“Let’s get this out of the way; Fallujah and Angry Metal Guy have a complicated relationship. Angry Metal Guy’s reaction to The Harvest Wombs signaled the beginning of a beautiful friendship; a friendship which, upon the release of The Flesh Prevails in 2014, some asshat proceeded to destroy.” Here we go again.
“Call me Diabolus. Some years ago – never mind how long precisely – I granted the privateers in Alestorm a Letter of Marque and they went on to capture The Good Ship TYMHM and raise the Jolly Roger high over the AMG Staff’s Top Ten Lists. It is a way I have of driving off the spleen and regulating circulation. Whenever it is a damp, drizzly November in my soul, I simply drink away the accursed rain. Alas, my initial deed could not go unaddressed forever; I was ordered to write about The Dread Crew of Oddwood’s Lawful Evil.” Keel haul em’ all.
“Pete Helmkamp’s varied projects over the years have one special unifying quality: there is something unsettling about them all that transcends music and hits the core of your being, reminding you that the world is an immaculately fucked up place and our tenure on it is tentative at best. Larvae Offal Swine, the debut album under the moniker Abhomine, is Helmkamp’s first true solo effort in which he wrote and performed all of the music with the exception of the drums. How does this nigh legendary extreme metal front man stand when on his own?” Offal before swine?
“1996. Yours truly graduated high school and landed a job at what would end up being GameStop. At the Electronics Boutique I was working at (Rockingham Park, Salem, New Hampshire), I would sometimes be visited by a lanky, long-haired dude wearing various different black metal shirts. One shirt was of a band called December Wolves, and I told him that was an interesting name for a band. He smiled and said, “Thanks, man. I’m the bass player. Check us out sometime.” Yep, that’s my story of how I met Brian Izzi (now best known as the guitarist for crusty grinders Trap Them) and got wind of December Wolves.” Tales of wind and wolves shall trap them all.
“Those who have malingered around this site for a few years may recall the name Boudain. They were one of the contestants in AMG’s infamous Unsigned Band Rodeo of 2013. Now in 2016 they get the added distinction of being the very first of those involved to send us a promo for an actual full-length album (though they’re still unsigned).” Go pig or go home.
“I’m not particularly invested in movies, but Danny Boyle’s Sunshine is one I recommend; an unlikely but enticing story of a handful of astronauts on a mission to restart our dying star. It has a compelling atmosphere, a beautiful minimalist score, and portrays scientists, for the most part, as real and diverse people – something that films rarely accomplish. Zealotry seem to like it as well.” Progressive death is always a ray of sunshine.
“I remember a simpler time, and American death dealers Necrot remember when death metal was just death metal, and The Labyrinth is their testament to that seemingly distant memory.” Can death live on in the past or is it still dead?
“There’s a lot of pent up anger and frustration going around these days. Whether that certain something bothering you is serious like the weather or banal as your governing politicians spewing hatred, it’s always nice to be able to turn to metal in search of some escapism. To find a way out. A portal to a safe space. A wonderful soundtrack for hollow and bitter soliloquies. You might think, at first, that San Francisco’s ex-trio, now duo, Howls of Ebb provide exactly that with their experimentally tinged blackened death adorned with dark and threatening atmospheres and hints of aggression.” And you would be extremely wrong.
“I love getting debut records to review, partially because debuts are usually where bands try to bring something new to the table, and partially because it means I have a lot less contextualization to do before I write about the album. But then there are sometimes cases in which I’m actually familiar with a band prior to their release, and in this instance I have The Zenith Passage covered.” Hey Kronos, you gonna pick up all those names you just dropped?
“Maybe I’ve heard one too many shitty re-thrash bands but it’s easy to draw conclusions from the bold illustration and title of Biological Enslavement by Hemotoxin. I feared that simplistic chugs, an angsty vocalist and a Neanderthal’s lyrics would lie behind the spiky logo and alien landscape. Happily, Hemotoxin are marginally more refined than this.” Marginally refined rethrash could be a whole new genre.
