Angry Metal Guy

Wow, it’s been a long time and you’ve all been waiting patiently. So here’s my 20-11 of the best heavy metal songs of all time. If you’re in desperate need of an update as to what else we’ve posted, here are some links: Mine: 50-41, 40-31, 31-20 and Steel Druhm’s: 50-41, 40-31, 30-21, 20-11.

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Raven Woods // Enfeebling the Throne
Rating: 3.5/5.0 — Some excellent parts, but they need to differentiate themselves from the pack…
Label: Code 666
Websites: myspace.com/ravenwoods
Release Dates: EU: 2011.01.04 | US: 06.07.2011

Middle-eastern tinged metal has become a slight trend. Since Nile really took off with the sound and influences, slowly but surely the metal scene has followed with. Behemoth played the Nile card and won big with it and Melechesh has grown to great popularity, releasing great records left and right. However, that bands from the middle-eastern or north African region are actually put out records influenced by their own culture, that’s pretty new. Sure, Orphaned Land has been around a long time, but they didn’t really catch the popular metal imagination until 2006. Myrath still hasn’t caught on and now we have Raven Woods of Turkish extraction. Continue reading

Abysmal Dawn // Leveling the Plane of Existence
Rating: 3.0/5.0 — A solid tech-death record.
Label: Relapse
Websites: abysmaldawn.com | myspace.com/abysmaldawn
Release Dates: US: 02.01.2011 | EU: 14.02.2011

I’ve been waiting for a long time to get to Abysmal Dawn‘s new disc Leveling the Plane of Existence. Having had a 2010 that was sadly devoid of mind-blowing technical death metal (excepting Hour of Penance‘s Paradogma), I was really looking forward to a slab of technical death metal mastery that is being sold by Relapse as the savior of American death metal. While I wouldn’t go that far, Abysmal Dawn does offer up some solid technical death metal that is well-played, well-written and full of enough novel ideas and good riffs to make the record enjoyable. And the band has a unique, melodic voice that separates it from the pack. Continue reading

A Walk with the Wicked // Architects of Sadism
Rating: 3.5/5.0 — A Walk with the Up-and-Coming
Label: Unsigned
Websites: awalkwiththewicked.com
Release Date: January 28th, 2011

Old school death metal is making a comeback around the world and apparently South Africa is no exception to this rule. In fact, as I’ve already referenced, South Africa is an up-and-coming scene that seems to have little cohesive sound but still has a lot of talent in it. Because of that, whenever you get a demo from one of these bands it’s always a surprise—and this was an old school death metal surprise that came out in the form of A Walk with the Wicked‘s debut disc Architects of Sadism. It was also a pleasant surprise, at that. Continue reading

Crow Black Sky // Pantheion
Rating: 3.5/5.0 — A promising start!
Label: Unsigned
Websites: crowblacksky.bandcamp.com
Release Dates: November, 2010

One of the things that people have been lamenting about the dawn of the Internet and how it will affect the future of music is that localized scenes no longer get localized sounds—and Crow Black Sky is definitely an example of this. Or more specifically, the South African metal scene seems to be a great example of this. See, Crow Black Sky is a melodic death metal band, whereas the other two bands that I’ve heard from South Africa (Heathens and A Walk with the Wicked) are black metal/black n’ roll and old school death metal. Due to access to music and information worldwide, it sorta kills that homogenization effect that gigging together, hanging out together and shopping at the same record store seemed to cause. Is it possible that the black metal scene from Oregon is the last cohesive scene we’re going to ever see? Well, that’s not actually relevant to this review. What is relevant to this review is that despite (or because of) the lack of homogeneity in the South African scene every single one of these bands that I’ve heard has been really very good. Crow Black Sky being no exception. Continue reading

Melechesh // The Epigenesis
Rating: 4.0/5.0 — Sumerian Metal Returns!
Label: Nuclear Blast [EU | US]
Websites: melechesh.com | myspace.com/melechesh
Release Dates: EU: 01.10.2010 | US: 10.27.2010

While the metal world has gone agog for Egyptian metal, and actually I’ve seen these guys linked up with Nile and Aeternam in other places, Melechesh is a unique band in that they are ultimately Sumerian metal. What’s the difference you say? Well, melodically not much. However, Sumeria is a totally fascinating historical place which was where modern day Iraq is (which is technically Mesopotamia—Sumeria was a grouping of city-states—this also includes the Israel and Palestine region). It is considered by most Biblical scholars to be the place where the “tribes of Israel” and the other natives of the region must have come from and it is south of or in the Fertile Crescent, which for anyone who knows their history is where agriculture is supposed to have come from. Some of the oldest texts in the world that we’ve ever found are Sumerian (written in Cuneiform) and the culture was highly advanced in math (inventing the abacus) and writing. Continue reading

Necronomicon // The Return of the Witch
Rating: 3.5/5.0 – Epic death metal that doesn’t sound fruity.
Label: Napalm Records
Websites: myspace.com/necronomiconmetal
Release Dates: EU: 04.06.2010 | US: 06.08.2010

There was a time where I loved all death metal and I mean all of it! When the death metal explosion started up in the mid to late 80s, I couldn’t get enough of the stuff whether good, bad or really awful. I just loved those Cookie Monster vocals. Over time however, as more and more bands glommed onto the style, my tastes refined and I steered toward those bands that were trying something different or unique within the genre. Canada’s little known death metal three piece Necronomicon (not to be confused with German thrashers of the same name) was always a band that did things a little differently and always earned my respect. In fact, Necronomicon helped jump start the whole “Egyptian themed death metal” style alongside Nile with their debut album Pharaoh of the Gods in 1999. Happily, their efforts to create unique death metal continue on their third album The Return of the Witch.

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Aeon // Path of Fire
Rating: 3.0/5.0 — Techy goodness
Label: Metal Blade
Websites: myspace.com/aeon666
Release Dates: EU: 21-24.05.2010 | US: 05.25.2010

Swedish death metal, I mean real Swedish death metal with the legacy of brutality that everyone can identify in the form of (insert your favorite Swedish death metal bands here) lives on in Aeon, a band that hails from Östersund a city in Jämtland (which is basically in the mountains and towards the Norwegian border). Östersund, while not known for its thriving metal scene, has indeed birthed one of Sweden’s current and most brutal death metal bands who were signed to Metal Blade and released an album a couple of years ago entitled Rise to Dominate which really excited fans of the tech and (more-or-less) brutal styles of death metal. I believe when I was introduced to them the words “fucking ridiculous” were definitely involved somewhere in that conversation. Continue reading

Aeternam // Disciples of the Unseen
Rating: 3.5/5.0 — Solid debut, can’t wait for more!
Label: Metal Blade
Website: myspace.com/aeternammetal
Release Date(s): EU: 15.02.2010 | US: 02.16.2010

Egyptian metal is apparently a genre now! I didn’t have any clue! I just thought it was kind of a thing that Nile did. And then it was Nile and Behemoth. And then it was Nile, Behemoth and SepticFlesh. And now it’s Nile, Behemoth, SepticFlesh and Aeternam! I think that counts as a genre! So, that’s pretty cool in and of itself. Oh, and it turns out that Aeternam is pretty cool themselves, leading to a generally all around happy feeling for a few fleeting moments before the general irritants that keep me so angry all the time come crashing back in.

Though, really, Egyptian Metal doesn’t describe much except the mode the band plays in all the time, so as a responsible reviewer it is my job to elucidate what exactly it is that this band is doing and what they’re doing well (and not-so-well). Like many other bands, Aeternam is fundamentally a melodic death metal band. Though, they border the line into what I would call “progressive” death metal, due to the use of acoustics, tribal drums and other not-necessarily-metal kind of things to build atmosphere and songs in general. But fundamentally Aeternam still whips out the melody, guitar harmonies and mid-paced riffs and growls enough to make you feel comfortable calling them melodic death metal. The other side to the band’s sound is a blasty death metal style that is definitely Nile influenced. However, due to differences in production and writing style (an ear more towards melody and drums much lower in the mix), the band manages to differentiate itself from the Egyptian metal giants pretty easily.

The writing on here is solid and dynamic, as well. Not only is the band obviously influenced by death metal bands, there is a pop sense and power metal sensibility on here that very rarely shows up in death metal. On tracks like “Esoteric Formulae” and “Goddess of Masr” you can definitely hear power metal influences (the two that spring to mind repeatedly are Iced Earth and Symphony X). One could say that this is partially due to the band’s vocalist, who has a great baritone range and is not afraid to show off his pipes. However, he’s also not overly showy with his vocals and they only grace a few tracks on the whole album, keeping them sparse and effective. However, there is a distinctively power/classic metal guitar approach on a lot of these songs.

Disciples of the Unseen is a fantastic debut record for this Canadian quintet. While the band isn’t breaking a whole lot of new ground, they are melding some sounds into something that is definitely their own! The more melodic take on Egyptian Metal with the fantastic grooves (like on “Ouroboros”) and excellent vocal performances, as well as a great band performance is definitely a recipe for success.  Some of the tracks on here (most notably “Through the Eyes of Ea”) are a bit too spotty, in my opinion, but in general the flow and consistency of Disciples of the Unseen are very good. In an era when metal is desperately seeking a new take on melodic death metal to take it into the future, a band like Aeternam might just have what it takes to work us in that direction with work like Disciples of the Unseen.

I am not a big festival fan. But I gotta say, the lineup for Metaltown 2010 looks pretty sweet, thus far. I think Angry Metal Guy might just try to get credentialed for this thing to do a shit ton of interviews, maybe a video or something…

Förra året slog Metaltown alla möjliga rekord när 22 000 besökare från hela Skandinavien invaderade Göteborg och vad som nu är en av Sveriges största festivaler. Efter utökat publikområde sålde biljetterna slut för andra året i rad och två fantastiska dagar på Frihamnspiren följde, med hela 32 band på tre scener.

Klara artister:

Rammstein (GER)
In Flames (S)
Bullet For My Valentine (UK)
Dark Tranquillity (S)
Kreator (GER)
Nile (US)
Sonic Syndicate (S)
Sabaton (S)
Finntroll (FIN)
Bleeding Through (US)
Cynic (US)
Dream Evil (S)
Raubtier (S)

That’s whose gonna be there so far… That might just be the highest percentage of bands I want to see on a festival ever except for Wacken, which is definitely not on the list this year, unfortunately.. Anyway, for those of you who get a chance to head to Sweden for festival season, that might be one worth checking out!