This Ends Here / The Conqueror Worm – This Ends Here / The Conqueror Worm (2017)


Review contributed to Death Metal Underground by Jon Browning.

This Ends Here / The Conqueror Worm is a not totally godawful, self-titled punk split from the bands of the same names. You won’t want to shoot half of them after listening to it if you’re that bored you know. This Ends Hear’s a-side consists of atmospheric d-beating crossover similar to Discharge crossed with Celtic Frost to create punk with the same tempo as 1990s post-hardcore and atmospheric sludge with none of the outright guitar wank and junkie idiocy. While listeners have probably heard the standard d-beat rhythms, the influence from the stranger, melodic side of speed metal (Sabbat and the Brazilians) and later post-hardcore gives them strength beyond the robotic machine punk guitar wank of bands like Martyrdod. This Ends Here would do well to get rid of most of their bluesier attempts at atmosphere in future material or better integrated it into flowing compositions similar to the better Celtic Frost influenced death metal like Autopsy and Obituary – Cause of Death you know.

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Exposing the Hypocrisy of Liberal Metal Journalism


In an age where the culture war has reached all corners of American life it is essential to understand the immense significance of the extreme metal frontier. As a liberal movement on the brink of extinction adapts a full blown communist agenda and wages totalitarian warfare against all beneficiaries of natural selection and individual freedom it is mandatory for the iron willed men and women of metal to defend the most liberated of all musical genres. By defeating these dystopian LARPers on the battlefield of metal culture we will accelerate their complete evisceration and ultimately emancipate the underground metal genre from it’s stagnant state. Therefore we must understand the enemy to swiftly and decisively destroy it.

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Lame Gates of Ishtar Albums Reissued

Century Media has reissued third rate Gothenburg melodeaf band Gates of Ishtar’s first two studio albums, The Dawn of Flames and At Dusk and Forever, remastered by Dugout Studios (vinyl mastering by Patrick W. Engel) and with new artwork from Juanjo Castellano as the original artwork was “really ugly” according to the band. The band should have been more concerned with writing worthwhile material than artwork for lame, cash-in releases on the popularity of In Flames and other competitors with VH1’s adult contemporary lite rock. Gates of Ishtar were not “melodic death metal masters” but warmed-over bouncy speed and power metal for a late 90s mallrat and Wacken audiences just like the most of their contemporary bands from Gothenburg, Sweden when they weren’t making outright pop music.

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Infester – To the Depths, In Degradation Reissue Review

Martyrdoom Productions, run by Dead Congregation frontman A.V., reissued Infester‘s long out of print classic To the Depths, In Degradation on CD and vinyl LP earlier this year. I purchased a copy of the CD version myself to review for our readers benefit. The record was never originally released on vinyl and being over fifty minutes long, the LP reissue will have compromised sound quality due to narrower groove spacing and all the limitations of the vinyl format such as the compression of the cutting lathe, high and low pass filtering, and mono bass.

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Elfsgedroch – Op de beenderen van onze voorvaderen (2016)

Op de beenderen van onze voorvaderen is yet another another Dutch black metal record heavily influenced by Gorgoroth and Zyklon-B like Tarnkappe. Elfsgedroch however structures riffs as hyper-extended, arpeggiated tremolo-picked chords in incredibly long to the point of droning phrases in the manner of French Canadian band Sorcier des Glaces, who are indeed the band’s primary influence. Clever but occasionally too sappy harmonies similar to Master’s Hammer‘s Bartok and folk influenced heavy metal ones on Ritual but way more annoying pervade the record.

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D. G. Yuengling & Son – Yuengling Light Lager

I went fishing in Pennsylvania today and forgot to bring water to prevent myself from dehydrating on the water in the spring heat. Not wanting to drink industrial run-off pond scum, I went to the bodega next to the bait ‘n’ tackle shop and pick-up the cheapest multi-pack of bottled water the store stocked: Yuengling Light Lager.

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Sadistic Metal Reviews: Inquisition of the Unworthy

Burn them all!

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Dawning – Mount Um + 1997 Demo (2016)


Another previously unreviewed record judged some of The Best Underground Metal of 2016.

Mount Um + 1997 Demo is a digital anthology collecting what Steve Cefala judged to be Dawning‘s strongest material. Half the run-time (“Side A”) is one new, extended track entitled Mount Um in three parts: “Pilgrimage to Umunhum”, “The Albino Bridge Sacrement”, and a melodic bass outro. Mount Um sounds like Summoning worshiping Emperor‘s In the Nightside Eclipse in a lengthy composition reminiscent of Celtic Frost‘s album work. Ambient fantasy keyboards are perverted into pandemonium as if on an arduous journey of great hardship and loss culminating in a bittersweet victory over the uncaring, vicious forces of nature. Mount Um‘s composition is progressive and profound.

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