Angry Metal Guy

So, Iron Thrones‘ new EP The Wretched Sun which I made the Record o’ the Month and raved about in my review came out yesterday (the 27th of July, 2010). You can order the record from the band via their website (actually, through their store, but go to their site, too) and over at their Band Camp you can download the EP for $6 and you can still download the particularly excellent Visions of Light (the band’s first LP) for as much as you want (i.e. free, if you don’t want to contribute to the band’s well-being).

Oh yeah, it’s also available on Amazon, iTunes and any other number of sources where you can probably find the thing.

Listen to that song above (I hope you’re already doing so) and tell me that it isn’t worth your six bucks. Or wait, it is worth your six bucks. So fucking buy it already.

Edit: Oh right. My friendly competitors over at The Number of the Blog (who shall lose righteously in the Pigskin Destroyer 666 Fantasy Football League) are also sponsoring a tour for the band as well. If you click that link up there, it will take you to their vastly inferior website for the details. Or you could stay right here in the comfort of AngryMetalGuy.com and look at the tour dates.

7/29/10 — Chicago, IL @ The Double Door w/ The Alaya Conscious, Hessler
7/31/10 — Columbus, OH @ The Summit w/ The C.O.A.S.T., Artillery Breath
8/01/10 — Aliquippa, PA @ The Fallout Shelter w/ Sathanas, Dethlehem
8/02/10 — Brooklyn, NY@ The Charleston w/ East of the Wall, Name, & more!
8/03/10 — Allenstown, NH @ Ground Zero w/ TBA
8/04/10 — Worcester, MA @ Tammany Hall w/ Irepress, Frozen
8/05/10 — Philadelphia, PA @ The M Room w/ Monolith, Willing Swords
8/07/10 — Spartanburg, SC @ Ground Zero w/ TBA
8/10/10 — Clarksville, TN @ The Coup w/ Evolve or Die
8/11/10 — Nashville, TN @ The Muse w/ TBA
8/12/10 — St. Louis, MO @ The Firebird w/ Ashes and Iron
8/13/10 — Marshalltown, IA @ The American Legion w/ Anno Domine, Tony Rocky Horror

Be’lakor // Stone’s Reach
Rating: 4.5/5.0 – Excellent melodic death.. after all these years?
Label: Kolony Records (Europe)
Website(s): myspace.com/belakor
Release Date: EU: 30.11.2009 | World: Out on iTunes

Be’lakor is an Australian melodic death metal band that has been getting some serious attention in the underground despite the fact that much melodic death metal has pretty much been declared by the scene to be dead on arrival. I’d been reading about them for some time so I just wrote them a message on MySpace and the guys were cool enough to send me a copy to review. And I can see why they’re so eager to get their music out to the masses—it’s a bit like ear heroin.

Quite the opposite of the many bands who have initially appealing music that after a while you never take out and listen to again (here’s looking at you Sonata Arctica‘s Silence), Stone’s Reach grew on me very slowly over the weeks that I’ve had it. The initial listens were definitely a “OK, sounds a bit like Opeth, Insomnium, and In Flames‘ lovechild, but I don’t get the hype.” Which was shortly followed by a stage where I realized that as I was listening to it I knew every riff and was singing along with them. This final stage was followed by me having the opening riff of “From Scythe to Sceptre” stuck in my head for two days and that was it—I was totally hooked.

Stone’s Reach has everything you want from good melodic death metal in this the late stages of the 00s.. it’s fast and catchy with solid melodies, great harmonies that aren’t too predictable and yet everything is just familiar enough (despite sounding unique) that you’re able to slip into it and enjoy it without having to spend too much time thinking about it. That’s not to say that there aren’t things to think about—I particularly enjoy the way that the rhythm section works together very well, reminiscent of Morningrise-era Opeth—it’s just that the music is catchy enough that you don’t have to think about it if you don’t want to.

Every track on here has something worth remembering and this record never falls into a rhythm that allows you to get lost in the songs as though they weren’t all separate entities. Instead, the band is very adept at writing and arranging and are able to create unique soundscapes and songs that you will remember and that you long to hear again. And with a clear, smooth production that doesn’t suffer from any of the downsides of modern production tricks and techniques (i.e., it sounds nothing like a record that you would expect to hear from a major label which seems to be enforcing a regimen of triggering on all of their bands these days), Stone’s Reach gives everything you want from a melodic death metal album without sounding rehashed or like a rip-off.

If you’re like me and suckled at the teat of melodic death metal as a young music fan, you probably also feel like the genre has lost its interest over time. Be’lakor lacks nothing and has everything except worldwide distro from a major label—so feel free to buy their record on iTunes or send check out their MySpace for info on where to buy it: you won’t regret it.