REVIEW: DEATHGUY - THE LEGEND OF ROMANCER

 

DEATHGUY - THE LEGEND OF ROMANCER (Trinity Records, 2000)

Produced by Deathguy

Recorded at Ghost Studio

Cover Art byThanit

Tracks: 1- Ballad of Sunset (intro), 2- Zero Frontier, 3- Lust Murder, 4- Lake of Tears, 5- Savage Seraphim, 6- Black Swan, 7- The Promised Land, 8- Beheader, 9- The Beast, 10- Marn, 11- Den Sungkhom

This CD starts with a melodic intro before getting into the really amazing world of this death/black metallers. Yes! Here we have this band whose music is a really great mix of elements of both death metal, black metal with a lot of original and interesting elements, such as the use of keybaords that give a lot of epic feeling to the songs or the guitar melodies that are fundamental for Deathguy´s style. The death metal appears in some of the riffs and some guttural vocals. The black metal can be listened in the fast riffs and some of the more screaming vocals (check for example the beginning of "Lust Murder"). This guys have a lot of technique that allows them to perform this song which have a lot of complexity in the many changes and moods (check for example "Zero Frontier" to see how many changes this guys make within the same song). The mix is good but I would have mixed a little bit different the guitars, maybe a little bit more fat or something like that. This is an absolute must for any metal fan!

Favorite tracks: All the CD is really great!

Contact: www.trinityrecords.com.hk orthepsitrakorn@hotmail.com

REVIEW: DARK FAITH - THE SENTENCE OF SATAN

 

DARK FAITH - THE SENTENCE OF SATAN (War is Imminent Prods., 2002)

Produced by Dark Faith

Recorded at "EL Refor"

Tracks: 1- Dark Faith, 2- Blinding Darkness, 3- Reflection, 4- Human Sacrifice, 5- Judas, 6- Religion, 7- Impure Son, 8- Necrophagus, 9- The Sentence of Satan

Here we have this black metal band coming directly from Spain!! Their music is raw in many places with fast guitars and drums and they have a lot of changes in their songs that make things really interesting! Ruth´s vocals are really devilish and fit the music perfectly. I liked a lot some acoustic passages in tracks like "Religion" who starts in a very calm way before getting into mayhemic black metal. The drummer is killer and makes a lot of fast passages, double bass drumming and breaks giving the band the dynamics they deserve. I like a lot when Ruth follows the guitar riffs with the vocals like in "The Sentence of Satan" (this track has also many killer guitar riffs). The sound of this recording is really good specially the drums that sound extremely well. Lovers of black metal will surely love this band!!

Favorite tracks: "Reflection", "Religion" and "The Sentence of Satan"

Contact: www.unholycross.com

REVIEW: CRUSH EFEKT - ECLIPSED

 

CRUSH EFEKT - ECLIPSED (Independent, 2001)

Produced by Crush Efekt

Recorded at Slaymaker Studios

Cover Art by Sean Alley

Tracks: 1- Big Man, 2- Eclipsed, 3- Falling, 4- Education, 5- No Going Home, 6- The Last of Me, 7- Anthem For the Weak, 8- Powertrip, 9- My White trash Neighbors

Crush Efekt is really brutal, but not in the same sense that a brutal death metal band could be. Even if they share a lot of the brutality that this kind of bands have, Crush Efekt has a sort of hardcore feeling to their music. I think that is because of two factors: first of all the vocals that are more of the screaming type, and then there are certain drum patterns that brutal death metal bands don´t use and Crush Efekt uses a lot. Don´t get me wrong...Crush Efekt is not hardcore, but they have some elements of the style that fit perfectly their more brutal music.There are powerful guitar riffs here with a raw guitar sounds that makes things even heavier! And there are a lot of blast beat parts which are fast as hell (it seems that this guys has eight arms in many places). As I said before the vocals are of the type that add a lot brutality to the music because of their screaming tyoe (not guttural). The sound of the recording is really good, specially on the guitars that are the main element here and on the devastating drums. Brutality guaranteed.

Favorite tracks: "Eclipsed", "No Going Home" and "Powertrip"

Contact: www.crushefekt.net

REVIEW: CRAWLING SUN - LES MERCHANDS DE DESASTRES

 CRAWLING SUN - LES MERCHANDS DE DESASTRES (Tumbleweed Records, 2001)

Produced by Crawling Sun

Recorded at Turtle Recordings

Cover Art by Giselle Blanck and Bryan Rode

Tracks: 1- Quarentine, 2- Under Heaven, 3- Fall from Grace, 4- After Love, 5- Ride On, 6- Easy Kill, 7- Hurt, 8- Butterfly High, 9- Suffering, 10- Fate of Our World, 11- Merchant of Fear, 12- Never Again My Friend

A beautiful acoustic passage starts the first song called "Quarentine" before getting into a mid tempo heavy rock track. This band is a great mix of rock, metal with a lot of climatic passages and changes. To see this you just have to put the CD an listen to "Quarentine" and see how this guys go from heavy to atmospheric and climatic passages (the keyboards are fundamental and I like the way this guys use them adding a lot of harmonies and melodic passages to their music). The tracks on this CD are very differnt one from each other letting us listejn to alot of differnt sides of Crawling Sun´s music personality. The heavy guitars add a lot of power to the songs and they are really well combined with the keys making a perfect blend of delicated phrases and heavy riffs. The sound of the recording is extremely good with a great guitar mix that makes Crawling Sun even more powerful. I have no doubt that this guys are creating a style of their own.

Favorite tracks: "Quarentine", "Easy Kill" and " Fate of Our World"

Contact: www.crawlingsun.com

REVIEW: COBOLT 60 - MEAT HOOK BALLET

 

COBOLT 60 - MEAT HOOK BALLET (VME Records, 2002)

Produced by Endre Kirkesola

Recorded at Dub Studio

Cover Art by Jon Tornnesen

Tracks: 1- Chainsaw Michelangelo, 2- The Explorer, 3- Night Stalker, 4- Daddy Dearest, 5- One To Go, 6- Salvation Principle Result, 7- Meat Hook Ballet, 8- Incineration (The Apical of Fire)

Guitar riffs! Here you have plenty of them ! And I really like bands that can do this and put many guitar riffs in a really coherent way. And Cobolt 60 can do this perfectly! Going from brutal riffs to more climatic ones within the same track and giving their music a lot of changes. Despite what you could think by watching the album cover, this is not a grind band. In fact Cobolt 60 is closer to death metal but the guitar riffs are differnt from this style and the vocals too. There is a certain eighties thrash feeling that allows this guy to give more hooks to the song and gain a lot of interest from the listener. The interesting thing here is also that Cobolt 60 is a duo consisting of Mr. Hustler on drums and vocals and Dod on guitars, bass and backing voclas. And they make this great music with a lot of passion and fury. I recommend this CD to people who want new emotions...this guys surely will provide them to you.

Favorite tracks: "Chainsaw Michelangelo", "One To Go" and "Daddy Dearest"

Contact: http://home.no.net/cobolt60

REVIEW: BURIAL PLACE - DAMNATION

 

BURIAL PLACE - DAMNATION (Independent, 2002)

Produced by Burial place

Recorded at No Brain Studios

Tracks: 1- Introspectrum, 2- A Bloody journey to the Land of tragedy, 3- Ancient Gods, 4- Presences

Here we have this band that starts the tape with a great orchestral and extremely dark intro before getting into an original style of black metal full of orchestrations and clkimatic melodies and adding a great female vocalist (with operistic type of vocals). The main thing here is the complexity of the compositions that have many different atmospheres within each of them changing a lot the rhythms and doing many melodic arrangements with the guitars and with the keyboards and female vocals. One thing that I have to praise here is the really good sound that this guys and girl have achieved on this recording that make all the interesting arrangements shine (and don´t become buried in the mix like in some bands happen). I hope this band can really soon release a longer recording for delight of all the metal ears out there.

Favorite tracks: All the ones that are here

Contact: http://burialplace.no-brain.com

REVIEW: BRICK BATH - I WON´T LIVE THE LIE

 

BRICK BATH - I WON´T LIVE THE LIE (Independent, 2001)

Produced by Eric Meyer and Brick bath

Recorded at Brick Bath Studios

Cover Art by Eric Meyer and Ken Seaney

Tracks: 1- Inner Peace, 2- Bone Dry, 3- Pain my friend, 4- Sick of you, 5- Undone, 6- I won´t live the lie, 7- Crucified, 8- Simple Life, 9- So Wrong, 10- Oppression Kills, 11- Need, 12- Legacy, 13- Erased, 14- Die Alone

Here we have this extremely powerful band who is a top number in the underground. This is a self produced CD where they have achieved an extremely HUGE sound, specially on the guitars and drums that smash your brain into pieces. I listened this release at top volume and it surely makes you bang your head along with the drumming and the rhythms. Eric Meyer´s guitars are crushing and they have nothing to envy to the ones of famous bands like Testament, Slayer or Pantera. The same with drumming. Here we have four top quality musicians who deliver a full energetica lbum with no mercy !!!! I like a lot the way in which the drummer supports the changes and the different breaks and shythms. I would recommend you to check tracks like "Pain My friend" to know what I am talking about. The vocals have a lot of power too and Joseph Mc Caw knows where to be more energetic and where to be calmer. A must for those who enjoy powerful music.

Favorite tracks: All the CD is really powerful and energetic. Killer!!!

Contact: www.brickbath.com or www.mp3.com/brickbath

REVIEW: BRENDAN PERRY - EYE OF THE HUNTER

 

BRENDAN PERRY - EYE OF THE HUNTER (4AD Records, 2000)

Produced by Brendan Perry

Recorded at Quivvy

Cover Art by Chris Bigg

Tracks: 1- Saturday´s Child, 2- Voyage of Bran, 3- Medusa, 4- Sloth, 5- I Must Have been Blind, 6- The Captive Heart, 7- Death Will be My Bride, 8- Archangel

Here we have this solo album from one half of the great band called Dead Can Dance. Here Brendan show us really dark and calm compositions that he could have used for Dead Can Dance´s albums but he prefered to use them in a different context here. The songs are mainly acoustic, slow and really climatic with Brendan´s voice singing the sad and almost arcane lyrics over the music. As always, Brendan shows us that he is a great composer who has many ideas going on in his mind and he can translate them to music easily. The songs here are really fluent and have some spontaneity....they sound fresh. This is a good solo album. Now we want a new Dead Can Dance album!!

Favorite tracks: "Saturday´s Child", "Sloth" and "Death Will be My Bride"

Contact: www.4adrecords.com

REVIEW: BRAINSTORM - METUS MORTIS

 

BRAINSTORM - METUS MORTIS (Metal Blade Records, 2001)

Produced by Achim Köhler and Brainstorm

Cover Art by Jan Meininghaus

Tracks: 1- Metus Mortis, 2- Blind Suffering, 3- Shadowland, 4- Checkmate in Red, 5- Hollow Hideaway, 6- Weakness sows its Seed, 7- Into the Never, 8- Under Lights, 9- Cycles, 10- Behind, 11- Meet Me in the Dark, 12- Strength of Will

It is always good to listen to bands like Brainstorm because their music is what you can call heavy/power metal but they never fall in the cliches of that style. Brainstorm prefers to play heavier and more rhythmic riffs instead of the usual galloping and running riffs that most of the bands do (specially those tha are from Germany). Here we have a really heavy band with fat sounding guitars and a great mix that helps a lot to the final result. Here we have also a powerful singer like Andy Franck who is melodic but powerful and he never abuses the high pitched vocals. There are really good guitar solos and many parts on each tracks really well conected: the musicl ideas are really well developed on this CD. Lovers of heavy and power metal who don´t like copycat bands will like Brainstorm.

Favorite tracks: "Blind Suffering", "Hollow Hideaway" and "Into The Never"

Contact: www.metalblade.com

REVIEW: BORN OF FIRE - BORN OF FIRE

 

BORN OF FIRE - BORN OF FIRE (Independent, 2001)

Produced by Larry Elea and Born of Fire

Recorded at Mindz Eye

Cover Art by Born of Fire

Tracks: 1- Centrifuge, 2- Lifemares, 3- In the End

This is a MCD containing three tracks of pure classical heavy metal. Here you have all the elments that the style must have. You have the heavy guitars, then you have melodies, then you have a bass that accentutaes really well along the drummer and you have a singer with a really big vocal range (in the vein of Geoff Tate - Bruce Dickinson). The drummer is good at making interesting arrangements and adding a lot of power to the music along with the guitarist. There are interesting guitar passages (also here there is some use of clean guitars to make some parts more climatic like it happens on "Lifemares"). I would like the mix to be a little bit less raw, specially on the guitar and I think that can make the music even more powerful. I liked a lot the way in which "In the End" starts with the clean guitars and the bass playing interesting notes while the singer makes interesting vocal inflexions. Lovers of heavy metal will surely love Born of Fire. I hope to listen more from them soon.

Favorite tracks: The three here are really good metal songs

Contact: SddDrums@aol.com