Tuesday, June 30, 2020

Baroness - Blue Record (2009)

   Baroness represents a genuine spot in the progressive metal scene. It's a band that even though plays quite comprehensive music by an unusual style mix, still didn't turn to a musical masturbation of fripperies, or not falling into the returning problem of many progressive bands by trying to express the simplest things in such a complex way, that everything is losing it's sense.
   There isn't more effective way of sludge killing, than turnig with sludge into a progressive direction, because this way the style is losing it's main features. Still, Baroness was able to manage the whole thing to keep it enjoyable, and even though the themes are frequently changing, the sludge parts didn't lose their effectivenes, but even having important role in the main view. And the most interesting thing is: the main impression (such as the message of the music) is positive. It's not about self-destruction, inner struggles or other morbid things, but about life, and the heaviness of the sound supports the emotional load of the songs instead of demoralizing effects. The root of the concept probably lies somewhere in the '70s, when musical progression, diversity and heaviness came hand in hand. When the musical challenge was to show all-round creativity on the side of being entertaining for wider audience. It's like a modern form of that concept, minus the impression of heavy self-destruction of course. The "Blue Record" is somewhere between artistic ambitions and the expression of simple and essential posivive feelings, free from any disturbing dark clouds. But in case of their show up, the calmer, chilling themes are suspecting a meditative way to find the solution.
   Even though Baroness' music might be compatible with wider audience, it couldn't repeat the overwhelming success of the '70s hard rock/progressive rock bands, because more intelligence is needed for it's reception than how much is available for the masses on the other side.

Goreaphobia - Mortal Repulsion (2009)

   Goreaphobia is also one of the late debuted old bands, and their active periods have been quite wavering too. But at least the first full-lenght album had great timing in middle of the New Wave of Old School Death Metal.
   Unlike most similar bands who had only a compilation release that collects their old demo and other short records, Goreaphobia wrote new songs after, so their return was more than some simple nostalgia. Their early style was raw, wilder and sounds like influenced by bands like Morbid Angel and Deicide, but there have been slow downs with melodies and themes that were more similar to some ancient black metal. The latest feature was kind of odd compared to other old school death metal bands. Over a decade later they picked up this line to express musical progression, and focused more on the diversity of their themes than on the harsh sound. They switched directly to black metal themes sometimes, and the main impression reminds to Necrophagia thanks to the simple but melodic switches and the sometimes narrative vocal style. Maybe the analogy with Necrophagia existed back then too, but it wasn't so showy like in this form. If it had more blackened themes, "Mortal Repulsion" would be a black/death album, but it's not so far from the border of the mentioned genres anyway. Probably if they didn't split up in the '90s and continued this line like this, we could say that the band was ahead of it's time. The albums offers excellent entertainment for the fans of old school death, and also shows an interesting way of musical progression.

Saturday, June 27, 2020

Horrific - Your Worst Nightmare (2009)

   As it was mentioned before, death 'n' roll became a popular error since the whole term was created. But fortunately the existence of a few bands gave sense to this style definition.
   One of these few was Horrific, a former short lived side project of Slasher Dave (Acid Witch) and Lasse Pyykkö (former Acid Witch, Hooded Menace) that really included rock 'n' roll influences, so their music genuinely fits to the style that nobody else was able to fit to, though it was created way before. It's like a recipe of something that once seemed great to create, but nobody could perform it how it supposed to. And later Horrific came and made it. Their music is basically similar to some '70s rock 'n' roll and heavy metal influenced hard rock (like Ted Nugent for instance), it's only more intense, and not intense like thrash metal, but like how old rock 'n' roll was. The catchy-wild, sometimes heavy and demoralizing, but all-round very characteristic guitar play of Slasher Dave proved to be the same effective in an intensity based style, like in the stoner/doom depths of Acid Witch. The strong sound distortion and Mr Pyykkö's extremely deep growling vocal style gave the touch of death metal, like icing on the cake. This combination resulted something that was catchy but also extreme, sounded modern and old school the same time. This style seems to have wider potential, because it could be compatible with both the underground and mainstream audience. So it's wonder why many others didn't even try to experiment with this? "Your Worst Nightmare" is a short, but very effective masterpiece that would deserve wider attention!

Friday, June 26, 2020

Festered - Flesh Perversion (2009)

   Festered was one of Elektrokutioner's early projects, a short lived one that had only one album released.
   Such as most of his bands, Festered was also an old school death metal band built on the same completely horror addicted concept. It was definitely meant to recall the feeling of the early '90s, but like at many other similar bands, the difference is noticeable. Even if the concept and the sound are similar, and most of the oldies also have been horror freaks, it's somehow not the same. Back than the whole death metal thing was kind of actual, something new, and horror movies also had some sort of renaissance. Decades later if someone's trying to do the same, it counts as a fan made project, and the cutten short details of ancient Z rated movies are also everything but actual. It's a different cathegory than it was before, there's no competition, it shouldn't be taken so seriously, and it also didn't mean to shock the audience (or not as much like before). In all of Elektrokutioner's bands the same musical features are waving back: fast, thrashy drumming style, short, heavy slow downs, characteristic guitar themes, that are easy to identify, deep growling vocals and putrid sound. If it's about sickness, heaviness or intesity, Festered was somehow in middle way compared to his other projects. It's simple, enjoyable old school nostalgia by horror and metal geeks made and recommended for horror and metal geeks.

Wednesday, June 24, 2020

Taake - Taake (2008)

     Taake is a great band to introduce to any trve Norwegian black metal fan. That is, if they're not too trve to already know who they are. This 2008 self titled album is an aggressive, well produced Norse black metal album. I always like to give credit to an album within this genre that can pull off a well produced sound while maintaining that ethereal raw and evil spirit and sound. Taake delivers with this album with a high focus on more clear and crisp guitar tones and drums that create the perfect fill.
     Though, the album does not come without critics of the genre railing it as dull or even too technical. Vocally, Hoest delivers what is familiar about previous Taake albums and delivers an often haunting tone throughout the album. In my opinion, sometimes all too predictable metal can be some of the most enjoyable. For the same reasons we watch the same TV shows over and over, sometimes we just want to listen to something that is more familiar, and this Taake album will always be a great classic.

Monday, June 1, 2020

Coffins - Buried Death (2008)

   As one of the most nerve wrecking death/doom bands, Coffins represents a traditional direction of musical extremity based on strictly old school influences and overwhelming heaviness. But the same time their music also fits to the main tendencies of the late '00s/early '10s when musical minimalism and the importance of the sound (mostly based on distortion experiments) was brought into focus.
   Since the beginning they're using the same simple recipe at every album that somehow never can fail and never gets boring. Probably the best aspect of this recipe was their third full-lenght album "Buried Death". The excellence of Coffins lies in simplicity. There's really nothing new in what they do, but their performance was able to give a new meaning to these good old things. They're mostly operating with very slow, repetitive themes and at speed ups their music never gets more complex than an ordinary punk song. Still their strongly distorted, noisy sound and the assisting animalistic deep growls are increasing the heaviness of the main view in such an extreme way, that it makes their music harder to go into. This form of pure noisy heaviness could be more like a challenge for ordinary doom or punk fans to listen, than enjoyable entertainment. Plus they have never been famous of being in a hurry, so the endlessly extended slow downs having a monotonous and therefore very demoralizing effect. There's no break from the constantly sick, mournful feeling, the stench of death haunts over the album in full-lenght. It's a quite authentic and probably the most compromise-less form of the genre. A real masterpiece.

Intestine Baalism - Ultimate Instinct (2008)

   It's always appreciating to find a melodic death metal band that truely have death metal themes in it's music, and not playing simply heavy metal or some modern influenced melodic metal with growling vocals and over emotional background. Intestine Baalism's music is one of the few of the style who are fitting to the term for real.
   Their music is able to recall nostalgic feelings because of the old school touch of their main themes, but the same time returning melodies are taking over the lead temporarily. It's a well made combination based on a contrast of rough approach and softening '80s styled heavy metal themes mixed with blackened influences. Before the listener might get used to one of each, the direction is switching to the other side. The combination of black and heavy metal is based on a well discovered analogy that's quite operable, even though not many have experimented with that in similar context. The vocals are also conforming to this direction by switching to blackened styled cawing. The death metal parts are represented by brutal themes, fast speed both by blast beats and thrash styled drumming and deep growling vocal. The 2 sides are easy to distinguish, but together they creating an interesting and quite colorful main view. At the end of the album the heavy/black metal side gets dominant. "Ultimate Instinct" might be compatible with wide audience, but for those, who are expecting some Göteborg styled melodic death, that actually lacks death metal influences and reminds to bands like In Flames or Dark Tranquility, this album could be disappointing.