![Melted Bodies – Enjoy Yourself [Things You Might Have Missed 2020]](https://www.angrymetalguy.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/12/a2050181391_10-768x768.jpg)
“In a year like this, there’s something to be said for going crazy. If you have multiple personality disorder, severe paranoia or schizophrenia with auditory hallucinations, you never have to feel alone while you’re locked in your apartment talking to the walls! Which is why Melted Bodies have the right idea.” Assorted nuts.
“I’ll open this review with the sentence I used to close my last Crippled Black Phoenix review: Crippled Black Phoenix are a band I want to like more, but the material continues to fall short of their potential. And with that thought the band’s latest album, Ellengæst, was bestowed upon me, giving me several weeks to think about how I’d be going in with high expectations and coming out feeling like I’d only eaten half a meal. A quick scan of the promo material did raise an eyebrow: the size of the band has been cut in half (CBP have always been immersed in drama), and there are a number of interesting guest vocalists as a result.” Crippled but dangerous.
“Didn’t get tickets for next year’s Mr. Bungle shows? Feeling olde because Faith No More’s The Real Thing turns 30 this year? Fear no more, for we have you covered here at Angry Metal Guy, with the latest from the always-restless Mike Patton. Content neither to rest on his FNM laurels, nor to simply rehearse for upcoming concerts, he has teamed up with French composer Jean-Claude Vannier for Corpse Flower, a collection of classically-tinged pop songs.” Smell that carcass.
“At some stage of sleeplessness, the pace of thought continues at speed while the fragmented hard drive of the mind reads straight across without regard for pointers or references. Ideas, memories, images, and anxieties flow without order or continuity through consciousness. It’s a state best approximated by mathcore, and mathcore is what Freighter approximate it with; The Den trades in the genre’s usual angst for a paranoid psychedelia to express this unique deprivation.” Not your dad’s metal.
The 90’s are not generally the most beloved of musical eras. The golden age of metal waned into an age of alt rock and grunge, with its faux-tough sensibilities and often minimalistic songcraft compared to the high-speed technical intricacies of classic heavy and thrash metal. All empires must fall, however, and alt rock and grunge found their wings clipped just the same, as the old millennium sighed into the new. Back in those days, an outfit calling themselves Jolly Mon were trying to turn ripples into waves around the Pacific northwest. They must have sensed the time was not right for them, because much like Pennywise the Clown, Jolly Mon went into hibernation for over a decade and a half.” Void if opened before 2018.
“Not a lot of bands last twenty years, and even fewer do so with no real lineup changes. British stoner rock stalwarts Orange Goblin are a rare breed: aside from losing second guitarist Pete O’Malley long ago, the other four members have stood fast since 1995. Two things usually happen in these cases: first, the band gets incredibly tight, with fantastic chemistry. Twenty-three years together will do that. On the flip side, more often than not the songwriting suffers (see: Angry Metal Guy’s Law of Diminishing Recordings™). Bands turn into caricatures of what they are most famous for.” Orange you glad the Goblin’s back?
“Okay, let’s get this out-of-the-way right off the top. This album cover gives me the creeps. It also makes me think of Monty Python and the Holy Grail. So I alternate between grimaces and laughter whenever I’m looking at this bizarre choice for sludgy avante garde collective Obake’s third album, Draugr.” Happy Halloween!
“Since we’re all adults, I’ll spare you the long intro. You know why you’re here. Be warned that this reviewer’s opinions are colored by 23 years of Faith No More fandom, as well as witnessing the band’s recent performance at Chicago’s Concord Hall.” For an album as eagerly awaited as Sol Invictus, we needed a double fanboy slobber-fest. Put on your bibs and prepare for foaming.
“Even a quick glance over Obake’s international lineup will tell you that this is not your run-of-the-mill extreme metal band. Nope, the musicians involved in this band are not metal musicians in the traditional sense.” Since we started the day with non-metal weirdness, let’s continue the trend with Obake.
![Pain of Salvation – Road Salt Two [Ebony] Review](https://www.angrymetalguy.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/09/roadsalt2.jpg)
In 2010 Pain of Salvation, best known for their progressive stylings and vocalist who wishes he could talk rhythmically like Mike Patton, released a record that blew me away and shook their fanbase: Road Salt One. It was shocking mainly because it was a largely not tech-geek-progressive and it was very 70s rock influenced. This left some long-time fans peeved, at best. They wanted something different. Well, Road Salt Two is definitely not that something different. It is stubbornly more of the same and it may have lost a bit of its luster with a year to sit on it.
