Anathema - Weather Systems review

Year : 2012
Genre : Walt Disney Lion King Rock
Label : KSCope (EU) The End Records (US)
Origin : United Kingdom
Rating : 3.0 / 10

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[This is a redirect for the original variant of the very same text. Read the original variant with comments here.]

Anathema's latest sounds to be the direct spiritual continuation of 2010's We're Here Because We're Here. I want to tell you right off the bat that the record, in my opinion is highly annoying and contains perplexingly narcissistic music. Anathema seems to have constructed an in-house song generator that is capable to produce smarmy songs, exclusively, as every single piece on this 55 minute affair exhibits the same premiere core characteristics and compositional tactics. I will get into those traits with ruthless efficiency later on. The disc shows constant preoccupation with the establishment of compulsive discomfort-elimination. This Anathema record is here to make you feel OH!, so special, you cosmic schmuck. Luckily, the cosmic schmuck who is writing this, warns you about this dangerous fact. Listen to this music, but know that it is a fragile lie and is designed to make you feel : - surprise! - ssssssssssssssspecial. But "you" are not special, "you" are "only" the expression of an unrelenting process beside an infinite number of other ones, and only this process that gives you the capacity to delude yourself into such ridiculous notions, IS special. It is consciousness medium, looking for lower entropy states. As for Anathema, they are looking for money for assuaging your fears. (Which is the same thing in a physical universe, funnily enough.)


In Anathema's domain, the only bird is the swan and the three colors that are most fervently encouraged to be used by everyone are blue and white and green. Your wasp is not allowed. Boosh! Boosh! Yellow, black, evil, stingy, evil! Boosh! Boosh! This is relentless Nazi music in the sense that it is arrogant enough to assume that the listener is retarded enough to not be aware of the fact the she/he is being fed the same daaaaayuuuumn trick for the 32423423rd time. This is Nazi music because it wants everything to be OH!, so peaceful and OH!, so eloquently and pretty much disgustingly and homogeneously beautiful. Like those posters with the dolphins and the naked ladies and the sunrise from the early '90s. Your receptors are in a constant harassment to submit to the limited/fabricated toy-beauty the songs actually reflect. Their capacity to entertain is vastly constrained by a self-congratulatory artistic behavior and related techniques that the music is forced to vomit out sugar-overdose accessibility for. This is an attempt to commit the slaughter of beautiful music. I adore beautiful music, I "only" demand it to be made from heart to heart, as this Cynic release sounds to me as. This is not the case at all with this baby, designed to sell good in the family friendly section of the record store, right next to Disney's Lion King. You are expected to be affected and be satisfied by very cheap and predictable patterns and methodologies. Read on to find out more about this vastly predictable pink plush toy music that secretly sucks immense demonic alligator dick in putrid anxiety-hell when you are not watching.

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A.I.(d) - Disorder review

Year : 2012
Genre : Instrumental Djent with Electronic/Dubstep leanings
Label : Independent
Origin : France
Rating : 8.5 / 10

Check out the project at the :
Official Bandcamp site
Official Facebook site

A.I.(d) - Disorder is an instrumental djent project by one man band Lou Gregoire, colored and spiced up nicely by tints and shades of playful electronica and minimalistic dubstep elements. Do not commit the mistake of prejudice and dismiss the contribution as a probable hybrid of bloated-, yet coarsely realized aspirations, as the Disorder LP is uncompromising-, aggressive mid-tempo djenting first and foremost, and remains as such even on the second intense scrutiny session. The elements of electronica are more of a cleverly used ornamentic character, coming to you through elements that you are not likely to pick up on at the first go. Example : Lou Gregoire likes to employ extremely fragile but persistent high frequency details here and there, and I'm not talking about the evident high frequency liquid synths, - which similarly kick toxic sci-fi toad butt - but about the strange and efficient "8-bit gargles/beeps/squeels/parrot noises" he offers buried deep within the sonic mass. Like on track number 2, "Skyrush" : listen between 3:40 to 3:47, left channel to right channel : WTF!!? this is a parrot!

The disc, as noted, is delightfully yet soberly aggressive in temper, and consorts nicely at heart to traditional djent - sooner or later someone had to write such a term - warfare : the basic character of the music seeks to mime Meshuggah metal, yet the actual fabric is funnily/inventively schizophrenic in its anatomy, refraining from-, remaining incapacitated to deliver along an actual-, mathematical formula that Meshuggah is the premiere employer of. Your current host, Lou Gregoire, as other artists are, is similarly content with the trademark Meshuggah 4/4 cymbal, and, from then one, deviation from that 4/4 core is necessarily great fun, no matter how you arrange the djenting in the sequencer - and that is the story of this release, as well. Read on to find out more about this.

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Marilyn Manson - Born Villain review

Year : 2012
Genre : Industrial Dark Rock
Label : Cooking Vinyl, Hell etc.
Origin : United States
Rating : 9.0 / 10

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The new Marilyn Manson album is a visceral cultivation of infectious industrial rock passages pummeling through you with a brisk, constant 4/4 coated into myriad tints of inventive darkness. There are at least two essential ingredients - among others, logically - that I managed to pick up on this release, both being of primordial significance of how and why this album works with so fluent effortlessness. First and foremost, The Marilyn Manson, thank God & Co., already knows perfectly well that it is not at all mandatory nor necessary to deliver sounds all over the real estate of silence like there is no tomorrow, so he handles the institute of the sonic gap with considerable skill and a valiantly spirited will. The other sum of clever things is the differing intensity-extremes of the disc. The sheer - quite literal - volume-arcs of the sonic mass Manson tends to make his way through a given composition with.

The songs seek and find relevant pleasure by fooling you on a constant basis, first delivering fragile, elegant and dainty textures, - not too much of overkills directed towards Manson's yo ding dong man ding dong ding dong yo narrative now, though a more tolerable variant of said punishment rhetorics IS present - and they often explode into highly efficient sonic intimidation-sessions that are openly out there to facilitate a radical effect on your awareness. Manson says he implemented sounds that only dogs can hear, but make a human being kind of nauseous. I believe him. The consorting success rate is pretty radical, thank Manson and God for that, as result of the deeply differing volumetric extremes and the precisely planned gap-strategies the artist is employing. In other words : the intense parts will bitchslap you on spot with galvazined gloves, and this always is something a snob has to be grateful for. Guys, let's talk about the music.

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Avishay Mizrav - Forgotten Melodies

Year : 2011
Genre : Progressive Instrumental Melodic Rock
Label : Avishay Mizrav
Origin : Israel

Official Sites :
avishaymizrav.com
Facebook
Forgotten Melodies at CD Baby

Avishay Mizrav is an Israeli guy armed with a guitar and an agenda, coming to you with a full length instrumental debut delivery that is chasing the tail of premiere fusion rock giant Frank Gambale and eminent lollipop-rock Specialist Soe Jatriani. The sonic data on the Forgotten Melodies disc is enthusiastic, desperately-, sometimes, even eminently varied and does a steady job throughout of consorting to an inner image of music that finds relevant pleasure in the mere act of seeking to relate to the high definition full musculature eloquency of its inspirators. The production values of the contribution are pretty warm and fuzzy, not necessarily of the "It'g going to fry your CNS on spot!"-caliber, yet the intent is not of such niche, either. Avishay Mizrav is not (- that much -) shreddage-fixated, he instead seems to find his most keenly cultivated comfort zones through backbone-melodies, from which he prefers to deviate throughout freely spirited intermezzos and more forgiving power chord passages. Forgiving in the sense that you can get away with what you actually play as long as the body posture is correct. You guessed it right : tamely presented harmonic power chord passages on which Avishay Mizrav showcases his string picking skills via high octane automotorsport efficiency, are : present and abundant. Read more to find out more about this.

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android

GyZ gives you the song : android. Listen in HD please.

Lyrics :

does not move on its own
I learn to feel when I'm alone

tactile be everything that I seek
be everything that I need
I love you 'cause I got to

GyZ at Bandcamp.

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and / or

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Accept - Stalingrad review

Year : 2012
Genre : Cryptocommunist Heavy Metal
Label : Nuclear Blast Records
Origin : Germany
Rating : 7.0 / 10

Buy it now

Accept's Stalingrad weighs in as yet another auto-motor sport and pinball machine metal contribution, with an immense fixation on family friendly radio metal and gangshouts, exhibited in the chorus context of this full length. The disc is servile enough - and, as I will attempt to justify, even uninspired in traces, secretly (but not silently) - that mentioning the premiere aspirations it seeks to sound like is Accept - oops - able.

Take Iron Maiden, subtract "The Animal" from it, apply an Aerosmith ballad-salad to support the central ingredients, and don't hold back on the zoo metal part and road-motor sport rhetorics, either. But, most importantly : substitute the terrible lack of an Iron Maiden Animal with some "theme-antics"-, a "Concept", so to say you think your release has potential to sell good with. This time, Accept chose to coat their recent full length into a communist propaganda vibe. Communism, as an ideology, indeed seems to be fixated on "monumentalism" : Stalin is sooooo monumental that the vastness of the sight of that ideology-pattern necessarily summons the communist marching song vibe in you. If it does NOT, you are a sick man and you WILL be reeducated.

If you are a regular here at Noise Shaft, then you know that I already had my fair share of rants about the communist marching song vibe - the link is the same now - that primarily permeates power metal and seeks to convey ACME-epicness, but this traditional heavy metal album baths in it, too. Lionel, look! Now that there is no (apparent) danger of Stalin emerging to unleash an elite assassin chick on us, why not market our comic book fears and make believe paranoia - that's an instant classic I just created - as entertainment? Indeed, why not. Read more to find out how it went for the German veterans.

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Mystica Girls - "The Conquest" music video

New Mystica Girls video, "The Conquest". These Mexican metal chicks mean it all.

GyZ at Bandcamp.

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High On Fire - De Vermis Mysteriis review

Year : 2012
Genre : Sludge / Stoner Rock
Label : E1 Music
Origin : United States
Rating : 7.5 / 10

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I have been introduced to this group anticipating stoner rock, but the data on the disc sounds to me as sludge metal with stoner elements and some rabid leanings here and there towards full scale thrash warfare. This particular album is - kind of - a concept album, and the free encyclopedia, Wikipedia does a tremendous job addressing the circumstances why it is such. The following introductory quotation is taken from this Wikipedia page.

"De Vermis Mysteriis is the sixth album by metal band High on Fire. According to frontman Matt Pike The album’s title (translation: “The Mysteries of the Worm,”) is a nod to a fictional grimoire conceived by the late, great Psycho author Robert Bloch in 1935 and later incorporated into horror master H.P. Lovecraft’s renowned Cthulu Mythos. “It’s a concept record, a little bit,” Pike offers. “I got this idea about Jesus Christ and the Immaculate Conception: What if Jesus had a twin who died at birth to give Jesus his life? And then what if the twin became a time traveler right then? He lives his life only going forward until he finds this scroll from an ancient Chinese alchemist who derived a serum out of the black lotus—which is actually in Robert E. Howard’s ‘Conan’ stories—and then he starts traveling back in time. He can see the past through his ancestors’ eyes, but his enemies can kill him if they kill the ancestor that he’s seeing through at the time. Basically, he keeps waking up in other people’s bodies at bad times. It’s kinda like that old TV show Quantum Leap. Kurt actually pointed that out to me after I told him the idea. But whatever—time travel is a killer concept.”

Guys, let's talk about the music.

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Paradise Lost - Tragic Idol review

Year : 2012
Genre : Doom Metal
Label : Century Media
Origin : United Kingdom
Rating : 9.2 / 10

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The new Paradise Lost LP brings ten sonic declarations of doom, orchestrated to morose guitars of gargantuan perspectives. The uttermost urge the disc is fueled by is its ever-present endeavor to coat you into lush wall of sound structures that seek both to entertain and to tamely interrogate the soul, primarily by top of the heat-, playful down tuned power chord melodic warfare. The album sounds particularly good and well defined, with multiple-, layered variants of the elements stored in each autonomous song-fabrics. Yet, the main factorial that casts an eminent light on this eloquent representative of the doom-flock, is the "mere" songcraft : simply put, the songs are pretty much flawless on this one, and provide the listener with an on-spot-I-get-it experience without making tasteless accessibility-compromises. The audio data on Tragic Idol is uncompromisingly doom, uncompromisingly exigent, and,  maybe you just guessed it : it uncompromisingly emerges to kick your ass to hell and back. Guys, let's talk about the music.

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Latex Gimp Retro Ultra Fusion Power

GyZ gives you the song : Latex Gimp Retro Ultra Fusion Power. Listen in HD please.

Lyrics :

latex gimp retro ultra fusion power

collagen queen
you're the Buddha, Buddha
you're the Buddha
you against all
fla-fla-fla flat inertia

cover the time with all the Buddha libido
want a debate with a tongue apolitical

retro, ultra, fusion, power

latex gimp retro ultra fusion power

collagen queen
you're the Buddha, Buddha
you're the Buddha
you against all
fla-fla-fla flat inertia

cover the time with all the Buddha libido
want a debate with a tongue apolitical

retro, ultra, fusion, power

latex gimp retro ultra fusion power

cover the time with all the Buddha libido
want a debate with a tongue apolitical

GyZ at Bandcamp.

If you want, check out my music

and / or

Buy me beer. Read more!

Jerrod Harlan - Hello Ontario EP review

Year : 2012
Genre : Synthpop with Atmospheric Shoegaze character
Label : Independent
Origin : United States
Official site : > - here - <

Introductory information is taken from the artist's website :

"Hello Ontario is the music project of Pittsburgh’s Jerrod Harlan. Only 20 years old and Harlan’s already made a name for himself playing top venues throughout the Alleghenies, including Western Pennsylvania and West Virginia. Hello Ontario’s flavor of modern indie/electronic has been compared to the bands Of Montreal and The Postal Service.

Actually, you’ll hear a wide range of influences in Hello Ontario, including Foster The People, Breathe Electric, Tokyo Police Club, Death Cab For Cutie and even the legendary Buddy Holly. Quite a ride, considering Harlan first learned to play guitar when he broke his arm! What is a musician at heart to do, with an arm casted at 90 degrees? He also plays synthesizer, piano, bass, and does vocals. Harlan has a wanderlust for sharing his music far and wide and yet, he has an ace card of a solid musical education. He studied music theory and composition at the highly prestigious performance arts charter school, Lincoln Park Performing Arts. Hello Ontario has played to jam-packed audiences at coffee shops, festivals and charity concerts."

Read on to find out how the music sounds.

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Neosis - Neosis review

Year : 2012
Genre : Junk Djent
Label : SAOL / H'Art / Zebralution
Origin : Switzerland
Rating : 7.5 / 10

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My heart is molten gold and its temper is butter, so I will be kind enough to reckon this disk from Switzerland as an interesting toy-take on Meshuggah metal, as opposed of dismissing it as a - to put it mildly - strangely produced disk. Neosis' debut is very hasty to outline the name of the game, which is - as already stated - toy-Meshuggah metal, the similar kind that the most popular djent bands are playing, too. The music shows no actual-, "soul-similarities" to its gargantuan inspirator, as neither does the premire UK Meshuggah fanband Tesseract or the premiere US based Meshuggah fanband Periphery.

These bands attempt to summon the basic character of the aspired music by playing largely mid-tempo, pretty much percussive guitar riffs, substituting the musical rabidity of the inspirator band with alternative metal and metalcore affectations in the "vocillist" context. So your sister likes it secretly, too. This is what Periphery, and Tesseract is doing, as well : on paper, they play "just" djent music, but, in reality, the current "popular" djent scene has its fair share of full scale pop-appeals in my opinion, as it now seems to be commonplace to whine in clean singing fashion to the djenting, all in the spirit of the emo ethos.

Neosis, with its hiiiiighly-highly cybernetic and scientifically fictional and fictionally scientific debut, also noticed this tendency. They have TWO sorrowful metalcore warriors valiantly whining along to the djenting in clean singing fashion, like the talented Spencer Sotelo of Periphery loves to do. This also is a record that sounds soooo fucking strange that it is a declaration of huge charisma on its own, and it is NO irony. Ladies and Gentlemen : BEHOLD the first

JUNK DJENT

delivery. As miresable music critic I hereby deem this release much more significant than the debut of Periphery that which I refuse to review - unless you pay me 99 USD, that is - because I consider the release so staggeringly egotistical with its 70+ minutes of playtime, - oh. my. fucking. g. - that I'd need to research and attempt to popularize words first to express my related true and honest sentiments towards silhouetted profound atrocity. Before I start my tame rant on Periphery, please let me implement the read more link, you  bitch.

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GyZ gives you the song : setup. exe. Listen in HD please.

This is a track about digital consciousness.

Lyrics :

set me up from the core
set me up from the core, motherfucker

set me up more
come and
set me up more

set me up from the core
set me up from the core, motherfucker

GyZ at Bandcamp.

If you want, check out my music

and / or

Buy me beer. Read more!

Oleg Prodeus - The 13 review

Year : 2012
Genre : DarkPop / Goth Soft Rock
Label : Independent
Origin : Austria
Official site : > - here - <

Oleg Prodeus comes to you from the slim field shared by darkpop/soft goth rock warfare, riding an emotional inner - seriously?. - setting that is defined and revealed in undoubtedly successful fashion by an artist who is as complete and ripe as is his mere propensity to express mentioned qualities. It is evident that Mr. Prodeus has been doing this for a while, and his conveyment reigns resilient between an almost-embarrassingly - therefore : efficient - open stance AND a frightening stance. Ladies, this is the guy right here who is in seeeerious-serious love with you, but you can't be sure if he will kill himself or you or both if his love is not fulfilled. Love, of course, is art, and it is "just" a video game, - as your 3D life seems to be, eh? - but Prodeus definitely strikes me - SIC! - as an artist who has mastered his vocal craft with accordance to the inner experiences he probably has been going through.

The subject matta' of the LP almost entirely is based on the desire to have a legitimate partner, and this indeed is an essential challenge to be met in this particular video game. Once again : legitimate partner. Tame resentment is ubiquitous in Mr. Prodeus' pipes : equally tame, stalking and murderous - think of a cobra who promises that it will tell you The Answer if you kiss it - airy, soft, and packs an undoubtedly frightening and smartly repulsive vibe at the core. Do you know the legendary actor Rutger Hauer? Yes, Roy Betty from Blade Runner, AHUFdff4uH!!. And his portrayal of that highly frightening man in the movie Blind Side? Mr. Prodeus reminds me of that fictional character. Obtrusive, but much too impertinently charismatic and imposing to be informatively told to f*ck off, - in the movie, Ron Silver tells Rutger Hauer to do so, and it is Silver who looks miserable in the process with a tame Demigod expressing itself in front of him as passive retort - and OH!, so gentle with a spiritual cleaver. Similarly enough to the lethally effective behavior of Hauer in said exploitation-video classic, Prodeus shamelessly and pretty smartly adores AND tamely threatens the dream woman, - "I want to be your lover, to burn with you on fire, and I just want to kill you, to answer your desire" - have no doubt whatsoever that these are the exact kind of lines that turn beauty queens on to be honest, regardless how it is against the untold rules of music production to offer the rhyme pair "fire/desire" since 1936.  Read on the know more about the delivery.

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In Cages - In Cages EP review

Year : 2012
Genre : Alternative Indie Rock
Label : Independent
Origin : United States
Official site : > - here - <

In Cages is a Hillsdale-, New Jersey based ensemble composed of artists that already have an extensive career at playing live, - with pauses between gigs, you know? - and it is of no wonder that the band already is booked for numerous independent festivals of current year. (Digable Arts Festival, Le Grande Fromage, David & Goliath music series, Cupcake Festival to name a few.)


The self titled debut EP of this band contains four tracks that are super-efficient at conveying old school alternative rock with tasteful, restrained-but-powerful singing and musical vibes that are highly compatible with a rainy day if you have someone to hug unto in the process. The same goes for ill tempered grizzly bears. Read on to know more about this passable, ultra-orthodox alternative rock delivery.

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JANG - Jungle Duets review

Year : 2012
Genre : Experimental Progressive Jungle Rock
Label : Independent
Origin : various, see text
Official site : > - here - <

As the artist JANG informs the visitors, the Junge Duets track collection - think of an EP length - reveals sketches of the Jungle in collusion with old friends, and new ones. This particular release will be the second installment of a trilogy of contributions thematized on experimental tiger-romantics.

The music is immensely free spirited and capricious in its character, never too much preoccupying itself with the prolongation of any given idea that it momentarily chooses to submit to. The one quality that I have just been informed you about, is the sole defining factor of how you will like this stimuli. I, personally think - because I have no legitimate capacity to inform you of other impressions - that the flow of things look like a sightseeing amidst a nice collection of diligently realized plastic-animals in a safari museum, waiting to be built into full scale models. Oops : full scale songs. Read on to find out more about the disc.

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WORLD5 - Global Experience review

Year : 2012
Genre : Soft Rock with a Tropical and Smooth Jazz flavor,
the 111% Scarface soundtrack
Label : Independent
Origin : various, see text below
Official site > - here - <

Buy it now

This review - as you will very soon see - starts out with a quotation section taken from the official site of reviewed ensemble.

Quote from the Bio of the official site :


"WORLD5 coalesced around the idea that music can transcend distance. The five members had all played together in various bands in the U.S. and Europe. But that was then. Today, they live on three difference continents spanning 19 time zones from the U.S. to Australia. Yet distance was no barrier to their creativity and shared sense of musical purpose.  Thanks to the power of home digital recording, each member recorded his part in the comfort of his own home.

Sure, it eliminated the intimacy of playing in the same room. But it also freed them from thetraditional stresses of recording. No scary red recording lights to rattle their nerves. No worrying about paying for recording studio time. No plates of unappetizing cold cuts moldering in the control room. That didn’t mean they didn’t talk.There were weekly chats on Skype and a steady flow of email to hone the vision of each song. And the occasional midnight phone call to hammer home an important point.

Then the final tracks were shipped to Randy Miller the wunderkind producer in Houston, Texas, where he tweaked and assembled them into the songs on this album that you’re listening to. The next step? Hit the same stage at the same time in the same city and play the songs together!"

Sounds good? Let's find it out!

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Job For A Cowboy - Demonocracy review

Year : 2012
Genre : Death Metal with a yet-coarse Technical Death ambition
Label : Metal Blade Records
Origin : United States
Rating : 6.5 / 10

Buy it now

Job For A Cowboy's Demonocracy would be an awesometacular release in a world that did not yet see (vastly) superior peers set their gargantuan T-Rex claws to claim the territory as their own to wage the not at all tame wars of modern day technical death fucking metal. Job For A Cowboy's Demonocracy is as good as an after-event substitute-janitor is in the Colosseum where Gorod suplexes Spawn of Possession for your appreciation, after it has just been body slammed by the secondly mentioned. Indeed, the Blotted Science-kind of warfare sounds to be a central inspirational factor of this disk, and, while it no doubt packs a legitimate sense of above-average level heft of intricacy, said attribute simply is not of the same fucking league yet as you will find in the music of the aforementioned gargantuans. The reasons are simple enough, and you will need to read on to find out what those are.

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By Night - Sympathy For Tomorrow review

Year : 2012
Genre : Metalcore with a Hardcore mindset
Label : Independent
Origin : Sweden
Rating : 8.8 / 10

By Night's Sympathy For Tomorrow puts at least one reviewer into a pleasant position, because the music I personally found on the disc sounds to me as the epitome of well executed non-emo metalcore with a hardcore attitude kept intact throughout the way.

The characterology of the stimulus in my opinion consorts nicely to a blend between the music of recent day Biohazard without the "supportive nuclear radiation" - the beauty of music journalism - AND hefty-butt metalcore which shows exactly sub-zero interest in the teenager antics of salescurvecore and its themes revolving around breakup traumas, suicidal lamentations and the HORROR of seeing your neighbor seeing you seeing him with a rubber giraffe.

The By Night guys are doing an especially noteworthy job with their top of the heat guitar production work : everything they offer is clearly and precisely defined STUFF with full value sonic meat on it. Virtually no out-of-real-estate distortion is present enough to be bugged about it, and THAT is something to be tamely bugged about. The data emerges ripe, muscular without having to be bloated like a whale on war steroids as the latest Lamb of God. NO, I do not want to pick on that release, especially not after how I was kind of a douche with it, but notice this : Resolution is sooooo "senselessly massive" sounding at its most crowded places that the sheer weight sounds to overwhelm the actual details and intricacies actually being presented. It takes tremendous effort to actually make out and appreciate what is being played, some of the time. Reason I mention the premiere Pantera peers is my percept that By Night similarly wants to deliver you music with crystal clear thought behind it, but, giving its elements in equally crystal clear-, YET soberly limited fashion is top priority for this ensemble. This is a rare-, but always very pleasant approach to encounter and be graced by, as most bands will be content with soniccannoning you into your favorite submission for your money. Guys, let's talk about the music.

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Emmure - Slave to the Game review

Year : 2012
Genre : Teenager Pop, Deathcore
Label : Victory
Origin : United States
Rating : 6.5 / 10

Buy it now

Your favorite latex gimp music critic GyZ certainly should loath this delivery on paper, yet, the latest Emmure outing is not nearly as tolling of a release that I anticipated it to be based on the teenager methamphetamine-pop cover art. Take heed and bear witness to the fact that there are virtual Photoshop scratches on the image, implying that this particular disc is the ONE and ONLY your 12 year old daughter won't EVER forget to pack with her baggage when en route to a camp site, so she and Co. can safely cry to their Emmure in the tent, Knowing and Embracing the Ultimate Meaning of All Pain.

I will be the first to admit that the vocals on this disc got me into a Faith No More "Evidence" mode, because, frankly, "I didn't fee-eeel a thing" about them. There is a disturbed-ass metalcore monkey giving you the usual bonobo style shrieking misery, - you might want to approach him with an umbrella - and a death metal "vocillist" who sounds like a butcher being slaughtered by a were-pig. FUCK, yeah!! In other words : just the usual everyday average attention-seeking teen pop suicide-banter, yet, fortunately not as obnoxiously and disgustingly done as it is done by Attack! Attack!'s front-product Caleb Slomo - a business man who is marketing his faked nervous breakdowns - who needs to be put into a carbonite cassette Han Solo style, then the cassette needs to be subjected to Tesla's shrinking ray, then the product needs to be cloned on a subatomic level and needs to be marketed as ice dessert on Tatooin. Without further adieu, read on to find out more about Emmure's latest declaration, Slave to the Game.

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Demon Hunter - True Defiance review

Year : 2012
Genre : Alternative Metal with Metalcore and Groove elements
Label : Solid State Records
Origin : United States
Rating : 9.0 / 10

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The new Demon Hunter LP arrives with an elegant trick, and that is to consort orthodox metalcore rhetorics with a much more ripe take on alternative metal incorporated into the fabrics than the variant of said element obtainable in the works of the stock-metalcore act. The top-form alternative fascinations of this disc are reeking top-form Stone Sour, and this influence is showing through the deeply melodic choruses. Segments that feature a strong mid-range vocal presence which exhibits only very mild interest in conforming to the OH!, so usual emo variant of the metalcore-chorus. After all, the chorus in emo metalcore "usually is" just a radio friendly example of alternative metal plus suckdom lyrics, share your opinion in the comment section if you think I'm deeply mistaken about this. (Too?) In the meantime though, read on to find out more about this ripped, curvatious sonic delivery.

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Burzum - Umskiptar review

Year : 2012
Genre : Black Metal with a tame character
Label : Byelobog
Origin : Norway
Rating : 8.5 / 10

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Varg Vikernes' Burzum project once again emerges to declare, and the music has changed in temper, but, not in style. If you have listened to the Belus and/or the Fallen LP, then you are familiar with the overall tone this disc similarly submits to, but! Regardless of the tonal reminiscence, the Umskiptar LP - "umskiptar" means "metamorphoses" in ancient Norwegian lingo - is definitely much more peaceful and - logically enough - much less "fiercely disillusioned" (is that a proper term at all for Buzum, I'm not sure?) - than what you probably would anticipate from Mr. Vikernes based on his previous outing.

And you would be quite wrong, too : as just suggested, Burzum never was discontent OR afraid of the darkness, - "burzum" means "darkness" in the Tolkien lingo used in M(u)(o)rd(e)(o)r - it made peace with it a long-long time ago, and the music itself is a testament of that peace. The darkness indeed is a relentless and humorless teacher. Did you take advantage of the occasion and reassessed your reality during the last household-blackout in the complete darkness, or, did you hurry to make some emergency light? Varg Vikernes surely has a Grandmaster Degree in darkness science, so it is interesting to witness that now he showcases the tamer side of the - uhm - anti-spectrum. Guys, let's talk about the music.

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