Archive for 2021

Commune is the second album by hippy-dippy (sorry) experimental project Goat, who burst into the world with the phenomenal World Music record. Commune, in comparison, is a little bit more muted. Things develop at more of a crawl than they did on the rather spectacular debut. It took me a while to realise that Commune isn’t necessary boring or without the spark that Goat made upon their unleashing to the world, its just that the…

Dark, mysterious, atmospheric; three words you would likely associate with the dungeon synth genre. Pafund is no different, with The Grim Abbot leaning more on the atmospheric end of proceedings. The tracks are loose and dense with ambience and conjure distant misty worlds. Cracking.

I love these nonsense multi-band splits. There’s just something intrinsically pointless yet gratifying about them. Nobody has room to breathe usually, and everyone is fighting for air in the little space they have. The bands are allowed a few tracks each on TSTH no. 3, but it’s still more of the usual carnage and I’ve already forgotten who I’ve listened to by the time it’s over. But that just means I’ll have to play it…

I can’t remember where I picked up Jandek as a recommendation. RYM, perhaps? Anyway, these are some intense and bizarre, even unsettling fragments of acoustic guitar and insane rambles. These are some female vocal additions too, but for most of the tracks, the recording quality is quite lo-fi and the sound is abstract enough to invoke all sorts of moods and thought patterns. One day, I will unearth more from this artist. I am intrigued.

I love Boy Harsher. Both their album (Yr Body Is Nothing) and this original demo/EP/whatever are absolutely fantastic slices of dark electronica. Here on Lesser Man, themes and imagery of the dark industrial or noise worlds is used with warbling analogue synthesizer sounds and cold, sparse and tense vocals, to create a danceable yet thought-provoking series of compositions. One of the best!

An interesting take on the dungeon synth formula. Admittedly not one that I would usually be all over, but I appreciate the artistic integrity and boldness involved nonetheless. The guy, Jon, seems to do a bunch of stuff across a ton of genres, a lot within the vaporwave kinda style.

This kinda shits all over my own Welsh dungeon synth project. Haha! Mari Lwyd lays down some serious tunes, obviously composed with genuine musical skill and chops. There’s a lot of dungeon synth that isn’t as musical per se but atmospheric, Y Ddraig Goch (I wanna guess ‘the red dragon?) is absolutely on the musical end, with a record full of dense instrumentation and excellent songs. Highly recommended. Tape is, unfortunately, long sold out.

I’m familiar with Striga’s drumming from Necrosis (and also for filling in for Black Skies Burn) but I’ll be honest I hadn’t even heard of this band until a week ago (Dec 2021 edit: this was written 6 months ago lol). Granted, the UK black metal underground is not my strong point and I am learning about it daily. I got this cassette off the back of how raw and intense everything sounds, this is…

All sorts of dark and evil vibes permeate these scuzzy, noisy compositions. I’ve been meaning to check out Rudimentary Peni for years, and Death Church seemed as good as any a place to start. Its not as “punky” (sorry for using such a stupid word) as I would have thought, but its still great. People truly revere this thing, which is really cool. I love the bass sound.

This gets thrown around a lot online for being idk, spooky or moving or dense or atmospheric or just fucking great. Reflection is all of those things, but its also a very, very slow burn. Its another one of those things that falls loosely under the vaporwave banner when in reality, its a million miles away, aurally at least. Dense atmospheric textures all round.

Where it all began for the Bungle. Its been interesting to go back to this again in light of last year’s complete re-recording (and more). The first three Bungle demos have never really done anything for me, but I’m looking forward to exploring them again with a new perspective. I can’t say my opinion on them has changed, but its more to do with the fact that the sound quality is so bad that I…

Stunning, dreamy, nostalgic – these are a few words that spring to mind with this album playing. In fact this is so good I threw down on a copy of the cassette release off the strength of the first track alone. I can’t wait for it to arrive so I can listen to it again on an analogue format (dec 2021 update: it sounds amazing). Mixing the treacle-like haunted nostalgia vibes of vaporwave with morose…

I haven’t heard this album in about 18-20 years. The sheer scope of those years alone crushes me with the reminder of the ceaseless march of time, but it’s also a reminder to me that my Limp Bizkit “fandom” belonged in a time and a place, and has, thankfully, stayed there. I have nothing against Limp Bizkit, or specifically Wes Borland, Sam Rivers and John Otto in particular, who are enormously talented musicians, but I…

Piece Of Mind is a classic-era Maiden album that I never really knew about until I started going through the lot. Like, I’d heard of the big guns, Number Of The Beast, Killers, Powerslave and what not, but not Piece Of Mind. Unsure if it has anything to do with the horrendous album cover and title? Unsure. LOL. All in all though this is another solid Maiden effort from their absolute prime. The band clank…

Slam is inherently a ridiculous genre, and the brutally mental Crepitation are a perfect example of how to do the sound justice. The band bring their own unique spin to a genre that is immediately formulaic; insane, farmyard vocals front up jazzy guitar and bass, and of course, dustbin drums. Plus how amazing is that album title? Full points from me!

BFA (sorry, I’m not writing that out for just a paragraph review! LOL) is another one of Bobby Maggard’s disgusting gorenoise projects which he kindly sent me a CDr of back in… I wanna say 2013. Its more of the sick, nasty shit you will come to know and expect from this prolific maniac. Be prepared for intense noise and vocals that sound like the performer has been impaled in the gut and is burping…

Well isn’t this just disgusting? An early incarnation of Don Decker’s Anal Blast (which may or may not feature members of Slipknot depending on which way the wind blows or which forum you read), Puss Blood Pentagram is a beginning of a running theme for the band. Its also super fucking sick death metal, like, some of the best of the mid 90s as far as all that brutal shit goes. I urge you to…

So come on! The Ethereal Mirror is a markedly different album from Cathedral’s debut, but this sophomore full length did kinda set the pace (or more like, the tone) for how the band would progress through the majority of the 90s. Eschewing deathly slow pace, and instead ramping up the groove, we have some all-time classics here, like “Ride” or “Enter World Of Worms”. Doom on, folks.

Mutilation And Death are really cool. Messy, but cool. The Agathocles stuff is reaaallly old, which usually means… yep, it’s really cool! This split has been shelved since the 80s, because it was apparently too noisy / sloppy for the label at the time (I’d love to see who agreed to release this without prior knowledge to how either of how these fuckers would sound? Like, what? Haha). However, step in the now sadly defunct…

Whore is an earlier album by the super-hyped Mephistofeles. Whilst I think Whore is better than Satan Sex Ceremonies I’m still not particularly wild about this project. I love the aesthetic, and the guitar tone, and that’s about it for me. Anyways, I’ve done two albums, I’ve tired to get into them. I guess we’ll just leave it at that for now! LOL.

Mesis Mesis Mesis. Hi, I’m Mr. Mesis! I can’t remember where I got this cassette from but I had a bunch of them kicking about for my label/distro way back in what has to be 2013? Hyperemesis stuff is great noisy gore as always, Pyemesis stuff really awesome too, with strange, I guess, kung-fu sounding samples or something, which have stuck with me all these years. Tidy gore! Excuse the shoddy photo on this one,…

Flux Information Sciences were admittedly a band I only ever heard of because they had an album out on Michael Gira’s Young God Records. The Last Mixes is a compilation of well, some of the last stuff the band ever did. Apparently. It’s not listed anywhere as an official release, and one of the band members has commented on the YouTube upload of this saying he doesn’t know where the hell the uploader got these…

Of all the Ice And Fire characters to base your project name off, Qyburn is probably one of the sketchiest. Anyway, Wax Mask isn’t particularly amazing I’m afraid to say. I found it quite disappointing. I’ll leave it at that because I don’t want to take swings at this thing. I wish the Qyburn project all the best.

Black Ark is (was) the name of the studio that Lee Perry constructed himself at his home in Jamaica. It’s – apparently – primitive gear and set up (compared to other big-business owned studios in Jamaica at the time) could easily have been the laughing stock of the record cutting elite, but instead what Lee Perry did with so little is now part of musical history. The dubs on this record seem to include cuts…

I played the fuck out of this thing when I was a teenager. I loved the big beats and the livelier remixes of some of the, dare I say, duller tracks on Love And Hate. Not to shit on that album, but there’s a few snoozers on there. I also had the CD (doubled with In All Languages DVD) and the vinyl version, each of which I think had a different track listing. “Time, Death…

Another solid album from Doom. Is there a bad Doom album? If so, I’ve yet to hear it. The sampling is turned up to 11 here, with seemingly every song filled with hare-brain references to heroes and villains of the past. Doom’s flows are of course, legendary, you don’t need me to tell you that.

Oi oi! A split between Justin Broadrick and Mick Harris? I don’t mind if I do. JK Flesh is fuckin’ top drawer as always, but Monrella is new to me, despite my flurry through the deck of cards that Mick Harris has as projects last year. Head-thumping, cerebral techno is the order of the day (all round actually). So get ready to stomp, but get ready for the tunes to be really dark too. Banging.

Ah yes the uhhh, classic entry from Morbid Angel. Honestly, I’m surprised I hadn’t covered this one yet, as I had the picture disc version for a very long time (pretty sure I sold it however). Anyway, where do I begin with this one? If you’re reading my site then I’m probably already preaching to the converted, but if not, then this is one of the essential death metal albums; one that defined a genre…

I think it would be wrong to say that Fief is head and shoulders above other modern dungeon synth projects, but the name does bring with it its own kinda unique sound, which gives weight to the name. There is a… musicality (for severe lack of a better word) to II that is absent from a lot of sparser, more ambient DS projects. Its lovely. Perfect RPG music.

Pyophagia is a project of MethXCamp drummer Antonis (who always played with me in Dzhumagaliev, which is probably my favourite out of all the bands I’ve played in). Pyo is straight up no-nonsense goregrind, and I can’t ever get enough of that stomp and those vocals. Tolerance’s recording here is from the project’s earlier days, and has a much heavier reliance on the drum machine (think 110% constant flurry of programmed blasts), but its still…

Chiwawawawa are from Manchester and play an interesting blend of noisy rock and a slightly more melodic vein of indie music. Without wanting to be derivative or to put these guys in a box, Violent Architecture has an awful lot of Black Midi vibes, and the final track has parts that sound as if they are lifted directly out of Swans’ “Bring The Sun”, but this is so blatant it simply must be some sort…

Ah yes, more horrible electronics from Godflesh. Just what the doctor ordered, and a welcome distraction from awaiting a new studio album. Pretty sure I’ve heard a bunch of these tracks before on the Japanese versions of “New Flesh” albums, but this release alone is consistent and filled with all sorts of nasty vibes. If JK Flesh doesn’t bring the crushing metal with GC Green, you can of course rely on him to bring the…

inb4 dat bass tho. It was a wild choice mixing this thing the way they did, but for better or worse Metallica achieve one of the most immediately recognisable production sounds in the history of metal music. The story goes they were raging from the death of Cliff, and with newbie Jason Newsted, they shat out this super dark, heavy, angry and bleak album. Saint Anger around my neck, right? This was the first Metallica…

Some hateful shit right here, y’all. Flächenbrand are, and are nothing more than, a consequence of me collecting (trying at least) all the Anal Cunt stuff on vinyl. They are not very good. Which is an odd thing to say, when they are infinitely more musical than their split mates Anal Cunt. I have a soft spot for these twats, purely because of how sick their stuff sounds. Seth’s vocals are mental and Josh’s riffs…

D.H.I.B.A.C. are the powerviolence tinged grinders I remember from their split with CxMxP. There’s more great stuff here from them. I first heard of Saywhy when they were announced for the first Blastonbury festival in Newcastle in what, 2007? I never ended up going, and I’ve sat on this 7″ for about 10 years so it was finally good to hear them! Haha! Good shit all round.

Different Class is fucking great but I’m not sure if it has aged well. Jarvis Cocker’s sexually charged mumbles and whispers give him the air of some creepy-ass sex offender, especially when a few of these numbers have a sting in the tail (tale? Haha). He will get your Mrs. coked up, fuck her without johnny on, and then bail. But, he’ll write a song about it, so that makes it OK, apparently? Like I…

Before Fear Factory decided to rip off Godflesh for a living, they instead ripped off Napalm Death for a living. I mayyyy just a tad be acting a little dramatic for effect but seriously, this band owes a large part of their career to Justin Broadrick. Concrete is Fear Factory’s unreleased original debut, which was shitcanned in lieu of Soul Of A New Machine. Concrete finally saw the light of day in the early 2000s….

In the past I’ve never really seen the point in one-sided records, often finding them to be a waste of vinyl with all that blank space on side B. However, there is something endearing about Bringer Of Gore’s Meltaaargh!!! series (or is it a sub-label?), which is designed to give underground gore and grind bands a shot at being on wax that they may not have had just yet in their career. It basically puts…

My favourite Iron Maiden album thus far (as I have definitely not heard them all! – not even close!). There’s just something about Powerslave which is just a bit more epic and grandiose than other Maiden records; everything from the art to the song writing, I don’t know what it is, but it all seems stepped up just one more notch! I could listen to the rhythm section of this band forever.

World Full Of Remains is Dead Infection’s debut album (demo?). I was after this for years but the tape is really hard to find, so I ended up with a LP repress that I bought in OEF 2013. The LP format makes the art a thousand times sicker, but it does nothing to alleviate the horrendous whoosing / phasing sound that exists across the recording. Not sure if this is a tape dubbing issue, or…

We played this on a night shift last year, after reading online about how its one of the evilist things ever recorded, or some such overblown statement. A Cool Dark Place To Die is, frankly, comical in its concept and delivery. Coming across like a mix of shit dungeon synth and even shitter “death-rock” like Christian Death and the like, Theatre Of Ice ham it up in every way possible, and then obscure everything with…

More Welsh black metal that I only heard because of FHED, but this time it’s not shit and is actually out on the FHED label itself. Defod’s strength is in its mesmerising riffs, which are cold, eery and hypnotic, and thankfully don’t sound like they were recorded inside a cupboard on a Nokia 3310 (I’m looking at you, Revenant Marquis). This album / mini album / EP was put out on cassette, which gives it…

Gar Hoover is a musician from the Detroit area who seems to specialise in fannying about with PO-33s, in amongst, I’m sure, other devices too. However, he has released two albums of tunes comprised entirely of creations from the pocket-sized PO-33. There’s a ton of vibes and grooves here, but the quality is consistent and the craftsmanship is second to none. My tape label Two Man Tape Co is doing a limited run of Vol….

I reviewed parts 1 and 4 of this series back what must be, shit, 8 years ago now, and I figured I had lost parts 2 and 3 to time, but I recently managed to unearth them from a long-forgotten drawer somewhere. The crap you accumulate around you, eh? There’s far too many entries in this series to mention, but at least I can round off the ones that I physically own. Stirner is pretty…

Choronzon was the album that got me into Akercocke, and was a fairly random buy off the strength of the “Leviathan” single (which had about half of the actual song cut out of it!). The single edit did not prepare me for the intense, hyper-speed death metal that was on show. In fact, I don’t think anything could have prepared me. If you take a step back, what an attack on the senses this is!…

I thought I had lost this to time, but no, it is now found! Nide De Vespe are super punk/hardcore influenced, at least that is how it comes across the sound, which is bouncy and sprightly, rather than the more metallic end of grindcore. There is a lot of energy here, and the sound is fantastic. Honestly, I really miss Merciless Precision, who are no longer with us. Many fantastic projects spawned from their demise…

I’ve had this CDr knocking about for, I’d say, 14 years or so. I used to be in heavy contact with Rob from Malignant Germ Infestation back in the MySpace days, and this must have come from him some shape or form. I shared the stage with these guys (Pain Penitentiary) and also MGI (in a solo incarnation) whilst touring with the Judas Cradle back in… I wanna say, 2016. Anyways, looking back aside, nothing…

I picked up this 7″ for pennies during a Earache Records websale. This is a strange one. It seems to have been another victim of the label’s “fling shit at the wall and see what sticks” phase during the 90s, where they took all their money made from breaking death metal and grindcore, and tried to invest in many new music movements of the time. None of these really were a success, even when the…

Hardcore is not my strong point (actually, doesn’t Strong Point sound like a cult 90s hardcore band from New Jersey?), but I do like to wander in every now and then to check on what I’m missing. Today’s selection was one of the first records by the now-legendary Madball. Set It Off is a doozy, and ticks all the right boxes, especially with its organic production. Get angry! Get shouty!

Napalm Death have a fair amount of live releases. Bootlegged In Japan, either is legendary, or is just hawked to death by Earache, because its been one that consistently pops up. However, its a bit of a plod through mid-career stuff, which isn’t super exciting to me in its studio form either, so this is a completionist listen and nothing more, for me at least.

Brutal, 90s death metal with a turbid yet clarified production. Honestly, it doesn’t stand out from the bunch but the recording is sound enough. My favourite is the bass player, who clanks away ‘neath the disgusting explosion of sound.

Thumpin’ underground techno to get you out of the clubs in the toon and into some rusty, damp shithole of a warehouse on a shady industrial estate 5 miles away, where many sweaty, half naked bodies writhe away in some sort of unison; each like a head of the hydra, unique but connected by one source and one purpose. The center of this hive mind is of course, body-movement commanding electronic barrages by the likes…

Ooh, she’s a noisy one! The intense levels of distortion and gut-rattling bass initially give me the impression of some mad grindcore version of Mortician, which is a great first impression, to be fair. 4 intense tracks follow in quick succession. A perfect taster EP for Meatal Ulcer sound. Original released I think as a first cassette demo / EP, this was then picked up for Bringer Of Gore’s Meltaaargh!!! 7″ series, which is what…

The name of this record sums up the sounds within almost perfectly. What a crazy mess of sound. In the best way possible, of course. Part of it grinds on my patience, part of it feels amazing to be listening to.

There’s something about Ghoul’s cheeky thrash-tinged metal that always makes me feel like I need to get some sort of party going. Its not quite in the realm of beer and/or pizza thrash, instead being somewhat slightly more sinister, but the songs on Transmission Zero are bouncy enough to open any mosh pit.

YOOOOOOOO!!!!! This shit right here be the 2000th Lines In Wax post. I don’t really know what to say other than “thank you” to anyone who is still reading this shit for some reason. Cheers! Here’s a lil something for you bustas. We were recently talking to Viper about doing a UK/EU release of this thing and talks are ongoing, but yeah – anyways, it reminded me I hadn’t done an entry for it here…

A twisted, zany approach to electronic / synthpop! And the best part, is that these guys are just from down’t road, as it were. On the Two Man Tape Co. label we’ve recently done a compilation of these guys’ best material (as picked by them!), which sold incredibly well. Consequential Quasars was the album I listened to when scouting out bands to approach with the label, and it was the record that sold me on…

Ah good ol’ reliable Thanatos, just the ticket when you need some no-nonsense death metal that won’t bore you to tears, yet in all honestly, doesn’t push things too far either. Angelic Encounters is a well made record, and is nothing short of a pleasure to listen to.

A seldom listened early Swans effort for me, which is a shame because there are some cracking renditions here. Granted, Real Love will almost always be overshadowed by Public Castration, but Real Love has, dare I say, slightly more audible and “less punishing” versions of a few of the same songs. Of course, this is 80s Swans we are talking about, and the music is inherently uncomfortable, but these are less tortured than Public Castration….

Gorgeous sounding, dense hard bop jazz with ants-in-your-pants constant-shuffling percussion meeting ear-piercing solo sax leads. I feel like I’m sitting in a Michelin Star restaurant enjoying a starter of gravadlax with pickled cabbage and dill. I’m about to try and stab a stray caper with a very expensive fork when actually, it turns out I’m on mushrooms and a waiter has appeared to my side and is blasting Ornette Coleman out of a portable Bush…

If you absolutely LOVE Unholy Grave then life must be an absolute cake walk for you, musically. These guys pump out records like its nobody’s business, and for the most part, they are all of the same consistent quality. The Grind Anarchy 7″ is no different, giving you another ten minutes or so injection of DIY grindcore goodness. This one comes in a gatefold with all the lyrics written, out as standard these days for…

You gotta fuckin’ love Nunslaughter. Is there a purer form of metal than this? It strikes me as something Fenriz from Darkthrone would be proud of. Think blackened thrash but in the grimy, crusty underground vein rather rather the polished HM-2 big sound vein. Murky sounds, murky vibes, encompassed perfectly by that art. Top stuff.

I have come across Tolerance before, when I dubbed a few of Pyophagia’s copies of the Pyo / Tolerance split for them. I know they have a few splits and stuff out now, so glad to finally come full circle and hear these guys on wax. Frenetic, chaotic, murky sound is the order of business, with pitch-shifted sickness for vocals. The riffs are super tight even though things get mushy now and then. Great goregrind…

Ever wondered what Mortician would sound like with a real drummer? Like pure shit, it seems! LOL – I’m joking. It’s just you get so used to the duo’s enormous and all-encompassing studio sound, that for me, the initial rough rehearsal room feel of this recording threw me for a loop. Once you’ve adjusted, it’s an absolute treat and the guys really pan out the 44 minutes with a veritable bevy of Mortician classics. Mad…

Before pressing play I am already intrigued by that artwork. How spooky is that shit? It isn’t a million miles away from what Uberkvlt (Justin Bartlett) does with his stuff, although I suspect that this may be before his time, as it were. Cadaver Symposium’s demo is a dry affair of grinding guitars (think early Carcass), heaving drums and a set of perplexing vocal performances, from your usual death growls through to your more unusual…

Gnolls! Those dirty bastards! One has conspired here to make a dungeon synth record, it seems. Leaning towards the video game / RPG worlds of inspiration rather than lore / history etc., Gnoll ticks two boxes: one for awesome dungeon synth and one for invoking some sort of analogue nostalgia from a better time.

Dirging death metal is the order of the day, with that “evil” vibe that you get with a lot of 90s stuff. Its not as slow and sludgy as say, Autopsy, nor is it as gothic as say, Gorment or even Altars… era Morbid Angel, but it travels a way down both of these kinds of paths nonetheless. The cover art is pretty cool too, but as a whole, I’m not that big of a…

I had a recent dabble into what could be called proto-metal (basically anything that pre-dated Black Sabbath’s self titled record yet was also very heavy). Sir Lord Baltimore are often a name thrown about for contenders who pipped Sabbath to the post for starting the heavy metal genre. The only thing available on Spotify is the complete works so I figured I’d give the whole thing a bash. Honestly, Kingdom Come (1970) is great but…

Boom! This is sicker than I remember! Hell of a production, such incredible beats and sick sounds, and of course, those amazing bars that introduced Twiztid to the world (House Of Krazees, who tf are they?). Mostasteless is the start of a long career for this duo but its arguably one of the best records they have done.

Carcass worship out the ass! Dark, mirky riffs and clandestine production cloaked in deep vokills and gory subject matter. Its like Symphonies Of Sickness had never been made, eh? The stones on these bands to mimic it so! All in all, a great listen, but you won’t find anything original here.

I was recommended this by @cassette_goblin and I can’t for the life of me put my finger on what the actual fuck is going on here. Is it black metal? Is it jazz? Shit, RYM has it listed as vaporwave, which is in an interesting intepretation. Honestly, do I like this?… Not really, no. But fuck if I’ve ever heard anything like this in my entire life, and for that, Winterquilt has my undying attention…

Tunkio are one of my favourite goregrind discoveries of the last few months. You can thank Chopping Headz Zine for that, even though the band have been around for a few years now. Blasting mental shit. Kuvotus are, without sounding too samey, cut from the same cloth of ping-tastic, hyper-blasting gore mania. Honestly, I’m in so deep at this point that this shit almost sounds relaxing. Fabulous. 2023 edit: Apparently I like this so much…

Man I fucking love Negative Approach. Like, hardcore punk really isn’t my strong point, even after all these years, but Jesus fucking Christ, Negative Approach go hard. (As a side note, the fact that Negative Approach was Seth Putnam’s favourite band (who played at his wedding) almost makes me believe he wasn’t a hateful piece of shit and just 110% committed to being a massive fucking cunt of a troll) Total Recall is a short,…

This is one of those records that I have been meaning to check out for years, mainly due to the cool artwork and the age of it. How can something so old be so important to doom metal? Well then, because this shit slaps, is why! For myself, it comes on a bit more trad than doom, but you know… this is the era of trad. Anyways, fuck all this BS genre talk, this is…

Everyone knows Seven Churches, right? (Well, every death metal head, at least). But, Possessed’s continued output seems to fall off into obscurity, for the most part. I know they have had success with more recent albums, but big up to Ken’s Death Metal Crypt for sharing this 1991 demo, of which I knew absolutely nothing about. It’s only 7 minutes long and 2 tracks in length, and whilst its not oceans apart from the Seven…

Viking metal has to be the most boring and uninspiring form of metal for me, even with the seemingly endless array of traditional instruments you could employ to spice up the sound. I’m not even sure if Turisas are a thing, but they were everywhere at one point, and I caught them at two festivals in one year so got a hold of this record. I mean, it’s epic, but that’s about it. There’s a…

Up until now I’ve been avoiding Agathocles split CDs to lower my risk of obtaining duplicate material that may already be on a 7″ that I own. Agathocles have a notorious back-catalogue of re-hashed shit (sorry, but it’s true), and as a collector on a budget I have put barriers in place to lessen the blow of unknowingly buying something that I already have. This was all well and good, until during a trade with…

Goatsnake have always been slow and bluesey, but Flower Of Disease sees them going lower and heavier than before. The band have always had groove, but multiple times through this journey things slow to an absolute crawl, without getting boring or drawn out. Personally, I love Goatsnake’s doom metal meets desert rock approach, the weight of which can only be helped home by the colossal riffs of Sunn O)))’s Greg Anderson. I see Flower Of…

There’s an easy pleasure in listening to old Motörhead. Ace Of Spades is far from my favourite, but it’s just so easy to throw this on, and drive, or something like that. “Love You Like A Reptile” is an interesting cut, and I can’t help but be reminded of David Icke and his moon-lizard craziness. “Jailbait” is a proper dodgy number, one I suspect you wouldn’t be able to get away with writing today, even…

There is nothing more human than Death, right? To live is to die, or so I’ve been told. There’s a sadness (moreso than usual) to Chuck’s death (his actual death, not the band Death) due to the subject matter he dealt with throughout his career. Puns aside, Chuck and company confronted death (not Death) head on, from its gruesome side earlier on, to the more philosophical or esoteric musings on later records. This man was…

One of the most revered dungeon synth releases of recent times and with good reason. There is something magical about these lo-fi recordings; a wonderful sense of adventure as it were, along with heaps of character. This has recently been re-recorded, so I’m interested to see why, as this release isn’t that old, nor can I find any fault with it. I’ve been putting this off since Feb 2020 (lol) but the recent rerecording of…

Another one of those cases where a random listen absolutely blows me away. This is, truly, what it’s all about, why so much time is spent searching, researching, listening, reading…. it all pays off when you go “hey, that cover art and logo looks sick, I wonder what that sounds like?”, and boom – you’ve just uncovered an absolute gem. I am, clearly, late to the party with Weakling, but god damn, this is in…

I believe British Piss Culture is a project of Derek Crozier, the fella behind the Vile Noise label. Deluge then, is vile noise in more ways than one. Expect nought but a single pummelling noise wall that is here to frazzle your brain and force you into submission, or something. Hey, if you’re going to be pissed on, this is a pretty good soundtrack to go with it.

Verletzen are a black metal band from my grimm home country ov VVales so it was super cool to check out this demo. There’s a few Welsh black metal bands knocking about now, but I don’t recall any that play in this old school and raw style, which is what I am all about, totally. This three song demo is raw and frostbitten without being completely fucking unlistenable, and has immediately got me wanting more…

Another absolute classic from Jim Kirkwood, this time from way back in 1992. Unsure if it’s just me but this one seems a bit darker and moodier than usual. Don’t get me wrong, Jim can always conjure infinite fantasy landscapes with all manner of vibes and feels, but there’s something oppressive about this offering. One of my favs so far.

This gives me similar vibes to the Agoraphobic Nosebleed split with Converge, in the way that something super heavy and chaotic goes up against something with more progressive punk elements. Napalm Death are, well, Napalm Death, and this is prime cut 90s era stuff, with dry production, busy riffs, and Barney’s trademark low growls. Coalesce on the other hand, are a bit more all over the shop, with dissonant guitar work, harsh vocals and a…

What a lovely and dank 7″. I’ve just got a record player again for the first time in 7 years (what!) so wouldn’t be adverse to getting a copy of this in the flesh. I was afraid for Spectral Voice’s long-form death doom in such a format but they sound great, and Blood Incantation were born to make metal for the vinyl format, it seems.

Eternity! (It’s certainly taken me an eternity to review this album). Black One was the first Sunn record I ever bought. When I was 16 or 17 years old, I didn’t immediately ‘get’ this. I wanted big fat drones in my face, blowing me out of my chair. What I got were intense atmospheric compositions that went over my head initially. I think it took seeing Sunn live with Attila on vocals to truly understand,…

Someone needs to tell Zillion you don’t need a 25 minute sample to set the mood – this is supposed to be some sort of (bastardised) grindcore subgenre, so just get to the point, eh? Thankfully the slow and groovy grind is actually pretty fucking good, sounding more like old Gut or Rompeprop rather than Gutalax or whatever. Patisserie are a different beast completely. Intense death metal riffery meets the tremolo haunting of bands like…

Another record that I have unceremoniously sat on for about 7 years. The Coming Age is a full length from one man noise maker Seige Electronics released on the excellent (and now possibly defunct) Vile Noise label from Scotland. Anyway, there’s some really cool textures here, and the whole thing sounds alive and analogue. There’s some horrible subject matter to confront and some intense vibes, but confrontation in this way is part of what power…

Recorded at Morrisound, not that you’d ever know due to the intense level of grime on this thing. But hey, that’s what we love about 90s death metal demos, right? I have the unique opportunity of having this 1991 demo be my introduction to Solstice, as I’ve not heard anything else by the group at all. It’s like its actually 1991 and I’ve picked up this tape through a trade or something. Anyway, this is…

Super fun, mosh friendly, almost skater-influenced thrash from the legends that are Wehrmacht. Is it as good as Biermacht? Probably not, but it’s cut from the same cloth, as it were. Good stuff, for when you absolutely must thrash out on the beach. Just don’t forget the beer.

Bleeeruuuhhhhhhjjjjjgghhh. This is my first experience with Master outside of the legendary self-titled album. Of course, this is much more polished and modern, but I am missing out decades of evolution here. Honestly, it’s pretty good death metal, but the prize is taken by Paul Speckmann’s vocal performances, which are outstanding. Hideous and outstanding! Haha! Think of a mix between John Tardy from Obituary and Dave Vincent from Morbid Angel.

Trad metal with enough of a sleazy swagger that you would usually find in occult rock and so on. God’s Right Hand is a fairly short outing, but it’s incredibly well made and the production is also fantastic and crystal clear, but without losing much charm. I look forward to seeing what these guys come up with next. I believe the record store (read: crypt) Crypt Of The Wizard helped to put this out.

I gave Revenant Marquis a second shot because I love the mystery around the project and this cover art is fucking so great. Unfortunately, what we have here on Orphans is more barely audible black metal that sounds like it’s being played from a third floor study in a haunted house – and you the listener are shackled in chains down in the basement. Honestly, why on earth would you make this so difficult to…

Entrantment? Is that even a word? In fact, I’m pretty sure it isn’t. I’ve tried to fight off and have succumbed to the temptation to make a “Kyle From Entrantation Has A Moustache” joke. LOL. Either way, this kills. There’s some super intense, low as fuck riffing on this mother. Proper slow, proper low! It’s nice to go all the way back to the beginning and check out the origins of this legendary death metal…

I have been borderline obsessed with Morrowind since I got given a copy of the game and it’s expansion packs in 2003 (or so). I think one of the original endearing aspects of that obsession that allows it to continue to this day is the absolutely magical soundtrack by Jeremy Soule. Not to shit on the OSTs for Arena or Daggerfall, but there’s a reason why the game’s creator’s continued to use Jeremy going forward…

I got sent a link to this and couldn’t decipher whether or not it’s a meme. But, either way, there is something in the undercurrent of Curse Of The Lock Master which is endearing. It appeals to that part of me that loves wobbly cassettes and shitty demos from the 90s, and so on. I’m unsure what to make of the project as a whole, but I’d be lying to you if I said I…

I recently started following Viper on Bandcamp. I thought my phone was having a time of it, because during the last day or so, its been spamming with with the notification “Viper just released a new album”. Little did I know, that these were genuine alerts, and not my Bandcamp app losing its mind. I always knew Viper to be prolific, but this was taking the piss a bit. Anyways, turns out all these “albums”…

Nightmares At Dawn is a compilation, which I didn’t realise at first when I started listening. There’s a bit of a jarring change between various textures / sessions but for the most part, this seems like a quality stack of songs, at least when it comes to Xasthur’s brand of drab and depressing black metal. There are several great atmospheres here. Oh, and a fucking Sabbath cover (“Zero The Hero”), which is actually really good…