s Wormed. Their hyper-produced sci fi death metal isn’t MDF’s usual fare, but Wormed play against type. They sound like they belong on Sumerian but released their last album, Khrigsu, on Season of Mist. Singer and frontman J.L. “Phlegeton” Rey squeals like a brutal slam singer, but emotes with wild, hand-gesturing quirks while performing. One time he appeared to mime a Kamehameha wave, and though it’s dorky the Dragonball Z effect works. Wormed sound like they tried to imagine what a metal band from the world of Ghost in the Shell or Akira would sound like and simply made that band in all its warp-speed ridiculousness. In turn, the crowd responded with equal absurdity.
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Compared to such futurism, Khold kind of sounded like if ’70s Aerosmith tried to form a black metal band, and I mean that in the best way. While I’m no huge fan of the band on record, their sound definitely works in the live setting. Huge blues chords and pick slides give their music a stomp and sexuality that too often black metal lacks. They picked a good time to begin playing the states: we are in sore need of black metal with this kind of entertainment appeal.
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In need of shade, and after hearing that Sinister had dropped from the bill with Gruesome taking over their slot, I trekked to the soundstage for a front row view of UK grind outfit The Afternoon Gentlemen, and I’m happy with that decision because they rip. With just enough crossover thrash in their sound to keep things from feeling too brief, even though most of their songs top out at a minute. The band invited stagedive after stagedive. Better, they persevered through sound issues which rendered one guitarist completely inaudible for the second half of their set. All the better to hear how killer their ’80s thrash bass tone is.
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I enjoyed myself so much at Soundstage that I missed the beginning of The Haunted’s set. I have a tight knot of opinions about this set. I love The Haunted, especially with Marco Aro. I’m aware that’s hardly in-line with the critical mainstream of heavy metal, but I stand by their first two albums and have a tremendous soft spot for rEVOLVEr. Hence my consternation that I missed “99” and “No Compromise” at the beginning of their set, and stood still through a bunch of songs which I almost always skip over. They played well, and Aro seemed comfy back in the captain’s chair after the departure of Peter Dolving, but they didn’t play many of the songs that made me a fan. Sure, they closed with “Bury Your Dead” and “Hatesong,” but by that time I had already decided that I wanted to get good and close for Paradise Lost.
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It’s not possible for me to give an unbiased opinion of Paradise Lost’s set. Nick Holmes, Gregor Mackintosh and company remain one of my favorite bands, period. I found myself next to fellow Paradise Lost superfan Albert Mudrian near the front, and I’m pretty sure the pair of us blew out our vocal cords screaming along to their set of mostly very old songs, including “As I Die” and “Rapture”. Choice cuts from last year’s The Plague Within rounded out the set. The band, and singer Nick Holmes in particular, has a small reputation for low-key live performances, but that’s not what I witnessed. My only complaint, however, is that a slightly late start cut the band’s set short by one song, and while “Beneath Broken Earth” is a bold ending, it’s also a somewhat anticlimactic one. As I remarked after their show, I could have watched them play for another hour and not been bored for a second. With any luck their reception at this set will set up a US headlining tour in the near future.
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I expected a little disappointment from Samael’s performance of their entire Ceremony of Opposites album. The band has played this set before at other festivals to lackluster reviews. What I saw sounded pretty good, though. “Black Trip” is a hell of an opening song, and its percussive assault shot me awake just as exhaustion and post-Paradise Lost depression began to take hold. I can’t comment further, because halfway through “Celebration of the Fourth” I received a text message:
“Dude. Are you at Soundstage?”
“No.”
“Get over here. Magrudergrind are killing it.”
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My friend’s words were true. Magrudergrind’s pit looked like a crew of refugees fighting to clamor onto a departing lifeboat. It was an absolute riot, so much so that I was too intimidated to elbow my way to the front. That didn’t stop Infest vocalist Joe Denunzio, who screamed a song with the D.C. grind trio and then took his own turn stagediving.
I enjoy listening to grindcore, but often struggle with articulating exactly how one particular band exceeds at the genre. Magrudergrind do it well, but don’t stray far from the tried and true tropes of the genre. So what about them inspires people to cause such havoc? It may have something to do with vocalist Avi Kulawy, who projects a stylized masculine intensity without it seeming like a put-on. He looked genuinely pissed, but not in an overly confrontational way. You just kind of want to be pissed alongside him. That kind of audience-artist connection is hard to follow.
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Having already seen Mayhem, and not particularly enjoying De Mysteris Dom Sathanas (I’m a Grand Declaration of War/Wolfs Lair Abyss kinda guy), I opted to stay at Soundstage for more grind fun. Rotten Sound didn’t get quite the same crowd response (I imagine some of the pit regulars were licking their wounds) but put on at least as good of a set. I opted to hang to the side and get a good view of drummer Sami Latva, whose crisp blasting is usually one of my favorite parts of Rotten Sound’s composition. Rightly the band’s set list focused on songs from Latva’s tenure, especially their most recent album Abuse to Suffer and 2011’s Cursed. I was impressed enough to buy a ticket to see them again in Seattle this coming weekend.
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After all of the up-close-and-personal grind, seeing Angelcorpse from a distance away at Rams Head didn’t stimulate me so much. It didn’t help that their constant machine gun sound can get a bit repetitive and, eventually, exhausting, which seems to be the point. Angelcorpse might have made a better daytime set.
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Edison Lot and Rams Head photos by Levan TK
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Upcoming Metal Releases 11/5/2017-11/11/2017
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End of the quarter and...year-end-list-writing season. It's like my sanity has a target painted on its chest.
Here are the new metal releases for the week of November 5, 2017 – November 11, 2017. Release dates are formatted according to proposed North American scheduling, if available. Expect to see the bulk of these records on shelves or distros on Friday unless otherwise noted or if labels and artists get impatient. Blurbs and designations are based on whether or not I have a lot to say about it.
See something we missed? Goofs? Let us know in the comments. Plus, as always, feel free to post your own shopping lists. Happy digging.
As a little bit of a challenge, include your own opinion about anything you want to add. Make me want to listen to it!Please note: this is a review column and is not speculative. Any announced albums without preview material will not be covered. Additionally, any surprise releases which are uploaded or released after this column is published will be excluded.
send Jon your promos at [email protected]. Do not bother him on social media.
As if flat-packed, The Mirror Void assembles itself inside listeners’ heads instead of outside of their ears. Similar to how white noise can sometimes aid sleep and rest, Nekrasov aids not only wakefulness, but also self-awareness, through forcibly exchanging your stream of consciousness with the music itself.
Electric Wizard - Wizard Bloody Wizard | Spinefarm Records | Doom Metal | England
I find it odd to be so excited for an Electric Wizard album after being disappointed for so long. Now, ten years removed from Witchcult Today (the last time I truly enjoyed an Electric Wizard album), it seems Jus and Liz quite literally "found their groove" again. Billed as "21st Century Funeral Boogie," Wizard Bloody Wizard's classic "doomed Jefferson Airplane" doomrock jams do boogie, and at an exceedingly slow pace. Psychedelics were more proficient than 'lludes in the days of weird hippies and black masses, so the sluggish, weird take on the style is refreshing, if a little draining. I don't think I'll ever find another album quite like Dopethrone, not that I'd want its singular nature to be ruined, but Electric Wizard's heavy renaissance is a-okay, too.
Hornwood Fell - My Body, My Time | Avantgarde Music | Avant-Garde Black Metal | Italy
Sweet, bizarre black metal. I'm such a sucker for it, which is bolstered by my near monthly declarations of adoration for the first use of "post-black metal" as a genre tag. Hornwood Fell finds a center, lost somewhere between much more conventionally modern, atmospheric black metal and the half-sung orations of vocalist Marco Basili. Of course, creative music is all that I can expect from a member of the unsung Kailash and Hastur.
[T]his French death metal group is nowhere near as sprawling as Nile, but they aim for the same blast-happy, globetrotting scope on “La Leyenda Negra,” the first single from their upcoming Seasons Of Mist debut, La Caída De Tonatiuh. The song feels much shorter than its five-minute runtime, but doesn’t sacrifice its ambitions for the sake of accessibility. Key to the song’s momentum are a pair of riffs that make up its chorus. One focuses on a dialogue between acoustic shredding and a slick, full-band syncopated pattern. The other is much simpler: a mean, mugging, palm-muted beast of a riff that only gets heavier each time they return to it. Instead of just alternating between these sections, Impureza string together unique transitions from part to part, featuring off-the-chain guitar solos and melodic turn arounds accented by clean vocals.
Auðn - Farvegir fyrndar | Season of Mist | Atmospheric Black Metal | Iceland
This is the kind of black metal I hear in my head when someone utters the phrase "Icelandic black metal." My romanticizing of Iceland as this mysterious, ancient place evokes equally spacious and ethereal music. Though Auðn definitely resides on the more "inoffensive" end of the atmospheric black metal spectrum, there is certainly nothing wrong with their music.
A Pale December - The Shrine Of Primal Fire | Avantgarde Music | Atmospheric Black Metal | Italy
A Bandcamp review cited these guys as a "rebirth of Agalloch," and I can't fully discredit that. A Pale December certainly follows Agalloch's expansion on the "dark metal" template from the early/mid '90s Finnish scene (rocking rhythms, morose, melodic, keyboards, etc), but have a few tricks up their sleeves. I guess hearing this kind of music with a larger musical sense and performed with a practiced hand makes for a more unique experience. Part of me is filled with an immense nostalgia, sort of. Certainly a nice effort.
Desolate Shrine - Deliverance from the Godless Void | Dark Descent Records | Death Metal | Finland
Someone once listed off a few things here, long ago in the comments: "Finland, check. Death metal, check. Dark Descent, check." That should answer all of your questions and set your level of expectation, really.
Infaust - Verblichen | Eisenwald Tonschmiede | Black Metal | Germany
Classic Germanic black metal in that wonderfully epic, feral style. Infaust truly never lets up, and, much like their musical lineage, utilizes uniquely horrific voice sounds. There are waldteufel outside the warmth and safety of town. Do not stray into the deep woods.
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FROM THE GRAVE
Hypothermia - Veins | War Against Yourself | Depressive Black Metal | SwedenHypothermia - Köld | War Against Yourself | Depressive Black Metal | SwedenHypothermia - Självdestruktivitet född av monotona tankegångar III | War Against Yourself | Depressive Black Metal | Sweden
I feel a nostalgia for this era of "depressive black metal." Before Kim Carlsson started dabbling with post-rock and made repetitive, droning black metal minimalism. It's nice to see labels giving these modern relics the proper reissue treatment.
Metallica - Master of Puppets Box Set | Blackened Recordings | Thrash Metal | United States
You might be thinking, "Oh shit yeah, a huge coffee table box set of Master of Puppets demos and ephemera!" However, maybe look into how SEVEN of the ten discs are live recordings. Kind of makes you question the $150 retail tag, huh?
Mortiis - Født til å herske | Foreign Sounds | Ambient/Darkwave ("Dungeon Synth") | Norway
Decades before the "dungeon synth" tag, there was Mortiis.
For all the Thangorodrims and Old Towers out there, maybe it's time we sit back and remember the true master of this eerie, castle-like ambiance. I remember hearing this when I was 15 or so and just being blown away at how bombastic one man can be with a cheap keyboard.
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OTHER RELEASES
Sinsaenum - Ashes | earMusic | Black/Death Metal | France/United States/Hungary
The odd supergroup of Sinsaenum, which boasts current and former members of Dragonforce, Slipknot, and Mayhem (among others) still misses its mark. There isn't really much to grasp onto, and it seems that Leclercq tries so hard to shed his power metal influence that the music dips into the uncanny valley. It doesn't work.
Ah Ciliz/Chiral - Origins | Hypnotic Dirge Records | Depressive Black Metal | United States/Italy
Depressive black metal splits seem like this weird anachronism in 2017. I recall a time in which these things dominated the download blog platform up until about eight or nine years ago. Luckily, none of this stuff is bad in the "we made post-rock and moaned over it" sort of way (see: most new "DSBM"), but I don't feel an affinity with these new projects like I did before. I guess it's a place, age, and time type of thing. Catch you on the flip side, I'm off to listen to Wehmut again.
Vhäldemar - Against All Kings | Fighter Records | Power Metal | Spain
Put on your sturdiest battle armor, it's fucking power metal time! None of this stuff is bad, it's just a matter of taste. Disliking it is in bad taste.
(DOLCH) - III - Songs of Happiness, Words of Praise | Van Records | Psychedelic Doom Metal | Germany
So most "hypnotic, old school doomrock" doesn't really do it for me, but for some odd reason (DOLCH)'s buzzing is absolutely bewitching. See, music which truly captures the mythic ideals espoused is what is truly magical.
Witchery - I Am Legion | Century Media Records | Blackened Thrash/Speed Metal | Sweden
Interesting to hear these guys are still billed under the thrash/speed banner, because Witchery's latest is...pretty stellar, if a little derived, Immortal worship. I have to admit, it is super weird listening to this and knowing Sharlee D'Angelo is taking part in a black metal record.
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Live Report: Krallice, Yautja & Pyrrhon @ H0l0
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What are the limits of control? How much power can you exert over an audience before they are simply incapable of responding? I imagine people don't like to think of music this way, but live performances are a low level form of hypnotism. A group of musicians, through volume, tone, and rhythm, will force you to move through the world according to their rules until they step off stage.
H0l0, a hip, literally underground nightclub in Ridgewood, New York, isn't subtle in corralling its patrons. A sign hanging near the bathrooms reads "put away your phones," and the room's array of pillars forces crowd to bunch and bump into each other. Even the prickly, self-selecting "smart folks" who come to see "brainy" technical metal bands were quickly forced to be social. That is, until they could scowl in semi-darkness when the music started.
Pyrrhon, a Brooklyn/Philly death metal band that have received plenty of love in these parts, seem to relish walking the thin line between control and chaos. Their music is incredibly specific: eters change rapidly and without warning, songs spiral out into blistering noise at the drop of a hat. Whether by design or happenstance, just as they have you believing you're lost in the weeds, these weirdos always snap into recognizable patterns. As their music defies any conventional physical reaction, vocalist Doug Moore's confrontational stage presence is essential to the band's live performance. Without someone reaffirming the music's relation to human life, Pyrrhon would be almost unbearably obtuse. Instead, they nail a very specific emotion; they are music for when the rational gives way to instinctual aggression. This is fight-or-flight death metal, and Moore forces physical aggression. Of course, trying to ride the band's nonstop rhythmic fuckery is half the fun. Pyrrhon create a space where giving yourself over to madness isn't just accepted, it's encouraged.
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Yautja, while equally proficient as musicians, take a much different tact. No matter how far they stretch into the unknown, drummer Tyler Coburn keeps the band locked into to an unerring grid. Coburn, much like with Cloud Rat's Brandon Hill and Sumac's Nick Yacyshyn, is one of the best metal drummers of the '10s. You could set your clock to him, even when he leaves wide open spaces in Yautja's music, he re-enters so precisely you'd think he has a metronome running into his monitor. Don't be mistaken, however, H0l0 is far from providing in-ear monitors to its performers. Quite the opposite, Yautja suffered from a case of "disappearing soundman," leaving their pleas for more stage lighting ("We're not that mysterious") to fall on deaf ears. They also dealt with a malfunctioning snare drum which stubbornly refused to get in tune, and instead got stuck at a Candiria-esque high pitched clang. While this was doubtlessly frustrating to the performers themselves, it added a throwback charm to their hyper-technical and undeniably groovy approach to modern grind.
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The show's final act, Krallice, also had specific demands for their lightning. Not too bright, not too dark. They didn't want you to worry about showmanship or presentation, the only thing that mattered was the music itself. No mysticism necessary, no transportation needed. Either you were going to pick up on the nuances of their compositions, or you were going to be left in the dust. Fresh off the release of their new Loüm EP, the hometown avant-metal act had no interest in pleasing their audience by doing anything other than playing on their own terms. The quartet has grown increasingly thorny over the last few years starting with the release of Ygg Huur. By now any hint of their early penchant for long form melodies appears only in glimpses. Their masterful use of repetition has been replaced with constant change and instability. They've always been cerebral, but their early material used those composition smarts to build tension and release, developing clear motifs over time and rewarding their listeners for their patience. Now their songs have gotten shorter, the long vines of their music now overlaid so tightly that seeing to the root of the material is nearly impossible.
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Krallice have only become more adept at controlling themselves, but in the process have sacrificed some of their ability to control a room. While undeniably impressive, their music is quickly approaching the point of pleasing few but those in the business of making music themselves. Members of Yautja and Pyrrhon exchanged "holy shit" glances throughout the set, but the rest of the room slowly emptied during their set. At nearly a decade old, Krallice may have found the limit to their immense power. The spell only works on itself.
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Bolt Gun Sculpt With Time On “Man Is Wolf To Man”
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I have a lot of questions about Bolt Gun. What would make an Australian band write an album about the end of Soviet Russia, and why is that happening now? I suspect my American bias is making me overly invested in this. Very little of Bolt Gun's music feels ideologically driven, rather they are driven towards the aesthetics of Soviet decay. In their own words, they are inspired by "Tarkovsky, Kieslowski and Lopushansky" rather than any political motive, and their music on Man Is Wolf To Man is more of a mood piece than a polemic.
Still, that a psychedelic metal band would find this particular aesthetic, and the moment of history it sprung from, worth exploring in 2017 isn't to be overlooked. After all, today is the centennial of the end of the Russian Revolution. Even if the band didn't intend to be so timely, authoritarianism of all stripes has been a common subject as of late (If you're looking for a more politically motivated musical response to the events of the Russian revolution, you might want to try Despereaux's "Marx" which also dropped today). In this regard, Man is Wolf To Man's lack of political vision is a boon. Despite the samples of Russian dialogue, Bolt Gun's ideological and musical looseness allows them to be applicable for any moment when the world seems lost. The album's two lengthy tracks aren't interested in building a narrative through their playing, and instead layer instruments with an ear for texture.
That texture is a bleak one. Retro synthesizers, distant piano, sparse slide guitar. This is emphatically desolate music, any signifier of open space and eerie emptiness is fair game on Man Is Wolf To Man. This is particularly true in the record's second half, whose patience briefly lets it ride alongside the questing meditation of Cult Of Luna's Somewhere Along The Highway. Bolt Gun spend their majority of their time focusing on stasis and decay however. The band only build sounds to break them down, washing them away in a sea of static. Even their vocals, most often a low roar in the distance, is best thought of as a whimper, not a bang. The last cries of something desperate, drained of life and fighting to survive.
Stream Man is Wolf To Man below. The album comes out on November 14th via Art As Catharsis. Follow the band on Facebook.
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Ulver Announces New EP, Releases Single “Echo Chamber (Room of Tears)”
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Hot on the heels of the celebrated The Assassination of Julius Caesar, Norwegian experimentalists Ulver surprised the Internet this morning with the sudden announcement of a new EP. Though Sic Transit Gloria Mundi's release date has yet to be unveiled, debut single "Echo Chamber (Room of Tears)" shows these wolves have, much to the delight of many, found a new center with their recently embraced synthpop/electronic rock style. Ulver's "catchy kosmiche," a new development in a career which covers the vast ground between trip-hop, first-wave dubstep, jazz, post-punk, and (though it's been twenty years) black metal, is yet another tour de force of metamorphic mastery.
The Sic Transit Gloria Mundi EP will be released on House of Mythology at a yet-to-be-disclosed date. Watch the "Echo Chamber (Room of Tears)" music video below.
Hüsker Dü’s “Savage Young Dü” Is Loud, Fast, & Lawless
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Hüsker Dü’s career spanned nearly the entire decade of the 1980s. Despite checking off many of the boxes that make for great metal – guitar-based genuinely heavy music with copious amounts of distortion and even more speed, especially in the band’s formative years – the group barely registered on the metal landscape. In fact, it’s likely that they did more to confuse metal fans by releasing an album with the title Metal Circus in 1983. I’ll bet there was a line of heshers returning it to record shops, confused over the misnomered noise.
That was a great way to describe the early Hüsker Dü output which is lovingly compiled in Savage Young Dü (The Numero Group), a four-LP or three-CD set containing demo, live, outtakes, and alternate versions of the most primitive and primordial music the band ever created. This includes new versions of the band’s 1981 debut album Land Speed Record and a special 7” including five previously unissued songs from the aforementioned Metal Circus sessions.
For someone who loves the band, it’s a treasure trove. For those unfamiliar with the group, it’s a decent introduction to the band's material before they famously started injecting melody and (more, different) emotion into their sound.
The box set compiles the years where they sounded like The Ramones (even covering “Chinese Rocks”) who themselves eventually became iconic to everyone who liked rock 'n' roll, including metalheads. Hüsker Dü also employed the breakneck speed and thrashing noise that became hardcore, although they were a little smarter about it than most. Witness “Bricklayer” and “Afraid Of Being Wrong” on disc three from Everything Falls Apart, both short, sharp, and shocked, pure hardcore, but that couplet is followed by “Sunshine Superman,” a Donovan hit from the psychedelic 1960s. Even then, Hüsker Dü was tough to pigeonhole, and maybe that’s why even underground metal fans at the time had trouble grasping the totality of the band.
Much like how Voivod helped invent death metal and then abandoned it right when it started to take off, Hüsker Dü would abandon the fury so they missed out on possibly crossing over, leaving that to the bands that would come to define the crossover genre. Bands such as D.R.I., and the metallic hardcore prevalent in New York (Agnostic Front, Cro-Mags) attracted the long-hairs. Although that evolution allowed them to become the first independent group to make the jump to the major labels and created their most timeless and enduring albums, that side of the band is only hinted at here.
Interestingly, it was after the band’s demise that metal fans finally started to get into the Hüsker Dü sound, though this did not benefit the band, at least not directly.
Guitarist and vocalist Bob Mould released a few interesting solo albums after the band split up in 1987 that attempted to distance himself from the sound he helped pioneer before finally reconciling his past with a new band called Sugar. At the height of grunge, 1992’s Copper Blue was huge, especially in the United Kingdom where the likes of Kerrang! and Metal Hammer were falling over themselves to finally give Mould metal press. It was even named one of Kerrang!’s “100 Albums You Must Hear Before You Die” in 1998.
So, metal fans should definitely pick that up as well as some of the latter Hüsker Dü material – start off with New Day Rising. Even though the mid 1980s material would go on to typify the golden age of college radio where there was little playlist symmetry with the guys doing the metal show, hindsight allows modern metal fans to go where few of their peers went before.
Besides, even though Hüsker Dü didn’t get metal fans in droves like their SST labelmates Black Flag, a few did figure it out. Hit up YouTube and you can hear the likes of Anthrax, Prong, and Entombed covering the band. So did Italian grindcore merchants Cripple Bastards, Irish alt-metallers Therapy? and Sick Of It All does a mean version of “Target.” VH1's 100 Greatest Hard Rock Artists ranked Hüsker Dü number sixty-eight and featured Kirk Hammett speaking glowingly about the band.
You can also hear the influence in contemporary bands. A lot of Melvins material sounds like Hüsker Dü played at half the speed. Torche have gone on record as loving the band and that is especially evident on 2012’s Meanderthal.
If you listen to the swirling guitar of “It’s Not Fair,” a live cut from 1982 that closes the box set, or the likes of “Ice Cold Ice” from the band’s swansong 1987 LP Warehouse: Songs and Stories or “Pink Turns to Blue” from 1984’s Zen Arcade, neither of which is in the set but are worth seeking out, you can hear the kind of atmosphere that post-black metal bands would be quite content to approximate.
The latter song is sung by Grant Hart, the band’s drummer (bassist Greg Norton rounded out the trio; all three would sing lead on the songs they wrote though Mould and Hart did the majority of the songwriting). Just last month Hart passed away from liver cancer at age 56. While acrimony among the three famously made a reunion very unlikely, Hart’s tragic demise solidified the fact that Hüsker Dü would never play together again.
Fortunately the music is still here and thanks to Savage Young Dü, everyone – but especially metal fans – can rediscover or discover the band for the first time.
—Brian O'Neill
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Cloak Give Black Metal A Glam Sparkle On “To Venomous Depths”
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There has been an undeniable surge in metal’s trendiness over recent years, much to the chagrin of genre faithfuls. Black metal in particular has been an especially popular hue on the palette of such trend-hoppers. As mainstream fashion brands increasingly incorporate black metal’s visual cues into their designs, artists in seemingly unrelated genres grasp hungrily across the expanse at authenticity via covers and stylistic appropriations. Atlanta quartet Cloak are not one of these guilty perpetrators, as they confidently declare on their debut full-length release To Venomous Depths. It is a statement which artfully fuses elements of black metal, death metal, glam, and more into a uniquely compelling beast that is all their own.
Though Cloak have engineered an aesthetic from so many diverse building blocks, nothing about it feels affected, contrived, or trite. On the contrary, the band exhibit a level of understanding and care for their references so as to forge them together in creation of a sonic entity which embraces and elevates the manifold souls of its parts. Cloak’s clever songwriting is made all the more notable when contrasted with their relative inexperience, having only released a single EP last year. To Venomous Depths could easily have been issued by a veteran band as an affirmation of a musical identity honed over years of progression, yet Cloak are able to showcase this level of vision and focus from the very beginning of their journey.
Cloak have made their sepulchral approach clear via multiple avenues. Somber press photos feature a black-clad, stone-faced group seemingly incapable of mirth, as they pose stoically in the woods or with lit torches held aloft. Band statements discuss the album’s themes of “darkness over light” as well as the group’s “dark energies." Despite this, their record is brimming with a contagious energy that refuses to be tempered or contained. Cloak have promised an expedition “to venomous depths,” but the descent proves to be far more ebullient than what is indicated by the album’s title and cover art.
The album commences with a gentle caress of piano and strings, a fragile moment which soon falls victim to the incoming storm of haunting chords. An upbeat tom groove from drummer Sean Bruneau drives the music forward as the guitars darken the skies from above. It is an unexpected complement to the doom-laden chord progression, but an important lesson from the band in navigating the way forward. Just a few seconds in, and Cloak are already signaling that there will be healthy portions of bouncy cock rock served up underneath a thick blackened gravy of death, the various dishes intermingling on the plate so as to set off the spiraling anxieties of those obsessives out there whose foods must never touch. “Get off this train while you still can,” warn the band, “because this is who we are, and this ride does not stop.”
Much of the album’s riffage is packed with syncopation, at times venturing dangerously close to something that wouldn’t sound out of place if included on Dr. Feelgood. Cloak’s catchy sound doesn’t discriminate as far as the good times are concerned, with as many nods to metal’s colorful faces as there are to its dourer contributors. Mid-album stompfest “In the Darkness, the Path” relies heavily on the expected evil-infused melodies, tremolo guitars and rolling kicks, but there, in the distance yet clearly audible, lies… a tambourine. Unlike many other recent “just add black metal” bands, Cloak succeed at organically weaving the genre’s defining elements together with their other influences to create a truly enjoyable result.
The album’s many guitar solos reinforce the band’s rock roots which consistently shine through their blackened exterior. There is much common ground between Cloak and blackened party troupe Kvelertak, though the former dance masterfully on the line between black 'n' roll and party-punk without ever crossing over. Cloak save their most blackened moments for mammoth album closer “Deep Red,” as they wrap things up with the only blast beat to be found on the entire endeavor.
Across the album, Cloak reveal a clear preference for builds over breakdowns, exemplified by the single “Beyond the Veil,” to channel and direct energy with disco-styled backbeats, quick high-hat stickwork, and propulsive bass. Momentum is created and nurtured as songs are allowed to swell and peak before dying down, only to build back up to even greater heights. Despite the majority of tracks tipping the scales with runtimes of over six minutes, they rarely feel as long as they actually are, thanks to expert-tier pacing, dynamics and structural choices. “Forever Burned” is a particularly infectious joyride in 12/8 that has all Cloak’s strengths on display.
Consistently impressive across the album are Bruneau and bassist Matt Scott, the kinetic rhythm section fueling the Cloak locomotive. Bruneau’s conservative beats are balanced by fluid fills that highlight his appreciable proficiency and finesse, while Scott never shies away from letting his funk flag fly. The two hold a clear understanding of their role in service to the music and possess the level of musicianship required to fortify and embellish their performances tastefully within these constraints.
Despite the breadth of genre input, the album is a remarkably coherent statement from a band brimming with potential and promise. Cloak have crafted a signature aesthetic from the outset, which further equips them for continued success. Their polished sound is consistently accessible while drawing on influences that will garner support from across metal’s fractured landscape, as To Venomous Depths establishes the group as one of those rare bands that can bring metalheads together in gleeful, head-banging consensus.
-- Ivan Belcic
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To Venomous Depths releases this Friday, November 10th via Season of Mist. Stream the title track as well as two others now on Cloak’s Bandcamp.
Nothing stops Joey Jordison. Not transverse myelitis, which sidelined him for months during a long recovery, not being fired from Slipknot, the world famous band that he had drummed for since 1995, and certainly not the opinions of the Internet, a medium he has no time for. Instead of worrying what the comment section has to say about him, Jordison spends his time working. Case in point: when this interview was conducted, Jordison was wrapping up a tour with Vimic, a project that shares members with his former band Scar the Martyr. Shortly after the tour, the band hit the studio to finish up not just their yet-to-be-released debut, as well as its follow-up. While neither of these records have been released, Jordison has been hard at work with another project, Sinsaenum, which features Dragonforce's Frédéric Leclercq and Attila Csihar, who will drop their Ashes EP on Friday, November 10th.
Jordison's complete dedication to playing music is matched by how he speaks. He is confident and direct, clearly aided by the countless press tours under his belt, but he's hardly jaded. Instead he is by his passion for his new projects. I spoke to him to Jordison over the phone about those projects, along with his songwriting process and his experience playing as a session drummer for everyone from Satyricon to Metallica.
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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SjmAgHkwbuw
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You recently overcame a battle with transverse myelitis. Do you feel that coming out on the other side of that put the pressure on you to focus on your career?
The thing is, as far as music is concerned, I'll never stop doing what I do. I'm very, very grateful and happy that I have the strength in my heart and my brain and my soul to be able to come out of this. I'm completely fine. I get this question a lot, I understand that you need to ask this. Everything is absolutely cool. When [Vimic are] doing the new record now, getting Open Your Omen out there and following up with the next one after that. I think that's gonna be the biggest triumph, to show people my strength to come back and know exactly where I'm at and why it's where I need to be.
It's killer, man. I couldn't be more happy. We just constantly just drive at it. It's like we just do not take baby steps or anything like that. It's just full-force. The record industry, it's just a different place these days. Even though I'm not an internet fan, and a lot of people know that I'm not that type of person, it really, really helps out your band a lot. You know, with doing tours, and the goal of what we're doing with the next record, the internet is gonna definitely going to help us, for sure.
What do you feel has changed the most since you started to where you are now in terms how the internet has affected the music industry?
When Slipknot got signed, you would get to fly to New York, and you go there and you meet with tons of people, and then you fly to Europe and you meet all their executives, too. Everyone's on the same team. Now, it's pretty much up to the individual to promote whatever they have coming out. And you know what? There's nothing wrong with that. The internet, I don't like it. I hate it to be quite honest. But, at the same time, it is your friend. It can help you very much.
Here's my thing, man. I hate the the fact that the record industry is dying. It crushes me. The days when you get to go to a store and buy all these records, you'd look at each label and be like, "Oh my God, there's this label, and this band is on it so it's gotta be awesome," and you buy it. You know? Usually, 80% it's good, sometimes 20% it's not. I miss those days, you know?
It's just not there. I go to record stores all the time, even independent ones that actually carry all the great stuff now, and they're even going downhill. But at the same time, the internet is actually your friend. That's what you need to help promote your career. So it's kind of a catch-22. But hey, if you can get your music out to the people, that's all that matters.
You mentioned the importance of having a team. You probably have one of the deepest Rolodexes in heavy music. How did you go about choosing the people that you wanted to play with for your next projects, for Vimic, specifically, and for anything else that you're working on?
Okay, I can explain that, and it's easy. When you get older and you've gone through the blessings of all the great stuff that you got to do and all the accomplishments that you've had, you don't take them for granted. No matter where life leads you, you always look towards the positive and what you can do while you're here on this earth. These people that I've got to work with, I've known for a long, long time.
I'm at the point in my career that I've been through enough stuff that I know when someone's full of BS. They can't sell me anything that I'm not going to completely see through. I just want to absolutely have the right people in place that get along. Especially with all of us living in a different states, we have to be able to focus when we come in and actually see each other, and make sure everyone knows their part. You can't have a weak link. You just can't. That was the thought process behind Vimic, to actually get everyone together that actually had the same focus and want the same result.
What do you see that result as? What are you aiming for with this band specifically?
You know, that's one thing about this. I'm not looking towards a Golden Record. I'm not looking towards Grammy Awards. I'm not looking towards awards or anything like that. What I'm looking towards is to getting out to the fans that meant so much to us while we were doing all our other projects. You know, we could've gave up. We could've done a bunch of stuff, but we just don't. We just don't. Even if things went bad, we would still not quit. No matter what, we're going to be here for the long-haul. We're not going anywhere. You're not getting rid of us. We are going to keep making music no matter what, for the rest of our lives, while we're here on earth.
When I say, "Not going anywhere," I mean we're not leaving your presence. We're going to excel. We're going to gain as many fans as possible, and we're going to be in your faces. And we're gonna go everywhere that we need to be from the strength of the people that are in the band.
Specifically, musically what are you aiming to do? When you sit down to write a Vimic song, what is your goal?
The thing is I cannot pick up a guitar or sit down at a drum kit and try and make a song. There has to be something that is either going on in the rest of the world or going on in my personal life, or in someone else's life or that means something to me. Or maybe one of the other guys in the band, they might have something going on or something that they bring in and I'm like, "You know what? I understand what you're saying," It relates to other things in life. You talk about what you want to create, and then you sit down and just start drawing it out. That's what's the best thing about being in this band is. Just creating music that's very, very personal. it's not a gimmick band. It's nothing like that. It's like they're actual stories. I want to portray, with everything that I'm gonna do with Vimic, with Open Your Omen and in the future, real-life stories.
What makes a story appropriate for a Vimic song? What kind of stories do you want to tell?
That's the trick right here. We're not a Satanic band. We're not a Christian band. We're not any of that. We keep the lyrics open-ended enough to where the listener can enjoy the song, listen to lyrics, and get their own interpretation out of it. That's what the whole point of making music is. I've never been in a band that's like, "This is exactly what it is and you need to follow us and that's that." I don't like that. When I listen to, like, say, old, classic rock songs, or even if I listened to black metal songs I get my own interpretation. That's what music is supposed to be.
Now, I know there's certain bands out there that have a certain message and they stick to it and that's what it is. With Vimic, what we're doing, there is a message. Kalen has a great way of portraying the feeling of what the song is and where his heart's at at the time being. We all kind of have a round table. We talk about stuff and then we sit in the room and create a song. Kalen already mapped it out. But it's not for me to tell anyone or a listener exactly what to think. That's the beauty of music, is it needs to be open-ended. Get what you want out of it, man. Like it, love it, like, hate it. Throw it in the trash, it doesn't matter. What matters is the fact that we put this much energy and love and thought into this process, and that's what we're trying to convey. And Open Your Omen will tell you a ton, man.
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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KlhiusqB530
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You write music both as a guitarist, and as a drummer. Do you feel like knowing how to play guitar and having experience as a songwriter changes the way you approach the drums as an instrument?
I mean, it's really hard to get across within a certain answer because it's really in-depth. When I started playing guitar, I learned from my grandfather, and I started learning piano right after that. So I learned keys, I learned notes, and I learned progressions. I wasn't that good then, but at least I knew where I was at. So when I was in fourth grade, you know, you have band tryouts and all that, and I was like, "All I wanna do was play the drums. I don't want to play the saxophone. I don't want to play a trumpet." I wanted to stick to rock. It was either guitar or drums. There was no in-between.
I started on guitar, but I still work on it. You know? The drums, for some reason, I could just do. It was just instilled in me. I started playing in fourth grade but I stuck with guitar the whole time and it still lasts to this day. That's like my childhood. If it wasn't for my parents blasting music all the time, I don't think I'd be doing what I was doing. I grew up in a great house where there was just constant music all the time. Once I got older and I got involved with, I wouldn't say with the wrong crowd because it was the right crowd. Because it put me where I'm at now. I just started getting into metal. Metal spoke to me. Rock and roll always spoke to me. I'm always into it. It's going to be a part of my life. It was basically 1986 that changed my life. You know, "The Big Four." Master of Puppets from Metallica and Reign in Blood. I was already playing drums and I was already a rock drummer, but that really what took me to the next level of determination as far as being a musician.
I can definite tell that you did have that earlier stage where you were more of a rock guy. Because one of the things that's made your career so interesting is that, even at their absolutely heaviest, all of your songs are still very catchy.
Thank you.
What do you feel is, the method to create that's super-heavy music still catchy and accessible in some way?
You know, honestly, man if you're trying just to create a song, usually it won't work. Let's just take the song "Wait and Bleed." I'm looking at the guitar right now that I wrote that song on. [When I wrote that song] I picked up the guitar, and I played the whole song all the way through. It was done in literally 10 minutes. You know? Same thing with "She Sees Everything". That song came out instantly. It's just something that spills out of you, but it always has to be at the right time.
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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B1zCN0YhW1s
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I didn't mean to parallel those two songs. They don't need to compete against each other. I'm just saying that from way back then to now, it's always about the moment. It's what's is in your heart and where you are at in your life at that time. That's all that matters. Because no matter what if you're a true musician, when you pick up your drumsticks, when you pick up your violin, when you pick up your cello, when you pick up a tuba or a trumpet, you're going to have great days and you're going to have shit days, man.
You're going to have both of them. You're never going to be perfect all the time. I can't just pick up a guitar and be like, "I need to write a song right now," because it seems forced. I can't do that. It has to be from the heart.
There's this other side to your career, too, where you've been a session drummer for Ministry, Satyricon, Korn and Metallica. How do you approach playing with other people and doing other people's music differently than doing your own?
I've had the privilege, I'd like to say, of playing with those bands that you've mentioned. I've looked up to all of those bands. They've been a big part of my life. When you get that type of opportunity, you get taught. No matter what, you can't go in there and think that you know everything. You get that opportunity to sit down and see these icons and they teach you so much. Even if you get to play with them just one time, there's no bigger lesson. They will teach you more within that hour than you could ever believe. I'm telling you, it's insane. And I've got that opportunity to play with not only Metallica but I got to play with Rob Zombie and I got to play with Korn. I've been able to do the things on my own making Sinsaenum and Scar the Martyr and, of course, my ex-band, Slipknot, Murderdolls, the Roadrunner United. I'm just thankful, man. The thing is, the fire doesn't burn out because there's always something else while you're on this earth to accomplish. And that's what I'm looking forward to.
At Vimic shows do you feel like some people are going specifically to see you are people going to see the band?
Well, here's the thing. This is not a Joey Jordison's side project. When this band was formed, everyone was equally involved. It wasn't just me. Because when we went in to record everyone was equally involved. This is a real band. All of this great stuff that is happening would not be happening without the equal participation of everyone in the band.
I can go and create a solo album. But am I gonna sing on it? Am I gonna play the leads on it? It wouldn't match, you know? Bands are marriages, and sometimes the marriages break up. Sometimes they succeed. I'm looking at succeeding because this concoction of people, is absolutely on fire and they're in the right place. Everyone is doing great. Everyone is ready and we're ready to just get out there and start to get it out to the fans, man, because they deserve it. We've been away from them for too long, man.
I feel like for a certain generation of drummers, myself included, you were the guy for metal.
Oh, thank you, man.
Do you feel like there's anyone else in a younger generation that is coming up behind you? Do you see any younger drummers that sort of have caught your attention in the last few years?
I feel bad for saying this, but, honestly, man, I've been focusing so much on Vimic and Sinsaenum. It's like day-in, day-out. Honestly, man, I could not even tell you. I mean, there's not one band that's really turned me on recently or drummers that I've been following. I know that sounds a little weird, but it's just the truth. It's not that I don't want to know, it's just that I've been having to work constantly, you know, day-in, day-out.
That makes sense to me because I know that some other musicians like to not listen to other music when they're working on their own stuff. Do you kind of feel like you need to have that tunnel-vision when you're working on your own music?
Right now, yes. With the two bands in two different time zones, absolutely. I love to give people props and stuff like that. I can name albums, but as far as drummers I always go to the classics, man. As far as new bands, I'll get an album. I'll listen to it, and, usually throw it on the shelf unless it really, really intrigues me. But right now, I've been so busy working with two bands that I've really not had the chance to actually sit down and dissect anything. I'm pretty sure when I go out on the road, I'll be able to do that. But right now, I couldn't tell you anything.
Do you have any records that have caught your attention lately?
I just went record shopping the other day, and I actually found a lot of great stuff. So I got the new Six Feet Under. I got the new Sovereign. I got the new Insomnium. I got the new Gruesome. I got the new Superjoint Ritual. I got the new Crowbar, which I can't wait to hear. I can't wait to hear it. Like, I haven't opened it yet. I bought the new Charred Walls of the Damned.
I don't know if you're into the band Today is the Day with "Sadness will Prevail." There's a new version of it that you can get two albums for the price of one, it has "Sadness will Prevail" and "Live Till You Die." I got the new Heaven Shall Burn. I got the new Puscifer, "Money Shot," which I'm looking forward to listening to. I got the new Sick of It All, "Outtakes for the Outcast." That's it.
As someone who's actually played with Metallica, what did you think of the new Metallica record?
I like it. I think it's good. I know a lot of people have different opinions on it but no matter what people say, I think that you cannot dis that band at all. They set the benchmark for pretty much from 1983 to now. I think them playing with that much fire is absolutely amazing. They are still blistering as far as I'm concerned. Metallica can do pretty much whatever they want. I could never say a bad thing about that band because they win. They're the kings.
You talked about doing it for life and sticking in it for the long run. Metallica's a perfect example of going through everything and still coming out with the same degree of intensity that they started with. You know, that's pretty much unparalleled in music. Like, you can't really talk shit about something like that. You're totally right.
Absolutely not. You can't. Listen, man, have me and you been able to achieve that type of success? No.
You've gotten a lot closer than I have!
Well, thank you. Thank you. But at the same time anyone that gives that band shit can go fuck themselves. You know? They are still the masters. Of course we have Slayer, we have Megadeth, we have Anthrax, we have all that. But all these [new] bands that we listen to right now, Metallica inspired. They really did. You're talking since 1981, man. I was, like, five years old. And they're still going. As far as I'm concerned, they're kings. They are the absolute kings of heavy metal. They are the fucking kings of all heavy metal. No one can beat them. Period.
The album should be coming out soon. Is that correct? There hasn't been an official announcement about the exact date.
It's gonna be really, really soon. I can't give an actual date right now because it's coming out and it needs to be official, like, from the site and stuff like that. Make sure that, you know, the management has it locked down. But, yeah, it's coming really soon. And, like I said, there's that whole other album that is completed in the works. But we're coming out very soon. We're gonna be on tour very soon. Cannot wait to get out and see all the fans. Like, everything feels positive right now. We could not be more energized and excited. So we're just ready to get out there, man. I really thank you for your time and all that stuff, man. I really appreciate it.
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Catalonian Thrashers Show No Pardon
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No Amnesty was formed and is still based out of an area that, depending on when you read this, either is a part of Spain or is its own independent nation of Catalonia. Thrash bands have traditionally been prone to wax political, and it might be hard to avoid it when history is happening right in your own postal code. No Amnesty hasn't really touched on political themes yet, despite the Trumpian moniker, but give ‘em time – they had an average age of only 16 when they self-released their A New Order For Attack debut in 2013.
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The band’s youthfulness was likely the main culprit in the EP's reminiscence of the more commercial moments of the most mainstream moments from The Big Four. Specifically, you hear a lot of the dry guitar tones and Hetfieldian muted riffs of …And Justice For All, while the promo (shot with one guy wearing colorful shorts while a graffiti-covered wall looms in the background) is not the only thing that makes you think of Anthrax.
With the backing of Xtreem Music, probably Spain’s largest independent metal label, the stakes are higher for No Amnesty and their debut full-length, which releases on November 14th.
Psychopathy shows exponential growth and does this without diluting the basic thrash formula. No Amnesty became better songwriters not by looking outside the genre to apply lessons learned, but rather looking from within, strengthening the foundation rather than merely covering it with a fresh coat of paint. The impetus might have been something as simple as someone a bit older pulling them aside and telling them, “Yeah, Metallica is great, but you really need to check out Testament.”
It’s possible that person was their own vocalist, Albert Garcia, who also sings with Spain’s first thrash band Fuck Off -- he joined in time to record Psychopathy and is about ten years older than anyone else in the band.
Although the title of the lead track "NOTLD” makes you think of “C.O.T.L.O.D.,” the song itself closely mimics the opening riff to The Legacy’s lead track “Over the Wall.” The cascading riffs give it that familiar gallop, and you’re soon off at lightning speed. Chunky mosh-friendly riffs can be found throughout, often accented with a strident neo-classicism that you also hear reverentially in modern peers such as Exmortus. Sometimes this manifests itself on syncopated bridges such as on “Among the Blind.” At other times, it’s with clean guitar such “The Prophecy,” a two-minute flamenco-like intro to “Fight below the Fire” that would be great as pre-recorded music for the band to take to the stage. It’s most obvious on the power balladry of “Eternal Light,” as well as with the tuneful leads by Jonathan Soler on virtually every track.
No Amnesty is at its best when the majesty of its early influences incorporate with this newfound musicianship. “Evil Priest” stands out in this regard, as the riffs come at you from every direction; the hooky chorus will get elbows flailing, while the searing lead will have up and coming guitarists nod their heads in approval. “Snake Eyes,” the longest track at five and a half minutes, is multifaceted Maidenesque melodrama presented in triple-time.
No Amnesty was a good thrash band that got even better by incorporating even more thrash into their sound. If anyone ever tells you that you can have too much of a good thing, they haven’t heard Psychopathy yet.
—Brian O'Neill
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Entry Level: Eugene S. Robinson Tackles Swans
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Entry Level is a new series where musicians re-examine the records which piqued their interests in heavy and loud music as children and young adults.
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He Ain't Heavy
I'm going to skip the early stage entry into what, for a 12 year old, passed for transgressive. Which means skipping over me borrowing Destroyer from a friend. Especially since it was more noteworthy that Kiss were from Brooklyn than that they were satanists. Or dark. Or heavy. Any rendering of "Beth" would have laid that to rest.
I won't even talk about how Eddie and the Hotrods, a record gifted to me by my stepfather on account of it sporting a suicidal teen on its cover. Yeah, that got me into the Ramones and the Plasmatics and deeper and weirder shit.
These were just all on-ramps to the moment when, still in the blush of post-teen friendship Henry Rollins and I were walking through San Francisco. Destination? Unknown. Location? On Broadway. I had been telling him about something I knew something about, James Joyce's use of language to destroy language as I understood it in Finnegan's Wake, a book I would later steal and send him. He returned the favor.
"Have you ever heard of Swans? It's like us [Black Flag]. But just....." and here he paused...."just uglier, slower, more brutal. You should really talk to Gira. I think you would like him."
Two weeks later a package showed up. It was a mixtape from Rollins. Swans, Diamanda Galas and Einstürzende Neubauten. The year was 1985. Diamanda and Einstürzende existed on the continuum of the known for me.
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Swans? Something else was happening here. The first artist I saw attack his audience? James Chance. But that was easy, as I would later learn in my own time with Oxbow. Gira, Norm Westberg, Al Kizys, Jarboe, and whoever I'm missing made Fuck You Music most extreme. Most hardcore at the time was the music born of a certain hysteria. Crack up moments caught mid-crack-up. Most metal? A kind of macho ideation.
But Swans -- on Filth, and Cop, both on the Rollins' mixtape -- were the soundtrack for some real, nightmarish adult living, undergirded by the grind and inevitability of being on the business end of a power arrangement where even if you win you lose.
Which is to say be you the jailed or the jailer, there was no light let into this prison. And this was life changing.
I called Gira soon thereafter. He hung up the phone on me. Then he called me back and asked me where I got the balls to call HIM? He cursed. At first I laughed and tried to explain that "our mutual friend" Rollins had thought I should call. He cursed me, now. Then hung up. I called HIM back now, not laughing, now. And I was caught. Like a fistfight you can't remember how you got into.
It was a policy of total war and suddenly I understood.
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When I later next had the opportunity to talk to Gira in person he was beyond polite. I never heard from Rollins again.
Nothing I have ever recorded since then sounds very much like Swans to ME, at the very least. But everything I have ever recorded has adhered to this policy of total war, also known as the day I stopped fucking around.
So everything good that happened after that and all of the horrible bad? Have this day to credit/blame for it.
As for me? I take responsibility for nothing.
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Eugene is an accomplished stage performer, the intimidating frontman of seminal bands Whipping Boy and Oxbow, and published writer, authoring Fight: Everything You Ever Wanted to Know About Ass-Kicking but Were Afraid You'd Get Your Ass Kicked for Asking, A Long Slow Screw, and Oxbow: The Thin Black Book, as well as articles for Viceland, LA Weekly, Decibel, and The Wire. You can learn more about Eugene at his website.
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Five Black Metal Albums Which Pre-Date “De Mysteriis Dom Sathanas”
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I feel so silly even listing these things off, but apparently many people read Lords of Chaos and have taken every word Michael Moynihan types as perfect historical canon. Though the "Black Circle" was certainly a focal point in the genre's transgressive history, and, murder aside, Øystein "Euronymous" Aarseth's presence as both owner of the Helvete record shop and proprietor of the short-lived Deathlike Silence label certainly made him a fixture, the musical world of black metal in the early 1990s was so much bigger and creative than we have been led to believe.
There are still many who consider Mayhem's 1994 full-length De Mysteriis dom Sathanas to be the first "true" black metal album, so I took it upon myself to find a few definitive staples which pre-date it. It is difficult to make this point without appearing to discredit Mayhem, but it's time to break the stereotype that they made black metal "true." If anything, maybe Mayhem reiterated the genre's conservative nature once more, and so early on.
Of course, these are all brief, word-salad meditations on a very small number of full-length albums out of many which helped sculpt this style's formative years, so be sure to share your pre-1994 second wave favorites in the comments below (yes, we all know Burzum had already released hours' worth of music at this point, as well). Note that first-wave bands like Bathory, Celtic Frost/Hellhammer, Sarcofago, Venom, the Medellín Ultrametal scene, and more are excluded. Citing first-wave black metal in this particular case feels cheap and dismisses musical efforts from the early 1990s.
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I don't think many realize just how early Czech weirdos Master's Hammer got their start. In a perfect world, people would bow at their feet. Sure, they are pretty… unconventional, and Tom "Necrocock"'s riff style runs the gamut from goofy and bouncing to pure, chilling evil, but beyond the superficial strangeness, Ritual approaches perfection, and so early on. Subsequent album Jilemnický okultista (1992) would expound upon this strangeness, thrusting Master's Hammer into further outsider isolation (and we all try to forget Šlágry), but Ritual so masterfully balances the band's penchant for both oddity and chilling atmospheres. I once read a review on Encyclopedia Metallum which declared this album "the first Norwegian Black Metal Album," which could be considered more valid than not.
A time for arguments and contention. The Norwegian scene completely dismissed Absu's first album and called it "death metal," but it seems so reductive now, continually fueling the "yeah man, black metal from the United States sucks!" mentality. Sure, the band's formative years were as a death metal band (Dolmen was actually pretty damn heavy), but Barathrum: V.I.T.R.I.O.L. is so oppressive, so uncompromisingly heavy, that the United States' post-Von black metal heritage had a strong backbone to build atop. The whole album moves with a momentum of self-discovery, shifting from the heavy, death/thrash exposition to mystical, keyboard-driven atmospheres which fuel its conclusion.
Darkthrone! Sure, the story goes that Euronymous showed young hip-hop and turntablism fan Gylve "Fenriz" Nagell black metal, but that was years before Darkthrone actually recorded anything. I guess many still cite that in favor of Mayhem's debut, which is a little strange. Suddenly shifting from a (very talented) death metal band, Darkthrone's first two black metal albums (yes, Under a Funeral Moon followed in 1993!) were incredibly (and unintentionally) progressive vaults of riffs. Though Mayhem's subsequent full-length would feature stricter songwriting and possess calculated momentum, Darkthrone's music was much more compelling. Some refer to Fenriz's songwriting as "riff Scrabble," just placing his pieces side-by-side with reckless disregard, but that adds so much magic and character to Darkthrone's superficial frigidity.
Bet you didn't know Euronymous released a Sigh album, huh. Though later material from this band is… not so good, at least in my book, early Sigh was adventurous and challenging in a way which immediately denied what was still a burgeoning style. I can be a broken record sometimes, shouting "Black metal was always weird!" on repeat, but few are aware of the genre's avant-garde lineage. Sigh's music may have grown increasingly strange over the decades to follow, Mirai and Shinchi's performances on Scorn Defeat still present an incredibly bizarre spin on the harsh stomp of early second wave black metal.
Another Norwegian band! Fimbulwinter's glorious stomp and desperate, howling voice was simple, but impassioned and frigid. In interviews and written works, Euronymous never acknowledged the young Fimbulwinter, who had already disbanded by the time their 1992 rehearsal was re-released under the name Servants of Sorcery, but the seeds of two members' careers had already grown roots. Featuring the bass work of Hugh James "Skoll" Mingay, who would go on to join Ulver, Ved Buens Ende, and Arcturus, and guitarist Stian "Shagrath" Thoresen, of eventual Dimmu Borgir fame, Fimbulwinter's early, mystical-ish minimalism set a wider stage than their isolation could ever predict. Sometimes I wish Shagrath would bring Hot Records back, if just to reissue this album (and maybe the first Malignant Eternal album so a CD copy wouldn't cost two hundred goddamn dollars).
Upcoming Metal Releases 11/12/17-11/18/2017
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The rare "light" release week. A brief respite. Wow.
Here are the new metal releases for the week of November 12, 2017 – November 18, 2017. Release dates are formatted according to proposed North American scheduling, if available. Expect to see the bulk of these records on shelves or distros on Friday unless otherwise noted or if labels and artists get impatient. Blurbs and designations are based on whether or not I have a lot to say about it.
See something we missed? Goofs? Let us know in the comments. Plus, as always, feel free to post your own shopping lists. Happy digging.
As a little bit of a challenge, include your own opinion about anything you want to add. Make me want to listen to it!Please note: this is a review column and is not speculative. Any announced albums without preview material will not be covered. Additionally, any surprise releases which are uploaded or released after this column is published will be excluded.
Since I wrote this, there have been surprise releases from: Ulver, Cryptae (death metal feat. Rene Aquarius of Dead Neanderthals), and probably more.
send Jon your promos at [email protected]. Do not bother him on social media.
Last Bastion of Cowardice is a truly uncomfortable listen. Yes, the music is heavy and melodic in this beautifully confrontational way which follows their approach on the Cold Migration EP, but the personal element to this album is private, almost as if we aren’t supposed to hear it. When presented with such an inward look, especially when compared to misanthropic and suicidal posturing, even the most accessible side of music can be difficult. When paired with Northless’s progressive mixing of various kinds of metal and punk under their sludge guise, we are presented with emotive, confounding music. There is no light here, only failure and sadness.
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OF NOTE
Godflesh - Post Self | Avalanche Recordings | Industrial Metal | England
I have to admit, I'm not much for industrial metal. Other types of industrial music, fine, but, for the most part, bands like Godflesh have never really "done it" for me. I understand the importance of Justin Broadrick's pre-Jesu career, but I feel largely disconnected from the sounds of pulsing, precise mechanigs.
Over the Voids - Over the Voids… | Nordvis | Black Metal | Poland
Michał Stępień, otherwise known from Owls Woods Graves, Medico Peste, and, of course, Mgła, eschews the sugary pomp of those more modern sounding affairs in favor of celebrating the frigidity of the mid-1990s. Over the Voids is haunting and icy, sounding much more Norwegian than the folky, keyboard-heavy approach which characterizes his brethren. Between you and me, I like this much, much more than Mgła.
Fister/CHRCH - Fister/CHRCH | Crown and Throne Ltd/Battleground Records | Sludge/Doom Metal | United States
A mournful doom split by two bands who aren't afraid of song-length, though Fister has definitely gone longer. Hearkening back to their Gemini full-length, Fister balances emotive theatrics with pure, classic sludge/doom filth. CHRCH, on the other hand, play their cards as Asunder did before them: sepulchral, incredibly slow, and super...super sad.
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OTHER RELEASES
Sacrilegious Rite - Summoning From Beyond | Dunkelheit Produktionen | Black/Death Metal | Germany
"Black/Death Metal" is generally a tag I approach with hesitance nowadays. I mean, with all the super "goaty" stuff, a guy has to be a little discerning and careful. Sacrilegious Rite definitely embodies the tenets of the tag rather than the modern Blasphemy worship which has saturated the market. Much like other Saarland-based extreme metal bands, Sacrilegious Rite utilizes big riffs, catchy melodies, and a uniquely mystifying atmosphere.
Jupiterian - Terraforming | Transcending Obscurity | Sludge/Death/Doom Metal | Brazil
I certainly praised these Brazilian doomsters for tastefully combining atmospheric sludge with Paradise Lost's early, tragic death/doom before, but there hasn't been much growth on this front. I was kind of hoping for a maturation, or even a more homogenized presentation, but maybe next time.
Cavalera Conspiracy - Psychosis | Napalm Records | Groove/Thrash/Death Metal | United States
I don't think I personally know anyone who seriously follows Max Cavalera's music at this point.
Nullingroots - Into the Grey | Prosthetic Records | Black Metal/Post-Rock | United States
One of the many occasions where a post-rock/black metal hybrid does nothing for me. Bands don't seem to understand the pitfalls of constantly maxed-out texture. How are we supposed to follow the flow of the song? It's all overload, too self-indulgent.
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Omotai Cut Deeper Than Skin On “Last of the Green Vial”
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Film, music, and the human body are machines whose parts obtain "being" by their arrangement. Taken individually, they are lifeless; an eye is just a wet sack of carbon -- a riff a collection of notes -- a frame a loose organization of colors and shapes. Strung together and connected to a larger whole, these parts take on meaning, form, and function.
This is an ugly and disquieting reduction of human life. No one likes to imagine that they can be taken apart and reassembled. We want to believe that we are complete wholes, whose meaning comes from something more than electrical currents and nerve endings. Violence against the human body forces us to acknowledge its fragility, especially when the violence seems inexplicable. The less tangible the cause of the tragedy, the more jarring the wake it leaves behind.
Omotai's "Last of the Green Vial" tackles this existential threat head on. The song, whose NSFW music video you can watch below, describes a communal disaster where an entire town is reduced to body parts, each person now only a "skull and ribs and a spine." Like the rest of Omotai's Ruined Oak, the song is explicitly about the colony of Roanoke, an island off the coast of North Virginia where 115 colonizers vanished under less than clear circumstances. However, "Last of the Green Vial" works just as well as a lament for any community wiped out by a force greater than them. Omotai are no strangers to this kind of widespread calamity, having contributed to Making Waves, a compilation whose proceeds go toward hurricane relief in the band's native city of Houston, Texas.
I bring this fact up not just because it's a good cause worth supporting, but because it gives context to Omotai's interest in tragedy. Their point of view is sympathetic, not exploitative nor cruel. That sympathy is an important counterweight to the harsh images of their "Last of the Green Vial" music video, which uses sampled footage of surgery to challenge our images of bodily integrity. Eyes are pierced with needles, hearts are made to pump by machines (the video's most clever moments when this pumping is synced up with a monster drum fill), and lungs collapse and expand with air from tubes. The video's chopped found-footage style, usually a bit of a cop-out for music videos, is an inspired choice here, as it mirrors the surgical process. Just as the human body is chopped up and repurposed, images of that dehumanization are all the more jarring for sitting side by side with more innocent footage. Even those selections help point back to the song's focus, depicting the absent protectors that the villagers of Roanoke called for.
In the video, the knight is victorious in fending off the dragon, but the video plays this victory as a joke. Only in staged combat is the human body sturdy enough to ward away its own destruction. In reality we are a needle away from meaninglessness.
Celebrating artists that change and evolve over time is a worthy cause, but it's important to distinguish the nature of those changes. There are plenty of artists for whom a change of sound is effectively a change in branding, new sounds signifying a new persona with new clothes to match. There is another type of growth characterized less by shedding skin than by burrowing inward. The essential spirit of the art hasn't changed, but the artist has dug deeper to its core, revealing it to us in more intimate and raw fashion.
Azar Swan are part of the latter class. The group, consisting of Zohra Atash and Joshua Strawn, have always had an aggressive and disturbing edge to their music, but on their last album, 2015's And Blow Us a Kiss, it was kept just out of sight. On "Shock", the opening track from their upcoming Savage Exile, they hold that edge right to your throat. No matter how dark it got, Azar Swan's previous work was grounded in melody and accessible rhythms. Even Savage Exile's first single, "Territorial", could reasonably be tied to a tradition of dance music, albeit a particularly confrontational strain. "Shock" on the other hand only uses rhythm to organize, not to mobilize. As an album opener it dashes expectations of the duo's old approach. On it's own it's an unnerving piece of textural experimentation.
Atash's voice is the site of the group's most dramatic change. Here it is just as much an instrument as a focal point, the words Atash sing obscured by both her drawn out performance and her use of processing to bend each syllable into a new shape. They are no longer the way into Azar Swan's music, instead Atash is issuing an aesthetic warning. This not for the uninitiated. If you aren't willing to follow them where "Shock" leads, you best turn back now. By the same token the song's sparse, vibrating layers of sound are almost like the opening pages of a book. If you can handle the paper cuts and decipher the dialect, then this one's for you. All else, be warned: here be monsters.
Savage Exile will be released on December 1st via aufnahme + wiedergabe. Follow Azar Swan on Facebook.
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In Praise of George “Corpsegrinder” Fisher’s Instagram
George “Corpsegrinder” Fisher, in addition to having the best heavy metal name since Tom G. Warrior, is the singer of death metal legends Cannibal Corpse and inspiration for Metalocalypse’s Nathan Explosion... but what he’s lesser-known for is being an absolute fucking master of Instagram.
“Corpsegrinder”’s feed features all the gore and glory that you’d expect from one of the world’s most recognizable death growlers; where it becomes truly shocking is in its tenderness. While other metal singers use Instagram to promote more serious endeavors, like Lamb of God’s Randy Blythe (who’s well worth a follow), or Megadeth’s notoriously humorless Dave Mustaine, George Fisher isn’t afraid to show a side you wouldn’t expect from a dude whose band was once attacked by Senator Bob Dole as “undermining the national character of the United States.” Seriously. “Corpsegrinder”’s Instagram is fucking cute.
Here’s George after destroying the claw machine at Toys “R” Us:
A post shared by George CorpseGrinder (@georgecorpsegrinder) on
The man who penned such hits as “Hatchet to the Head” and “Mummified in Barbed Wire” is also a dedicated family man who loves taking the kids to Disney and Legoland in his home state of Florida:
But where George truly captured my heart was in the days leading up to hurricane Irma, earlier this year. At first, he was defiant, as any true metalhead would be, vowing to ride it out at home, but even George’s defiance is endearingly dorky:
Thankfully, the Fisher family decided to take shelter at a Florida elementary school, so “Corpsegrinder” can continue making some of the most vile records the world has ever known, snapping sweet pictures, and most surprisingly, being such a good dad. I’ll let the man himself sum it up with the following post of a picture of a lonesome Florida highway and its caption:
It was a beautiful 81 outside this morning. 85% humidity though but that didn't stop me as I took my morning walk. It was mostly quiet with a few cars driving by and people walking by both of us saying "good morning" with a smile as we passed each other. WITH A SMILE. It made me think how easy it is to look at others as PEOPLE and nothing else. No race, no religion and no politics....Just PEOPLE, out on their morning walk sharing two kind words and a smile. There is always hope that it can be this way EVERYWHERE. THINK ABOUT IT… Have a great day everyone.
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Namaste “Corpsegrinder.” You fucking rule.
-- John Dziuban
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Cetacean Solve Their “Dichotomy”
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In my experience as a music fan, I’ve found it nearly impossible to divorce an album from its accompanying artwork. When Cetacean released their debut Breach | Submerge nearly two years ago, their triple-guitar gorilla swings, saxophone flexes and progressive arrangements made for songs that boasted depth, weight and force. The violent cosmic vortex emblazoned on the CD case made plenty of sense: bursts of light in a sea of darkness being drawn towards an empty pit was an all-too-accurate image befitting Cetacean’s muscular color palette.
Cetacean’s newest release Dichotomy strides down a different path than their debut, both aesthetically and aurally. While the vortex remains, the stark colors and swirling overcast of Breach | Submerge are gone. Islands and oceans erode and fall apart, trapped in the naked detail afforded by the sharp shading and a grayscale eye. Where guitars came to the forefront on Breach | Submerge with burly chords and saccharine harmonies, Cetacean have taken a more expansive route on Dichotomy. The axes spend less time riffing on “Zephyrvs,” letting Daniel Pouliot’s tambourine and Stephen Carouhas’s overdriven bass charge that track to its end.
The layers are less obvious on Dichotomy; there are fewer colors to highlight and differentiate the details, and the listener has to spend a bit more effort unpacking what’s there. The vortex finishes its meal on the title track, where Cetacean arrogantly ebb and sway toward the chaos. Swansong’s saxophone makes a somnambulistic return before waking up red-eyed, flying about the stereo field just as Trae Malone’s screeches, Pouliot’s blasts and the ever-apocalyptic organ signal the end. Though it’s a shorter listen than their debut, Cetacean have entrusted us with more work on Dichotomy. The spotlights are gone and so are the endearing surprises. What’s left is a more cohesive piece, where the accents and garnishes aren’t painted neon pink for us to spot. The vortex has flipped from black to white, but the grip and pull remain.
Cetacean’s Dichotomy EP will be available on November 17th via Apes Who Looked Up. Follow them on Facebook and Bandcamp.
—Avinash Mittur
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Watch: Expander Totally Nails “Mechanized Deathcanal”
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Truth: you don't need a ton of money to make a solid music video. Mostly, it's attitude, plus some creativity. It's best to focus on the music, i.e. the video's storyline should play a small but ultimately non-defining role. Leave the grand storytelling to big-budget bigwigs who'd rather make a video with music rather than a music video. Another hot tip: don't go gung-ho on editing. You're still learning. Just do fast, smooth cuts in step with the music's beat, mild effects here and there for flair; let the content shine through. If the band is wild enough, you don't need to hyper-process things for extremity's sake. Be cool.
Following this rubric is Austin-based thrash-something-core band Expander with their recently released debut full-length Endless Computer. This album is like some kind of alien mechanical acid, caustically gnawing away at anything it touches: grinding guitar riffs, crashing drums, and roboticized screams. It doesn't care, it just wants to destroy. Endless Computer fails to cease, a victory of heart and soul over patience and finesse (though Expander does know how to dance). Plus, the production is fresh, a blend of warm and hollow; even the album art is groovy as hell. The point is this: the musical appeal is all there, but so is the style and grit. To wit, below is an exclusive look at the music video for "Mechanized Deathcanal."
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https://youtu.be/juck5hZXZno
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The video features the following: tin foil surgical masks, flags as capes, car trunk hotboxing, playing the snare drum with your head while wearing a cheap Halloween mask, donning sunglasses inside, holding invisible oranges, and laying down some fine, fine fucking thrash. Expander have the formula nailed: be weird, be wild, be whatever. The sole ideas are to headbang and to hail the riff. And because you can't see clearly when headbanging, Expander went full-on mad with the video's four million cuts. Mind-numbing, eye-melting, tongue-drying, but in the right and purposeful and true-to-form way.
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Endless Computer released on September 20th via Nuclear War Now! Productions. Stream the entire album below.