REVIEW: FLOODLAND - THE NOW AND HERE IS NEVER

 

FLOODLAND - THE NOW AND HERE IS NEVER (Serpent Qui Danse, 1998)

Produced by michael Strasser and Axel Rob

Recorded at Future Sound Studios, Vienna

Photos by Gerald Zugmann

Tracks: 1- The Now and Here is never, 2- War In My Head, 3- Digital Heaven, 4- Sister of Mercy, 5- Talking To My Radio, 6- Trust, believe and Die, 7-Shepherd Death, 8- marionette, 9- The Plague, 10- Black Rain, 11- Neon Dreams, 12- Too Late, 13- Behind the Unicorn

This is the prelude of what Floodland was going to achieve in their new release, "Ocean of the Lost". There are three years between that album and this one and the band got better in that time sounding tighter and doing more intrincate arrangements. The music here is again very dark with an emphasis on vocal arrangements, guitar melodies and keyboards that help the music to be as climatic as the band wants. It is interesting the way in which the vocals are harmonized in some tracks like "Shepherd Death" where you can listen to a deeper vocal in the background while the main vocal is completely in the middle range. The palms here go to the guitarist, Burnhard Wieser, who is the risponsible of many of the moods contained in this recording through his constant change between clean and distorted guitar. A classic. Favorite tracks: "Trust, Believe and Die", "The Plague" and "Neon Dreams". Contact: www.floodland.org

REVIEW: FLOODLAND - OCEAN OF THE LOST

 

FLOODLAND - OCEAN OF THE LOST (Wait and Bleed, 2001)

Produced by Milos Dolezal

Recorded at Hacienda Studios, Zirovnice

Cover Art: David Maninger

Tracks: 1- White Skin, Black Soul, 2- Ocean of the Lost, 3- Crepusculum, 4- Never, 5- I standing Fall, 6- Always on the Wrong Side, 7- The Dawn (version), 8- remembering Tomorrow, 9- Coming Home Tonight, 10- Mist of Time, 11- Sea of Light, 12- Prague, 13- 1648, 14- The Camp, 15- Coming Home Tonight (reprise)

This is a release with a really good mix and sound! The band Floodland goes along the style that I call gothic metal, that is a style heavier than gothic rock but retainingv the climatic elements of that style along with some of the arrangements. And this is one of the fundamental things in Floodland´s music: the arrangements...they have plenty of them here, from certain guitar arpeggios along with keyboards that enhance the music to certain vocal passages that make the music really climatic or the female / male vocals duets that are used in songs like "Never". This CD has fifteen tracks in this vein and it is interesting to see how well developed the songs are, being exactly that: SONGS. The main influences thta I can listen here are: Moonspell, Sisters of Mercy, some Paradise Lost ("One Second" era), that is very dark music but constructing songs that have a lot of hooks on them. Favorite tracks: "Crepusculum", " Remembering Tomorrow" and "Always on the wrong side". Contact: www.floodland.org

REVIEW: FEW LEFT STANDING - WORMWOOD

 

PRESS RELEASE:

FEW LEFT STANDING - WORMWOOD (Solidstate Recs., 2001)

Tracks: 1-Burn me to the ground, 2- The latest Fad, 3- What´s the use, 4- Kneel Down and Fight, 5- Against All, 6- Contemplating Spiritual Suicide, 7- The pursuit of happiness, 8- Give credit where credit is due, 9- No Apology, 10- 10000 Angry hardcore kids, 11- Identity Crisis, 12- Educate the ignorant, 13- Wormwood

A full strength beginning on this CD with "Burn me to the ground" . this is the new Few Left Standing CD that will be released on February by the extreme and modern label Solidstate Recs.. Few Left Standing is a modern death metal band with guitar riffs that are not typical of the style ...in fact they are more dissonant (as an example check the opening of "The latest fad"). There are also some melodic lines done by the bass guitar that make the tracks more interesting and diverse. But the fundamental thing here are the crushing guitars with their dissonance and the rotten and powerful vocals in the vein of Death. The CD is 50 minutes long and there are 13 brutal tracks with no mercy for the listener. Favorite tracks: What´s th use", " The pursuit of happiness" and "10000 angry hardcore kids". Contact: www.solidstaterecords.com

REVIEW: FEW LEFT STANDING - WORMWOOD

 

FEW LEFT STANDING - WORMWOOD (Solidstate Recs., 2001)

Tracks: 1-Burn me to the ground, 2- The latest Fad, 3- What´s the use, 4- Kneel Down and Fight, 5- Against All, 6- Contemplating Spiritual Suicide, 7- The pursuit of happiness, 8- Give credit where credit is due, 9- No Apology, 10- 10000 Angry hardcore kids, 11- Identity Crisis, 12- Educate the ignorant, 13- Wormwood

A full strength beginning on this CD with "Burn me to the ground" . this is the new Few Left Standing CD that will be released on February by the extreme and modern label Solidstate Recs.. Few Left Standing is a modern death metal band with guitar riffs that are not typical of the style ...in fact they are more dissonant (as an example check the opening of "The latest fad"). There are also some melodic lines done by the bass guitar that make the tracks more interesting and diverse. But the fundamental thing here are the crushing guitars with their dissonance and the rotten and powerful vocals in the vein of Death. The CD is 50 minutes long and there are 13 brutal tracks with no mercy for the listener. Favorite tracks: What´s th use", " The pursuit of happiness" and "10000 angry hardcore kids". Contact: www.solidstaterecords.com

REVIEW: EVAN PARKER - LINES BURNT IN LIGHT

 

EVAN PARKER - LINES BURNT IN LIGHT (Psi Records, 2001)

Recorded at 11 October 2001 by Martin Davidson

Cover Art by Roger Ackling

Tracks: 1- Line Im 2- Line 2, 3- Line 3

This is a killer experimental album of solo pieces by soprano saxophone master Evan Parker. There are three pieces here "Line 1", "Line 2 and "Line 3". The first one was played improvising before the audience arrived and the other two were played in front of the audience. Parker plays phrases using a lot of notes on each making the audience gasp because of the technicality that this phrases demand. The notes played are not performed within some scale or some commonly known structure. Instead of that the music here is coming directly from Parker´s brain to his fingers, lungs and mouth making this a masterpiece in spontaneous music. This CD is released on Psi Recs. a division of Emanme Disc, the reknown jazz/experimental music label, Contact: www.emanemdisc.com

REVIEW: ESO-CHARIS - ESOCHARIS

 

ESO-CHARIS - ESOCHARIS (Solid State Recs., 2001)

Produced by Bruce Fizhugh and Eso-charis

Recorded at Poynter´s Palace in little Rock, AR

Cover Photo by Bitter

Tracks: 1- Born With a Future, 2- Processed Bodies, 3- Once Upon a Fashionable, 4- The Narrowing List, 5- Spirit of Revival, 6- Dunamis, 7- Skimmers, 8- The Judas Swing

What we have here? Eso-charis is a band that in some places sounds like Nile, in some places like Soulfly, in some like a new metal band and all of this with a lot of breaks and changes within the same song structure. In fact I think that they have created with this album the Eso-charis sound that is an extremely heavy and modern sound (specially on guitars) with multiple technical changes that sets them apart from other bands of the style. It is really great to listen to the calm parts with clean guitars that are very weird using chords and open strings to create this passages that sound very twisted. The bass is distorted and that adds a lot of bottom end to Esocharis music. A really powerful album. Favorite tracks: "Born With a Future","The Narrowing List" and "Dunamis". Contact: www.solidstaterecords.com

REVIEW: EMPEROR DEB - BLACK MOSES

 

EMPEROR DEB - BLACK MOSES (Lunasound Recs., 2001)

Produced by Graeme Flynn and Jim Jones

Recorded at Emperor Deb, NY

Art by The Gasworks

Tracks: 1- Second Skin, 2- Slow Mama, 3- Yr Gonna Get it, 4- Blown Away, 5- Hot Grundies, 6- Wont let go, 7- Strange Life, 8- Cut it out, 9- 20/20, 10 Eye on You, 11- Yr Friend, 12- Under The River

This CD starts directly with a guitar playing riffs with fuzz distortion and wah wah making it sound like a mix of stoner rock and some seventies sounding rock and roll. Then it calms down and the vocals enter in the sort of hard rock style mixed with some grunge and modern rock. There are a lot of different moods going on in this CD...from direct rock to songs that are much subtler (using cleaner guitar) and rocking vocals. For rock´n´roll fans. Favorite tracks: "Hot Grundies", " Cut it Out" and "Eye on You". Contact: www.lunasoundrecording.com . 

REVIEW: EDENBRIDGE - ARCANA

 

EDENBRIDGE - ARCANA (Nems Enterprises, 2002)

Produced by Lanvall

Recorded at House of Audio Studios by Lochen Weyer

Cover Art by Markus Mayer

Tracks: 1- Ascending, 2- Starlight Reverie, 3- the Palace, 4- A Moment of Time, 5- Fly on a Rainbow Dream, 6- Color My Sky, 7- Velvet Eyes of Dawn, 8- the Whisper of the Ages, 9- Into the Light, 10- Suspiria, 11- Winter Winds, 12- Arcadia

"Ascending" the orchestral introduction takes us to the world of Edenbridge. A world full of heavy metal melodies as you can listen in "Starlight Reverie" the first track. Compared to their previous album this one is a step forward, specially in certain arrangements between the guitars and the keyboards. Obviously, the main thing here are Sabine Edelsbacher vocals who is singing in her own way without trying to sound like a classical soprano (even if that is her vocal range) ansd without abusing the vibrato in her voice. Instrumentally speaking the music is completely dominated by Lanvall´s guitars and keyboards taht construct all the songs contained here. This edition comes with two bonus tracks: "Velvet Eyes of Dawn" and "The Whisper of the Ages". Really progressive heavy metal. Favorite tracks: "The Palace" (a lot of arrangements and orchestration here), "Fly on a Rainbow Dream" and "Velvet Eyes of Dawn". Contact: www.nems.com.ar

REVIEW: DUNCAN WILDER JOHNSON - DESTRUCT-A-THOR

 

DUNCAN WILDER JOHNSON - DESTRUCT-A-THOR (Wonderdrug Recs., 2001)

Mastered by Ken Camaro

Edited and Produced by Tara de Marco and Duncan Wilder Johnson

Graphic Design by Duncan Wilder Johnson

Tracks: 1- God of Car Crashes, 2- Dictionary definition of the Word "Dude", 3- Heavy Metal Mountain Movie, 4- heavy metal Part 3: Ozzfest, 5- Tim Catz, 6- Dude, Fuckin´war, Man?, 7- On Fire, 8- Nipplekabob, 9- Heavy Metal part 5: Motorhead, 10- Screaming penis eats the Corpse, 11- Assholes Part 1: Electric Boogaloo, 12- Assholes Part 2: Chicago, Enhanced CD: Heavy metal part 4: Scissorfight

The music of Duncan Wilder Johnson has elements from metal, from straight rock´n´roll, from stoner rock and from hardcore too. The first name that comes to my mind is Henry Rollins but Duncan is heavier and has influences closer to the more extreme side of the specter. Even if there are certain rock elements here, they are played with a big fat guitar sound that makes the result heavier. Duncan has a great sense of humor as he shows in "Heavy Metal Part Part 3: Ozzfest" a spoken track where Duncan tells the audience about his experiences in the Ozzfest festival. I liked a lot this combination of extremely heavy and fast tracks with spoken tracks with great humour. This CD has twelve rocking tracks plus an enhanced part with a video for "Heavy Metal part 4: Scissorfight" live performance. Don´t miss this CD. Favorite tracks: "Heavy Metal Mountain Movie", "Dude, Fuckin´war, Man?" and "Screaming Penis Eats The Corpse". Contact: www.wonderdrugrecords.com

REVIEW: DREAMING IN RED - SILENCE BEFORE

 

DREAMING IN RED - SILENCE BEFORE... - DEMO 2001 (Independent, 2001)

Tracks: 1- Devotion, 2- I bid You Welcome, 3- Dalse, 4- Lunatic, 5- Ashes, 6- denied, 7- Braeheart, 8-Resist, 9- Lost Souls

The album opens with a clean guitar and a voice speaking before getting into the heavier side of Dreaming in Red. I like a lot one element and that is the combination of one guitar doing an extremely heavy rhythm combined with other guitar doing some sad melodies over it. And that is the thing that sets Dreaming in Red apart from the other bands...that combination of heaviness and bestiality with melody and subtle moments. There are a lot of passages where the instruments shine. Plus the vocals are real death in some parts and remind me of bands like Illdisposed. The drummer is killer with a lot of double bass drumming and a lot intersting patterns using the toms and the ride cymbal. Fans of bands extremely heavy but at the same time really melodic will have orgasms with this release. Favorite tracks: "I bid you welcome", "Ashes" and "Resist". Contact: www.dreaming-in-red.com