“Crack a beer and get comfy folks, it’s storytime. Our tale is about a brave group of Swedes who decided to storm the castle of greatness, knowing full well the dangers and hardships they’d face. The lofty standards of age-old records loved worldwide would need to be breached. Our protagonists would need to deftly maneuver within clear and defined stylistic boundaries. These Swedes go by the name Hyperion, and the tome of their triumph is called Seraphical Euphony. Storytime!
“It doesn’t take an encyclopedic knowledge of heavy metal to figure out where Foul Body Autopsy draw their name from. Which is good, because I certainly don’t have one. In fact, I didn’t even remember “Foul Body Autopsy” was a Necrophagist song until conducting research for this review, and the first time I actually sat down and listened to Muhammed Suicmez’s legendary tech death project was a few days ago when I found myself stuck in an airport terminal for five hours with a dead Kindle. Still, it only took a cursory listen of Onset of Putrefaction to reveal that FBA is far from mere Suicmez worship.” Does the apple fall far from the rotten tree?
![Predatoria – Unmarked Graves…Tell No Tales [Things You Might Have Missed 2015]](https://www.angrymetalguy.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/12/Predatoria_Unmarked-Graves-768x768.jpg)
“If we apply the maxim of “I didn’t feel like drinking until I started drinking” to listening to metal bands you’ve never heard before, I firmly believe that this fertile ground is where plenty of our favourite records are born. When I first listened to Belgium’s Predatoria in an effort to acclimatize myself to my temporary home’s up-and-coming death metal bands, I had no idea that what they were selling was exactly what I was looking to buy but here we are.” Can we start drinking now?
“When great music flows from a band like water, it cranks up expectation to burning point. Your nerves tingle at the mere mention of a new official video. And your palms sweat a little as the band’s shiny new promo drops like manna into your outstretched, grabby hands. With so many full-bodied offerings under their belt, can Omnium Gatherum make a clean sweep giving themselves a mighty four out of four winning streak?” Grey is the new black.
“While I’m a man who has never invaded a cottage owned by bears, eaten their porridge, and slept in their beds while complaining about everything the entire damn time, I sometimes feel a bit like Goldilocks when commenting on melo-death.” It’s time to bed hop our way through the melo-death genre.
“I have to admit that I picked up Frostbite’s Etching Obscurity for the cheesy band name and the “progressive black metal” tagline. Expecting a pretentious ambient/avant garde black metal album to laugh circles around, I instead found Etching Obscurity well worth my time.” And you know a doctor’s time is very valuable.
Fleshgod Apocalypse is well known in these parts for having produced a debut album that I worship and two albums since then that I don’t. Back in aught nine, the band released Oracles, which was a neoclassical death metal record unlike anything I had heard. The songs were intense, with intricate, artful, and beastly guitar work. Unfortunately, while songwriting was excellent, the drum sound on the record was a bit like reading a great Russian novel IN ALL CAPS; high art, ruined by someone’s inability to capitalize properly. 2011’s Agony was a better produced record than its predecessor in some ways, but the band undermined its own sound by moving all the interesting melodies and ‘riffing’ to the orchestras. When they returned to correct this problem on 2013’s Labyrinth, the master was so bad that all attempts to rectify earlier missteps were voided by the static of clipping master.
“There are many types of melodeath; the moody, acoustic-tinged odes of ’90s Dark Tranquillity, the thrashier Gothenburg style favored by early In Flames and At The Gates (and the thousands of other bands that ape them), as well as the poppier sound of Soilwork clones that seemed to crawl out of the woodwork in the late 2000s (hey, look, In Flames again!).” Kronos loves to classify and identify things. It’s what he does.
Have you ever wondered what it would be like if Jon Nödtviedt decided to put Dissection to rest after the highly-influential Storm of the Lights Bane and decided to join Dark Tranquillity? Yes, I know, total blasphemy, but weirder things have happened. I mean, W.A.S.P. put out a better record last year than Slayer, for crying out loud. Nothing is completely out of the realm of possibility, right?
“Every promo to hit my desk receives an initial listen without the reading of websites, promo sheets, or any such fuel that would result in premature judgment. Sometimes absorbing myself in the artwork or the musical theme of the album transforms a mediocre first-listen into something worthwhile. Other times it does not.” Will such a fair and even-handed approach make Evil Drive a pleasure trip?
