In With Winter Comes Despair, we hear a maturing Sapremia [1] characterized by its ingenious arrangement of phrasal riffs that use common or even simple building blocks to craft meaningfully elaborate statements. (more…)
3 CommentsTags: 2008, death metal, sapremia, with winter comes despair
Review by Linus Douglas.
Pek brings death metal of the traditional, direct kind to your table that advances through simple but effective melodic phrases in low register and makes ample use of chromatism. Pek makes a progression between riffs happen, but it is more of an exchange than something that feels “through-composed”. Instead, we find cyclic structures that help expand simple content into longer songs simply by playing upon the replayability of the collection of riffs as narrative paragraphs, which helps the music support itself on more than the complexity of a single riff.
1 CommentTags: 2008, belgium, Black Metal, death metal, pek, preaching evil, review
Article by Lance Viggiano. Read his take on Transilvanian Hunger here.
I was essentially swindled into purchasing the gorgeous gatefold edition of this Averse Sefira LP which showcases some rather magnificent and captivating artwork as well as an above average execution of the band’s themes, concepts, and symbolism in visual form.
31 CommentsTags: 2008, Advent Parallax, article, averse sefira, Black Metal, boring, counter-review, death metal, jeff tandy, lame metal, lyrics, modern metal, re-review, review, techdeaf, tek-deth, texas, vapid, wanking
“Detail shows the face of Stela D which rises 12 ft beside the altar of sacrifice with a death god effigy. The stele represents the 13th ruler of Copán, King Waxaklajun Ub’aah K’awiil (in English, Lord 18 Rabbit), showing half of his face as it was sculpted, and the other half stripped as it would look in Death.” – Akherra Phasmatanás
Article by David Rosales.
Desolation is a full-on ambient project that blends simple and solid harmonic backgrounds, repetitive phrases of a dark coloring, with recorded lamentations both human and otherwise. The aim seems to be to produce the whole array of impressions encapsulated within that single word: desolation. The music’s structure is progressive and appears to be segmented in an episodic manner, which normally implies a loss of continuity between sections. This unwanted effect is expertly avoided by providing smooth transitions, interleaving ambient soundscapes, nature sounds, vocal improvisations, all of which bring variety within a strongly directly concept that never loses content density or a strong sense of purpose. Furthermore, the album being simply distributed between two long tracks reinforces its unity and the requirement that the audience listens to the whole work as if commencing a mental journey, which once begun must be seen through to its very end.
6 CommentsTags: 2008, Ambient, chorus from the ruins, dark ambient, demo, demos, desolation, review
Legion of Doom – The Horned Made Flesh (Zyklon-B)
This Greek band take their acerbic traditional metal and slowly meld in symphonic keyboard elements, making an album that is easy to appreciate but surpasses most others in artistic vision.
Lemmy and Company rarely go completely wrong, and so they wing another one down the middle. Like all Motorhead, most songs are cut from similar patterns and the drone wears thin, but riffs remain cutting and rhythms compelling.
Neuraxis – Thin Line Between (Prosthetic)
We all know metalcore as a genre is like an omelette — throw everything in and hope the flavors carry a lowest common denominator mix. Neuraxis attack metalcore like a metal band, using melody and rhythm to centralize, to great effect.
Deeds of Flesh – Of What’s to Come (Unique Leader)
Getting experimental, this brutal technical death metal band play with some new ideas but deliver solidly resounding songs as they try to wrap their old school metal around metalcore technique.
Hellhammer – Demon Entrails (Noise)
Three bands formed this genre: Hellhammer, Sodom and Bathory. This re-release of formative material from the first of that triumvirate shows us again how mind-blowing it must have been to be there as it happened.
Gridlink – Amber Grey (Hydra Head)
Blurring grindcore with absurdist technical elements, Gridlink make an album that upholds the best traditions of thrash mixed with speed metal and technical death metal, and by keeping it short, don’t wander outside their content zone.
Averse Sefira – Advent Parallax (Candlelight)
This rarity upholds old school black metal and infuses it with classic death metal. Like Morbid Angel from the Convenant era colliding with Graveland from the time of Thousand Swords, this band makes vicious but beautiful music.
Bahimiron – Southern Nihilizm (Moribund)
Imagine early Impaled Nazarene and Gorgoroth combined: fast, melodic riffs with a tendency to deconstruct everything they touch. Although slightly confused in ideals, Bahimiron deliver music that does not compromise aggression or darkness.
Intestine Baalism – Ultimate Instinct (No Colours)
Swedish death metal fanatics make an album in tribute to all three eras of Swedish death metal — the initial surge, Gothenburg and NWOSDM, combined. It’s an improvement over their last and most things coming out of Sweden.
Master – Slaves To Society Re-Release (Ibex Moon)
Evolving from their early primitive roots, Master present us an album that is rippingly fast like Slayer and uses melodic fills to good effect, but never compromises the driving roadhouse rhythms that pound this music forward.
Skepticism – Alloy (Red Stream)
Lush ambient doom surges resoundingly throughout this album, like dye in a pool tracked by the motion of carp. It is meditative, powerful and insightful, but prefers not to state these explicitly, rather letting you absorb them from the resonance.
No CommentsTags: 2008, averse sefira, bahimi, bahimiron, best of, deeds of flesh, gridlink, hellhammer, Intestine Baalism, Legion of Doom, master, motorhead, neuraxis, skepticism
