Vemod- Venter på stormene(2012)

Vemod- Venter på stormene

Ethereal and twisted, Venter på stormene provides a hypnotic back drop of dissonant, melodic guitars and tortured, emotional vocals.  The Norwegian two-piece combine snippets of the primitive Second Wave sound, particularly influenced by Burzum and Ulver but also a bit of Darkthrone, with a heavily modern Ambient Black Metal deluge inspired by the genre's titans.  It's not revolutionary nor is it deserving of exhalation, but fans of the genre will find much to love about Venter på stormene twisting forest paths and screaming dead lost in the fog.

 Above all other adjectives to describe Venter på stormene, hypnotic would be at the top of the list; be careful blasting this record while driving along a sorrowfully alone highway in the dead of night, because you'll likely be coming face to face with a ditch(I nearly did).  A whispering, hollow and noisy production sound combines with inescapable repetition to cast upon the listener an all encompassing trance that is difficult to break.  The vocals are overwhelming, mixing shrieks, moans, guttural growls and effective clean singing to further intensify the atmosphere, while the highly repetitive drumming provides the foundation for this dreamscape of ice and fire.

Those looking for Black Metal which predicates itself on ultra tight, fast moving musicianship and lots of complexity will struggle to find much of value with Venter på stormene, but Vemod do a very good job of adding some Second Wave grime and brutality to their sorrowful, melodic sound.  The title track and second track, "Ikledd evighetens kappe" both feature a strong foundation of blast beats, throat ripping vocals, slithering bass and shrieking, thin guitars to go with the ambient, soaring compositions used to break up the endless, mechanical repetition.

Mechanical, but powerful and emotional at the same time.  Truly the strength of Venter på stormene comes from this facet of it's sound; despite the overall lack of complexity and the bare-bones content of the songs, Venter på stormene is an emotional, profound experience.  It's the very back-bone of the Ambient Black Metal sound, but far too many new artists utterly fail to achieve any sort of real emotion.  Often, they sound more like a boring art-house Drone project for their college performance art class than a truly absorbing Black Metal beast, but Vemod have clearly mastered this concept on Venter på stormene, while developing a sound which should appeal to a more diverse group of Black Metal fans.

That said, "Altets tempel" is a complete waste of track; mostly a collection of various Ambient Black Metal tropes that don't involve any of kind of Black Metal, but instead a grouping of generic melodic leads and keyboard work.  At nearly 13 minutes long, it sucks the energy that the previous two tracks electro-charged the room with.  These incredibly boring, lazy compositions are far to common in the genre and a major black eye for Venter på stormene.  The final track, "A stige blant stjerner" is a stronger ambient piece, featuring more straight up Black Metal and some strong melodic leads, but it likes energy and power overall.

Such as it is, Venter på stormene is still a fine overall album.  The failings of it's second half do little to diminish the raw intensity and profound introspection of the first half, and in the right atmosphere this album will simply cast a spell of confusion and dreams over you that is nearly impossible to break.  Fans of this genre, and purists looking for something more dynamic while still firmly entrenched in the old ways of the Fatherland of Oslo will find appeal in Venter på stormene's rotted, ice-tortured orchards and hard, lifeless soil which glows an unholy twilight across the night sky.

Rating: 8/10

Consummation- Consummation(2012)

Consummation- Consummation

As if the Australian Death and Black Metal scene was not strong enough, loaded with a veritable All-Pro group of musicians and bands, here comes the mysterious and slithering mass known as Consummation with their brilliant, haunting and dissonant s/t debut.  Featuring a pair of mighty Satanic hymns for truly unclean worship of old spirits whose names cannot be uttered, Consummation is one of those brilliant little releases that despite it's minuscule running time delivers more than many full-length albums.  Everything here works, from the song writing to the musicianship to the production, making Consummation a little masterpiece whose value is diminished only by it's format.

"Heautontimoroumenos" shows off the strongest elements of Consummation's sound right off the bat: hazy, dissonant and mildly technical riffing, thundering and massive drums, earth shattering low end and vicious, tortured vocals which run the gauntlet of shrieks, guttural growls and deathly moans.  Consummation has a sound firmly rooted in the Australian Black/Death style, but flourishes of other influences shine through from time to time, whether it's the squirming and swimming dissonant leads and "pulpit preaching" vocal patterns that bring to mind later Funeral Mist or the Celtic Frost like moments of Doom-laden, percussion driven madness, and all of these elements are present on "Heautontimoroumenos";  The thundering percussion in particular reminds me of the Celtic Frost song "Dawn of Meggido" from To Mega Therion.  A better combination of spine-tingling solos and sheer face melting blackness you will not find, and this track without question the stronger of the two.

"Rend the Ain Soph" has a very strong Orthodox Black Metal vibe to it, featuring a near impenetrable wall of dissonant fuzz and unholy vocal assaults.  The drumming here is phenomenal, absolutely leveling the listener with power and control.  I wouldn't be surprised if many a drum head needed replacing, because each strike of the snare or tom feels like a battering ram demolishing a castle gate.  Everything works in brilliant conjunction to create a dense, foggy atmosphere; a ritual of burning flesh in a desiccated cathedral where nothing holy remains.  "Rend the Ain Soph" isn't quite as catchy or as head-bangingly brutal as "Heautontimoroumenos," but you'll still feel as though you bathed in blood and goat urine by the time it ends.

Consummation doesn't really have enough meat on it to truly transcend into classic territory, but the quality of the limited quantity cannot be denied.  Finding a way to stand out in the Australian Black/Death Metal scene is no easy task, but Consummation stands as one of the more impressive debuts I've heard.  It's serpentine song-structures, effortless atmosphere and commanding, unique sound is refreshing and highly enjoyable, and makes this a demo well worth your time and money.

Rating: 8.5/10

Knelt Rote- Trespass(2012)

Knelt Rote- Tresspass

Few albums are as relentlessly, appallingly heavy as Trespass, the third album from Portland, Oregon spine snappers Knelt Rote.  A group I'm not intimately familiar with, Knelt Rote apparently started as a Noisegrind side project for a group of well traveled Oregon musicians before metamorphosing into a new, equally savage and noisy though far less avant-garde beast.  With Incantation worship having been all the rage for many years(though this seems to have begun to die down slightly), Knelt Rote have found a far more creative and chaotic way to emulate them: by mixing in and equal amount of blistering Grindcore into the tremolo-and-Doom formula of the Old New Yorkers.  It's certainly an interesting concept, and one that surprisingly works despite what appears to be an oil-and-water mixture.

Perhaps the strongest aspect of Trespass is that Knelt Rote find a way to, for the most part, organically mix the two disparate styles without having songs fall into that "this part sounds like A band, this part sounds like B band" formula so many bands use.  It's always impressive when an artist can instead create a synthesis, combing the essence of both styles into a single uniform approach, and throughout Trespass we see this unholy matrimony in full effect.  The final track, "Catalepsy," is without question the strongest example of this union and the strongest track on the record, a dissonant and blasting track which mixes unholy Blackened riffs with relentless drumming, driving tempo and disjointed, demonic vocals to create that wondrous swirling effect that Incantation so completely mastered while moving at speeds far more reminiscent of Napalm Death or early Carcass.  "Hunger" has a more Grind focused approach, bringing some Pig Destroyer-esque chaos and mildly technical riffing before transforming into another driving, Blackened nightmare.  I was somewhat surprised by the complexities on display here, and like many of their peers such as Adversarial and Muknal, there is some subdued but tangible technical flourishes throughout Trespass which offer a nice contrast to the musty and murky invocations and sledgehammer blasting.

Just don't expect a ton of variety or a consistent atmosphere with Trespass.  Though certain tracks stand out over others, there isn't a great deal here to differentiate the individual tracks from one another, and at times Trespass develops a droning quality that clashes with the chaotic and static-riddle madness.  It's an album which can work you into a lull of concentration without ever finding a way to hook you back in, yet the loud snare often grinds against the backdrop of the coiling riffs and creates a somewhat disjointed contrast.  And all this relentless brutality can at times eviscerate the strongest elements of the record: the atmosphere.  Incantation did not become one of the greatest Death Metal bands, or one of the most influential, by being the most brutal or relentless band.  They did it by creating an atmosphere which truly evoked a dream-like state of demonic possession, one where bathing in the madness and the nightmares made you feel the music on a different level.  With all of it's fury and fire, Trespass can force you in and out of this trance in a jarring way.

Still, it's hard to find much overwhelming fault with Trespass.  The sheer fact that Knelt Rote have discovered a creative and original way to take use those Incantation elements that doesn't fit into either banal worship or occult naval-gazing is worthy of praise if nothing else.  You simply won't find another album which sounds exactly like Trespass, and it's an album of excessive extremes and suffocating barbarity that will not suffer survivors.  If you take this album head on, be ready to search the dirt for your teeth.

Rating: 8/10

Desert Rot: Doth- Datura Wrightii(2012)

Doth- Datura Wrightii

Over the next several weeks, Curse of the Great White Elephant will be doing some spotlight reviews for Extreme Music acts located in Arizona.

Why?  Because Arizona's local music scene, and particularly it's local Extreme Music scene, is mostly terrible.  There is a reason why bands who gain any measure of success in the AZ either move the fuck out(Graves at Sea, Vektor) or break-up(Vehemence): because the AZ scene can be incredibly toxic at times, sucking the life out of bands and artists who try to reach a greater audience.  The reasons for this are numerous: AZ largely lacks a strong youth culture and is populated by migrants from other states who would as soon leave and head to California, Oregon or New York and pursue their musical dreams there.  Cities and towns in AZ are often great distances from each other, and getting together with like minded musicians can be both time consuming and cost prohibitive.  As someone who was in a band, and had to drive 15 miles just to get to practice and sometimes 100's of miles just to play at an anarchist bookstore without pay, being in a band in AZ and merely being able to focus on the music can be difficult.

But it's not all bad.  Since I quit following the local scene, things have started to pick up just a bit.  AZ is experiencing a bit of an upswing in it's local Extreme Music scene, and since this is where I live and since I often bitch about the state of the local scene, I owe it to the bands in the AZ to support them and help build up the scene in my own little way: by being a critical, nit-picking asshole about their demos.  So welcome to out first ever Deseret Rot segment.

Doth are a mysterious Tempe, AZ Black Metal band with very little in the way of available information on them.  Signed to Phoenix based record label Tagobella, Doth play a style of raw, atmospheric Black Metal which is not easy to pigeon-hole.  It's far more throat-slicing, nasty and aggressive than the Liturgy's of the world, yet has a more modern and progressive feel than the Black Twilight Circle and their LLN-esque traditionalism, falling somewhere in a strange, caustic middle-ground populated with trumpets and insane, swirling, Death Metal-infused riffs.  At times eerily melodic, at other times simply head smashing, Datura Wrightii is a limited experience at only two songs, but also dynamic enough to be engrossing.

The title track is by far the better of the two, and comes exploding forth with the most devastating riff on the album, one heavily influenced by Blackened Death Metal and inhumanly ferocious.  It quickly begins running the gauntlet between grimy and atmospheric traditional Black Metal riffs and haunting, melodic and modern atmospheric compositions, as well as the most effective use of a trumpet I have ever heard in a Black Metal song.  It's an absolutely massive track, slamming like a meteor into a Russian woodland and leveling everything for miles around.  The vocals are powerful and deranged, and the drumming, while a bit raw and sloppy, is also explosive and thunderous.  It's the kind of track that gets heads banging and blood pumping, and it's a damn fine effort which fully explores the bands musical palette.  "Schist Crevice" doesn't fare quite as well: the production quality is clearly much different and generally very poor.  It lacks almost all of the aggression of the title track and stumbles in a failed effort to be hyper-atmospheric and noise-y.  It has some haunting moments, particularly in the last minute or so when the noise begins to crescendo into what sounds like a choir of banshee's, and the vocals remain vicious and unhinged, but the horrendous drum sound(sounds like a drum machine) is a major buzz kill.

Doth are planning to begin recording a new album shortly, and if the album bears any resemblance to the title track of Datura Wrightii, than we are going to be in for a treat.  Doth are a band which don't sound like any other Black Metal band from Arizona that I have heard, and have serious potential to become one of the big new things in Atmospheric Black Metal.  That potential is not completely realized here, but the title track alone is worth any Black Metal fans time.

Rating: 7/10

Be sure to check out Tagobella's Bandcamp here

And be on the look out for more Desert Rot segments.

Coheed and Cambria- The Afterman: Ascension(2012) and Descension(2013)

The Afterman: Ascension

The Afterman: Descension

It's been a long time coming.  Hell if feels like an eternity since I felt this tingle down my spine, this electricity in the air...this obsession.  But I can safely say this, and it's been way too long let me tell you:

Welcome home, Coheed and Cambria.  I've missed you, and I forgive you.

It felt as if the Keywork itself fell apart after Co&Ca, the purveyors behind some of the best Prog and Pop albums of the previous decade with their first 3 masterpieces Second Stage Turbine Blade, In Keeping Secrets of Silent Earth: 3 and Good Apollo I'm Burning Star IV: From Fear Through the Eyes of Madness, had dropped the bane that-should-not-be with Year of the Black Rainbow.  It was an album that was so devastatingly bad, so poorly produced and so lifeless that it drove many diehard fans of this once mighty group, myself most of all, into a pit of musical cynicism and despair.  A bit dramatic?  Certainly, but then again this is what real passion does to the person infected by it.  It leads to dizzying highs and subterranean lows, and after Year of the Black Rainbow and it's utter lack of anything, well, Coheed and Cambria in it, I was buried under miles of defeat.

So when faced with The Afterman: Ascension/Descension, I felt like a jilted lover face to face with an old, painful flame for the first time in ages.  I felt cold and angry, but also intrigued.  I had to know what they had been up to since we had been apart, I had to see if this old flame would once again feed my obsession...

Ascension/Descension in fact did satisfy me in more ways than I could have imagined.  It may not have been a complete return to the bands classic, incredibly epic Prog-Metal-Pop they had mastered, but instead a new evolution on those same genre's to produce something wholly new and exciting.  By increasing the focus on the Pop elements of the bands sound, which were completely missing from Year of the Black Rainbow, and layering the Prog and occasional Metal on top of the hook-driven sing-along compositions, Ascension/Descension felt like as though it were both a brilliant return to form and a completely new sound: familiar yet fresh.  Ascension/Descension features only a handful of songs over 5 minutes, and the epic single track yarn-spinning of earlier albums is replaced by a more accessible and textured songs which are less exhausting but even more infectious.  Led by Claudio Sanchez's unique falsetto, Ascension/Descension is like a pied piper, leading any within earshot to start dancing like an idiot and singing along like no one is listening.

Not that Ascension(album 1) doesn't have it's classic Co&Ca moments, bu they are few and far between.  "Key Entity Extraction I:  Domino the Destitute" would have felt right at home on Good Apollo I or II, with it's saga of Metallic riffs, shredding solos and orchestral trappings, not to mention those glorious sing-scream along moments specifically designed to incite a crowd.  But beyond this track(and IMO, the best one between both albums), Ascension is largely new territory for the band.  Tracks like "The Afterman" and "Subtraction" sound closer to something from Claudio's solo project The Prize Fighter Inferno, mixing Electronic music and textures with understated or acoustic guitars and soft, whispered vocals, while "Goodnight, Fair Lady" is pure no frills Pop Rock.  It's also incredibly contagious, so good luck not singing it in the grocery line.  And "Key Entity Extraction IV: Evangira the Faithful" is a truly unique beast: Blues-y, psychedelic, ominous yet beautiful, it's a far more subdued and atmospheric track that we have come to expect from Co&Ca in the past.  The rest of this album is so god damn fucking awesome, I can forgive the lone mis-step: "Key Entity Extraction II: Holly Wood the Cracked."  Imagine Coheed playing Nu-Metal, and you about get the idea... it's an atrocious, ugly, frankly stupid song which stands out like Nicolas Cage in a good movie with talented actors, and the lone pock-mark between the two albums

One simply cannot under-state the importance of one key line-up change that occurred between Year of the Black Rainbow and Ascension/Descension: the departure of drummer Chris Pennie and the return of Josh Eppard, the man behind the kit for Coheed and Cambria's first 3 albums.  Now, I am reluctant to place the blame of Year of the Black Rainbow on Pennie: Claudio writes the songs after all, and Pennie has serious chops and is a tremendous drummer.  But it doesn't seem like a coincidence that Eppards return helped make Ascension and Descension the bands best material in nearly a decade.  Eppard's performance on the kit for both albums is the highlight bar-none.  He seems to literally play the hooks, and his punch-y kick drum becomes a beloved companion throughout the entire experience.

If Ascension feels like a new Co&Ca, than Descension(album 2) will feel even more alien, yet like Ascension it still feels like a true Co&Ca album.  The Pop elements take an even stronger hold on the album, and there is a much greater emphasis on just pure Pop Rock and even more Prize Fighter Inferno-esque moments.  "Key Entity Extraction V: Sentry the Defiant" is about as close as we get to the bands classic sound, featuring a more Metallic approach and an epic acoustic intro, but it's still very thick and heavy more in killer vocal hooks than head-banging moments.  "Number City" is like a brain slug: prepare to be it's host for a long, long time.  It's funky, Pop-y bubble-gum they way it should be, and Co&Ca always find a way to make even their happiest of songs feature a twinge of sadness and darkness that lets you know that the song is more substantial than sugary sweet cotton candy.  "Gravity's Union" truly stands out: for a moment, I thought I was listening to a lost track from In Keeping Secrets of Silent Earth: 3.  It has those serpentine riffs, those sudden one-off sections that never repeat but amp up the atmosphere to 11, and of course the bands patented intense bridge-section that the band has become famous for.  But like the rest of the album, it has a unique feel from any previous Co&Ca effort, with the vocal hooks taking center stage and the drums thundering and smashing about, leaving the guitars to create texture and atmosphere.

The atmosphere of Ascension/Descension is without question the greatest strength of the albums.  They may be infectiously catchy, but there is an air of sadness and despair over both of them which leaves a powerful, lasting impact on the listener.  As you sing and scream along to these tracks, you can feel the real emotional weight behind each and every track, the power of the story and of the characters who inhabit it.  Coheed and Cambria have truly bounced back in a massive way, completely blowing the lid off of low expectations and once again basking in the light of the sun.  Do either of these albums compare to the band classic album?  Nothing really does, but that is an unfair comparison.  Ascension/Descension is the kind of thing which can completely rehabilitate a bands damaged image.  Well done sirs... well fucking done.

And welcome home.

Ratings:

Ascension: 8.5/10

Descension: 9/10

War From a Harlots Mouth- Voyeur(2012)

War From a Harlots Mouth- Voyeur

Those of us in the underground, Extreme Metal community have gotten pretty damn good and filtering through the endless garbage that invades the scene from all sides without every really having to listen to any of it.  We have all developed a comfortable routine of check-marks, usually a mix of general broad guidelines and personal preferences, that allow us to avoid ever having to confront a single artist which may in anyway offend our sensibilities.  We form safe, secure barriers around ourselves and let the shit that's flying from the fan bounce off it, allowing only the diamonds in the rough through the force-field.

Germany's War From a Harlots Mouth was one of my many "instant fuck-offs" the very second their existence became known to me.  Between the bands absolutely stupid name(which remains embarrassingly bad), their affiliations with dozens of shit artists, and well...

Looking like that, I instantly wrote them off as Hot Topic overhead tunes for 13 year old scene queens who like to "mosh and fuck shit up" between classes at the Junior High School.  I am, after all, and Extreme Metal sophisticate whose pure ears are better suited for brilliant, mind-altering music such as XXX Maniak and Cock and Ball Torture.  A band like War From a Harlots Mouth was, I thought, below me.

Consider me properly fucking learned, for the bands most recent release Voyeur has reminded me one shouldn't judge a book by it's cover(a lesson I should have learned after Morbus Chron tricked with with their gorgeous pink cover art...).  Don't mistake this for endless praise: Voyeur is not where near the best album I have ever heard nor does it feel particularly essential.  But for an album which gives off such a Devil Wears Prada-esque vibe from it's asinine cover art and, well, the fact that the band is called War From a Harlots Mouth(ugh!), Voyeur is a damn solid little 40 minute album which, like a good book with a worn and tattered cover, needs to be cracked open to really enjoy.

WFaHM(even the abbreviation annoys me) have stumbled on a sound which certainly stands out from the vast majority of modern Metalcore bands, mixing the aggressive, tech-and-sludge of Gaza with the dissonance, off-kilter riffing of bands like Ulcerate, Deathspell Omega and Abyssal...and lots and lots of obnoxious and same-y sounding chugs(more on this later).  It's a pretty cool style, one which I haven't heard any other artist attempt and one which certainly stands out in a sea of "me too" Unearth-clones.  These styles might seem clashing, but throughout Voyeur WFaHM finds cool, interesting ways to make it work.  "Vertigo" features some very cool dissonant leads over quiet, ambient compositions to match some vicious blast-beats and some very heavy, aggressive Sludge sections, while "Terrifier" actually starts off with a good breakdown before unleashing a torrent of blast-beats and hyper complex riffing which instantly brings to mind a Sludge-y Ulcerate smoking bowls in a Louisiana dive bar.  "Terrifier" is particular is a great song, creating a really strong and atmospheric sense of unease with some truly evil sounding compositions, while "Of Fear and Total Control" is a more subdued and melodic track that also has some very strong atmospheric undertones, using some Black Metal-esque sections for maximum effect.  When Voyeur works, it works really well and shocked me to know end when I first spun it front to back.

And this whole thing is driven by the fantastic production sound, which is both incredibly professional without being in anyway too slick or sterile.  The guitars and bass are Leviathan-sized, completely crushing anything and everything beneath their massive weight.  The drums are obviously triggered, but they sound great, with very little to no "clicking" on the kick or the snare, which is a death-knell for most modern Metal of any genre.  Obviously supported by time and money, Voyeur is one of the best sounding Extreme Metal albums I listened to in a long time, keeping all the punch and static without giving up on clarity and balance.  It's a brilliant piece of sound engineering that helps elevate Voyeur to new levels that perhaps the music couldn't quite reach on it's own.

Yet for all it's strength, Voyeur suffers from a lack of concrete ideas to support the WFaHM ambitious style.  Around the track "Temple," Voyeur quite literally grinds to a halt creatively and in some seemingly desperate scrambling begins to recycle it's own compositions for the second half.  It's not a completely unimpressive second leg, but it is mostly forgettable, heavily handicapped by the incessant chugging which begins to infect it.  There is quite a bit of chugging throughout the album, but it reaches a fever pitch in the second half, ending with the sleep-inducing "Scopophobia," which when it isn't chugging features an atrocious clean vocal section and riffs pretty much stolen from "Of Fear and Total Control."  In truth, there is such a thing as a "good chug" (see "Terrifier"), but if your tolerance for chugging is low, then even the best elements of Voyeur will leave you cold, so be forewarned.  It also doesn't help that vocalist Nico Webers is abysmal, belting out his weak, uninteresting Hardcore growl for most of the record.

For a brief moment, I lifted my blinders and discovered quite the surprise in Voyeur.  And my final score isn't really indicative of the enjoyment I got from it, but Voyeur feels like an incomplete album which is missing many key elements for brilliance or even consistent competency.  Yet for it's fault Voyeur is a fucking heavy album, sounds great and has some atmosphere and intensity to it, enough so that it's worth listening to.  So does this mean that I will no longer judge bands by their name?  By who they associate with?  By their physical apperance?

This...or the...Apocalypse?  Really?  No thanks.

Rating: 7/10

Vassafor- Obsidian Codex(2012)

Vassafor- Obsidian Codex

For the weak, I have a message: get the fuck out.  Obsidian Codex is simply too much for you.

Those looking for an album which in any way caters to the casual or accommodates the uninitiated simply need not apply for this review or Obsidian Codex, the latest masterwork from New Zealand two piece Vassafor.  The long running project, which formed in 1997 but has had a very irregular release history, have crafted a masterpiece so thrilling and mesmerizing that working through it's incomparably dense facade becomes a journey in and of itself.  In fact, describing Obsidian Codex and it's 96 minute running time(you read that right) as a "journey" is about the best description I can formulate: Phil Kusabs and Ben Parker(known as VK and BP) take us on a musical adventure which features terrifying abominations, hellish landscapes and twisted black forests inundated with freezing snow, where moments of beauty and emotion are few but present, the driving force that keeps us on the path to this massive quest's ultimate conclusion.  It is in no way an easy album to enjoy; it will pummel and suffocate all who challenge it, and test the endurance of anyone foolish enough to take it lightly.  But it's also one of the most worthwhile musical experiences to be found in Extreme Metal of any genre.  Obsidian Codex is simply a masterpiece removed from needless classification beyond "awesome."

Stylistically, it's not hard to pick out the genres and artists which influenced Obsidian Codex, but everything here is put together in such a way that those influences feel like they are being transformed by Vassafor, molded and shaped into effective new tools for the song writing mechanism, beyond the well worn instruments that have been continuously reused for the same purpose again and again.  At the most "brass-tacks" level, Vassafor could be described as "Occult Blackened Death/Doom," but such a classification simply misses the mark that the band has set with this album.  The atmosphere is thick to the point of solidification, the creepiness of the compositions is so spine chilling that ice forms on the flesh and the unshakably somber moments, driven by smothered melodic leads and some deeply emotional compositions, brings about occasional moments of truly subdued beauty; a fallen angel, wings broken and flesh cleaved, laying amongst the ash and crying silver tears.  Of course, Obsidian Codex has plenty of good old brutal, bestial and even Thrash-y moments that reminds you that Mr. Kusabs has played with the likes of Blasphemy and Diocletain in his long musical career.  And you can note that all of these elements are right in the very first actual song on the album, "Rites of Ascension," and continue to appear throughout the album, culminating in the truly epic monster known as "Nemesis," which starts with a short but incredible woodwind intro(unsure of the exact instrument) which sets the tone for a 23 minute epic of unparallelled  proportions.

I've often complained about extremely long songs, and "Nemesis" certainly fits the bill of an incredibly elongated piece that runs the risk of going disastrously off the rails.  But that's the glory of "Nemesis" and the other epically long tracks on Obsidian Codex: they are perfectly fleshed out with a combination of ambiance and ideas that they never grow stale or lose the listeners interest.  Tracks dance between tempos and riffs with perfectly calculated brilliance, showing a level of song-writing which transcends what most artists could even hope to achieve.  "Sunya(Void  Paradox)" maintains a driving, aggressive rhythm throughout, showing a more take no prisoners approach to song writing that instigates furious bouts of relentless head-banging and stands in stark but effective contrast to the more Doom-y aspects of the record, while the aforementioned opening track "Rites of Ascension" features some truly horrific yet oddly haunting compositions which give off an unhinged and ritualistic intensity.  And the final real track, Makutu(Damned to the Deepest Depths)" starts off with a tribal, ritualistic drum pattern before morphing into an unholy fusion of Blasphemy and Portal.  And it ends with a slice of Sludge, yeah Sludge, which just adds icing to an already maggot ridden, gory cake of true nihilism All of these tracks are well over the 7 minute mark, yet never fail to entrance for a single moment.  It's almost stupefying.

I mentioned the albums 96 minute running time, and that will automatically create a barrier of entry for many.  Truth be told, I could see why a lot of people simply wouldn't like this album, or even hate it.  Obsidian Codex is one of those albums where the creative direction of the artist is encapsulated to the point where it offers no leeway to the listener, a "my way or the high way" style of song-writing which some will find dull, others obnoxious or even offensive.  Even the ambient tracks go for several minutes, and the album leans heavily on them to help intensify the already dense compositions.  And while the production is fairly accessible, especially by the standards set in this particular genre, and many of the riffs invitingly familiar to fans of bands like Diocletain, Antediluvian or Mitochondrion, Obsidian Codex is an album defined by excess and disregard for the listeners time or sanity.

Yet for all of Obsidian Codex's excesses, for all of it's density and disregard, its an album built mostly on accessible, inviting riffs and enjoyable variety.  Every track feels intertwined, yet all of them also feel distinct and unique when compared to each other.  And while this album was clearly meant to be experienced front to back in one single sitting, each of the actual musical tracks on Obsidian Codex stand on their own feet and can be enjoyed and replayed independently of each the whole album experience.  This is perhaps Obsidian Codex's greatest triumph, and a true rarity in this particular genre, where the whole album experience is the rule and playability is more often than not the exception.

I hesitate to use the word "perfection" here, but in many ways Obsidian Codex is the perfect album: 

perfect in it's atmospheric and thematic presentation, perfect in it's execution and musical competency, perfect in it's song-writing and production.  Obsidian Codex is the ultimate realization of a single musical vision being shared by two musicians who are working as a single, cohesive creative force.  It's an absolutely stunning album, one whose flaws are so few and far between that mentioning them is simply pointless beyond the need to be typed here; hyperbole be damned, Obsidian Codex is unlike anything I have ever heard.

Rating: 10/10

Chasm of Nis- Redolent of Spheres(2012)

Chasm of Nis- Redolent of Spheres

Justin Blake Smith has quickly become one of the more prolific performers of putrid, pestilential putrescence in the American Death Metal scene.  As one of the main forces behind Encoffination's brand of sinfully slothful down-tempo Death/Doom and Father Befouled's well oiled Incantation worship machine, JBS has also had a prolific solo career with acts such as Hills of Sefiroth and Vomitchapel.  But his newest project, Chasm of Nis, is by far the most interesting and dynamic project yet.  In today's modern Death Metal scene, Chasm of Nis might not be as original as it would have been just a few years ago, but it still brings a somewhat fresh perspective on Occult Blackened Death Metal.

Redolent of Spheres doesn't too a lot to separate itself from the myriad of highly atmospheric, low-fi Star Cult provocateurs that are quickly saturating the genre, but it does just enough to stand out.  Featuring only two real tracks(it also has a cool intro and a completely pointless outro that borders on offensive), Redolent of Spheres doesn't have much time to make an impact but makes the most of it.  Comparisons to Portal, Antediluvian and Grave Upheaval are almost mandatory here, and they do fit.  JBS brings many of the same aspects to the table: lurching, ritualistic tempos, deep guttural vocals(which suddenly sound powerful and interesting, after being completely pointless on the recent Father Befouled, which makes me think it's a production issue), and a hazy production which suffers from some unfortunate distortion that occasionally gets obnoxious.  But Redolent of Spheres does bring a bit more to the table, namely in a distinct and surprising influence which stood out to me almost immediately: some of these riffs will being to mind Demilich, and in the best way possible.  "Œnemic Subjugation" explodes right out of the gate with ferocious blasting and a strange, dischordant and chaotic lead with a guitar sound as close to Nespithe as I have ever heard.  It's incredibly awesome, and after a moment of sleepy miasma, it returns again and expands in a way which is really exciting.  "Archaiciasis Ænfernal" is an even more dynamic track, which runs the gauntlet of Portal, Grave Upheaval and Demilich with fluidity and song writing chops.  It's a killer track, filled with creepy underpinnings of melody and some truly demonic atmosphere.

I can honestly say I haven't been all that kind to previous projects from JBS, but Chasm of Nis shows that the man has more in him than slow stuff and Incantation worship.  Redolent of Spheres is short and doesn't truly light the world on fire, but it's a highly enjoyable listen which brings just enough originality to the table to stand out in an increasingly over-crowded scene.  Hopefully, the Demilich-esque elements take center stage here, giving Chasm of Nis and even more defined place in America's massive Death Metal scene.  Be sure to purchase the demo here.

Rating: 8/10

Desolate Shrine-The Sanctum of Human Darkness (2012)

Desolate Shrine-The Sanctum of Human Darkness

By this point, Dark Descent has become a label that has well established itself as a flagship of darkly evocative and powerful underground black and death metal.  The latest Desolate Shrine album, the Sanctum of Human Darkness, is no exception to this tradition, containing eight tracks of monolithic Finnish death metal that will not fail to have ground your bones to powdered ash at the end of a full sitting.  A noticeable improvement over the unfulfilled potential of its predecessor, Tenebrous Towers, Desolate Shrine’s sophomore effort manages to collect the former album’s expansive, yet meandering atmospheric approach into a more focused attack, ultimately creating an album that leaves a greater impression due to the sheer momentum generated by the coupling of muscular riffwork and stark, obsidian atmosphere.

What is particularly impressive about The Sanctum of Human Darkness was its inability to conjure comparisons to the usual troupe of enfranchised death metal legends that every “old-school” revival act and their 5^th cousin claims to be the inheritor of.  While glimpses of regional Finnish patriarchs Demigod and Convulse flashed by, coupled with a bombastic, infernal delivery that more than slightly hinted at Immolation and Morbid Angel, and topped off with a filthy layer of Incantation-esque soot, nowhere in the middle of digesting the album was I ever given any inclination to pinpoint specific riffs and passages to any entity other than the tormented muses of Desolate Shrine themselves.  In a death metal scene that has in recent years filled with acts whose sole claim to note was to do a particularly “legitimate,” undeviating rendition of an older template, it is refreshing to find a band that, while clearly “old-school” in their approach to the craft, interprets their influences in a way that accentuates their own identity as opposed to subsuming it behind a revivalist banner.  

While on a song to song basis, the album is hard to analyze, as every track more or less meshes together into a single cacophony of whirring, choking black miasma, the album never truly becomes tiresome due to the monolithic relentlessness of its chaotic attack.  Occasionally acoustic guitars and piano pieces break the mayhem, acting as a somber eye-of-the-storm, a calm that becomes all the more nerve-wracking knowing that the hurricane of guitar riffs and nocturnal ambiances will inevitably return.  Yet even in its most violent moments, The Sanctum of Human Darkness never loses its more morose tendencies, and as a whole there is a feeling of tenderness and sorrow contrasted with your usual old-school sensibilities that is more characteristic  of Peaceville-style melodic death/doom efforts, including early Katatonia, Paradise Lost, and more contemporary acts such as Daylight Dies.  

Don’t be fooled though, this is not an album that strives to approach accessibility in any shape or form.  Almost nonexistent are the hooks and overarching melodies that serve to anchor many other records to a backbone, and Desolate Shrine never seem to settle down into comfortable, headbang-conducive groove.   Instead, this opus works its way into the mind of the listener through the layering of musical textures in a way tasteful enough to paint evocative images of desolation and despair.  At certain points, it almost feels as if you are staring at the smoldering pillars of a post-apocalyptic wasteland, where the fragments of human civilization (analogous to the moments of extremely human pathos that emerge through the aforementioned tenderness) stand as stark supplicants to the majesty of destruction, heightening the sense of loss as you ponder the futility of humanity in its struggle against the forces of inevitable entropy.  Indeed, the greatest strength of The Sanctum of Human Darkness is, more than anything, as a holistic work working through a wall of slightly-melodic ambiance to generate its desired effect.  The songs themselves serve as individual variations of a shared theme, as opposed to distinct entities with their own artistic identity.  However, the album truly comes together when listened to in one sitting, taking the listener through an entire obsidian mountain range of emotional peaks and valleys.  

The Sanctum of Human Darkness’s role as atmospheric, impressionist music ultimately fails to place it in the upper echelon of death metal albums, as its ambitious yet monotonous approach towards composition renders its movements largely devoid of individual standout moments.  The band mostly plods along heavily at the same tempo throughout the album, reinforcing the idea of The Sanctum of Human Darkness as more of a deliberate, unmovable hellforged machine than a musical album, and unfortunately the album eventually begins running out of steam to propel it forward in any attention-grabbing manner.  However, when all is said and done, you could do far worse than to give this unique, yet wholly traditional piece of death metal a spin or two in your passing hours.  

Rating: 7.5/10

Sodb- Don Seantalamh a Chuid Féin(2012)

Sodb- Don Seantalamh a Chuid Féin 

Featuring a classic Black Metal sound which occasionally dips into the modern for moments of true inspiration, Sobd's debut demo Don Seantalamh a Chuid Féin will at times struggle to maintain a consistent pace of excellence, but when it peaks it towers over the listener with truly glorious arrangements.  Hailing from Ireland, Sodb's sound should at the beginning feel instantly familiar: elements of Emperor, Gorgoroth, Tsjunder and Shining all show themselves throughout the demo and provide much of the backbone for Sodb to explore darker, more melancholic or violent compositions.  It's an impressive demo from beginning to end no doubt, even if it doesn't consistently make a positive impression.

The first thing that stood out was the surprising musicianship featured on Don Seantalamh a Chuid Féin: I was consistently blown away by the individual performances on the album, particularly bassist Irene Giragusa, whose twisted basslines slither and squirm throughout the songs yet are never lost in the flurry of riffs and blast-beats.  This is largely due to the brilliant production here, which is absolutely mind-boggling for a debut demo and a band's first release.  The mix is even yet none of the rawness is lost in the guitar sound, while the drums sound phenomenal and completely raw while remaining at the perfect level.  The vocals are perhaps a bit high in the mix, and are also perhaps the least impressive aspect of the bands performance: there's a bit too much reverb on them, and they sound somewhat over-produced in comparison to the rest of the instruments.  The vocals are not bad per-se, but a more raw, throat-ripping performance might have better suited the sound that Sodb have developed.

Outside of the technical aspects however, Don Seantalamh a Chuid Féin suffers from a bit of what I like to call "the songs are too fucking long."  Long songs are an incredibly difficult thing to do, and many artists simply fail miserably when they attempt to go over the five minute mark: songs either become a mess of random experimentation or brutal, endurance-testing triathlons of repetition, and in both cases it's because the band ran out of ideas.  These failings are not extreme nor unforgivable on Don Seantalamh a Chuid Féin, but they are present, especially on the first two tracks.  "Don Seantalamh a Chuid Féin" runs out of steam about half way through and muddles about for about three minutes in a mire of random melodies, sudden starts and stops, and general apathy before it peter's out, while "Aigre Ré" suffers from poor use of repetition and far too much melodic noodling.  Both tracks start strong but end weakly, and show that Sodb still seem to be feeling things out.

But things ascend quickly with "Tethered," a brilliant piece of Norwegian and Swedish influences that heads in some surprising directions.  Starting with a brilliant acoustic and melodic intro, "Tethered" weeps atmosphere and envelops the listener in darkness; the proverbial blizzard in the dead woods.  One hears the influence of Emperor and Shining clearly, but "Tethered" also has some interesting and expertly used elements of modern Atmospheric Black Metal to flesh out the minutia.  There is a hint of Wolves in the Throne Room's rustic woodland-hymns and even a bit of Shoegaze-y ambiance ala- Krallice at work on "Tethered," though it's all very subtle and worked organically into the composition.  "Old and Withered Form" is far more traditional, but it benefits from it's somewhat shorter running time and straight up, Gorgoroth-style neck slicing attack.

 Don Seantalamh a Chuid Féin may not be perfect, but without question this is one of the more impressive debut's I've come across.  It's certainly one of the most listenable Black Metal albums in a while, featuring an even production and a classic, well thought out sound featuring plenty of melody.  Those looking for reverb-pinged snare drums and endless armies of grimm ghouls may not be overly impressed with the material here, but anyone looking for a Black Metal album that doesn't excessively challenge while remaining deep, and those looking for a more complex and melodic style of Black Metal that doesn't mesh completely with modern standards, will have a new favorite album in Don Seantalamh a Chuid Féin.

Rating: 8.5/10

Monomakh- MMXII(2012)

Monomakh- MMXII

Monomakh are a new project from(where else) Australia, and with MMXII, the projects new demo, is their contribution to the Blackened Death Metal resurgence that has taken place over the last several years.  Yet those expecting cavernous and overwhelming ambient atmosphere or warp speed blasting and war machine riffs are in for a bit of a wake up call here, as Monomakh bring a somewhat unique approach to the sound.  Bands like Incantation and Archgoat come to mind when listening to Monomakh no doubt, but this one piece project offers a fairly fresh perspective on the Blackened Death Metal sound from a country which has already defined and progressed the genre a dozen times over the last decade.

It's not to say that MMXII doesn't have it's share of doom-laden, tremolo picked riffs, occasional ambiance or war torn imagery(the cover art is literally of a battle after all).  It's what with all of these well worn elements, Monomakh brings both a more riff-oriented and diverse song writing template to the table, complete with a slightly greater focus on melody, and a more expansive, busy song-writing style.  Only "Barbaros" clocks in at under five minutes, and both "Kokytos" and "Deathabomination" exceed seven minutes running time.  Yet despite this, neither track ever feels under-developed, self-indulgent or tired.  Monomakh never resort to pointless, boring Funeral Doom or over-the-top keyboards to pad the running time... hell, riffs are barely ever re-used.  Each track on MMXII is jam packed with ideas, yet all of them remain cohesive and brutal from beginning to end.  "Barbaros" in particular is as savage and deadly as they come, starting out with a mighty scream and some fantastic drumming, while the whirlwind of riffs and melodic undercurrents bring to mind an unholy mix of Deiphago and Arghoslent.  Then it ends in a suffocating cloud of demonic plague spores that would feel right at home on an Antediluvian or Grave Upheaval release.

There is this wonderful yet subtle mix of modern, atmospheric Blackened Death Metal/Incantation worship and seemingly out of place old-school 80's/90's Death/Thrash on MMXII that may not quite hit the listener through the first few listens, but the more time one spends with it the more these elements show themselves in the compositions.  "Deathabominations" features plenty of old-school, Thrash-y sections and melodic leads what will remind many of the previously mentioned Arghoslent, as well as fellow Australians Destroyer 666 and Vomitor, yet it's so lost in the minutia of the cavernous production style as to feel organic and like a natural progression of the composition, as opposed to merely thrown into the song for "old-skull credibility." This focused thematic and musical attack is as impressive as they come, and makes MMXII one of the most listenable and powerful Death Metal releases this year.

And as if it couldn't get any better, MMXII is free of charge on the bands Bandcamp page, which makes the wonderful, heavy and catchy as fuck demo a must listen for everyone involved.  MMXII may not blow you away on initial listens(it sure didn't with me) due to a feeling of deja vu, but its the kind of complex, active album which requires multiple listens to appreciate and will eventually worm its way into your skull as it did mine.  Monomakh have come up with a new approach to Blackened Death Metal in a time in which the genre is dominated by clones and imitators, and that is something everyone should be able to appreciate.

Rating: 9/10

Download MMXII 100% Free on Monomakh's Bandcamp Page.

Spawn of Possession- Incurso(2012)

Spawn of Possession- Incurso

Since we last saw Spawn of Possession in 2006 with Noctambulant, the landscape of Death Metal has seen a drastic change.  Let's step into the Way-Back Machine, to a different era with a different sound.  It's not quite the TARDIS, but it will do.

When Spawn of Possession were in their heyday during the early part of the century, Death Metal was a genre where pushing the limits of speed, technicality and tempo were the standard, not the exception.  Bands like Necrophagist, Augury, Lykathea Aflame and Anata were the modern Titans, and most Death Metal fans( at least the ones I knew) worshiped at the altars of Suffocation, Gorguts, Atheist and Cryptopsy.  Death Metal didn't just flirt with Jazz and Classical music, they were starting to become attached at the hip.  Rampant experimentation was commonplace, and the sheer technical prowess of the musicians in these bands rivaled musicians in any genre.  Death Metal was becoming a bit of a thinking man's genre, much to the chagrin of old-school purists, who quickly and loudly decried the end of Death Metal.

But the times have changed, or perhaps more accurately reverted.  Those temples to the likes of Suffocation and Gorguts have long been sacked and torn asunder.  Now the land is once again filled with monuments to Incantation, Angelcorpse and Entombed, and Death Metal has largely returned to the sounds of the late 80's and early 90's.  Experimentation still exists, but even these bands have roots in classic, well worn sounds long ago established by a group of aging musicians, whose bands now seem to be reforming left and right(Purtenance, Dominus Xul and Uncanny have all returned from the grave very recently).

Now, I'm not going to argue about whether this is a good or a bad thing(in this writers opinion, it's both), but it is the reality of the current Death Metal scene.  And needless to say, it's strange timing for Spawn of Possession to return with their first new material in six long years.  It begs the question: does anyone care anymore?  Recent forays by many current Technical Death Metal band closer to the sound Spawn of Possession helped establish have been at best sub-par.  Artist like Obscura, Anomalous and Archspire have not done much to help set up Spawn of Possession's glorious return to the realm, and with Old-School Death Metal now so trendy, how could these members of the Old-New-Guard do much to make an impact?

Incurso does make and impact though.  Boy does it ever, mostly by reminding everyone that the "Death Metal" part is still more important than the "Technical" part, no matter how brain-meltingly technical an album is.  And trust me, Incurso is just that: inhumanly precise,  Jazzy and wonderfully complex.  Tempos and riffs shift at light-speed, tearing across a galaxy of immeasurable complexity, eviscerating quasars and spewing their luminescence across the galactic horizon.  The bass work is, as to be expected, is beyond compare: Erland Caspersen dominates this record, and the intro to "Spiritual Deception" is just incredibly awesome thanks to his effortlessly technical style.  The rest of the instruments follow suit, and there is little doubt that the members of Spawn of Possession are some of the finest musicians on the planet.

Still, there are a lot of amazing musicians out there, and just because you can play doesn't mean you can write.  But it's the writing on Incurso that makes stand head and shoulders above many of the bands modern contemporaries within this style of Death Metal.  For starters, Incurso stays brutal, heavy and aggressive through-out.  Sure, things get Jazzy and melodic, but the album never stops being heavy and nasty from a song-writing perspective.  Spawn of Possession also find a way to keep things drenched in a layer of atmosphere, effectively using dissonance, melody and even the rare electronic or keyboard segment to give the entire album an air of cosmic creepiness.  "Apparition" makes the most effective use of these elements, and it proves to be one of the most atmospheric and creepy songs on the album, evoking a chorus of alien horrors in a chapel made from the dead husks of ancient moons. From a technical and song-writing perspective, Incurso delivers where releases from bands like Obscura and Fleshgod Apocalypse have failed miserably.

The same issue I had with the unquestionably brilliant Noctambulant rears it's head once again on Incurso however: an obnoxiously clean guitar sound that takes more from the album than it gives back.  I understand why this happens: if you work this hard and this long on writing some of the most complex riffs in existence, you want people to able to make out each note without losing any in a sea of reverb or distortion.  But some of the very best Technical Death Metal albums in history, if not the best, featured a filthy and nasty production sound: Nespithe, None So Vile, Effigy of the Forgotten, Onset of Putrefaction.  Even Spawn of Possession's first full length album Cabinet was no where near so clean or sterile sounding.  Thankfully, Incurso is not quite as slick sounding as Noctambulant and the drum triggers are far less obnoxious, but Incurso is clean enough to be occasionally annoying

That said, beyond the guitar sound and the ugly cover art(I really cannot stand these Dan Seagrave-inspired covers so many Tech Death and Brutal Death Metal bands use), Incurso is a wonderful return to form for Spawn of Possession.  Death Metal as a scene has no doubt changed since they left, but quality Death Metal will always be the rule that we all go by.  Without a doubt, Incurso is an album of unquestionable quality, brutality and complexity.

Rating: 9/10

The Great Old Ones- Al Azif(2012)

The Great Old Ones- Al Azif

How strange it is that one of the most influential creative forces that has helped shape Metal in all it's forms would  be a long dead horror writer from Providence, Rhode Island with one of history's truly great ironic monikers.  H.P. Lovecraft and his cosmic, esoteric Cthulhu Mythos is among the most referenced subject's in Extreme Metal's historically limited lyrical pantheon(also featuring a little cloaked man with horns and various naked, mutilated women), yet seems to carry a certain air of class about it.  Anybody can write a song about Satan or goats or gore, but in order to Lovecraft-up your lyrics, it means you had to actually read what is now considered classic literature(though Lovecraft was only mildly successful in his own lifetime).  Pretty classy, and the main draw behind The Great Old One's newest album, Al Azif.  Though French, The Great Old One's sound is distinctly American; specifically, the new breed of atmospheric, Shoegaze-and-Doom influenced Black Metal popularized by the likes of Weakling, Wolves in the Throne Room and Krallice.  Being French and all, you would hope that The Great Old One's would have some fresh new ideas to bring to a very trendy, very popular genre, other than the whole Lovecraft thing.

Well... no, not really.

Frankly, Al Azif comes and goes, leaving little in the way of extra-dimensional terror or cosmic infestations.  Hell, it barely lifts a tentacle as it plods along at typical Depressive Black Metal tempos and thick, admittedly inviting Black/gaze/Krallice riffs rule the day.  This is just very typical, very mild stuff The Great Old One's are showcasing as dynamic, progressive Atmospheric Black Metal.  Song's follow predictable progressions, usually alternative between a soft intro followed by lots of fast bits, with softer compositions popping in just on time to break the monotony before the fast stuff starts again... usually for excessively long play-times.  Memory fails when trying to find a single highlight in the haze, and the haze itself is pretty bland: more a smokey, smelly mess then a true thickening of the air that causes the lungs to struggle against inhaling it.  The only aspect of the album that stands out in anyway is the wonderful production: I'm a big fan of the thick, static heavy approach to Black Metal, and it does work here, if only to provide the lone bright light in a sea of dimness.  Al Azif struggles to give the listener much of anything: riffs, atmosphere, or even delivering on the promise of it's subject matter.

This is the thing I understand the least about Al Azif: why even bother going with a Lovecraftian theme if all you are going to write are typical, generic Blackgaze songs that Leucosis and Ash Borer did better last year?  Truth is, I know little about Lovecraft as a writer, but it seems to me the man had a really cool vision.  The whole idea of cosmic horror and esoteric, ethereal old spirits slowly devouring our souls and minds sounds pretty fucking twisted, especially considering the age in which Lovecraft wrote these stories.  If your concept band is going to make a concept album about this kind of shit, it better be as demented and perverse as the concept itself.  Compare this tripe to Brown Jenkins, another Lovecraftian themed Atmospheric Black Metal band(now essentially called The Ash Eaters), and it's like comparing an infant wearing a Cthulhu mask to the real thing's massive, tentacle cloaked member.  We could compare this also to the works of Thergothon or Catacombs, but it's pretty much the same result.  Al Azif might as well be titled Al Franken or Al Capone, because in the end there will be no "visions of R'lyeh" to haunt your dreams after listening to this chore.

Al Azif is not a poorly played album.  It doesn't sound bad, in fact it sounds utterly fantastic.  And it really isn't even a poorly written one.  It follows all the established guidelines of the genre to their well-tread ends, on time and with gusto.  It's that none of it feels unique, memorable or intense in anyway: everything is a blur, and the twisted chants of the star cult are completely obscured by the dime-a-dozen Blackgaze eclipse wonderfully suggested on the albums (brilliant looking) cover art.  The rites of Cthulhu this is most certainly not.

Rating: 3.5/10

Putrevore- Macabre Kingdom(2012)

Putrevore- Macabre Kingdom

Late in 2010, I discovered Putrevore's debut album Morphed From Deadbreath, and it was love at fist listen.  Tearing itself from the primordial ooze, drenched in slime and embryonic diffuse, Morphed From Deadbreath was a Precambrian beast to be feared.  Firmly entrenched in the Rottrevore school of down-tuned, gut-bucket brutality, it was a worship album that felt more like an extension of the sound than mere imitation.  Rogga Johansson and Dave Rotten, two titans in their own right, had created the single most impressive love-letters to a sadly under-utilized sound I've ever had the pleasure of being skull-fucked by, and it left me wanting more.

But like all primeval, primordial beasts, evolution must take it's course.  Since we last left Putrevore stewing in a pit of bile and muck, much has changed: the claws have become sharper, the teeth more serrated, the hunting techniques more advanced.  Macabre Kingdom is the definition of a nightmarish predator: massive and hulking indeed, but also in possession of a frightful, instinctual intelligence that sends shivers down one's spine.  Rogga and Rotten have brought their collective experience to the project, writing songs which offer a more diverse pallet of Old-School sensibilities and good ol' American brutality(not bad for a Swede and a Spaniard) than Morphed From Deadbreath.  Rottrevore's trademark sound, revisionist Swedish Death Metal cut free of cheese-tastic melody and guitars tuned to "Black Hole" mixed with strong Proto-Brutal Death Metal elements, remains the core of Putrevore's sound and Macabre Kingdom's devastating assault.  But the two opening tracks, "Mysteries of the Worm Part I and II," give clear indication that this is not more of the same.  Rogga brings his patented Swedish Death Metal vibe to the entire package, but shows a strong understanding of the material by never over-doing it: melody slinks below the torrential riff storms and Rotten's incredible guttural vocal assault, and occasional guitar solos add more to the material than detract from it.  Also present is a healthy dose of Incantation style tremolo picking and Doom-laden devastation, perhaps a bit token for the current era of Death Metal, but executed beautifully here.

That would be more than enough innovation for any band from one album to the next, but Rogga and Rotten must not have been content with even that, and sought to push Putrevore's sound further into new directions.  "Mysteries of the Worm Part II" fit's right in with the modern Occult Death Metal scene, featuring atmospheric keyboards and dark, serpentine riffs that would give Antediluvian nightmares, while "Awaiting Awakening Again" grooves and rumbles like Bolt Thrower and Grave after blowing through two thirty-packs.  Macabre Kingdom doesn't really maintain a consistent tone throughout the album, and instead goes for an all-encompassing view of Death Metal as a whole; it's past and it's present.  There really is something here for everyone, and the fact that Rogga and Rotten can keep the whole album focused and utterly uncompromising over all eight tracks is a monumental achievement.  Rogga has always been known as a "if it ain't broken, don't fix it" kind of guy through his various SwedDeath worship acts, but Macabre Kingdom feels like a coming out party for the gifted guitarist: he deftly and expertly dances between styles and riffs with impressive dexterity and real understanding of the material and the sound.  I never would have guessed that a Putrevore album would be Rogga's most impressive and multifaceted performance, but that's exactly what has happened.  As for Rotten, there is little to be said: this is arguably the most impressive guttural vocal performance on an album since Antti Boman first blew the world's collective dome with his inhuman vocalizations on Nespithe.

I can't imagine Putrevore will remain in the periphery of Death Metal any longer with this release.  Morphed From Deadbreath was brilliant but very niche, as only hardcore fans of the already generally obscure Rottrevore would get much from it.  Macabre Kingdom is truly an appropriate title: the vast appeal of this album will, if justice be served, crown Putrevore as one of the best projects the modern Death Metal scene has to offer.  May they rule with an iron, gory fist.

Rating: 9.5/10