“Misanthur was listed as “trance ambient noise” in the cold boundaries of the promo dump and just plain black metal on other sites. Truthfully, both are true. What this Polish duo offers is a hyper-atmospheric breed of black metal with heavy electronic and industrial flourishes, not unlike a blackened version of C R O W N’s latest, The End of All Things.” Kitchen sink-core.
“Contrary to popular belief, we adhere to some concrete rules around these parts. You always put the toilet seat back down when you’re finished. You never, ever speak to the whereabouts of former writers once they move on to greener pastures. Finally, you don’t swipe another reviewer’s band unless you get permission first. Long story short, I nabbed When the Day Years For Light by German post-metallers A Secret Revealed without realizing that Cherd tackled their last one, Sacrifices, just two years ago. That said, after profusely apologizing to the sagely-bearded one, not once did he fight me for reviewing rights.” Promo chess and poorly kept secrets.
“Jason William Walton. By my count, this guy has been a part, or founder, of at least 24 bands, collaborations and projects. Most notably, of course, as bassist (and sometimes songwriter) for the much-missed Agalloch. Other entries in Walton’s bio include folk-doom outfit Dolven, the bonkers electronic oompah of Especially Likely Sloth and progressive melodeath band Sculptured. Walton strides across broad musical lands, arriving at Snares of Sixes, an experimental collective ‘assembled, arranged and constructed by him.” Constructed insanity.
“Sometimes you just need an audio beating, to crank that funky brutal music to 11 and let your ears bleed. The issue with a lot of beatdown music is that there’s simply too much of it and not enough contrast, which is why bands like Isis or Opeth were applauded in their heyday, while Tetragammacide and Deiphago are chastised like a class clown. Having your skull beaten in is fine and dandy, but you need some sophistication. A baseball bat made of maple instead of ash, perhaps, or a titanium crowbar instead of iron. Maybe a fist with some pretty rings or maybe even a bedazzled tire iron? Brazil’s Trance of the Undead utilizes predictable beatdown techniques in its blackened death attack.” Discount diseases.
“Every Deafheaven album prior to this has been a reaction to the last. If the cold, heavy New Bermuda was an attempt to establish the band’s bona fides to a skeptical metal world after Sunbather, Ordinary Corrupt Human Love was the group embracing the warm blackgaze sound they pioneered and drifting away from the black metal scene about which they have always been so ambivalent. In that respect, Infinite Granite breaks the mold: it is a continuation of the aesthetic of OCHL, not a reaction to it.” Bad reactor.
“I’ve moonlighted as a metal reviewer for a couple of years now and I never cease to be amazed that bands – and black metal bands in particular – seem to have a burning wish not to make it easy for fans and reviewers to find them, nor to find out anything about them. Ok, I get it, you might not want your real name out there. I’ll give you that. So maybe you come up with some sort of creepy-weepy pseudonym to go by and, perhaps, splash the cash on a black cloak, maybe some face paint and. if there’s any change from that, possibly some barbed wire to wrap round a good stick that you can waggle about menacingly. Alright, I can get on board. But then there are bands … or projects, I don’t know, like today’s subject Disparaître, where there’s really very little out there. No proper Bandcamp page, no Facebook page that I can find, obviously no website, and even Metal Archives has nothing beyond a nationality: French.” Socially/sonically distant.
“I have history with Devil Sold His Soul, but not all of it good, especially when we parted on poor terms: I got fed up with Empire of Light’s excessive vocals and didn’t give EP Belong ╪ Betray a fair chance. Loss, the first release in seven years, hits differently: it chronicles seven years of grief and personal loss from its creators. Is it the labor of love it was intended to be?” Devil in the details.
“Thanks to that one boozy pirate-themed power metal band whose name rhymes with “Sail Dorm,” it’s difficult to take oceanic themed albums seriously. There are plenty of bands that have torn it up, Ahab showcasing mammoth waves with their breed of crushing funeral doom, Isis displaying the uncaring expanse with shoegaze-y post-metal, and Firtan and Déluge offering some respective symphonic black and post-black to reflect he majesty of the oceans. Scrolling through my black metal collection and each album’s respective themes goes something like this: winter, winter, occult, winter, occult, occult, evil, winter, etc. Oceanic-themed black metal is few and far between, and you’d be hard-pressed to find the good stuff. Will Thermohaline kickstart a new trend or will it end up drowning in its own ambition?” The sea was angry that day, my fiends.
“For post-metal fans, the big release this week is the Cult of Luna EP. But other bands are working hard in this genre as well, one of which is Canada’s Sarin. Their third album You Can’t Go Back drops this week, and while they don’t have the marquee name to go with the release, that doesn’t mean they should be thrust to the side as we all rush headlong into The Raging River.” Breathe deep.
“What? Another album by Empress? But it’s only been like 6 weeks since Premonition dropped! Ah, but you see, sometimes names can have two bands. Rather than the frigid wastes of Vancouver, this Empress is from the slightly less frigid wastes of Gold Coast, Australia. Both dabble in various forms of post-metal, too. And if that doesn’t make for enough confusion, my cleverly modified search for “empress australia” revealed Empress Australia already exists as well, except this one is… a shoe brand. No wonder the band’s Bandcamp and Facebook addresses have to repeat their name twice. So the band is a little difficult to DuckDuckGo, but is it worth the effort?” Crowded doom.
