LP Review: "Prophets From The Occultic Cosmos" by Excuse

Prophets From The Occultic Cosmos

Being the proud papa that I am, after skating lessons last night, the video of my daughter doing crossovers got spread around.

A friend of mine commented about how much more opportunity there is to play the sport of hockey nowadays compared to when we were children.

He was absolutely correct, but it's more than just hockey...or any other sport for that matter.

Humanity, much to the chagrin of many in the population, has leaped forward. We are capable of improving at dizzying speeds.

Take Excuse. They're a progressive thrash metal band from Finland.

Their debut album is nearly perfect. The musicianship is miles ahead of any thing Metallica, Slayer, Anthrax, or even Megadeth did on their first couple of records, and this is a debut.

This record is akin to a goalie tossing a shutout in his first start in the NHL. The last goalie who did that was Jordan Binnington who won the Stanley Cup in the same season. So, no pressure, Excuse. I just expect you to continue making thrash metal masterpieces like this one.

RELEASE 8/2/19 BANDCAMP FACEBOOK 

LP Review: "Striking the Bell of Death" by Sins of the Damned

Striking the Bell of Death

During my formative years metal was growing divergent. Metal had left the blues and psychedelia based music like Sabbath.

Priest, Venom, Iron Maiden, and others had kind of put the stake in the heart of that. Things were kept, the progressive bent, the evil imagery, etc.

In the early to Mid 1980's though, a change happened. Different subsets of metal could co-exist on this plane.

From there we got Black Metal, Thrash Metal, Death Metal, Industrial Metal, and the return of Doom/Stoner Metal.

Now we're past the factioning off of all of the genres and into hybrid territories. Blackened Death Death Metal. Folkened Black Metal. Atmospheric Anything Metal. This is ever so pleasing to me, but what about a band that could reach into the past and pull upon the first thread in the tapestry?

That's what Sins of the Damned have done. The debut, Striking the Bell of Death, is a pure look back at 1984. It's proto-death, thrash, progressive, and all points in between.

It's a banger from start to finish. The anger of Venom, the dexterity of Iron Maiden, and the riffs of Metallica.

OUT 5/3/19 BANDCAMP FACEBOOK

DLP Review: "Shem Ha Mephorash" by Mephorash

Shem Ha Mephorash

There was a time in the United States when being a metalhead marked you for death.

Perhaps I'm overselling it just a touch, but we were singled out and reviled. The PMRC was some lovely social conservatism that came out of the Satanic Panic.

And if there's one thing we love in the USA, it's a good panic.

This record here, our double record, takes many of the things we were told back in the day as pejoratives and mixes up in the blackness.

Sweden's Mephorash is third wave black metal personified for me. They've got this wonderful symphonic feeling to them as well.

It's especially pronounced by the epic long tracks. The finale clocks in past fifteen minutes. So all the metal is so dumb stereotypes and even the Black Metallers can't play stereotypes are all cast to the wayside. It's progressive. It's expansive.

It's the perfect example of why we shouldn't listen to anyone who doesn't listen to metal.

RELEASE 4/18/19 BANDCAMP FACEBOOK

LP Review: "Troll" by Troll

Troll

It's easy to judge a book by its cover and look deeply into the dark pits of the soul and other hippy stuff right?

Well, consider if nothing else, just the word troll.

Yesterday my family took sick days and I worked from home in order to care for them.

During that time, my daughter subjected me to no less than two hours of Trolls cartoons.

The kiddo has also inherited a fandom of Harry Potter, but would she consider the troll in Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone to be the same thing as Branch or Poppy?

We haven't even gotten to the trolls in The Hobbit. So, really if you think about just those three parts of popular culture, the word troll evokes three very different connotations.

EP Review: "Victory is Mine" by Lucifer's Hammer

Victory is Mine

It's become apparent to me that I have been digging a rut for quite some time around here.

Normally, my reviews go in cycles and never really encircles one thing. My lack of specialization is source of great pride, but that's not been the case for awhile now.

This site has been working, insidiously I might add, to become another doom/stoner metal site.

That's not what we are all about.

So, for at least a little while, the focus will shift away from this glorious music scene and refocus on others.

Doom shan't be abandoned, but it's got to be one of many voices heard around here instead of the main voice heard. So, with all that said, here's the latest doom metal....sorry, habits are hard to break...

LP Review: "The Heresiarch" by Nupraptor

The Heresiarch

Well, this is frustrating.

There was a movie that I saw years ago in the 80's, back when everything was plastic and ridiculous.

It was about a gent who was the prototypical 98lb weakling that we all read about in comic books.

He entered into a pact with, naturally, the Devil. Oh wait, googling has finally surfaced the name of this terrible flick, Hunk.

Among other amazing things it featured a wannabe Dom Deluise and a wanna be Elvira.

Well, the point is, the young is transformed from his normal self into an alpha male. The devil's emissary explains to him piece by piece where his outer shell came from.

LP Review: "The Tree of Death" by Condenados

The Tree of Death

Aside from a blizzard that traps me inside of my house for just long enough to skive off of a day at the office in the real world...

The best weather patter is a drowsy rainfall, preferably in the summer because it then will cool down some of the terrible heat we experience here in St. Louis.

The lazy rainfalls are the best for sitting out on your porch listening to a sports game or having a beer.

In my house, it's not uncommon for us to sit out there when it's dark and play cards or whatever.

The constant sound of the rain hitting the roof, splashing the ground, making mowing my lawn impossible, and the smell of everything is an experience that is rarely topped.

Album Review: "Black Crusades" by Tombstalker

Black Crusades

As someone who's been into music for a very long time, the idea that there are places which create musical scenes is an idea I have long been able to get behind.

Who reading this isn't familiar with Tampa Bay Death Metal? Bay Area Thrash? Swedish Death Metal? New York Glam?

London Punk? Seattle Grunge?

Long has it been said, on these pages and probably elsewhere, that the biggest influence a band will have is its hometown. Black Sabbath played angry, but downtrodden music.

Metallica's sound came from trying to blow away LA Glam Metal. Today we consider another band from Kentucky, Tombstalkers. Frankly, Kentucky is one of those states that just seems so alien to me. Aside from Louisville, no cities stick out in my mind.

What does Kentucky sound like?

Album Review: "Our Cult Continues!" by Cardinals Folly

Our Cult Continues!

I have a gift for being able to tell if I'm going to be interested in a record when I hear the name or see the cover.

Or I'm a closed minded so and so.

Well, based on the name, the title, and the cover, I was interested in hearing this record. That in and of itself brought up a whole different can of worms that just had to be picked through.

Listening to this album made me think stoner metal, but their bio lists them as Doom Metal. Frankly, I'm not entirely certain I know what the difference between these two closely related sub-genres is.

If you do know, please hit it in the comments. A point by point with references to significant artists and songs should do well enough.

Here's what I can tell you....whatever you want to call it, be it Stoner Metal or Doom Metal, or whatever, I thinthink that it's the true 2nd Generation of metal and these boys from Finland, sure have it figured out.

Album Review: "Inner City Wolves" by Johnny Touch

Inner City Wolves

The world is a smaller place today. Is it because of the robot master race as discussed in The World's End or are we just advancing?

Thankfully, that connectivity is making it easier to find new music in an age when terrestrial radio has achieved a smug sameness across the country. In this modern world, it's easier and harder than ever to find new metal...

Today's album review is of a debut record. Johnny Touch, the band in question, is from Australia, and has released small bits of music here and there: demos, split 7"s, and not much else.

Outside of their home nation, they are virtually unknown, but that's all going to change soon.

Hopefully. For those metal fans who don't enjoy cookie monster vocals, ultra high gain music that all sounds the same, and desires music that hearkens back to the good old days of Judas Priest and Iron Maiden, keep reading.

Album Review: "The Awakening" by Powerlord

The Awakening

Have you ever heard of Powerlord?

Well, in my opinion, to know about this band you'd have to be one of those fabled tape traders from the early days of thrash metal that got Metallica noticed by Johnny Zazula on the East Coast.

I surely had never been introduced to this band and I've been metal for a long time.

As is normally with the case with demos that are discovered and later released as albums, this album sounds gritty. There's literally no polish on this record at all. It takes money to be able to hire a producer and get it to sound clean.

Well, it's not entirely true to say that this album has no polish, because it does, just not in the production. This band was wildly talented.

Album Review: "Terminal Death" by Terminal Death

Terminal Death

 The golden age of Death Metal.

Well as if there was such a thing, we'll call this a hidden gem from the gilded age of Death Metal's Pre-history.

In a time when Metallica's Kill'Em All was the heaviest album recorded to date, death metal was born.

There was an age that existed before the "wider" world knew of death metal. Before bands like Death, Master, and Carcass had yet to record an album.

This era of the early 1980's is largely forgotten because many of these bands fell through the cracks. Terminal Death is one of those bands.

The 20 tracks on this album up for review was recorded in three sessions: a demo and two rehearsals. In some places, it sounds as though the album was recorded on a boom box with the amplifiers in a circle. I know this sound because I've done it....

"Mystification" by Manilla Road

This is a classic edition of Glacially Musical. Shadow Kingdom Records is re-releasing (again) the sixth album by Manilla Road, the most metal band ever to come out of Wichita, KS.

This is my first experience with this band. The trio was started by Mark "The Shark" Shelton in 1977 while he was still in high school. They would go on to record nine albums before going on hiatus in 1990.

"Mystification" is their sixth album in a very impressive catalog of music that has been recorded in both incarnations of the band.

Am I the only one who can't help but think of those brown papers from elementary school? Manilla paper? Seriously though, this album is a classic record for a band that deserves more renown than they have.