“When further listening to Skym and reading everything the good folks at Hammerheart sent our way about Kjeld, I was surprised. Not in the “huh, neat” way, but in Keanu Reeves’ infamous “whoa” way.” We didn’t see this one coming.
Hammerheart Records
Wormed – Exodromos Review
“It is brutal, rather technical and it has its roots in death metal. But is Exodromos a pure brutal technical death metal album? A lazy, complacent answer would be: yes. A more elaborate response – and one you would expect to read on these respected pages – is: not quite.” Alex Franquelli reviews the new Wormed record, in all its brutal, technical glory and asks “What next?”
Sophicide – Perdition of the Sublime Review
Technical death metal was the darling of the death metal scene about 5 or 6 years ago, but since the ever-growing retro-death craze has begun to take over the number of quality technical death metal releases that I’ve gotten my hands on has dramatically decreased. Still, that didn’t stop the now 22 year-old Adam Sazslo from writing a bunch of pretty fucking sweet techy songs and getting himself a worldwide deal with Willowtip. Perdition of the Sublime is Sophicide’s debut record and one can see why this record – produced by someone who can’t tour to support it – is being released by a label of this quality: because it’s a truly elite technical death metal experience.
Illogicist – The Unconsciousness of Living Review
I first became acquainted with Illogicist back in 2007, at the height of the tech-death explosion, via a record called The Insight Eye. What intrigued me about these Italian virtuosos at the time was that, unlike most of the scene they were lumped in with, they leaned less towards “tech” and way more towards “death.” The band was clearly influenced by early 90s progressive death metal like Atheist and late-era Death, a.k.a. shit that I really like. And yet, despite all the potential, the album seemed to be missing something.
Dim Mak – The Emergence of Reptilian Altars Review
Dim Mak arose from cult heroes Ripping Corpse in 1996 (after Erik Rutan ran off to join Morbid Angel) and they decided to do something entirely different. And yes, I believe that Dim Mak definitely qualifies as that. A thrashy, techy death metal band with martial arts themes almost exclusively (yes, their first record was called Enter the Fist), The Emergence of Reptilian Altars is the band’s fourth full length and first since 2006. Five years (well, six if you’re looking at the Euro release date) is a long time to wait between albums, so you’d like to think that they were preparing something super special (like the Touch of Death!) for their return. But during that five years down, original vocalist (and Ripping Corpse member) Scott Ruth left the band and was replaced by newcomer Joe Capizzi, whose style is markedly different than his predecessor.
Ulcerate – The Destroyers of All Review
Being a well on the way to aging angry metal nerd, I have a stomach that is not quite as leadbellied as it used to be, and many of my friends and acquaintances are under similar circumstances. There’s only so much beer and whiskey a stomach can handle before it gets a little acidic (although I continually go back to testing the limits every now and then). Hence I’ve been quite amused by the band name Ulcerate since they stormed the realm of heavy music with 2009’s Everything is Fire, which was one of my favorite albums of that year. The title track of that album was very impressive (one of my favorite metal songs of recent memory), as well as the rest of it (that album is nasty!).
Corpse Molester Cult – Corpse Molester Cult Review
It’s important to remember that despite being known for their folk metal, doom metal, melodic death metal and well, just for being the official metal mecca of the modern world, Finland also has been home to some pretty sick and impressive old school death metal acts like Hooded Menace and Claws, and going back to the early 90s bands like Demilich and Amorphis were pushing into new territory; and I think it’s safe to say that we should maybe think about adding Corpse Molester Cult to that list. Apparently, in 2005 Tomi Joutsen (you know the new vocalist from Amorphis) started Corpse Molester Cult with a couple buddies and filled out the band in 2006. In 2008 they released this 4 track EP which is now seeing an official release (though it appears to be available for download still here). And really, can you go wrong with any disc that starts with a Night of the Living Dead quote? I think not.
Macabre – Grim Scary Tales Review
Macabre probably shouldn’t need any introduction to the majority of readers on this blog, but it’s possible they might. So let’s put it like this… Macabre is pretty much the one of the most underrated and idiosyncratic death metal bands of all time. Or grind. Or, whatever the hell you call them. These guys have been around forever (25 years, apparently) and while they haven’t produced that many full lengths in their existence, they have produced some of the most memorable albums I own. My first introduction to the band came around the time when they released Dahmer, which is their infamous concept album about Jeffrey Dahmer. Yessiree, bob. If you haven’t heard that record you are missing out. But Dahmer isn’t it, 1993’s Sinister Slaughter is another classic which is loaded with amazing tracks, as is 2003’s Murder Metal. But since it’s been about 8 years since the release of Murder Metal, I’d kind of even forgotten that these guys were still around. So what a fantastic surprise when Grim Scary Tales landed in my box. Oh, happy day!
