Unrestrained Magazine Issue #27

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NILE ~ NAPALM DEATH ~ CORROSION OF CONFORMITY www.unrestrainedmag.com

ISSN 1715-2453 UNRESTRAINED!

Printed in Canada For Cally & Ally

ISSUE 27 $4.99 Also Inside: CANDLEMASS, GREEN CARNATION, KRIEG, ULVER, MARDUK, DARKEST HOUR, OVERKILL, CEPHALIC CARNAGE, NECROPHAGIA, BRAINSTORM and more…

INDEX

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EDITOR/WRITER: Adam Wasylyk <unrest@rogers.com> CO-EDITOR/WRITER: Adrian Bromley <energizerbunny@sympatico.ca> STAFF WRITERS: • Chris Bruni <cbruni@istar.ca> • Tate Bengtson <tbengtso@junction.net> • Alex Ristic <lextic@sympatico.ca> • Kevi Metal <doomhauled@hotmail.com> CONTRIBUTORS: • Paul Schwarz <p.schwarz@ntlworld.com> • Paul Silbiger <acdd196@hotmail.com • Alvin Wee <alvinwee@email.com> • Jadd Shickler <meteorcity@earthlink.net> • Laura Wiebe Taylor <killeatexploittheweak@yahoo.ca> • Bane • Cameron Archer <camuron@gmail.com> • Nathan T. Birk <nathanbirk@hotmail.com> U! PHOTOGRAPHERS: Mark Coatsworth @ www.still-live.com <http://www.still-live.com> (mark_coatsworth@yahoo.com) • Lynne Harrington <drunkbastard666@hotmail.com> MAGAZINE LAYOUT/DESIGN: • Brian Munson/White Mountain Studios: <http://home.earthlink.net/~whitemtn> and Unrestrained! staff COPY EDITORS: • Rob Hughes and Rûna FINANCES: • “The Suit” WEBMASTER: • Winston Bromley • url: www.unrestrainedmag.com • E-mail: info@unrestrainedmag.com Copyright 2005 UNRESTRAINED! All Rights Reserved on entire contents; nothing may be reproduced in whole or in part without permission from the publisher.

ISSN 1715-2453 UNRESTRAINED!

UNRESTRAINED! c/o Adam Wasylyk, 5625 Glen Erin Dr., Unit 57, Mississauga, ON L5M 6V2 CANADA Phone (416) 483-7917 • E-mail: unrest@rogers.com UNRESTRAINED! is presently distributed by: Deyco, Gordon & Gotch, Century Media, Relapse, Scrape Records, Civilian Death Network, Ubiquity Distributors and sold in Chapters, Indigo Books, Barnes & Noble, Towers, Newbury Comics, Metal Haven and other national retailers. Those interested in helping distro U! please get in touch! Good wholesale rates are available.

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Check out www.unrestrainedmag.com for exclusive interviews and record reviews!

Thus Spake The Wasylyk Spirit!

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Eight years. Seriously? Unbelievable really, looking back, this magazine approaching obliteration on more than one occasion.

How did we do it? Perhaps the magazine becoming part of daily/weekly routine had something to do with it, because our love for this music goes without saying. It sure wasn’t for the money because I’m still waiting for some. I’m sure Adrian would agree that we’re still trying to get things right here, that there’s always room for improvement within these pages. From a personal perspective I’m rarely happy with any given issue, so perhaps that figures into my pushing forward to see what the next one will bring. Eight years has brought us much more responsibility in our respective lives, of both the editors and the contributors who have stuck around with us—namely Alex Ristic and Chris Bruni, who have been here since issue #1—not to mention other mainstays such as Tate Bengtson, Kevin Stewart-Panko, Paul Silbiger, Paul Schwarz and Rob Hughes whose voices carry considerable weight within this magazine. Not to mention our new(er) writers—I love every word both Bane and Alvin Wee contribute, and Nathan T. Birk is back with some fantastic contributions!—not to forget Laura Taylor and her notable pieces. Personally I’m a fan of each of our writers; I enjoy their work, and helping to spread their work is another plus to doing this mag. The future will bring rich contributions from Cameron Archer and Jadd Shickler; among others as well in the near future, and who knows, maybe more from me as well (ha?).

But really, we’re only here because of the music, right? Issue #27 will be remembered as a disappointing one for me because of a number of last minute interview fall throughs, but as a whole it’s an effort I’m quite proud of. Paul Schwarz took an exhaustive look at Meshuggah’s new effort, along with a recognized nod at the impact their Destroy, Erase, Improve effort has had on the metal scene since it first started making waves ten years ago, and continues to do so today. Did I mention that Nathan T. Birk is back with some fantastic contributions? His prose (and decidedly underground tastes) was undoubtedly missed during his absence, and it’s something I’m hoping won’t be a one-off effort. And Brian Munson has really come into his own layout-wise, another superb effort. Alas, this circle jerk has finally ended (and man am I tired!), it’s needless to say we thank you for your continued support and we hope to bring you as much as we can physically/mentally/emotionally stand.

While I’d like to thank my entire family for their support, I’d like to dedicate this issue to my father, George Wasylyk, whose inspiring words and encouragement have meant so much to me, and who sees himself as our biggest fan. He may be right about that.

e d n i x

Enjoy our work, Adam

4 MESHUGGAH 8 NILE 9 ULVER 10 CORROSION OF CONFORMITY 11 CANDLEMASS 12 MARDUK 13 INFIDEL?/CASTRO! / THESYRE 14 NECROPHAGIA 15 EMBRACE THE END / VULTYR 17 NAPALM DEATH 19 DARKEST HOUR 20 GREEN CARNATION 24 ABORTED / PSYCHOFAGIST 27 DEAD OF WINTER / WIDOW 28 KRIEG 31 THE RED CHORD 32 SLOUGH FEG34 THE PROVENANCE / KLIMT 1918 36 SAMAEL /CALLISTO 39 TRAIL OF TEARS 40 KILLWHITNEYDEAD 42 RUSSELL ALLEN 44 GUAPO 47 BRAINSTORM 49 OVERKILL 50 DIVINITY DESTROYED / VANCOUVER 53 BENEATH THE MASSACRE / WINTER OF APOKALYPSE 55 STALAGGH 56 WOODS OF INFINITY 59 KYLESA / MOUTH OF THE ARCHITECT 61 CABLE 62 ABRASIVE OUTLETS 65 REVIEWS 73 CEPHALIC CARNAGE 74 RAGING SPEEDHORN / HERESI 75 BRAND NEW SIN 77 NEMHF 78 KEVI-METAL’S RIMSHOTS

Tickets onsale now at Ticketmaster!

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M ESHUGGAH

M ESHUGGAH

Meshuggah are an exception among exceptions. Though a metal band from Sweden, they are ill served by the description “Swedish metal,” yet they are perhaps the country’s most unique contribution to the metal genre’s worldwide “scene.” Though a band with solid metal roots, who count their greatest audience share among the ’heads of this world, they are similarly ill served by the description “heavy metal”; likewise none of its numerous corollaries, whether solitary (“metal”), ostensibly general (“metalcore”), or simply misplaced (“Norwegian death metal”—thank you, Jack Osbourne!) can entirely encapsulate what these four self-proclaimed “fucked-up guys from Sweden” create. And though Meshuggah have attained a status as innovators and titans that stretches across the metal/hardcore divide and beyond, they have also never stopped experimenting—their collective creative mind having never shut its doors to new ideas. There is perhaps no band that has lost, gained, and also won back as many fans and followers as many times as Meshuggah have. But when your name equates to insanity, perhaps it’s not entirely inappropriate that your own raison d’être should lead you to piss people off once in a while.

“It can be kind of a setback being a band that has that type of thing going,” admits rhythm guitarist Marten Hagstrom. “Some people love one album and then when we come with the next album, some of them get thrown off.

They really don’t like the direction we’re going. But we win new fans. And then we piss them off. I guess what we wanna do is have people go with the evolution of what we’re doing, ’cause we’re in the midst of this evolution or process of being a band.”

CATCHING OUT THE CLOWNS Whether or not you always approve of the results they achieve—and for the record, this writer only finally “got” 1998’s Chaosphere during their near-religious-experience set at last year’s FuryFest—you’d be a fool to deny that Meshuggah are one of the few purely and honestly lateralthinking, genuinely exploratory creative forces still pushing back the boundaries of “hard music.” As Marten and his partner in band spokesmanship, drummer Tomas Haake, sit down with Unrestrained! in London’s Camden Town mere hours before the two are due to record a live interview for BBC Radio One’s Rock Show, their breakthrough sophomore album Destroy Erase Improve (which set so much of the tone for metal and hardcore’s separate and combined evolutions since, some of which have only recently been blossoming in the “mainstream” [see sidebar]) has just celebrated its tenth anniversary. Yet neither of the relaxed, unassuming Swedes displays a hint of rock star arrogance or even a whiff of selfassured sophisticate smugness, despite selling on a level no one would have credited as possible a decade ago…despite being a significant influence to more bands than perhaps any act that remains relevant to what’s going on in extreme, rockrooted music-making today…or despite a current “cool” status that rivals rock saviours and musical devotees The Dillinger Escape Plan, national scene contemporaries Opeth, and prog-powered, enigmatic grunge/alternative survivors

Tool (who say the writing of their upcoming album has been actively influenced by the touring they did with Meshuggah back in 2001). This is a band whose self-assurance is quiet, reserved, and essentially plain speaking. For though Meshuggah are rightly renowned as a band who take a certain pleasure in fucking with people’s heads and expectations alike, they are not a band who are interested in sacrificing their drive to create great, original musical art at the altar of shock value or post-modern commentary. Of course when your impending fifth album is a near-50-minute single “song” divided into movements (marked as tracks) that form a symphony of sorts and featuring the same, droning, atonal riff throughout its first five minutes, it’s perhaps not surprising that some find it hard to believe that Catch 33, as this song-cum-album calls itself, isn’t just weird for the sake of weird. It would almost

make some kind of twisted sense for Meshuggah to release a completely unlistenable, insane album just to see if the many bandwagon-jumpers who have been championing the band of late would nevertheless hail it as the next stage in the very evolution of music. When you add the fact that Catch 33 will also see Meshuggah finally, definitively fulfilling their obligations to long-time label Nuclear Blast, following disputes that came to a head a year ago about whether 2002’s Nothing was in fact the last album of their contract, it is indeed not at all that surprising that some, in the words of Spinal Tap’s David St. Hubbins, are indignantly asking of Catch 33, “Excuse me! Is this a joke?”

“You have to like it to like it,” Marten admits.

“We’ve been tempted to play that kind of prank,” adds Tomas. “But it probably wouldn’t be under the name of Meshuggah. We’ve had a lot of ideas throughout the years of doing things that would be more of a spoof towards other metal bands or whatever, but this is definitely not one of those things. I think a lot of people initially thought that: a lot of people got the idea that this was something that we would just put out to rid ourselves of the contract with Nuclear Blast.”

That was certainly the most persistent rumour.

“That’s just really stupid though. We’d never use our name and just put something out that we wouldn’t stand by,

you know? To us it’s not only been a tremendous effort to do this album because of the different aspects of it—like we have a lot of like different voices and stuff in there, there’s a lot of work behind it. It’s also like the different way of coming up with this album and working with it;

By Paul Schwarz recording it.

It not only challenged us, it also felt like the right thing to do, to inspire us to kinda go back to maybe something more ‘what we have been doing.’”

While Catch 33 is very much an experiment, it’s not a frivolous one. The same went for last year’s I EP, which played with the similar “one long song” format, though from an almost opposite musical standpoint.

“Basically, the I EP was many different things put together in one song, while Catch is more like a few fluctuating themes explored throughout an entire album,” says Tomas.

“Also their overall musical aspect is kinda opposite; the I EP being a really fast song, and this being kinda a heavy, droning song. So I guess in a few different ways they are kinda opposite sides of the spectrum of what we are or what we

have been doing—at least, up until now. But at the same time there are similarities.”

“Since it’s us,” laughs Marten.

“Of course,” Tomas continues. “And also in the sense that the I EP is also one track, and the recording process wasn’t that different, really.”

“The difference between them is like…” Marten pauses.

“The I EP is going through all these things, touching base on the old school Meshuggah, touching base on Chaosphere, touching base on Nothing...”

It’s almost like a remixed recap of your career.

“Yeah, exactly. It was like a part of what we’ve been doing, and this one is like, just pouncing on this atmospheric, soundtrack kind of focus for the minute.”

“Which is totally new stuff,” adds Tomas.

With Catch 33 Meshuggah are, so to speak, throwing their listeners into a drone abyss.

“Exactly,” agrees Marten. “So that’s like what’s separating

Despite how “prog rock” it undoubtedly appears when described by news posts and sound-bites, Catch 33 was not founded upon any obvious precedent like Rush’s 2112 or Queensrÿche’s Operation: Mindcrime. Fundamentally rethinking song structuring, Catch is instead the most radical departure from rock/metal norms that Meshuggah have embarked upon. That’s really saying something about a band who were among the first in their field to utilise syncopated, off-kilter rhythms; who embraced the possibilities of then-prototype, now-perfected eight-string guitars for 2002’s Nothing, developing a style of heavy metal guitar playing that eschews chords, almost exclusively utilising single notes; and who remain, in a world now filled with their impudent imitators and ingeniously influenced followers, a band who haven’t sounded significantly like anyone else in over a decade. Even for Meshuggah, Catch was a serious challenge; and being interrupted by the I EP’s recording and release along with a shortish stretch of European touring last summer, it took some

them. What’s uniting them is that we have all these things going on which might at first sound like they’re pretty structured; but when you really break it down you can see that the I EP is like, randomly frantic in many ways. Catch is not as random but the patterns are long and unconventional—like changing over the bars, so that you get a similar type of illusion but with different tools.”

time to complete, despite originally being conceived over a year and a half ago.

“It was kinda difficult to finish because of the simple fact that we started writing the album and then we wedged the tour plus the I CD in the middle,” admits Marten. “That kinda fucks up the routine. If you’re doing one thing and you’re totally focused, and then you all of a sudden go off and do other shit, it’s really refreshing when you come back and start again— ’cause you have new ears, new inspiration and everything. But you also kinda have to start again.”

“You gotta get that pace going,” adds Tomas. “The whole recording process was very different for this album. As everyone knows, all the drums are programmed—which is a Meshuggah first—and for this album only, it worked out really well. But just starting from scratch, this album was much more of a whole band effort than anything that we’ve released before. Usually we’ve always sat separately and done stuff.

Sometimes me and Marten would work together, sometimes me and Fredrik—and we’d start bringing things together as we went, kind of trying to zone-in on what we wanna do with various parts, and try to make them into songs. This time, basically all four of us sat continuously by one computer and throughout, everyone in the band has had a say in the matter: all riffs, all drum parts. Everyone has been involved in pretty much everything about this album. The recording process of this album has been very different, and the only thing that we actually did in the studio was the vocals. Apart from that, Catch was all done on one computer in an office space, basically.”

The guitars were recorded straight into a computer?

“That’s nothing new. That’s the way we did it with Nothing and I,” Marten reminds. “The different thing with this was that it was more like jamming on a mental level, rather than playing it. Like Tomas was saying, the four of us would sit together and work; then all of a sudden somebody comes up with something, and we go with it: we see where it takes us.

As a result, there was a lot of rearranging. Something that also made Catch take a little more time was not only the process itself, but the fact that when you work like that, you run into obstacles. We would just go through stuff and it would be working out great. Then all of a sudden, we’d hit a snag: up until a certain part of the album we’d be ecstatic, but then we wouldn’t know where to go next. Then it might take some time to find the core idea, get through that passage, and then stuff would start rolling again. It’s a 47-minute-long track: it’s a totally different beast than just like, making five minute songs.”

NEW MILLENNIUM MENTAL JAM SESSIONS Constructed quite differently from any previous Meshuggah album, Catch 33 saw Haake’s entire kit be sampled; over 90 minutes of repetitious riff parts, assorted guitar drones, soundscape loops, ambient passages and much more be recorded; and the four core members of the band (completed by vocalist Jens Kidman and lead guitarist Fredrik Thordendal) all sitting down together for the first time to complete the album on a computer located in an office space. Taking over six months and many work hours to complete, Catch is, cliché as it surely sounds, Meshuggah’s most ambitious album to date.

“Everything was ‘live’ on the I EP, but it came together the same way as Catch,” explains Tomas. “It was the same machines and the same workspace, basically. The only difference would be that on I, me and Marten or me and Fredrik would just kind of jam things up; then once we felt that we had something, we would record that; but in a very random way. I would sit down to play the drums and even if I’d kind of lose the pattern, I would just keep going. The guitarists were really silly. I mean, they would do like schematics for how the beats were supposed to be...”

“Parts he would be able to play, but playing it all the way through wouldn’t be possible,” Marten interjects. “It just doesn’t work. So it is really a random song. It’s really hard to learn it because of the pace, the speed. It’s up-tempo and there’s a lot of shit going on.”

“With the I EP and with Catch in particular, we definitely wanted to kind of change the way we work in the studio, just to see what kind of vibe that would, and will create,” Tomas resumes. “So in that sense Catch has definitely been an experiment for us, and to a lot of people I would think it would come across as an experimental album for a few reasons. Not only because the drums are programmed but also because it’s not really a ‘live’ album. It was not intended for live use. We may or may not do an outtake of it live; we don’t know yet.

We’ll see what we’re gonna do from it, if we’ll do anything. But that was not the intention when we wrote it. It was just, let’s do something that even by our standards kind of is an experiment. Even though every album is somewhat of an experiment for us, this one is maybe even more so.”

“We don’t have to force it,” adds Marten. “Some people don’t realise that this is just the way it turns out for us. This is kind of a natural process. We always experiment. That’s the thing. That’s what we do. But on the other hand, we realised pretty early on that this was not gonna be the traditional, runof-the-mill thing we do. This was gonna take us someplace else, you know.”

INVOLUTED EVOLUTION An album that evolved during its creation, Catch 33 was originally planned to be a 33-minute opus, in keeping with its title. Thus it is interesting to note that on the finished version, almost 33 minutes have elapsed as the 13-minute “In Death— Is Death” finally collapses in on itself; reducing its sporadically

scarring, hypnotically evocative repeat-riff psycho-jam assault to an eerie, barely audibly unsettling soundtrack-style hum, and letting an almost tactile waft of finality through its grim sewer grate. Then begins “Shed,” the video outtake—set to be an entirely 3D animated affair, which will not feature the band.

The natural suspicion is that “Shed” opens a section that was added to the original Catch 33. But this is probably not how things came together...

“The 33-minute thing was like an initial idea we had— when we had about 16 minutes of the album done,” offers Marten.

“The biggest part of making this album was actually arranging it,” adds Tomas. “We had a project of 120 channels, one-and-half to two hours of music, and a lot of it was just riffs going on and on and on: it’s a lot of the same riff.”

“Shortening, lengthening,” Marten exemplifies with hand gestures.

“Just different versions of all these things,” Tomas resumes. “Also to arrange everything and make everything kind of fall into place was what took the most effort, and was also even more time consuming than we thought it would be initially. That’s also one of the main reasons why we used the programmed drums. The drums just came out right and really supported this music—you could never do it and make it sound like this if they weren’t programmed. It would be something totally different. Once we heard that and kinda got that vibe, we decided to go with it. Also, if we had decided to use live drums, it would have been hell, because when we’d go back to a riff, we’d change it—we’d even change like, the patterns of the riffs, throughout the whole song. A lot of the whole process has been about that.”

“The tweaking was immense,” interjects Marten, sounding almost pained by recollections of times when Meshuggah “hit a snag.”

“Absolutely,” continues Tomas. “Everything’s been tweaked and gone through like 10 or 20 times or something. So if we’d have done that with live drums, I would have had to learn one part, record it, and then maybe relearn it in like another week, just to make it slightly different. That’s really hard. The task of recording live drums for this album would have been immense. I wouldn’t have wanted to do it.”

“It would have taken four years...” adds Marten.

“And it wouldn’t have enhanced the final product,” says Tomas. “This is really about that kind of machine-like, almost emotionless feel of the drums. Even though it sounds like drums as opposed to a machine, it still has that extremely steady—almost cold—emotionless vibe to it.”

CONTRADICTIONS PROLAPSE There is special kind of relentlessness and inexorability to the demonically drone-laden “song” that is Meshuggah’s fifth full-length “album.” Yet though, as was mentioned earlier, Catch 33’s first three tracks feature only the one, anythingbut-basic riff that it opens with, that’s not to say that there is no development or change, either over these tracks or the ten that follow. Subtle transitions are sometimes barely discernible, hidden in the background behind a wall of deftly off-kilter single-note riffage; other times Meshuggah throw a curveball just as you’re getting into the groove, as when fourth track “The Paradoxical Spectacle” transmutes the aforementioned riffage into a shimmering, 100-second string-drone.

“The tracks are ‘movements,’” states Marten, looking to Tomas for confirmation. “Definitely, yeah,” assures the other.

Marten resumes: “We were talking about this when we went over to L.A., about the fact that this album actually is sorta structured much more like a symphony. Not the tonality, not the way it’s played, nothing of that. But just the way it’s arranged, because you’ve got like, loooong parts to listen to. It

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M ESHUGGAH

M ESHUGGAH

A decade on from its original release, Unrestrained! asks the question: just how historically important is Meshuggah’s landmark sophomore disc, the inimitable Destroy Erase Improve? starts out with these three tracks like, going the same way; and then all of a sudden it goes like this; and then at the end it gets a little bit more intense. But that was pretty much unintentional. It had to be that way. We started out with this like, biiig movement of this one thing, flowing—and then it gets sectionalised and tuned down a note. So we were like, working more with dynamics than I think we realised, doing it. When I listen to it now, there’s a lot of dynamics in it even though there’s not that many really frantic, chaotic parts—not as many as on the I EP for instance, which is pretty much all about that.”

But there is a discernible end to “In Death—Is Death.”

Surely this isn’t simply coincidence?

“I don’t really remember how it came together,” Tomas confesses. “It was probably one of those arranging things where we just found that this would really work. It is a bit—like you said, final; and we also felt that ‘In Death—Is Death’ is definitely—it kind of comes to an end, just by how it sounds and whatnot. So with ‘Shed’ it kind of starts something new. But after ‘Shed’ you still have parts that relate to parts before it started.”

Motifs reappear, just as they would in a symphony or opera—rock or classical.

“The theme comes back,” agrees Marten. “Sometimes it’s a rhythmical thing and sometimes it’s a total thing,” adds Tomas. “The themes are really intertwined.” Marten resumes: “Another thing that’s unique: this record was a challenge to us in every respect. The way we wrote it, the way it’s a single, 47-minute song, everything. But also from a guitar point of view, this is by far the most challenging work we’ve done, because this is the first time we really realised what we could use the bass strings for. It opened up a new way of writing and gave us a new kind of freedom to write instinctively, just going with ideas and developing them. So it was really awesome. It was great fun writing this record, from a guitar point of view.”

“In the past the percussive parts of what we do have always like, taken a front step,” says Tomas. “Of course it’s guitar-based music, but a lot of times in the past even the ideas behind the riffs were percussive. I’d say this album is really about guitars—and to me the guitar parts are really insane. Some of the parts on this album are just really, really cool stuff that we’re really proud of, and really stand by. There is a lot of really cool stuff, y’know.”

UNRELENTING DELIRIUM Just in case all this talk of movements, tracks, sections and premature finality have got you in a sceptical mood, rest assured: Catch is a single song. It never quite stops. Most tracks blend into each other, and even where the transitions between them aren’t loud enough to skip on primitive CD player, there is always some audible continuity. It seems that by its very nature, Catch must make some kind of post-structural comment on the way records are broken up into songs, but was this in any way intentional?

“You’re very welcome to interpret it that way,” offers Marten, smiling.

Well, the I EP was almost like a crowd pleaser by Meshuggah’s standards, despite being a single, 20-minute song. By comparison, Catch 33 breaks every taboo, as it were.

“Which we love, you know,” he quips, grinning.

But that wasn’t a guiding principle for album’s presentation or creation, just a happy outcome?

“Yeah, it’s a happy outcome. The way I see it, if you start to seek out what’s commercially accessible, what will work for the crowds, what will work in the charts, you’re gonna lose.

I mean, I’ve never heard anything like that that pleased me. I think it doesn’t matter if it’s metal, hip-hop, pop rock—when it’s obvious where they wanted to go, it sucks. But I think that’s true the other way around as well: if you’re just trying to be inaccessible for the sake of it, it’s not gonna be very funny to listen to. It’s gonna be a statement, yeah, but it’s not gonna be that much, musically speaking. For a long time now we have been lucky to be able to put out records that kind of defy standards a little bit. Not so much that nobody else is doing what we’re doing. Just the simple fact that a lot of bands would shy away from sitting down to do an album that’s a single, album-length song, that uses programmed drums, and that has guitar parts which go on for like three minutes at a time which are basically just weird stuff, you know—that would fit on like, a weird soundtrack or something...”

“We could never do an album that was just about making a statement,” Tomas concurs. “If you focus in on those things, like even before you actually start writing, you would just

totally block everySOULBURNED BEYOND RECOGNITION thing you’d try to As any long-time Unrestrained! reader should already know, DEI emerged during Swedish metal’s do.” most singularly significant year on record: 1995. But though rubbing shoulders upon release with Meshuggah are both precise power-lodes (Slaughter of the Soul and Storm of the Light’s Bane) and dazzling, inherently unconportentous triumphs of the technical (The Gallery and Orchid), DEI stands out today as the trived. Do they just go most impressively enigmatic and fortuitously foresighted work of the lot. We say fortuitous with the flow of what because as it turns out, Meshuggah don’t consider DEI to all that great—generally highlightworks at the time? ing 1998’s Chaosphere as where they “found their sound.” But it’s symbolically fitting, isn’t it?

“Yeah, totally,” agrees Meshuggah’s “second-best” is still a metal master-class in its own right.

Marten before Tomas Standing out; alone in a syncopated, intensely dense headspace that capitalised on all of resumes. “To get a certhe potential 1991’s Contradictions Collapse concealed beneath excessive Metallica-isms and tain vibe going throughout seeming confusion as to how to respond to death metal’s then-ascending star, DEI took its the whole thing has been primary cue from 1994’s None EP, which first provided positive proof that Meshuggah were the strongest intent that we tapping a truly individual vein. Relocating to the major metal scene hub of Stockholm—from had with this album. Once whence their by-now-seasoned second drummer (Haake) and recently recruited rhythm we kinda started figuring guitarist (Hagstrom) had originated—Meshuggah seemed to leave their creative baggage out what we were doing and back in their spawning ground (the northern university town of Umea), opening a new where it was going, we were chapter that honed-in on that aggressive, unrelentingly and infectiously off-kilter vibe definitely very keen on keeping they’d touched on as far back as 1989’s “Psychic Testbid” 7-inch. It was the megathat vibe throughout the album, mosh-worthy violence of cuts like “Sickening” (None’s far-reaching outtake) that got and I think we succeeded in Meshuggah on Machine Head’s 1995 European jaunt—unbelievable as it seems today, that. Even though it goes through the Swedes’ first proper tour. changes, it still puts you in a cerA network of bedroom sleeper cells would slowly spread DEI on a listentain mood just listening to it, you and-love basis to many lovers of mind-massacring metal worldwide. But upon its know, and that goes as well for the release, the record was largely ignored by the mainstream metal press. Remaining lyrics.” generally unsung until Jack Osbourne used “Soulburn” to torment his neighbours five years ago, DEI is still often marginalised as a musicians’ album. Combined A HELLER WAY TO THINK with the growing coverage from guitar and drum magazines Meshuggah began In yet another first for Meshuggah, garnering in its wake, DEI ultimately led to their perennial pigeon-holing as a Catch 33’s lyrics centre around a single musicians’ band—especially after one music student based an entire thesis theme. around its iconic opening cut, “Future Breed Machine.” Yet when you dig “The tracks and their titles mark deeper, the truth is that technicality was but a tool to Meshuggah, who are ultichapters, not titles of different scripts,” mately guided by feel rather than technique. It is this home truth that explains explains Tomas. “There’s actually just why DEI’s ambitious blend of covert Rush and Voivod influences, passing pasone continuous lyric for the whole album. sions for tech/prog/fusion-toying extremists like Cynic, and particularly the It just felt like a good thing, to kind of name strikingly shredding, ’70s-excess-indebted solo stylings of guitarist Fredrik different parts of it.”

Thordendal, managed to combine with a pounding pulse that could pummel It’s already been widely reported that the Pantera into a pancake in such a way that, rather than simply throwing a theme of this lyric centres around contradicspanner in the proverbial works, it forged a new standard. tions, negations, and paradoxes; but does it At the heart of DEI was Daniel Bergstrand. The distinctive, do this in the form of a story? Is Catch 33 a dynamic, and expertly balanced production he blessed it with arguably narrative piece? gave Meshuggah the additional tools they needed to crack open our “In a sense. It’s kind of a story. Since it runs heads and rearrange the ideas inside in gloriously cinematic style. straight through it’s kind of loosely conceptual in a Though not even 21 at the time, Bergstrand had already seen sense. Everyone can interpret it their own way, but the future. Where the likes of Terry Date, Colin Richardson and if you wanted to, you can see like, kind of a journey Tomas Skogsberg were all simply struggling—admittedly with through life and death, almost. But as always with our some success—to avoid the power production potholes that lyrics, it’s written metaphorically in a lot of ways. This had just recently upset the Burns/Morrisound applecart, one all the time like, touches base with what is paradoxical Bergstrand was effortlessly engaging with his subject: his and what are like, negations and contradictions. That’s like seeming raison d’être to plumb the depths of a band’s the loose theme of it all that I was talking about: paradoxes, creativity, whilst resisting the temptation to rubber stamp negations, contradictions.” their work with some intransigent “personal” identity.

Catch 33 does not, however, attempt to make any particuBut whatever one can say about the record’s lar pronouncement on these subjects. Is it then a linguistic creation and musical merits, one thing remains experiment of sorts? certain: DEI could be released today, and justifiably “It’s not necessarily a linguistic experiment, but probbecome “Album of 2005.” If that doesn’t seem to ably an experiment in the sense that it’s more questioning compute, it’s only because it has now become that actually telling.” “It’s more philosophical,” adds Marten. almost impossible to imagine what extreme, hard, “Yeah,” agrees Tomas. “I guess you could say that. It’s like rock ’n’ roll-rooted music would be like today had a musing. It kind of paints out these kind of... images, you Meshuggah never destroyed, erased and radically know. Kind of...” improved upon the so-called “cyber” sound; a “Different ways of describing this thing,” interjects Marten, move that always secretly assured that metal gesturing at his surroundings. would someday emerge from grunge’s shadow, This reality? having assimilated rather than ignored the most “Yeah, exactly.” important lesson in its history since punk Or flow? arrived on the scene back in 1975. DEI is “Yeah, from a certain point of view. We are throwing this one of heavy metal’s most masterfully very general idea that springs from different paradoxes and evolutionary albums. It’ll sound just how they might affect an individual or a psyche.” already writas great in ten years time; you just “Yeah,” agrees Tomas. “It’s like looking into someone ten the lyrics wait and see. else’s idea; but it’s your own. It’s like looking at a movie, but and half the you’re kinda making it up as you go: how the movie is going song. We thought to turn into something different...” of it like: okay, it’s “It’s third-person interactive,” chuckles Marten.

Catch 22, but we’re So there’s a sense of characters? haunted by this number “Yeah, kind of,” says Tomas tentatively. “But then again 33.” vaguely, even in that sense.”

So how far away is it from Nuclear Blast’s original pitch, THE STING IN THE TALE circa a year ago: “Meshuggah’s version of a Catch 22”?

“This thing—this lyrical construct, if you will, “Well, Catch 33 is a philosophical term. Catch 22 everybody comes across as more of a sense of inner turmoil than knows about because of the Joseph Heller book, where it was anything else, because it’s not describing something out coined. Catch 33 is kind of a tweaked-up version of Catch 22. there on the floor. It’s not like, ‘Look, this is happening right I’ve read about it, like on the Internet and stuff like that, but now!’ It’s a lot about what’s going on here,” offers Marten, that was not what we had in mind when we actually came up tapping his temple. “In many ways; because it’s emotion, it’s with the idea. We heard of the actual philosophy after we had

rage, it’s fear, it’s inevitability.”

It’s quite internal then?

“Absolutely,” agrees Tomas. “Also in that sense that it’s not necessarily all questioning, but it’s also not stating anything, not stating facts. It’s not an opinion.” “No,” concurs Marten, resuming his train of thought. “But I think that came more from things we’ve been discussing in the band or experiencing as people than having an influence from other bands or other artists, you know. Because even though this is not the first time that somebody’s been doing something kinda vague, lyrically, which has some philosophical touch to it, it’s still—you know, when you write about saving the rainforest it’s all right to really sit down and say: we’re talking about saving the fucking rainforest. That’s all right.”

Like Sting.

“Exactly,” he chuckles. “That’s it.”

“You could name a song ‘Save It,’” Tomas deadpans playfully. “Or ‘Don’t Mess With the Trees’!” he adds, cracking a smile.

“And that would work,” Marten resumes. “But here it’s like, everything you listen to or everything you read and you really think is like, great, is where you have your input in it. You know, nothing becomes really great until you actually feel that you’re interacting with what you’re reading, listening to, looking at—you know, what you’re doing.

So in a way Catch is throwing stuff out there to set the underlying atmosphere for thinking, and then people can make of it what they will. Here you have the pieces: go mess with it. That’s what we’ve been doing musically as well.”

FUTURE BREEDING SANS MACHINES Already dividing fans and critics across the globe, Catch 33 seems destined to become Meshuggah’s most contentious release, probably for some time yet. Uninformed sceptics might point out that that ain’t saying much; Meshuggah are self-confessedly

lazy, and have historically never got a new fulllength out in even two years, more often taking three to four. But this cycle has recently been broken. For perhaps the first time in their 15-plus-year career, Meshuggah are on somewhat of a roll.

“We’re hoping to release a new full-length next year,” reveals Marten.

“What we’re aiming to do is to take a couple of weeks off after this European thing,” say Tomas, referring to the smattering of festival and club dates Meshuggah are playing this summer. “Then start writing the next album, and work on it all throughout the rest of the summer. After that, we may or may not do something in the States in the fall. We’re really anxious to get the next, if you will, ‘live stuff’ album going, because after that we’ll be able to really delve into like, changing the visuals and doing a totally new set. After that album we’ll probably tour a lot more extensively. We’re really kind of anxious and really psyched to get going on that and get to that next stage. So if no accidents happen we’re definitely going to release album number six during the next year. But we’re hoping to be able to release it before summer 2006. We don’t know, ’cause sometimes we get kind of lucky—like we did with Nothing, where writing a lot of the material went pretty fast, actually...”

“Even though we started late,” reminds Marten.

“Yeah,” Tomas resumes. “We started late so it kinda suffered anyway, but it kinda came natural after that, it kinda flowed on.”

Any idea what label the new album will be on?

Any thoughts of releasing it via your own Hideous Appendix stable, since you did the I EP for Europe?

“No, that is not very likely,” states Tomas.

“We can go wherever we want,” Marten interjects. “So we’re just looking at who is interested and what our options are and all of that. But it looks good right now. We’re also discussing with Nuclear Blast about staying with them.”

Depending on how Catch 33 goes?

“Depending on that and depending on some other stuff, but the thing is that we’ve had a long working relationship with Nuclear Blast, since like the beginning of the ’90s. We’ve had our ups and downs for sure. It’s been really bad and it’s also been really good. But I think it’s just the last two or three years that we actually have been starting to slowly, really understand each other better—talking the same language, basically. We’re working together and we’ve been having some discussions recently about what’s been wrong and what’s been good and things like that, and we’re on very good terms with them right now. So there’s nothing that like, contradicts us staying on Nuclear.”

No thoughts of moving to a major?

“We’ve been discussing it, and the thing is that major labels right now might be interesting if the right offer comes along and we feel good about it, but it seems like a lot of major labels have been...”

Tomas takes up the thread: “Yeah, they’re doing kinda bad, a lot of them. Major labels that still would sign metal bands, anyway. At least looking at the Stateside of things, it’s kind of a hazardous game to get into at the moment, because there have been so many people losing their jobs and so many bands dropped. There’s a lot of things going on. So we’re not saying we wouldn’t, but it would have to be a really good offer. It basically comes down to what’s best for the band.”

Marten plays us out: “Major labels have always been good for bands who wanted to cash in on getting good money for promotion and this and that.

But if you start looking at it, the bigger metal labels have grown recently—have become stronger, are tied into bigger distributors, are getting more money for promotion. And they at least know what type of music they’re dealing with, which might not always be the case on a major. We’ll see: whatever works out and feels right in the moment.”

7

8

NILE

ULVER

“Every time there is a new release by Nile, the feeling is always a bit different, never the same,” says Nile founder/guitarist/singer Karl Sanders about the release of the band’s new opus Annihilation of the Wicked (Relapse). “This time it is different because somehow the album got leaked out [on the Internet] and some of the feeling for me has been short-circuited.”

That is the way things are in this day and age. It is a whole new ball game. I can understand your frustration to some degree. Personally I don’t upload or download new albums from these shareware programs because a) I like to hear albums as they were meant to be heard with lyrics/artwork and b) downloading kind of takes away from my work as a music journalist to write about music and inform Joe Public of an upcoming release when Joe Public has it at the same time as me—or even before sometimes.

drum parts for this album. It was truly a burden lifted off of me. George, being a Nile fan before he joined the band, made him more familiar from the outside. He intuitively knew what kind of drums had to go into Nile and I didn’t have to explain anything to him.”

Dallas’s role has expanded as well for this release.

“Yeah. Dallas and I collaborated on three songs on this record, and man, I loved every second of it. And on the songs where he wrote the music and I wrote the lyrics he did an incredible job of bringing those words to life. I cannot say how great it was to work with him. This album turned out great and…”

I jut in. Is this the best Nile album?

Answers Sanders, “In so many terms this is the best. It is the best recorded, the best produced,

“Like you said, it is a whole new ball game.

I don’t think artists have any other choice other than to deal with it. It’s a sign of the times, that’s for sure. It is going to happen, no matter how you go about doing it. Hopefully people who really care about the album will go and pick it up.”

Tell me about Annihilation of the Wicked.

“We were trying to really aim for a savage metal album. For Dallas [Toler-Wade] and I it was very satisfying as guitar players to be doing a whole lot more guitar playing and have it be heard. The difficulty of the last few albums was trying to make you hear every twist of the pick and sometimes some of the leads would get lost because there was so much going on or the crazy drums would sometimes deafen out the guitar work. Whatever the case may be, we wanted to have a clean production and a solid producer [Neil Kernon], and in the end it made it much more rewarding for us as guitar players.”

Why did this record need the more intense and savage approach that you described? What led to this intensity?

Sanders replies, “There was a lot of built-up anger at the world in general and some of the music scene. We really wanted to come in and crush. We wanted to establish some dominance. I dunno if that is the way I’d put it, but in a nutshell, that is it. We just wanted to come in and say this is what we are and what we can do and we owe nothing to anybody. Fuck anyone who doesn’t like it.”

He adds, “I think the record has so much impact this time around because we prepared this album. We demoed a lot and worked on songs quite a bit before we recorded the album. We knew exactly what we had and what we knew had to be done to make this record just crush.”

The artwork makes the same kind of statement: awe-inspiring and still so savage.

He laughs. “I agree. It really draws you in.”

And how do you go from something as wickedly intense as this album to the sound/styles of your solo disc, Saurian Meditation (also on Relapse)?

“It all comes down to the spirit I get from each song, and each spirit appeals to different emotions or facets. It takes me to different places, and that is how I am able to put out these two very different albums. I mean come on, there is nothing from the Nile album that would fit on the solo record or vice versa. It all stays separate because that is the way it was meant to take shape.”

Do you ever compare older Nile albums to newer ones? How do you react to the older material and where you have taken Nile up to this point?

“I don’t really listen to the older stuff much anymore. Maybe every couple of months I’ll throw on something old.”

I’m like that too with my writing. Once I write a story, I may read it once published, but I don’t really ever go back to it.

“I think it is more enlightening to give it a couple of years before I go back to my music,” he states. “It had been a long time since I had listened to Amongst the Catacombs of Nephren-ka [1998] and I put it in last summer and I was like, ‘Wow, that isn’t so bad.’ If you stay close to an album you’ve worked on you start to hear the little things that start to irritate you. I get mad and start kicking myself at what I could have done at the time but didn’t, and that’s no fun. I’m still absorbing the new album and trying to figure out what the hell is going on with it. No doubt we have seen changes over the years musically, and that has served us for the better, I think.”

Speaking of changes, you’ve seen some lineup changes over the years and new blood coming in. Is it difficult to deal with or do you just carry on?

“We just carry on,” he replies. “You have to deal with stuff and keep going. You need to persevere. The drummer change worked out well this time around. We got George Kollias in the band and he was able to come over from Greece for two months and record the album. We actually got to write the album with the drummer here and it was a blessing. [As well, bassist Joe Payne has replaced Jon Vesano.] In the past that wasn’t always necessarily the case with our drummer. I think it is showcased very well in the coherence and the strength of the arrangements. This album is very straight and to the point. I don’t think there is any kind of filler on this album. The drummer was with us the whole album and songs were built with the drummer right there, and I think that really helped with the songwriting. He wrote a majority of the

the songs are the most streamlined they have ever been and it is the hardest hitting record we have done. Having said that, I don’t want to seem like I am dissing our old records because there is a lot of music there and I love those albums. I wouldn’t change it for anything. Mind you, if I could miraculously change the production on some of them...” he laughs. “They are what they are and we did the best we could with what we had at the time in the studio.”

Are there ever any songs left off in the studio?

“While we always try to carry an album as far as we can and try to make everything work as one, there are sometimes songs that just don’t work. There is one song that was meant for the new album that will come out as a bonus track in Japan. It is a great song and I wanted it on the record, but I didn’t think it worked well in the context of the rest of the album. It’s still a great song and sounds like Nile, but the flow of this album was a savage metal annihilation and I wanted everything on this record to have that impact. Plus the album was too long, so it was a wise choice.”

Without a doubt Nile has become a force to be reckoned with in today’s metal music scene, a band that has become stronger and more consistent over the years. Critics and fans worldwide adore the brutal yet unique death metal assault that Nile has always delivered. Is there still more to come?

“I prefer to think of it like this,” he concludes. “We have worked damn hard to get where we are today with our music and there is still plenty of work to be done with Nile. We have lots of things to do. Oh yeah, lots!

There are many more songs to be written by Nile and there are many places in the world that we still need to play. We won’t go away any time soon, that’s for sure.”

By Adrian ‘The Energizer’ Bromley

The only thing predictable about a new Ulver release is that you never know quite what to expect, and Blood Inside, the band’s first “proper album” since 2000’s Perdition City, is no exception.

There’s little sign of black metal left in the Norwegians’ sound, although Ulver is still no easy listen, and Blood Inside conveys some of the bold power of black metal, if in a more civilized form.

For Ulver, taking five years between albums is not a sign of inactivity. In that gap the band has released several EPs, an album of remixes, and two soundtracks. Founding vocalist Kristoffer Rygg (known variously as Garm or Trickster G.) describes scoring for films as a “welcome challenge.”

“It’s good to make a proper album again, but at the same time I always think it’s good to do a lot different things, and all it’s a way to get certain ideas out that may not be fully developed or fit into a long player album context but are still important components. All the things we’ve done from Perdition City to now, acquiring new influences and learning new ways of making and processing music, have no doubt shaped what has become Blood Inside.” Ulver already has three or four more projects in the works to follow Blood Inside, but Rygg is unsure which will materialize first. “I do think there will be kind of a counter move to Blood Inside being all big and pompous sounding.

There might be a very, very quiet and calm album around the corner.”

Untypically for a musician promoting his newest release, Rygg admits to having mixed feelings about Blood Inside, but he explains that it’s not unusual for him—the material is too fresh, and he’s too close. “First and foremost, what I’m happy about now is just that I’m sitting with a distinct feeling that it really is different music and doesn’t resemble much out there in terms of our references. It’s just kind of a cryptic referential language, so I’m happy about that, having made something that bypasses all genres and all conventional ways of focusing on music. But in terms of being happy about the album itself, that’s another story, I guess. I have a limited capability of being happy about music straight out of the making. I’m always really ambivalent about things when we’re finished. It’s irrevocable in a sense; you can’t call it back. You’re doomed to kind of just sit around and think ‘Oh, why didn’t I do that? Why didn’t we do this?’ So, to me success is always a relative phenomenon.”

Extending that relativity and ambivalence to Ulver’s earlier material, Rygg similarly refers to the older Ulver albums as “relative failures,” and laughs as he says it. “At the same time that’s part of what makes it interesting. For us it has always been the road, the process, so that’s okay.

It’s something we can come to terms with, even though it’s hard at times to be self loathing to such a degree,” he says, laughing again.

Blood Inside is like other recent Ulver material in the sense that it combines a wide array of elements—including orchestral music, jazz, electronica—a characteristic Rygg is well aware of.

“We have quite a few references in our music, I think. We listen to a lot of music and we’re into a lot of things and that reflects in the sheer difficulty of album, in the sense of being able to place it somewhere. It’s kind of a little bit of a lot of things.”

This time the band had a little help from outside, not with writing but with the overall effect of the new album—from well known producer/mixer/artist Ronan Chris Murphy. “He started the mixing process, so he defined a lot of how things were turning out. He kind of outlined the aural feeling of the album. But it was always the plan that we would take those things back with us to Norway and rework them some more. This album has a quite different sound, more kind of retro rock-ish sound and mix, and I guess he’s been pretty crucial to that element.”

Having received an invitation to work with Murphy several years ago, when Ulver began to think about bringing in a third party for this album they didn’t have to look very far. But why bring in someone else now? “I think slowly realizing that we’re kind of becoming possibly more difficult and non-communicating. And also we’d been working with the material for some time and we figured it might be a good idea to just go away. It wasn’t necessarily getting someone else to do just the technical work, because we’re perfectly capable of doing that ourselves, but just getting away.”

Something else new with Blood Inside is the band’s decision to create a video for the first time, a gesture to increasing visibility and public relations. “It’s kind of difficult for me because I usually have a hard time with this video format,” Rygg says. “It felt a bit awkward for me trying to transcribe musical material onto such a different format, so we just opted for something which turned out to be a quite ridiculous borderline video, a humorous take on public relations.”

The video for the song “It Is Not Sound” combines several biblical images.

“The tower of Babel, communicating with god, stretching for high ideals and ultimately falling short, failing, and getting killed in the process,” Rygg explains. “It’s kind of just taking all of those things into a more or less ridiculous context. It’s our failed attempt at communicating with god.” A pope character, played by Rygg, figures large in the video. When asked why, Rygg is playful rather than informative. “In my latter days I’ve become quite the prophet, so I kind of foresaw the death of John Paul, and figured I’d run for the new guy.”

Although there are ballet-like parallels between the animation and the music, Ulver’s new video is not meant to illustrate the lyrics, says Rygg. “The whole idea for that video came in mind because we wanted to do a video for ‘For the Love of God.’ We actually started doing it. We just had a change of heart, I guess, in regards to song. There are a few lyrics in ‘It Is Not Sound’ that are even more borderline, I think, than ‘For the Love of God,’ but in some way the lyrics from ‘For the Love of God’ fit better. But it doesn’t matter. A video is always something on top of something already made, so by necessity it’s something else. For me it’s not an intrinsic part of the album.”

Picking who would execute Rygg’s concept for the video was apparently an easy and obvious choice. “There are two guys [Gustave Doré and Albrecht Dürer] who worked on the video, but one of them is the front guy in a band on my label [Jester Records] called Bogus Blimp. It’s a weird visual radio theatre rock act—hard to describe—but he’s got a strong visual connection to the music, so it was really easy to go with him.”

Though now embracing the visual, Rygg has long been vocal in his disavowal of live performance, but that doesn’t necessarily mean Ulver fans will never see the band perform in the flesh.

“I’ve been so stuck up about it for so many years that, truth be told, I might even enjoy it,” Rygg admits. “But at the same time, I think we really need to find some way to make it feel comfortable.

And we don’t like the idea of having to drag this material along for another year. We’ve already invested a couple years on this album, and investing another year just taking it out in poor imitations of what we do on record—it wouldn’t sit well with us. To be honest, someday I’m sure we will refocus the energy at doing something in a live context, but I don’t think you’re ever going to see us go and play songs that you’ve heard before. It’s going to take some effort, I guess, and right now there are other things we want to do. We have some other beasts we need to give birth to.”

These “other beasts” may have little hear-able connection with Ulver’s black metal roots, but they are inevitably fed by that past legacy, and the band’s background is part of what makes them hard to place. “That’s definitely got something to do with it, not really fitting in anywhere. We weren’t into rave music in the early 90s; we were into the dark stuff. I think that’s just a generally misunderstood thing. Some people seem to think that we’ve aspired to get away from black metal but it’s not something that I’ve thought much about. It’s been more that we take with us the things we want to take with us from all the places that we’ve been. And we’ll go new places as well, I guess.”

With that philosophy, Ulver has achieved a great deal of critical acclaim in recent years, including nominations for Norwegian Grammy awards and a film music composers’ award as well. Rygg welcomes the appreciation but says that it doesn’t change the way he works. “It’s always great to get some good feelings back, but it doesn’t affect how I think in terms of the music. It’s not like if we receive an

Light Words About Weighty Music b y L a u r a W i e b e Ta y l o r

award, then we’ll have to do this twice. It’s not going to dictate our moves. I think it’s a general tendency in the music business as well—I mean, you’re very popular one day, and the next month you’re nothing.”

Knowing how fickle the music business is, and feeling ambivalent about his own material, Rygg still finds a sense of personal satisfaction in what he does. “Sometimes I’m totally in love with myself, other times I just wish it all to hell. But yeah, for the most part it feels like we’re doing important work. This might sound pretentious, but in my mind we’re building something that’s gonna stand out in the cultural landscape in the long term, even though some of our bricks might not be all that solid. Seriously, we’re the musical Gaudis,” he laughs. “Is that a perfect illusion, or is the illusion perfect? That’s the question I need to struggle with on an everyday basis. So, ambivalent, yes. Feel accomplished? Yeah, that too.”

Feeling accomplished is a fortunate pay off, because for Rygg, the music never goes away; it’s beyond a full time job. “It’s not like I go home and turn my mind off. It’s always there, consciously and un-.” Which is good news for those fans raving from the other side of the fence.

9

10

CANDLEMASS

CORROSION OF CONFORM ITY

“Wise fool with devil’s hand, I broke the rules to understand” – Never Turns to More A new Corrosion of Conformity album is always an event, in part because it is impossible to predict what the band might offer with its next opus. Hardcore? Thrash? Southern rock?

Corrosion of Conformity has elevated progressive mutation to an artform, always without the calculation and pretension that typically accompanies those bands most willing to subject their musical DNA to constant modification. As the band name implies, Corrosion of Conformity has always been about breaking the rules and defying expectations, although without sacrificing that all-important focus upon the quality of the song.

After the over-polished approach of America’s Volume Dealer, which vexed many longtime fans clamoring for a heavier, grittier edge, rumors began to circulate that the next Corrosion of Conformity album would offer exactly that. Enter In the Arms of God (Sanctuary). It is a return to the heavy, a pilgrimage to heavy metal’s holy land. Heavy, visceral, and vital, In the Arms of God possesses the riff-heavy edge and the monstrous rhythms that its immediate predecessor lacked, while retaining a high appreciation for memorable hooks and captivating songcraft. In the Arms of God has been described as Corrosion of Conformity’s heaviest album since Blind, which is a problematic way of looking at the band’s back catalogue given that “heavy” is, at best, an ambiguous term.

Deliverance and Wiseblood were heavy in their own right, but in a different way than Blind or In the Arms of God. It is like drinking whiskey versus drinking beer.

“This is a meaner drunk!” exclaims guitarist Woodroe “Woody” Weatherman with a laugh. “It makes you want to get up and fight! It’s never a conscious thing. We always just do our thing and whatever flies out at that particular moment is just what it’s going to sound like. Even on this album, there is such a big variety. Something like ‘Rise River Rise’ up against the title track. Every album has heavier songs on it compared to some of the other songs and we try and make it have some type of a variety like that. The whole point behind this album is to make it something that you can listen to from beginning to end and really not get too bored with it. As opposed to just having a couple songs that are good and the rest of it filler. We try to avoid that,” he chuckles.

One of the most intriguing aspects of In the Arms of God is the addition of noted jazz drummer Stanton Moore. Sure, his technique is flat-out heavy but, even more importantly, his willingness to play outside of the typical metal rhythms adds a truly unusual flavor to the album. His approach initially disconcerts the ears: “Did he miss a beat?” you might ask incredulously. It happens again. “Can he DO that?” you might exclaim with more than a little perplexity. He can. And he does.

“As soon as he [Stanton] jumped in—by the time that we made it down to New Orleans where we laid the drums down at Galactic’s joint, a little studio—the second that we started jamming with him, everything livened up,” Weatherman affirms. “It was exactly what those songs needed. And it was weird because we had never jammed with him or even rehearsed. We just went right to the studio. There are a couple of songs on there that are literally first takes, man. He just listened to some of our demo work that we had done and dove right in. It’s a pleasure to work with somebody who is that talented.

“Even with some of the jammier stuff that he does with other bands, he is just all over,” the guitarist continues.

“He really attacks the drums. It was really a perfect fit for us. Nobody really approaches heavy music that way. It’s just the tiny little things, like the way that he hits the drums with his sticks. He doesn’t leave the stick on the head, it bounces right off. It makes the drums sound loud and huge. Somebody might hit the drums harder than he does, but if they leave the stick on the drum head for even a second, it just kind of deadens it. Whereas he’s just got this snap and it sounds huge.”

Opting to utilize a drummer known primarily for his work in the field of jazz is surprising, but this risk produced serious dividends. “Pepper’s known

him longer than the rest of us,” Woody explains. “I’ve seen his band Galactic on a couple of occasions and he’s just an old school dude from down there [New Orleans]. We’ve been looking for a drummer for a while. Pepper came up with the idea of calling him [Stanton] to see if he knew of anybody and it wound up that he was into it himself. It came about at just the perfect time because we were about to throw our hands in the air. These songs deserve some serious drumming and it took us a while to find the right person and make it happen. We knew he was phenomenal. He’s playing a totally different kind of music, but I knew that it was a perfect fit.

The songs were already done [by the time that Stanton joined us]. We had demoed everything up here [in North Carolina] with the exception of a couple little things here and there.

The structure pretty much stayed the same but the way that they came out changed quite a bit once he started attacking them.”

Even though it has been five long years since the last Corrosion of Conformity studio album, the material for In the Arms of God was composed over a relatively brief span of time. “A couple of the songs had been around for a year or so, but 89% of it was pretty much done in the couple of months leading up to jumping into the studio,” Weatherman recounts.

“Everything came together pretty fast by the time that Pepper made it up here to Carolina and we did some of the rehearsing and demo work. We did the basics [of recording the music] over an eight day period down there in New Orleans around the end of July and into August. We were down there for eight days with Stanton and then brought everything back up here to Carolina. And it was a few weeks before Pepper dragged his ass up here [laughs]. That was the reason that it didn’t happen quicker, but by the time that he showed up, we were ready to go. We did the tracking and then took it over to John Custer’s place to mix it. We got it done in January. It does seem like a little gap there, but really it was just waiting on Pepper to get up here!”

While In the Arms of God is a forward-thinking album unblemished by nostalgia, it does an excellent job of bringing together elements from the different styles that Corrosion of Conformity has embraced over the years. “It’s never like, ‘Hey, let’s make that kind of record.’ But during the writing process we might have had a little bit of that in mind,” he reveals.

“Just trying to cover a wide array of different styles but not stray too far from what the band is. We try to never let it hold us back and dictate the kind of stuff that we like, but you want it to be a cohesive thing. I think that was the point of this record—to cover all the bases.”

In fact, In the Arms of God is perhaps the one Corrosion of Conformity album which fans from all of the different eras can come together over rather than bicker endlessly about why a particular era is superior to another.

“That’s a good point. I guess that is kind of true, because [the new

album] has elements from all of the different vibes that we’ve gone through over the years. There’s four songs that didn’t make it on the record from this session that I don’t know what we’re going to do with. They take it even a little bit further with some of the old school vibe. They are great tunes but we ran out of time. It wasn’t so much space, even though this is a pretty long album. We could have squeezed another couple songs on. We ran out of time when we were mixing—we actually went about a week and a half over our supposed deadline, [if we were] to get this thing in and have it out for the summer. But there are four songs that are almost done—like 98% done—and those songs went a little further back to the old school. I hope that we can do something with ‘em, get them out or something. I wouldn’t say that it’s hardcore, but it’s in the same vein as all the other stuff on the album. I think three of them were like the fastest songs that we had done.”

For Woody, choosing to sit down and listen to any Corrosion of Conformity tends to evoke specific memories of the time during which the album was created. As he relates, each album has a certain memory attached to it. “I always think about what it took to get it [the album] done. For the Blind record, we were living up in Manhattan for a little over two months and I didn’t leave Manhattan. I was going insane! First thing you know, I’m down here in North Carolina and then I’m up in New York City for eight or nine weeks or whatever. And it was pretty trying because we weren’t living in the best accommodations. We were in a flop-house. Pepper was riding around in a damn wheelchair at the time; he had busted his leg at a show. So I listen to the record and I think about stuff like that.”

Regarding the current album, Weatherman’s associates it with a memory that is perhaps not as trying as, for instance, living in a Manhattan flop-house…but no less taxing in its own way. “Trying to drive back from New Orleans with a really heinous hangover after drinking a whole bunch of those damn daquiris that they make down there. They have these shops with these slushee machines that have daquiries. They’re really strong but they don’t taste like they have alcohol in them. The next thing you know, you’re drinking four or five and you’re really hurting the next day because of all the sugar and everything. So that was one of the bad memories, of that drive home. It was like a sixteen hour drive, just me and Mike Dean driving my truck back full of equipment.”

Laughing, he comments, “Hopefully that won’t be the only thing that I think about, but right now it’s the only thing that I think about.”

B y Ta t e B e n g t s o n

B y Ta t e B e n g t s o n

TALES OF RE-CREATION In heavy metal, the reunion phenomenon has a most dubious track record. Legendary bands announce a reunion and are lucky to complete a tour without imploding. And it almost goes without saying that any recorded output is going to be, at best, little more than an anemic shadow of past greatness. The announcement that Candlemass’ classic lineup had reunited was met with a mixture of skepticism and excitement. Could Candlemass dip into that veritable well of souls, ring those bells of Acheron, and transfigure those voices in the wind into something that does justice to the Candlemass legacy yet still remain relevant? Frankly, it’s a bit unfair to hold any band to that standard; expectations of this ilk are unrealistic, as cruel history has proven time and time again.

Of course, history is about exceptions to rules. Even those supposedly ironclad laws of the past are rather like the fine print of a cellular phone contract: Always subject to change without notice. So enters the eponymous new Candlemass album (Nuclear Blast), the first release from the classic lineup since 1989’s Tales of Creation. It is the exception to the reformation rule, proof positive that a legendary band can balance the preservation of a legacy against the imperatives of contemporary relevance. The riffs and rhythms are lessons in epicness, bombastic and spirited. Messiah Marcolin’s soaring voice hammers home an effervescent attack on “Black Dwarf” only to display a more ominous, occasionally even fragile, dimension on “Copernicus.” Messiah delivers the lines with a little less vibrato than in years past, but still nails the high notes with nary a problem. Ultimately, and most importantly, the album is a shining example of songcraft; fluid, dynamic, balancing heaviness against melody. Candlemass in 2005 succeeds where so many reunited bands have failed.

Songwriter, lyricist and bassist Leif Edling offers his insight on the reformation, the new album, and reality television.

Don’t expect to see him crooning on American Idol any time soon.

When bands that I care about reform, I usually get a little scared. There seems to be a pretty good chance that a reformation will only serve to diminish a band’s legacy.

I totally understand what you are saying. When we sent out the demos to different record companies, they said that they were afraid to listen to it. After they heard it, they were quite convinced that we could deliver a good record. They were scared for a while, but we got them into liking the band again.

We did really good live gigs a few years ago that people really liked and said, “Oh yeah, they are still pretty good live.” But to deliver a good record is quite a different thing. I guess that a lot of bands from the old days are still good in a live situation, but it’s not really the same thing as delivering a good record.

With regards to the reunion, do you foresee the band producing another album down the road or should this be taken as Candlemass’ last statement?

Next year, we will start to work on a new record, to have it out in the autumn. I would be surprised if we don’t do that.

We have a great feeling in the band now, a great atmosphere.

We cannot wait to go out in Europe and play, we can’t wait to go out on the road in October and September. It would be fantastic if we could come to North America to play. I’m really looking forward to that. And it’s not impossible, I think—if people in the United States and Canada like the record and it receives good press, I am sure that promoters would like to have us over.

If we could go back a little bit, could you go over the history leading to this second reformation?

The thing was that we never said that we were going to do a record anyways, during those reunion tours that we did.

We did maybe a hundred interviews during those years and we always were asked the question of whether there would be a new studio album. And we always said, “We’re not sure about that.” Because the tour that we did was for us to play for the fans one last time. For me, it was not a big deal when the question came up after two years of whether or not we should do a record. I was pretty much against it, myself. I was pretty satisfied with the gigs that we did. The first year of the reunion was probably one of the best years of my life; we did great gigs and we played for so many people. I was really satisfied with that and I didn’t see a reason for this record. I need a reason to make a record.

I wanted to do the Krux record instead, so I didn’t really mind that the [Candlemass] record didn’t happen. But the thing was, the Krux record was postponed. I had a studio booked in May of last year and the label didn’t want to release it and told me to postpone it until the autumn. I got pretty pissed off about that. So I started to write again and I wrote a bunch of new songs. I demoed a few of them. The guitar play, Mappe Björkman, he heard the songs and he was the one that persuaded me to make a [new Candlemass] record.

He said, “This is fucking good—these are Candlemass songs and we really should do this record.” So he was the one that persuaded me into doing it and it took off from there. And when we started to rehearse, the old magic was there again.

We’ve got something special when we plug in.

Even though the album is being described as a return to form, it’s also clear that there are a few modern elements that have been incorporated into the music, especially on the opening track. I think that is the central challenge for bands who reform: How do you balance that urge to recreate your old sound and spirit against the general transformations in music that inevitably occur over time? Was this a concern to you?

In a way, yes. I think we did it by not trying to do it. What was so important in making this record was—of course the songs were important, but we already had that—but the most important thing was to choose a good studio with a good environment and good people to work with. We chose wisely who we worked with—Polar Studios in Stockholm.

The studio owner, he recorded drums for John Bonham in ’78 or ’79 for In Through the Out Door. He got us almost exactly the same drum sound. The same microphones, the same [recording] technique. We mixed [the new album] in a studio that we knew was great—not a metal studio or a rock studio. The guy that we mixed with, he works with R&B and soul artists. He fucking mixed Britney Spears’ ‘Toxic’ and he received a Grammy for it. But you can’t use that as a sticker on the record, because that’s not what metal fans are about. [laughs] How do you think that your experiences on the Candlemass albums after Tales of Creation and before the current album affected your approach on this new album?

Maybe in a way that you keep active, that you’re still at it and still writing and still productive. Otherwise, it may be easy to fall back a bit on what we did in the ‘80s and that would have been dangerous. I think that you use the routine that

you’ve got and try to look forward at the same time. I think that there are a lot of fucking traps in this, so the smartest thing that you can do is to avoid the traps.

Of course, you can only discover those traps in the first place by making the mistakes and learning from them, right?

Yeah. I mean, I have fucking twenty years of making mistakes. I can write a book on making mistakes and the Candlemass fuck-ups A to Z! So that’s the only thing you can do—use your routine and try not to repeat your fuckups…but of course you do anyways. [laughs] It’s the circle of life, right?

Oh yeah, absolutely. Did it, done it, will fuck-up tomorrow.

Regarding the lyrics, one of the songs that stood out for me right off the bat was “Copernicus.” Could you tell me more about the theme to this song?

‘Copernicus’ is about reality television shows. Stars today are something different today than when Copernicus lived.

It’s pretty much about the obsession with looks and youth.

The stars today represent something really different than a few hundred years ago. I would prefer it to be the other way around, where you have some mystery here and there. You don’t have these so-called stars that people shove up your ass every day. All these nineteen year olds on American Idol or Fame Factory [sic] or all these fucking idiots on reality shows.

You have to deal with them one way or another, even if you don’t look at the shows.

And “Black Dwarf”?

‘Black Dwarf’ is about my hate for the fucking tabloids. The biggest newspapers in Sweden have turned into tabloids a la the English model. Just fucking garbage journalism now. Do you have to be a psychopath to write for a newspaper today?

I mean, it looks like it! They prefer writing about fucking reality shows than when the Pope died.

Of course, these journalists would argue that they are simply meeting public demand.

Oh yeah, and I hate that fucking “we are the press” attitude, like “we are above everything.” And they have so much power and they are pissing in our faces every day and they are getting away with it! People do not react. I really hate this garbage journalism that you see so often these days. They are screaming that they are giving the public what the public wants, but that is fucking bullshit. They create a demand for it. People who are young and maybe don’t question things so much, they will believe that you should behave this way, like those stupid morons that you see on reality shows.

I think that society is increasingly moving towards a passive consumption of information…and many journalists prey upon that.

People react very aggressively to other things that are not as grave or serious. I think that it’s such a threat to western civilization and how people treat information. This is like the fast food of news and people are so tired and lazy that they don’t question what they are getting fed by the media.

They don’t question it and so it continues. So I do what I can now, by writing songs like ‘Black Dwarf’ and speaking about it whenever I can, because nobody else speaks about it. I mean, all the bands write about the American wars and about the Church, but give me a break, that would probably happen anyway. There is other stuff that needs your attention. Of course it’s great to condemn Bush—I’m all for it—but there are other things that you need to think about.

Did you learn or discover anything about yourself, personally, as you wrote the words and music to this new album?

No…but I learned a few things about myself in the studio that were quite scary, actually. I will definitely try to loosen up next time. I walked around for two weeks [in the studio] with an aching stomach, or ten days anyways. We had to nail those songs in ten days, as we could not afford extra studio time. And to cut an album in ten days is not easy. You have to be so well-rehearsed and everything needs to work perfectly.

We had a great time in the studio, but at the same time, I had this aching stomach. It didn’t feel good. I could hardly sleep for a long time. But it had to be good. We had to deliver. And that [pressure] caused real anxiety.

Are you at the point now where you can listen to the new album and be happy with it?

Yes, I am very happy with it. But no, I cannot listen to it yet. [chuckles] How long will that take, until you can go in there and just listen to it for what it is?

I can listen to short bits and pieces of it. But I cannot listen to whole songs. Maybe in the autumn, in a year or something.

I’ve been living and breathing this album for nine months and I’m pretty fed up with a lot of things about it [chuckles].

I know it’s good. And people have said that different songs are their favorites songs. I know that we could pretty much play any of the songs from the record and people would not be disappointed, so that’s a good situation to be in. It’s going to be great to incorporate new songs into the set—it’s been fourteen years since we did that.

11

12

INFIDEL? / CASTRO! / THESYRE

MARDUK

“I don’t give a shit about any of the bands out there nowadays,” he says.

“There are maybe like three bands that I follow and that is it. I am not interested what is going on in the black/death genre at all.”

And some of those bands you like are…?

“I just follow the ones that I consider to be the best of both the black and black/death genres. An example would be Darkthrone. I still think they are doing great things. When it comes to the bands that I like and follow, as long as it is dark and can really get into my soul—be it black/death or gothic—I am into it.”

Speaking of dark and getting into your soul, Plague Angel is a perfect name to go along with Marduk’s music. Why was that album title chosen?

“When we were in the studio working on the album, we just had a general discussion about the album title and Plague Angel came up. It is a perfect fit for the album. The whole album deals with plagues in many different forms— plagues that are putting mankind through eternal suffering.”

The artwork is stunning as well.

“Yeah, that was important,” he states. “It was important for the music, lyrics, and the art to come together as one fist to the face. The artwork was chosen as it very much so reflected the spirit, the music and the production.”

Has your studio work ethics changed over the years?

“I don’t really think that much when we are in the studio because I don’t care about the equipment side of it all. The thing we did this time around was that we had been recording at the Abyss Studios from 1996 to 2002 and I just thought the last few records have sounded too digital and clean. We decided to

There is no denying the creative energy of Infidel? / Castro! duo Colin Marston and George Korein. Their latest offering, Bioentropic Damage Fractal (Crucial Blast), is a swashbuckling parade of noise, ambience, beauty, distortion and electronics that hits you like a wall of concrete the first time out. Not to say repeated listens don’t deliver blows here and there, it’s just that the band’s music starts to take shape after you air it a few times.

First things first. I have to ask, was there a game plan with this album?

“Well, there is a plan, but it does change gradually,” starts Korein. “As the project progresses, things change. It wasn’t supposed to be released as a double album, but it just turned out that way. I came up with all the song titles and concepts in advance—that is my department—and then we come in with the music. Colin [Dysrhythmia, Behold...the Arctopus] is a much better player than I am, so he takes care of all that. If I have an idea, chances are he can play it. It is a lot more fluid than it sounds really. It is not like I sit there and tell him what to play. The assembly of music is a lot weirder than that. It changes all the time.”

By Adrian ‘The Energizer’ Bromley

A Plague On All Our Houses The one thing you notice right away when talking to Marduk’s founder/guitarist Morgan Håkansson is that he speaks his mind. He’s very direct and blunt. He believes very strongly in his band and could care less about the rest of the music scene. Does he harbour a healthy ego? No doubt.

But can you blame him? I can’t. Why should he not be that way? His band has been one of the pioneering black metal bands. They’ve never bowed to trends, and their crusade to destroy religion, the weak and the naysayers is as powerful as ever with the latest release Plague Angel (Candlelight/Regain).

This is easily one of the strongest Marduk albums in years, despite the lineup changes that occurred in the last little while. (Singer Legion was replaced by Mortuus, new drummer Emil Dragutinovic entered the fold, and original guitarist Devo Andersson replaced bassist B.War recently.)

“Changes are natural for a band, and we have come to accept it,” he says. “I mean, there are some people who have been in the band 8 to 12 years and it is just time for them to exit. There is no need for them to be a part of the band sometimes and you needed to move on. The main thing for a band is to move forward and as many other bands who have seen changes, it’s just something you get past. I have always been focused when it comes to the changes in the band’s lineup and I knew when it was time to make the change and who I was going to work with. It’s a gut instinct, really. I think our new vocalist is way more powerful than anyone else we have ever had. He uses his voice as an instrument as well as a voice.”

Despite the lineup changes, things have been pretty steady for Marduk over the years. They’ve never really stepped out of the spotlight or slowed things down.

“When it comes to this band I am very determined to make things happen and to create music. I can’t just let it go for a few years. The burning desire and passion of playing this music is always there. Some bands play for a few years and give up. Not me. I’m always planning a few years in advance. I’m always working on music, lyrics, artwork and ideas. There is nothing that thrills me more than just taking all of the time I have available to me and working on the band. It has made me feel very proud about what Marduk stands for in the metal scene. Why should I stop the creativity flowing?”

You just shut everything out.

“To some extent. I wanna live in my own world and not worry about what other bands are doing or who thinks what or how the scene has changed. My focus is Marduk and only Marduk. That has been the strength of this band for so many years.”

I am sure you must get a lot of fan mail and people contacting you to tell you how much of an impact you had on them. Do you ever reflect on any of that, and what Marduk has done?

“I don’t have time to reflect or take it all in. Like I said, I put all my time and energy into this band. I am grateful that we have had fans for a long time and that they’ve stuck with us, and we always try to be there for them. We are always trying to outdo our past for them—but most importantly for ourselves. I know a lot of bands get all caught up with people kissing their asses or trying to get in every magazine on the planet. All I want with Marduk is to play and put out killer black/death metal and have people be into us. It’s not much, now, is it?”

How do you feel the new album turned out? How have you reflected on it?

“I don’t ever really reflect on what I have done once it has been done. I have other work to do, other songs to assemble and lyrics to write. I’m thinking of the future and making things better for Marduk. I never look back—always forward!”

Do you ever hit a blank wall and not know what to do with Marduk, lyrically or musically?

“Never,” he blurts out. “I don’t face those dilemmas.”

There’s that ego. What are your thoughts on today’s music scene?

change studios [to Endarker Studios] and I think we were able to capture this real raw, black-and-white sound that really helped make it a better recording. I always have a vision of how we want the album to sound in my head and I take the time to explain to the technicians involved what I want to achieve and to understand my feelings towards the music and how it should end up. I need a certain sound for this to be Marduk and we work hard to make sure that sound is always there in full force no matter what year an album is released.”

He adds, “It can be very frustrating to be in the studio for so many weeks working on an album and re-recording and tweaking stuff. I hate studio work. I prefer to play live.

That is where Marduk comes alive.”

I know you guys have had some problems in the past coming over to the United States. Have your visa problems been cleared up yet?

“I know we have had some problems with our papers over there, but hopefully in due time it will be cleared up,” the guitarist notes. “Everything is being sorted out as we speak. We are ready to come over there and blast you all away. We want to be there.

We have spent thousands of dollars trying to make it happen. The machinery goes really slow with all the bureaucracy. We have a new lawyer working for us in the States and he says he will sort it out, but it will take him time. We trust him. I mean, we’ll let him take care of all that paperwork and we’ll stick to the creative side of things.”

Having never seen the band perform, I can only imagine what Marduk live must be like.

“It’s a wild time that is for sure, Adrian,” he finishes off.

“We take you to hell and leave you there!”

By Adrian ‘The Energizer’ Bromley

All the Rage!

Merging Minds, Music and Mayhem How so?

“Well,” he replies. “Sometimes he comes up with the ideas and I pick up the instruments and we make it happen. We just don’t like to keep the same formula as most other bands do.”

Was the album released as a double-disc because of so much material being worked on at the same time?

“Pretty much so,” he says. “I mean, when it came time to assemble the record we had so much material and we didn’t want to back down and edit and get rid of stuff. Colin was like, ‘Okay, it is a double album.’ It sounded ridiculous at the time to do this, but I think it turned out great. Maybe by having two albums worth of material—and so much going on—maybe it makes this album more digestible? The shorter chunk of material, the first album, serves up the appetizer, while the second disc is the meal. Makes sense to me.”

It seems as though you guys like to try a lot of things and expand on stuff you already have a grasp on. Could it be you guys just don’t know where to end a song and move on to the next one?

He chuckles. “I think we do know when it is time to finish a song in the studio,” he says.

“Well, um, there are certain occasions where I have come up with an idea after a song has been shelved for weeks and want to add one sound effect or sample. You know? Just add the one piece that is missing. It happens.”

Are there outside influences stimulating this continuous flow of ideas?

“I, like any human being, am incredibly influenced by other people. People are social creatures that are not in bubbles. We cannot exist without contact. Since we judge everything relatively, it is all in the context of what other people are doing. It is all comparison. And in many regards I am influenced by all sorts of crap, but I think I can be selective and judicious about who I am influenced by and how. And I think I have some sense to know when I am turning out crap that sounds redundant to something else out there.”

A lot of people consider this to just be noise.

“To me, we’re just trying to making something intense, interesting and exciting. We want it to be challenging. I’ll explain it this way. People go to horror movies all the time – but why do people do that? Or how about people who go on rollercoasters? I won’t ever go on something like that. Let alone do it upside down. There are way scarier things than Infidel? / Castro!

But people like stuff that is exhilarating and intense. And at the same time, both albums end with the real ambient, cacophonous kind of material, and that is very traumatic. People go to tragedies all the time because there is a catharsis there. Why did Million Dollar Baby win Best Picture at the Oscars? I’ve heard that movie just makes you feel like crap. How about Dancer in the Dark? That is a movie that just beats the shit out of you. It’s like, ‘Cry, cry, cry, goddammit!’” he yells. “But it is a human activity and we like things that stimulate certain emotions and responses, and this is the way we do it.”

Korein ends off, “Even though we have an abstract sound, we are coming from the lineage of mainstream/successful bands like Pink Floyd and Tool. We’re just kids who like self-indulgent concept albums with lots of cool artwork and big ideas. Or ideas that seem big, you know?” he laughs.

By Adrian ‘The Energizer’ Bromley

Quebec’s Thesyre are indeed one of the shining lights in today’s Canadian metal scene.

A brash hybrid of black/thrash/punk, Thesyre’s second full-length album Duality (on Sweden’s Vicious Recordings) is a rabid onslaught of power, speed and rage, yet still emanating a sophisticated aura, thanks to a wickedly slick production. Minimalistic on the surface, but determined on the inside to pack as much of a wallop with each song as they can.

Duality has a frantic feel to it—like holding a match to dynamite at times. I love the tense nature of some of the material. I ask found/singer/bassist Eric Syre what kind of emotions he gets from the album when played back?

“I like the imagery of the match and the dynamite you use to describe this album,” he grins. “The material on this album has an immediacy to it and I like the way we captured it on the recording. There is a definitive tension in the lyrics and I think the songs translate well this feeling. We always try to have a good mix of hooks, rhythm and dynamics within the compact frame of a short song. I also try to use strong and short words and I often address direct questions in the lyrics. I think all this helps giving the whole album this frantic feel you experienced when listening to it.”

He continues, “Thesyre is the expression of my reaction to the world around me. You exist when you manifest yourself, when you react to something. I can feel a lot of frustrations, anger and disgust when I get confronted to the daily reality I live in. I react to the politics, the laws and the rules our society evolves within. I react to the mediocrity, stupidity and general idiocy I see everyday. One way to manifest those reactions is to write songs for Thesyre.”

Thesyre (rounded out by drummer Zvord and guitarist K) keeps it very simple. Why is that?

“There is two reasons why we keep everything simple with Thesyre. First, our music is somewhat in reaction to all the bands overdoing and over-producing their albums recently. It comes to a point where the basic idea of writing a good song gets lost within a big blur of processing, effects and orchestrations. By stripping down our music to its very core we feel it keeps its primal qualities and transfers itself much more easily and directly to the listener. Secondly, our lyrics, reflections and general ideas are direct and to the point. Everything is kept as free as possible from artifice or ornamentation. I consider there is no better way than to bring it all to the listener with the help of a medium which is simple, immediate and direct.”

The topic turns to the recording of the band’s album. A lot of bands have struggled in the studio. How has the studio experience been for the trio?

“We’re really fast in the studio,” Syre points out. “Everything is usually done within a week. This includes recording, mixing and mastering. I like this fast process. We do pre-production demos so everything is 90% ready before we get in the studio. It works fine for Thesyre. I see no point into putting a lot of money in studio time when it can be done effectively within a few days. We might use two weeks for the next album, which is still quite fast compared to most bands recording a third album.”

I hear a bit of Darkthrone and Motorhead in your music. Not afraid to wear your influences on your sleeve I see.

“I think our influences can be heard and it’s ok with me. There is some Motorhead and Sodom in there. Maybe some Voivod and Darkthrone too. There was a little more Celtic Frost or Hellhammer on our debut. I also consider we come up with something which still has a strong identity and is not just the sum of some influences.”

As I stated above, while relatively unknown, I think Thesyre is one of the better bands that Canada has to offer. But unlike a lot of bands touring and making names for themselves across Canada, Thesyre are doing things on their own terms. So, what does Syre think today’s Canadian music scene?

“Too many bands, too many labels,” he quips. “A few gems lost in a growing pile of crap. Canada is a huge country built around provinces which are often bigger than most European countries, so I feel like each province is a country within a country, producing a handful of bands trying to gather some attention on them. There seems to be some more attention to the Canadian scene these days but I guess we’re not the band the national metal media will focus upon anyway. Our province of Québec brought to this whole music scene some great bands. I don’t feel like Thesyre is a part of any musical scene right now.

He finishes, “We’re in touch with very few bands, we don’t tour and we don’t even play shows so I guess we’re not really seen as a ‘scene band’ either. Our only implication right now is to release albums and to promote them once they’re out. That’s fine with me.”

13

14

NECROPHAGIA

Horror and heavy metal have crossed paths on numerous occasions over the years. After slithering out from under Sabbath’s first, unwittingly “Satanic” slab of searing riffage back in 1969, HM dabbled in vaudevillian spectacle (think Alice Cooper’s travelling circus and Ozzy’s early ’80s dwarf-hangings), classic cartoon-style creature featuring (think Iron Maiden’s fixation with mummies and zombies) and a host of in-betweens, before a more deep-seated connection was established in the mid-’80s. When death metal was born (in the USA) with the likes of Death, Possessed, and particularly Necrophagia, our current case-in-point, it made a connection. Wittingly or unwittingly, these teenage musicians caught in the glorious daze of unshackled, youthfully exuberant excess that fuelled their burning creative drives to up thrash metal’s aggression and/or impact, forged a bond between the brutal “death metal” music they created and the brutal breed of horror films that followed on from ’70s shock landmarks like The Exorcist and The Texas Chainsaw Massacre—which themselves were digging steadily ever deeper into the worm-infested horror underground as the slasher-franchise—and censorship-infested ’80s rolled onward.

Death metal had its basic template, and thus at least in principle, “gore metal” was born. With a little help from Carcass and Autopsy this carnage-fixated cross-pollination was given a curvaceous cadaver in which to enclose itself—and after Cannibal Corpse and Obituary suitably dumbed things down, death metal became an institution that today supports them, along with a mere handful of others, as full-time career musicians.

But somewhere in the shuffle, the real horror got lost. For whatever its virtues and vast potential playing field when viewed from a musical perspective, death metal qua horror is today cliché-ridden in the extreme. As such, it makes perfect sense that—whatever their connections to the style’s roots—Necrophagia should today distance themselves from the DM tag.

“What we do is so far from death metal,” says Killjoy, the driving force behind the band since their inception, circa 1983.

“I don’t see any comparison between us and Cannibal Corpse, and to me, they define death metal. When we started there was no term for what we were doing—it was labelled death metal, but I never called it that back then, and neither did Chuck [Schuldiner, of Death and later Control Denied]. Someone else came up with that. But I just think that we’ve progressed beyond any already-defined category. For me, Necrophagia is just extreme metal put together using elements of horror movie soundtracks.”

Evidently we’re dealing with “horror metal” here: it’s those two elements in their most barely defined forms that are both inextricably linked and forever shackled, as they march under Necrophagia’s black-blood-vomiting banner.

GORE IS THE LAW NO MORE Killjoy’s contribution as the brains behind Necrophagia’s original, influential aesthetic was undoubtedly to the “gore” side of horror qua metal—just look at the cover of their 1987 Season of the Dead debut, copied almost wholesale by Cannibal Corpse only a few years later. But horror is about a lot more than just gore. Thus it was that, in 2003, when Necrophagia released the superlative Divine Art of Torture, it was not adorned with gutchurn-inducing artwork, unlike its three predecessors.

Some suspected that the cover painting—which pays fitting tribute to vintage horror film posters, being a Basil Gogos original—was chosen in an effort to reach out to horror film rather than metal music fans, judging by the fact that it clearly depicted Brazilian horror legend Coffin Joe (to whom the whole album is dedicated) and had nary a spot of blood or inch of entrails anywhere. But the truth is far simpler.

“I just really liked the painting and wanted it on there, and I paid a lot of money out of my own pocket so that we could have it as the cover. But it was a selfish cover, and it was a break

EM BRACE THE END / VULYTR

with tradition,” Killjoy confesses. “Going right back to Season… our covers had always been very gory. That was my way of just not caring if it was following something that I started, not caring enough to say: we have to; we’re expected to do this. For me, personally, the cover fitted the mood of the record, and that was it.”

The exact same thing goes for the cover of Necrophagia’s latest, the long-awaited Harvest Ritual Vol. I, whose theme is ever so slightly satanic...

“It has gotta be the most used cliché centrepiece ever to have an inverted Jesus,” Killjoy volunteers. “I’m in no way trying to jump on a trend or present that as an original concept.

It’s a very direct, very easy-to-digest, very simplistic cover, but at the same time it reflects a side of horror that we’ve never really explored visually and taken to that extreme. I felt we needed to do that.

“I think it’s pretty unexpected, by our standards, to have something that’s more on a satanic edge or whatever,” he adds.

“But it’s not the way Deicide or someone would do it. It reflects more the mood of The Omen or The Exorcist. I’m taking the occult, satanic part of those movies the way my mind is visualising it. It’s not like, ‘Satan sells.’”

TIME WEIGHTS FOR NO MAN Where TDAOT was made under pressurised conditions, being written in two months and recorded in one during trying times of “record company disputes,” Necrophagia insisted on dictating their own terms when creating HRV.I—an absolute necessity when working on a record with such grand, hithertounrealised-anywhere ambitions.

“Harvest Ritual was a very long, complex process,” comments Killjoy. “We started in April of 2004 and just finished at the very end of January. Originally we wanted to have it out on Halloween 2004 and then follow up towards early Summer this year with ...Volume 2, but of course that went out the window really quick ’cause there was just no way to get the results we have now in that timeframe at all. This was not a cheap record by any stretch of the imagination.”

When all was said and done, Necrophagia emerged with a record that unleashes their catchy-yet-crushing combination of chainsaw guitar gut-busts and ’70s-prog-borrowing, horror-film-score-esque sounds in devastating, dynamic form via a well-rounded, Mark Prator-engineered production (“He said the vocals were the weirdest he’d ever heard,” claims Killjoy).

HRV.I is Necrophagia’s best album yet; a direct but grand (and suitably grandiose) progression from its predecessor.

“We’ve delivered what I have no doubt is our best record,” he adds with conviction. “I know everyone says that when they make a new record—as an artist, you always want to out-do what you’ve done. But the previous thing we did was Goblins Be Thine. That was not our best record, and when it came out I did zero interviews for it because I think that was just like when you go to a drive-in and there’s a little short film or a trailer on before the main feature. Kinda like a prelude to what could happen. I think a lot of people misconstrued where we were headed, ’cause there was a lot of synthesizer and non-metal stuff on Goblins..., and people seemed to get the impression that Necrophagia was going to evolve into Enoch [Killjoy’s sideproject with Mirai which primarily utilises spatial soundscapes and synthesizers in an attempt to create the ultimate experience of aural horror—PS]. For me, that was a good feeling: let people think that.”

THE WRITE STUFF Harvest Ritual will be the first full-length that Necrophagia have released less than four years distant from its predecessor, and the band’s next record is expected by early 2007 at the very latest.

Why the recent burst in writing speed? Apparently, it’s the

rather fitting result of the band members feeding off each other.

“With Divine Art and Harvest Ritual it was honestly a very collective effort,” says Killjoy. “I write a lot of the riffs and structures of the songs based on how I foresee it coming along vocally. The core of writing is still myself, Frediablo and Fug, but you have Mirai and Iscariah composing a song each for their respective instruments on Harvest Ritual. By the time Titta gets to it he puts his own feel into it, and he often has ideas to change parts too.”

Though almost every member composed at least one song for HRV.I all by his lonesome—ex-Immortal man Iscariah being particularly notable for having penned the catchy-as-chlamydia “crypt single,” “London—13 Demon Street,” of which more later—it is Sigh-seasoned synth player Mirai who has perhaps played the greatest individual part in bringing Killjoy’s morbid vision(s) to life.

“Mirai is truly an evil genius. His mind doesn’t work like a normal person’s mind,” says Killjoy with enthusiasm. “That being said, with Enoch and with Necrophagia, it has to fit with what we’re doing, and he is so great at taking suggestions.

He’ll come to me and say, ‘How do you want this?’ and if I explain it to him he’ll get it right off the bat. He is just absolutely amazing at interpreting what fits the song or what I personally have in mind. Him being in the band has elevated us to the point I envisioned three or four years ago. Necrophagia needs synthesizers, but they’ll never play an overall bigger part than they do in our sound now.”

AN ENSEMBLE EXECUTION Though arguably the first metal artist to use recordings taken from horror films as intros, Killjoy today avoids such samples except in special cases. HRV.I’s sole regression in this respect is “Excommunicated,” based on the Blind Dead films. For “Return to Texas,” lyrically a take on how the first ...Chainsaw Massacre film could have continued, Necrophagia chose to painstakingly recreate the film’s iconic opening score using violin and camera-clicking sounds, rather than use a sample.

And when a truly horrible voice was needed to introduce Iscariah’s aforementioned contribution to the album—which is also its first video—Bill Moseley (House of 1000 Corpses, Army of Darkness) stepped into the booth.

“He’s a friend of mine, really liked ‘13 Demon Street,’ and was just totally into doing it,” says Killjoy. “He did some random things, but in the end I wrote the announcer bit out for him, ’cause I thought his stuff sounded kinda like his Chop Top character in Texas Chainsaw 2. I had a very specific image in mind of him being a DJ at a radio station and being a big fan as well.

So that’s why he says ‘new crypt single’ instead of ‘new hit single’. Then at the end of the song he starts losing his mind.”

Bill Moseley will be appearing in the video. However, another friend of Killjoy’s who was due to guest on HRV.I didn’t make the album’s final cut—and you won’t believe who it was...

“Sebastian Bach was going to do some stuff but there was a really bad snowstorm in New Jersey.” explains Killjoy. “He will definitely be doing something for Necrophagia though. I think Sebastian is 100 per cent one of the coolest, nicest, most talented guys out there, and there are some things that he can do, that I’ve heard him do, that believe it or not will fit. It’s definitely gonna happen.”

I think you can bet on that: as Necrophagia stand now, nothing seems destined to stand in their way.

“Everyone is fully dedicated,” gushes Killjoy. “We all do things on the side, but when it’s time to tour, write or record, whatever else is going on gets totally pushed to the backburner. We have the freedom of knowing that if there’s something that we want or need to do, everyone is 100 per cent willing to drop what they’re doing and do it. That has made me, personally, very much more into this.”

By Paul Schwarz

g n i m m a J r Culty k

By Nathan T. Bir NESS D A M E H T N I E G A S S E AM So, I’m at home one day, working (read: probably downloading porn) when the phone rings. After debating whether I should answer it or not, I pick up and the publicist from Abacus Recordings immediately starts going on about a band they’ve recently signed, how indefinably brutal and amazing they are and could you please let me know how much you love it when the advance arrives? Now, this particular publicist is an A1 stand-up dude who’s simply doing his job, but when you’ve been in this racket for as long as I have, a lot of this dick stroking goes in one ear, out the other and crashing through the solarium window. Thus, when the debut by Sacramento’s Embrace the End arrived the next day, I threw it on with absolutely no feelings of anticipation. Damn it if this wasn’t one time I should’ve actually paid attention to a label’s blah, blah, blahing because Counting Hallways to the Left absolutely crushes, kills and destroys like an illegal underground atomic weapons test. Yes, this album is brutal—okay, fucking brutal—as tracks like “After Me the Floods” and “It Ate Everybody” take about half their durations to introduce your ears to a nutmeg grater. However, there’s more to this band than just meticulous thrash/grind riffs and kneecap implodin’ breakdowns.

Embrace the End utilise an abundance of melody in a near-schizophrenic juxtaposition and layering of off-the-cuff spastic riffs, throbbing and effective breakdowns and quasi-screamo guitar duels (played overtop frantic blast beats, natch) that has me picturing Drowningman and Shai Hulud versus Kreator and Napalm Death in a winnertake-all tag-team thumb war of the ages.

“There’s definitely a conscious decision, when we write our songs, to keep things interesting,” explains Pat, one half of the band’s vocal crew, about the importance of melody amid the mayhem. “It’s not really fun to listen to a record that’s 30 or 40 minutes of crushing blast beats; it loses something over time. We try to just keep things as diverse as we can by putting in some nice, melodic pretty parts. I don’t know, I always enjoy hearing it, and everyone else does. They’re definitely there because we thought they’re part of the sound.”

That Embrace the End is able to sound so fresh is not only a triumph when one looks at the overcrowded extreme music scene and subsequent battle to be the most brutal, but also because the septet consists of current members of First Blood and Killing the Dream, bands that aren’t exactly known for their overwhelming uniqueness. As it turns out, Embrace the End’s isn’t exactly the side project they’ve been made out to be.

“Originally, this wasn’t a side project; it happened before we branched off into some of the other bands and those other bands started to take precedence. We started getting back into this band about a year-and-a-half ago, so it’s like a resurgence, even if it has the look of a side project from the outside.”

How are things different after all the time off?

“We’re definitely taking things more seriously than we ever did and it’s definitely turned into the main focus for everyone as we’re stepping back from our other projects. When things first fell apart, the band kind of wasn’t going anywhere, people lost focus and there were creative differences. We took time off and regrouped and started working on stuff that everyone was really enjoying and it naturally developed.”

For Pat and his bandmates, Embrace the End isn’t simply an outlet for the realisation of their collective brutal metalcore fantasies or a medium for cranking out music their other bands frowned upon. Embrace the End have a message within the musical madness and aren’t at all hesitant in expressing it.

“Personally, this is the only band I’m working with right now, and this band is a little bit more politically driven than any of the other bands I’ve worked with. I felt like this was a really good time to do something like that, to bring back some sort of purpose and value to aggressive music. I feel that’s lacking these days in a lot of different facets. We’re all into veganism and the concept of animal rights, but it’s not necessarily just about veganism for animal rights purposes. It’s about creating a social awareness about the effects our society has on the environment and that the lifestyle that our society leads is detrimental to themselves and the planet. It all kind of culminates on the theme that everyone today seems to be short-sighted and reactionary and people don’t take a step back to analyze what’s happened in the past to stop it from happening again.”

And, of course, there’s a considerable tie-in with these above-mentioned themes, the album’s title, the institutional feel to the artwork/design, and the CD booklet being printed on recycled paper. Embrace the End definitely walk the walk. Does Pat ever find it frustrating when his band’s message gets pushed aside, lost or ignored by the average extreme music fan?

“Yeah, definitely,” agrees the singer, “but the best thing to do is instill some positive ideas into people; even if it’s lost on most people, it won’t be lost on everyone.”

By Kevin Stewart-Panko

“I listen to a lot of ‘70s rock music, but mostly I’m into early David Bowie, The Stooges, early Alice Cooper, late ‘60s Velvet Underground and such. Even my fondness for ‘80s Sonic Youth might be heard in Vultyr’s sound.”

Now how often do you hear that coming straight from a black metal band? Never, most likely, but Finland’s Vultyr are cut from a different black cloth. Like the Rolling Stones’ Exile on Main Street if it came from the Northern Heritage rehearsal room or, at their grungiest/crungiest, if Drakkar Productions released Pussy Galore’s Groovy Hate Fuck as a demo-tape, this duo’s an enigma wrapped up in a paradox—but, rest easy, one well and truly grounded in the blackest of metals.

“Musically, it’s one of those rare genres where you can find honesty of an expression these days,” states vocalist/guitarist Spectre about his personal understanding of BM. “I get nothing from the over-produced, well-marketed nonsense. Polished production and flawless musicianship just don’t resonate if the music evokes no feeling.

Music’s a form of expression born of a creative need, not a competition or a marketing plan. Ideologically, black metal underlines the individual. Black metal’s essentially anti-Christian, and for me it’s against one-dimensional thoughtlessness or anyone who cannot form an opinion or thought of his own.”

And that assertion is certainly played out by Vultyr’s fourth and latest (and greatest) album, Philosophy of the Beast. Despite being wrapped in a truly eye-damaging cover, Philosophy finds these Finnish fiends relishing the rivetheaded, rock-out traditions of the underground ‘80s, drawing such (oc)cults as Tank and Tormentor and even Razor into the fray and dumping copious amounts of sewage dredged up from the same pool of filth Finland’s way-underground BM scene is renown for. What results—and extending from the immortal archetype of the Stooges’ Fun House, at least to these damaged ears—is an elegantly wasted romp of a most time-less/-ravaged tenor.

“The concept was to make a sort of ‘live in the basement’-sounding album,” says Spectre of the exceptionally dank ‘n’ drunken recording. “It’s pretty much first takes and that’s it—cranking the amps for natural distortion, no tricks and fancy effects, nothing corrected. The songs were written in very weird states of consciousness and recorded while hung over.”

So, what exactly is the “Philosophy of the Beast”?

“Simply, it’s about bringing the primal senses to the surface,” the man summarizes the album’s lyrical grist. “Modern society’s made us more distant from nature, making the animal in us idle. However, the nature of the beast is still within every man, you just have to listen to it.

“If your medium is black metal,” Spectre delves deeper, “your message is within, since there is no black metal without the message.”

But what of the Message behind the Medium of album-highlight, “Vultyr Culture,” which in more ways than one approximates ’74-’76 Aerosmith gone black-FUCKINGmetal?

“I think the lyrics in ‘Vultyr Culture’ pretty much explain themselves,” the songwriter contends, “‘This world is a fucking prostitute, going cheaper while growing old’.

And yes, we had an idea of making a ‘70s-style rocker with harsh, ‘live’ black metal sound with this song—I’m glad to hear you think it works.”

Surprisingly, all this underlines the fact there’s now lyrics printed within the liner to Philosophy, whereas in the past they left everything to the imagination—including, most importantly, who exactly was in the band. And although rumors have spread as to Vultyr’s membership, some would contend that this “mystery” has indeed lessened while others would argue this development has simply made the enigma that much more bizarre…

“In general,” comes Spectre’s contention, “lyrics are a very important part of music. It’s just natural to include lyrics to our own releases, too, as our pronunciation isn’t exactly according to the Oxford standard. There’s no mystery, we’ve just kept a low profile and let the albums speak for themselves—the rest is irrelevant.”

Seriously, though—what’s with that cover?

“Good or bad, that’s completely matter of opinion,” asserts drummer/bassist Godslayer, the man also responsible for the new album’s “artwork.” “It’s an abstract vision that describes the awakening of primordial senses, the animal instincts within one’s mind.”

So, all things considered, could Vultyr feasibly be the filthiest version of BM? “It’s a matter of opinion,” concludes Spectre, “but I don’t think many people would label us as ‘filthy black metal,’ and I don’t think that’s exactly the direction we’re going, either. We’ve always tried to maintain a certain grooviness.”

Alas, enigmas never rest… www.solistitium.com

15

NAPALM DEATH

16

By Adrian ‘The Energizer’ Bromley

Napalm Death singer Mark “Barney” Greenway has always been one of the better interviewees over the years. Not to say I didn’t like talking to Ronnie James Dio (he is always great) or Peter Steele (gotta love his dark humour), but Greenway always has this casual ‘I’ll meet you in a pub for a few pints and we’ll chat’ kind of vibe. Sure the conversations I had this time around sees the frontman voicing his opinions on politics, the music business and religion with as much gusto and fury as the grinding noise that his band exudes, but that’s what makes Greenway and his band standout.

Not only are they musical pioneers, but they’ve always got something to say.

The band just released The Code Is Red ... Long Live The Code (Century Media), a face-crushing, grind assault that many have called the band’s best work in years. Greenway sees it as a reflection of the sign of the times.

“Using the title as a reference point, the general theme of this album is based on the general fear and paranoia that we’ve been living the last few years. There was a pivotal event in September of 2001 and no one will deny that, but that has been used as a very convenient platform ever since.

And now we are led to believe that ‘Mr. Terrorist’ is lurking around every corner and that any day now he is going to drop a bomb through our letterbox. I travel around the world—and I am just one person—but I am a pretty perceptive person and I think this just a real scam at the same time. I think that

On topic!

years ago we’d be saying nothing like the Patriot Act would never happen, but now we’ve reached that point. Where is it going to go next? Will we be imprisoned for protesting against other issues? They can keep me there and fabricate anything about why I am detained. It is a deeply depressing scenario that we are facing.”

It seems as though, especially the last few years, that each new Napalm Death record has been very straightforward and informative about a certain issue, something a lot of other metal bands that dabble in politics or other issues have trouble with.

“Thanks for the kind words,” he replies. “It is a difficult balancing act on the ethical standpoint because obviously, I personally, want to make points that are not cliché. It is difficult to escape that at times. There are plenty of Bushbashers out there right now and good on them, I don’t have a problem with that, but sometimes it has become almost the automatic thing to do for some people. It has lost a bit of its impact, I think. What I have tried to do is not speak in cliches, like come out and say ‘Bush is bad! He totally sucks! Fuck you Bush!’ You have to give reason and insight into why you feel this why and why you are saying the things and I think some bands don’t always make apparent.

“And another thing about writing about subject matter like this is that some people might call us an intelligent band and I would kind of balk at that. I know this might sound over-

Paul II and the same goes for Pope Benedict XVI. I say that because I was bon into a Catholic family in Birmingham and my mom went to Catholic school and the nuns there brutalized her. You may have heard similar stories before. I find the Catholic Church to be deeply oppressive. The whole society needs to be blown wide open and for people to know about the underhand things that are going on. John Paul II, who just passed away, looked like a very gentle man on the surface, but how can you possible condone such things as the widespread problem of AIDS in Africa? What is the Catholic Church’s stance on condoms? They won’t touch them with a barge pole. Henceforth, you get places in Africa where very strong Catholic factions exist and where people will not go against those teachings and don’t use condoms and other forms of protection and as a result people are dying from AIDS. How can you ever condone something like that? That is absurd. That really bothers me. Their attitude towards abortion bothers me. So does their stance on homosexuality. There are tons of things I could come up with but we’d be sitting here for a week. That is basically why I can’t take the Pope seriously and I bet a lot of Catholics will be deeply angry with me, but at the end of the day the facts speak for themselves.”

Let’s talk about the recording of the new album. Does it get tiring after so many years of turning out albums and studio work?

“As a band we know we are not going to change the world, but at least we can write awareness.” - Mark “Barney” Greenway we are being convinced—and there is a certain part of the population swallowing this—that our civil liberties should be eroded because that is the only way we will maintain general security.

“I totally refute that,” he continues. “We have gotten to a point in England, now I know you have a certain amount of this in Partiot Act over there in the U.S. which I have read and skimmed through it and understand it, but over here the parliament try to pass a bill and it was refused at that point and rightfully so. They want to have the powers to, if they suspect that there is a possibility that you might consider the possibility in indulging in terrorist acts, that they can imprison you indefinitely with no legal recourse. It is at there discretion. This is a difficult situation to be in. It is like going back to fascist Germany in the 1940s. The governments are a lot more powerful in the world right now than they ever have been before, and that isn’t Bush-bashing, that is a general observation. Their support networks are getting more powerful as well. In the case of George W. Bush, the oil companies are posting some of the most insane financial profits. When the support networks are so profitable—and profit means power—where is our response to that as defenseless citizens? We have no recourse and there is no response to that. We are talking about this now. If we were speaking five

analytical, but I don’t want to appeal to university graduates by writing thesis-like lyrics and whatnot. You have to have a general level of understanding. You need to have well-reasoned points that need to be simple and concise. That is the whole balancing act and I think that is why Napalm Death [guitarist Mitch Harris, bassist Shane Embury and drummer Danny Herrera] is sticking out of the crowd. As a band we know we are not going to change the world, but at least we can write awareness. And when people have that awareness, people look at those things and they go, ‘That is really credible, truthful and logical stuff’ and they develop from there.”

Is there any subject you won’t tackle?

“Nope. Anything goes. Nothing is taboo for me to tackle. I will always try to get my teeth into something. A lot of other bands have tackled women’s issues and I too have always wanted to do that as well. Now, some people might ask now can I come in from that perspective. It doesn’t matter. I believe in equality, therefore on such issues as abortion. I believe it is a women’s choice. It all sounds like an obvious choice but it all goes back to the opinion that I believe the church or state should have no control over a woman and whether she has access to an abortion.”

Okay, let’s talk current. What about the new Pope.

“What do I think about the Pope? I didn’t like Pope John

“Mate, I’ll be honest, if I wasn’t excited about a Napalm Death album and wanting to record the material, then we wouldn’t bother doing it anymore. There were certain albums by the band in the 90s that I had a hard time getting my head around, and I was out of the band for a while and it was a puzzling time for me, but when Shane and Mitch send me four-track recordings of new songs I’m excited. I’m here at home writing lyrics to the music and jumping around at the same time! Mitch and Shane, as guitarists, are very underrated. To avoid being arrogant, I am kind of stepping outside the band and saying this, but the riffs they come up with are full of power and impact. I don’t know many guitarists that can touch them. Their riffs excite me and it just helps me put a new twist on certain subjects we have tackled before as well as new ones.”

Greenway concludes, “Being in a band that is considered pioneering, I don’t let it go to my head. Where can I go from here if Napalm Death finishes tomorrow? I have been in a band that many consider pioneering, as well as a band that takes music intensity to the nth degree. Where can I go? You can’t. I could be lucky I guess and fall into a band that sells a shitload of records—but am I ever going to get that rush again? I very much doubt it.”

17

DARKEST HOUR

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Darkest Hour guitarist Mike Schleibaum is in Las Vegas on vacation with his lil’ lady and some friends—yet he still finds time to talk to Unrestrained! about their forthcoming album, Undoing Ruin (Victory).

“I could have easily decided not to do this interview, but I didn’t because this is what I do, this is what I do. This is my band. There is no reason to have a vacation from all of this. You sit around since you were 15 and wanted to go out and tour and play your music. Why would you want to take a vacation from this? I’d rather, even though I love Las Vegas and want to have this vacation time, be in the studio right now working on new material. I’m very proud of what we have done with this new album and I think it says a lot about us as a band and I want to talk about it.”

The album in question is Undoing Ruin—an 11-track, 37+minute rollercoaster ride of aggression, atmosphere and the band’s Gothenburg/hardcore/thrash attack—was produced by Devin Townsend (Soilwork, Lamb Of God) and is easily the band’s strongest/diverse offering to date.

“It was a much different environment than the last album [2003’s Hidden Hands of a Sadist Nation was recorded at Studio Fredman in Sweden],” he says of recording with Townsend. “In Sweden, it was very to the point, with you playing parts and Swede’s saying, ‘Okay, try that again.’ With Devin, it was very hands-on and he really felt what we were doing and it was like he was a part of the band.

There was no barrier between band and producer.”

“Working with Devin was cool because he was the first producer that we [guitarist Kris Norris, bassist Paul Burnette, singer John Henry and drummer Ryan Parrish] were a bit scared by, but at the same time we went up to him and said, ‘Here are our songs. You are the producer, what do you think?’ We’ve never let anyone come into the inner circle of the band—it was cool. He could have taken the music and made the music off the wall and wacky and a real trip, but instead he took the power we gave him and made this band find an identity but at the same time keeping that identify.

When we were writing the record we set out to have a theme of just trying to do something different.

We weren’t going to do a hip-hop record, y’know? We wanted to push ourselves to the next level as a metal. As soon as Devin got into the mix he was like, ‘Hang on. You guys have to remember who you are and keep that involved with your band and you’ll loose everybody.’ I thought it was very interesting because he has a reputation of working with band’s sounds and changing them and people blaming him, kind of what happened with Soilwork.”

That is a great example of the blame he’s been dealt for his work.

“That’s the record those guys wanted to do,” he states, “They wanted to make a record like that with all the melodies and Devin helped them get it and they’ve done that since then with the follow-up albums. Same goes for what happened with Lamb Of God and people blaming him for the changes. Devin is just the producer, he doesn’t come in there and say, ‘Okay I am gonna fuck this band up!’—that is the impression I had of him in the beginning. I thought he was going to screw things up!

What happened was he came in and told us he was going to keep the identity and just help us make the best Darkest Hour album and we did.

“I was ready for the drum samples and rapping,” he chuckles. “We’ve done the metal and thrash records, we’d done all we can do and we know who we are and we don’t have to prove ourselves to anyone. We can push this whatever way we want to go, but I’m glad he had the mindset he had going into the studio with us because it was the mature and right way to think about it.”

I love track #2 (“Convalescence”) because that is where John kind of has the clean vocals during the chorus. A subtle, one-line part of the chorus where he sings normal almost, which eventually leads back into his manic screams.

“People are gonna ask about that song. There is 5 seconds where John does something different and ...”

I jut in, “But people are going to notice that within a Darkest Hour album.”

“Seriously…if you think that song is a lil’ too much for you, just go onto the next song with is a straight up trashing Darkest Hour song. Honestly when I play that song for “normal people”— not metalheads—they’ll think John is screaming the whole time! How picky do you want to be? We could write eight thrashing songs for the whole record but I think that would be a disservice to all the fans of the band and more importantly a diserveice to all of us. We’ve been doing this for 10 years and we should be able to do whatever we want with this band.”

Starting out ten years ago, did you ever think you’d be at this point with the band—musically or success wise?

He says, “Sometimes I wish I could go back to 1998 and play this new album for me back then and see what I think. That would be cool,” he muses. “As for where we are now, personally, I know why we have made every decision we made, especially musically. Why have we gone this way musically? It is a real adventure that’s for sure. It is sometimes real painful for 5 guys who have been friends forever arguing how they want a record to sound and getting at each other’s throats all the time, but when you step back and look at the band, it is interesting to see how the band has grown.”

Do you think you’ll ever get to a point where you’ll reconfigure the sound/style of Darkest Hour?

Says Schleibaum, “That is a dangerous question because I can say no and then later feel totally different about all of this. We retain the rights to do what we want to do, but I will say we are not idiots. I’ll fucking wave the flag. Metallic sucks and I’ll stand up and say it. Those guys are my heroes and all those records early on influenced me. I loved those early albums but the new Metallica records are bullshit. I can say that Darkest Hour will never do anything like that to the people that like this band. For us, if there is gonna be a drastic change, fuck it, we’ll start another band. This is the music we play in Darkest Hour. We all like all types of music but when we come together this is what you get. We’ll never get together and collectively as a unit and say, ‘Let’s sound like Thursday.’”

Tell me about the album title and its significance.

“This was a really hard album to title,” he explains. “Musically there was a theme happening, with all the songs written in the order that they appear on the record. But a lot of the themes lyrically are different from the last record because they are not as political. I mean, there are some political themes but it is more personal. A lot of it is stuff with what John has been dealing with in the last few years since we wrote and recorded the last album. Undoing Ruin kind of says what he has been trying to do, which is wrestling with the demons he been dealing with for a long time. He is trying to take his life back. It is sort of a positive spin on things. This record is more about him and his life and probably the sort of things a lot of other people are dealing with in their lives as well. Undoing Ruin isn’t just another record about this fucked up country we live in. It is about certain things and occurrences that are real to many of us and we hope our fans can connect that way just as much as they do with the music we play.”

That’s why you keep doing this.

“Yeah. I mean it is difficult to do this and sometimes when you are asleep on the side of a road at a truck stop awake at 3 a.m., you think about just why you are doing this. Then you think about why you really do this. I mean, we can sit around and bitch that we have no money and are struggling to get on certain tours, but we are lucky. We are able to make records, we can go on tour and I get to do interviews with people like you, Adrian, that are going to write about us.”

He closes off, “What keeps it going for us is that people are at least paying attention to us a lil’ bit and that keeps us around and makes us push harder to get the Darkest Hour name out there. The main thing for us in terms of being successful at this is being able to reach people and interest them. I have to pay rent and I need to eat, so yeah, I want our records to sell and do well, but I’m more concerned that people find something in the music and something they can relate to in the lyrics. Being able to keep doing this has been the real success of the band.”

A Few Steps forward, No Steps Back

By Adrian ‘The Energizer’ Bromley

19

20

GREEN CARNATION

“Rotting carnage” must be one of the last phrases to creep into people’s heads when they hear the words “Green Carnation,” words more closely aligned with blooming plants, Oscar Wilde’s aesthetic philosophy and, most significantly, the heavy, art-drenched rock of the Norwegian band.

According to vocalist Kjetil Nordhus, “rotting carnage” is pretty close to what Green Carnation was originally meant to convey, but these days the band has embraced the literal meaning—the flower—while treading a path far removed from the name’s brutal roots.

As artistic, and even flowery, as that path may be, Green Carnation’s latest album, The Quiet Offspring, sits on a solid rock foundation—Green Carnation’s sound, admits founding member and guitarist Tchort, is less about metal now than it is about “progressive and atmospheric rock.” This shift in focus developed out of live performances supporting 2001’s Light of Day, Day of Darkness, and became apparent on the more down to earth follow-up, A Blessing in Disguise.

Tchort explains: “We built Blessing on the themes of Light of Day that we thought did very well live, the sort of rock beats, the really groovy parts… and The Quiet Offspring is a progress of what we achieved on Blessing in Disguise. We have our very progressive moments, for example, ‘A Place For Me’ [on the Quiet Offspring], and then we also have this type of song that you could predict from ‘Crushed to Dust’ or ‘Myron and Cole’ from Blessing in Disguise, these more straightforward rock songs. We tried to continue that path but also to involve a little more progressive stuff again, and I’m sure we will go even more progressive on the next album.”

Songwriting credits for The Quiet Offspring shift as often as the songs themselves, and yet the album is remarkably whole, despite the fact that each band member arrives at the recording studio with songwriting virtually complete—no collaboration, no rehearsal. Tchort admits there was some concern going into The Quiet Offspring that things might not work so smoothly with more writers in the mix: newer members Kenneth Silden (keyboards) and Michael Krumins (guitars), and even previous (occasionally still contributing) keyboardist Bernt Moen, in addition to Tchort himself, Nordhus and bassist/guitarist Stein Roger Sordal. “We were a little afraid that this album would sound like a compilation of different bands, but I guess when everyone puts their work into it and they know the basic sound of Green Carnation and you have the same production, it kind of melts into shape.”

Sharing writing duties democratically required some adjustment from Tchort, who is used to taking responsibilities (including, these days, management and booking) on his own shoulders.

“I think it was natural progress for the others,” he explains, “but for me, being the one who wrote the early material basically alone—but the first album with X Botteri—it was a big change. I needed to adapt to the idea that other people were going to put words on my songs or to leaving more responsibility for the Green Carnation sound to others. But in the end I think of

21

Green Carnation as a band, so that was something I had to accept, that the others wanted to participate and be a part of that sound. This is not a solo project so I should be able to give up some of that writing responsibility and share it with the others, and I can tell from the results that I did the right thing.”

Recording away from home may have helped solidify the sound of The Quiet Offspring, as this time Green Carnation packed up the gear and headed to a studio in the south, escaping jobs, girlfriends and all the other distractions of home. “We felt like we wanted to have a more ‘band’ feeling to the album and that’s why we decided to go somewhere where you have to be in the studio all the time. It was just us, the studio and the album that we had to record. And I mean, this is the French Riviera, so we had a vacation at the same time. It was perfect.”

Identifying the final product of that studio time as “Green Carnation” is easy enough, but slotting it into generic categories is more complicated. As a not-so-metal band strongly associated with the metal scene, Green Carnation occupies an awkward place, and Tchort is well aware of the band’s hybrid identity. “With Green Carnation it has been a little difficult, to be honest, because I feel somewhat stuck between two different sides of music,” he says. “I mean with me and Anders Kobro, who was in the band, drawing the more extreme metal fans—well, Green Carnation is too mellow for them but on the other hand it’s too hard for normal people.”

Having Season of Mist release Green Carnation material outside North America doesn’t necessarily help the situation, Tchort explains. “When I go to a record store, I will see the album in the extreme metal section, because our record label is an extreme metal label. And it just didn’t seem right when someone like blackmetal.com would do a review of Blessing in Disguise, because it isn’t meant for a black metal fan. Yes, if they enjoy music and have an open mind, but most of the black metal people don’t.

“The End Records fits us, as a band, much better and have done an amazing job for us in the U.S.,” he continues.

“Season of Mist did a good job for us in Europe, but still I think we haven’t quite reached our audience. Blessing In Disguise, when they released it, set new standards for them in terms of good reviews and awards like album of the month in some major magazines and also in North America, and they had never experienced that before with their extreme metal bands. But on the other hand, it’s not only the reviews that will help you sell. You have to reach out to the correct audience and I think we have not achieved what we could have.”

What Green Carnation does share with many metal bands, besides some seriously heavy-weight riffs, is a gloomy outlook. But even in the midst of despair, The Quiet Offspring offers the odd flash of optimism, at least musically, and however unintentional. “I think that has a lot to do with the fact that we spent the whole studio session together and we were very enthusiastic about the album, the recording process and the material,” Tchort says. “It’s not like we make happy stuff. Our music is dark, mostly a sad or melancholic style, but some people have mentioned

that it seems like there is hope in Green Carnation in some way, and I can’t say why.”

Definitely falling in the realm of sad and melancholy, “Child’s Play” parts I and II on The Quiet Offspring may be the most moving and disturbing songs on the album. “Child’s Play” is dedicated to the memory of a five-year-old boy, Pascal, who was sexually abused and murdered in Germany then buried in a quarry in France, and although the song is not actually about the child, his story deepens the mournfulness the music and lyrics evoke on their own. Part II is the eerier of the two songs, and it owes its existence to Tori Amos’s equally eerie version of Slayer’s “Raining Blood,” Tchort explains. “Her cover really touched me because it is so naked and she does it so well, so I asked our keyboard player [Moen] to make his own interpretation of ‘Child’s Play—Part I’ because I had it already recorded and because he is one of the best piano players I know. This is why we have the same lyrics for both, because it is the same song, just done by two different people looking at it and understanding it in two different ways. ‘Child’s Play—Part III’ is already recorded and that is totally different again, still very dramatic, but not as naked and stripped down. I guess you will hear it on a future release.”

What we also are likely to hear from Green Carnation in the future are parts II and III of Light of Day, Day of Darkness, because Tchort has begun work on what may become two more one-song albums. “With number one, or the first part, I had completed something. I used everything I had for this album so there was no need for a second part, and I did not want to force it because the first one came to me very naturally. For two or three years I didn’t think about it at all, but a few months ago I was working on non-music work and during those days I had a lot of ideas that were really good and it all led out from Light of Day. So I started working on them and I realized that I could build a second and probably a third album on those ideas.”

The release of Light of Day parts II and III – and maybe even a live performance of all three—is still a long way off.

Composing and arranging an album-length song is no quick process, and Tchort has also been writing for Carpathian Forest and Blood Red Throne, and for another multi-song Green Carnation release. In the meantime, there are tours to book and play as well, the live shows injecting the muchneeded energy and inspiration to keep Tchort writing. But without the touring, even without anyone listening, it’s not likely the music would stop flowing, or that the vision behind the music would change “Writing music is therapy for me,” he says. “I have to write my music for myself because if I start writing music and comparing it to what other people want me to write then I think it would be totally fucked and I wouldn’t be able to write anything. There would never be a Light of Day first part, for example, because everyone was against it. The drummer was against making a song lasting one hour, the record label was against it, and it ended up being their best seller because I blocked them out and said this is something I have to do because I had a vision about doing this. If people like what I do, in addition, then cool, that is great, but I listen to music, I write music, and I play music that is therapy for myself.”

And therapy for Tchort’s audience as well, even if he can’t let himself speculate about others’ responses to the music he creates. If the ever-shifting Green Carnation sound depends on Tchort and the rest of the band—Sordal, Nordhus, Krumins, Silden, and new drummer Tommy Jackson—following their own visions and writing for themselves before anyone else, only a fool would want them to try it any other way.

Ever Shifting, and Still Unmistakable b y L a u r a W i e b e Ta y l o r

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ABORTED

/ PSYCHOFAGIST

“We’re one of those bands that likes to bring changes to our sound and style with each new recording, but at the same time we want it to have the familiar Aborted sound that people have come to like,” says Aborted singer Sven De Caluwe. “It is important to try new things and make an effort to enhance what we did the last time around.”

The band’s new album The Archaic Abattoir (Olympic Recordings) is a solid follow-up to Goremaggedon (2003), a violent and surgically precise assault of gore-grind/thrash for 2005. No doubt this one will turn heads. Hell, maybe it’ll snap them off.

“We [guitarists Tace De Cloedt and Bart Vergaert, bassist Frederic Vanmassenhove, and drummer Gilles Dellecroix] wanted more of a varied record, one that offered a lot, as well as some groove,” he says of the album. “I know people reading that will think we slowed things down, but we didn’t. Actually this album has some of the fastest songs we’ve ever had and it seems a lot more balanced. It isn’t just all blast beats. But when the blast beats come in, they become more of the prime focus and they come across more powerful.”

Do you care about how your albums are received by your fans?

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“We look at it this way. Making a record for us is a big deal.

There is lots going on, sounds and styles adjusting and we’re just trying to make it all sound perfect. It’s a task, but at the same time, you can only do as much as you can with an album and you can’t really worry about if certain fans can’t get into it.

We make these records for our own tastes first and foremost.”

Is success important for the band?

“Of course it is,” he comments, “but maybe not as much as some other bands, you know? The ones that always want to be in the spotlight or on magazine covers, touring all over the place, et cetera. We don’t want to be the middle-class band just playing local shows and not doing much else. We want to make something with this band. We work hard for what we do and we definitely want to see results. We are no way occupied and/ or worried about the competition out there because like I said before, this is for us and only us. We want to enjoy ourselves and see how far we can take it.”

He continues, “It’s not like from one record to the next one we’ve become the next big thing, but we’ve appreciated the exposure and support we’ve gotten this far. I’ve noticed bands that break big and fast and become the next big thing the next month or so. They are going nowhere for the most part.

No thanks; we’ll take the hard work and move up in success album by album.”

Aborted once again pushes the boundaries with the lyrics, artwork, and album title for The Archaic Abattoir.

“For the longest time we were thinking about trying to come up with a concept-like record, to kind of continue on where we were going with Goremageddon,” the singer reveals. “At the time we were making this record I had just seen the remake of The Texas Chainsaw Massacre movie and I was really into it.

I was into the colours and just the atmosphere of the movie.

It inspired me. I kind of had this vision of that story carrying on with the surgeon from Goremageddon and him working out of this sick slaughterhouse or something like that where he would do real evil things. The cover alone sets the mood for this album, as does the artwork on the inside of the CD booklet.”

Imagery has always been important to Aborted.

“Yeah. We put a lot of work into it and while there is censorship out there, we try to get around it. The album artwork for this is gritty, but the photos on the inside are pretty sick. In Europe they really crack down on this stuff, especially Germany. For the release in some parts of Europe we have special slipcases that show art of just the abattoir and some skeletons on the outside, so there is no guts and hacked-up babies visible. We sort of censored it ourselves to avoid a problem. The stuff in the booklet on the inside makes up for it though,” he laughs. “It’s pretty disgusting but so in step with the storyline of this sick surgeon doing nasty things.”

Seems like a smart move on your part. At least you can get it into the stores somewhat hassle-free.

“Yeah,” he finishes, “Censorship can really hurt sales and getting music to the fans over here sometimes, if you have something they don’t like gracing the cover. But then again, our name is Aborted, so no doubt they’re watching us regardless,” he laughs.

Screaming Bloody Gore

By Adrian ‘The Energizer’ Bromley

Jazz-influenced grindcore is probably one of the more difficult musics to pull off successfully—it has to sound bizarre enough to alienate the straight grindcore fan, but it has to sound grindcore enough to alienate the non-metal general music listener.

That, and having a name containing the word “fag” (which you should be familiar with through every message board, forum and web page ever) makes it that much harder for a band to succeed.

By all accounts, then, I shouldn’t even be talking about .psychofagist. as they both play weird grindcore and go by that wonderful, attention-seeking name. If you judge your bands by those criteria, you’re probably missing out on one of the more interesting bands on the planet right now. Their self-titled debut CD (on Subordinate Productions) has a polarizing effect on people. Grind fans either love it or think it’s among the most annoying things they’ve ever heard.

Guitarist and effects man Stefano Ferrian debunks any rumours of homosexual intent with regards to .psychofagist.’s name—you know you’re wondering about it—thus: “It is not intentional. Our main aim when we sat down to choose our moniker was to find something that could assume different meanings to every person. Most of the time, people think that it means something like ‘psyche-feeder.’”

Ferrian is also not shy about giving his opinion of the Italian grind scene, either. “In Italy there are a lot of bands that if they were from a nation like USA, Sweden or Canada right now, they could be the major acts of labels like Relapse Records, Century Media or Nuclear Blast. In Italy there are really tons of cool bands, but the problem is that the underground scene doesn’t exist. The only underground genre that was strong enough to put some bands out in Italy was the hardcore genre in the 1990s. The Italian laws just kill all the underground bands and Italian guys don’t support the Italian scene. I’m sure that if a band is really worth something, the only thing to do is to keep on rockin’ until someone will take care about that.”

Subordinate Productions, of course, is trying to prove its charges’ worth to a world marketplace. Asked what Subordi-

nate’s future holds, Ferrian tries to prognosticate the success of the fledgling label. “The reason why Subordinate hit the ground like this is that [Subordinate owner] Gianpaolo Zanon really knows what to do to put a band out. I think that Subordinate could really be one of the main underground labels sooner or later.”

How would .psychofagist. figure in Subordinate’s long-term

By Cameron Archer strategy, though?

“Right now we’re fully satisfied with Subordinate,” answers Ferrian. “If in the future we get more attention by a major label we’ll make our choice. There are some good labels out there, but the one we really dream about is Relapse Records. I think that is just the best label out there for an extreme band. We’ll consider every future offer and it is not so obvious that a major label is always the best choice for a band.

“Right now I’m pretty satisfied,” says Ferrian of .psychofagist.’s crossover status—comparisons to a mixture of Cephalic Carnage and The Dillinger Escape Plan are common.

“That’s why I check every time we’re on the stage playing our songs live that our music fits with every kind of crowd and situation. Right now we’ve played everywhere and with everyone.

We’ve played with grindcore, crossover, death metal, gothic metal, brutal, hardcore bands and so on. Most of the time the crowd was impressed by our ‘sub-genre’ style. The reaction that always comes out is that the people literally love our music or simply hate it—nothing in-between…just hate or love. I think that the only way to put our music out is to play live everywhere with the coolest band possible headlining. That way we could play in front of a bigger crowd that, if they like us, will for sure spread the word.”

Is there a purpose for .psychofagist., though?

When Ferrian was asked the question, he seemed reflective answering it. According to Ferrian, “My opinion is that the underground scene needs bands that play their own style. Right now the underground is filled with tons of too-similar bands. I don’t know if our music is good or bad…I don’t care about that and I’m not the right person to judge that. In the same way I’m not the right person to judge if the underground needs our music. The only thing I could tell you is that we just play the .psychofagist. music. Of course, you could find a lot of influences in our songs but the final result is 1000 per cent .psychofagist. That’s our only aim. We couldn’t find any kind of sense in playing the same music as a thousand other bands.”

How does one promote oneself in the grindcore scene, then?

“Working really hard,” as Ferrian puts it. “Of course it is impossible to have any kind of profit on the band activity, but it is also impossible for all the other European underground bands. In fact, we don’t want to live upon the band profits. For us it will be enough to get from the band activity just the money we need for touring. Most of the time we don’t get much money to cover the travel costs. We hope that the situation will be better soon with the band’s name growing. If there’s a good chance for us to tour Europe with a well-known act before the end of 2005 I think a thing like that will be cool to get the name of the band out.”

26

WINTER OF APOCALYPSE

DEAD OF WINTER

/ WIDOW

27

Hatred and Disgust

By Adam Wasylyk

pics by Chris Bruni

It was only a couple of issues ago that Dead of Winter were featured in these pages for both a rehearsal and live recording—both of which exhibited the band in suitably raw and deadly forms. Recognizing the young talent herein, the upstart yet flourishing Canadian record label Profound Lore has issued the band’s debut full-length titled At the Helms of the Abyss. A blistering affair speed-wise, it features some of Dead of Winter’s most aggressive material to date, not to mention the always notable vocal prowess of Schizoid. A rampaging beast with a chilling awareness of all its faculties, At the Helms… makes no subtle or casual motions in regards to anything, either musically or lyrically—it’s brutal, unapologetic, and not to be taken lightly.

So how does such an album come to pass? Guitarist Typhon took on the task of speaking in regards to exactly this, as well as whatever else happens to come to mind.

“Basically we took four of our best demo tracks and four new songs that we had written; we felt the songs all flowed together very well and perfectly represented the first era of our saga,” begins Typhon, in analyzing how At the Helms of The Abyss came to be. “The opening track on the album is meant to immediately immerse the listener in violence, basically pushing them directly into the fray.

This song was written by our drummer and represents his utmost rage and utter contempt. The last three songs on the album (two of which were written mostly

by Schizoid) are probably the ones we are most proud of as far as being a pure expression of our diabolical intentions and the direction we are heading with our songwriting.”

So taking into account that their debut album contains both old and new material alike, was there any particular aim to be achieved here? And what should a first time listener expect from this particular Dead of Winter experience?

“Our only aim is to expel our black hatred, to exert a genuine work of hatred and disgust.

“We don’t really consider the listener when we create; honestly, we just try to satisfy our own need to expel our putrid energy. I assume that our music would garner a reaction of complete indifference, or perhaps disgust and shame. I can’t really say, but I suppose the listener should expect to be pummeled and battered severely.”

As Dead of Winter (rounded out by bassist Kacht and drummer Abyssious) play a both raw and bestial form of black metal, does the musical style of the band also mirror the tastes of its members in regards to this type of music?

What qualities within black metal do you personally enjoy, and hope that others see within Dead of Winter and equally enjoy?

North Carolina metallers Widow made their mark within the heavy metal world in 2003 with the blistering debut disc Midnight Strikes (Tribunal). It was a scorcher for sure, a real fireball of heavy metal gusto fuelled onward by morbid ideas, mouthwatering guitar solos and anthemic metal attitude. How could they top this release?

Fast forward to 2005 and the band is on the verge of unleashing the brilliant sophomore album On Fire (Cruz Del Sur), an energetic heap of heavy metal goodness that’ll have you headbanging until the wee hours of the morning.

“On Fire is the next step in our evolution of the band.

Midnight... was the beginning of our vision, but we wanted to make more straightforward songs,” says lead guitarist/vocalist Cristof.

“There were some really technical moments on the first album, and now we really just want to rock!

“We did all the recording in John E’s [guitarist/vocalist] home studio. Both albums were recorded there, but he figured out what he was doing on this one,” he continues. “Seriously, we got a much better guitar sound this time around. I am so much happier with it. I love the first album, and it has the right feeling in the songs, but I am glad this one is different because we didn’t want to do the same thing again. I am very pleased because we were able to capture the feel of these songs as well, so it really does take Midnight Strikes to the next level. Hopefully we won’t spill any beer on the computer so we can keep recording here,” he laughs.

You brought in a female vocalist (Lili) into the mix for On Fire and that has added a new dimension to the band. Was this what you wanted?

How did you know it would work?

“The lyrics tell their own story, and we felt that we [the band is rounded out by drummer Marc and bassist Josh] needed a female perspective with On Fire. On the first album, some very crazy things happened to the ladies in the lyrics. So this time around you get the male and female point of view. My death vocals always represent the evil side that exists in all of us, and this

Heavy Metal Know-How!

By Adrian ‘The Energizer’ Bromley

“Yes, our expressions do mirror our tastes [but] we all have slightly different inclinations when it comes to our personal choices to listen to. I personally enjoy music where the guitar is used in non-conventional ways—extreme note bends, sliding chords, pick slides, strange disharmonic meanderings, as well as stuff that has very fast chord changes. I think there is a certain type of extreme back metal that was developing before the Norwegian explosion. Basically, after Darkthrone, black metal became all about ambient riffing with no chord changes.

I am personally very interested in the earliest nineties style of black metal riffing that bands like Beherit, Blasphemy, Sadistik Exekution (The Magus only), Impaled Nazarene (their first one), Mystifier, Bestial Warlust and the like were producing.

It was actually more extreme and faster than death or grind, instead of being this mellower and atmospheric style. Our aim is to basically work alchemy between these differing and sometimes seemingly opposed styles of black metal and create something even more disgusting and hideous than either.”

Having penned a good portion of the lyrics on At the Helm of the Abyss, Typhon delved into the themes behind those words, and how they reflect upon the style of black metal Dead of Winter perform.

“Though some of the lyrics were written when our band was in its embryonic stages,” states Typhon, and continuing, “they still all represent the same themes.

Destruction—whether through self abuse, by the power of nature, or presented in more fantastical themes is what we are all about. The title track represents the realization of what this planet really is, and the places where this realization leaves you stranded is the point from which our next albums lyrics will develop.”

Speaking in relation to their future work I wanted Typhon to estimate, at this moment in time, how At the Helm of the Abyss will stand amongst their future creations.

“It is the beginning,” begins Typhon. “It was purposely titled At the Helm… because obviously it contains a double meaning. It means at the top the abyss about to descend, as well as in control, or at the wheel, of our descent. Basically we are going to make damn sure it only gets worse from here.

“We’ve only begun to scratch the surface,” concludes Typhon in explaining how close their new album comes to expressing the true essence of Dead of Winter.

“We are dedicated to the idea of pushing the boundaries of what has come to be known as ‘black metal.’ We insist on continuously pushing the limits and breaking into more extremes of terror and depravity. At the Helm… is the best we possible could have done at the time it was released, but we have already vastly improved our style and begun to create hymns that are incredibly more hideous.”

Enticing words needless to say, but raw talent and commitment to their craft will surely see Dead of Winter rise in prominence and reap the rewards.

really brought our stories to life even more on this album. I don’t want to give it all away, but there are stories on there of a preacher’s daughter having her way with the men of the cloth, reanimation, sexual encounters with ghosts...

We even continue the American Werewolf story, as the curse comes to our own hometown.”

I have to ask—what’s up with “Family Affair”? That song is so wrong, it’s great. Great male-female dual vocals, creepy lyrics and killer riffs. So King Diamond-esque...

“Cool! Thank you!” he says. “Well, it is an autobiography. We are all in relationships with family members, you know.” He laughs. “Actually, I am really intrigued with inbreeding. It is unbelievable that really happens. But hey, it makes for a great Widow song. We want to push the envelope and take things further than bands usually go.”

So obviously King Diamond is very influential for the band’s music. Who else has played an important role?

“Our main influences that made us start the band are groups like Crimson Glory, Queensrÿche, Warlord, Dio, and Ozzy Osbourne. We love Sunset Strip metal too. How could you not love old Mötley Crüe!? It almost goes without saying in a melodic metal band that Judas Priest and Iron Maiden inspired you, so of course we love them. I love old Metallica and I pretend that they broke up years ago. I absolutely adore almost all NWOBHM, and I love really cult bands like Halloween from Detroit. Don’t Metal With Evil is a classic. Our lyrics are inspired by our favourite movies, such as The Omen, Mark of the Devil, The Exorcist, Trick or Treat, Re-Animator, Phantasm, and many, many more! I love a good mix of sex and gore!”

There has been a good buzz about Widow for a while now, and with On Fire things will change, no doubt. Are you ready for it?

“I love doing what we do. There is no other way that I would want to do it.

I feel that we are very lucky to have the fans that have supported us; they understand what we are doing. I mean, in a world of war, politics, and all of the problems we have today, I want anyone who would listen to Widow to have a good time. There is nothing more fun to me than metal, horror, and girls. That is what Widow is about. Some critics think we should write about politics or whatever, but we won’t change, and trust me, we are not going away. Widow is forever!”

So I gotta ask “O Heavy Metal Warrior” Cristof: how did you discover metal and why is it so important to you?

“My older sister turned me on to metal at a very young age. She is 11 years older, so when I was a kid I would visit her at college and her boyfriend had posters of Iron Maiden on his walls, and it was so appealing to me as a child. I actually started with Quiet Riot, and I still love them. She got me started and I have been a metalhead ever since.”

He ends off, “Metal is my life and it means everything to me. Talking about this really makes me want to go crank some Manowar!”

28

29

KRIEG

For Krieg mainman Imperial, black metal is an ongoing spiritual war, its battles far from over. It should come as no small surprise, then, to learn that the decade-strong USBM torchbearer-cum-rule burner is soon bringing the band to a close—on his own terms, and far from pleasantly. An enigmatic end for an enigmatic entity.

But, lest we mourn unnecessarily, this past year was not without event in the Krieg camp. Firstly, many have witnessed the metaphysical devastation-unto-atavistic (alter)consciousness of career apex The Black House—crumbling spires of speeding, monged-out blackcrush. Presently, we get the much-anticipated Patrick Bateman MCD, Imperial’s thematic/sonic interpretation of Brett Easton Ellis’s novel American Psycho and a quite-literal shitstorm of jet-blackest drone set on warp/stun/decay. Beyond that, the characteristically prolific vocalist has plenty of split and vinyl-only releases brewing as well as a ten-year anniversary double LP, which will include a whole record’s worth of unreleased material and another of Krieg’s final show, tentatively set to take place in Belgium this spring. Before the curtain falls, Imperial stepped from the shadows and pondered the past (prolific) year and beyond—precisely where Krieg’s music has resided all along.

The songs on The Black House, despite being rather psychedelically claustrophobic, seem well suited to the stage. Was there a sense of that when writing began so long ago?

“You would think so, but I didn’t start using any of the songs aside from ‘Deviant’ and ‘Nemesis’ live until our gig in Bordeaux last year, so I guess there wasn’t really an expectation of the songs for a live sense.”

To that end, will there ever come a time—final “suicide” of Krieg, “death” or whatever—when you’ll write compositions solely suited to the studio and meant entirely to be absorbed in the solace of isolation ’n’ headphones?

“Krieg will end after the next album, and I will pursue another project, which will mainly be studio oriented, aside from maybe one live gig a year. This decision’s based on reaching every goal that was set for Krieg in ten years time—I’m ready to move on.”

As for reactions to The Black House, are you pleased? From what I understand, response is near-unanimously positive, so is this more down to the quality of arguably your creative apex or perhaps just good timing?

“It’s been surprisingly positive, aside from a comment that my ‘Jewmerican accent’ comes through too much and some other things that were said in reaction to my dislike of certain people’s projects—one hand washes the other, I guess. I guess people saw it in terms of its sincerity despite not having a traditional approach. I hope they hate the next one, then...”

Either way, would you estimate the gulf between the way you understand Krieg and the way listeners “understand” Krieg to be rather massive and even antagonistic? In a sense, is this antagonism of meaning crucial to the overall Krieg aesthetic?

“I could care less how others interpret my music anymore since this ‘scene’ is now littered with so many sub-classifications of black metal, people putting black before metal and metal before black, et cetera. There’s so many ideas and mindsets running around now that the chance to be completely understood is almost impossible, really, especially given the propensity of low intelligence when viewing music these days. Black metal’s become more of a social activity rather than a personal expression to many people, and a ‘thrashin’ good time’ to too many. It’s just not really a serious thing to too many people anymore, it seems.”

Moving on to the Patrick Bateman MCD, when you first read the novel American Psycho, what element(s) most spoke to you and your inner self?

“The emotions of greed and lust which we all feel but keep controlled, to some degree, were unleashed in that novel. This was the first thing that caught my attention, but the deeper I looked into it, it was also an attack on American living in the 1980s, the decade where aging beatniks, hippies and punks all developed an electro fetish and created the whole ‘he who

has the most toys wins’ way of thinking into a mass-marketed mess. The first generation born after the hippies grew into this mindset rather quickly and became a faceless mess of cocaine-addled stockbrokers and lawyers only interested in fitting in. So, the book works on two levels: primal emotions which can no longer be contained, and a good slap in the face of the Reagan era’s excess.”

Really, would you say that your exterior and interior selves are perpetually at war with each other? Is this MCD literally the sound of that war?

“Patrick Bateman is the combined talents of all involved in their interpretation of the novel—nothing else.”

If anything, Patrick Bateman draws together the perpetually suspended white-noise no-man’s land of Destruction Ritual and the ominous, atavistic, thick-as-shit throb of The Black House. Was this intentional?

“It’s no secret that the American Psycho novel had a great influence on Destruction Ritual, so in a sense this recording was meant to take what I’d done on that album and morph it into the progression that Krieg took from 2002 onward.”

Regardless, does this particular and most recent lineup have a penchant for violently droning oblivion? And being the vocalist/arranger, how does it feel to stand in the middle of that oblivion?

“You’re not dealing with ‘well’ people in such a circumstance, so it was dealt out in an unusual manner, which was captured perfectly on the recording. It was a dynamic experience, chaotic and unsettling, especially since it was so drastically loud yet tightly drawn together. It was something I’d wished to do for a long time and was fortunate enough to have the correct people and correct circumstances come together at the correct time.”

Considering all the rotating lineups over the years both recorded and live, are you a difficult person to work with?

Or, to a point, does working with myriad people offer you newer—if not entirely better, natch—insight into the entity that is Krieg?

“I’m a bastard to work with if the conditions are right, but I’d agree more on the second idea. Seeing that I don’t have too many musicians in my local area that aren’t complete retards, I need to go elsewhere to find decent people to work with in the recording sense. I travel a lot, so I tend to interact with different people on a constant basis, which yields different collaborations. It’s been a great experience for the most part, not counting some failures.”

money so that his other releases can be pressed since Krieg sells well. The live MCD [Kill Yourself or Someone You Love] was only supposed to be released to 500 copies, but he’s done at least two more pressings that I know of. Totally shitty behaviour... I respect him for his longevity, but not this shit.”

It seems Krieg releases, especially split ones, are always changing hands, labels dropping commitments, and so on. This has to be frustrating, right? What do you attribute this to?

“Irresponsibility and lack of dedication on the part of cunts like Into the Pentagram Records, Suicidal Stimulous Records, Black Vault Records, and a dozen others. It’s quite frustrating, but sometimes these issues occur because of valid circumstances like when Sombre Records was forced to shut down or when Akhenaten left Breath of Night.”

Still, as much it seems beneficial to support the underground through such releases, it’s surely unnerving to inform people of news that weeks, months, or whatever down the line will never come to pass... Can a happy medium ever be found? Or is this mostly futile?

“It’s futile, really. You just need to have patience, which I’ve learned over the last few years is golden to advancing your music. There are many great and dedicated labels out there that run into problems, and there are many rip-off bastards that fuck around. You just need to know how to handle the good ones and bad ones, especially if you ever get the chance to meet the shite ones in person.”

Er, not to seal your doom, but is this a considerable factor in you “putting Krieg to rest” soon?

“It’s one of them; others being what I described before and also a distinct disappointment in how things have degraded in the black metal scene. I still have the desire to create, thus my work won’t end with Krieg, but rather mutate into something else.” www.destructionritual.com

And what about dealings with Merciless Records lately?

“Fucking cunt’s bootlegging the Patrick Bateman MCD with a layout that I haven’t approved. He also owes me for other things, which I’d rather not get into. The MCD’s official pressing with my layout will be done through the new label of Devotee’s guitarist, and was sent to press a few days ago [Note: This interview was conducted in August 2004]. I hope to resolve the situation with Merciless soon, without legal action, but I am prepared for that if the need arises. The guy’s not into Krieg at all; he’s just trying to make some

Tyranny f o d n E The

By Nathan T. Birk

30

THE RED CHORD

“It was important for us to make a record that was going to make an impact,” starts The Red Chord singer Guy Kozowyk about their Metal Blade debut, Clients.

“The prime motivation with this record was [that] we wanted to write better songs.

We always had been working on doing that over the last few years and had not perfected that with the last record [2002’s Fused Together In Revolving Doors on Robotic Empire].”

“Any band can have blast beats, breakdowns and tech parts. There are a lot of great bands out there that really get into the whole tech thing and do it well, but can’t write a decent song to save their lives. We wanted to show as musicians and songwriters that we can do it and that there is an art form to writing death metal/ hardcore/grindcore songs. We can play all that tech metal-like shit, but we don’t want to be the most over the top band in the world. However, we did want to write a heavier record and a record that was a reflection of what we are doing these days and what we like collectively as influences.”

So what influences do you hear making up the band in 2005?

“Well,” he replies. “I still think we are a metal/hardcore/grindcore kind of band—and I can even hear a stoner/bluesy Crowbar–like sound at times—but this time around the music flows a lot better than the last record. Overall, I think we made a much heavier record.”

And that is a good thing.

“Yes it is, but since the whole hardcore/metal scene is blowing up, I know there were people waiting for us to write that one Killswitch Engage kind of song. People were waiting for us [guitarists Mike McKenzie and Kevin Rampelberg, bassist Gregory Weeks and drummer Brad Fickeisen] to throw in the clear singing parts and the melodic choruses and sound like everyone else out there. You know what? Fuck that shit. We are still a grind band and we want to write the heaviest shit possible.

The fact that this record was going to get more attention and that all eyes would be on us that this was our opportunity to blow doors and to write a real heavy disc. And knowing that, we have a lot of touring planned. Knowing that our video might be played on MTV2 or Fuse serves as a role model to write the heaviest fucking album we can and show these twerps that are fucking blowing up just who we are. There are a lot of good band, but there is also a lot of over saturation in certain genres, especially in that whiney, metallic hardcore genre.”

No punches held I see.

“Nope. I mean, why follow trends? We were like, ‘Lets go write this record and become big doing everything we have always done before.’ We’ll tour our asses off three times as hard if we have to make a difference and show people it can be done.”

Let me ask you this Guy, do you think you come off as an asshole making comments about a scene like that?

“I am simply stating the facts. The problem I have with the metal and hardcore scenes right now is on many levels. When I got into extreme music back in 1994 I was into bands like Napalm Death, Pantera, Cave-In and others that were pushing the boundaries. Ten years ago it used to be about busting your ass to make a name for your band. There was no Internet. So when a band started to get noticed it was because they worked extra hard busting their ass to get their name and music out there. It was about hard work and originality. It was like, ‘Your time will come if you stick to what you believe in and do everything that needs to be done.’ Granted, there are bands that go underrated or forgotten. Nowadays it is about some kid in highschool that picked up a Thursday or Atreyu CD—and I don’t have any problems with any of those bands personally—but the way this industry is set up right now is if you got the look, you wear eyeliner and wear girls pants then you could do this. All you need to do is look like this, write a few songs and have the right moves and you can be huge. It is also cookie-cutter. There are labels now looking for the right band, band name and right look ready to sign you to be the ‘Next Big Thing.’ Labels are willing to send loads of cash on these bands and huge video budgets to help them sell 100,000 records and make money from sales.”

These bands just blow up right away with no real history. It’s been like that for years, man.

“I know. Bands literally come out of nowhere with no tour history, no previous albums and no past and they come out to sell thousands sand thousands of records thanks to the way things are set up in the industry. Good for those bands and I wish them luck, but they have to understand [that] we’ve paid our dues, as have thousands of other bands, and we have a right to show some concern about the way things are going.”

He adds, “We’ve been around for 5 years and played 400+ shows in the last 3 1/2 to 4 years and we’re very firm in the belief that if you tour and bring something original and fresh to the scene then good things will come to you, even if you don’t have the sing-a-long choruses, even if the vocals are super guttural, etc. We will not compromise our sound at all in order to cater to the lowest common denominator of metallic metalcore, bitchy whiny metalcore or mosh metal. That is something we don’t do and something we will NEVER do.”

You go on and on about how the industry helps create and shape bands. Seeing as this is the debut album for Metal Blade, how have things been with them?

“They have been great to us. Brian Slagel, Mike Faley and everyone on the staff has been so supportive of us since day one. President Mike Faley had been after us for a good year and a half before we signed to the label. The deal was on the terms that we wanted and they said to us that whatever we wanted to do with our record that they had faith in us as artists. They wanted us to write the record we wanted to write and not dumb shit down or change things because we signed to the label.

The reason we signed to the label is because they are real good honest people, very encouraging to whatever we want to do and let us do the layout for the album [artwork by Paul Romano; Mastodon, Nasum] they way we wanted it done. The main thing is that we just wanted a label that supported us while we did things the way we always got things done. And we found that with Metal Blade.”

Good to see you can still feel proud of how you handle things with the band.

“Exactly,” he comments, “We didn’t change. We just needed the extra kick to help get the name out there a bit more and get our music into stores.”

While Fused Together In Revolving Doors was indeed an ass-kicker, Clients no doubt delivers twice the blow. A new drummer (Fickeisen replaces heavy-hitter John Longstreth), better production and road/studio experience has The Red Chord delivering a serious beatdown on us.

“The old record was as it was. It took us four days to record, master and mix it.

We didn’t have time to play around with it or try and get any experimenting going on.

The songs were a collection of songs we’d been working on for a few years so they were old. With the new record and working with producer Zeuss at Planet Z and with three years in-between the record, it allowed us ample time to write the record we

The Red Chord

s d i K w e N The on the Block

wanted to write. We were able to fuck around in the studio and try new things and work on the sounds we wanted to get.”

“There are a lot of things I hate about the old record that I didn’t realize until we made Clients. The drums lose a bit of the edge and my vocals just annoy me. I had two, maybe three hours, to record the vocals and I think it is obvious. With this record, I had one day or so to get the vocals down. It was nice have a bit more time to try new things. We recorded this album in 2 weeks and then spent another week mixing it and tweaking a few things. I don’t get it how bands can spend a month or two in the studio. We’re a no bullshit kind of band. We want to go in, record the album and get out on the road and play.”

He ends off, “Being on a big label is great, but like I said before, we’re in this to work hard and see success on that level. It won’t change for us. So the closer we stick to our rules, the better we feel about what we’re doing.”

By Adrian ‘The Energizer’ Bromley

31

32

33

SLOUGH FEG

As the old saying goes, you can’t judge a book by its cover.

And despite the old saying imparting wisdom about not making premature associations, we all do it in order to save ourselves valuable time, energy, money and grief. Of course, the law of averages being the law of averages, this means that there’s a pretty good probability that we’re going to be wrong when we make uninformed prejudgments with the result being our looking like intolerant idiots with gooey egg dripping off our faces. Here’s my egg-on-face tale: For the longest time, I’d heard the name The Lord Weird Slough Feg kicked around in underground metal circles. I had heard many positive things about them and someone even once described the San Francisco band as something that, “might be up my alley.” Hey, John Cobbett of Hammers Of Misfortune fame was in the band (although he’s since been replaced by Angelo Tringali), so they must have something going for them, right?

However, I never got around to checking them out, mainly because of their ridiculous name. Actually, that’s not entirely true: They just weren’t a band that seemed to resonate with me beyond a light curiosity where I would say to myself, “I really need to hear what this is all about.” That was before I’d go on to bust out a list of disparaging remarks and funny and not-so-funny takes on that nonsensical name. Then, the quartet’s latest, Atavism (Cruz Del Sur) showed up and I had no excuse not to check them out at least once. What hit me was a barrage of chest-thumping traditional metal, pedal to the Bay Area metal thrash, epic power metal, center-parted boogie rock and tasteful instrumentals wrapped up in a phalanx of stream of consciousness lyrics lapping on the banks of reality and air guitar worthy soloing. Essentially, Atavism ruled and rocked my world despite the band’s moniker, despite their throwback sound, despite song titles like “Eumaeus the Swineherd” and “Curse of Athena” doing little but evoking a series of ironic chuckles. Guitarist/vocalist Mike Scalzi has probably heard everything there is to hear about his band’s name and doesn’t seem too offended that his was a band that I—and undoubtedly others—have used to kickstart various giggle-fests. However, that was the furthest thing from his mind in taking “The Lord Weird” part of the band name to the chopping block.

“Umm, it wasn’t that we felt misrepresented. I mean, there are a lot of weird names out there, names as weird as ours, if not weirder, and there have been since Mott The Hoople. I never thought the name was holding us back. The truth is it was because, annoyingly, I know people who would go to stores or look on mailorder lists for our stuff under ‘S’ or ‘L’ and they wouldn’t find it, then they’d give up. And in Germany they have us listed under ‘T’ and really it’s just been a lot of confusion that’s caused us to lose customers so it was a purely corporate decision,” he laughs. “Actually, it just got annoying after a while because we started off as Slough Feg and we’d always put ‘The Lord Weird’ up there because it was part of a comic book, but we never intended that to be the full name. Dragonheart Records really started that with our Twilight Of The Idols record where they put everything in a row in equal-sized letters and we didn’t really like that very much, but we’re on a new label now and we figured they wouldn’t care.”

However, even after the band’s name becomes a nonissue, there’s still their music acting as a bigger roadblock to further success, especially with North American audiences.

There’s a definite old school metal feel to what Slough Feg do, but with enough added flare to cheese off heavy metal’s older guardians of the faith who detest change and progression in

Totally Ridiculous?

By Kevin Stewart-Panko

metal with the same fervour they detest hip-hop. This leaves Slough Feg in a precarious middle ground where they don’t quite appeal to the lion’s share of extreme music’s new audience, nor do they relate to the crowd who want their metal a certain way. Living in San Francisco, but being in a band designed for overseas popularity, Scalzi is aware of the corner his band has been backed into.

“I don’t know what the differences are anymore because we don’t play live here as often as we used to. In the 90s, it was horrible. San Francisco is a very trendy city and when you play, your friends come and it ends up more like a popularity contest; who has more friends, who hangs out at the hipper bar, who knows more drug dealers whose customers come to the shows,” he laughs. “I don’t know, but I think it’s like everywhere in America. It’s definitely not about the quality of the music, but maybe it never has been because people have a different attitude in America and they’ve never been as musically sincere as, say, Greece where they’re very sincere about what they like and they listen to the music and understand what you’re doing; they don’t just categorize.”

This brings up an interesting point. Scalzi originally moved from Pennsylvania to San Francisco fifteen years back in order to do Slough Feg. In hindsight, would a move to Europe have made more sense?

“I don’t think it would have matter really; it wasn’t a good or bad decision. If we had moved to New York we would’ve been up against the same kind of thing. If we had moved to L.A., we would’ve been up against the same kind of thing except we would have had to drive a lot further and maybe we’d have been able to get extra work in commercials. I don’t think it would have made a god damn bit of difference.

Sometimes I think that maybe we should have stayed out east because we weren’t accepted for a long time here, but I don’t think we would’ve been accepted anywhere for a long time, no one who was playing metal was. We came here at the wrong time, in the early 90s when metal was on its way out.”

It probably wouldn’t have mattered where Slough Feg parked their caravan, unless that is, they could’ve somehow gone back in time. Their music, while certainly ear-catching and unique, sucks off a pipeline of two-plus decades of metal and hard rock influences. And if anyone attempts to deny the Iron Maiden Soundhouse Tapes, Kirk Hammett-era Exodus, Manilla Road and Ramjam influences, then they’re just wrong.

“Yeah, I think I remember hearing that,” Mike drawls, about Exodus’ classic Whipping Queen demo, “and that’s what the first song on the new album—the little instrumental—is supposed to sound like. I wrote that in 1985, when I was like fifteen and that’s probably why it sounds like that. We like different kinds of hard rock and we just did different kinds of hard rock. I’ve really been astounded for a very long time now that metal hasn’t evolved in such a way that people are trying different styles and getting bored with doing one style and rehashing the same stuff. I guess I have a lower attention span or am not as complacent. Or maybe it’s because I live

in the city. Most metalheads live out in the suburbs; there aren’t that many really true heavy metal bands that live in the city. We live smack in the middle of the city and I’ve always thought that you can hear the speed of the city in our records.

Things for us are a little more choppy, mixed, integrated and faced-paced than they are for a lot of metal bands.

“Umm, it’s hard to say,” says Scalzi, when questioned about metro San Francisco’s impact on Atavism’s live and organic feel. “Maybe I live in the middle of the city because I have that kind of metabolism or maybe I make music like that because I live in the city or maybe it’s because I live in the city and everything is fast-paced and I get very high-strung about things...” …Or is it that this is the way you think metal should be presented?

“That’s the way I like to present it and that’s how I like to listen to it. I like to listen to some slow stuff as well, but I have a low attention span and I don’t like filler. So, when I listen to something I find myself fast-forwarding through the interludes and arpeggio introductions to everything. Y’know what I can’t stand is that every heavy metal album for the last three years has some four-minute thing at the beginning with winds and battle sounds and some stupid-ass guy going ‘Now the time has come…’ and then maybe the song starts. I just put track two on because I don’t want to hear that shit.”

In some ways, it’s funny that Scalzi holds a fair amount of disdain for metal’s typical elements, especially considering the title of the new record—which basically means a recurrence of, or reversion to, a past style, manner, outlook or approach. It’s a tricky little dance because even though Slough Feg are throwing it back in time, there’s still enough individualism in what they do to separate them from their previous masters.

“It’s not very specific. Atavism is a vague term that I’m personally interested in; the idea that certain things and traits can skip generations. If you look at things like I do from an academic angle and have studied a lot of anthropology, philosophy and science and look at things in evolutionary terms, it’s like, ‘Why am I depressed? Why am I hyperactive? Why do I hate sitting still in an office working in front of a computer screen all day?’ If you choose to explain things to yourself in evolutionary terms you can say, ‘It’s because I haven’t adapted to this yet.’ But if you take things further and say, ‘Well wait, my dad sat in an office his whole life and so did his dad, but somehow I need more,’ then you could conclude that some kind of atavistic trait has skipped generations.”

How does this relate to the new album?

“Really,” he laughs, “the reason we called the album that is because this album was meant to sound more like our first album and skipping the generations of the three albums in between. And it kind of does go back to a more primitive sound, although I add concepts and lyrics about being atavistic and there are a lot of evolutionary insults towards the end of the album, although they’re made a bit more subtle so the lyrics don’t sound totally, totally ridiculous; they’re just totally ridiculous.”

34

THE PROVENANCE

35

/ KLIMT 1918

How Would You Like to be Spat At, the third album from Sweden’s The Provenance, is a pummelling onslaught of delicious melodies, relentless riffs, and despairing images.

If that sounds contrary it’s no accident. Angular and thick, sweet and caustic, these ten songs are a mass of contradictions but also a pool of creative harmony.

Claiming The Provenance’s history is tedious, drummer/lyricist Joel Lindell summarizes ten years in half as many sentences. “Tobias [Martinsson, guitars/vocals] and I have known each other since early childhood, so when we met Emma [Hellström, keyboards/flute/vocals] in ’95 and understood we shared similar tastes in music, we just had to do something about it. The Provenance was born, with a basic musical intent of combining the darker elements of goth and doom with the more tentative approach of progressive symphonic rock. In ’97 and ’99, The Provenance conceived two more members in the shape of Joakim [Rosén, guitars] and Jonnie [Täll, bass] and since, we’ve ruled the planet with biscuits and tea…and by this I mean to say, there’s no chance in hell one could rule the planet with biscuits and tea. The probability of this is equivalent to that of our personal domination of this godforsaken industrialized musical climate of today, given we play the music that we do. However, this doesn’t mean we don’t like biscuits and tea; we truly do.”

The gloomy atmosphere drenching How Would You Like to be Spat At makes it fairly easy to point to My Dying Bride as a source of inspiration for the band, but Lindell also identifies “Swedish symphonic prog-gods Änglagård” as a major influence. “I guess what was most inspiring about Änglagård was their theatrical and emotional output,” he explains. “They’re true geniuses when it comes to expressing themselves. But what I think made the most impact on us was that their general outlook on being musicians was never associated with any rockstar qualities, them being mere ordinary blokes who like to play together, to push their personal musical limits without the concern of what others might think.” Lindell also points out how his band’s influences have expanded throughout the decade, incorporating the “frenetic down-strokes and indifferent hi-hat” of an “indie-pop approach” and “trip-hop elements.”

As tea-drinking metallers weaving indie-pop and trip-hop into their music, The Provenance don’t seem much like typical Gothenburg metal, but that doesn’t mean they don’t feel a part of the scene, Lindell says. “I think The Provenance comes to show the broader picture of the Gothenburg metal scene. There has always been a great variety of good bands from here, but only a (well deserving) handful has been labelled ‘Gothenburg metal.’ Whether this is a good thing or a bad thing is for someone else to decide. The Gothenburg metal scene contains so much more than the very generalisation of its term.

And this is where The Provenance enters the picture. We are part of the Gothenburg metal, although we’ve never sought to sound like the term connected to it.” The Provenance has also had some close ties to the Gothenburg progressive scene, Lindell adds, “but nowadays we strive to be accepted by the indie-pop audience, mainly because we drink tea…?”

The mixed bag of tricks making up The Provenance’s sound is more or less part of a collective effort, although Lindell says the songs tend to begin with one member’s personal ideas. “The lyrics are, however, my personal makings,” he says. “I wouldn’t want any one else in the band getting blamed for their existence, being associated with my previous convictions and other mischief. I’ve lived through hell; they’re singing about it and that’s just about where I draw the line.”

Lindell’s lyrics revel in gloom and venom, and he claims that none of it is “made up.” Rather than inner demons, he describes his words as purging “inner Satans”: “Everyone has a personal Satan inside. My Satan is huge and consists of all my previous women…this probably goes for everyone. Unfortunately, this Satan continues to grow by every relation and the music is just a small relief in the matter. Although I actually put a lot of effort into brightening my outlook on the world this time round, else it would be far too hurtful reading.” The brightening effect hasn’t actually gone far in dispelling the album’s darkness, but Lindell isn’t worried that his negativity may scare off more casual listeners. “Who the hell cares for scatter-brained optimists not in touch with all of our emotional range as human beings,” he says. “If you want easy-listening go somewhere else!”

The near future may hold the odd festival appearance for The Provenance, and the band’s already set to start recording the next album—“a further shipload of pure misery and sheer joy,” as Lindell describes it, but he’s also willing to speculate about where he’d like to be somewhere down the road. “Hopefully I’m situated in a nice little cottage in Spain with a future personal Satan, perhaps. The Provenance has by now reached world domination levels (not), created world peace and brought an end to third-world hunger.

And we will drink loads of tea…”

For now, The Provenance will keep up with various jobs and full-time studies, saving their spare time “to drink, have sex and murder.” Lindell adds that they’re really a “cheerful crew though” and, as a farewell, suggests that we all have a cup of tea.

Gothenburg Metal and Tea

B y L a u r a W i e b e Ta y l o r

Amongst the other bands in this issue, KLIMT 1918 sticks out like a sore thumb. The music on their latest album, Dopoguerra (Prophecy) is tranquil yet unabashedly passionate, in the vein of Anathema, U2, and Tears For Fears. As drummer Paolo Soellner so eloquently puts it, “Dopoguerra includes nine pieces of comforting, emotional music. Nine songs informed by the intensity of laughter born of tears.”

This album—especially the first few tracks—hits you like a ton of bricks with a lush, solid flow of familiarity and vividness. I am sure everyone who hears this record will react differently.

“We frequently wonder about how people should react to this album,” says Soellner. “I hope the listeners will take care first at the emotions and the many ways we try to express them. Then the freshness of the sound; its way to be new and never-heard.”

It’ll be interesting to see what kind of fans pick up on this release. I’m an open-minded metalhead, but there are many that are very fickle about sounds/styles/genres.

“It would be nice to reach the audience from many music fields, not only the metal and gothic ones. Just look at Dopoguerra as a melting pot of different sounds compressed into 10 tracks. The music doesn’t refer to an exact kind of fans and its aim is just to create good emotions, atmospheres and suggestions,” he explains. “The sound probably drives you to metal and powerful music, but the attitude has no boundaries at all. I hope each one could find in KLIMT 1918 something to like, whatever kind of music you usually listen to, from metal to pop, from indie to post-rock, from dark to wave. At the same time we don’t want to leave the metal audience and it would be cool if they started to listen new musical ways through our songs. Thanks to bands like Anathema, Opeth and Katatonia, we took interest in new kinds of music and we learned that metal could be influenced by different sounds.”

And those influences would be?

Says the drummer, “Year by year we find even more our own direction. Our aim is to find an identity following our ‘post-modern’ way to see, play, and compose music. Many influences are mixed, adding many sounds from many kinds of music, creating a hybrid that has kept together through our personality and our own ideas. During the time, we [guitarist/ singer Marco Soellner, guitarist Alessandro Pace, and bassist Davide Pesola] have become acquainted with other sonorities. That’s the reason our music evolves continuously. I can define our sound as a kind of overlapping of different layers that let our music be various and heterogeneous. These layers take inspiration from pop, rock, post-rock, indie, wave, ’80s music, and obviously metal.

“Are we children of the post-modern eclecticism? Just look at Interpol’s sound as a hybrid. For that reason we don’t consider them an influence but as a band who has done the same way of us,” he continues. “They are sons of postmodernism like KLIMT 1918; their music is a mixture of past and present. However we think that also ‘derivative’ music may have its own identity for sure! On Dopoguerra, we used guitar techniques that U2 invented 20 years ago. The wave background has become hybrid with the rock-metal one. Regarding the style, we learned from bands like The Cure and Depeche Mode, for example, that joy and melancholy are feelings that can be joined in the same songs. Sometimes the ‘rules’ of pop count in every kind of music, including metal music of course. Anyway our current influences are The Beatles, The Cure, Depeche Mode, Tears For Fears, U2, Police, Explosions

The War Inside

in the Sky, Dredg, Interpol, Katatonia, Godspeed You Black Emperor, Smiths, Sophia, Death in Vegas, Anathema, and metal music.”

Okay, let’s talk about Gustav Klimt, the artist to whom you pay homage in your band’s name. What drew you to his work?

“First off,” he responds, “this is a not a musical homage to him. Klimt has been the maximum exponent of Wien secession. We just like his figure and the period in which he lived, worked, and died. He represented most of all, the epochal passage between decorativism and expressionism; he was the symbol of liberty-style, the point of conjunction between 1800 and 1900 art. He died in 1918 when the First World War finished and the belle époque ended. That year represents elegy for the dying ‘old’ and the excitement for the ‘new’ that comes out. It’s a period of renovation for art, people and the world-wide history, full of hope and vividness. The music of KLIMT 1918 moves through all these suggestions.”

“The main theme of Dopoguerra (‘postwar period’ in English) is convalescence, what comes after a painful experience—the end of an inner conflict, the condition of someone who reminds that the evil just finished with will, strength and hope. We took as models the poor and devastated Italy of 1945, poetry from neorealist De Sica, Rossellini and Visconti films. We transposed that in our songs with the aim to spread the same sensations of misery, but also relief at the same time. But Dopoguerra’s lyrics do not have a direct relationship with the war, as it could be wrongly deduced from the title. Sometimes start again from the beginning means to forget for not suffering again (‘Dopoguerra,’ ‘La Tregua’), sometimes means to hope (‘They Were Wed by the Sea,’ ‘Nightdriver’), or accept with resignation the melancholy of the past (‘Rachel,’ ‘Snow of ’85’). Every lyric deals with this suggestion in different ways.”

So the new album is out now and I’m sure the band will tour this album. When it comes time to come back to record once again, where does the band go from here?

The drummer replies, “We’ll always follow our emotions and feelings...”

By Adrian ‘The Energizer’ Bromley

36

37

SAMAEL / CALLISTO

“Change has come to Samael’s music over the years and it was something we welcomed. It all started when in 1996 we started to use a drum machine in the creation of our music—and we never looked back,” says the band’s singer Vorph about their evolution. “It was just something that we decided to do with our music. We were young when we started this band and I think as we grew as musicians we saw our music taking on new sounds/styles.”

The band’s latest offering is Reign Of Light (NBA/Regain Records), an album a few years in the making that indeed pushes the band’s music further. An album heavily influenced by electronics and keyboard work. In a nutshell, an album far from the black-rooted anguish of the band’s classics Worship Him (1991) and Blood Ritual (1992).

“I think that despite the obvious changes with how we [the band is rounded out by guitarist Makro, bassist Mas and Xy on drums/programming/ keyboards] go about making music, that the dark vibe that Samael has always cast out is still there. That people know it is still us. I hope people still see this album as a reflection of what we are.”

Each Samael release seems to be a bit more explorative than the last one.

“I think every one who has followed this band is aware that we change. It’s part of the plan with Samael, so it is common knowledge. But at the same time, change is something some people have problems with. It would be pointless to go out and make the same record every time out. A lot of bands are doing that these days but obviously we’re not one of them.”

He continues, “I think this is a record that we wanted to make. I know some fans will no doubt not be into this at all, but that is how it goes. We need to feel and react to this first and foremost. If we’re not happy with the final results, why even bother with Samael. We’ve learned to accept that reactions will be mixed.”

About Reign Of Light, Vorph comments, “We had a long time to work on this record. The last album we did was Eternal in 1999 so the five or six year gap allowed us to try and do many things with the music. It was interesting and fun, but also challenging to try and find the right ideas to go on this album. Lots of searching within to find the material. We tried many things, started a new project called Era One which has never come out and we worked with more electronic stuff. It was a lot of experimentation and we just wanted it to be a part of the new Samael record. We tried new to find new influences, new ways to be dark and just new ways to bring life to our material and the sound of Samael.”

You were keeping busy.

“Yeah, some people thought we had disappeared and faded away, but no, we were hard at work and we did do two North American tours, as well as select festival dates in Europe. Plus we had to sort out stuff with the label in order to get the album out. Its on Regain Records for Europe and Nuclear Blast for the U.S.A.”

Scandinavia has long housed various thriving death and black metal scenes alongside equally active, though less internationally celebrated, hardcore punk and grindcore enclaves. But in recent years a movement has been emerging—arguably spearheaded on a worldwide scale by Sweden’s Cult of Luna—that suggests Scandinavia is also an unusually fertile breeding ground for cerebral, engrossing and often deeply affecting “metallic doomcore,” one of a number of clumsy-yet-descriptive labels applicable to bands who would arguably not exist were it not for the pioneering work of Neurosis.

Young Finnish five-piece Callisto are the latest shining example to break out of this thriving underground scene, so perhaps they can explain why Scandinavia has responded so impressively to what could crudely be called “Neurosis’s call.”

“Hard to say exactly,” ponders bassist and backup vocalist Juho Niemelä, as the band sit down with Unrestrained! prior to their recent London Garage show supporting stoner sludge super-soldiers High On Fire. “I think there is something in that kind of form of musical art that appeals to the Scandinavian state of mind and sense of melancholy. I see that thing in Neurosis’s music too, but maybe a bit differently.”

So you’d say there’s something distinctively Scandinavian about the dirge-laden, melancholic music Callisto creates, and others like Cult of Luna create in broadly similar ways?

“Yes, I would say there is. I cannot describe it in words but it is the certain state of melancholy only Scandinavians can fully understand.”

“Watch movies from the Kaurismäki brothers,” adds Henri Kuittinen, a recent addition to Callisto’s lineup who handles onstage samples and one of three guitars. “You’ll get a glimpse of Finnish melancholy.”

Callisto’s debut album, True Nature Unfolds (originally released by Finnish stable Fullstream in 2004 and recently rereleased by Earache, to whom the band are now signed) certainly offers a glimpse of a band who are something special.

Immense and densely textured, the hour-long opus weaves familiar sounds together beautifully, fusing driving riffs evocative of Cult of Luna’s crushing 2002 triumph The Beyond with strains of female vocals and fathoms of Isis-worthy ambience.

Its sound is another spectacular testament to the work that Miezko Talarcyzk (RIP) engineered at his Soundlab Studio. But face Callisto with comparisons to the bands above, and they’ll not be best pleased.

“I think we have had enough of us being compared to Cult of Luna and Isis,” says Niemelä. “It is understandable when people

Dark Soundscapes Tell me about Era One—will it ever see the light of day?

“There is some discussion about it coming out possibly now. We delivered that album to our previous record company [Century Media] to end the contract with them, but they didn’t like it and didn’t want to put it out on the market.”

That kind of sucks.

“I know. I mean, they are thinking about putting it out now but the material is like three years old now. We are discussing with them right now that if they really want to put it out, we might want to have some time to work on it and freshen it up a bit. It seems very old to us.”

A lot of bands seem to get comfortable with their style of music and the way they do things as the years go on, whereas Samael seems to never be comfortable with things. Seems as though the band is always itching to rework stuff. Why is that?

Explains Vorph, “When we started this band back in the early days, our main goal was just to get a record out. It was the main objective and we did that. After that was done and we knew how to get to that point, there really was nothing holding us back. The next step of handling things for the band was the priority of making the music better. We have just kept going on over the years and trying to remain satisfied with whatever we come up with.”

“We’re not asking for much,” the singer finishes off, “but at the same time we won’t settle for something typical. This album is proof of that. “

By Adrian ‘The Energizer’ Bromley

tend to see the tide between us and those bands but I’m sure that musically we have and represent something they don’t, and vice versa. It feels frustrating when some people often see only what is common between us without seeing what is different.”

Did Cult of Luna or Isis directly inspire Callisto?

“Those bands have had certain views of inspiration in our music, but if we’re talking about bands which inspired us from the very beginning, I would name bands like Zao and Breach.”

“Yes, Zao and Breach were the main influences to us in the beginning,” confirms main vocalist Markus Myllykangas, who also handles an axe. “Zao’s vocalist has been a really big influence for me. Nowadays we listen to so much different kind of music compared to the early days. Lately I’ve been listening to 16 Horsepower, Johnny Cash, Joy Division, and some heavier stuff like Trouble, The Hidden Hand, Place of Skulls, and Southern Lord-related releases. I’m also a big fan of Cold Meat Industry bands.”

Callisto started life in 2001, when the four long-term friends who still make up its creative core (Juho, Markus, drummer Ariel Björklund, and main axe-man Johannes Nygård) were just budding 19-year-old first-band veterans. Yet in less than a year Callisto had issued their self-financed Ordeal of the Century MCD; and soon followed it up with live shows—played with Shai Hulud, Burst and others—along with a full tour supporting Cult of Luna, all of which were also self-financed. Thus it was that, not long after their debut disc first emerged in Finland a year ago, Callisto were snapped up by Earache. But with their debut proper for the British label tentatively predicted for winter 2006 at the earliest, Callisto are going to be living with True Nature Unfolds for some time yet.

“We still feel very satisfied with the album, but of course in some way we see it differently, too,” says Niemelä. “We have noticed our progress in songwriting, for example, so we would not compose songs similar to the album anymore. The songs still sound good but the new material is better.”

How far are Callisto with the writing of album number two then?

“We have completed about four songs but we have material for the needs of the whole album. I would say the new material is even more dynamic and subtle. In a way the heavy parts are

now heavier and the soft parts more sensitive.”

If you’re currently thinking that increased sensitivity in the “soft parts” of Callisto’s music necessarily implies that there will be more female vocals on the five-piece’s next full-length, don’t get ahead of yourself...

“I think it is an outstanding part of our sound on our records,” says Niemelä of how the female voice is utilised—sparingly but

By Paul Schwarz

An Apocalypse of Nature effectively, in this writer’s opinion—on TNU. “It isn’t used when playing live. Maybe we’ll continue using it in the future...”

“I think nowadays using female vocals as a tidbit would be a cliché,” Kuittinen puts in. “It’s like underlining certain parts: ‘Hey listen, this is a beautiful part!’ And not to be able to reproduce it live makes it even more aimless. Maybe this calls for a band sitdown,” he laughs. “I liked the parts on True Nature… though.”

We certainly did. Judge for yourself.

TRAIL OF TEARS

38

The withdrawal of keyboards and choirs makes for a striking shift, but it contributes to the sense of sonic balance that distinguishes Free Fall Into Fear from Trail of Tears’ earlier work.

“For us it was just a case of using things where it sounded normal, or natural,” Thorsen says. “Even if you have a keyboard player in the band it doesn’t mean you have to drown the songs in 50 layers of keyboards all the time, and the same when it comes to choirs. I think we have accomplished a lot of other things with the vocals instead of choirs, and we really didn’t see it necessary this time. And it’s the same with the female vocals—we didn’t see that it fit. And when it comes to the keyboards I think that actually it sounds more effective now. When you finally hear something you notice it better. It sounds more natural, not overdone, or ‘make it symphonic just to make it symphonic’.”

If all had been right with the world, Trail of Tears’ fans could have heard this more subtle version of the band last autumn, but what should have been a fairly standard set of recording sessions turned out to be more of a nightmare, says Thorsen.

“It was a torturous experience to record this album. We chose to record in Norway this time, as opposed to the last album, which we recorded in France. We really thought that we made the right move by recording it here, working in our own tempo close to home. But it actually turned out to be the opposite.”

Computer and technological problems haunted the band in the studio, nearly resulting in the loss of the album. “We lost files, we had crashes, and everything just culminated with the complete crash we had in the end. We were actually barely hours away from finishing the mix, but everything broke down. It was hell. We were more or less ready to give up. The problem was that we didn’t know how long it would take to restore the files, if it was possible to restore them at all—would it take a week, a month? And it ended up taking three months. I guess if we knew how long it would take we would’ve just started again in another studio.”

Not having that foreknowledge, Trail of Tears arduously pieced Free Fall Into Fear back together, and the album was finally released this past winter, months after a major European tour with no new record to support. “Somehow we managed to overcome it, and I think the end result is the absolute best we could have done under the circumstances.

It’s just lucky that we had experience from before. If this happened on the debut album it would be the end of the band I guess. But luckily we had three other albums under our belt, so it was somehow easier to handle it. Like I tell everybody, it’s something that I wouldn’t even want my worst enemy to experience. It’s an extremely terrible situation to go through and I just hope we never experience anything like that ever again.”

Thorsen has since managed to gain some perspective on the disaster: “It’s something I can look back at now and laugh about it, but when it happened, I guess it was almost the end of the band, to be honest. That’s the irony of things. It’s fascinating to see how you can forget about things when you have the final result. I think actually now it just tastes even better, having still in mind what we experienced. It really feels great to see the feedback and the responses. The album is doing well, so you have to look at it like that—it turned out to be worth it after all.”

That final result, Free Fall Into Fear, is a collection of songs linked by a common spirit, one captured in the album’s name. “There’s a lot of darkness there both musically and lyrically, and it deals a lot with these things—fear, and the darker sides of human mind, and things like that. So we were looking for a nice title or nice sentence to kind of represent the whole concept. Not that it’s a concept album, but, you know, the album in general. We put ten songs on it, and they’re all separate from each other. It deals with a lot of different topics, but you can say that it represents the atmosphere of the album in a good way.”

The album’s lyrical darkness is based on a combination of current events, personal issues, and imagination, Thorsen explains, but personal issues have a bit of an edge.

“Naturally I get influenced by what happens in my everyday life and what I write is painted by that of course. I think the majority of it is self-experienced, or it’s at least something that I can relate to myself. I don’t write good about unicorns or fighting dragons or things like that. I really have to have something to relate to, to feel that I’m doing a good job.”

Thorsen took a short break from society to write the lyrics for Free Fall Into Fear, isolating himself for a few weeks so he could delve into his own psyche. “I stayed alone and just buried myself into my own head, just trying to dig out whatever lies there and put it down on paper, and try to make it work out. It’s a lot of reflections of how I see things and how I experience things. I don’t like to be more specific than that because it’s somehow abstract, and it’s a cliché but if people are really interested in the lyrical part I think they should read it for themselves and spend a little time on it. The album lasts longer that way.”

Free Fall Into Fear has plenty of lasting potential, its subtlety allowing the band’s dark reflections and creative flair to reach the surface, and its artistic success overshadowing its painful construction. If this latest album represents the natural Trail of Tears sound, well, sometimes natural is what works best.

B y L a u r a W i e b e Ta y l o r

Trail of Tears latest record, Free Fall Into Fear, is far removed from the band’s origins playing thrash and death metal covers under the name Natt. Four full-length records in a decade may not seem like that much, but Trail of Tears has travelled from raw and primal to bombastic and symphonic, now finally achieving a sense of natural balance between epic power and subtle restraint.

Long-time vocalist Ronny Thorsen reflects on the differences between Natt and where the band is now: “Back then it was much more primitive. We didn’t have any keyboards, clean vocals or anything like that. Then we started making our own material back in ’95/’96. It’s just been evolving all the time. That’s also why we changed the name in ’97—when we got new members, and the music kind of took a different turn. We added some keyboards and all that stuff, and started on our way to where we are today. I think the main basis of how we started is still there, but it’s just a whole much more massive sound picture now.”

Trail of Tears’ main creative core—Thorsen, lead guitarist Runar Hansen, guitarist Terje Heiseldal, bassist Kjell Rune Hagen, keyboardist Frank Roald Hagen, and drummer Jonathan Perez—has remained stable for the last eight years. But Trail of Tears has also seen two consecutive female vocalists come and go, and the near-absence of a woman’s voice on Free Fall Into Fear makes for a very obvious difference in the surface textures of the band’s sound. The only other line-up change is the addition of Kjetil Nordhus (from Green Carnation), who provides clean vocals to contrast Thorsen’s rasping growls. “And the thing with Kjetil is not a new thing,” Thorsen adds. “He also contributed on our last two albums as a session member, so it was just now that we decided to bring him in as a full time member. We are still the same musicians in the band, the same songwriters.”

The way those musicians write songs has also stayed fairly stable throughout Trail of Tears’ history, with the band settling into a successful pattern early on, Thorsen explains.

“It’s more or less been the same all the way. It’s mainly our keyboard player and our lead guitar player who make the skeletons of the songs, but we really all contribute in our own way. Over the years we’ve had the chance to purchase a lot of home recording equipment, so if there are any ideas that pop up we just record them at home and then and gather up everything at the rehearsals and show it to each other.

“When it comes to the actual sculpturing of the songs I would say it’s more or less the whole band,” Thorsen continues. “And when it comes to the vocals, lyrics—that’s mostly been my department so far. I got a little help from Kjetil on this album, so it was a little bit different for me to work like that. I was used to doing everything myself. I think it’s like a lot of other bands. We just record separately and put it together like a democracy. That’s how it normally works, but we can also come up with things just by drinking beer and jamming. It’s a band in the right sense of the word. It wouldn’t be the same, or sound like Trail of Tears if we didn’t do it like that. That’s how we’ve done it since the demo days. It works out good for us.”

On Free Fall Into Fear, Trail of Tears has exchanged some of its neo-classical operatics and orchestration for a little progressive experimentation, but Thorsen explains that the band wasn’t making a deliberate effort to go for something new. “I think it’s always easier for people outside of the band to see the differences. For us—we just make songs like we’ve always done. There are obviously changes on the new album compared to our previous albums but the idea and working methods are the same. This album can have some more progressive elements, but it sounds, if anything, more direct and to the point.

I think also the production helped a lot on that. It sounds more in your face and a little bit more stripped down maybe. Especially when compared to the previous album, which was extremely symphonic—there were a lot of keyboards, a lot of choirs. So we stripped that down a little bit and just tried to make good songs that work both on album and also live. I think it’s more technical but at the same time more straightforward.”

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41

KILLWHITNEYDEAD

“She’s doing very well for herself. She is currently getting her Master’s degree in economics here in town and we try and get together about once every few weeks.”

That’s Mike, killwhitneydead’s vocalist/samplist(?), responding when asked about the woman who, at one point affected his life so deeply that she became representative of everything or anyone that he wished dead and gone. So much so that he named his band after her. Now, depending on who you are and whether or not you’re a fan of the band Mike fronts, the above quote will mean different things to you. If you’re a student of interpersonal relationships, you may find it absolutely amazing that Mike and Whitney have been able to restore and maintain a friendship in light of the fact that he has nefariously utilized her birth name to name a band designed for not only his musical expression, but also as an outlet for his vindictive and violent fantasies, many of which have the fairer sex on the receiving end of some not-so-savory activities.

For those of you who’ve been wondering about the mystery that killwhitneydead has been perpetuating over the course of three albums, including their latest So Pretty, So Plastic, you might question whether or not Whitney is an actual person. You also might be trying to decode just where Mike is referring to when he says, “here in town.” KWD have always claimed to hail from Flagstaff, Arizona, although no one in that bustling metropolis will admit to even knowing anyone in the band or anything about the band, including their claims about being banned from performing in every venue in the state.

Now, Mike is going on record as saying the band are presently based somewhere in North Carolina, where Tribunal Records, the label they’ve been signed to since day one, is also located—although the Tribunal Web site claims Upper Darby, PA as their home base. So, where is “here in town”? Hmm. Adding to the KWD labyrinth is that pre-ordered copies of So Pretty, So Plastic come with So Plastic, So Pretty, a companion disc featuring a remixed version of the album as played by KWDMF which, given the nature of the disc and the KMFDM influenced artwork, presumably stands for killwhitneydeadmotherfucker. The mystery/confusion deepens with the credits which claim that So Pretty, So Plastic was performed by Mike, Steven (guitar), Cook (guitar), Collin (drums) and Mac (bass), while the remix disc says KWDMF “could be” Matthew (vocals/samples), BJ (guitar), Justin (drums), Travis (guitar) and Ryan (bass). All right, Mike, explain this clusterfuck.

“KWDMF is our alter ego, so to speak. So the names that are printed inside the remix CD are who we are when we aren’t performing in KWD. They are all tied together in some form and the clever fans out there will be able to figure out the puzzle.”

It would appear that the mystery that has surrounding killwhitneydead since 1999

reference to the current state of the hardcore scene—kids all look alike, dress alike and have the same hair, guys wearing girls’ pants. We all know what I’m talking about.

Essentially, this song is talking about kids selling out their individuality to be part of a ‘scene’ and how that has erased everything beautiful about hardcore. It isn’t so much about the music anymore, it’s more about how good you look when you attend the latest trendy show. Basically, all these kids who think they look ‘hot’ are just so ordinary because there are no visual differences in any of them to distinguish them from the rest of the pack. They’re all just a dime a dozen.”

Still, for the heart-ripped-to-shreds faithful there are a good number of new tunes that, on the outside, appear to be rife with Mike’s over-the-top venting about his stormy relations with the opposite sex. This complements extremely comprehensive, intelligent, hilarious and musically appropriate sample use and placement amid a swath of unique, bowel rumbling Carolina metalcore that combines tire-iron breakdowns, groovy half-Obituary, half-Pantera riffage that drips with energy and emotional turmoil, plus solos seemingly written as tributes to Dimebag and the ghost of Connecticut’s I.N.C. But back to the misogyny. Has Mike ever come across or been contacted by an ex he’d so blatantly and remorselessly immortalized in song?

“None of the ladies have ever said anything to me personally; they are probably too scared of confronting me. But the worst thing

THAT OBSCURE OBJECT OF DESTRUCTION is starting to unravel, due in part to the band’s increasing profile, the need-to-know curiosity of their fans and the band themselves not fiercely sticking to their assumed identities, easing up on past tall tales of troubles with law enforcement and the use of old Possessed promo pics.

“KWD wasn’t ever started to be a real secret or anything. When I started the project I didn’t want KWD to be tagged or pigeonholed, so I decided to use my influences as a kid and come up with a project like Brujeria where they made up stories about the band. I was having fun with it and over time the stories have turned into some of the craziest things I have ever heard. It’s great because KWD has taken on a life of its own outside of what I have been able to have appear in print. KWD has developed into a myth of sorts; it’s great and we applaud the fans for keeping it alive. Essentially, all I have ever wanted to do was create records I was proud of and have us judged solely on what you hear, not what you see—although we definitely have a certain image to our artwork—and not what the band members look like. It has become very hard to keep the secret from everyone nowadays, especially since kids online will come to me and flat out ask me who I am. I don’t mind because if they are supporting us then they deserve to know. But I don’t want to have to officially post our identities anywhere; we want the fans to figure it out. We have provided all the pieces; now it’s time for the kids to do their detective work.”

You heard the man. (By the way, your intrepid reporter has seen fit to provide y’all with a couple of additional clues within this piece for you to wrap your investigative powers around. But I digress…) You also heard Mike go on about his appreciation for the fans and supporters of his band’s shadowy exterior. This, however, is a far cry from the “disgust for humankind” and “hate is good and hate is necessary” philosophies that have thematically powered killwhitneydead since their inception. It’s almost as if that, now that the band is coming out from behind the nihilistic veil of these past few years, they’re mellowing with age and/or with the knowledge that even the most misanthropic individuals have to be appreciative and thankful for the opportunities their lives have afforded them. Then again, if you skim through the lyrics to new tracks like “One Match & a Gallon of Gasoline,” “The Age Old Dilemma of Romance vs. Retribution,” “If I Told You I Loved You Would I Get It Any Faster?” and the song the album title is taken from, it’s obvious that Mike still has Komodo dragon venom flowing through his veins—the targets are just a bit more varied.

“The title is taken from the lyrics of ‘Put Your Mouth Where the Money Is’ and is a

you can do is feed a woman’s ego, so for the record, I haven’t written any songs about any women I have ever gone out with,” he laughs. “They don’t deserve any credit, plus it isn’t too hard to write songs of a vindictive nature. Most of the songs on [previous album] Never Good Enough for You were written about a few people I didn’t even have relationships with. It was just about going through all the usual bullshit hoops we have to go through when dealing with the opposite sex and all the games that are played. I learned my lessons and then wrote 17 songs about it all. Once I get into a mood I just write tons of lyrics. On a more positive note, I don’t think I’ve lost all hope in womankind. They aren’t all bad; just 99 per cent of them.”

So, as you’ve probably figured out, much of the public face of killwhitneydead ain’t the God’s honest truth, and that includes the fact that the band aren’t actually banned from playing in the rock clubs of Flagstaff, Arizona. Actually, KWD isn’t banned from playing anywhere because the band has yet to play any venue, anywhere. It’s been rumoured that the band have been getting together to rehearse with the intention of hitting the stage sometime in ’05.

“We are attempting to get our asses out there and onto a stage soon. We are shooting for summer, maybe making a debut at Hellfest, if they will have us. Our buddies in Swift want us to play a huge show with them in Winston-Salem too. So since that is just up the road from us we will probably do that as a warm up for anything bigger we have coming down the line. We can test the waters.

“One of the other main reasons for the ‘stories’ I created about the band was that I never thought KWD would become anything more than a studio project,” says Mike, in conclusion. “So I had to come up with a reason why this alleged band could never tour and I created all the troubles with the law. Jail time is always a good excuse to keep people from touring. But with all the popularity recently, the fans are demanding that we come play their towns. So we are trying to work out our schedules to make this happen, but what the fans don’t understand is that most of us are pushing, or are over, 30 years old. We have been doing this as a studio project thus far, so we have our daily lives that keep us tied down. We all wish we were 18 again and could pile into a van and tour the country, but unfortunately it isn’t that easy for us. Mac has two children at home and is in school to become a teacher. Instances like these that keep us at home just recording albums. We want to tour because we want to get out there and meet all the fans.”

Even the ladies…

By Kevin Stewart-Panko

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RUSSELL ALLEN

Russell Allen is on cloud nine right now and he won’t be getting off for some time. Not only has Allen been blessed with a solid band like Symphony X to front as singer, but now he’s been able to live out a dream he’s had for years: a solo record. Life is indeed good.

“I’ve always wanted to do something like this. This is the kind of music I was born with, man,” says the singer of the bluesy/hard rock swagger of Russell Allen’s Atomic Soul (Inside Out). “The stuff I do with Symphony X is a whole different side to what I can do. This stuff is

RUSSELL ALLEN from my childhood. I remember as a child hearing Led Zeppelin and Bad Company and it just making such an impact on me.

So I came up with some songs, talked with some musicians, and here’s what came out of it.

I really wanted to do an honest record.”

I think you captured that perfectly here.

“Thanks, man. I just wanted something that wasn’t polished.

It had to not be overdone, just real raw and have that vibe from the ’70s. I didn’t sit there and say, ‘I need to make a Symphony X kind of record to be able to get some sales and make some money.’ It wasn’t that kind of deal. The irony of this is that this kind of a record probably has more of an appeal on the market than my band does. You know what I mean? Anyone who is into rock music may not even know who the hell I am and still dig it.”

He adds, “The main reason I did this album was to rock out and have a good fuckin’ time.”

People always need to let loose.

“Exactly, and this was my time to get out there and whore myself around,” he laughs. “Just kidding. I actually did this album with friends. I actually was able to get some old friends of mine to play on this record, guys from my past bands. Great guys [drummer Robert Nelson, guitarists Brendan Anthony and Jason Freudberg, bassist Larry Salvatore, and Stratovarius keyboardist Jens Johansson] that really brought something to the table. The drummer was in Michael Romeo’s [Symphony X guitarist] old band. He never became a full-blown musician but he kept his chops up over the years and he did recordings here and there so he was already primed to play in a band. When it came time to find a drummer [note: Allen wrote and produced the album, and played most of the instruments] I didn’t want to play the name game, so I chose Robert. He

was very passionate about playing. He grew up with Bonham as an idol and he always plays in the pocket. All his drum work for songs was done in one take. It was unreal.”

Seeing as this is an album where you step away from your work with your full-time band, how did you think fans of Symphony X would react to it?

“I wasn’t trying to distance myself from my fans or detract from what the band was doing. I think by doing this I took away maybe four months of working with the band to do this since our last record came out in 2003. It wasn’t much time. And I know people thought I’d go do this and not come back to Symphony X. That’s not the case.”

He continues, “I had to get this out of me, man. I needed to express myself. I wrote all the music myself, but of course, I needed some help from some good friends. It was a test for me and I wanted to see if I could do this. I also produced the record, so that was a challenge too.

It was important to get a real rock vibe to this and as well focus on the vocals.”

With a sound that harkens back to great bands like Deep Purple, Rainbow, Dio, Led Zeppelin or Badlands (check out the superb tracks “Blackout,” “Voodoo Hand” and “We Will Fly”) and wanting to really go into this album balls out and rockin’, how prepared was Allen?

Replies the singer, “The Symphony X stuff is very planned and very crafted and there is a certain way I need to go into doing the vocals.

With this album, I did actually spend time preparing with the players, but it was not stressful. It was a good relaxed environment. It was a

STRAIGHT FROM THE SOUL different atmosphere, it was almost like a jam thing, and I don’t have that with the Symphony X guys because there is no room for it in that band.”

You don’t hear a lot of records like this anymore.

“No, you don’t,” he agrees, “and I don’t know why that is. I mean, I know the times have changed but we need albums like this. I just wanted to write this album and see what I could do. I just told the guys I needed a platform I could jump off of so I can do this bluesy rock style that I dig so much. This was the perfect environment for me to get expressive. This is music from my youth and what I grew up on and I’ve waited a long time to be able to get a chance to do this kind of an album.”

Well, I think you succeeded, Russell.

“I know,” he concludes. “And it feels great!”

By Adrian ‘The Energizer’ Bromley

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GUAPO

Brutally Handsome

By Rob Hughes

What can you do with a band like Guapo? Where do they fit? While they share a penchant for extreme metal’s musical shock tactics, the near-total lack of guitar excludes them from that genre. Call them “progressive rock” if you must. However, this British group doesn’t churn out the sort of dressedup AOR of a band like Enchant, nor the jazzy ear candy of the Flower Kings, nor the Berklee-honed chops clinics that Dream Theater is famous for. No, Guapo create progressive rock of the most jarring, scarifying sort. Rigidly martial one moment, flying apart like a cluster bomb the next, the instrumental bass/drums/keyboards trio wields their instruments like hammers of doom, flattening obstacles and scorching earth on albums like Five Suns (Cuneiform Records) and their latest, Black Oni (Ipecac Recordings). They defy comparison, and have no direct peers or disciples in any journalist-imagined “scene.” What you can, and should, do with Guapo is turn off the lights, strap on the headphones, and listen.

Keyboardist Daniel O’Sullivan is well aware that his band has a certain square peg nature, but he sounds like he enjoys their outsider status. He talked to Unrestrained! from a park in London, having just returned from a short tour of Holland and Germany where they sometimes had to make the best of a strange situation.

“Holland was a gig in Amstelveen at the Headway Festival.

It was like a dodgy prog-metal fest. We were billed amongst a load of bands that sort of sounded like second-rate versions of Dream Theater, which was very odd. I think we were billed to replace of a band called Jadis whom I’ve never heard, but I think they’re along those lines. We were sort of the odd ones out. It was a bit strange, but we were really well taken care of, and we got on well with everybody else. It was fun.”

This seems to be Guapo’s lot, more often that not—playing with bands who may be nominally progressive rock, but don’t play similar music at all. O’Sullivan and band are always up for a challenging gig, even in the rare instances when they’re amongst kindred spirits.

“That was part of the appeal of doing the Headway Festival. I was looking forward to the bewilderment in a sick voyeuristic kind of way. Just to talk to bands that are coming from that school of thought was kind of interesting. It’s kind of good. We’ve never really played with a band that sounded like us anyway, apart from this festival we’ve done for the past few years called Les Tritonales in Paris. Usually that’s all chamber rock, sort of avant-prog stuff. Univers Zero’s played it, Magma’s played it, but we’re approaching it from more of a punk rock angle. Generally we have no choice but to play with bands that are different from us.”

If Guapo have anything in common with prog rock convention, it’s their fondness for epic composition. The title piece on Five Suns was a multi-movement, 40-minute monster, while the latest album features more condensed tracks that still often stretch past the 10-minute mark. Then there’s the trilogy—Black Oni is the second album of three related releases.

People love a trilogy (just ask Peter Jackson or George Lucas) and the progressive rock community is no exception. Perhaps aware that prog-rock nutters tend to get over-excited about such things, O’Sullivan is keen to play down the conceptual master plan behind the three albums.

“It’s quite loose, basically. Really, each album is a reflection of our interests at the time. They all seem to have a mythological resonance, which is kind of incidental. It’s not something that we’ve intended to portray. But I guess what we want once all three records are completed is a definitive filtered-down piece. That’s what we’ve been doing live—almost creating a montage of pieces off each record and gradually trying to filter it down into one defining moment in our career. I don’t know what we’re going to do with it after the three albums are finished, but for some reason they just feel like more of a triptych. I was expecting to be asked this and was kind of dreading it to be honest. It’s more of a metaphysical trilogy, without trying to sound too pretentious.

It’s just three people working together. The third album that we’re working on now is the last album that the three of us together will be working on because Matt [Thompson, bass] has left the band, and that also created an interesting energy to those three albums. Some definite demarcations and different ways that we want to approach things have come to light.”

The final album of the trilogy, then, marks the end of an era for the band, as one member leaves and another comes on board. Dave Ledden, from O’Sullivan’s other band, Miasma and the Carousel of Headless Horses, has joined as touring bass player, and there may be more additions as Guapo grapples with the musical outpourings from the last three albums.

“Essentially Matt has quit the band,” says O’Sullivan, “although we are intending to finish this last record together because there’s some more recording to be done. I think our intention was to expand anyway for next year, try and create something a bit bigger. In order to play this final filtereddown piece out of three records I think we may need a bigger lineup. As far as Matt being replaced, he won’t be replaced with regards to his artistic involvement. Dave certainly brings his own energy to the band and it’s working well.”

The often hyperkinetic, layered nature of Guapo’s material suggests it must be difficult to replicate on stage, and O’Sullivan’s thoughts about expanding the lineup to play the stuff live seem to reinforce this impression. Because Guapo’s music springs from such an uncompromised, painstaking aesthetic, it must be frustrating to strip the recorded material down to be able to present it live.

“Yeah, I think that’s always been the way for the band,” agrees O’Sullivan. “I joined the band four or five years ago and we started writing Five Suns together. We worked on some basic themes that Matt and David [Smith, drums] had put together and improvised a lot and came up with something that was far more elaborate and grand than what we could do as a live unit, as a trio. But we just thought ‘Fuck it, let’s get in the studio and create an album that we want to hear. If that involves using a multitude of overdubs, then so be it.’ What we do live is interesting because we are trying to over-compensate and we’re constantly trying to create the level of energy that comes across on the records, and that pushes us to another level. We’ve been a quartet before; we’ve played with another keyboardist and I had a lot less to do, but in some ways that was less exciting to me. I like having a lot to do on stage. I like being pushed to some kind of extreme or transcendental state. Basically we just go hell for leather on stage and hope for the best.”

O’Sullivan nails the essence of Guapo with that description. The Black Oni experience is one of unbridled, working-with- o u t - a - n e t daring and energy. Thompson’s barbed basslines growl like a pack of rottweilers and Smith attacks his entire kit like Keith Moon, abandoning standard rock beats for elaborate, tribal patterns. Overtop the mayhem floats O’Sullivan’s haunted keyboard voicings, a blend of overdriven Fender Rhodes piano (“It’s a versatile but also organic, visceral instrument,” he says) and that prog-rock mainstay, the mellotron. The five album tracks bear only roman numerals for titles, giving listeners the responsibility of connecting to the music by conjuring their own images and associations, weaving their own web of nightmares.

Guapo don’t reach out to their audience with anything other than the music. Their latest promo photos depict them in masks, and CD artwork is enigmatic yet elegant, presenting only the bare details about the music within. Despite the lowkey approach, Guapo found labels reaching out to them right from the birth of the trilogy, resulting in each album coming out on a different label—Cuneiform (an avant-prog boutique label), Ipecac (Mike Patton’s outlet for Fantomas, Melvins, Isis and others) and Neurot (home of Neurosis), respectively. It sounds like a clever strategy to reach the maximum number of adventurous ears. O’Sullivan, though, admits it was down to pure circumstance.

“It just kind of happened—no strategy intended. The band had previously worked on Pandemonium Records, but they kind of disintegrated, so the band needed a new home and to be honest, we probably deserved a new home. We sent Five Suns to a bunch of different places and Cuneiform wanted to release it, and we signed with them. Then Neurot got in touch and they wanted to release Five Suns and we said ‘Sorry, you missed the boat, but we’d like to work with you on something.’ Then Ipecac did the same thing. They all wanted to release Five Suns, but we managed to negotiate with every one of them. They’re all great labels and we were totally honoured and flattered that they contacted us. So somehow we managed to pull it off. There’s nothing in writing with Neurot yet, but they’re pretty anxious to hear this thing we’re working on. I think it’s looking good.

“Music is very much an ephemeral thing,” O’Sullivan continues. “We’re not putting all our eggs in one basket. We’re constantly evolving and discovering new ideas and methods of music that were unknown to us previously. There’s a bunch of different labels that I’d want to work on with other projects.

It’s difficult to imagine ourselves in one place for some reason.”

Indeed, Guapo will be constantly on the move for the rest of the year, with shows across Europe and plans to possibly cross the Atlantic this autumn. Ideally, O’Sullivan says, the American jaunt would be a package tour with one of Mike Patton’s projects or some other Ipecac artist. It’s tempting to imagine Guapo realizing such a scheme, although if they don’t, there is still much more new Guapo music to come— plenty to keep listeners’ imaginations stoked for a long time to come.

BRAINSTORM

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German power metal act Brainstorm was a band I always knew of but never fully explored. That all changed at least year’s ProgPower IV in Atlanta, where they blew me away with their live show. I was so impressed I went out a few weeks later and bought a good chunk of their back catalog and was anticipating their latest offering for Metal Blade, Liquid Monster.

The new album continues where the band left off with 2003’s Soul Temptation, though the production is a tad slicker and the arrangements are much tighter. Plus, singer Andy B. Franck’s vocals have never sounded better.

“I feel good all around about this album and it seems as though the fans and critics are loving it too,” boasts a jubilant Franck down the phone line from his home in Germany. “What do you think of the album?”

I think this album really does kick some serious ass. You got me hooked at ProgPower and now I’m on board for the long haul.

“Good to hear, Adrian. ProgPower was great. I was so nervous, but once we hit the stage, ‘Bam!’ We were on fire!”

Let’s talk about the new album.

“Okay, well, this is a very important record for us in Brainstorm [the band is rounded out by guitarists Torsten Ihlenfeld and Milan Loncaric, bassist Andy Mailänder and drummer Dieter Bernert]. This is a record that will no doubt help shape our future. This is kind of like the album where the boy becomes a man. We tried a lot of things last time in the studio and some worked and some didn’t, but this time around with Liquid Monster we just took this by the reins and made it a worthwhile experience for all involved. We were in sync from the get-go and no doubt you can sense that with the album. We spent a lot of time in the studio making everything sound perfect and as good as possible.”

In your own opinion, how does this album stack up against the last album?

“To me personally,” he responds, “I think we just gave this album a lot of effort. It shows. We wrote a lot of the songs in our rehearsal space and on the road, because that was the only time we could do it. We were out on the road last year a lot and when it came time to record we had a lot of groundwork already covered and knew the stuff quite well. There was really no worries that we’d go into the studio not ready.”

Liquid Monster— does the title refer to partying too much?

He laughs.

“No, no, no…

There re-

ally is nothing special about the title. It was a pairing of words we put together. We were talking about the rough mixes of the album and one of the guitarists commented how it was a very monstrous sound so the word ‘monster’ was attached to the album from the start. Then the artwork was being assembled with the three metallic faces coming out of the water and the next thing you know, we had Liquid Monster as the title. See, it’s nothing all that exciting.”

Things seem to be going well for the band. The album is getting a strong push from their label, press has been good and the band is embarking on their first-ever series of headlining gigs.

“It feels amazing to be at this point in our careers, but it wasn’t always like that. We don’t really care about where we fit in or what people think because as many other bands face early on, some people always say your band won’t take you anywhere and that it is a waste of time. This is something I wanted to do for so many years. I remember when I was young standing in front of the mirror singing and screaming, ‘Yeah, people, can you see me now?!” He laughs at the memory.

I used to do that to old Ozzy Osbourne albums. I always wanted to go on stage and be a madman. Sadly, my music career never got out of my bedroom. You’re lucky.

“Too funny. So yeah, you know how I felt back then, and as you can imagine it has all changed dramatically over the last few years for me. I will always cherish those young days in front of the mirror. Now we go on tour and have all these die-hard fans coming out and wanting to meet us.”

He continues, “We’ve always believed in ourselves. We never followed trends or hype or anything. For us it is very special to see that we are allowed to play all over the world. It is unbelievable that we have been able to do so much for the band up to this point and that there is so much more we can do.

“We’re very humble about all of this and as long as we can make music and go out and put on a great show for the fans, then it’s all good.”

Let the monster out!

“Of course. We’re always ready to rock!”

By Adrian ‘The Energizer’ Bromley

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OVERKILL

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I take umbrage with the title of Over Kill’s latest disc, RELIXIV (their 14th disc), simply because I disagree with the terminology. Pronounced Relics-fourteen (get it, relix plus four in roman numerals with the letter ‘x’ doing double duty), it almost gives the impression that the group is a bunch of fossils, and what they have to offer us is to teach us from the past, rather than bringing forth something new.

It is tongue-in-cheek, and indicative of the bands sense of humour, any short conversation with frontman Bobby Ellsworth will tell you that, but still, it rankles. Kiss has more than 20 albums, but how many of the last few have been vital? Motorhead as well has more than 14 albums, but if you were to talk to the average fan, most don’t own the newer releases, or just go to see the band live to hear the hits.

Even though it’s been 20 years since Feel The Fire was released, Over Kill has broken their own mould, and don’t come from the same building blocks as many of their forbearers. When they tour for a new album people go to hear the new songs.

It’s an event and a full-blown process. Touring coincides with a new release, with lots of press in support. Sometimes there’s a video-clip (sometimes not), as well as other hullabaloo and hoopla that surrounds new releases. It’s not just “Yawn, there’s another Over Kill album,” it is more like “Damn, it’s been two-years and the new one is finally here.”

But you can’t change a band, or the entities that comprise it. If the collective will of those in Over Kill want to poke a little fun at themselves, they’re going to anyway.

“This [the title of the album] was just to give you guys something to think about; we know that you don’t have enough to think about,” laughingly says Ellsworth. “I suppose to some degree it still proves we have a sense of humour, and I suppose to call the album ‘relics,’ or ourselves for that matter, means our sense of humour’s intact!

Take the music seriously, but not always yourself.”

Then again, after 20 years as a band, I guess you can pretty much do whatever you like. How many other early-mid ‘80’s metal bands have 14 albums? Kreator?

Nope. Testament? Try again. Slayer? More than halfway there. Megadeth? Have they cracked 10? Anthrax?

Ding-dong, you’re wrong! They didn’t get this far, and thrive by being lucky. After paying dues for so long, they are entitled some latitude.

“I’ve known D.D. [Verni, bass, founding member] since ’81, and we were a band thereafter doing gigs in cover bands, but have a professional band since Feel The Fire in ’85. Pretty nice run. 20 years! Who knows how? Who knows why? Maybe it’s part of that sense of humour, maybe it’s, in hindsight, standards that we had, and those standards have been adjusted along the way; I think they became higher as time went on. The results, of course, is whether you like it or you don’t like it, but we’re working at a higher level. We always saw the value in it and continue to from day to day. In hindsight, when you’re working on a day-to-day basis, two decades have strung together, and 14 records have been made.”

Part of that 20-year history, and coinciding with latitude, means that producing RELIXIV was up the bands alley. This time around, Ellsworth states, the group felt they were the best person’s for the task, combining the elements of yester-kill with equal parts of the kill of today.

“I think it’s how things line-up. I think the way that this record was taking shape was that there was a collision of two of the more dominant characteristics of what Over Kill is, and that’s the world that was and the world that is; the contemporary Over Kill and that deep-rooted historical Over Kill, and those two worlds collided. To self-produce, we want to look at something and say ‘how do you make those two worlds cohesive and make a record that’s cohesive?’ How does everything work off each other, even though they’re coming from that ’85, ’87, ’89 Over Kill, and that 2000 – 2005 Over Kill. It was really about the challenge, it was really about steering the ship, it was really about doing it our own way, and these were the real motivational factors. We came off of a record with Colin Richardson [Killbox 13] where he produced and mixed the record. We took co-production credits, but a lot of it rested on his shoulders. So we came off an easy one into a hard one, but we had a guy who was in the studio, in Colin, who was also a fantastic learning tool, a fantastic teacher. If you look at the drums on Relix and the drums on Killbox, there’s very similar production qualities. Hey, if in 20-years if you can’t pick some good shit up and throw something else in the mix and do it ourselves occasionally, just to make it fun, then there’s something wrong with you.”

There’s lots about RELIXIV to be nostalgic about. It marks a silver-age for the band, with a lot to be proud of and look back on, but at the same time they’re still young and vital enough to look to the future. RELIXIV reflects that in that the album is a time-capsule of sorts, embracing the sounds of yesterday and today, although Ellsworth says the record formed on its own in this fashion, with no conscious thought influencing its ebb and flow eras.

“Musically it just shows up so. The records take their own form. The lyrics, that just happens from within my world. I’m the guy who puts the roof on the house. The house has been constructed, the architecture’s been done, the foundation’s been laid before I even get there. I just have to make sure that the rain doesn’t go in, but it’s not complete without the roof. But I think it took shape more so on its own. In a short amount of hindsight, I think that it was a good thing to show all these elements. It’s a funny feeling this record gave. I’m a hater of the ‘best of,’ unless it’s Motorhead or the Ramones. ‘Best of’s’ are not what it’s about for me. It’s about what cohesiveness a record has. When you put on ‘Within Your Eyes’ are you still interested by ‘Old School’?

Because it takes you to different places. And this record did, it took you back, and it took you to the present day, and I think the best evidence of that are ‘Bats In The Belfry’ and ‘A Pound Of Flesh.’ ‘Bats In The Belfry’ [track four] is a more modern-day sledgehammer groove—Over Kill, with a lyrical and melodic content that’s almost written from a pop perspective. It keeps going that simplified chorus. It’s that evolutionary Over Kill. You go into ‘A Pound Of Flesh,’ which is the fifth song, and its cut

from 1988. Why does it sound fresh? Because ‘Bats In The Belfry’ precedes it. Why do these two songs work together? They shouldn’t. But it almost becomes a best of Over Kill over a 20-year period with regard to characteristic, elements, and personality. It’s an interesting record from that perspective.”

It also goes to show that adapting, and the ability to change, has helped to keep them going too. But do they see the changes coming and become proactive, or do they react to the stimulus coming their way?

“I think we’re reactive,” exclaims Ellsworth. “I think that’s quite obvious because there’s an evolutionary process within this band, but it’s never been forced. Songs like ‘Love’ and ‘Old School’ off this album, where you go ‘curveball, slider, not the same old fastball all the time off these guys.’ I think we react to which situation it presents itself as. In this case, the record starts forming itself, but we start mixing it and start looking at it and go ‘what do we have here?’ That was due primarily to the reaction.”

Guaranteed to get a reaction is their live show, which this year promises to be unparalleled. Most of the summer has festival dates, where the band will rub shoulders with the metal elite, followed by a proposed tour with Metal Church, then some 20th anniversary celebrations.

“We’re actually looking to celebrate Feel The Fire at the end of it, in Cologne [Germany], start to finish, take a break, come back out and do a second set. Then we’re doing that same show in New York when we get back from Europe. It’ll be a night of that record—that record plus. I always thought we would need to do that when the time came, so I suppose the time is here. I never thought it would be, but it is!”

Here’s to 20 more years!

By Alex Ristic

Relics Of the Past, Present and Future

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DIVINITY DESTROYED / VANCOUVER

STRAIGHT FROM THE NETHER REGIONS

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New Jersey quintet Divinity Destroyed are a band not that easily classifiable. I mean, they play slightly technical death/black with a cool progressive edge to it, but there is so much more to it.

The band’s release Eden In Ashes was originally put out independently in 2003, garnered some solid reviews, and then that was pretty much it. Cue lineup changes and a few years of work to get the name out there and in 2005 the band signs to Screaming Ferret Records. The re-release of the album has given them a second chance in the spotlight, and they’re going to make the best of it.

“Knowing that someone out there thinks we’re worth enough of a damn to acknowledge our existence is definitely a comforting concept,” says guitarist/vocalist Mark Ward about hooking up with the label. “It makes us feel warm.”

There is a lot going on with this record. When you went in to record the album a few years back, was that a concern or did you have to work around making it all come together? How did you decide to bring in the rough and clean vocals?

“The songs had long been completed by the time we [guitarist/vocalist Tom Ward, keyboardist Jonny Heerema, bassist Jim Cowen, and drummer Dan Leonard] broke into the studio, vocal melodies included—although, due to procrastination, the lyrics were written minutes before going to tape...usually in the bathroom. As far as the coupling of clean and dirty vocals goes, that’s just the direction in which we felt the songs were careening. We had a lot to holler about. Although now, none of us are too keen on screaming live, so we kind of screwed ourselves,” he laughs. “But we pull it off like champs. We’re winners.”

And because the band has seen some lineup changes since that time in the studio, how does that change things for the band currently and for future writing and recording?

“Little has changed other than our having to memorize more birthdays and blood types,” he jokes. “That, and the songwriting process is entirely different. We’ve actually known both the newbies, Jonny and Jim, from back in Hanoi, so their shenanigans are nothing new to us.

They each have their own libraries of material that we’re presently trying to steal.”

He adds, “Our influences stand out more distinctly in the newer material while the earlier, primitive ditties reflect our need to get our jollies off. After we squeezed out that initial lump of tunes, we were more comfortable exploring our creative nether regions and letting those juices flow. Although our roots are planted firmly in metal, we’ve always had annoyingly diverse tastes in noise. So whereas a song might be spawned as some bastardized concoction of classical, punk, jazz, funk, blues, and 8-bit Nintendo, it’ll all end up as this comprehensive pool of vomit. Each component will retain some of its original traits, but concealed under a thin veil of metal.”

No matter how the band brings together their disparate ideas, the end result always seems to come across in stellar fashion. Take the songs “Sweet Heresy” and “Borealis”—those are great and unique songs that could have easily come across as cluttered. They fully capture the band’s sound and style.

“Thanks,” replies Ward. “What the music brings out depends greatly on situation and circumstance. If a song is in its fetal stages, there is a lot of conscious thought involved in arranging the parts. But when it’s complete and we’re butchering it live, we completely surrender ourselves and let it manipulate us in the most violent manner possible.”

A lot of people I know who have heard and reviewed this record think this band has the potential to blow up big. Are you hearing that?

“Can you ask those people to buy CDs? We need a trailer,” he chimes in, laughing. “Blow up big, eh? We’ve heard that a few times—just as many times as we’ve been told that we need to immediately disband/ choke on feces. There isn’t much we read in reviews that we haven’t already considered. I don’t need someone else to tell me I can’t sing.

It’s definitely flattering reading positive reviews, but just as a negative review does little to harm us, a positive review will do just as little to encourage us. Regardless of critical esteem, we’re just going to keep doing what we do and pray people pick up what we put down.”

Now that you are signed, what has changed?

“Now if we don’t feel like doing something, such as going to work or showering, we can just blame it on contractual obligations,” he laughs.

“We’re doing the same exact thing we’ve been doing every single day for the past few years, i.e. desperately clawing for shows, peddling merch, fighting to maintain our dignity, et cetera, so not much has changed since coming to Screaming Ferret. And as far as new music goes, we have enough songs for another CD, but absolutely no money to record it, so we’ll have to break out the kneepads and toothpaste again.”

By Adrian ‘The Energizer’ Bromley

Sometimes you just need to make changes, explore and see what comes out of it.

That was the case with Switzerland’s Vancouver, who originally came together as a sideproject from various acts like Unfold, Impure Wilhelmina and Iscariote, but eventually came to exist as a new band. The band’s debut The Moment, out now on Deepsend Records, is a noisy assemblage of atmospheric chaos, hardcore and hard-ended riffage akin to the likes of Neurosis, Isis and Cult Of Luna for the most part.

“We recorded these songs really quickly. We spent only two days in studio. Basically, we just wanted to make a demo, but the result turned out cool, so we decided to release this material. The whole thing was recorded live in one take,” starts guitarist Alain about how the band’s debut The Moment came to be. “We’re not used to recording like that, but even if the songs are not perfect we won this ‘energy’ thing this time around.”

Two days? That’s impressive. Was anything planned or was it just spur of the moment ideas?

“The whole production work was really quick. Nothing was calculated or planned. We just went in studio and clicked the record button. Moreover, we made this bunch of songs quickly as well. We never wanted to sound in a specific way, we just played and that music became Vancouver. At that time, we had no bass player and no singer, so we asked friends afterwards to join us in order to exist as a real band [the band now consists of singer Michael, bassist Bastien, drummer Laurent and guitaist Elie]. Now we’re working on new material, all together. We really want to keep the spontaneous touch in Vancouver’s music but I think the new material is gonna sound a lot more sophisticated.”

The thing that impressed me about this debut—and even moreso now that I am aware that this was recorded in one take and in just two days—is that there is a lot going on, but somehow it all works together. Was it hard to harness and channel all of these styles and moods?

“Vancouver’s music is like a wall full of doors: we open some, and we close some others,” he answers. “We only try to manage with our technical level in order to keep the music interesting and original. No restriction regarding our music, instruments or whatever. To me, music is not about finding something, it’s about searching for something. Always searching for something new is a good way to figure out music as a band.”

And your influences? Do you still hear them in your music?

“I guess everyone in the band has their own influences. I mean, we all come from different musical environments, and this is a chance to get them all amalgamated in Vancouver’s music. I can speak only for myself (but I’m sure all members of Vancouver feel the same). Many bands try to justify their originality by telling the magazines they don’t have any influences and that they’re one-of-a-kind. How can you avoid the music that you listen to, the movies you watch or any art form that you enjoy? You absolutely need to accept your influences and try to go beyond them. I personally try to keep my mind open to every kind of music as long as it’s well done. Wanna get a taste of what is played on my turntable? From classical to death metal, depending of the mood. But nowadays: The Dillinger Escape Plan, Christian Kjellvander, Money Brother, Killswitch Engage, Kristofer Astrom and Mastodon.”

A lot of people—including myself—would lump you into the same core group of bands like Isis, Cult Of Luna and Neurosis. How do you feel about these comparisons?

He replies, “I would say that we feel comfortable in this comparison. People usually like to have some references of a band to know what kind of music they play. We don’t feel offended about that. But these bands are big and we’re not. We would love to play as opening act for one of them sometime, just because they’re great bands and certainly cool people.”

The band is from Switzerland—what is the music scene like there nowadays? Any bands we should look out for?

“It’s pretty seldom that something BIG happens besides heavy weights

Noisemongers on the Prowl! such as Samael, but there’s a lot of really interesting bands around. Almost no one lives off of their music here—that means you play music besides your job/studies and it’s sometimes hard to tour, rehearse and so on. On the “dark” side you should check out Zatokrev, Nostromo, Forceed, Impure Wilhelmina. On the “rock” side we have a big band called Favez and some rock ‘n roll guys called Houston Swing Engine. Of course this is one percent of the Swiss scene, but I really like these bands.”

I’m curious, where did the band name come from? Has anyone in the band ever been to Vancouver, BC, Canada?

He ends off, “When I was in my previous band I used to say that I would love to play in a band named Vancouver. When the recording was done, we were in the need of a name. So we chose Vancouver, just because it sounded cool. No one in the band has been to Canada.

Perhaps with a name like that, we’ll have the chance to get money from the Canadian government to do a tour there?,” he chuckles

By Adrian ‘The Energizer’ Bromley

BENEATH THE MASSACRE / WINTER OF APOKALYPSE

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Sometimes being thrown to the lions is the best lesson… ”Considering that our first show was in October 2004, I think things are going good for us,” starts Beneath The Massacre singer Elliot Desgagnés about the formation of his band and their debut disc for Galy Records titled Evidence Of Inequity.

“Two months after our first live appearance and we were in studio recording a 5songs CD with Yannick St-Amand [Despised Icon, Ion Dissonance], one of the best metal producers in Canada. While recording the album we were shopping the album to Alex Erian at Galy Records so that eventually we’d be able to get it out and get it into stores to buy.”

He adds, “Evidence of Inequity is a spontaneous album. As soon as we had enough songs to do a show we did one and recorded a CD with those songs. We didn’t really have plans for the CD other than push it as far as we could. Basically we just wanted the CD to catch the attention of metal fans, labels, promoters, booking agencies, etc.”

They say bands take years to craft and create their debut. How hard was it to come together to create the music and record the album? What do you think of studio work?

“It was quite simple for Beneath The Massacre to create our sound because we’ve all known each other for years and we knew what we wanted. In fact, the band came from a line-up change in our ex-band Observing the Falling Tree. We started O.T.F.T when we were kids and the new songs had nothing to do with the old stuff so it was a good thing for us to take a few months off to prepare the new band. So I guess the fact that we had another band made things a lot simpler. We [drummer Justin Rousselle, guitarist Christopher Bradley and bassist Dennis Bradley] didn’t really have to convince the bookers to put us on line-ups because they were trusted our band and that’s how we got to play our first show in our hometown with Candiria. This is when Eric Galy [owner of Galy Records] first saw us. As for the recording, I contacted Yannick St-Amand when BtM wasn’t even doing shows yet, so by the time he got us a recording date it had only been two months we were doing shows. We were amazed how it was easy in studio. We seriously thought it was going to be hard, but Yannick helped us a lot by being real professional.”

How have you dealt with the whole label/business side of things?

“Having previously played in another band, we were prepared for it but Alex and Eric from Galy Records have been good to us. They knew we had a shit load of questions and that we wanted the record deal to be as simple as possible. It was quite simple to work with these guys.”

Coming from Montreal, Quebec, a hotbed for all things metal in Canada, why should the average metal fan care about BtM? What do you have to offer?

“I think we have a particular sound that might come from the fact that we’re influenced by many different styles of music,” he comments. “We are influenced by many styles of music. In fact, most of our CDs in our van are not death metal CDs. Of course we have our favourites, for example I think we are the biggest Origin fans, those guys are incredible and some may find some similarities between them and us. Basically we are trying real hard to develop our own sound.”

Is there a song on the Ep that best represents the BtM sound? Y’know? To act as an intro to the band.

“I’m not quite sure if there’s a song that could represent BtM more than the next one on the Ep,” he answers. “I think every song has its own mood and is different in a certain way. Of course we have a style that you can recognise in all of songs but the songs are different enough that when you’re listening to the CD it’s not like you are listening to one long song. People seem to like ‘Profitable Kill Count’ a lot, but I couldn’t say if it’s a more representative song than the next one.”

In closing, I ask if there’s a story behind the band name? Why was it chosen?

“The world’s actual economic, political, social and cultural structures, as well as the inhumane destruction they have done, can easily be measured up to a massacre,” he replies. “In order to have a rational vision of this world it is important to understand the reasons underneath these problems so that the same mistakes won’t be perpetuated over and over again.”

Now that’s heavy.

By Adrian ‘The Energizer’ Bromley

FIRST IMPRESSIONS

B y Ta t e B e n g t s o n It is almost comical to scour the reviews of Winter of Apokalypse’s label debut, Solitary Winter Night (Moribund), in order to note the sheer number of slapdash comparisons to Darkthrone. While Winter of Apokalypse certainly plays a form of black metal that holds to the early-90s Norwegian frame of reference, to summarily dismiss the band as a slavish adherent to the Darkthrone cult of personality betrays ignorance at best, carelessness at worst.

“The name of Darkthrone gets thrown around way too much in my opinion. I really do not think that we are ‘like’ Darkthrone,” flatly states guitarist Fascist. “I would say that a strong percentage of black metal listeners are worthless, ignorant fucks with worthless, ignorant responses. I have to say that I have always found a common ground in being a listener and purveyor of the Darkthrone collection, but I am certainly not out to steal their sound…I believe that we offer a style that does not, and will not, compromise...which goes back to the roots of filthy blackened metal. I believe this because the members of Winter of Apokalypse cannot even compromise unto each other. Fuck them and fuck you...I will never compromise. You get the idea...” The six-stringer trails off, absorbed in his own misanthropy.

It may be subtle glint of a guitar melody or maybe just the abject horror of the vocalist’s depraved snarls, but Winter of Apokalypse knows how to compose a classic black metal song in structure, in execution, and in nihilistic anti-spirit. The finale, “Black Metal of Death,” epitomizes Winter of Apokalypse’s ability to mix austere guitar melodies with a monstrous riff that leaves ulcers where once there was healthy stomach lining; it’s the sort of song that bridges the so-called First and Second Waves of black metal, that treads that unholy-yet-venerable ground between Blood Fire Death and De Mysteriis Dom Sathanas. “Black Metal of Death” is “a bit different from the other songs on the album, but that is something that folks do not truly know about Winter of Apokalypse yet,” the guitarist foreshadows. “We have many songs that sound very different from one another. The arrangement of the tracks on Solitary Winter Night was done [in] that way because of the way that the songs seem to flow together. The aim was to gather a chilling, yet heavy, half an hour of barbaric noise. I believe that the goal was met,” he asserts with well-founded confidence.

One of the other unusual aspects of Solitary Winter Night is the use of line art for the cover, rather than the more typical corpse-paint/landscape imagery. As it turns out, Fascist is not exactly pleased with the cover choice. “I would never personally choose that drawing or logo if the decision were clearly up to me, but I hate to get too involved with all of the details of a CD release (although I can certainly appreciate them when they are done correctly, [which is] rare). The other members find it to be much more important than I do. I see/feel nothing special in that cover drawing…and furthermore [in] most of today’s black metal scene.”

He continues, elaborating upon his stance vis-à-vis his art: “As a guitar player, I am perfectly content in recording analog riffs onto a tape and forgetting about it. I pity the lost pukes who will pay $18 for this Moribund release in their local Tower Records store but it isn’t worth my time to attempt to rearrange the distribution. Fuck it—deep. Do folks even realize all of the effort that absolutely was not put into this release? Give me a fucking break. The politics are all twisted but I am not fifteen years old with a set sail into the great pathetic place that too many black metal losers/sluts (depending upon your sex) seem to wane within.”

Playing no favorites and pulling no punches, the guitarist’s disdain extends to the black metal genre itself. Spurred by my question about the zealousness with which most black metal devotees avow the superiority of the form, he fumes over the deteriorating state of black metal and whether it even deserves to be held in such regard: “What I consider to be the most impure black metal, others do not. So what is black metal these days? Everyone has to have a black metal band. Ridiculous ego has stricken the metal scene with great harm. A shame. Black metal should hurt the ears and devastate the soul of the fan-pig. When black metal is written correctly then I do consider it to be an elite art of sorts, but I do not consider Winter of Apokalypse to be a black metal band.”

If not black metal…what, then, is Winter of Apokalypse?

“We are a metal band and should never be gathered up in the cliché that is black metal 2005.”

With that, I cannot argue.

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STALAGGH

CIRCLE OF DEAD CHILDREN

“It’s not important to know who’s behind Stalaggh or what other bands we’re in. Only our therapy he ever had. Their thoughts about mankind have many similarities with the ideology message of warfare against humanity is what matters. We want to spread hate, fear, and of Stalaggh, so we can really relate to them. terror. You’ll never know our human names, no photos, not even how many humans are “In our personal lives, we have the same ideology as Stalaggh, so it’s not hard to separate part of Stalaggh. We’re ashamed to be part of the feeble human race.” the two,” says Stalaggh regarding the ever-so-thin divide between Life and Art. “Living among Black metal braggadocio, or earnest agenda? For most blackened hordes, it’s the forhumans makes us sick and full of hate, and these emotions are transformed into sound with mer route; no less heartwarming in its idiomatic familiarity, but Stalaggh. We’re misanthropes/nihilists, and we try to be in contact with hardly threatening when the formula is simply X from This BM humans as little as possible. The more we hate living in this world, the Band and Y from That BM Band. But for clandestine blacknoiseniks more extreme the audio-terror of Stalaggh will get.”

Stalaggh, this modus operandi is DEAD FUCKING SERIOUS. Just one About that. By comparison to Nihil, musically Terrror has even less of spin—hell, one fucking minute—of either of the collective’s two a human element—in other words: tangible instruments, “normal” exalbums plays this assertion out in no uncertain terms. Between pression using them—but not quite stepping over the border into all-out those two long-players—2003’s Projekt Nihil, originally released noise. This time, the audio exorcism is guided more by the inmates’ eron super-limited vinyl and then reissued in a sleek digipack toward ratic screams rather than the improv drums ‘n’ synth of the first album, the end of last year, which also found the arrival of the one-upthe sound more assaulting but not aggro per se, yet rather menacing ping Projekt Terrror—Stalaggh have painted portraits (seemingly instead. And although Stalaggh are more “there” in this second audio in human skin) of frail, failed humanity, of dreams being crushed, assault—particularly the swirling and sucking noise-effects, for examof nightmares becoming reality, of the unsettling being the status ple, which confront the listener as much as the patients’ screams—it’s quo. That they do so in a confrontationally abstract, deconstructivall sounding less like Instruments Being Used Properly. And now, a third ist manner, breaking Conventional Music over its back much like treatise on mental/emotional terror is in the works. Entitled Projekt Misearly industrialists Eintsturzende Neubauten and Throbbing Gristle anthropia, this allegedly last Stalaggh album will subtract everything did decades prior, is only half of Stalaggh’s severely perverse alto simply the voice. All told, a “peeling away” process at work across lure.

Stalaggh’s records? Abstracting abstractions even further, if you will?

The other? They fucking use mental patients. Seriously, no shit.

“Your analysis of both our projekts is most accurate and interesting,” Thus, the screams of pain, anguish, disgust, hate, frustration, and assesses the Collective Voice, “but we don’t really plan how a projekt every negative emotion you and I think we feel is parlayed by a will sound. Everything is improvised. We never rehearse before a recordbunch of asylum inmates on leave for the weekend, recorded in ing. We only know the theme of the projekt before we start, and that’s near-darkness and -solitude and entirely improvised all the while. the only guideline we have while recording. Projekt Misanthropia must It’s beyond unsettling. It’s beyond voyeuristic. Some would even become our most extreme projekt, and we have decided that only vocals say it’s in extremely poor taste. A resounding Yes all around, of mentally deranged patients will be the most effective. We’re planning but there’s no denying the weighty, uncomfortable impact these to make our last projekt at least 60-minutes long, so it will be almost all-too-honest gesticulations have when coupled with a woozy, impossible to endure. wasted, slobbering swarm of ass-raped doom-riffs, smoke-‘em“Projekt Misanthropia will be the final chapter of the Stalaggh when-you’ve-got-none synths, and drums that seemingly fall trilogy,” the Voice confirms. “When we started, we had very precise down stairs despite operating at a snail’s plodding pace—in ideas of what Stalaggh should be, and we decided only to do three reverse. Fucking hell. projekts. Every projekt has its own theme—nihilism, terror, and “We never got any permission to use the mental patients,” misanthropy. We have some idea of what we’ll do afterwards, but says Stalaggh’s collective voice when queried about potential only time can tell what will be created. legal-wrangling. “They were allowed to leave the mental asy“There will be no coordination or arrangement,” says Stalaggh lum for one day every month, so this is when we had to record. regarding the (non-)setup of the imminent Misanthropia. “All our This is why it takes us so long to create a projekt. It takes us projekts are completely improvised. This is the only way to create months to find the right mental patients, and then we have to audio-terror. We try to bring together at least 10 mental patients in plan everything to get all the mental patients together on one one recording room and let them scream out all their insanity and day. We have a contact who works inside the mental asylum who hatred towards mankind. It will sound like a vocal hell on earth, a helps us with this. He also got us the drawing from the mental monument of hatred. Without a doubt, this projekt will be our most patient who performed on Projekt Nihil and committed suicide a extreme creation and will mentally destroy the listener.” few months after the recording; we’ve used that drawing as artNot surprisingly, Stalaggh have received countless correspondence work for the Projekt Nihil digipack CD. We’re sure the authorities from maniacal converts, many of them expressing dire and extremely have never heard Projekt Nihil [before allowing us the mental patients violent responses to the collective’s records. One must wonder, then, the second time]. whether Stalaggh’s music is simply that (overwhelmingly) intense or, more “On Projekt Nihil, we only used two mental patients,” the Voice conso, whether such is merely a reflection of society as a composite of the mentinues, “and that was already most difficult. For Projekt tally unsound…

Terrror, we used four, and we had prepared for the worst.

“We’ve received many very extreme messages from We recorded it in a small room in complete darkness. At Stalaggh maniacs,” the Voice again confirms. “It’s good to first, it was very hard to stimulate the mental patients know that our audio-terror has that effect on human minds. to scream, but when things got going they went comSome of them performed auto-mutilation while listening to pletely berserk. The female patient was too intimidated Stalaggh, and they proudly send us photos of their mutiby the others and crouched in a corner most of the time. One of the male lated and bleeding flesh. So, not only our audio-terror is intense, but there’s patients started throwing things around and hitting the others. It was also a growing number of humans in this society with mental problems, and total chaos. that number will only grow more when our audio-terror spreads across “One of the ‘musicians’ almost got strangled to death by one this cursed world. of the patients who could no longer control his homicidal urges,” “We have no idea why almost all reviews of Projekt Terrror are so the Voice reveals. “We have, of course, recorded this incident for positive,” Stalaggh now turns attention toward the surprisingly posiProjekt Terrror. The patients drove each other over the edges of tive responses their latest album has received in the metal press, insanity during the recording. The atmosphere and emotions be“we even had a few perfect scores of 100/100 points. We expected came more extreme every minute, and you can hear that very only extremely bad reviews, but it seems there are people out there well on the finished recording. The terror and fear grow to imwho sympathize with us and understand our ideology. Most of the mense proportions towards the end of the album. The recording reviews praised our originality and the fact that the emotions we process of Terrror was many times more intense and disturbing portray in our sound are real and not acted. It’s a good thing that than Nihil.” we get such reviews because a lot of humans will buy our records, But by using these mental patients, isn’t this partially exploiand this way we can spread our audio-terror.” tation?

And about that. Refreshingly, the mind(s) behind Stalaggh relish “We don’t care if we exploit these mental patients, as long as the widespread distribution ‘n’ dissemination of their self-described we can reach our goals,” shrugs They-Who-Are-Stalaggh. “They audio-terror—refreshing, in that no truly great/brave/confrontationall agreed to join the ranks of Stalaggh after we told them what al work should be mired in obscurity. However, hypothetically speakour ideology is. Because of their mental illness, it’s impossible for ing, if a deal with a major (metal) label came along, would Stalaggh them to enjoy life in any way, so we can better put their sickness take the proverbial bull by the horns? to good use in Stalaggh. All of the Stalaggh members suffer from “If a major label would sign us and not censor our message of nihilsome kind of mental illness, but only the mental state of the vocalists istic, misanthropic propaganda, we would do it,” the Voice concludes with is serious enough that they have to be institutionalized.” no uncertainty. “We’re not interested in making money—we only want to www.thr.cjb.net So, do you at all relate to these mental patients or simply pity them? spread our audio-terror as much as possible. We never agreed to the limited neweraproductions@email.com “We do not pity them at all,” the Voice deadpans. “We cherish their taleditions our labels have released; we always wanted unlimited editions of our ents. The mind of the mentally deranged is far more interesting than the mind of releases. The more human minds are destroyed by Stalaggh, the better.” normal people. One of the mental patients called participating with Stalaggh the best

Two Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest

By Nathan T. Birk

STALAGGH

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WOODS OF INFINITY

“Woods of Infinity is a creature of chance. Anything can happen. Don’t be surprised if you hear a saxophone or oboe or whatever in our music. Sick minds make sick music, I guess?”

No question about it, Woods of Infinity vocalist/lyricist Ravenlord is right on in that regard: From the very beginning, this Swedish duo has remained the epitome of “sick music,” black metal or no. Over the course of countless demos and some highly coveted 7-inches—all culminating in 2002’s staggering Förintelse & Libido double-demo, reissued/remastered/reconfigured on CD late last year by Total Holocaust as F&L, no less intimidating ’n’ beguiling in its sinisterly kaleidoscopic expanses—Ravenlord and string-wielding songwriter Melkor have handily made an exciting, envelope-pushing career for themselves under the BM umbrella. So far, anything’s been fair game for WoI: blackened primitivism, orkish thrash, quasi-Oi, apocalyptic folk, agit-prop soundscapes, even severely mutilated pop have all gone into the duo’s daring blender, and all with a wicked sense of wit. Now, six years since their inception, the band’s official debut LP has arrived, again via THR: Hejdå is its name, and even more daring is its game.

“It feels like Hejdå has developed naturally,” remarks Melkor about their debut salvo, “something that has grown forth with our increasing ability, knowledge and maturity. It’s in the same vein as our earlier material but with a slightly more ‘professional’ sound, I suppose. I’m very satisfied with it.”

Ravenlord offers his perspective. “It feels like we’ve got more to give lyrically than most black metal bands nowadays.

A lot of people confine themselves in their rooms with black wallpaper and the same 30 albums they derive inspiration from. It’s a hard question to answer—your idea of perfection is in constant flux.”

From the tightly/tensely coiled/contorting song structures to the often elegiac, even stately flow of the album track to track, from the alternately fluid/jarring dynamics employed to the even more impeccably placed samples, there’s a strong sense of cohesiveness at play on Hejdå versus the flying-bythe-seat-of-their-pants wildness of WoI’s earlier material.

“The short period in which this album was completed naturally made the tracks more similar,” Melkor confirms. “I don’t think this is a bad thing, really. It’s still a very odd album and every song strikes a different vein, in my opinion.”

“When we recorded F&L, we had no real hopes that anyone would find it interesting or even good,” admits Ravenlord.

“I’m glad that our simple and impulsive creativity appeals to people. F&L was a mean ogre, a patchwork of songs, but it has a genuine malice about it. Hejdå is just the beginning on a long journey of perversion.”

With that cohesiveness comes a startling sense of refinement, which works surprisingly well in the duo’s favour.

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States Melkor, “Well, it’s in part due to better equipment and in part due to the fact that I’ve had more time to work on the songs and the arrangements. The refinement was deliberate, naturally. Our progress has been organic, and we haven’t compromised our lyrical content or music to appear more professional.”

“Nowadays, I just sing and scream out everything without any self-awareness,” says Ravenlord of the refinement. “I’m being more honest with my vocals, and I feel more immersed in my vocal performance. Woods of Infinity is my only focus, that which makes my dull everyday life bearable. Woods of Infinity is part of my nature now, as natural to me as sleep or sex.”

“It’s a bit more subtle, I guess,” concedes Melkor of Hejdå.

“I haven’t really thought about whether this album will hold out better in the future than F&L. F&L is more chaotic and has a wider spectrum of different sounds and musical content.

The albums are very different in that aspect. I can see that it takes a bit more awareness to detect the disease behind it. At this time, I can’t say whether that’s positive or negative; it’s just the way things turned out.”

As for lyrics, one of WoI’s most peculiar perks, says Melkor, “I only contributed with a few lyrics on Hejdå. The only lyric I wrote alone is ‘Piskar Ut Mitt Hat’ [Whipping My Hate Out]. It’s about sexuality, frustration, love and hate; to love something to the point of hate, desire something to the point of disgust. It’s a bit contradictory, but it’s what I feel. I’ll let Ravenlord explain his lyrics.”

“I’ll simply go through the lyrics in the order they appear on the album,” the vocalist/lyricist graciously offers. “‘Köld’ [Coldness] is a tribute to winter, the real cold winter. It’s so appreciated that I feel I might end my life for it. ‘Under Färden’ [During the Journey] is about the reconciliation with the ones you’ve abused and becoming as a family with them, seeking forgiveness from the public through mock salvation. ‘Kärlek och Vänskap’ [Love and Friendship] is about existential angst. Read it. ‘En Förgången Tid’ [A Past Age] was written in 1995. It was my first ‘evil’ lyric. It’s about the feeling of walking in the winter forest at night and the feeling that you’re not alone—demons, entities, spirits… ‘Det Som Hände’ [That Which Happened] is twofold. Melkor writes about anti-Zionism and the withered pride of our country. I write about helping a pathetic and suicidal person end his/hers life so you won’t have to tolerate their self-pity. ‘Old Songs’ is a cover

by Barry Manilow, so I can’t really comment on it. It’s about lost love. We both adore the man. I own nine Barry albums.

‘Sakrament’ is about me murdering a close friend. I’m sorry that all the lyrics are in Swedish—learn the language.”

When pressed further why the duo chose to cover Manilow’s “Old Songs” on Hejdå, Melkor huffs, “Because we both adore Barry Manilow. He’s the master of bitter love, the angst of heartache and sadness. His music is extremely emotional and has inspired us both a lot.”

“I have a bitter note in my brain,” Ravenlord chimes in. “I’m not extremely depressed, though.

Often, a sad Manilow song will give me more than three modern black metal cassettes; their uninspired works of semi-hatred just won’t do.”

As for the aforementioned samples, another one of WoI’s most peculiar perks, which again are more studiously integrated on Hejdå, Melkor declares, “We will

e l p o e P d a B r o f Bad Music

By Nathan T. Birk

always use samples. I can’t say if we will use more or less [in the future]; we just use them as we see fit, when they add and improve on the song. We don’t have a minimum quota of samples to fit into each song. Some songs have no samples, some have tons.”

“Samples have always been close to my heart,” admits Ravenlord. “They make the listener more alert to the music.

I have lots of samples left, recorded on the unused parts of black metal demos.”

However, through this usage of samples, what would the duo say to those who would make accusations of plagiarism, that there’s no talent in the fine art of finding and placing samples?

Melkor: “We don’t make any high claims of superb talent; that has never been our ambition. We use any means at our disposal to create our music. Through our samples, we also pay homage to artists we admire.”

Ravenlord: “Feel free to sample Woods of Infinity. Just don’t sample the samples!”

So, is it inevitable for WoI to go in a more conventional— yet still relatively weird, mind—rock direction like predecessors Fleurety and Manes? Like, would you welcome such a challenge?

“I haven’t reflected on us becoming more conventional,” shrugs Melkor. “I adore Fleurety, but I have no desire to follow in anyone’s footsteps. I think our music will develop in harmony with how we develop as persons. I’m not following any grand master-plan, other than staying true to what I believe in and my own inner workings.”

“Anything can happen,” concedes Ravenlord. “We won’t become rock stars or conventional at all, though. We’ll always have our dedication and the will to spread words and songs, writing the songs that make the whole world sing.”

On that note, are you wilfully trying to distance yourselves from the “weird” tag compared to, say, the exceptionally wild F&L? “No, not at all,” says Melkor. “In a way, I think Hejdå is as weird as anything we’ve done before. I guess it’s not as apparent, though. It’s more subtle, as you mentioned earlier. It might be a bit more mature. We aren’t trying to appeal to the masses, though, if that’s what you mean.”

“Our only focus isn’t on sounding weird,” rightly asserts Ravenlord. “It comes to us naturally.”

Then again, WoI is still (thankfully) pretty bizarre, and beyond all else. But if quality is truly to be prized in the underground, why isn’t the duo more known?

“I guess we aren’t that well known because we haven’t made any real attempts at self-promotion,” Melkor sighs with indifference. “We haven’t sent in copies to zines or made ads or flyers or anything like that. I don’t mind being relatively anonymous; I don’t think our music would appeal to the general masses, anyways. Also, it has taken us six years to get our debut album out. Most bands seem to be able to cram a full-length album out within two years of the band’s start.

That might have added to people not being aware of our existence.”

“We’ve only been published a few times before,” adds Ravenlord, “and only once to my knowledge in a printed zine.

We haven’t been too involved with distribution, either. But if people show interest in us, we cooperate happily.”

“We get along very well,” says Melkor, turning his attention toward the duo’s working dynamic. “We have a lot of different ideas, and we’re able to meld them together most of the time. We’re very co-ordinated most of the time. We think similarly and without friction, which helps smooth the creative process.”

“We’ve been friends and have worked together for a long time,” Ravenlord elaborates. “It took us four years to start creating music together. All these years have been very nice, and it’s nice to have someone you can create together with and has the same attitude to things.”

“I can’t imagine we’ll include anyone else in our band except on a session basis,” says Melkor. “Woods of Infinity is and will always be binary.”

“Yes, we work very well together,” concurs Ravenlord.

“We always get along, and a third person would jeopardize that balance. But a 10-year-old girl would have a good chance to get in.” www.woi.cjb.net

KYLESA / MOUTH OF ARCHITECT

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“Making this album [To Walk a Middle Course on Prosthetic Records] was unlike anything we have ever done as a band,” starts guitarist/vocalist Laura Pleasants of Savannah, Georgia’s Kylesa. “This was the first time ever we had a producer and the first time we’ve spent an extended period of time in the studio. We’ve always had a shoe-string budget.”

Plus working with Alex Newport (Codeseven, The Locusts, Theory of Ruin) as producer must have been an eye-opening experience.

He has done some great work.

“Oh, yeah,” she agrees.

“It changed everything for us, but put us in a very positive light. We [bassist/vocalist Corey Barhorst, drummer Brandon Baltzley, and guitarist Phillip Cope] worked with Alex and he ran a pretty tight ship. It was gruelling, but we had time to really focus on the instruments, the vocals, and just bringing detail to the music.”

She adds, “Alex was great to work with because on one hand he has worked with some really heavy bands like Sepultura and Fudge Tunnel, but he’s also worked with many non-heavy bands. He has dabbled within many genres, and that was something we were looking forward to. We wanted him to bring out something fresh and unique with our sound. He didn’t change us drastically; he just helped tighten stuff up.”

The band’s debut for Prosthetic Records is a hard-edged, noisy collection of potent riffs, a tight rhythm section, and snarling vocals that come with pure attitude. Some call it metalcore, but there is a lot more going on with this album than you might expect. The guitarist explains.

“We’ve always been a band that has never followed any musical trends, and that is fairly important to us because we want to keep our sound original, but we didn’t want a typical sounding metalcore/metal record. We wanted it to sound sonically different. We feel that Alex was the right person to work with to really make a statement with this album and not allow us to be thrown into the same grouping with other metalcore/metal acts.”

Since recording with Newport was going to be such a great opportunity, how prepared were you for the studio work?

“We were very prepared. We had to drive all the way to California for the two weeks we’d be working with Alex, so we made sure we had the blueprints for this album all set.

We worked on a song or two in the studio—the instrumental track [‘Crashing Slow’] we came up with while in the studio. Lyrically we had loose ideas when we left, and solidified them in the studio. The thing about the studio is after you spend so much time there, it all starts to become as one and you really can’t focus on each track. It’s more like one big process: the album. It took a while for me after the studio work to be able to sit and listen to this album and hear it as just that—an album. Now when I play it back I think Alex did a great job and I’m proud that the rest of us were able to keep things focused and make an album that will represent our sound and style.”

Were you nervous about the whole process—both the studio work and putting out an album on Prosthetic?

“Sure, we were a little nervous,” she admits. “We were anxious, but I think that’s just natural for any new band who are new to all of this studio and/or label stuff.”

The band is currently on the road in support of the debut, and plan to be touring for a long time.

“We tour our asses off! We just get in the van and go. It is the only way we know how to get the band name out there,” she says. “We know the label is going to be great and get the CD out there, but at the same time live is also a great place to get new fans. Each new town is an experience for us. We’re out on the road now and hitting new towns, and each night it’s a different reaction.”

Well, how are the kids reacting?

“I think we are going over pretty well. Right now we are just criss-crossing the United States and playing small towns we’ve never been to. It’s just us and local acts playing small clubs. The thing about this tour and the new places we are going to is that not many kids know who we are sometimes, but by the end of our set we’ve won some fans over and that leaves us stoked.”

Must be a great feeling.

“It is. It really is,” Pleasants says. “Just to know that maybe no one in this town knew who we were this time around but next time we come back they’ll be waiting for us. The road rules!”

Road Rules

By Adrian ‘The Energizer’ Bromley

Reaching Skyward

Mouth of the Architect is helping fuel an imminent renaissance in drawn-out, multi-layered post-metal. It’s the sort of stuff Pink Floyd sketched unoffending versions of 30-plus years ago, and which art-metal visionaries like Tool and Neurosis heavied up and offered anew. With a vantage indicating a deeply nuanced base of influences, Mouth of the Architect’s sound ranges from ethereal and delicate to anguished and pummelling. Each song on their debut, Time and Withering (Translation Loss), is a flowing, slow-burning organic mass that progresses without looking back, rarely recycling elements without some tweak or addition. Melody and harshness coexist here, with instrumentation both raw and pristine operating simultaneously, rather than alternating. And unsurprisingly, the four songs run almost 40 minutes altogether, with three circling the 11-minute mark. “We all listen to an eclectic variety of music,” says singer/guitarist Gregory Lahm, “and are all inspired by different things, so when we came together and started writing, this was the product.” Lahm’s explanation is simple, perhaps suggesting that he prefers the music, and not his opinions, remain the primary focus. That’s certainly acceptable, as this music will stand up to infinite analysis.

Isis’s Panopticon is a good basis of comparison for Mouth of the Architect. If the movementbased, mid-tempo, textural heaviness of that album suits your taste, Time and Withering is a close corollary worth exploring. Beginning with “A Vivid Chaos,” the first of their go-to modes immediately slams to life—a dissonant, riff-driven melody propelled by low, tribal toms that feels like birth and invention at the same time. An abrupt downshift leaves a sole strummed guitar, before the driving dirge renews, underlying one of the few and far-between vocal sections.

Notably, Mouth of the Architect boasts three singers. Guitarist Alex Vernon and keyboard player Jason Watkins, along with Lahm, all contribute to the sung passages, and their voices merge in a semi-harmonized roar of clean singing and deathy growls. With each coming from a different perspective, the band avoids the lyrical and thematic heavy-handedness that many outfits purvey, allowing vibe and ideas to coalesce uniquely in each listener’s mind.

“Musically, the songs speak for themselves as far as setting a mood and conveying emotion,” Lahm explains. “As far as themes lyrically, they vary due to three people writing lyrics. In most cases one person will write for an entire song, so the theme tends to be more personal than something intended by the band. But I think we leave the door open wide enough for people to decide that for themselves.”

The album’s second track, “Soil To Stone,” initiates with the band’s other most relied-upon approach, an airy, atmospheric section that’s uplifting yet reflective. Complementary melodic accents dive and interweave, taking full advantage of the band’s instrument array (including haunting keyboard chords recalling a certain Mr. Wright’s subtle influence). Their lack of interest in focusing on just one mood or style is perhaps the best thing about artists like Isis and Mouth of the Architect. “Soil To Stone” is a glittering hybrid of artifice and organism that reaches skyward, the intellectual opposite of the jerking, demonic riff-monster that follows in track three, “Heart Eaters.” This stylistic diversity illustrates a clear desire to move through every state of emotional resonance, a goal so many of their contemporaries, rooted firmly in twisted gutturals and darkness, would do well to take note of. It’s very likely the key to Isis’s fast-spreading acclaim, and there’s no reason to think Mouth of the Architect won’t be close behind.

Interestingly, Time and Withering also eschews the download-friendly direction many artists are currently pursuing. Musicians today cannot help but be aware of the titanic rise in single-song downloading, a trend that’s inversely tied to the plummeting attention span of listeners, and they’re responding: compositions are written and shaped to function just as well sandwiched between songs 40 and 42 on iPods as within the context of the band’s own albums. It’s neither good nor bad, necessarily, but it’s happening. “We wrote the album as a whole,” Lahm responds, “and therefore it should be listened to in the same way. I’m really not worried about the effects of downloading in regards to our record, but I’m sure there are people out there who can only stomach a couple songs at a time.”

Mouth of the Architect’s members also hold the ethic of delivering their music in a live scenario close to their hearts, a welcome trait in light of so many underground acts’ inability or unwillingness to do so. “Live, the songs are more intensified in all aspects than how the record presents them. The sound is dirtier live, and the noise aspects play a larger role. As far as touring goes, it is absolutely a necessity to be a productive and lasting band. We all love being on the road because playing becomes our sole focus, plus everything about being cramped in a van, driving to distant cities to play to new faces, and sleeping on strange floors is appealing.”

That attitude and their destructive live show have already earned the band representation by Relapse Records’ in-house booking agency, indicating beyond any doubt that Mouth of the Architect is a band to investigate sooner rather than later.

By Jadd Shickler

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CABLE

When a band continually delivers great music, as Hartford, Connecticut’s Cable has for ages, it’s easy to take their resilience and consistency for granted. But give credit where it’s due: it’s rare for any band, let alone one from the depths of the heavy rock underground, to get as far as seven records. Revolving guitarists, drug problems, lineup shifts from a four-piece to a trio (and back), and regular label jumps are just some of the obstacles that make longevity an elusive goal. Yet here Cable stands, seven records and counting.

And having weathered it all, they’ve produced their crowning achievement in Pigs Never Fly, the pinnacle of a long and rocky career. Extended atmospherics and melodic leftturns wind around noisy grooves, and their trademark crush unfolds as a series of mini-movements that breathe within the bludgeoning.

“Cable is always experimenting with new sounds, just not as consciously as some other bands,” says drummer Vic Szalaj. “In the early days we were blown away by bands like Buzzov*en and Today Is the Day, and I’m sure it had an effect on us. Today we just play what we want and try to create our own self-styled music.” With an almost effortless swing and flow, Pigs Never Fly also feels like Cable’s long-awaited arrival. “Call it what you want,” Szalaj responds, “but don’t forget that we were in the trenches before a lot of today’s sludge/noise artists even picked up a guitar.” It’s true—peer back a dozen years to the dawn of sludge and noisecore, and you’ll find Cable grasping free of the primordial slime just behind the progenitors. “We’ve been doing it longer than most; I have no problem saying that. And before us, EYEHATEGOD, Buzzov*en and Neurosis were paving the way, and we hail them with every breath we take.”

Cable’s core of bassist/singer Randy Larsen and Szalaj has been intact since their days as noisy young miscreants on the cusp of a burgeoning scene. “We started out as anyone else, in a basement with small amps and no real P.A., jamming on shitty tunes we threw together,” Szalaj explains.

“One day something changed, and the basic songs turned into noisy, messy, feedback-soaked three-minute numbers that made us freak out while we played them. In those days there weren’t too many bands playing ‘arty’ metal/rock/ whatever, so there wasn’t a big base of comparison for us to say, ‘That sounds like…’ It was just Cable, and that’s the way it stayed.”

The band’s earliest incarnation, which included future Isis bassist Jeff Caxide, produced a demo and a pair of 7-inch singles that would later be re-released as the Early Years full-length. In the spring of 1996, Larsen, Szalaj, and new addition Bernie Romanowski (who would become the nextmost consistent Cable member) recorded their debut album, the seminal Variable Speed Drive, for Doghouse Records.

“This tends to be the album we’re best known for, partially because Doghouse had much wider distribution at that time than most labels even have now, so it was available in every store and mail order worldwide. This record is much noisier

than any of our later works, our springboard onto a juststarting ‘noise-core’ scene which (I think) I’m proud of. Some people say it’s up there as far as influential albums go.”

In 1998, with the band trimmed down to just Romanowski on guitar, Cable landed a deal with developing label Hydra Head for their next record, Gutter Queen. “This was our first attempt at being a three-piece,” Szalaj says, “and I think it really worked for this album. It was also the first album Jeff Caxide ever tried his hand at producing.” Hydra Head released Gutter Queen in 1999, and Cable toured that summer (with Isis opening), despite growing issues within the group. “These were dark days for the Cablers; everyone was on something and had all sorts of fucking problems…

Some days I wonder how the hell we ever got [that album] recorded.”

The first of numerous breakups came and went, and in 2001, a reinvigorated Cable got to work on their next outing, Northern Failures. “This was to be our ‘we’re back’ album, and our second for Hydra Head. Randy and I went on a trip up to New Hampshire for ten days and came back with all kinds of lyrics and weird ideas. We had everything ready to record by fall and entered Austin Enterprises to record with Steve Austin [Today Is the Day], a longtime friend of the band. It was pure magic; everything was done in three days and off to the pressing plant.”

The album was released in August of 2001 and the band toured behind it with the addition of second guitar player Ben Cowles. This is also Szalaj’s guess as to when Cable genuinely found its sound. “To be honest, I don’t really know, but I’d say Northern Failures, 2000–2001 era. We felt the most comfortable and kind of let loose, and were well received and got a chance to play to some seriously intense Cable fans,” Szalaj recalls.

This prolific period also yielded the material for a nearimmediate follow-up in Skyhorse Jams. “This EP was conceived right around the same time as Northern Failures; they came out three months apart from each other. We recorded with Steve [Austin] again, and somehow managed to record, overdub and mix the entire record in one night. Not kidding.

It was Ben’s first time in a real studio and we were all partying, listening to playback, getting all sorts of fucked up, and I think it transferred to tape. Sometimes that’s not a good thing, but for us it really worked.”

Following another break, Cable reconstituted itself, eager to write a new album, but found themselves without a label.

The lack of an outlet to release new material brought about some internal questioning amongst the members as well. “It was around the age when you start asking yourself, ‘What the fuck am I doing?’ It was natural, and we needed to do that,” Szalaj says.

Despite a somewhat cloudier vision of their future, Cable recorded Never Trust a Gemini in 2003, once again working with Steve Austin. The record continued with the two-guitar lineup of Romanowski and Cowles, and was the band’s first output featuring second vocalist Peter Farris. “We met Pete while he was going to school in Connecticut in 2001.

He was singing for a local band called The Farewell Order, and we’d done a few shows with them and became friends. We asked him to sing on one or two songs

in the studio and he just kinda got in that way. Pete sings mostly backing vocals but has appeared on a few whole songs as well, and we definitely consider him a member of the band.” Yet even with Never Trust a Gemini garnering acclaim as Cable’s best effort to date, the band once more considered hanging it up.

Given that uncertainty, no one could have predicted the colossal leap forward Pigs Never Fly would be. Over the years, Cable’s gradual transition from a frenzied noise-metal act into a Southern-tinged sludge behemoth had felt natural. So nothing was less expected than a new album bearing swells of textured, multi-guitar ambience, lush mood pieces, a piano section with haunting female vocals, a 17-minute feedback-seething opus, and directional shifts as sudden and numerous as the Blue Velvet sound bites that surfaced throughout the disc. Further, this album’s spacious, multiversal depths were achieved not with a member of Isis or Today Is the Day at the controls, but in the band’s home studio.

Of course, the band claims no conscientious change in the creative process or agreed goal. “It all just happened, came together and sounded great, so we kept it. Listen, at this point we’re not afraid to say, ‘That sucks’ or ‘Let’s tweak it a little.’ We’re comfortable enough with each other and no one’s feelings get hurt, and if everyone isn’t on the same page [about an idea], we trash it. That’s the only way to get a genuine, emotional feeling for a tune.” Regardless of intent, Pigs Never Fly affirmed Cable’s renewed purpose and stylistic reinvention (again). Formerly a lurching riff-giant that simply levelled all comers, their new approach was that of a methodical destroyer, like rust that devours a skyscraper at thousands of times the normal speed. Inarguably, their ongoing saga had begun its most profound chapter yet.

The tortuous tale now brings things to 2005, a year that’s seen CNN reference Isis and Mastodon elicit millions of dollars from Warner Brothers. What might such interesting times yield for Cable? “Cable has always been under the radar,” Szalaj reflects, “and that’s fine. We never tried to sound like anyone or pick up on other bands’ approaches to music… That’s maybe where we sort of failed. We had all the opportunities to rip people and become much bigger, but left that to our ‘contemporaries.’”

Indisputably evidencing this is a wealth of granite-heavy material that truly sounds like no one else’s. “It’s the thing in my life I’m most proud of,” Szalaj says of their body of work, “and whether or not it’ll stand the test of time relies solely on whether or not we continue to push ourselves to create our art. I can’t speculate on what will happen in an hour, never mind ten years, but it’s a nice thought.” It’s here that resilience serves Cable most significantly. When a band expands and revitalizes their sound on each new album, it recasts their prior work in listeners’ minds, often unconsciously.

Older records feel less like batches of songs and more like autobiographical slices of history. And while Cable’s supply of urban, blue-collar sludge may seem endless, juxtaposition with their raw artistic spirit transforms the discography from a few hours of recorded performances into a series of aural mile-markers that map the life of an uncompromising band.

“I love all of our work; I’m proud of it all,” says Szalaj.

“We busted serious ass to get where we are, which isn’t that far by today’s standards, but we own it, it’s ours, we will always have those years and those songs that we bled for. Most importantly, I’m glad I shared all those times with Randy. We’re not silver spoon kids, Randy and I; we grew up the hard way, working for everything we have, which isn’t much. But I could tell early on that he and I were musical soul mates…and I’m happy knowing we didn’t suck any dick in these years. Whatever we have, as little as it may seem sometimes, is ours. We earned it.”

By Jadd Shickler

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ABRASIVE OUTLETS

ABRASIVE OUTLETS

Who’da ever thought that the hallowed pages of U! would ever feature a hip-hop project? It takes all kinds and it takes the handy dandy Abrasive Outlets section to keep shattering barriers and preconceptions. Don’t worry, there’s still more than enough noisy shit for you all to sink your teeth into if phat beats aren’t stirring your loins. -Kevin Stewart-Panko

BY KEV I N STE W A RT-PA N K O, A D R I A N ‘TH E E N E R G I Z E R’ B R O M LEY, PA U L S I LB I G E R A N D C A M E R O N A R C H E R

A STATIC LULLABY A Different Kind Of Shock

I’ve interviewed A Static Lullaby twice and I still have no bloody idea what the band name means. But one thing is certain: these guys are one of the least static bands out there. Their debut album, And Don’t Forget To Breathe, was released on Ferret Records back in January of 2003 and these guys haven’t stopped moving for a second since…at least until the day I caught vocalist Joe Brown at home, recuperating on his first day off after the whirlwind punk-fest, A Taste of Chaos tour. I asked Joe to catch me up to speed on developments within the band over the last couple years.

“When And Don’t Forget To Breathe came out, we toured really heavily,” Joe begins. “After about a year and a half, we were contacted by Columbia Records. We weren’t sure whether we wanted to go onto a major label and we were thinking about just staying with an indie. But after more conversations, we decided we would go and do the next record with Columbia. We waited about another year and kept touring. Once we decided to write this record, we had to take some time off because we didn’t have any time to write for those two years in between And Don’t Forget To Breathe and now. So we took some time off. The first two weeks were a little weird with the writing process, but then we got in the groove and made the record we all wanted to make.”

That record would be Faso Latido (Columbia), a recording that will probably surprise a great number of their old fans and equally surprise a great number of music fans getting their first exposure to the A Static Lullaby sound.

And Don’t Forget To Breathe was an amazing album, filled with a mixture of singing and screaming above an original-sounding backdrop of the punk/hardcore/metal hybrid. It’s hardly ironic that they should end up on the Taste of Chaos tour sharing the stage with co-headliners The Used, Killswitch Engage, and My Chemical Romance, because there are nuggets of all three of those bands in the A Static Lullaby sound—especially their earlier sound. On the new record, there’s a lot less chaos (pun intended). The songs have more focus, there’s considerably more singing and the musical direction is bending more towards the punk/alternative end of the spectrum. So, between the change in sound and the change in record label, I wondered if Joe felt the band was on the verge of experiencing a negative backlash from their old fans.

“Kids are very opinionated towards bands that make a jump,” he says.

“Since the record is a little bit different from And Don’t Forget To Breathe— actually a lot different—kids have been saying a lot of shit, but you’re going to get that no matter what you do. I mean, if you’re not doing the exact same thing that kids are used to, it shocks them and they either come to their senses or move on, and hopefully you make three new fans for every one fan you lose.

“It’s kind of ignorant for kids to be that way, but I understand because I’ve loved bands that have released records and I didn’t understand what they were doing at the time. I’d soon become accustomed to that record and start liking it for what it was, but at first it’s a little shocking, so of course I can understand any kids’ feelings towards that conflict.”

Considering the band’s youth, the evolution they’re exhibiting on their sophomore release is to be expected. Joe blames much of their evolution on their relentless touring.

“Honestly, the road takes a whole lot out of you, emotionally and physically.

It changes the whole way you see life. I view touring like the movie Groundhog Day with Bill Murray, because it is the same and repetitive. Some days you want to kill yourself and some days you want to learn to make the best out of it. When you change your lifestyle and go from just being a band with a lot of teenage angst to going on the road and having to change your whole lifestyle to accommodate what you’re doing every day, it changes you as a person. It changes the way you feel and the way you approach your life.

“A lot of things went on with the band over the last two years that allow me to understand why Faso Latido turned out to sound like Faso Latido, just as I can understand why And Don’t Forget To Breathe turned out to sound like And Don’t Forget To Breathe. Teenage angst was in And Don’t Forget To Breathe—a bunch of pissed-off kids with nothing but drive. Not that I’m an old man now, but I feel that every year you spend on the road, you actually age about ten.

“I think Faso Latido, as a whole, is a great transition record for the band and a great way of saying this is A Static Lullaby two years later. We’re not about to write the same record and we never will because we have to keep challenging ourselves, and we hope you guys understand it.” [www.astaticlullaby.com] – Paul Silbiger

A STATIC LULLABY

THE PLOT TO BLOW UP THE EIFFEL TOWER Fuck All Y’all

Saying that San Diego’s The Plot To Blow Up The Eiffel Tower are agitators is like saying that Sugar Ray Leonard is black. First stop: the band’s name, which in this post-9/11 world of ours, is equivalent to walking into the Department of Homeland Security and asking them to open a file on your ass. Second stop: the artwork to their latest album, Love In the Fascist Brothel (Revelation), is dripping with intended-to-offend militaristic, fascistic and sexual imagery —everything from Sieg Heiling armies to gay leathermen to implied bestiality.

Next stop: the suggestive lyrics to tracks like “Lawnmower Love,” “Exile On Vain Street,” and “Love In the Sex Prison” with the whole shebang set amid a rollicking mélange of spastic jazz-punk-math-noise referencing and recalling The Blood Brothers and The Locust alongside skronking forefathers like Nation Of Ulysses and Trenchmouth. Funnily, The Plot’s shit-disturbing ways are quite deliberate with any and all fallout embraced with an ironic chortle that results more in the sharing of entertaining stories than it does in feelings of remorse.

“We took it from a book by Greil Marcus called Lipstick Traces,” says guitarist Sir Charles Rowell of the band’s name. “It’s something that sounded kind of vicious and a name that had a natural air about it. It paid off, because 9/11 and all this other shit happened and now our name is definitely something to think about.”

And it goes on from there. Their on-stage garb consists of mock SS uniforms with the band’s logo replacing the swastika in the red-and-white armbands. Of course, they like to stir things up, usually at their whim and at the expense of paying customers.

“Last year was when we sought to put our name everywhere we could and the shenanigans were incredible and we got into a lot of trouble. We played in Baltimore and we got in a huge fight with the crowd; it was almost a riot. Our tires got slashed and we got stuff thrown as us because we were being snots and they weren’t being responsive to anything we were doing. In Salt Lake City, we got into this huge fight with another band. A lot of shit happens. None of this is calculated; I don’t want to say that. We didn’t go into that Baltimore show thinking we were going to do stuff. It just happens and shit starts to fly; why not see how far you can take it? I was up there making fun of Baltimore and we were just being jerks. But if you’re smart you know it’s just a joke. Those people, I don’t know, I guess they like Baltimore. I don’t like Baltimore; it’s a terrible place. We want to rile up people who have no sense of humour or irony, and that’s where most of the violence comes from.”

It’s gotten to the point where the band’s European booking agency has had to post a detailed online explanation about what-you-see-not-entirely-beingwhat-you-get as a means to counteract death threats, sympathy from neoNazis and simply to get shows booked in certain cities, especially in Germany where using any sort of Nazi imagery is highly sensitive, not to mention illegal.

“By way of all the shit we’ve caused, everyone knows the name now and thinks the band is infamous,” deadpans Rowell. “But in Europe there’s not so much they can get their hands on and this is going to be our first tour there, so a lot of rumours have been blown up, so we did that statement on our Web site. Also, out of respect for our booking agent, we’re not going to wear our uniforms in Germany. We don’t want to make them look bad and we also don’t want to get lynched, y’know? That might be kinda cool, but whatever. Man, we think people over here don’t have any sense of irony, but in Germany—when your record is drenched in Nazi imagery—they’re not laughing at it. It’s kinda scary, but it’s also probably like that awesome feeling that bands like The Sex Pistols felt, whether they knew it or not, going into the South on their American tour, wearing swastikas and just being total cunts to everybody. I’m sure they felt that same sense of danger. Something really messed up is going to happen, but it’s cool at the same time.”

Despite all the provoking, bratty irreverence, there is a take-home message that The Plot are attempting to achieve with Love In the Fascist Brothel in addition to the album’s title, which speaks to the idea of both love and fascism being dangerous and corrupting acts of surrender.

“We all had the feeling that punk has become too safe, that the original spirit of it is gone, the people who are involved in punk have become so liberal that they’ve become conservative and all the spit and piss has been lost. So we sought out to make the nastiest record we possibly could, everything about it was supposed to be a big ‘fuck you’ to everyone: left, right, punk, indie, everything.” [www.blowuptheeiffeltower.com] – Kevin Stewart-Panko

THE PLOT TO BLOW UP THE EIFFEL TOWER

SYMPHONY IN PERIL Harlots, Whores And Christian Metalcore

“I don’t know if you’ve heard, but last week Shawn played his last show with the band and we’re looking for a replacement for him,” begins Symphony In Peril drummer Collin Simula, talking about vocalist Shawn Jonas. It seems like a pretty big blow for the band, especially considering a number of their fans got into the band thanks to Shawn’s past life in Zao. “He’s older than all of us and he just got a great new job, plus he has a wife and two kids and he just felt like it was his time to settle down and move on,” explains Collin. “We’d kind of seen it coming for months and we all talked about what we were going to do and what he was going to do—if he was just going to show up at shows or quit the band completely. We were totally supportive of whatever he wanted to do and we always accommodated for whatever he needed. If he needed a break or whatever, we totally understood because of his home situation.”

While it’s a big blow for the boys, the change also comes with its merits.

Symphony In Peril is no longer “the singer from Zao’s new band,” and it allows the other guys—Collin, plus bassist Andy Richards and guitarists Joshua Aronovsky and Andy Reale—to forge an identity of their own. In fact, working with someone with such a pedigree sometimes became cumbersome because a good portion of the band’s surprising success was thanks to Shawn’s past.

“It’s something that we came to terms with and we can’t deny it because it’s obvious,” Collin confides. “He came from Zao which was, like, the biggest Christian metalcore band ever so, yeah, it definitely turned heads big-time and it’s always been in the background. With our new album, the nice thing is that, before, a lot of people got turned onto us because of Shawn’s background, but now people will look at us and just say this is a great metal band. We’re not Shawn’s new band anymore; we’re Symphony In Peril. It’s really nice to hear.”

The new album, The Whore’s Trophy (Facedown) is a more focussed release than their debut, Lost Memoirs And Faded Pictures. Collin explains what led to this evolution.

“The first album was a year’s worth of writing. It was everything from the first song we wrote since I joined the lineup to a song we wrote just before going into the studio. I feel that we made a pretty good flowing album out of it, but it was still kind of disjointed because it went through a number of writing style phases and a number of musicians. On this album, we finally came together into our own as a writing force. We wrote this stuff a lot quicker. Not to say that we didn’t put the same thought into it, but the stuff just flowed easier and the songs came easier. Our first record definitely showed what we were listening to at the time: a lot of technical metalcore and stuff like that. This time round, we were listening to Lamb of God and Unearth and a lot of those straight-forward metal/metalcore bands. We just wanted to be fast and brutal and heavy, and the whole time we were writing we were pushing ourselves as much as we could to make our songs faster and heavier.”

For a Christian band, The Whore’s Trophy is a pretty risqué album title even though it is actually inspired by Revelation 17, in which a harlot comes down to deceive Christ, and that theme is expanded and applied to many of life’s everyday deceptions. Collin sheds some light on their rationale.

“We really wanted to break from the Christian bands out there that are just so ‘blah,’ so safe and do everything to make the mothers and the youth pastors happy. A lot of times, in presenting these squeaky clean images and these squeaky clean sounds, they lose something. It just turns out sounding like a not-as-good version of a general market, secular band. We really wanted to break from that mould and not just be a Christian band. The term ‘Christian’ itself has so much crap tied to it usually and we just wanted to be different so that people would say ‘wow’ and wonder what we’re all about.

“I know there are people that think we’re a little too scary or whatever, but to be honest with you, I expected more of a negative backlash. Even my Mom, who’s a very conservative Christian, asked me what we meant by the album title. I told her and she just said ‘Oh, that’s very good.’” [www.symphonyinperil.net] –Paul Silbiger

SYMPHONY IN PERIL

AMERICAN HERITAGE Music to Beat Steve Bartman To

“We just wanted to write music that we all loved, that was challenging and made people think a little harder about what they were listening to. We were all feeling that, especially in Chicago, there was a lot of pussy bullshit out there and we were just like, ‘Fuck that, let’s do something a little different,’ because we all liked heavy shit.”

The above comments by American Heritage drummer Mike Duffy, in addition to outlining the original goals of the band (“We also wanted to release records and go to Europe with our music, and we’ve done that four times over.”), illustrate how reality can be misinterpreted by outsiders. For those of you with an appreciable amount of distance between yourselves and Chicago who like to scour music magazines, absorbing information beyond the music itself, you’re probably under the impression that the Windy City is a vibrant musical metropolis pulsating with the sounds of anything you care to mention.

You’re probably also of the mind that, considering the rich history of support for sounds ranging from the traditional to the original, the experimental to the ordinary and various forms of unchecked all-out weirdness, a band like American Heritage would be welcomed by some faction of the Chicago music community with the equivalent of a rib-shattering hug from a rotund Bears fan.

Y’see, since the late 90s and over the course of four full-lengths and a handful of EPs, American Heritage have been kicking out unique jams that are a musical rollercoaster of technicality, time changes, tempo shifts played within time signatures akin to unsolved calculus equations. Basically, they take the angularity and skronk of math rock and wrap it in a rumbling metallic package with the added plus—or minus, depending on your viewpoint—of being a mostly instrumental outfit. Yeah, Duffy and his crew (presently consisting of guitarists Adam Norden and Ray Donato and bassist Scott Shellhamer) hail from the town that begat instrumental icons Tortoise, Macabre’s serial killer obsessions, Ministry and the freakazoids over at Skin Graft Records, in addition to more recent, off-the-beaten-track acts such as Pelican, Tusk, Java, and Idiom, so you’d think that illustrates some local support for the extraordinary.

“You’re right, in some respects,” replies Duffy with a thoughtful pause, “but a lot of the instrumental stuff that was coming out of Chicago in the later ’90s, when we were forming, was a lot more indie and less metal, and we’re definitely on the heavy side. Yeah, we had a good reception compared to other cities, but when you had a band like Tortoise, who were the cat’s meow in Chicago at the time, and people were all into that kind of stuff, to hear a band doing more of a metal take on that kind of stuff…you either loved it or you hated it.”

Are the hometown metal people—Usurper fans or otherwise—accepting of what American Heritage offers to the ears?

“Umm, since we’ve added vocals, maybe they’ve been more accepting.

Chicago, as a metal scene, is fucking terrible. It is getting better as it seems that like every year there are more bands coming out that are pushing boundaries, plus heavy music in general is more popular than it was five years ago.

So, we’ve seen a change over time in terms of acceptance and receptiveness at metal shows we play, like when a Relapse band comes through town. Other shows we’d get booked at would be indie shows and we’d get a very mixed reaction. When we did our Troubleman Unlimited release (Through the Age of Quarrel and Into the Era of Putting Up With It), the label would say that people would either love us or hate us. They were either into the fact that we were doing something different or they hated us because we weren’t arty enough.”

Mixed reactions to any album aren’t unexpected or unsurprising when you consider the range of criteria that a recording can be judged on. American Heritage’s new album, Bipolar (Escape Artist), may temporarily bridge the love/hate gap with frantic, dynamic and diverse songs that feature tracks with and without vocals played by three different lineups.

“That name has multiple meanings for us,” explains Duffy, when asked about the title. “The record is actually kind of a collection; it’s got songs on it from different recording sessions with different lineups. In the obvious sense, you’ve got songs that are instrumentals and non-instrumentals, but you’ve also got a lot of songs that were written with our old guitar player, Andrei. Now, I like Andrei and he’s a good guy, but man, he was a bipolar dude! He was either hot or cold, and over time it caused a little bit of band tension and, ultimately, he quit and moved to Los Angeles. We were all very disappointed that he couldn’t get over some of the issues he had and continue to play with the band. So, I think that when it came time to title the record, it wasn’t only about the songs themselves and the vocal versus non-vocal thing, but also about who we wrote a lot of these songs with and where did these songs come from?” [www.americanfuckingheritage.com] – Kevin Stewart-Panko

HELL WITHIN Hatin’ Metalcore

“It took us a while to get the lineup right for this band, but this has been the steady lineup now for three years, so everything is working out great,” says Hell Within guitarist Tony Zimmerman. “The reason it took us some time, since we started in 1998, is because some people’s hearts weren’t in the right place or we didn’t have the same vision. When Matt [McChesney, vocals] and Joe [Martinez, bassist] came into the band in 2002, it just went from there. They had the same vision and we all came together and knew that we’d do whatever we needed to do to get the job done.”

The band, who used to go by the name Twytch before changing it to Hell Within, showcase a real tough metal/hardcore vibe meshed with some death/thrash nuances on their Lifeforce Records debut, Asylum of the Human Predator.

“We changed the name because over the years we grew as a band and it just didn’t suit where we were musically. When Matt and Joe came to the band we held onto the name, but when we signed to Lifeforce —and even before

AMERICAN HERITAGE

HELL WITHIN

that—we had thought about the change. Basically, the person who named the band isn’t in the band anymore. This is the original lineup now, so we felt a name we chose was needed.”

And how do you think the music changed since the early days?

“Well, I think it is a lot more focused. Matt came in and added his own style to the band with his vocals, and we are just not going all out and technical crazy with what we do. This is a strong metal record and there is technicality, but not just for the sake of getting all ‘math metal.’ We have a rule we go by: the songs can be technical, but it has to be a good part and really make the song stand out. God knows there are enough technical/math metal hybrid bands out there. We want to make an impact, basically, and wow the listener at the same time—but only when it works.”

I’m sure playing this kind of music, you get tagged as “metalcore.”

“Oh yes, we do and we hate it,” he groans.

That term is so overused, isn’t it?

“That is an understatement, Adrian,” Zimmerman laughs. “I don’t like the tag because a lot of the new metalcore sounds like heavy nu-metal. We are a metal band with a lot of hardcore influences. I just, just…” He sighs. “All metalcore is is basically heavy verses and wide-open choruses. That’s it. We like to switch things up. Some of our favourite bands are Slayer, Pantera and The Haunted, as well as old-school Metallica. And at the same time hardcore is big with us. You get a good mix of styles throughout this album, so yeah, far from anything that in our mind sounds ‘metalcore.’

“We love to play metal and just really get into the music and the lyrics.

We wanted to create a great package for people to digest. One thing that we learned from doing this for so many years is that if you follow trends, you’re screwed. Trends die and the bandwagon will roll by and where will you be then? Stick to what is your own sound and style and you’ll be able to make some kind of dent in this industry.”

What inspires the band lyrically?

“Matt writes a lot of the lyrics, but I think a lot of what is on the news and just around us—everyday life—is what comes out in our lyrics. We like the music heavy, but at the same time, it’s not just the heavy sounds that are making our songs. We like people to submerge themselves into Hell Within’s album. The whole theme of the title track is about all the religious scandals that are going on; the child molestation cases and how the church tried to shelter the people that were doing it. Like what the fuck? These are children here and it’s wrong. Everyone needs to understand that, especially the church.”

Zimmerman ends off, “I don’t want to get too into the album’s lyrics because they are there for people to read. I hope they do read them and come to their own conclusions as well as be informed. If not, at least they got our music to crank up nice and loud.” [www.hellwithin.com] -Adrian ‘The Energizer’ Bromley

SLUMLORDS Rocking Out And Locking Out

As you read through this, or any other extreme music publication, 99 times out of 100, the band in the interviewee’s chair will discuss their music, albums, touring plans and themselves in a methodical and calculated manner.

Even when a band attempts to take a more light-hearted approach to their existence, typical responses lacking in spontaneity illustrate that the goals of public acceptance and record sales are nudging them along from the wings.

Baltimore’s Slumlords are a direct 180 degrees from that mentality and prove that you don’t have to be a po-faced nit-picker with a five-year plan to write quality music.

“We may not deliver in quantity; we deliver more in quality,” laughs guitarist Domenic Romeo. “We’ll play a lot of good shows and sell a whole bunch of records at those shows as opposed to stringing out a two-week tour with good and mediocre shows. We condense it and play three or four good shows then lay low for a while.”

If the guitarist’s name sounds familiar, especially to Torontonians, that’s because Dom was once the main man behind Day of Mourning. He’s since moved to Baltimore and started up this band, featuring ex-Breakdown vocalist Jeff Perlin and ex-Stout members bassist Doug Williams and drummer Scottie Powers.

“I moved down here to join Comin’ Correct,” he recalls, “and I went to Europe with them for two months and stayed after that. We all knew each other through friends of friends and work—a lot of dudes in Baltimore do evictions and work for eviction crews. Our drummer had a barbeque and Jeff was there.

I’ve been a Breakdown fan forever, so I stalked him and got him drunk enough for him to agree to jam with us, and it just kind of fell into place from there.”

Slumlords are all about having fun, and putting a smile on all faces involved without sinking their melodic old-school hardcore sound and look—the cover of their self-titled album recalls the Crumbsuckers classic Life of Dreams—to joke band status is a major motivation for this band. In fact, rocking out between kicking people out may the only motivating factor.

“Actually, only a couple of us work in the eviction field anymore. The rest of us have moved on to greener pastures, but we do the band for fun and to amuse ourselves and anyone else that gets a kick out of it.”

All members of the Slumlords have serious recording and touring experience. Is there something different about going back to doing a band as a hobby?

“Yeah, it kind of makes it easier because we make better decisions as to when to play and how often to play out and that sort of thing. Back in the day, Day of Mourning would cart all our gear on the subway to play the Gasworks on a Tuesday night for three people. Now, we’d rather stay home. It’s tough because everyone either has a family or some kind of adult responsibility, so we pretty much try to play within three to five hours of Baltimore. We actually have played Florida and Canada, so if we can make it work, we’ll play any-

SLUMLORDS

where. We flew to Florida and Canada was a fluke because there’s no way we’d normally drive 12 hours and when you’ve got old man Jeff being all cranky and saying, ‘I’m almost 40 years old and I slept in a van’ it’s a little harder to pull it off.”

At present, the public can partake in their self-titled debut and new Drunk At the Youth of Today Reunion 7-inch (both on Perfect Victim). A split with No Redeeming Social Value is upcoming, not to mention anything that Dom decides he may want to release on his newly formed label, A389, named after the type of locks the eviction crews use on the job.

“The album has been out for like a year and the new 7-inch just came out.

We tried to do a video for the title track and I tried to get Ray Cappo [ex-YoT, Shelter] to be in it, but he didn’t want to. You wouldn’t believe how hard it was to track him down. I tried every means possible and I finally got in contact with him through a yoga Web site where there were pictures of him doing handstands and shit in Speedos. It was weird. We have a split coming out with No Redeeming Social Value and in Japan there will be a bonus DVD. That was what the video was going to be for, but we have some other tricks up our sleeve.”

The biggest trick, though, is how the Slumlords are able to keep fired up about playing, especially after the disappointments of their previous bands and the inherent difficulty of band life, especially when life’s responsibilities get more and more pressing with time.

“After Day of Mourning I was pretty bummed out because of the way everything unfolded; that was pretty discouraging and being from Toronto is pretty discouraging because Toronto—back then anyway—was a tough scene.

I don’t know, this kind of just fell into place. We were just having fun, we played a show and got a great response that we just kept going with. Our music isn’t brain science; we just write songs that we think are funny and entertaining. At the same time, we practise at Scott’s house, which is like a block away and really convenient. I think if we didn’t practise at Scott’s house, we would have never made it past the first demo.” [www.slumlordsevictioncrew.com] -Kevin Stewart-Panko

WEERD SCIENCE Wave ’Em Like You Just Don’t Care

No doubt Coheed and Cambria drummer Josh Eppard knew that releasing his hip-hop side-project Weerd Science’s debut Friends and Nervous Breakdowns (Super Rap/Equal Vision) was going to cause a shitstorm—lovers and haters spewing praise or hatred were destined to come in droves—but what can you do? Creativity comes in all shapes and forms, and when you are an artist, sometimes you got to let it come out and hit the ground running.

“I think this album is an exploration into music, just as Coheed and Cambria is. I think people who are into the band may also take a chance on Weerd Science. The label made a wise decision, noting that this was a hip-hop album, with a sticker on the CD just so people buying the album would know that. And people are picking up the album, so obviously they are interested in Weerd Science—or at least giving it a chance—and that makes me feel good.”

And what about the naysayers?

“I’d be lying, Adrian, if I didn’t say it hurts my feelings, but I was ready for it. I see a lot of comparisons.”

I’m sure you’ve seen the “Eminem-wannabe” comments?

“I’ve heard and read it all,” he laughs. “I could go online and put up songs I was doing way before Eminem came out, but I won’t. I always use my personality in the songs I do and not base it on other artists. If anything, the most bitch move I made was changing things up because people would think I was ripping off Eminem. I didn’t want to put the song ‘Girl, Your Baby’s Worm Food’ on, but the producers told me not to think like that. They said it was me, and only me, in that song, so it stayed on the album.”

Seeing as you have spent the last few years making a name for your main project, where did all of this hip-hop influence come from? Did you grow up listening to this music?

“I’ve been into hip-hop for a long time and I have been doing Weerd Science since I was 12. Where I grew up, the neighbourhood was like the United Nations—black kids, Chinese kids, Latinos, white kids—and we’d all get together in rhyme circles and just have fun goofing on rap. People called me ‘Weerd Science.’ It was a creative outlet for me over the years and it was a lot of fun which is why I eventually made an effort to get this out. It was important for me for Weerd Science to come from me naturally and not be forced. Having done this for a long time I can honestly say that these songs really do reflect what I was attempting to do.”

He adds, “I’ve got about 48 other songs still on the go, but I only had time to mix and include these songs for the album. I know there are people out there who know the older demos I have, asking where certain songs are and why they were not included. This is what I had to work with, so here ya go. There will be another record, so don’t worry, folks,” he laughs.

Knowing the difference between both Coheed and Cambria and Weerd Science albums, I can only imagine the difference in the studio.

“Oh man, so much difference,” he quips. “Making a Weerd Science is so free and open and a lot of fun, with lots of changes and ideas flowing around.

Making a record with Coheed and Cambria is very stressful. I think we take it a bit more seriously. It is fun in a different way. Coheed has producers we work with and there is a work dynamic we need to maintain to get the songs sounding a certain way and to make it work, but with Weerd Science, sometimes the off-the-cuff ideas and experience results in something unique and cool for us to play with.”

Can you give me an example?

“Sure, look at it this way. We can be all ready and rolling in the studio with Weerd Scinece then, all of a sudden, we stop what we are doing, go get some chow and hook up with ladies and come back tomorrow and kick out the ideas

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once again. It’s just like that. But with Coheed, the music demands attention and we all know that.”

He ends off, “I live and work on music in two totally different worlds. It’s a juggling act at times, but it’s a real trip.” [www.weerdscience.com] – Adrian ‘The Energizer’ Bromley

DEATH BY STEREO Committed To The Road, The Rock, The Fun

“We know what we do and we know what we are capable of,” says Death By Stereo guitarist Dan Palmer down the line from a restaurant in Topeka, Kansas.

“I think we had a lot of fun making this new album [Death For Life on Epitaph].

We just went with what felt right at the time. It just came out of us. There was no set pattern of making this song melodic or making this bit heavier. It was just a fun time.”

And knowing what Death By Stereo is about, I’m guessing studio work is something you’d rather not focus on?

“Yeah, we’re a fun band,” he says. “I mean, we [singer Efrem Schulz, drummer Todd Hennig, guitarist Tito and bassist Tyler Rebbe] know we have to go in the studio and make albums, but I gotta tell you, we belong out on the road and on stage. It is such a thrill to be able to do this. We are getting better at studio work, getting ideas down, and knowing what works as well as what does not work.”

Death For Life is a hard rocking/punk/hardcore album that truly captures the band’s live edge; more accurately than their previous albums did.

“I think we got it right this time,” he states about the album and its production. “I think our older records are great but lack something. I see it more now than I did back then. I hardly listen to our older records. Once in a while I’ll throw them on, but I just analyze them too much and see how we have changed stuff around for the live environment. We are so much better at what we do now. It is always important for us to try and push things forward.”

How so?

“Well, I think as a band you always want to make your stuff current and original. That’s why we change old stuff around and why we always change each album. We push forward all the time.”

Is this inspired by your own ideas or is it a studio vibe kick-starting things?

“We pretty much always have the ideas there and are always working hard to bring about change. If we waited for the studio to inspire us, we’d not be where we are now. We pretty much knew going in what we needed to get out of Death For Life; it just shaped itself as we went along.”

And why was this particular album title chosen?

“A lot of kids chant that at shows. So when it came time to choose the album title, and we spent a while doing that, it just seemed like the obvious one to go with. We’re committed to this band forever.”

Palmer continues, “Nothing much has changed for us as the years of doing this have gone on. We are pretty much the same people since when we started out. I know a lot of bands see success and they change. Success is a great feeling, but once you start to lose sight of what it means to be in a band, then you might as well get out because it will ruin you. We try and stay grounded because we know this can all change at the drop of a hat. If we started, all of a sudden, rolling in buckets of money, I personally think we would keep focused on the band and not change. I know it sounds clichéd, but I think because we have worked so hard to get to where we are, we won’t feel the urge to change.”

Metallica changed.

“I agree, but then again, look at their climb to success. It did happen pretty fast with each record. We have a few more years to even muster up the success an album like Master of Puppets gave them. Like I said, change is not in our future.”

One thing that has always been prevalent about Death By Stereo is that they are always—I mean, always—on the road.

“Road dogs for sure,” he laughs. “I mean, yeah, what can we say? The road is where we make it happen and get people to take note of the band. We are going to tour more with this new record because we have a lot more touring possibilities this time around. Plus there is a good buzz about us.”

Dan finishes, laughing, “We’ll be out on the road for the next year or so, so the next time we chat I’ll probably still be calling you from the road somewhere in the middle of nowhere. It’ll be fun.” [www.deathbystereo.com] – Adrian ‘The Energizer’ Bromley

THE ZIMMERMANN NOTE War Ensemble

“We’ve come together from various bands [Broken Free, Better Off Dead, and Commit Suicide] and various influences [grind/death/hardcore] and it all just creates what is The Zimmermann Note,” says singer Travis French about his Pittsburgh-area band’s debut EP New Deception (Innerstrength). “We like where we are at right now with the music, which pretty much has us sounding like that European metal sound mixed with the American hardcore.”

I think the EP has a lot to offer, especially with the short running time (five songs, 19-plus minutes).

“I think people latch onto us right away when they hear the EP, especially the young kids, because liking metal seems to be a bit trendy nowadays. We [guitarists Damian Yenick and Joe Madia, drummer Jordan Villella and bassist Carey Davenport] see a lot more cynicism from die-hard metalheads who have been in the scene for 10 years, and they don’t like the Swedish sounds in our music. We get lumped into that trend, and it sucks, but this is what we’ve been into for a while now and it wasn’t until last year we got together and jammed and tried to break free from the other genres we used to be a part of. Plus we offer up a lot of ideas and I think people like the variety of that in our music.”

This EP could have gone many different ways.

DEATH BY STEREO

“How so?”

Well, when band members come from other bands sometimes their influence on other musicians showcases a similar sound in the new project. With The Zimmermann Note, there is no definite sound overpowering others.

“We all have equal control when it comes to the writing of the music. We all add our own parts. We’re not afraid to listen, to try and understand what each other is thinking. It feels good being in a band like that. I’ve played in lot of bands since high school—shitty punk rock and hardcore bands—and these guys are easily the best guys I’ve worked with. It is hard to explain, but when you are in a band you bond as musicians and friends and you go through a lot together. Having the right people in the band is essential to staying happy in this industry.”

Was there a reason you did an EP first? Did you not have a sufficient amount of material yet or did you just want to get it out as fast as you could?

“We are very proud of the songs on the EP, but I think we have a lot more to offer in the future. Some of the new stuff we have sounds killer. We wanted to get an EP out before the full-length because we wanted to test the market and see what people thought of it. We need to build up the experience and the name with the EP and then deliver the full-length. If we had put out a full-length it might have been an all-or-nothing kind of situation, and this way we have a little more leeway.”

Showcasing a World War I soldier on the EP cover in a mock war poster theme, some may wonder where the band name came from and how these two tie in. Or maybe the history buffs around here already know? Anyway, the Zimmermann note was a telegram that German foreign secretary Arthur Zimmermann sent to the ambassador of Germany in 1917 telling him, in the event of war with the U.S., to ask Mexico to join Germany as an ally, saying if Mexico allied with Germany to combat the U.S. in World War I that Germany would hand over Arizona, New Mexico and Texas back to Mexico. The British got hold of the note and turned it over to U.S. President Woodrow Wilson. The Zimmermann note turned the tides of the general public opinion on the U.S. entering the war. So I’m assuming the band members are history buffs?

“Not really,” French laughs. “We are just really into war imagery, especially the war posters of that era, and the name just seemed to fit so we went with it.” [www.thezimmermannnote.com] - Adrian ‘The Energizer’ Bromley

SINAI BEACH Death Before Stagnation

“A lot of people who listen to the new record [Immersed on Victory Records] either love it or hate it. There are quite a few fans who don’t like the fact that we changed our sound/style. They say we sold out. Why? Because we wanted to make heavier music. C’mon, people,” begins Sinai Beach frontman, CJ Alderson.

“I mean, when we went in to write and record this record, we were listening to way less hardcore and loads more metal. We were kind of burnt out from our last album [When Breath Escapes, on Facedown Records] because when it came out we toured for like nine months solid and we really didn’t see any growth at all.

We basically gave up a year of our life to not get much gain out of it.”

Change was on the horizon…

“Yeah,” he says. “We were getting to the point in our lives where some of us wanted to get married. Should we keep doing this? So, we [guitarists Mike Risinger and Logan Lambert, bassist Jeff Santo and drummer Mike Dunlap] decided we would give this one more shot, and instead of making music the kids want to hear and sell millions of records, we did what we wanted to do with Immersed. That was the most important thing for us.”

How did you bring about the changes?

“We just looked at all the bands we loved and wanted to have certain parts that were like those albums and heavy parts here—just go to the max. We sat down and made a record that we would want to crank nice and loud. I decided that unlike our last album where the vocals were a bit cheesy, going from heavy to soft, that this record would be me just totally letting go and screaming my head off,” he laughs. “I totally changed the vocal style, and I think it caught many fans by surprise.”

Alderson continues, “It felt good to step out on our own and do our own music, how we want it. And you know what? If this doesn’t go anywhere, at least the last thing we ever put out as a band was something that sounded the way we wanted to sound.”

While Sinai Beach might have their own sound and style, it doesn’t take long to hear some of their influences surfacing on this release.

“A lot of people say I sound like Danzig at times…”

Most definitely!

“I’m a fan, but he sings a lot lower than me. I just went into it and let the music draw the vocal style from me. It just came out that way. I just wanted a real heavy vocal and nothing pretty. One of my other influences is Prince, but you don’t hear him in the music, do you?” he laughs. “You pull the influence into your music but do it your own little way.”

“There are a lot of great songs on this record,” he notes. “I mean, so many of these songs sound great and it is a diverse record, and again, that comes from our influences.”

I enjoy “Obedience Through Desecration.”

“That song kicks ass and it’s one of my faves too. One track that stands out for me on this album is ‘To the Church’ because we did something different adding the techno part to it. Overall, I am happy with the material here; it’s much stronger than our previous release, that’s for sure. And also I hope this new album opens us up to bigger tours with heavier bands like—and this is a long shot—someone like Lamb of God. That would rule!”

Travis Smith did the artwork for Immersed. As usual, it looks spectacular. Do you know him?

“No not at all, but we know his work,” says Alderman. “A lot of the metal

THE ZIMMERMANN NOTE

SINAI BEACH

albums we play have his artwork and we were like, ‘We want him to do the artwork.’ It came out great, especially when you look at the whole layout. I can’t believe we got him to work with us. First a great album and now we have the art to make it all come together nicely. If this was to end tomorrow, I’d have a smile on my face.” [www.sinaibeach.net] -Adrian ‘The Energizer’ Bromley

PB ARMY A Blue Ribbon Moment

Let’s get the frilly promotional shit out of the way. Keith Bergman is well known for his ’zine work, especially with regards to Infernal Combustion, the Onion-style parody site that Roadrunner.com subsumed a few years ago. Like every ’zine writer ever, his “stoner-pop-metal” (his words—don’t blame me if he’s wrong) band PB Army have recently put out their latest CD, Spine For the Snapback (Sin Klub Entertainment), which some listeners have listened to.

Watch as Bergman and I promote each other, try to be funny and squeeze some more blood out of the rock of the Q&A format. I hope Wiffley Snidegarb is mildly entertained by this interview, ’cause if he isn’t...

So, about PB Army, how’s that working out for you? Getting much sleep?

It’s working out well, except for the sleep part. We’re promoting the new record, Spine For the Snapback, and doing a lot of shows, so what sleep I do get is usually on some friendly stranger’s potato-chip-and-beer-cap strewn floor.

Seriously, though, why Sin Klub?

Well, they took a chance on us before we had a bassist, a live show, or more than five songs. We’ve all been part of the music scene (or what has passed for one) around Toledo for 15 years now, and though our eventual goal was—and is—to get on a bigger label, they were the perfect place to launch us, let us figure out exactly what the hell we were doing, and present ourselves to the world as a real band. With two albums on SKE, we both agree it’s time to move upward and onward, which is what we’ll be working on this summer and fall.

What’s been going on regarding Infernal Combustion, blabbermouth.net etc., anyway?

Well, Infernal Combustion was invited to be part of the Roadrunner family a couple years ago. Unfortunately, it hasn’t been updated regularly, thanks at first to some health problems I had, and now thanks to my ridiculously busy life. Contrary to what some think, IC is a total labour of love for me and the other writing I do, locally and nationally, is mostly what pays my bills. Given the choice between writing articles for Metal Maniacs and paying my rent or keeping IC up-to-date from the Apple II computer at the homeless shelter, I gotta pick option one. It does suck though, and I’m working on making the time for more metal parody.

Speaking of which, you get sick of the writing comparisons to The Onion?

Does it seem like writing’s too much like music, with all the similarity in ’zines and such? I know stoner can be redundant at times. Is “IC is the metal Onion” like “PB Army is like Sabbath, man! SABBATH!” Well, in the case of IC we kinda deserve it, because the format is very similar.

I mean, parody and satire are not new devices, but we’re using a format they made very, very popular. As for the band, I think the stoner rock tag is one of the most overused and meaningless tags out there; it gets applied to anything that sounds like heavy rock and roll and retroactively stuck on guitar rock bands back to 1969. Shit, I’m sure someone out there thinks The Doors are “stoner rock.” Labels are labels, and arguing about them makes a lot of people who like message boards happy, so who am I to stand in their way?

I notice Lumberjack/Mordam seem to have delayed release of the album, pushing the dates back a bit. Any problems getting Spine For the Snapback out there?

The delay worked out for the best, as it gave Lumberjack time to solicit the CD to their network of stores. Our last distributor [Cargo] didn’t do that at all for the first record, in two years’ time, so we’re already better off. We’re still in a very “wait and see” period with them, on both sides—they’re not heavily committed to us, or us to them. People in other states actually say they see Spine… in stores now, which never happened before, so they seem to be doing all right so far.

Are you thinking of setting up an LLC, then?

We’re gonna set up our own corporation for merch and touring expenses, since we hope to be doing a lot more of that in 2005–2006 and beyond. As for releasing our own product, we’d be down with that as well, but even if there was a big demand for our stuff, we’d still have to deal with distributors and their attendant headaches. My only “goal” right now, on the business side of things, is to not get stuck in anything long term, keep our options open and never let this side of the band get in the way of having fun, making music and gaining new experiences on the road. It’s kind of a deliberate naïveté—I’ll take care of business, but always keep in mind that that’s not why we’re here.

Do your health problems make you reflect more on what you’re doing?

I imagine almost dying from an aortic aneurysm puts the whiny shit in perspective.

Definitely. It’s a cliché to say, but it puts everything in perspective and makes you appreciate your life. If our record gets delayed now, I’m still gonna go and tour, because I want to go have that experience in the time I’m allotted. I don’t want to spend my second trip to my deathbed wondering why I wasted six months crying about release dates and ad placement and other such bullshit. I’m gonna write, play, record, make stuff, see the world, meet everyone I can, eat all kinds of weird food, act like an idiot and take every bite of life I can. What reason would anyone have to live any other way? Everything from January 31, 2004 until the day I actually do die is bonus time for me—I’m gonna enjoy the hell out of it. [www.wvbizmall.com/PBarmy/pbamry.html] -Cameron Archer

PB ARMY

Adam Wasylyk 1. RAMMSTEIN - Reise, Reise (Universal) 2. NINE INCH NAILS - The Downward Spiral (Nothing/Interscope) 3. ANTONY AND THE JOHNSONS - I Am a Bird Now (Secretly Canadian) 4. WINTER OF APOKALYPSE - Solitary Winter Night (Moribund) 5. DEAD OF WINTER - At the Helms of the Abyss (Profound Lore)

Laura Taylor 1. GREEN CARNATION - The Quiet Offspring (The End) 2. DECODED FEEDBACK - Bio-vital (Metropolis) 3. NOVEMBERS DOOM - The Pale Haunt Departure (The End) 4. DEAD OF WINTER - At the Helms of the Abyss (Profound Lore) 5. NIGHTINGALE - Invisible (Black Mark)

Adrian ‘The Energizer’ Bromley 1. EXTOL - The Blueprint Dives (Century Media) 2. AVENGER OF BLOOD - Complete Annihilation (JCM) 3. MESHUGGAH - Catch 33 (Nuclear Blast) 4. ULVER - Blood Inside (The End) 5. OCTAVIA SPERATI - Winter Enclosure (Candlelight)

Bane 1. ANTONY AND THE JOHNSONS - all (Secretly Canadian) 2. DAWN AND DUSK ENTWINED - The Hikimori Songs 10” (Eternal Soul) 3. KOPP, HERMANN- Necronology (Red Stream) 4. OFERMOD - Mystérion Tés Anomias (Norma Evangelium Diaboli) 5. PENDERECKI - St. Luke Passion DLP (MHS)

Tate Bengtson 1. CORROSION OF CONFORMITY - In the Arms of God (Sanctuary) 2. CANDLEMASS - self-titled (Nuclear Blast) 3. AUDIOPAIN - The Traumatizer (Vendlus) 4. PRIMORDIAL - The Gathering Wilderness (Metal Blade) 5. SUMMON - Fallen (Moribund)

Rûna 1. MY DYING BRIDE - The Dreadful Hours (Peaceville) 2. THE CURE - Pornography (Elektra) 3. RAMMSTEIN - Reise, Reise (Universal) 4. NEW RISEN THRONE & CRUEL HAVEST Shadows over Humanity (God is Myth) 5. JOY DIVISION - Closer (Warner Brothers)

Paul Schwarz 1. NECROPHAGIA - Harvest Ritual Volume 1 (Red Stream/Season of Mist) 2. MESHUGGAH - Catch 33 (Nuclear Blast) 3. VOIVOD - To the Death (Devil Metal) 4. CLUTCH - Jam Room (Megaforce reissue) 5. TURBONEGRO - Party Animals (Burning Heart)

Jadd Shickler 1. TRUCKFIGHTERS - Gravity X (Fuzzorama) 2. THE ATOMIC BITCHWAX - 3 (Meteor City) 3. CABLE - Pigs Never Fly (Translation Loss) 4. MOUTH OF THE ARCHITECT - Time and Withering (Translation Loss) 5. VILLAGE OF DEAD ROADS - demo

Chris Bruni 1. DECEASED - As the Weird Travel On (Thrash Corner) 2. LURKER OF CHALICE - Lurker Of Chalice (Total Holocaust) 3. DREDG - Catch Without Arms (Sony) 4. STAR WARS EPISODE III: REVENGE OF THE SITH - Original Motion Picture Soundtrack (Sony Classics) 5. THRALLDOM - Black Sun Resistance: Six Strain Ceremony (Total Holocaust/Profound Lore)

Nathan T. Birk 1. HELL MILITIA - Canonisation of the Foul Spirit (Total Holocaust) 2. THE HOLY MOUNTAIN - Entrails (No Idea) 3. GLORIOR BELLI - O Laudate Dominvs (Eerie Art) 4. BLOOD RITUAL - Black Grimoire (Moribund) 5. KRIEG - Advance tracks for final album (Blood Fire Death)

Alex Ristic 1. Overkill - All Kevi-Metal 1. DEATH ANGEL - Archives & Artifacts (Restless/ Ryko) 2. DALEK - Absence (Ipecac) 3. VIO-LENCE - Eternal Nightmare (Megaforce reissue) 4. SNUFF - Six of One, Half A Dozen of the Other 1986-2002 (Fat Wreck) 5. BEECHER - Breaking the Fourth Wall (Earache)

Cameron Archer 1. That feeling I get when I totally half-ass a Top 5 an hour before deadlines 2. TOTAL FUCKING DESTRUCTION - Compact Disc Version 1.0 (Bones Brigade) 3. SAPROGENIC - The Wet Sound of Flesh on Concrete (DeepSend) 4. BIG DADDY P & THE MIDWEST CREW (promo) 5. FIST OF FEAR, TOUCH OF DEATH DVD (Guillotine Films)

Brian Munson 1. NAPALM DEATH - The Code Is Red...Long Live the Code (Century Media) 2. PRIMORDIAL - The Gathering Wilderness (Metal Blade) Alvin Wee 1. WINTER OF APOKALYPSE - Solitary Winter Night 3. NOVEMBERS DOOM - The Pale Haunt Departure (The End) (Moribund) 4. GREEN CARNATION - The Quiet Offspring 2. IMPIETY - Paramount Evil (Agonia) (The End) 3. DEAD OF WINTER - At the Helm of the Abyss 5. SWALLOW THE SUN - The Morning Never Came (Profound Lore) (Firebox) 4. V/A - Nornoise DVD/CD (Ohm) 5. BLOOD RITUAL - Black Grimoire (Moribund) ‘The Suit’ Paul Silbiger 1. EMANUEL - Soundtrack to A Headrush (Vagrant) 2. THE BLUEPRINT - Phenomenology (Copro) 3. A STATIC LULLABY - Faso Latido (Columbia) 4. TAKING BACK SUNDAY - Tell All Your Friends (Victory) 5. ISIS - Panopticon (Ipecac)

1. BIOMECHANICAL - The Empires of the Worlds (Earache) 2. ULVER - Blood Inside (The End) 3. SPIRITUAL BEGGARS - Demons (Savage Messiah) 4. CANDLEMASS - Candlemass (NBA) 5. NOVEMBER’S DOOM - The Pale Haunt Departure (The End)

Rob Hughes 1. NAPALM DEATH - The Code Is Red...Long Live the Code (Century Media) 2. RUSSELL ALLEN - Russell Allen’s Atomic Soul (InsideOut) 3. GUAPO - Black Oni (Ipecac) 4. CAN - Tago Mago (Spoon) 5. PORCUPINE TREE - Deadwing (Lava)

Mark Coastworth 1. MOONSORROW - Verisäkeet (Spikefarm) 2. GREEN CARNATION - The Quiet Offspring (The End) 3. THE DRESDEN DOLLS - The Dresden Dolls (Roadrunner) 4. AGALLOCH - Pale Folklore (The End) 5. ULVER - Blood Inside (The End)

Steve Wasylyk 1. RAMMSTEIN - Reise, Reise (Universal) 2. DARKTHRONE - Transilvanian Hunger (Peaceville) 3. SATYRICON - Dark Medieval Times (Moonfog) 4. DARK FUNERAL - Secrets of the Black Arts (No Fashion) 5. CALIGINOUS - 2005 Rehearsal (Pre-Production)

Lynne Harrington 1. JUDAS PRIEST - Angel of Retribution (Sony) 2. GREEN CARNATION - The Quiet Offspring (The End) 3. YYRKOON - Occult Medicine (Osmose/The End) 4. NICK CAVE AND THE BADSEEDS - B Sides & Rarities (Mute U.S.) 5. CLUTCH - Transitional Speedway League: Anthems, Anecdotes, And Undeniable Truths (Atlantic)

9 to 10: brilliantly executed, mind-altering work of art 7 to 8: ambitious but slightly flawed 5 to 6: technically competent but unimaginative

ACID KING III (Small Stone)

Mistake Acid King for your typical band of Dopethrone-worshippin’ sludge fiends at your peril.

True, this is down-tuned sludge with more fuzz than a mouldy peach, but the underlying ethos has more to do with psychedelic rock. Acid King is closer to the Sons of Otis school of spaced-out gargantuan dirge, with low bass rumblings and lumbering guitar riffs leading the mind on an interstellar journey that is, paradoxically, quite claustrophobic. Frontwoman Lori S. adds something manifestly unique to Acid King, with her smooth but otherwordly singing making the band a bit more memorable than, say, the disconcerting yowls of Sons of Otis or the scum-soaked snarls of (Men of) Porn. The second track, “Heavy Load,” epitomizes what Acid King is all about: drugged-out drones dragged on till doomsday, fornicating with the loose rhythmic grooves in order to procreate a little slow-mo wickedness. Lori’s vocals are particularly captivating on “Bad Vision,” where her eerie chant of “woaah oh oh” leads into a semi-lucid but entirely catchy verse babbling of bad visions and surrounding spirits (coincidentally, the lyrics for this song consist of exactly one four-line stanza repeated thrice over; consider it a mantra for the valium generation). Meanwhile, the molasses-saturated 12-minute stoner epic “War of the Mind” trudges like an overdose of hallucinogens winding its way through the dilapidated neurons of the grey matter, the riffs stretched almost to their breaking point, Lori snarling with a dispassionate yet catchy tone, and a lengthy jam session that begins around the seven minute mark never failing to lose its hypnotic power. Like most sludge rock albums, it is entirely understandable to accuse Acid King of resorting to a one-dimensional approach that lacks dynamics.

From the outside looking in, that makes a lot of sense. But the key to Acid King, the key to nearly all psychedelic and sludge rock, is that one needs to be on the inside looking out before you really “get” what it’s all about. A vibe, a 45-minute escape from reality; your mind needs to embrace those grooves and host its own Holy Communion with that nameless primordial ooze, that pagan god neither good nor evil but simply there to usher the mind’s sense-making apparatus into a state of supreme nothingness. <Tate Bengtson> -8.5-

AIT! Fiori di Carne (Punch Productions)

Intriguing first glances upon this picture LP: Saturno Butto’s crimsonly seductive fetishistic paintings.

But what exactly does that mean in terms of setting the mood for the music? This is Italian, as is the artist. Italy has gone strange places in recent years thanks to Novy Svet, I would say. Kind of a decoction of jazz, psychedelic rock, industrial, experimental, folk, and naïve futurism. Some bands are able to refine their sound and hone in on a specific blend, à la Novy Svet, who may be the masters of this kind of “neo-surrealist” fusion. AIT! seems to be a bit too scattered to fully convince me that this record is worth its price tag, which is not cheap since it’s limited to 333 copies and refuses to hold back on the presentation. Songs blend all of the above styles through the course of the 13 or so songs with oddities like “Make War Not Love,” which is in English, “Take an Oath,” which is comprised of some German WWII sample (a wild guess on my part), and “Il Vessilo Nero,” which is in AIT!’s native tongue. Other song titles belie a sense of wackiness that characterizes this new Italian wave of musical inebriation: “Cosmic Swastika,” “Giddy Bomb,” and “Love at First Stroke.” <Bane> -6-

RUSSELL ALLEN Russell Allen’s Atomic Soul (InsideOut Music)

I love having my expectations decimated like this.

So much is stacked against this record. First, there’s the premise: “Symphony X vocalist makes hardrockin’ solo album.” I really couldn’t give a rat’s ass about Symphony X or what their vocalist does

3 to 4: uninspired and clichéd 0 to 2: misguided, cynical exercises in utter shittiness

on the side. Secondly, there’s project name. Atomic Soul? Two words rendered impotent by extravagant overuse in rock. Third: an ultra-naff cover that resembles a radioactive pizza and featuring a spelling mistake in one of the song titles. Nevertheless, acting on a tip from the Energizer, I threw Russell Allen’s Atomic Soul into the player the first chance I got…and was knocked flat on my cynical ass by the ferocious boogie of opener “Blackout.” This album is miraculous in its sly combination of retro hard rock/proto-metal styles and modern, in-yer-face guitar crunch. Allen, an amazing singer, works a variety of voices into the satisfyingly diverse collection of self-penned tunes. On “Seasons of Insanity” he belts it out like Dio circa The Mob Rules; “The Distance” sees him emoting like Paul Rodgers.

The latter song flirts with the kind of AOR styles that anesthetized the populace when Journey and Foreigner ruled the airwaves, then twists those elements via brilliant songwriting into something to truly savour. Like I said—miraculous. The danger with this type of album is that it will descend into pastiche or novelty. Though it contains obvious nods to Zeppelin, Purple and Rush, the sizzling production and fleshed-out songwriting save the day, as does the palpable sense of fun that Allen and his band (featuring Michael Romeo of Symphony X, Jens Johansson, and ace drummer Robert Nelson) are having throughout. I myself can’t help cracking a smile at songs like “Saucey Jack”—title nicked from an old Spinal Tap number, I believe—with its unrepentantly rocktastic combination of slide guitar and handclaps, or the title track’s speedy, Riot-ous party-rock anthem-to-be. For an album that initially seemed to have so little to offer (in my view), Russell Allen’s Atomic Soul redeemed itself spectacularly. <Rob Hughes> -9-

ANTONY AND THE JOHNSONS I Am a Bird Now (Secretly Canadian)

Antony has retained his sullenness and sexual ambiguity throughout this new release. The precedent set by previous recordings has transformed here in a slightly more moribund, confused manner. Sister, child, brother, boy, girl are all entwined amidst the voice of someone struggling to understand his own complexities. The ingredients are simple: voice and piano, mostly, with some strings, a subtle bass and casually languid drum and cymbals—all of which can capture such pain and passion and complexity. Only about 35 minutes in length, so it’s shorter than the cabaret-styled plucking of songs from a notebook that one can witness in a live setting, but it can be equally as captivating when one chooses to get lost with this internally.

The instrumentation on this disc is far more subtle and gospel in sound than previous encounters and the list of attendees has increased: Lou Reed, Devendra Banhart, Rufus Wainwright, Boy George, and many others I’m unfamiliar with. Antony is his voice, which is something that could be concomitant with his stature: large male, pale white skin, barrel-chested, bald head—everything to be found in a castrati. <Bane> -7.5-

THE ATOMIC BITCHWAX III (Meteor City)

I’ll admit I kind of lost interest in The Atomic Bitchwax after founding member/guitarist Ed Mundell left the band to focus on his main band, Monster Magnet. I kind of never gave the band a chance to get back on top of things. It seems as though the band—Chris Kosnik and Keith Ackerman—felt the same way.

Fast forward a few years and the band is back with a new singer/guitarist (Finn Ryan—ex-Core) and the band is “rawking” once again. The new album III finds the band in a nice jam mode, loads of guitar work and tight rhythm section meshed with dual vocals and a killer fuzzy-feedback that only few stoner rock bands can capture. There also seems to be a real fluid flow of energy on III, something that the previous release lacked, so it seems like good things happen to those who wait. Rock on, Atomic Bitchwax! <Adrian ‘The Energizer’ Bromley> -7-

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REVIEWS

AUDIOPAIN The Traumatizer (Vendlus)

Forget about Carnal Forge and Darkane and all of the other proponents of the so-called “new thrash” genre. Audiopain raises the stakes by returning to the “old thrash” sound of Coroner (circa R.I.P. and Mental Vortex) and classic Destruction, then tossing a generous dose of mid-period Death (circa Individual Thought Patterns and Symbolic) into the mix. While the riffs are sufficiently potent to steamroll over dozens of “all bark no bite” new thrash weaklings, what gives Audiopain its unique flavour is its ability to weld these rifftacular histrionics together with a foreboding atmosphere. Witness the creepy labyrinthine prog thrash riffs of “Living Among Humans,” wherein cerebellumsearing complexity is delivered with calculated ponderousness, much as when the unflappable horror movie antagonist Jason stalks his latest victim. Audiopain writes huge riffs that are delivered with an appreciation for angularity and juxtaposition that never verges on awkwardness. Vocalist Sverre utilizes a high pitched but intelligible snarl lurking somewhere between the desperate growls of Schuldiner and the frenzied quasimelodic ranting of Schmier, spitting out the lyrics with venom and bile aplenty. Sverre’s sense of phrasing hones his slight melodic verve to a razor-sharp edge without sacrificing an iota of vindictive energy in the process. The band capably mixes blitzkrieg thrash assaults with midtempo riff-heavy crunch, occasionally inserting exploratory prog-thrash tangents into the music and always finding a clever way to segue from one passage to the next. Audiopain knows how to take its time and flesh out an idea to its fullest, which makes a cut like the eight-minute closer, “Religion of Reality,” flow seamlessly despite its epic length. Loop back to the beginning of the album and we are faced with the furious opener, “Believer,” where an enraged riff attacks in one of the most violent and catchy moments on the album. In short, Audiopain has the creative depth and musical skills that much of the recent thrash resurgence/regurgitation lacks. <T. Bengtson> -9.5-

AVENGER OF BLOOD Complete Annihilation (JCM)

I’ve been following this band for years and have several of their demos in my music collection still, and for good reason. I knew one day they’d sign a record deal and put out an album that would knock my head off, as Complete Annihilation has done.

With years of experience and some maturing Avenger of Blood have become a powerhouse thrash metal band—easily one of the best the U.S.A. has to offer. Fave tracks include the title track, “Bound by Torment,” “Scent of Death,” and “Everlasting Plague.” This is total German thrash metal worship and fans of the mighty trio—Sodom, Kreator and Destruction—will eat this up! Throwing on this album brings me back to the mid-’80s, a time when thrash metal showcased a sinister raw production, razor-sharp riffs and no-holds-barred attitude. The glory days are here with Complete Annihilation, so crank it up and commence headbanging! <A. Bromley> -9-

BLOODLINED CALLIGRAPHY They Want You Silent (Facedown)

Album review quotes on CD packaging can be a pro and con for an album’s release. For the pro side they will give the music fan a quick idea of what can be expected from said CD and/or what bands sound similar to the band. The con side is that the reviews are way off in description and/or the styles of the bands mentioned in the review stick in your head as the music plays, not really allowing you to distance yourself from the band’s music all that much. That was the case with Bloodline Calligraphy’s They Want You Silent as descriptions of Walls of Jericho (oddly enough WoJ singer Candace sings on the track “Know When To Hold Em”), Kittie and Arch Enemy were all over the album cover packaging. Does this really help? As mentioned above, I don’t really think so. That being said, singer Ally French screams her lungs out on this album, urged onward by a rampaging hardcore assault that does pack a few solid shots (“A Variety of Damage” and “Shall We Dance”). They Want You Silent is good, but marred in spots by the band’s lack of drive to add some uniqueness to what they do. Hmm, maybe those comparisons were accurate? <A. Bromley> -6-

BLOOD RITUAL Black Grimoire (Moribund)

This cult act finally returns with a massive masterpiece that slams a fistin the face of myriad death metal pretenders plaguing the scene today. Legendary albums like Sumerian Cry or Blessed Are The Sick set the standard for horrific, morbid atmospheres in death metal, and till today, Black Grimoire is one of the few newer releases which captures this eldritch ambiance perfectly. Melodies are used artfully, injecting a sense of progression and landscape, even as the tortured, grinding background keeps the proceedings pitch black and unholy as fuck. Utterly sick passages of drawn-out riffage and caustic vocals leave one gasping for relief, which comes in the form of surprisingly melodic leads. Parallels to early Grave and Entombed will no doubt be drawn, but Blood Ritual reworks the old-school method with an intensity and depth of sound that adds a new dimension of complexity to the classic sound.

Messy and somewhat lo-fi in attitude (if not exactly in strict production terms), this album clearly targets fans of the old school, and succeeds tremendously at that. <Alvin Wee> <9>

REVIEWS

BLOODY SUNDAY To Sentence the Dead (Facedown)

The first thing your senses will perceive with To Sentence the Dead is not that initial strum of the guitar but the truly amazing cover art by Travis Smith, creator of several attention-getting album covers for a variety of hardcore and metal bands. When you do hear that first strum and the following couple of bars, you realize you’re listening to traditional hardcore with a good influence of old-school punk. In a contemporary sense, you could compare them to Floorpunch; in an ancestral sense, they’re borrowing from innumerable other bands. Lyrics deal with typical negative punk themes such as disgust with corporate greed and disillusionment with society, plus an occasional positive, Christian infusion. Because there’s so much out there in this genre, it takes a lot to stand out from the crowd, and unfortunately Bloody Sunday aren’t doing anything unique.

They just play good, solid hardcore—like 1,001 other bands. <Paul Silbiger> -5.5-

CAESER ROMERO The Grotesque Burlesque Revue (Fin de Siècle)

This 3-inch CD was a complete surprise, picked at random from a catalog full of hundreds of musical oddities that I’d never heard a thing about—always an intriguing and challenging proposition. This music was originally the demented soundtrack to which the Dragon Ladies performed their risqué art performances—often at strip clubs or other dens of iniquity. The Dragon Ladies, I’ve gleaned from the text included on this nice little digipack, were a cult dance troupe that was charismatic and deviant, successful and self-destructive. The premise for their performances was loosely inspired by the fables of Bluebeard. One can vividly imagine the seduction and subsequent dismemberment that accompanies these Rorschachian-strip club-film noir-Sweeney Todd-esque-carnival freak show-soundtracks compositions. Minor elements of horror seep through to add an edge to the music, but most of these songs have a choreographed, invigorating and slightly jovial feel to them that makes them all the more uncharacteristic, enchanting, haunting, and compelling. The clock strikes twelve again and again on a Hitchcock-ian surrealist runaway as the panic consumes the frightened young one who has never ventured into a carnival of the grotesque before where the mirrors reflect more than the self, where the walls continually shift dimensions and where the end is just the beginning.

It’s just too damned short. <Bane> -8.5-

CEPHALIC CARNAGE Anomalies (Relapse)

I never understood Cephalic Carnage as a band, which makes one wonder why I interviewed them for this issue (hint: it has something to do with me not having enough bands to interview for this issue). After Anomalies, I still don’t understand. They’ve obviously become a more focused, less gimmick-prone outfit, and the band earns those hard-won crossover points with each album. Personally, though, I don’t like Anomalies. It’s funny, because Anomalies is a technical enough, suitably genre-bouncy collection. It’s great that the band is succeeding in the often-contradictory world of “proper music criticism” while performing the rare act of making their music smarter and in keeping with the band’s extreme music past. To me, though, Anomalies just seems too distant for my tastes. I don’t get that certain experience, that feeling of being hit by a bus that grindcore can give in its best moments. The production is too clean, too pristine—that and Cephalic Carnage have always seemed to have that unfocused sound to them. Not that I’m the king of focused, mind you, but Cephalic Carnage have a sterilized, “everything but the kitchen sink” sound to them, and it’s not my thing. It’s also why I never could get into Dillinger Escape Plan. It’s almost like those bands are the progressive rock bands of grindcore, whereas I’ll prefer punk and/or Devo. I’m not trying to sound like I’m aiming to write for Pitchforkmedia.com here (and when they reviewed Anomalies, by the way, they sounded stupid, which isn’t hard for them) but while I can identify with Cephalic Carnage’s substantial improvement every time they release an album, they still leave me wanting a certain extra. I don’t hate Cephalic Carnage and I can understand why they’re well regarded, but Anomalies isn’t my thing. Yes, I know I’ve offended a few people by not being “objective” enough—as if I could be anything but subjective while trying to overcome my biases in judging a music album.

The music hounds will judge by their wallets and their opinions how worthy Anomalies really is, and they’re far better than I at such judgments. <Cameron Archer> -5-

CORROSION OF CONFORMITY In the Arms of God (Sanctuary)

Corrosion of Conformity are one of the few bands that I would describe with the word “consistent.” The band has never delivered a bad record, even though many COC fans will beg to differ with the polished ways etched deep into 2000’s American Volume Dealer. While lacking in the gritty, dark edge that COC has managed to mold into their previous albums, the previous album still showcased a spark. (Thanks to Tate for letting me see the potential in this disc.) Fast forward to 2005 and the band returns with what could easily be one of their best albums to date, the rugged, hard-edged rolling machine of In the Arms of God, an album coated with a dense towering wall of emotion, dirge-like riffs and sinister snarls courtesy of guitarist/singer/ lyricist Pepper Keenan. The band also taps into an eerie vibe in certain spots, most notably on the semi-acoustic track “Rise River Rise,” a track that helps exemplify the band’s drive to

stay focused, deliver quality material, but mix it up. There are indeed some fiery moments here, no doubt songs that will become staple parts of the band’s live set in years to come: “Paranoid Opioid” and “World On Fire.” In the Arms of God is a record that showcases a band firing on all cylinders, but not destroying everything in its path initially, rather slowly chipping away (emotionally and physically) at us as time goes on. We’ll see our maker in due time… <A. Bromley> -9-

DAWN AND DUSK ENTWINED The Hikimori Songs (Eternal Soul)

“In Japan, today, some youth called Hikimori make the sudden choice to withdraw from society and stay shut-in at home, in a second state of mind, out of an outside world they loathe…”

Damn how I admire the capabilities of the Europeans to continually produce incredibly lavish and highly aesthetic releases—and to actually have an audience for them at the steep prices often demanded for such art. The music on this 10-inch is nothing like the last D&DE release I listened to, as this one sounds nothing like stern, tight-lipped, percussive-based seriousness. Rather, this is stunning soundtrack material, or potentially could be a film backdrop for an elder Japanese (or European) black and white film where the music takes precedence over the voices of the actors. A simple plucking of strings or plunking of keys and some radiant waves of sound give the impression of, well, the dawning of a day or the passing of the sun beyond the horizon. The voices, where they appear, almost seem as if they are the shadows that have faded into the past and play a vital yet submissive role to the presentation afforded the eyes and mind by way of the music.

Song credits here are given to G. Revell and J. Carpenter, and the record is dedicated to the memory of Theo van Gogh. A perplexing mishmash of sentiments—that which makes this listener want to delve deeper into the machinations of the makers. <Bane> -8-

DEAD OF WINTER At the Helm of the Abyss (Profound Lore)

Dead of Winter is the analog black metal project featuring Schizoid, one of the people keeping the mutated spawn of the “digital hardcore” genre alive and relevant. (Dead of Winter were also interviewed in Unrestrained! #25.) The hype for Dead of Winter is not insignificant, and I have to admit to being at least somewhat interested in their debut album. Hearing this, I’m slightly disappointed. Maybe it’s because I was expecting something somehow different, but the metal being played here is of the death/black variety. For black metal, Dead of Winter are decent enough—At the Helm of the Abyss does what it says on the tin, and it’s the kind of no-frills, char-the-ground, to-hell-with-that-“symphonic”-shit black metal I can appreciate. Still, the drumming here is very monotonous, enough that it affects the music to an appreciable degree. Honestly, Dead of Winter seem rather generic as a black metal band, and beyond the usual claims of bypassing the metal mainstream and such there isn’t anything that really stands out on At the Helm of the Abyss. Being familiar with Schizoid’s oeuvre, it’s weird to hear a band like Dead of Winter not experiment with their sound considering the talent on tap here. Still, as a first album At the Helm of the Abyss establishes Dead of Winter as a proper band rather than a “cute side project,” and it’s obvious Dead of Winter won’t fall on the wrong side of the “poser” black metal hard-line any time soon. Still, Schizoid’s prior output had me expecting better things than the band might be capable of right now. Dead of Winter are good at what they do, but they’re not great yet. It seems Dead of Winter are in this for the long haul, though, and doubtless they’ll establish themselves in the world of Canadian black metal. If they don’t, then I’ll know something went wrong on their road to complete aural destruction. <C. Archer> -6-

DEATH BEFORE DISHONOR Friends Family Forever (Bridge Nine)

Hailing from one the hardcore capitals of North America, Boston’s Death Before Dishonor offer seven songs of traditional old-school hardcore with new-school production values. The results are quite powerful and believable; however it seems we’ve been down this path countless times before. There’s nothing significantly new going on within this 18 minutes of music. If you mixed it up in the pit at an Agnostic Front show back in ’86 and still wear the concert shirt, this disc is probably for you. Featuring Aaron Knuckles (Death Threat) on guest vocals for the final track, “6.6.6. (Friends Family Forever).” <P. Silbiger> -5.5-

DECHRIST Strong Men On Drugs (Independent)

A strange package, this one: an eight-song demo CD, with half the songs simply being instrumental versions of the previous four. “There’s a new definition for Extreme Metal!!!” screams the attached flyer, and two minutes into the first track of blackened death metal I’m tempted to concur. In the tradition of their fellow Canadian war-metal brethren, Dechrist blast forth a lethal blitzkrieg of fretboard shredding and impossibly fast skin pounding. We’re talking Martin Maurais (of Kataklysm fame) here, and his Herculean performance on the disc is nothing short of astounding. Vocalist/bassist/guitarist Maerk Asselin’s work truly comes to the fore on the instrumental versions, which arguably work better without his caustic vocals confusing the already mayhemic proceedings. Unlike other play-as-fast-as-you-can troupes, Dechrist manage to maintain intensity without losing any of their heaviness or composure.

That fact alone, coupled with the faultless songwriting, should convince any label to sign these guys as soon as they can. <Alvin Wee> -8Contact: dechrist666@yahoo.com

DEMONS & WIZARDS Touched by the Crimson King (SPV)

If you liked the first Demons & Wizards album, chances are you’ll be enjoying this just as much. And for those who expected the band to bring a bit more to the table this time around, you may be a bit disappointed. Don’t get me wrong, there are plenty of gems here (i.e. “Crimson King,” “Love Tragedy Asunder,” and “Wicked Witch”) and an adequate cover (Led Zeppelin’s “The Immigrant Song”), but this pretty much sounds like the same album that Jon Schaffer (Iced Earth) and Hansi Kursch (Blind Guardian) delivered a few years back. The fast-paced “Terror Train” is a nice touch, as is the mesmerizing flow of “Beneath the Waves,” but not enough to salvage a mediocre offering. The chemistry of Schaffer and Kursch is still intact; they just haven’t taken too many chances yet to spice things up in their relationship as songwriters. Next time, perhaps? <A. Bromley> -6-

DEPRESSION/MESRINE Die Toten Tage Kommen...Sooner Than Later (2+2=5 Records)

If you needed any pointers as to why I find the metal genre so fascinating, it’s the fact that a Brazilian label is releasing a split CD featuring a veteran German band and a reasonably wellknown Canadian band. Fascinating! Die Toten Tage Kommen... is one of those “under the radar” releases that come every so often—it isn’t a classic, but it doesn’t deserve to be this obscure either. Depression took a while to get to me (lame pun, I know) with their modernized version of simplistic death metal, but the guys in Depression are effective at what they do and whip another effective run out of the old warhorse. Depression seem to have a consistent work ethic and the resulting first half of the split is entertaining enough to be respectable as a death metal release. Mesrine, on the other hand, are somewhat better at conveying their brand of deathcore/grind to the masses and there seems to be more life in Mesrine’s half of ...Sooner Than Later overall. Perhaps that’s due to the way Mesrine present themselves—they claim to deal in lyrics about serial killers although no one in band claimed to write lyrics for ...Sooner Than Later. It leads me to believe that there are no lyrics, period. Either way, Die Toten Tage Kommen...Sooner Than Later spends 45 minutes of time wisely and effectively. Just don’t expect this album to wow you with bells and whistles, though—there aren’t any. <C. Archer> -7-

DEW-SCENTED Chapter VI (NBA)

Lord knows us metalheads like our German thrash metal straight and to the point. The fewer changes the better, right?

Dew Scented’s latest album Chapter VI is pretty much by the thrash metal books, a little heavier in spots, but definitely the type of German thrash metal that both the veteran and newer metalheads want to hear (i.e. “Ruins of Hope,” “Rituals of Time” and “Never To Return”). Alongside new albums by newcomers Avenger of Blood and heavyweights Usurper, Dew Scented’s offering will no doubt please many and cause any mosh pit to swirl like Hurricane Ivan. <A. Bromley> -7-

BRUCE DICKINSON Tyranny of Souls (Sanctuary)

Holding true to the sound established on Accident of Birth and The Chemical Wedding, Maiden’s venerated mouthpiece returns with yet another addition to his solo catalogue. Once again collaborating with Roy Z (but sadly without guitarist Adrian Smith this time around), Dickinson unleashes an album that is simply not up to the standard of Accident of Birth or The Chemical Wedding but remains acceptable in its own right. The album suffers due to a large quantity of material that is unremarkable at best, filler at worst. After the pointless introduction has been put out of its misery, tracks two and three emerge as the album’s twin powerhouses. The uplifting chorus to “Abduction” is classic Dickinson, embellished with a driving guitar riff that unfurls into a resplendent lead on the chorus. “Soul Intruders” is a midpaced cut that would have fit comfortably alongside the likes of “Starchildren” from Accident of Birth. So far, so good. Unfortunately, the remainder of the album verges on “so what?” Tyranny of Souls starts to waver with the fourth track, “Kill Devil Hill,” as Dickinson finds himself mired in much the same problem encountered on the last two Maiden albums: struggling to match his lyrical meter to the rhythmic cadence, he oversings and falls into melodrama and awkward phrasing.

Acceptable but unspectacular describes the next few cuts. The manner in which the acoustic-based verses of “Navigate the Seas of the Sun” transforms into a quixotic-electric chorus is a throwback to “Tears of the Dragon,” although it lacks any sense of poignancy. The soft verse/hard chorus oscillation of “River of No Return” is predictable and lacks compelling ideas while “Power of the Sun” is an upbeat rocker that never seems to capture the explosive energy that it so desperately grasps for. “Devil on a Hog” is a stripped-down hard rock goofball with an unabashedly catchy chorus that will excite fans of Bruce’s Tattooed Millionaire album and few others, but it at least serves as a respite after the bland nature of the preceding tracks. Skipping past the pointless “Believel,” the album closes on a high(ish) note with the title track, an ominous epic that slowly (sometimes too slowly) climaxes in an exhilarating

chorus and crunchy rhythm combination punch. Despite a strong start, Tyranny of Souls fails to satisfy; a few bright points well deserve to be fast-tracked into any future Best of Bruce compilation, but the album’s inability to maintain a high quality level for the duration leaves the taste buds thirsting for that heady brew served up on Bruce’s two previous solo outings. <T. Bengtson> -5.5-

DIVINITY DESTROYED Eden in Ashes (Screaming Ferret/Escapi)

Diversity is a sword that can cut both ways. Provided a band has a strong vision that warrants a genre-bending approach and the compositional skills capable of melding disparate sounds into a cohesive whole, diversity can be a grand thing.

However, if diversity becomes the end in itself rather than the means to a greater end, everything sours faster than a carton of milk tossed into an uncovered convenience store dumpster on a scorching summer day. Divinity Destroyed is a band that comes down almost entirely in favor of the former; its syncretic idiosyncrasy merging Vintersorg-ian stilted melodies with progressive (in the experimental sense) song structures that manage to encompass chugging death riffs, Cynic-like leads, Pain of Salvation prog wonkery, Arcturus’s sense of the carnivalesque, and more than a few qualities that are beyond description. It is a bit of a stretch, of course, but Divinity Destroyed do a remarkable job of ensuring that the constituent elements coalesce into a (reasonably) coherent whole. Despite this range of influences, the band ensures that its diverse references are all meaningfully related to the band’s core concept. Moreover, Divinity Destroyed is generally careful in its exploration of different ideas, fleshing them out and integrating them into the overall song trajectory in a logical fashion. In other words, Divinity Destroyed is rather like that kid who always manages to win at the game of piñata: no matter how many times and how fast you spin the little twerp around, no matter how dizzy he gets, he still manages to make that supreme swing connect squarely with the erstwhile abdomen of the papier maché animal, spilling sweets all over the ground.

Undoubtedly, one of the major factors ensuring that the music holds together is Mark Ward, whose clean singing voice is fairly close to Vintersorg in terms of pitch although Ward does so abusive of the vibrato. His chorus hook on “Threnody” is particularly notable, elevating the song with an epic catchiness originating in an escalatory pre-chorus and delivering the wholesome goodness on the chorus proper with a soaring hook that swims in the mind for days on end. Songwise, there are a few kinks here or there, to be expected given the band is relatively young yet possessed of a singularly ambitious vision, but overall this is an impressive feat by any measure. There is some room for the band to ensure that every song stands distinct from its neighbours, but that problem diminishes (largely, but not entirely) with frequent listens. A very fine album, in any event. <T. Bengtson> -8-

DRAWN AND QUARTERED Return of the Black Death (Moribund Records)

This band has been compared to Immolation, Morbid Angel and other classic “old school” early-1990s death metal bands and I’ve been trying to get myself to appreciate Return of the Black Death. I can’t. With the pedigree the band’s earning, what I’m saying might amount to death metal heresy (which would be, what, renouncing Satan? Sorry, bad gallows humour) but I just can’t recommend this album for the life of me. It’s nice that Drawn and Quartered are holding themselves to a high standard, but I’m just not thrilled with trying to recreate the past as Drawn and Quartered are committing themselves to doing on the album. Return of the Black Death isn’t a badly constructed album and I can see why people are into the band.

Still, Return of the Black Death seems to be treading along the same well-trod death metal path, like riding the teacups at Disneyland or something. It feels too familiar—yes, there’s the brutality and crushing riffs, the blastbeats, et al., but I’m not satisfied with just those elements. There’s no bloody urgency to Return of the Black Death and I can’t understand the hype this band is getting. I give Return of the Black Death its due propers, but Drawn and Quartered sound like a pick-and-mix of elements to me and I’m not satisfied with that. So they sound like Immolation—so what? Can’t they sound like themselves instead? Is that too much to ask? <C. Archer> -4-

EMANUEL Soundtrack to a Headrush (Vagrant)

New, young bands can be hit or miss. With talent still developing, some first releases suffer from a lack of focus. Other first releases, such as Emanuel’s Soundtrack to a Headrush, benefit from...a lack of focus. Emanuel seem to have paid attention to all the sounds circulating in the underground these days, including those dual sing/scream vocals that seem to be all the rage right now. But these guys are not just a copy band. Their chief influence comes not from punk but from pure, aggressive, dirty rock ’n’ roll like Bionic and The Bars. Then they mix in infectious pop/punk choruses that ooze more syrupy sugar than a candy factory and hold it all together with bridges and parts that hearken back to mid-’90s modern rock. Thanks to the rock ’n’ roll foundation, this disc doesn’t lose itself in radiofriendly trappings; instead it kicks you in the gut, apologizes with a couple kind words, and then kicks you in the gut again.

Soundtrack to a Headrush is maybe the only time it will ever feel this good to be a punching bag. <P. Silbiger> -9-

EXTOL The Blueprint Dives (Century Media)

No doubt there are people out there who’ve heard this record and feel that the band has completely changed their sound/ style since their previous album Synergy. I was one of those people who slammed this album when I first heard it because, yeah, the band had brought in a lot more melodic parts and clean vocals, kind of simplifying their well-known eclectic meshing of styles (death/black/hardcore). I was like, “What happened?” Then came the opportunity to interview singer/ guitarist Peter Espevoll about the album and find out just how things took shape. Things became a little clearer for me and the album (as he explained about his band’s need to explore new territory) began getting regular spins. Then I saw the band while in Camden, England opening for God Forbid. Since then I cannot get enough of this album. I love the fact they took a chance with this album (seeing as they recruited two new guitarists) and are able to pull it off live. It does make an impact, especially first single “Pearl” (amazing!), “Gloriana,” “Lost In Dismay” and “Soul Deprived.” Most of the times I’m pretty spot on with my first time impressions but I’m glad I gave this a second go because I would have missed out on one of the best records of 2005. It’ll be on my list for sure. <A. Bromley> -9-

FLOTSAM & JETSAM Dreams of Death (Crash)

Many will tell you Arizona’s Flotsam & Jetsam’s claim to fame is that Jason Newsted was plucked from the band following the release of their 1986 classic Doomsday for the Deceiver by Metallica in order to fill the bass slot left empty by the death of Cliff Burton. Others will say they’re just a great thrash metal band, always evolving, always doing what they want to do.

The fact is that the quintet are still around after more than 20 years and that is a good thing—despite having put out 2001’s My God, an album Tate refers to as “My God It’s Terrible.” The band’s much-anticipated return to the scene after a four-year hiatus comes in the form of Dreams of Death (their debut for Crash Music!), an album that dabbles a bit in each era of the band, producing for the most part a thrash metal extravaganza that is fused together by F&J’s trademark metallic stop, razorsharp riffs and off-kilter heavy harmonies. Choice cuts here are heavy opener “Straight To Hell,” “Parasychotic” and “Bathing In Red.” This may not be a comeback record on par with Cuatro, but Dreams of Death showcases a band that still has the chops to deliver something special and all their own to us metalheads. <A. Bromley> -7.5-

FROST Extreme Loneliness Fragments (Paragon)

Not to be confused with the myriad other bands known as Frost, this Hungarian troupe plays a typical form of symphonic black metal akin to early (For All Tid and Stormblast era) Dimmu Borgir. While the band offers nothing of particular remark, to its credit the music is tastefully written barring a few humorous exceptions. The symphonic elements are strategically inserted in order to build an ominious/imperious atmosphere, never robbing the guitars their rough-edged melody nor the vocals their imposing snarl. Frost hits upon some fairly interesting moments on the frenzied fourth track, “Storm Above the Carpathians,” where the most interesting and involved keyboard work is combined with a frenzied guitar attack and a willingness to ease into an ominous mid-paced passage in order to build tension. Unfortunately, the sharply phrased vocal caterwaul of the fifth track sounds quite ridiculous when juxtaposed to the almost spaced-out prog of the guitar line heard early in the song. Even when the approach shifts to a more typical black metal style later in the track, the vocal lines still suffer a certain maladroitness that comes across as pure absurdity. Other tracks recall the more sophisticated symphonics of Tartaros, while the almost stark piano accompaniment of “Heathen Lament” crafts what could have been a truly remarkable moment had it been properly fleshed out and the vocals delivered in a more complementary fashion. In addition to the nine tracks that comprise Extreme Loneliness Fragments (which was originally released in 2001 on Stygian Shadows Productions and recently reissued by Paragon Records), no less than five bonus tracks are here for the taking, although the only number worth your time is “The Calling,” a track from the Voices from Beyond the Gates EP (2004). Following a similar path as Extreme Loneliness Fragments, “The Calling” mixes up the vocal approach a little bit more (although the end result is not particularly good) and is seemingly less symphonic, although this could be obscured by the poor production values.

An acceptable album for the less-discriminating fans of symphonic black metal, but it offers nothing of particular interest to distinguish it from the crowd. <T. Bengtson> -4-

FUNERARY CALL Beckoning at the Black (Fossil Dungeon)

Ominous and foreboding are two words that could summarize this whole disc, if feeling succinctly inclined. Subtle vocals echo out from the shadows whilst cascading and shuddering cinders are overwhelmed by blistering bombasticism. Funerary Call’s musical assemblage continues to strengthen over the years with effective spine tingling, electro-shocking sample/ synth/militaristic percussion. All sorts of chthonic sounds suitable for scaring kids on Samhain or for working magickal rites, for necromantic adventures, or for performing an autopsy on the witching hour. Sometimes I’m drawn towards the comparison of Celtic Frost’s “Danse Macabre” as a sample source and set at a much slower tempo. It all sounds as if it were recorded

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in a desolate environment, upon windswept moors, as if trying to summon the spirits of those disposed by Ian Brady and Myra Hindley. Anyone familiar with Cold Meat Industry will find similarities with some of the older bands on the label. My only quibble is that none of the six songs is nearly long enough to fully submerse oneself in. <Bane> -7-

GIZMACHI The Imbuing (Big Orange Clown/Sanctuary)

The debut for New York’s Gizmachi is on The Clown (or #6) from Slipknot’s label Big Orange Clown Records (an imprint of Sanctuary) and it doesn’t take long to pick up on certain similarities: the angst-ridden screams, the subtle change in vocal styles, the stop and start of the heavy-set music. The Imbuing has it all. To be fair, this is not a carbon copy of Slipknot—it seems that would be quite the task—but rather a more rockorientated version of Slipknot to some degree, and seeing as The Clown (a.k.a. Shawn Crahan) produced the album, it all makes sense now. I’m not gonna deny there are some moments here (i.e. “Burn” and “People Show”) but having heard this album and seen them live at the New England Metal and Hardcore Fest this year, I think Gizmachi needs a bit more work before they will impress me. <A. Bromley> -4-

GRAVE FLOWERS Incarcerated Sorrows (Firebox)

There are a lot of albums out there that no matter how hard you try you just can’t get into it. Swedish duo Grave Flowers have just released Incarcerated Sorrows, an album that, well, has me wondering how I should feel about the album. On one end I love the soulful vocals and the dark/doomy atmosphere that emanates from the album, but then there is this odd guitar sound and song structure that kind of rubs me the wrong way. Perhaps it’s the melancholy of the songs and how it is presented? At any rate, this is an album that does showcase some definite aspects of creativity (i.e. “Sleep Demons Sleep” and “At Night”), but for the most part one that leaves me feeling uninterested as it plays along. <A. Bromley> -4-

GZR Ohmwork (Sanctuary)

Evidently, the rigors of performing the same tired (er, make that “classic”) set list with Black Sabbath year-in, year-out on the Ozzfest is a truly draining experience. It is the only possible explanation as to why Geezer Butler’s latest solo album—the first since 1997’s Black Science—is so creatively barren.

Sounding like it was thrown together on a whim, Ohmwork features the same team as heard on Black Science, but it lacks the songwriting and catchiness that made the latter so

REVIEWS

memorable. Vocalist Clark Brown, who once had a unique and captivating singing voice, has taken to shouting/screaming like a tone-deaf Devin Townsend mixed up with a little rap that sounds like he has drawn much of the inspiration for his performance from the most uninspired Machine Head songs.

The vocal harmonies that do creep into his delivery are usually fleeting and forgettable, such as his attempt to sound like the whiny singer from Slipknot on “Aural Sects.” The compositions are unremarkably straightforward at best, and haphazard riff conglomerations at worst, the latter epitomized on the unfocused and utterly pointless “Pseudocide,” which also features some unbelievably annoying female backing vocals. This contemptible and lamentable concoction of rap-rock and crap-riff hits the unflushed toilet hard with “Pull the Strings,” an utterly unlistenable track whose only redeeming quality is that it is not quite as bad as the whiny self-absorption of the obligatory ballad, “Alone.” By this point, most listeners will be screaming, “Make it stop! Make it stop!” at the top of their lungs while desperately plugging their ears with anything likely to block the sound. But the “magic” continues for another two tracks, the Slipknot-for-crackheads “Dogs of Whore” and “Don’t You Know,” a slightly moody nu-metal track that is welcome only for the fact that it marks the end of this pathetic album. Make it stop! <T. Bengtson> -1-

HATE ETERNAL I, Monarch (Earache)

One listen to Hate Eternal’s third opus—the monster I, Monarch—and it’s obvious that Erik Rutan is making his way to the throne of death metal royalty. To many, Rutan’s band (backed by powerhouse drummer Derek Roddy and bassist Randy Piro) have already pretty much claimed that throne, but with this album the deal is done. Bombastic, brutal and truly pummeling from the get-go, listeners will be trampled by such tracks as “Two Demons,” “The Plague of Humanity” and “It Is Our Will.” And the guitar solo on “To Know Our Enemies”? Wow! Incredible! Rutan also mixed and produced the album as well, so his blood, sweat and tears are all over this album and its superior results. He should be proud of the new album ’cause alongside Nile’s Annihilation of the Wicked both are pretty much the only two death metal albums you’ll need to hear/buy this year. <A. Bromley> -8.5-

HELL MILITIA Canonisation of the Foul Spirit (Total Holocaust Records)

This band should be called Hype Militia as I’ve been hearing nothing but raving madness about/over this band since their demo was sold out. The only song I’ve heard by them came on a long out-of-print compilation 7-inch that did not really

warrant much in terms of attention. The first song sounds a bit like “Buried by Time and Dust” with a meatier bass.

Something about the sound here has no resonance to it, like when a skull is struck with a blunt object again and again.

The vocals are very reminiscent of Attila’s on De Mysteriis in the way the words just ooze out of the vehicle. As a matter of fact, I can’t help but think Mayhem all over the place. Take De Mysteriis minus the arpeggios and mix it with some of the primitiveness/more death metal structures of Deathcrush and add a dose of a stricter DM band and you may get some vague impression of the music here. “Psalm VIII—Goathrone” has more of a grindcore sound to it, but that is the exception from the other psalms. The major drawback here is the lack of lyrics.

The text on the back of the slipcase is highly provocative and philosophical and my curiosity is piqued as to how this chain of logic can be captured in a song called “Black Fucking Cancer” or “Burning Human Pigs” or “Black Arts of Crime.” Did it live up to its expectations? Decide for yourself. <Bane> -7.5-

HÈTTEN DÈS Ace of Spades (Drunkabilly)

I’m not going to mince words here. Even though this was at the top of my top five list last issue, I was taking the piss with said top five. There are two covers of Motörhead’s “Ace of Spades” on this CD-single, and on first listen I thought the single was terrible. It’s hard to take a band seriously when they cover this song in a rockabilly fashion, but damned if this isn’t the best cover version of the song I’ve heard in a while. Compared to the original, Hètten Dès seems like a joke band—listeners will basically hear a drawl on top of a relaxed-sounding honkytonk backing band, exactly what you’d expect if a country band tried to go “metal”—but Ace of Spades is still great in its own way. No one’s trying to sound like Lemmy or recreate standards, and god knows some death metal band isn’t trying to make the song FASTER! or MORE BRUTAL! Hètten Dès seem to have remembered what most bands that try to cover “Ace of Spades” forget: the song only retains its classic status when the backing band sounds like the prelude to having your ass kicked. I’m sorry for being so coarse, but there are only so many bands that have the sound that Motörhead typified, and it’s nice to know Hètten Dès went for their own interpretation using the sound that they know so well. It isn’t that much of a translation from Motörhead to so-called “bar band,” but Hètten Dès’s “Ace of Spades” does the bar band treatment right.

Strangely enough, this came from a Belgian label. It’s astounding how little borders matter these days, isn’t it? <C. Archer> -2- or -8- ( it varies)

IMMOLATION Harnessing Ruin (Olympic/Century Media)

Despite the claims of the naysayers and otherwise ignorant, Immolation has never been content to simply write the same album ad nauseum. The band has a distinctive style but it has done a commendable job of exploring every nuance, nook and cranny of that sound over its 17-year existence. Harnessing Ruin is the latest chapter in this journey and it also stands as the most ambitious and exploratory album yet conceived by Immolation. Harnessing Ruin is, for lack of better description, a revising of the apocalypse in the form of the epic; destruction without conquest or even protagonist, the epic glories ultimate devastation as ultimate victory. Lyrics and music converge on this theme, crafting an atmosphere akin to the tyrant proudly surveying the wasteland of destruction and terror that he calls his kingdom. This album is slower in pacing than other Immolation albums, with the guitar riffs delivered ominously and inexorably, tense disharmonies welded into a mangled sonic prophecy. Unfortunately, where the great musical leap of previous album Unholy Cult seemed perfectly realized in execution, Harnessing Ruin stumbles. First, the production is rather muddy, which furnishes mixed results. On the positive side, it accentuates the grim, suffocating atmosphere of the overarching concept. On the negative side, the typically convoluted guitar riffs that have been the hallmark of Immolation lose some of their gut-wrenching tautness owing to absence of sonic dynamics. The drum sound is also weaker than would be expected, which dulls the impact of the timing twists that Immolation has exploited with great success on past albums. The second problem with Harnessing Ruin occurs in the songwriting department. Unlike Unholy Cult, which placed heavy stress on ensuring that all ideas were sewn together in a logical fashion, Harnessing Ruin too often finds its component passages arranged in stilted, uncomfortable patterns. As a result, Immolation reverts to that old tendency (as heard on its first few albums) to rely on the quality of riff to save the song rather than ensuring that the quality song structure is in place to envelope and gird the riffs. Even this occasionally works in the band’s favour, creating a disjointed, almost chaotic (anti)sensibility that adds to the apocalyptic concept. While I can and do appreciate the direction in which Immolation is heading, as well as the impressive quantity of awesome riffs, Harnessing Ruin is a flawed album that only hints at the supreme conquest that could have been achieved. <T. Bengtson> -6-

INACTIVE MESSIAH s/t (Black Lotus)

This Greek band showed so much promise with the strong opener “T.C.D.D.” but quickly does an about face with the generic death metal outpouring on “Give Me All.” So, so boring. And don’t even get me started on the annoying “Shut the Fuck Up.” Throw in the nu-metallic nuances throughout and Inactive Messiah can’t see to find a sound/style to call their own, rather taking the safe route and providing us (the average listener) with music that we’ve heard done much better. Black Lotus has put out some good stuff in the last little while—The Duskfall, The Bereaved and Dark Nova. What happened here? <A. Bromley> -3-

INQUISITION Magnificent Glorification of Lucifer (No Colours)

With Inquisition it is all in the vocals. The infernal chants are the most effectively gurgled/spewed/channeled invocations in, quite possibly, all of black metal—completely and utterly unique and demonic. Whether they echo the bellows of hell or mock the christian worms or drool acerbic rites of profanity, they are without comparison. The first song starts out blisteringly enough and one notices that the drums sound kind of fucked up, almost like they were “hot” in the mix. I can’t really say this destroys the mood of the song or the record in general; rather it enhances the demonic, unstable nature of the breath that this exudes, effectively stupefying the victim (listener).

Inquisition hails from Washington and sounds like nothing else coming from the area. They have developed a sound of their own, maybe reminiscent of some older U.S. acts, but there is some element that creates the feeling that one is confined within a humid, subterranean grotto and that incense is thick enough to devour all concepts of rationality. The distraught shades come skirling forth again, particularly on “Under the Black Inverted Pentragram” with that trademark guitar sound evoked by Dagon. I can’t say that this disc sounds very distinct from the last full length, but that is much more preferable compared to the ever eclectic Norsemen who seem to get bored with their own sounds after six months. Inquisition, on the other hand, has slowly, insidiously been fomenting a caustic chant of infernality that deserves much greater recognition that it gets. The oddity on this disc is in “Impaled by the Cryptic Horns of Baphomet,” which has a very odd sample that sounds like it was accidentally spliced in from another (religious) album. The last track is partially hidden and should fuck with most expectations…perfect. <Bane> -8.5-

ISOLE Forevermore (I Hate Records)

The power of doom metal has always been something special to those who listen to metal music. While it has been an integral part of metal since the early days of Black Sabbath, it takes a certain sense of control and emotion to bring it to the forefront and really shine. A controlled attribute if you will, but something so deep and passionate when accurately plugged

into. Sweden’s Isole have managed to tap into a true epic doom metal feel with Forevermore, reminiscent at times of early Candlemass and Solitude Aeturnus. You can even hear some of the rugged tones of Bathory amongst their explorations as well, but it’s the epic doom feel that takes the reins here. The harmonies are haunting amongst the sorrowful flow of Isole’s music, most notably on “Age of Darkness” and the title track.

Forevermore is a brilliant journey to sink oneself into, and that’s why I can see myself throwing it on for more than one occasion this year. <A. Bromley> -8-

KOPP, HERMANN Necronology (Red Stream)

Sounds from the man who dreamt up the Tödenking and Necromantik films and the best release to come from Red Stream in a while, in my opinion. Supposedly all the sounds were created with the gizmo pictured on the booklet interior, but why the picture stressing the violin? Anyway, a violin seems to be prominent on this disc, which can be one of the most hauntingly enchanting instruments ever crafted. The songs tend to have an airiness to them, a struggled breathing, asthmatic rhythm. Or perhaps one could envision a funeral home that also had a band that performed music in the day care facility. It’s almost grotesquely morbid, almost primitively folkish, somewhat nursery rhyme-like minus the lyrics. It all lumbers in wearied steps across the planes… <Bane> -8-

KRIEGSMASCHINE A Thousand Voices (Goatowarex)

This LP contains nine songs, including one Countess cover that should convey leagues to those who are familiar with that band. The CD version was issued by Blureinhet, if anyone cares. The CD version is actually only a MCD with only four songs. Goatowarex calls these other five bonus songs, if you want to consider a demo from 2003 bonus songs. More bonus than not… Blureinhet calls KM “Old School Satanic Black Terror.” I would seriously debate the “old school” part of that and could accept the other three words not set aside one another. Kreigsmaschine hails from Poland and has a definitively raw sound and a style that is more in the vein of a crust/ grindcore/hardcore band that has converted to black metal over the past few years. The newer material is a vast improvement over the demo, mostly due to the recording quality and because the vocals are fucking throat-shredding greatness and are not totally lost in the mix. The diabolical laughter that echoes through so many tracks is a feature I greatly admire, so they win a few points there. Every once in a while the riffs are totally bouncy and upbeat (read “happy” if it weren’t for the singer). Yeah, most of these slower passages have drums that are way too peppy. On the b-side (Devotee) the vocals get totally lost in the maelstrom of metal for the most part and the music is lo-fi extraordinaire. Despite my dislike for the music, this album does have some Satanic appeal in terms of some of the lyrics, the presentation which looks strongly influenced

by E./Watain and the way the lyrics are set up: being in verse form à la the Bible. Some of the best lyrics: “Break the sigils on poisonous vials, set our little friends free…” <Bane> -5-

LAST DAYS OF HUMANITY In Advanced Haemorrhaging Conditions (Bones Brigade)

Wow, what a ripoff. This is my first exposure to Last Days’ music and I obviously entered their world through the wrong end of their discography. I’m not surprised—Last Days of Humanity have gone through wholesale band changes, and even to a LDoH newbie like me it seems like the band’s mailing it in. I’m not trying to be presumptuous here—this is a sevenand-a-half minute disc and at least three minutes are wasted by film samples and the other four minutes are wasted by bogstandard goregrind with a vocalist going “BLEEORRRRRRGH” the whole time and what sounds like the most triggered drums I’ve heard in a while. For that, the album will sell for at least the usual going price for EP-length albums despite the fact that the band can’t even deliver five minutes of actual music on an eight-minute CD. I’d love to blame Bones Brigade for putting this out, and the label is at fault for going ahead with this release—still, LDoH thought this was worthy of committing to aluminum and plastic. I’m not jumping on an anti-LDoH bandwagon here, but this is terrible value for money and putting out a sub-ten-minute CD in the age of the DVD is backwards business sense. Things like this help kill bands. Considering LDoH have decided to disband, maybe it’s just as well to let the band run their course like this. <C. Archer> -2-

LEAVES’ EYES Vinland Saga (Napalm)

What can I say? Leaves’ Eyes continue to blow me away with their music. After 2004’s surprising, yet amazing release Lovelorn (I was never a Theatre of Tragedy fan, hence the surprise), Liv Kristine and co. return with Vinland Saga, a dreamy and enchanting continuation of Lovelorn. Much fuller in production and more grandiose in many ways (such as the title track and “Twilight Sun”), Vinland Saga is a solid listen from start to finish thanks to the stellar vocals of Liv and the superb musicianship of her band—no filler or epic songs that go astray. I think it’s safe to say that Liv has tapped into something very heartfelt and warm with Leaves’ Eyes, a nurturing realm of safety, caressing emotions and love that is as powerful on the tenth listen as it was the first. <A. Bromley> -8.5-

LIGHT THIS CITY Remains of This Day (Prosthetic)

For any band starting up in the Bay Area metal scene, it is like stepping into the spotlight, entering a world-renowned milieu that saw the rise of Metallica, Exodus, and Testament and trying to get noticed beneath its enormous shadow. Light This City is not just your average metalcore band; their influences from this particular scene run deep into their sound and style, adding a flair of uniqueness and sharpened edge to the bellowing growls that singer Laura Nichols delivers with such conviction.

Check out tracks like “Obituary,” “The Hunt” and “Fractured by the Fall” for proof of that. I can see some less-open-minded metalheads knocking this band for their metalcore sound, but for those who give Light This City a chance, you’ll be happy to have witnessed the spark in their music. <A. Bromley> -7-

METSATÖLL Hiiekoda (Nailboard)

While Pagan folklore metal may not be my strongest forte, the genre has always interested me from time to time as new bands have cropped up over the years—many of them gracing the pages of U! thanks to other writers’ interest. Haling from Estonia, Metsatöll play a very spirited romp through folk-tinged numbers and a rumbling bard-like tales akin to Turisas and Finntroll at times. The use of various homeland instruments and vocal chants add a unique quality to their frequent hard metallic drives, most notably on tracks like “Rauavanne,” “Söjahunt” and the title track. Not something I’d put on every week, but an album I’ll indeed go back to from time to time and digest the fun ’n’ diverse nature of Hiiekoda. <A. Bromley> -6-

MISERY Production Through Destruction (CAH)

Piss-poor production, belligerent vocals and dirty guitar riffs all coated in a nasty crust sound. It could only mean one thing: Misery. Classic crust band Misery gets the respect and support by the good folks of Crimes Against Humanity with the re-release of their out-of-print album Production Through Destruction. No flashy liner notes, no new pictures or anecdotes, just the simple set of lyrics, artwork and full-on attitude. And is there no heavier song than the gem “Born, Fed…Slaughtered”? For those in the know, you’ll be scooping this up for sure (right?) and for those not familiar with Misery it’s time to investigate. You might want to also check out bands like Amebix, Discharge and ENT while you’re at it. <A. Bromley> -8-

MÜTIILATION Rattenkönig (Ordealis)

Despite some of the criticism that many closet critics are brandishing concerning this CD I’m still taken by its negative stain.

Eight songs with some atrocious tray card art. Otherwise this picks up where the last one last left us: cold, craven, and cut up. The songs themselves are similar, but with some better guitar riffs, better compositions, more fucked-up vocals—treated and corroded with sulfuric acid—along with a lot of panning (I think it’s called when the vocals travel from one speaker to another). With headphones this can be quite trance-inducing, or annoying, depending on your mood. Meyhna’ch takes complete license with his vocals this time—swallowing the microphone or casting his anguish out from 20 feet away. The guitar sound is the same utterly fucked fuzzed-out wall of moss that became the signature sound of the band long ago. This is the type of record that is best left unscrutinized in many ways, for one begins to hear the disturbed and excessive cymbals and the warped way in which the sound on the drums versus cymbals is produced. Warped and demented in a truly unique way. I’d recommend it more so than the last one and think it would be as good a place as any for a neophyte to begin the descent. <Bane> -7-

NORMA JEAN O God, The Aftermath (Solid State)

Norma Jean, a Douglasville, GA five-piece, has built a growing fan-base playing hardcore/metal/noise on the fairly extreme, adventurous end of the spectrum. With numerous time changes, erratic guitar fills and a herky-jerky delivery, their sound often inspires comparison to Dillinger Escape Plan. What they’ve done with their second album under the name Norma Jean (they earlier released an EP and a full-length under the band name Luti-Kriss) is to infuse their sound with greater variety, more dynamics, and an occasional nod to Pantera-style rock/metal. The result is an album played by amazing musicians that is quite digestible. “Bayonetwork” and “Liarsenic,” two of the album’s standout tracks, include a touch of singing here and there, which help distinguish these tracks from the potentially homogenous flood of noise this genre of music often creates. “Disconnectktie,” a song that clocks in at just over ten minutes, also helps give the listener a break from the constant barrage of battering tempos, with a slower, sludgier delivery. O God, The Aftermath is a perfectly wrought album for music in this earspace, and with this effort, Norma Jean deserve to be considered among the top of the pack. <P. Silbiger> -9-

NOVACT Tales from the Soul (To Those Who Understand)

(Sensory) This Dutch band operates within parameters laid out by Evergrey, preferring their prog metal alternately chunky and lush, with deadly earnest vocals railing against injustice, war, and disease, all neatly parceled into five- or six-minute songs.

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Though the style is nothing original, Tales from the Soul is undeniably professionally produced and presented. I get a sense that this young band is still finding their way. Depending on what other musical directions they pursue or incorporate into their present sound, and depending on which of the genre’s major acts lose their way, NovAct have definite A-list potential. Repeated listens help their cause, as some memorable melodies emerge from the well-trod sonic landscape, and hints of Anathema’s supreme glory pop up at various points—especially on the hard-driving highlight “Eternal Life,” written in remembrance of Jeff Buckley. For now, NovAct are a band to keep tabs on, and recommended to those who can’t get enough classy, elegant metal in their lives. <R. Hughes> -6-

OCTAVIA SPERATI Winter Enclosure (Candlelight)

The deceptively sweet vocal melodies spun through Octavia’s full-length debut, Winter Enclosure, only vaguely disguise the more brooding atmosphere that lies underneath, ever threatening to erupt. Despite suggestions of chill and claustrophobia in the name of the album, or in song titles like “Icebound,” Winter Enclosure is unfettered and rife with aural colour. Goth and doom both battle for ascendancy here, but it’s a productive struggle, enhancing the depth of Octavia’s sound rather than diluting the band’s focus. Comparisons to Lacuna Coil, Madder Mortem, or any number of other female-fronted bands are inevitable. So are comments on the (now nearly) all-female lineup—as I’m proving just by pointing this out. But musically Octavia make gender irrelevant, and their first album is as potent as it is spellbinding. <L. Wiebe Taylor> -8-

OCTOBER 31 No Survivors (Thrash Corner)

Gotta hand it to King Fowley and his love of heavy metal—there is no one like him! After a health scare that almost dethroned him (literally) Fowley and October 31 are back with one of their most ambitious and high-rolling heavy metal records in their catalog. The aggressive one-two punch of Fowley’s bellowing metal cries and the soaring riffs hit fast and hard. The fists will be pumping high and mighty no doubt during such killer songs like “Rivet Rat,” “Back Alley Murders” and “Powerhouse.” There are a lot of bands worldwide playing classic heavy metal and October 31 are going to ride this heavy metal crusade to their very end. Their pledge to avoid trends continues. Long live October 31! <A. Bromley> -9-

OFERMOD Mystérion Tés Anomias (Norma Evangelium Diaboli)

This is “Orthodox Death Metal.” Religious Death Metal. Brutality wrought in musical form, caustic and acerbic, smiting all the cowards in its path, bearing the mark of the watery serpent.

Despite the fact that this consists of only four songs—two previously available only on their utterly occult 7-inch—matters not. The two old songs still have a potency and virulence that eclipses more than 95 per cent of what passes as black metal today (for that is what the band refers to these two old songs as), even though the material originally surfaced back in ’98.

Those songs will now gain some of the true recognition they deserve, as this band may be the most influential to what has come to be known as religious DM—due to the fanaticism and intolerance of Belfagor, now Michayah. These new workings are striking examples of the craft—slow, punctuated, methodical with prominent bass and decipherable vocals, which is a very important aspect of the band’s delivery. Ofermod calls their 7-inch material “Orthodox Black Metal” and the newer songs “Orthodox Death Metal.” I would hardly classify these songs as anything remotely resembling the death metal that I am familiar with, but the important word here is “death”—for this band hails death in all its guises. Ofermod has become a five piece in recent months, increasing the scope and reach of their machinations. Be warned, for this is the future that needs to be delivered to the throngs of play actors. This disc will attest to the impotency of most of the rest of your music collection. One need not be overly bent on the orthodox slant to appreciate the capacity and vehemence built into these four songs. This is limitlessness… <Bane> -9.9-

OPEN HAND You and Me (Trustkill)

Straight out of the Queens of the Stone Age songbook comes Open Hand’s second release, You and Me. It’s a pretty dreary experience, with a solid majority of the 14 songs plodding along at a relaxed tempo while Justin Isham’s Shannon Hoon-ish high-pitched vocals really get under the skin by about track ten. Also irritating are the ever-present Josh-Homme-copy guitar fills. A couple of the up-tempo songs such as “Pure Concentrated Evil” and “Tough Guy” do excite, but they’re overshadowed by the melancholic feel of the entire piece.

Just like The Dream, the band’s debut release, the best thing going for these guys is the adventurous die-cut CD sleeve. <P. Silbiger> -4-

PRESTO BALLET Peace Among the Ruins (InsideOut Music)

First Russell Allen kicks out a monster bluesy-rock album (à la Deep Purple/Badlands) and now Metal Church guitarist Kurdt Vanderhoof joins him with a new project titled Presto Ballet. The debut, Peace Among the Ruins, is a great Hammond organ-led journey of ’70s rock, both epic in scale and mesmerizing in sound and delivery. The sounds of Yes, Styx and Deep Purple are fused tightly into the concoctions that Vanderhoof

REVIEWS

has assembled here, truly capturing the spirit of that era thanks to the analog production of the album. Choice cuts: “Find the Time,” “The Fringes” and the title track. Thanks to Allen’s Atomic Soul and Presto Ballet’s debut (both of which are getting continuous plays this month) I’m back combing through my vinyl collection for older albums by Yes, Deep Purple and Scorpions—and that’s a good thing. Superb album! <A. Bromley> -8-

PUNGENT STENCH Ampeauty (Nuclear Blast)

This is my first go at Pungent Stench, which may make me seem like (or you deem me) quite the metal newbie even after reviewing in some capacity for six years, but even I know Pungent Stench have come out with yet another of their groaner titles—this one’s not on the level of Been Caught Buttering, but what is? For those not in the know, the style of music Ampeauty displays is slow death metal with stoner overtones at times. Right away I know Pungent Stench are an acquired taste, considering how much bigger, faster, more brutal and more blatant the death metal of today is. Still, there’s something appealing about Ampeauty and it’s not the cover (which is a rather dull computer composition by the looks of it). Pungent Stench continue with their classic offensive streak and sense of gallows humour on Ampeauty while playing interesting death metal, not a bad feat considering how they remain on the slow end of things. Personally, while the stoner-like sound Pungent Stench play won’t appeal to certain people they manage to come out with some interesting riffs, and musically this is involving slow-paced death metal, which is honestly hard to pull off. Maybe the time for Pungent Stench has been passed by musically, but to these ears they’re still irrelevantly relevant and they’re still one of the premier bands upholding Nuclear Blast’s reputation as a death metal label. Pungent Stench know who they are. They’ll be around for another 10 to 20 years yet. Don’t ask me if that’s a good or bad thing. Maybe it’s both. <C. Archer> -7-

QUELL One Man’s Struggle with the English Language (Goodfellow)

It’s an ugly sound, but somebody’s gotta make it. Or, at least, that’s what Quell would have you believe. In fact, you can reach over and hit the ol’ “stop” button at any point during the album and be done with it. And most probably will. And few would probably blame you, including the members of Quell who are, I am sure, upstanding and polite young chaps perfectly aware that the dense sonic vomit that they churn out is a far cry from elevator music. Unless the elevator is in freefall after having its cables cut. And the zero gravity has brought your nose dangerously close to a fellow with dangerously bad body odour, such that your last thought before becoming splat pancake is, “Boy, does that dude smell.” This is not a particularly easy album to enjoy and it does not offer rewards commensurate with the time and energy spent delving into its intricacies. That said, there are a few nuggets of gold in them thar hills. At the heart of Quell is two diverging tendencies which, when juxtaposed, constitute the central dynamic of the band’s sound. On the one hand, we have explosive noisecore characterized by nutso fretboard runs and sudden, psychotic changes in tempo (think The Dillinger Escape Plan’s Calculating Infinity mixed with Converge on a particularly plain day). On the other hand, we have a somewhat progressive and even mellow tendency, wherein Quell explores its quieter side and the audience can take a breather from the pandemonium. While this approach does assume a unique configuration on “Purge and Consolidate,” with the proggy tangent cleverly intermingling with the dominant noisecore, in general the songwriting approach needs a bit more conceptual work in order to better fuse these tendencies. The vocals are sickened snarls that sound as if the singer has just finished a ten-hour session of reverse peristalsis, but they do little more than lash out blindly and fail to add much to the music. In fact, this is also a fault of the music. Quite simply, it’s not all that interesting.

The noisecore parts lack any great dynamics and, despite the frenzy with which the band switches from one gear to the next, its bag of tricks is limited and rather tedious. Unlike The Dillinger Escape Plan’s Calculating Infinity, which boggled the mind before sending it into a state of numbness, Quell’s music offers no such hypercomplex disconcertation; the music simply floats in an enraged stasis like a violently angry prisoner who is placed in shackles—the rage is being expressed but it’s simply not producing anything of any great meaning. The only thing going for the band is its integration of spacey prog passages into its music which, while not amazing by any stretch, at least offers a contrasting agent that adds dynamics to the band’s sound. Sure, it’s like mounting the rear spoiler of an automobile on a dump truck in a vain attempt to improve aerodynamics, but at least it’s something. <T. Bengtson> -3-

SAPROGENIC The Wet Sound of Flesh on Concrete (Deepsend)

This is the re-release of a 2002 album that came out on Macabre Mementos before the band had problems with that label. Deepsend was wise enough to pick this up for North American distribution, though not wise enough to retain the band’s services. Hopefully Saprogenic will make more of a name for themselves despite the band’s early fascination with bodily fluids (not that I’m squeamish; I just hate schtick). Brutal death is the name of the game on The Wet Sound of Flesh on Concrete, and Saprogenic delivers what it promises. There is

no flashy technicality to The Wet Sound of Flesh on Concrete, it being as clean a cut of brutal death as one gets, but there are some memorable riffs here and the skills on display are amazing for such a young band. Listening to the CD, some people wouldn’t be able to guess that the band formed in 2001—such is the quality level on The Wet Sound of Flesh on Concrete. There’s nothing on here that’s going to put the band’s lyrical quality above the standard brutal death quota, unfortunately—we’re not talking about that other Macabre Mementos signee Wormed, now—but Saprogenic are young and it’s easy to excuse the lyrics when the music is this good.

Lyrics are the red-headed stepchild with regards to the band’s repertoire anyway, given how guttural Jeremy Swanson’s vocals get. Saprogenic have the tools to become a major player in brutal death metal, and Deepsend should have kept the band on its roster. As it stands now, the band has toddled off to Forever Underground, which leads me to think Deepsend lost out on an opportunity here. Bands this good at what they do at a young stage in their careers don’t come around every day. <C. Archer> -8-

SCOTT MOSHER Inferno (The Ambient Mind)

I’ll be honest. I’ve neglected this record for a while now— months on end, to be exact—and I don’t really know why.

Maybe the name turned me off? Whatever the reason, I never got around to listening to it, no matter how many times Scott Mosher dropped me an e-mail re: a review, coverage, et cetera.

Eventually I got around to listening to his work for a review this issue, and boy do I wish I had heard this a few months back. Inferno is a wonderfully sculpted world that Mosher has created, a world built on progressive rock, spacey-metallic sections, lush soundscapes and intelligent lyrics. While the instrumental passages (lots of great keyboard and guitar work) are dynamic on many levels, vocalist Todd Corsa also adds his own dimension to the music (shades of Geddy Lee and Geoff Tate are apparent) as well, something that has allowed what could have been just an ambient record to shine and draw the listener in. In my mind, Mosher has brought more of a Blade Runner-esque world to the forefront, yet with delicate precision stripped that world of its grimness and despair for a realm where passion and dreams take flight. This record needs to be heard as a whole to really take in his magic. Okay, Mosher, when does the next album surface? I’m on board and ready to go! <A. Bromley> -8-

SHIVERDOWN End Themes (Skyscraper)

Having seen the band a few times live I was quite excited to hear the Montreal hardcore/metal act’s album End Themes.

The album is a barrage of music styles all blended into one—some hardcore, metal and even nu-metal nuances here and there—but not enough to take charge as the dominating sound/style here, and I think that may be the faltering aspect of this record. Something seems missing here amongst the strong delivery and the ace production of J-F Dagenais, something essential to making the music stand out. I dig opener “Just When I Thought,” “Minutes” and the cover of The Smiths’ “Bigmouth Strikes Again,” and it is obvious there is potential here, but their debut doesn’t hit the mark as much as I had hoped. Bummer. <A. Bromley> -5.5-

STRENGTH IN NUMBERS The Veil (Ironbound)

Galloping rhythms, intricate guitar riffs, infectious choruses, dual vocals—all of these descriptions could easily apply to Killswitch Engage. Or they could apply, in a somewhat different way, to this New Jersey six-piece. Featuring two vocalist—one clean, the other gruff—Strength In Numbers carve their own niche in the metal oeuvre by mixing up their song structures and throwing a tonne of variety at the listener while remaining in the same general ballpark. The gruff vocals and erratic tempos actually bring another potential influence to mind: Vision of Disorder, especially the first Roadrunner album. The clean vocals can take a little getting used to because they sound more inspired by Journey or REO Speedwagon than anything current, but once they lodge into the unconscious they actually, somehow, sound really good. An amazing album that will have you scrambling to find their earlier effort, Rise and Resist. <P. Silbiger> -9-

SUMMON Fallen (Moribund)

Black thrash acts have been running at pretty much a dime a dozen for four or five years now, with very little to distinguish one from the other outside of a more or less successful take on a rather narrow formula that has not been exceeded since Nifelheim’s Servants of Darkness was unleashed back in 2000.

After a rapid succession of good releases that never really held up all that well over time, Summon has finally delivered what could be considered its magnum opus. Just as Lucifer arrived in hell by falling from heaven, so has Summon arrived and taken mastery over its domain with Fallen. Take the sound of Bathory’s Under the Sign of the Black Mark, give a fleeting nod to Slaughter Lord, and you’re off and running…running for your life. Fallen is a breathtaking and breathless slab o’ thrash that relents only for the pleasing “Loud as Hell, Fast as Fuck,” a track that would fare well alongside Witchery, Usurper and Venom’s seminal Black Metal album. Each and every Summon song is guaranteed to be a gimmick-free barrage of riffs delivered at high tempo. Of course, this rather concise

statement does no justice to the speed and intensity that the band manages to convey throughout its songs. Summon does not burden its compositions with too many riffs, but instead concentrates on delivering them with the utmost vigor, all the while accentuated by inhuman snarling vocals and ample rapid fire drumming. The important thing to note is that, somehow or another, Summon manages to hold things together where most bands fail. The formula itself is rather narrowly defined, but the band has it down to a fine art. Most importantly, Summon knows how to write a good song; a song that holds together as a song yet also stands distinct from neighbouring tracks. In a genre predicated upon speed and a rapid succession of riffs, Summon displays a level of songcraft that is generally ignored. While the tempo favors stratospheric heights, a mixture of creative drum fills, sick vocal phrasing, and memorable riffs always almost careening off of the edge of a precipice reveals a band with a clear idea of what to do and how to achieve it. Moreover, a crystal clear production draws a robust sound out of every instrument (okay, the kick drums sound a little “clicky” in places), allowing the album to maximize its impact without sacrificing its intensity.

Moribund should have sent a bucket of plaster with Fallen so that unwitting listeners can more easily cover the fist-sized holes in walls and other flimsy structures that will inevitably accompany the sound of this album. <T. Bengtson> -9-

SUPERHEAVYGOATASS 60,000 Years (Arclight)

When it comes to stoner rock/hard rock it doesn’t get any more straightforward than it does here with SUPERHEAVYGOATASS. The band rides a wave of fuzz, guitar solos and drunken good times as they storm through an assortment of rockin’ goodies.

While the band’s music is heavily dominated by the guitar work (nice solos!), there is quite a variety of memorable numbers (i.e. “Druglord” and “Built To Last”) that keep you coming back. It’s a little uneven in spots, but the energetic pace of 60,000 Years keeps this party from derailing. <A. Bromley> -6-

SUPERVILLAIN Earthquake Machine (Independent)

I loved the band’s 2003 self-titled EP when it came out—it was a rockin’ good time with elements of rock, metal and darker-edged grunge packed nice ’n’ tight. The band—featuring ex-members of Blitzspeer and Murphy’s Law—obviously had the experience going into this band so it should not come as a surprise that come the full-length release that the band is tighter, the production and playing are more focused, and the band have discarded any past nuances that didn’t fit their Supervillain mold. The raspy vocals of singer Morgan Adams

is a definite plus when meshed together with the band’s attitude and slick guitar work. And the rhythm section? Pure energy! Crank Earthquake Machine and grab some beers! <A. Bromley> -7.5-

THANATOS Undead.Unholy.Divine. (Black Lotus)

Thanatos have been around as a band since 1984, and this being their fifth album in 20 years (although Thanatos were defunct from 1992 to ’99) might do well to explain why Thanatos are as obscure as they are. Still, the band have been stalwarts of the death metal scene for that long and Undead.

Unholy.Divine.—an awkward title for an album, it must be said—is proof of their longevity. The production is modern enough to appeal to a 2005 audience, but the core of the band is distinctly 1980s-style death metal. It’s probably why Undead.Unholy.Divine. sounds a little monotonous, granted.

Having been a legitimate part of the first wave of death metal bands, Thanatos have that tangible old-school sound to them considering the experience Thanatos have logged over the past two decades. Undead.Unholy.Divine. isn’t original sounding in the least, but it’s obvious that Thanatos are their own band and aren’t trying to rip off the sounds of others. While they’re keeping a modern edge, they’re also a solid outfit keeping in touch with the fundamentals of the sound they had a small part in building. It’s all one can ask of a band, and with older bands it’s difficult to keep this sort of momentum going over the years. Thanatos are truly in touch with their past while acknowledging the present music scene mores. Undead.

Unholy.Divine. might not be a must-buy as albums go, but Thanatos are as solid an outfit as any and their reputation as a death metal band is well deserved. This is a perfect example of a band aging gracefully. <C. Archer> -7-

THEE PLAGUE OF GENTLEMEN Primula Pestis (I Hate Records)

With a really uncomfortable vibe, basted in doom, death and darkness, comes Belgian trio Thee Plague Of Gentleman and their debut for I Hate Records—Primula Pestis, an album rekindling the atmosphere and vibes of such metal legends as Celtic Frost, Winter, and Pentagram. The noisy rumblings of the band echo with such ferocity that the doom element of this band is sometimes sidelined by the shaking of the foundations.

Each listen, no matter how many times you hear this album, is an uneasy one as TPoG plod through their compositions with a menacing snarl of aggression (i.e. the lengthy drive of “As Cold As They Come” and “Your Love Is King”). It seems almost as torturous to them as it is to us. This is “heavy” music on all fronts and one unlike anything that has come out of this genre in a long time. <A. Bromley> -8.5-

TORCHE s/t (Robotic Empire)

Torche’s self-titled release gets a “Hell yeah” from Kevi-Metal and I’m sure Nathan T. Birk’s otherwise grim knees get weak every time this record spins. So why are these two music critics all giddy like school girls? Well, the debut by ex-Floor members Steve Brooks and Juan Montoya is a mind-numbing wall of fuzz, melodies, and infectious riffs. I was hooked from the opener riffs of “Charge of the Brown Recluse.” Think Black Sabbath meshed with the Melvins and some sugar-coated pop harmonies delivered from a somewhat laid-back Redd Kross and you wouldn’t be too far off.

The album shines on many levels, most noticeably the ace production that synchs up the harmonies and noise effortlessly as the album rolls forward. I guarantee you’ll be humming these tunes long after your ears stop buzzing from Torche’s powerful sonic assault. <A. Bromley> -8-

TOTAL FUCKING DESTRUCTION Compact Disc Version 1.0 (Bones Brigade)

Maybe it’s because I’ve been leaning on the crossover shit as of late, but this is great.

This album (with the most matter-of-fact title ever) is basically a remastered history of the band fronted by ex-Brutal Truth member Rich Hoak, and it’s a reminder of where grind came from.

CDV1 isn’t without its prob-

lems—I’m not exactly fond of Hoak’s way of singing, sort of an atypical high-pitched scream more suited to hardcore than straight grind. Certain songs are also repeated without any noticeable differences between the versions on display here—I understand the tracks on CDV1 were remixed and this is technically a compilation album, but Hoak likes to reuse many a song. Still, CDV1 is probably one of the better grindcore albums you’ll hear all year, simply because the punk influences are so prevalent and Total Fucking Destruction are obviously good at what they do. Listening to CDV1, it’s quite obvious that this album could have fit right into the grind scene circa 1988 when grindcore was just starting to establish its own identity in the punk scene, what with the surprisingly intelligent lyrical content and relative lack of “metal” posturing. It’s not exactly a throwback to the late 1980s, though, which makes Total Fucking Destruction all the more relevant in 2005. CDV1 is by certain turns political, serious, classic-definition “brutal,” and at times goofy (you tell me it’s not goofy and I’ll point you to the 4:20 and change track of bleating goats that is “Goatlord”) and it’s refreshing to know that there are still people playing this type of grindcore out there—not to say that I don’t know of any such bands besides TFD, but they tend not to get the hype in mainstream-alternative extreme press avenues like this one. Trust me, calling Rich Hoak “that guy from Brutal Truth” right now makes the unwary that more ignorant, as TFD will obviously find its place in the grind scene on its own merits. Now that this band’s name is more out there, I personally wonder if a Doctor & The Crippens reunion will ever take place. A man can dream. <C. Archer> -8-

TSJUDER Desert Northern Hell (Seasons of Mist)

If I am to even give this a hint of a chance I have to pretend the cover artwork does not exist. This seriously soured my previous judgment with the Demonic Possession record—because I’m fucking shallow like that and because D&D axes are not threatening, frightening or dangerous in any way, shape or form. I wonder why they didn’t use the crude thorny, maggoty crucifix drawing that is on the inside for the cover? I suppose the slick photo more aptly sums up the sound going on here, but I would be vastly more inclined to pick this up with the teen notebook looking drawing, were it to be adorning the cover. But, what lies inside, besides the better art is…black metal with a clean production. Far better than their last two efforts. Fast, traditionally inspired black metal, Norwegian in origin, with some rock ’n’ roll/heavy metal elements. Mostly fast paced with a strong, hefty guitar and drum sound. The bass is a bit discreet. These guys have been practising their instruments and the competency is noticeable. The band’s Web site says they play “raw and brutal black metal.” Whilst I would certainly call their previous efforts raw and brutal, I think the production on this one renders the raw adjective invalid. Nine songs with one being a good cover of Bathory’s “Sacrifice” without any real frills or alterations to the classic. “No synthesizers, no female vocals, no Fucking Compromises!” except maybe a UPC code. Oops. <Bane> -6-

TURBONEGRO Party Animals (Burning Heart)

I never thought Norway’s Turbonegro would be able to top their reunion album Scandinavian Leather (2003), but they have. Not only is Party Animals a much better album than its predecessor, the band seems a lot tighter (and I’m sure they like that—wink, nudge, wink) and a lot of the songs are just mesmerizing i.e. “City of Satan,” “Hot Stuff” and “All My Friends Are Dead.” The ace production helps their music shine with real rock ’n’ roll vigor. So kids, get ready, as the ultimate party band returns with their flamboyant attitude, rockin’ guitar riffs and heavy metal know-how. Got your sailor cap yet? <A. Bromley> -9-

UVALL Obsidian Torment (Antinomian)

This begins, classically enough, with a thunderstorm, rain and acoustic guitar. Slowly a mounting keyboard approaches from afar and then to silence. What follows could be classified as falling within the Burzum tradition of derivatives—repetitive guitar riffs that have a mini-epic feel to them. Uvall mixes it up a bit more than a straight Burzum clone, adding a good dose of a more rockin’ heavy metal feel, but the sentiment and influence is evident. Ultimately, this is a forlorn, desolate, and introspective record. The vocals sound strongly of Gorgoroth, especially those from “Antichrist” with maybe a hint of the Varg screech. Appearing, as this does, on the Blackmetal. com side label Antinomian, it is not a huge surprise that this is part of the scene they are trying to create with the ABMU—American BM Underground. I hope ABMU will not be synonymous with a weak sounding recording, because that is the one fault I can find with this. The Web site says “Raw production (but not ‘primitive’),” although I’m at a loss regarding the distinction between the two. I’m guessing it also means lack of money, because this could be twice as strong with a good recording and mastering. Perhaps this is where the comparison to some Northern Heritage bands also comes from, as per the BM.com Web site. This is not as chaotic as anything on NH, but the raw (cheap) production is reminiscent of many records on that label—which I understand is a conscious choice. As it is this comes across sounding rather thin, and therefore…fragile, for lack of a better word. I wonder why they use a picture of a European(?) castle on the inside of their CD booklet. Ten tracks in all with three being culled from the split CD with Baresark. <Bane> -7-

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CEPHALIC CARNAGE

This won’t be the typical Cephalic Carnage interview. First of all, I have to come right out and say that I am not a fan of the band. I appreciate what they’re doing on Anomalies (Relapse)—the weed gimmick has run its course (make no mistake, the band members are still big pot supporters) and the band seems to be making actual inroads into broader musical respectability. I still don’t like them, though. The whole album has that “Kornesque” guitar tone that I’m not fond of and every listen to their music has always left me distant. I also came into this interview with no preparation whatsoever as the phone interview was finished literally a week before interview deadlines. Still, this is the best way to interview a band—one is able to cut through the obvious fanboyism and converse in a way that is lost when reading through the typical “what did you do/how’s the band/do you like puppies?” sort of rundown.

One of the things that will surprise many, for example, is that Cephalic Carnage is literally a limited liability company these days—which might not seem “metal” to a lot of the punters, but it’s business to people like bassist Jawsh Mullen. “Leonard [lead singer] does all that shirt-printing,” he says, “and I have to give him ultimate props because he draws everything to print, all shirts... He’s amazing. I don’t know how he budgets his time but he does it very efficiently. We own our own screen-printing business as a result of turning the band into a company with our own tax ID number and tax write-offs, plus we do t-shirts for different functions. We turned it into a limited liability company. We wanted to start our own record label and t-shirt printing business. We wanted to re-release Conforming to Abnormality but we didn’t want to do it with a licensing agreement through this company or that company—we wanted to reap the benefits of it ourselves. We have a distribution agreement with Relapse for Conforming to Abnormality, but we own all the rights.”

Which is fine and noble in its own right, but will Cephalic Carnage stay with Relapse after Anomalies? Mullen didn’t make it seem as if it was a lock.

According to Mullen, “We are going to do a couple more EPs along the lines of the Anal Blast split. We want to put out our own DVDs on our label [Highbryd Records] as well as the Halls of Amenti [EP]; we want to put that out on our own record label.”

Obviously, then, the band members are keeping themselves busy throwing their hats into the record label game. Still, their future with Relapse isn’t as cut-and-dried as where they’re going to release Halls of Amenti product.

“It’s all up in the air right now,” deadpans Mullen. “Personally, I’ve seen Relapse in the last few years start signing bands I never in a million years thought they’d even approach.”

Like Nebula?

“Well, Nebula, that was a very unique band on the label at the time, but bands like Burning Inside, The End... Zeke, that was a surprise to me. Personally, I think [Relapse is] going the way of Century Media, not necessarily in the roster of bands or the style of music they have, because Relapse to this day still has one of the most diverse lineups on their roster. I think it’s more of a business standpoint... They could stand to make a lot more money signing more palatable bands for the radio and MTV, so the days of signing bands like Mortician to Relapse are just completely over. We got in right on the upswing, but our music didn’t follow the music trend at the time. We kind of just did our own thing.

It’s one of those things where they’re starting to be a bigger label than they were ten years ago and they’re certainly starting to act it. I love them all to death, they’re still great guys and everything, but it’s the priorities that have changed for us and them throughout the years.”

So where does the band go from Relapse, then? Will Cephalic Carnage sign a new contract with the label? It’s a difficult question, but Mullen’s up for the challenge of answering it.

Germany, Poland, Czech Republic...are most certainly dominated by a desire for death metal and grind, whereas in America it’s more of an interest thing, where it was popular for a few minutes to be gory and brutal and now it’s popular to shop at Hot Topic.”

That was probably one of the most contentious issues he’d brought up, because there still is an interest, to my way of thinking anyway, in gory and brutal. There always will be in some pockets of the grind/death scenes—dare I figure out this bassist’s thought processes? I think most readers will be able to figure out the answer.

“I know bands like Waco Jesus, Mortician and Impaled have very extreme visuals and subject matter and in the underground six years ago it was who was the brutalest, who was so brutal that they had blood on their CD, actual real blood,” he says sarcastically. “That kind of stuff. It just seems like to me, America’s a very superficial country when it comes to music. People are into it, but the majority of people are into it because of what they see first. They like the way the band looks and then they get into their music. That’s most certainly fuelled by the commercial industry in America being of degraded quality. There are guys that say ‘You’re marketable because you look this way and I think we can market your look.’”

Hipsterism, right?

Mullen agrees, to the shock of no one if you’ve guessed by now. “The whole emo movement that’s out, all these bands that have cursive writing in their title and sing about the same subject matter—you could basically trade their riffs one for another and not miss a beat. They all look a certain way, and now it’s marketable—it’s something you can buy.

You don’t even need to be part of the scene or have the feeling in your heart—as long as you have the belt on your hip and the haircut on your head, you’re metal. In Europe, they’re going to come up and tell you ‘You know, hey, your set sucked tonight. I’ve seen you guys before, but you guys were horrible tonight.’ They’re that brutally honest.”

w e i v r e t n I n a f o A True Anomaly

By Cameron Archer

“We’re not absolutely certain right now if we’re going to stay with them or if we’re going to go to someone else. Also, at the financial end of being at this band, the next label—should we choose to go to another label or choose to go to Relapse—there are things that have to change about our current contract. We would much appreciate a signing bonus that would afford us a brand-new touring van and a trailer, because the one we’ve been using for the last ten years is on its very last legs—240,000 miles and we’re about to put a few more on it. If we can hypothetically sign to Metal Blade or Nuclear Blast we’d hit them with ‘Can we get a signing bonus, can we get a little bit more for our worth?’ Stuff like that. If we’re going to continue with this we want to take this to another level. We’re just looking at the future of the band and one thing that puts signing with Relapse into question would be ‘Can they bring us to another level, would they willing to bring us to another level?’

Personally, I’d love to stay at Relapse.”

Another topic that seemed to pop up during the interview was the Relapse forum, and forums and metal fandom in general. In a tighter interview things like this wouldn’t come up due to the reliance on that damned script, considering the formula’s been worked over so many times that one can set one’s watch by it. Damned if Jawsh Mullen didn’t manage to make my half-lucid stumblings after eight hours of pond-hole digging (hey, I do work for money you know) seem like something profound.

“It goes without saying that parts of Europe,” intones Mullen, “i.e., Norway, Sweden,

I bet you can guess where Canada’s place is within Jawsh Mullen’s heart.

“Canada’s the shit,” gushes Mullen. “Canada to me is like Europe Junior, America Junior. They pay a lot of attention to what’s going on in America. However, they appreciate music for a totally different reason.”

Mullen went on to say that Canada was one of the countries that gave Anomalies good early reviews while America tended toward the more negative early reviews. It almost seems like Mullen’s making generalizations—in fact, some of the better-known “hipster” music sites are jumping aboard the Cephalic Carnage bandwagon like they did Mastodon’s last year, but they don’t have the baggage of being in the metal scene for more than a few years (lucky them.) Still, what is Mullen’s salvo for those who hate Cephalic Carnage because of the more mainstream attention?

“People in America that reviewed [Anomalies] were like ‘What happened to Conforming to Abnormality? That was the greatest album ever!’ My big question is, where the fuck were those people when Conforming came out? Nobody liked it then.” It’s kind of a crude way to say it (and weird coming from a man who’s only been with Cephalic Carnage since 2003), but Mullen’s point still stands.

To be honest, I went on to talk about politics, Consumer Reports and cell-phone rates with Jawsh Mullen, and it’s sad that you might not be able to read a longer interview than I’m allotted for Unrestrained! Your loss, I guess. We can’t all be me.

73

74

BRAND NEW SIN

RAGING SPEEDHORN / HERESI

“This is like a new chance for us to do some damage over there,” says Raging Speedhorn’s bassist Darren Smith. “We’ve put out two albums before this [self-titled and We Will Be Dead Tomorrow on ZTT Records] and they never got released over there Stateside, so now it’s time for us to show people who we really are. This album [How the Great Have Fallen on SPV] is blazing, so I think we will make a dent, that’s for sure.”

Smith tells the truth. The band’s third opus is definitely their best to date, a harrowing assault to the senses with shades of Iron Monkey and EYEHATEGOD, the band’s sludgy ’n’ vicious raw rock combo detonating on impact. With such songs as “A Different Shade of Shit,” “Fuck You Pay Me,” and “Don’t Let the Bastards Grind You Down,” you’d be foolish not to prepare for an ass kicking.

“We definitely changed things around this time around when it came to studio work,” he reveals. “We [singers Frank Regan and John Loughlin, guitarists Gareth Smith and Jaye Thompson and drummer Gordon Morison] went in and tried to capture the live feel of the band, which is no easy task, mind you. What we decided to do is leave in some of the mistakes and just mix it in and leave it very, very raw. This is far from being polished, and to agree with you, this is the heaviest record to date for Speedhorn.”

You said it was no easy task to capture the raw live sound—how so?

“Well…it goes like this. It is hard to capture, that’s for sure. It has more to do with catching the energy rather than a perfect riff on the tape. If you have perfect-sounding riffs and drums and whatnot it just sounds very mechanical to my ears, but when you leave in rawness like guitar noises, tuning issues, and mistakes I think it sounds a lot more heavier and darker.”

I’ve seen this album labeled as “blistering.”

“Yeah, definitely not a record you could listen to with headphones on,” he laughs.

“I have been trying to make the heaviest metal record possible since I was young,” Smith continues, “so every album is a task. That is the same mindset for all the guys in Speedhorn; just wanting to produce the heaviest album possible, not cut any corners and just make it much bigger and louder and violent than the last album.”

It must have been annoying not to be able to let people discover the band earlier with your first two albums.

“Oh, it was,” he replies. “You wouldn’t believe how hard it has been on us. We have these awesome records that haven’t been able to make it into the record shops over there. Quite a lot of songs off the second album are about the record company politics and holding out for a good deal. We don’t give a fuck about a good deal. We just want to be able to go out and play to people who haven’t heard us before. Our live show is so much more than what you get on record—it’s ferocious! It really angers us that this is our third album and the only album we’ve been able to get into the shops over there.”

Label politics suck.

“I hate it. Total bullshit!”

And then you have the critics.

“True, but they offer something different each time out. Reviews are great because they come in many varieties. I know this record will get the attention it deserves and I hope there

is a good and bad vibe for this record. You can’t have one without the other. I like to hear the bad things about the record from reviews because you learn from it. You might not always agree, but it is something to take note of.”

Have there been any bad write-ups on the new album?

“None that I’ve seen,” he says. “It seems like everyone agrees that this is one of the most ferocious albums they’ve heard in a while, and that is a great thing for us. But we’ll take the comments like ‘it sounds like someone dragging a stick along the fence’ too,” he says, laughing.

“People interpret our music in so many ways, and while our influences are apparent at times with the likes of Iron Monkey, EYEHATEGOD and Converge fuelling our fire, I think people who hear us know that we do it our way just as well. This is all we got.

“We’re from a crappy small town called Corby in England where there is nothing to do.

The only exciting thing we got is a swimming pool, and they are tearing that down later this year. So yeah, this is it. Music is all we got and we need to make the best of it. I am very optimistic about this record bringing about big things for us.”

Third time’s a charm, right?

“Now you got the spirit!”

Seek ’n ’destroy

By Adrian ‘The Energizer’ Bromley

No Spiritual Surrender “Worship. A way to show praise and appreciation.

A celebration of mankind’s misfortune and the triumphs of evil. Satanic devotion, acknowledging faith.”

Simply stated, yet profound. This is how black metal is defined by Heresi mainman Skamfer, and this is the sound of the band’s debut MCD, the tri-songer Psalm I. Suitably opening with a Roman war-march, “Civitate Dei” ominously plods ’n’ pulses onward and abyssward with frequent spirals into that latter locale, Skamfer’s whiskeyripped bellow painting portraits forlorn ’n’ frightening. Beginning with a gutter-crawling motif, “Deus Absconditus” is one cryogenic, coma-inducing transition after another, ambient blast doing battle with ambient gallop, and frequent guttercrawling ensues. The final track, “Efter Själens Stympning,” is black-metalled quicksand, slow-fucking-death iced over by disarmingly bittersweet melody only to right itself into t-ttense oblivion come the coda.

And this is only the beginning. A monumental album is slated for release later in the year, about which Skamfer reveals, “It won’t differ that much from the material on Psalm I, as I have found a unique sound for Heresi.

“I met Acerbus and Nabemih in late summer of 2000,” the mainman picks up the story surrounding his involvement with the well-cult Ondskapt. “They were a member short of a complete lineup. We talked, and it was obvious that we shared

enough opinions on religion and issues concerning black metal for me to join without hesitation. We rehearsed, and I provided them with their name, but I left before the recording of the debut MLP. At the time, I was too depressed to maintain any relationship.”

Regarding his initial goals with his new guise, Skamfer states, “Heresi is a sinister urge of mine, a special one. It has emerged from my mind and become reality. With it, I mean to make a difference.

“My lyrics aren’t your standard black metal lyrics,” the mainman asserts. “They might come across as strange, although you must be pretty fucking ignorant to confuse my point with something that is not malicious and ominous.”

As for “preaching to the converted” versus aiming beyond the black-metalled box, Skamfer is firm: “I primarily aim my Satanic propaganda towards the converted black metal fanatics, who are a select few, for sure, but they are able to grasp the most essential of its contents. They’re more likely to do damage and to cause harm; preaching to a greater mass wouldn’t be as rewarding.”

And as for whether Heresi is a fuller, more personal vision of what he wants to achieve musically and lyrically versus his time in the not-inconsiderable Ondskapt, Skamfer is even firmer: “I am Heresi! With Ondskapt, I was seriously involved, sure, but I did no writing for its sake. Heresi and Skamfer are one. Be it by curses or blessings, what alters me alters Heresi.”

Still, the spectre of prime Mayhem—and, more so, what they could have/should have done after De Mysteriis Dom Sathanas or at least Wolf’s Lair Abyss—looms equally over both Ondskapt and Heresi, its resonance writ large and just as potently. Skamfer is not in denial: “It possesses, as a whole as well as every track on it, an authentic evil aura and a unique bleak ambience rarely found anywhere even to this day, where the Satanic black metal underground is more potent than ever.”

Speaking of resonance and, further afield, the (potential) role of psychedelia ’n’ altered states in Heresi, the mainman reasons, “I don’t see why Heresi couldn’t mesmerize the dedicated listener and lead him further out in his darkness, where

he can glimpse at the malice beyond.

“I think black metal, at its best, can distort the human mind to a point,” Skamfer continues, assessing the role of physical annihilation versus mental annihilation in Heresi’s aesthetic.

“However, I wouldn’t rely merely on music to influence evil deeds. People need to be told what to do, or follow an example made by a more potent individual than themselves.”

Speaking of which, to this writer’s mind, Skamfer’s native Sweden presently maintains the most potent BM scene going, the fiercest examples of the idiom as truly serious art: bands who commandingly worship morbidity and inspire devotion ’n’ fanaticism—and obviously, we’re not talking the post-Dark Funeral school of blastbeat boredom that’s well past its expiration date. Something of a sub-sect of Swedish UGBM is the “new religious scene,” headed by such bands as Funeral Mist, Watain, Malign, Armagedda, Matricide, Dom Dracul, the recently reformed Ofermod, the aforementioned Ondskapt, and certainly Heresi can now be added to these hallowed ranks. Concurrently, an equally religious scene has sprung up in France during the past five-plus years, counting the considerable likes of Antaeus, Deathspell Omega, Bael, Arkhon Infaustus, Temple of Baal, Malicious Secrets, Hell Militia, and Glorior Belli, among others.

“A new age of black metal is dawning,” the mainman rightly concurs. “The gifted have inherited its core values, religious ones, and perfected some slightly different Satanic ideologies.

The uprising is in the midst of its happening, I think—not a ‘black metal mini-trend,’ for sure! With Heresi, I claim a dark place in it and a part to play. I hold the Swedish scene to be the most prominent, together with the French and the Finnish ones. Though this religious scene didn’t happen with a massive bang like the one in Norway in the early ’90s, I have high hopes for it to get really ugly and out of hand before dissolving in chaos!”

Prophetically, Skamfer signs off: “With nearly half a decade of shit getting in my way, I have risen with Heresi to grace and to claim a rightful position within the Satanic black metal underground scene!” www.thr.cjb.net

By Nathan T. Birk

By Paul Silbiger

13 deadly sins

“Major labels are evil. They sign a band and then force them to sell out.”

I’d always thought the above was music’s contribution to the urban myth. In fact, I’ve talked with numerous bands signed with major labels and they’ve always said they were surprised by how hands-off their label had behaved. That was until I talked with Brand New Sin’s singer, Joe Altier.

Like a mysterious severed finger in a bowl of Wendy’s chili, another astronomical allegation was about to come back down to earth.

“Obviously it’s somewhere everybody wants to be,” Altier begins poetically about their short-lived Sony experience. “You want to be connected to a major label and the money that’s involved and the endless possibilities of working with a big company like that. We went through the process of thinking we’d drop them 20 some-odd demos and they knew exactly what they were getting from Brand New Sin. “They heard the first record [self-titled, Now Or Never Records, 2002] and signed us on the strength of our first record. But we felt things were getting weird because we were sending them demos and they’re saying stuff like it’s just okay and maybe we’ve got a good B-side or one good album track.

“Then they started sending us to songwriters. In fact, they flew one songwriter up to Jersey to work with us and then we ended up going to Connecticut to work with another songwriter. At first we just thought this was the kind of game that you play when you’re on a much larger label like this, but at the same time we felt it undermined our talent. I mean, what, we can’t write our own music because you don’t feel we’re good enough?

“To tell you the truth, we learned a lot about ourselves and we learned a lot about other ways to write songs. But in January of 2004 we dropped them 50 some-odd demos and they came back and said that we’re not close and we need to keep writing and that they were looking for the quote-unquote hit. That’s all we kept hearing from them.

“They would make references and say ‘You guys are way better than Nickleback but they write really great songs,’ basically implying they wanted us to do the old sell-out thing. For a little while we tried to play their game and then we realized, you know what, we’re Brand New Sin, and if you don’t want Brand New Sin for what they are then we’re sorry about that but we have to go somewhere else.”

That “somewhere else” became Century Media, who probably had to jump through a couple hula hoops in order to extract Brand New Sin from their Sony contract and release their 13-track effort, Recipe For Disaster. Fortunately Joe didn’t have to get involved in all the legal wrangling, but what he could talk about was that “a contract was signed but luckily we hadn’t spent much of the label’s money. We had close ties with Century Media because when Now Or Never went bankrupt, all the bands went to Century Media.

We were actually going to be part of that migration but then the Sony thing came up.

“We have a lot of friends at Century Media, even from the first record, and not just friends but fans. When we realized that the Sony cycle had run through, we called up our old manager and told him we wanted to get out of our deal and asked him if he wanted to work with us again.

“He instantly said yes and told us he’d call Century Media right away. What do you know, two seconds later I’m on the phone with Marco, the president, and he said he wanted to do this. He knew the process would take a little bit of time and effort to get through all the paperwork—and the back and forth between the lawyers—but he set the ball rolling in April of 2004 and by August we were officially

signed with Century Media. By September we were in the studio.

“We obviously didn’t think we would take this long to record our next record, but we ended up writing close to 70 some-odd songs. When we finally got away from Sony, we had to figure out how to whittle down 50 some-odd or 60 some-odd songs because we only needed 15 to record.

“We looked at it like a greatest hits, with everybody voting on what they thought was the best group of songs. The first vote got it down to 25, the next vote down to 20, the next vote down to 15. We ended up going into the studio to record 15, and three of those didn’t make the record because they didn’t have the feel of what we wanted the record to be like. So we decided to save those for another day.”

Some of you may remember Godbelow, the EarthCrisis-like band Brand New Sin members Kevin Dean (bass) Kenny Dunham (guitar), Kris Wiechmann (guitar), and bassist Chuck Kahl were all members of. They also had a third guitarist, Brian “Slider” Azzoto, who was in Godbelow and performed on the first Brand New Sin release. Live, it was quite an experience watching three guitarists all duel it out. But when listening to Brand New Sin on disc, you often couldn’t discern what the third guitar was getting up to. I wondered if that was why Brand New Sin streamlined their lineup to two guitars.

“Everyone was always wondering why the three guitars were there,” Joe admits, “and it was just something that was left over from Godbelow. When we really got into the writing of this record, the dynamics of the band had changed.

“You never want to get rid of a brother and a band member like that, but it came to the point where we had five people on one page and one person on another page. We just couldn’t get it to work anymore so it was time to part ways.

“The thing is, it’s made us tighter because Kris and Kenny play so well together and know exactly where each other is going. Writing for the record was a lot easier because we didn’t have to think about a third guitar part. In the past we had to think of something to try and make it sound like three guitar players.”

There is one song, in particular, that stands out on Recipe For Disaster: “Black and Blue.” You can tell straight away that it’s the type of song these guys will use early in their live set to get the crowd going. Was this song “the hit” that Sony was looking for?

“That’s actually a song they probably would’ve thrown away,” Joe laughs. “It never would have seen the light, not even as an album track. It’s really weird because they knew what they were getting into, and that was what amazed us.

It was like, ‘what did you expect from us? Did you not listen to the first record?’

“Their answer was that our first record was just a start.

They’d say, ‘Don’t you want to sell a million records, and a year from now you’ll be getting blowjobs and driving Ferraris?’

“Okay, yeah, that would be great. But what it basically comes down to is I want to pay my bills. I want to pay off my college loan. It’s not necessary for me to drive a Ferrari. I just want to make a living doing this and if it means I just live in a simple house here in Syracuse and drive a Ford F-150, so be it. You don’t have to be a millionaire to be happy.”

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NEW ENGLAND M ETAL & HARDCORE FESTIVAL

All pics Lynne Harrington

76

BEHEMOTH

OBITUARY

CEPHALIC CARNAGE

CRYPTOPSY

If there’s one thing that I’ll forever remember about this year’s version of the New England Metal and Hardcore Festival it’s the fact that, in comparison to previous years I’ve attended, I was in a remarkably better mood this weekend. Why’s that? Well, my sunny disposition was simply, and almost entirely, based on the fact I didn’t drive. Normally when we go on these road trips, I’m the one driving 8-12 hours non-stop each way, hardly getting any sleep over the course of the entire trip, eating shitty food, dealing with self-important border guards and a car-load of people and their self-important musical tastes. This year, I sat back and let someone else be fucking Geeves and I gotta admit that I now understand why limousines and taxis are so popular. I slept most of the way down to Worcester and when I wasn’t sleeping I was reading, mindlessly staring out the window or trying to convince my Canucklehead posse that the new Paint it Black album is one of the best records of the year. They weren’t buying that. The shitty food? Well, it is America, so it was no surprise that everything was bogged down in transmogrified bacon grease and chocolate sauce. Another non-surprise was the amount of scratch I spent at the local Newbury Comics. This store continues to rule and every year all of us end up buying many more CD’s and such here than at the actual fest.

Ahh, the fest. By now, even if you’ve never attended, you should know the drill: 75 or so metal and hardcore bands play on two separate stages.

You spend the time you’re not watching bands hanging out—but not in the lobby!—or picking through the merch area, which this year was pretty flimsy, as it was comprised mostly of labels peddling bands that have signed their lives away to them as opposed to the variety of distros. And what’s up with Victory Records having a merch table but having next to no merch?

Some bands played. On Friday, when most people were still getting groped by security, Kylesa and The Esoteric were rocking my universe; Premonitions Of War threatened to bring the balcony crashing down onto the pit below; As I Lay Dying sucked until they played that one song that I, and apparently, everyone else, likes and Obituary had the old fogeys in attendance banging their receding hairlines and spilling their beers. John Tardy seemed extremely happy to be back on stage, while Allen West looked like he just finished dialysis treatment, picked up a guitar and hobbled his way over to the gig.

Of course, all good things come to an end and my thus far restful trip was about to come crashing down around me as six of us retired to our hotel room and started nodding off. That’s when the un-

STRAPPING YOUNG LAD

DARK TRANQUILLITY

KING DIAMOND

MNEMIC

NILE

SONATA ARTICA

earthly din of The Adrian Bromley Versus Matt Lewis Sleep Apnea And Log Sawing contest began.

Adrian was off to an early lead with window rattling expulsions that I could feel in my bones even though I was sleeping on the floor, across the room with my head next to the whirring heating unit.

Somehow, I managed to drift off into dreams occupied with noisy shit like cannons, space shuttle launches and pig farms, only to be awoken at various times by the remarkably vivid sounds of moist airways closing and struggling to re-open with oxygen and carbon dioxide being propelled at incredible velocities. As I lay there, trying to recall my CPR training—not that I’d need any as one of our posse is a med-student—I realized it was Matt (the guy who drove – sucka!) who was on his death bed and ‘The Energizer’ was only snoring like a dragon while trying to promote The End Records’ bands in his sleep.

Saturday’s early standouts were Reflux’s incredibly complex tech-metal (too bad about the singer) and Twelve Tribes. No, really. Walls Of Jericho aren’t much to listen to, but frontwoman Candace rules. Darkest Hour played an awesome new song and incorporated nudity into their set.

Why do people like Trivium? The fist-banging hordes down front were too busy whirling around like dervishes to answer coherently, but this band seems so contrived and unnaturally hell-bent in their attempt to obtain fame, fortune and respect for music that isn’t all that astounding to begin with.

Sure, it’s a precarious balancing act in the public’s eye when you’re working hard to make a living playing metal, but this bunch, especially their frontman, reek of desperation and insincerity. They got a big reaction from the kids and played to that reaction very well, but I’ve seen them play for indifferent crowds and they act totally different; almost like they believe they’re entitled to the metal scene’s praise and accolades. Oh well, The Red Chord was next and basically showed everyone how

NEW ENGLAND

The Palladium Worcester, Massachusetts April 22nd to 24th, 2005

it’s supposed to be done. I only saw one song by Sonata Arctica, which normally would be one song more than necessary, but in a live arena these guys are fucking incredible! They may be as slick as a mallard caught in an oil spill, but their professional perfor mance and meticulous sound can’t be ADRIAN, KEVI, J-ROKK, LYNNE, MATT and SAILOR BOY denied, neither can the note perfect four-part harmonies which, when you consider the number of off-key vocalists performing this weekend, were more than welcome. After that Strapping Young Lad blew everyone away with a pummelling performance that included more fellatio and anal sex jokes than your average Chris Rock standup gig. That’s something you don’t see enough of in metal: references to dick sucking and ass fucking. Cryptopsy hit the stage next with the melodramatic Lord Worm back in the fold. He ate a bunch of worms—and hilariously, almost puked them back up, proving that metal ain’t ready for Fear Factor—and introduced songs with this weird Hellraisertype vocal effect, but that was about the extent of the entertainment as their set was a wash of fuzzy mid-range and non-existent drums, except for the ever-present kick triggers. I mean, when two songs of Bleeding Through’s following set wipes the floor with you, you know you’re having an off night.

After that, it was back to the hotel for some pizza and Bromley’s reclamation of his snoring and apnea championship. By the way, the secret to keeping people away from your pizza is to order a vegetarian pie with all kinds of “green shit” on it.

We had decided beforehand to leave halfway through the third day, after Cephalic Carnage’s awesome showing, for the 12-hour drive home. Other than Cephalic, there were a few highlights and there probably would have been one more had Extol not got into a car wreck on their way to the fest. Behemoth were unrelenting and brutal and the only corpse painted band of the weekend.

Noctuary are a band many seem to be pretty ambivalent about, but I like their Maiden-ish black metal, or is it black metal-ish Maiden? Mnemic drew a huge crowd over at the side stage, but while I found their stage energy rather swell, their music fell flat. Into The Moat should be dropped into a moat, Gizmachi need a new name, Howling Syn need to break up and Dead To Fall need to be a bit more subtle. I mean, kicking off your set with an At The Gates cover illustrates either a lack of effort or foreshadowing of the obvious. The definite highlight was 3 Inches Of Blood. I’d only ever heard one song of theirs and a bunch of message board whining about how they were hardcore kids doing a piss-take on traditional metal. Well, fuck that surface analysis. They may not look like Manowar or Hammerfall (except maybe for vocalist Cam Pipes who looks like he walked straight out of Blessed Death into 2005) and they may have elements of non-trad metal in their take on trad metal—i.e. Pipes’ hardcore screamer counterpart—but brass tacks are that they came in and fucking blew everyone away with warp speed versions of songs about orcs and pirates and an uncontainable amount of energy and sincerity to defending the faith of not just metal, but extreme music as a whole. Any band that can introduce a song saying, “This one is about pirates,” and not have me cynically rolling my eyes, but smiling like a teenager in a co-ed locker room is all good in my books.

By Kevin Stewart-Panko

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79

KEVI-M ETAL’S RIMSHOTS!

78

Great. Just fucking great. Unless you’re one of those people who likes it when whatever they’re reading abruptly cuts off and gets sucked into a vortex, unlikely to reappear ever again, last issue’s Rimshots column must’ve had you blasting ceiling-high volleys of baby batter wherever you like to wile away your limited time on this planet reading your Unrestrained! Yeah, that’s it! The perfect cover! No need to explain the relationship between those stains on your ceiling and your behind-closed-doors-so-no-one-will-everknow expressions of your sexuality. But that’s alright, because if incompleteness is your fetish—and ten bucks says you can probably find said fetish somewhere on the ‘net—you may have been getting off on the fact that a couple bands interviewed for the Abrasive Outlets section had their pics mysteriously drop like the stretched and distended colon of one Ashley Blue. However, if you’re like me, you like a beginning, middle, end and some motherfucking continuity to your literature and in case you were wondering, here are the reviews that were unceremoniously cut from last issue’s cavalcade of homo-eroticism: SHALLOW NORTH DAKOTA

Mob Wheel (Self-released) Sounds like: Melvins jamming with Orange Goblin in a marijuana grow house.

The Rimshots Gaydar sees: This is like the brawny mountain man who went gay because he had no other options after all his cousins got knocked up. He works with the land, has about as much hair on his back as he does on his chest and gets really depressed when his fuck buddies are out of town at lumberjack competitions.............................................................................-7SIX FEET UNDER

Graveyard Classics 2 (Metal Blade) Sounds like: The worst death metal band ever doing AC/DC covers.

The Rimshots Gaydar sees: This isn’t gay, it’s stupid..............-1SONATA ARCTICA

Reckoning Night (Nuclear Blast) Sounds like: Oscar Wilde playing metal.

The Rimshots Gaydar sees: It’s like the million people who converge on Toronto every year for the huge Gay Pride Parade all got together to make an album.....................................................................-2UDO

Thunderball (AFM) Sounds like: Everything else UDO has been doing since 1982.

The Rimshots Gaydar sees: Brush cuts, black stomping boots, khaki cargo pants, military-lite clothing and tapered t-shirts on a fifty-year-old man who doesn’t have the body for tapered t-shirts.

Mr. Dirkschneider is the ultimate “daddy.”.............................4.5USURPER

Cryptobeast (Earache) Sounds like: Careful you don’t stab yourself in the forehead with those spiky gloves while headbanging.

The Rimshots Gaydar says: This album sounds like what it sound like if Tom Warrior and Daniel from The Chasm directed gay, gangbang porn featuring the talents and furry ‘staches of your favourite big ‘n’ burly leathermen and motorcycle cops...........-7Last issue’s flub up is the fault of… well… that depends on who you talk to. Of course, the person you talk to will tell you that it’s not their fault. But that’s not what this is about—even though I’m completely innocent because I just write this mess.

I have nothing to do with any of the other processes involved in putting this mag together. Hell, I barely read the thing. Oops, did I say that? Anyway, I got to thinking; thinking about the way this column used to be: insulting, insensitive, hurtful, angry, funny, stupid and ridiculous while relentlessly pointing out any band’s or label’s weaknesses and foibles. I always liked how this space was the ultimate antithesis to the material—including my own stories—featured in the rest of the magazine. Sure, in some ways—okay, in all ways—it still is, but over time, I got bored and sought out new ways to gussy up the little page in the back that the big, bad slavemaster editors were so kind to bestow upon their humble little nigger servant. With that came the era of ridiculous pictures accompanying ridiculous reviews, which in

all actuality, ended up doubling my workload because of the constant hunt for some retarded image that somehow managed to sum up what I was trying to sum up using limited words to begin with. Sure, everyone guffawed and the visual element probably made things a lot more entertaining, but I was usually at my wits’ end, not only trying to crank out something I’d be (somewhat) proud to attach my name to, but doing it within the throw-a-dartat-a-calendar dates that pass for deadlines around here.

Remember that whole rolling blackout thing in California a few years back? That’s what an Unrestrained! deadline is like: you never know when it’s coming, no one tells you until two days before it supposed to happen and even when you are told, it’s likely to change at the last minute. For instance, for this issue, there were three separate deadline dates for writer’s to deliver their goods—one of which, oddly, fell on a day when Bromley was riding in a car with me, en route to the New England fest.

Don’t ask me how he planned on doing any Unrestrained! related work while sleeping and buying vinyl in Worcester—and they got moved on three different occasions. After a while, you start to feel like one of those porn chicks who shows up on set at 7am only to end up waiting for hours upon hours to shoot her scene.

You gotta wonder what’s going through the mind of some chick, likely straight off the bus from Idaho or just back from getting her braces removed, who’s been sitting around for eight or nine hours with the knowledge that she’s essentially waiting to get two cocks stuffed into her asshole at once? I’m not sure what someone in that position would be pondering, but it’s probably similar to the unease one feels when they see “The Energizer” in their inbox four times a day. That’s all fine and dandy and I guess he’s just doing his job, but when you’re life is as complicated and busy as mine is at the moment, you’d rather have a date chiselled in stone so you can plan accordingly. And before you hit me up with some Dr. Phil-inspired palliative condescension about how you understand about having a jam-packed sked and how you totally know “what it’s like,” let me answer by saying that, as far as it concerns myself, no, you don’t. So, in an attempt to counteract any and all fuck ups this time around, I’ve decided to throw it back and revert to the days of yore by losing the frills, bells, lights and whistles, pictures of gay men and my wife’s tits and have this space live, die or be suspended in a state of perpetual enuui by my words and wit alone. Of course, it doesn’t hurt that my words and wit will be nudged along by a fair share of unlistenable tripe. By the way, in case you keeping score, I didn’t get this column in for this issue’s deadline. Or did I? ABORTED

The Archaic Abattoir (Olympic/Century Media) Geometrically speaking, this album is about as complex as a square. The entertaining part comes in watching that square fly across the room and mercilessly gouge someone’s eye out....-7ANTIGAMA

Discomfort (Selfmadegod) You know how people who don’t listen to extreme music characterize it as that “kill your mother, rape your dog” shit? Well, this is the kind of shit that you kill your mom and rape your pooch to.

And smile about it afterwards...................................................-7-

CHIXDIGGIT

Pink Razors (Fat Wreck) Chix may dig it, but who in their right fucking mind understands chix and why they do anything they do?..................................-5CIRCA SURVIVE

Juturna (Equal Vision) Success spawns imitators. No surprises there. Trouble is that Equal Vision have signed this unholy mess of a Coheed & Cambria (only far more flaming) clone. Yet, they were the label that originally signed Coheed. If you can explain that fucking move, someone from the band will be right over to relieve you manually. ..................................................................................................-2THE DEADLY

The Wolves Are Here Again (Pluto) Picture the collective membership of The Blood Brothers and Refused strapped down to a line of S/M spanking benches and being administered enemas consisting of steroids extracted from equine urine. Yeah, the same shit Ben Johnson was using in the 80s to power his way to a 9.79 in the 100m.........................-8.5THE EPOXIES

s/t (Fat Wreck) To anyone living in a house with either Rik Ocasek (The Cars) or Mark Mothersbaugh (Devo), heed my words: Get the fuck out!

After hearing this Portland band steal left, right and center from them, Ric and Mark are gonna get hammered down at the local and at closing time they’ll be coming home looking for some bitch ass to kick.............................................................................-3.5FIGURE OF MERIT

Vatic (Code:Breaker/Earache) For those who can’t get enough Isis, Neurosis and Cult Of Luna in their lives; especially if you like your Isis, Neurosis and Cult Of Luna with a shitty guitar sound................................................-7GRAVEWORM

(N)Utopia (Nuclear Blast) No more please. Any similarity between this and good metal is purely coincidental...................................................................-1HATE ETERNAL

I, Monarch (Earache) I, bored...................................................................................-5.5MESHUGGAH

Catch Thirty-Three (Nuclear Blast) Listening to this is like having Dirk Diggler hold you down by the ears and split your corpus collosum with his foot long dick. A true mind fuck..................................................................................-8RAGING SPEEDHORN

How The Great Have Fallen (SPV) I don’t care how good your band is, you shouldn’t be allowed to be so stupid as to name your new album “How The Great Have Fallen.” Especially when, not but three years ago, your band was being considered the future of UK metal before the press came to the realization that some other band was actually the future of UK metal........................................................................................-8RUMPELSTILTSKIN GRINDER

Wikka (This Dark Reign) Asguard? Belarusian proggy, black metal? Somewhere a pillow is being bitten...............................................................................-3-

Two-Song Promo (Self Released) This is what you get when you subtract the bullets from Dimebag’s head, the chemical pollutants from Anselmo’s bloodstream and add a midget strapped to a windmill blade listening to A.O.D. on an iPod..............................................................................-7.5-

BEECHER

SENTENCED

ASGUARD

Breaking The Fourth Wall – U.S. Re-issue (Earache) The musical equivalent of a weekend-long threesome with the two hottest members of the Brazilian women’s beach volleyball t eam...........................................................................................-9BLEED THE SKY

Paradigm In Entropy (Nuclear Blast) Fuck, these days it seems like Nuclear Blast will sign just about anybody able to plug their instruments into power outlets. I’m not sure what’s easier: a shitty band scoring a deal with Nuclear Blast or a soon-to-be washed up celeb scoring one of those follow-my-dumb-ass-around reality shows?............................-2.5BLOODY SUNDAY

To Sentence The Dead (Facedown) Christian metalcore with guitars that sound like an unending loop of pussy farts. Satan, come and take me away from this.

Please?.....................................................................................-4-

The Funeral Album (Century Media) “The Funeral Album”? Like tripping over the cord of a cell phone, this is stupid. Let’s hope they don’t see fit to grace us with “The Burial Album” or, god forbid, “The Exhumation and Resurrection Album.”.....................................................................................-4WOLVERINE

The Window Purpose (Elitist/Earache) Musically, this album reeks like the unwashed underwear of Yes’ Chris Squire: a little cheesy, a little crusty, a little shitty, but they encase something (erm, yes) that has more musical talent than most of us could ever hope of having. To top it off, there’s probably some fucknut out there willing to shell out large for ‘em on e Bay........................................................................................-6.5-

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