Gold: Interbellum (2012)

Old-School

It’s been a while since I’ve talked about retro and/or female-fronted metal, so I think I’m due. Gold is a new Dutch band featuring Thomas Sciarone, formerly of The Devil’s Blood. If TBD is your starting point for comparison, this band drops all the folk influence and faux-serious Satanism to go for a more tried-and-true classic sound. Christian Mistress and Royal Thunder are better touchstones.

The band’s debut, Interbellum, consistently hovers in that nether region between hard rock and heavy metal. The songwriting is upbeat, and if you ever complained that metal doesn’t have enough “actual songs” anymore, the hooks on this one (both vocal and instrumental) are sure to satisfy. Vocalist Milena Eva sounds a little like Blondie belting it out in Pat Benatar fashion. She isn’t an excellent singer in a music student sense, but the feeling she puts behind it is much more important anyway.

Varg: Guten Tag (2012)

Windir Meets Dark Tranquillity?

Review by Patrick, proprietor of Beards, Etc.

Varg are a German group who play what I would loosely call either pagan metal or black metal. They have been pretty productive recently, releasing three albums in the past three years. In October they released their fourth full-length record, Guten Tag.

This is kind of an odd record. Its Viking themes and black metal roots, combined with a fairly conservative pace, make it seem like this would be pretty easily defined and understood. But it's not. Most metal in this vein strives for a natural, rugged, ancient feel so as to evoke the windswept north and the exploits of its barbarian subjects. This, though, sounds decidedly and purposefully modern. The upbeat rhythm to the music, the clear and accessible guitar work, and the vocals that seem to drift into melodeath territory with surprising frequency all contribute to this impression. It's not melodic death metal, but it plays like it's trying to bridge the gap between Windir and Dark Tranquillity.

Nails: Obscene Humanity (2012)

Short, Fast, and Furious

Review by Metallattorney. He is the law.

It was with a lot of trepidation that I agreed to take a listen to this release. I was not familiar with Nails before so I had to look them up. What I found concerned me even more. Nails is a hardcore band. I do not care much for hardcore music. Nails is often associated with Converge. I really do not care for Converge. And Nails is on Southern Lord Records. With the exception of Lair of the Minotaur, I have never really cared for that label. But I did agree to give this a shot, and the fact that the release is three songs from an upcoming seven inch, I figured it would not be too painful. I can probably handle ten to fifteen minutes of hardcore.

Yes I can. This is a very impressive release, which is likely made better by the fact that it is so short. I am not sure I could listen to a full album of this, but I can definitely listen to these three songs.

Bell Witch: Longing (2012)

I Wait (for It to End)

I consider myself a huge fan of the slowest kinds of doom metal. I also consider myself a discerning fan. There are those fans of the funeral/drone doom varieties who are not so discerning, and will ascribe genius to just about anything that comes along. Then there are those who don’t get it at all and don’t claim to. I’m not sure what combination of those types conspired to unleash Bell Witch’s debut, Longing. For people who fall into the last camp, this is all you need to know: The record is sixty-seven minutes that are essentially divided into four songs, a six minute interlude with a movie sample, and a three minute outro. Other than the twenty minute opening track, the other three proper songs are about twelve minutes.

For those undaunted by the track lengths, there is a lot of promise to be found in any brief sampling of the music. Here and there, you’ll find melody that’s compelling, or heavy guitars with death growls, and some clean singing that betrays a crushed soul.

God Seed: I Begin (2012)

So You Do at Last

Review by Metallattorney. He is the law.

Any discussion of God Seed will necessarily include some discussion about the band's origins. The album title here is particularly apt because of this. God Seed is made up of King ov Hell and Gaahl, formerly of black metal psychos Gorgoroth. In actuality, these two members attempted to carry forward with the name Gorgoroth after splitting from Infernus. A lengthy court battle ensued with Infernus actually being granted the rights to the name Gorgoroth. In the meantime, God Seed formed for a couple of months and then disbanded when Gaahl retired temporarily. King used the material written for God Seed for a project with Dimmu Borgir's Shagrath which was called Ov Hell. Gaahl eventually returned and God Seed was formed.

God Seed has already released a live album from Wacken and a single. This is the debut full-length however and the first exposure that a lot of people will get to the band. Expectations are certainly high as Gorgoroth has been a stalwart in the Norwegian black metal scene for a very long time.

Give Thanks for Play Count

Last year I shared my guilty pleasures for Thanksgiving. I've decided to go ahead with a similar theme and share some information that may be embarrassing. I've had my iTunes going for something like seven years now, and it saves the play counts for each and every song. This will list the ones that are highest on that list. As a caveat, you should know that some of these have been played many more times on CD or on my first iPod, which would lose all its play information when the batteries ran out (which happened often).

First up is Dream Evil's "The Book of Heavy Metal" with 43 plays. This is a recent addition, but my eldest loves it, so it gets played a lot. After that is mostly a lot of Slipknot, a band that I still love no matter what anyone says about them.

33 plays: Slipknot: "Left Behind," "The Nameless"
30 plays: "One Winged Angel" by Nobuo Uematsu. This is the music from the final boss battle of Final Fantasy VII. As I was playing it the first time (in 1997) I got to this battle and hooked up a nicer stereo to the Playstation, just listening. It's great stuff.
29 plays: "Hurt" by Johnny Cash
28 plays: Down - "Stone the Crow," Godsmack - "Greed" (great stuff you bastard), Living Sacrifice: "Threatened"
27 plays: Deftones - "Change (in the House of Flies)"
26 plays: Mudvayne - "Nothing to Gein" (essentially the sole reason I believed in these guys for so many years), Slipknot - "People=Shit" and "Wait and Bleed"
25 plays: Danzig - "Mother," Godsmack - "I Stand Alone" (which I haven't heard in nearly two years), Mercyful Fate - "Buried Alive," Metallica - "Mercyful Fate," Slipknot - "New Abortion" and "Duality," George Thorogood - "Who Do You Love?" and Tool - "Prison Sex"
24 plays: Corrosion of Conformity - "Clean My Wounds," Korn - "ADIDAS," Led Zeppelin - "Stairway to Heaven," Slipknot - "My Plague," "Everything Ends," "The Heretic Anthem," and "Purity," Black Label Society - "Stillborn," and Rob Zombie - "Iron Head"
23 plays: Johnny Cash - "Folsom Prison Blues," Led Zeppelin - "All My Love," Slipknot - "Spit It Out" and "Circle," Stone Temple Pilots - "Interstate Love Song," and Rob Zombie - "Living Dead Girl"
22 plays: Coal Chamber - "Something Told Me," Deftones - "My Own Summer (Shove It)," Mercyful Fate - "Black Funeral," Meshuggah - "Future Breed Machine," Metallica - "Die, Die My Darling," Monster Magnet - "Space Lord," Slipknot - "The Shape" and "Skin Ticket," Soulfly - "Bleed," Wayne Static - "Not Meant for Me" (from the embarrassingly ridiculous Queen of the Damned soundtrack), and Rob Zombie - "Bring Her Down (to Crippletown)"

That's all. Mock at will, and share yours if you dare.

Bloodbeast: Bloodlust (2012)

Solid

Review by Patrick, proprietor of Beards, Etc.

Bloodbeast are a death metal band from South Africa. They just formed last year, and this spring they released their debut album Bloodlust.

I've noticed that a common problem for metal outfits from out-of-the-way countries is a tendency to stick to the clearly defined standard practices of their chosen sub-genre. I have my theories about why exactly that is, but that's a discussion best left for another time. The important thing is that it's a trait Bloodbeast shares for the most part. In this case, they've largely (though not exclusively) stuck to the Swedish variety of death metal. This is not an inherently bad thing, but it does stick them in bit of a box. There are exceptions to this normalcy (like the bizarre, halting tempos on "Merciless"), but the bulk of the record sounds pretty familiar.

Dark Americana Briefs, Part 2

Acoustic Guitars Can Be Brutal

Do you want some more of that dark Americana? Of course you do.

16 Horsepower: Secret South (2000)
(5 out of 5 stars)

Good Lord, do I love 16 Horsepower. After their incredible debut record (reviewed here) they released more of the same, with only slightly less excellent results. Until Secret South, that is. The record retains everything that made the band great, the proprietary blend of dark Appalachia/country/grunge/punk/etc., but in retrospect it clearly marks a shift for David Eugene Edwards and company. Its focus is more on the sound, less on hook-oriented songs, and it jettisons the occasional upbeat moments of its predecessors. The songs themselves are still each worthy in their own right, though. As a complete experience, they never exceeded it. It's fitting, then, that it would be the band's last record of new original material, and is a perfect segue into Edwards' Wovenhand.



Look, if you're a regular reader of mine and you haven't checked them out yet, get on it right now. Check out "Strawfoot," "Cinder Alley," and the incredible rendition of "Wayfaring Stranger."

Buy Secret South

Derelict: Perpetuation (2012)

Shackled by my Derelict Indoctrination

Review by the third metal attorney, joanismylover.

Bob Dylan once said "Don't criticize what you don't understand." Adhering to Mr. Dylan's advice here will be difficult because I've been asked to "critique" this release from Derelict, a technical death metal band from, where else, Canada. And I don't really "do" technical in my music. Full disclosure, I have tried many times but do not get bands like Opeth and Dillinger Escape Plan. Everyone and their mother, including Joan, thinks these two bands are great. I don't doubt they are, I just don't get it. Opeth bore me to tears. DEP just sounds like noise.

Eis: Wetterkreuz (2012)

Teutonic Black Metal

Review by Metallattorney. He is the law.

My German is non-existent so the first thing I will say is that I do not understand a word these guys are saying. Ever. But luckily music is consistent across language barriers. And one thing I do understand is black metal when I hear it.

This is Eis's third full-length since a messy legal dispute forced them to change their name from Geist. They released three albums under that name prior to the change, giving them six full-length albums since 2005. Eis is apparently quite prolific. The band is currently made up of only two members. Alboin handles the vocals and all of the instruments except the drums. Marlek covers the drums.