REVIEW: NOCTURNAL RITES - SHADOWLAND

NOCTURNAL RITES - SHADOWLAND (Century Media, 2002 )

Produced By: Daniel Bergstrand

Tracks: 1- Eyes of the Dead, 2- Shadowland, 3- Invincible, 4- Revelation, 5- Never Die, 6- Underworld, 7- Vengenace, 8- Faceless God, 9- Birth of Chaos, 10- The Watcher

Nocturnal Rites is with no doubt one of the most powerful power metal bands that have ever surfaced. First of all, their riffs are much more powerful than those that one can listen in any of the other bands of the style, they are faster and they don´t abuse the galloping rhythms prefering more interestiong riffs (check the "Shadowland" for example). Then they have a singer who sings putting all his guts in the melodies instead of simply abusing the high pitches melodies, and he has a lot of personality to distinguish his voice from the others of the style. Then this guys have Daniel Bergstrand producing them and that has made the guitars louder and more in your face as is also the keyboard (I like a lot the way this album is mixed because the production have make things tighter but have not taken the power of the band away as sometimes happen). Lovers of power metal will enjoy this one. 

Favorite tracks: "Underworld", "Faceless God" and "Revelation"

Contact: www.centurymedia.com

REVIEW: NOBODY´S FOOL - 2002

 NOBODY´S FOOL - 2002 (Independent, 2002)

Produced By: BK and Nobody´s Fool

Tracks: 1- Inside Out, 2- Hold On, 3- Forever, 4- Bye Bye

Cover Art by Nobody´s Fool

This is a four track demo promo CD from this australian rocking band. Here we have four new songs with a lot of hooks in the choruses and the riffs. The sound is a little bit more thin here than in the "II" CD (specially on the drums) and I liked more the drums sound in the other CD. The songs are well constructed and they have this eighties rocking feeling that is typical from this band. There are also the solos by BK that are an extra ingredient for Nobody´s Fool´s music that add some flavours that lovers of guitar will like. 

Favorite tracks: The Four

Contact: http://nobodysfool.cjb.net

REVIEW: NOBODY´S FOOL - II

NOBODY´S FOOL - II (Independent, 2001)

Produced By: Nobody´s Fool

Tracks: 1- Living in Another World, 2- Party, 3- Easy, 4- Forbidden Fruit, 5- Without You, 6- Heaven, 7- Born To the Sun, 8- Guiding Lights

Cover Art by Milosz

Recorded at EA Studios

Nobody´s Fool is a great hard rocking band from Australia. It ´s been a long time since I did not listened to an album as rocking as this one or the one by Machine Gun Kelly that we are reviewing too. The music here is heavily influenced by eighties rock and roll bands. One of the main things here is the job that BK, the guitarist does through all the recording. Playing all the rocking riffs and adding a lot of solos on each track here. Here we also have a rocking vocalist with some bluesy shades in his voice that add a warm touch to each of the tracks here. This is a demonstration that hard rock is not dead and that there are great bands like Nobody´s Fool out there!

Favorite tracks: "Living In Another World", "Born To the Sun" and "Heaven"

Contact: http://nobodysfool.cjb.net

REVIEW: NINE FINGERS LEFT - GROWING AS A HUMAN

 

NINE FINGERS LEFT - GROWING AS A HUMAN (Independent, 2001)

Produced By: Chico Santos and Johnny Cadaver

Tracks: 1- Make Up Your Mind, 2- Down To Nothing, 3- Found a New Day, 4- As a Human

Cover Art by Américas and NFL

Recorded at Morgan Sul Estudios

The CD starts really rhythmically in the vein of bands like Biohazard but even with more rhythm in the vocals. The guitars are here used to emphasize this type of rhythms that are constructed around some riff and the drums patterns. Here we have a lot of hardcore influences too that are evident mainly in some of the vocals and in some of the guitar riffs. The production here is very polished and the guitars sound specially heavy and clear. Ther is also use of clean guitars like in the beginning of "Down To Nothing" which soon get into heavier ones and into a faster rhythm. Lovers of bands like Biohazard or maybe later day Agnostic Front will like Nine Fingers Left with no doubt.

Favorite tracks: "Make up Your Mind", "Down To Nothing" and "As a Human"

Contact: ninefingersleft@hotmail.com

REVIEW: NIGHTWISH - CENTURY CHILD

NIGHTWISH - CENTURY CHILD (Spinefarm Recs., 2002 )

Produced By: Tuomas Holopainen and Tee Cee Kinnunen

Tracks: 1- Bless the Child, 2- End of All Hope, 3- Dead To the World, 4- Ever Dream, 5- Slaying the Dreamer, 6- Forever Yours, 7- Ocean Soul, 8- Feel For You, 9- The Phantom of the Opera, 10- Beauty of the Beast

Cover Art by Markus Mayer

Recorded at Caverock Studios

Here we have Nightwish´s new album. And I have to say that this album is closer to "Oceanborn" than to "Wishmaster". Why? Because it has a heavier sound than on their previous release ("Wishmaster") which had a lot of emphasis on easy listening melodies. Here we have riffs that can be compared to the ones in classics like "Passion and the Opera" or songs like that one (check "Slaying the Dreamer"). On "Century Child" we have also more male vocals that contrast a lot with Tarja´s ones and add new sides to Nightwish´s music. The sound of this album is excellent and makes the music shine even more. .

Favorite tracks: "Slaying the Dreamer", "Beauty of the Beast" and "Ocean Soul"

Contact: www.spinefarm.fi

REVIEW: NEVER AGAIN - GERMAN DEATH METAL AGAINST FASCISM

 

NEVER AGAIN - GERMAN DEATH METAL AGAINST FASCISM (Deich Recs., 2002)

Produced By: Michael Eden

Tracks: 1- PROFANITY: Thw springs within, 2- SPAWN: At the Gates of Human Mercy, 3- MEATKNIFE: Bloodblister, 4- MEATKNIFE: Tombstone sucker, 5- TEARS OF DECAY: Redemption, 6- MENTAL ABERRATION: Escape from Within, 7- MALEDICTIVE PIGS: Delicay Deformity, 8- EMBEDDED: The forsaken Soul, 9- FETUS CHRIST: To those who Oppose, 10- GALLERY OF DARKNESS: Sea of Silence, 11- VERY WICKED: Creation of a God, 12-FALLEN YGGDRASIL: Nightflower, 13- IMPURE: Something Evil, 14- CRYPTIC: Shrinkhead Butt Plug, 15- ANASARCA: Something Evil, 16- INTESTIONAL INFECTION: Der Arbeiter, 17- INTESTIONAL INFECTION: Nazischweine, 18- THORNESBREED: Dream of Extinction, 19- FESTERING SALVIA: Festering Salvia Live, 20- OF TREES AND ORCHIDS: Nywlathetep; 21- FEARER: Stored Experiment; 22- DESPONDENCY: Dogmatic Strangehold

Cover Art by Michael Eden

Here we have 22 tracks of pure death metal from bands coming from Germany who show their feelings against fascism and nazism. Here is pure brutality with fast riffs from bands like Profanity or Of Trees and Orchids or the technicality of Embedded. There is a lot of difference in the sound of each band and some of them are mixed better than others but they all show teir brutality and their devastating riffs. My aboslute favorite here is Thornesbreed that delivers a brutal yet climatic tune that melts the listener´s brain. Apart from being a manifest against fascism this is a good sampler of underground death metal bands that are showing their talents in Germany today. A must

Favorite bands: Of trees and Orchids, Thornesbreed and Despondency

Contact: www.deichrecords.de

REVIEW: NECROPHOBIC - BLOODHYMNS

NECROPHOBIC - BLOODHYMNS (Hammerheart Records, 2002)

Produced By: Necrophobic and Tomas Skogsberg

Tracks: 1- Taste of Black, 2- Dreams Shall Flesh, 3- Act of Rebellion, 4- Shadowseeds, 5- Mourningsoul, 6- Helfire, 7- Cult of Blood, 8- Roots of Heldrassil, 9- Blood Anthem, 10- Among the Storms

Cover Art by Sebastian Ramstedt

Recorded at Sunlight Studios

Necrophobic is a powerful death/black metal band with interesting thrash touches. Here we have their powerful new album which was recorded on the mythic Sunlight Studios where the nineties scandinavian death metal scene developed. This time they have ten powerful tracks that are extremely fast and really powerful. Tobias Sidegård´s vocals are powerful as hell going from screaming to guttural but always adding power to the tracks. Also thumbs up for the killer drummer Joakim Sterner who can be clearly listened on this album (this CD has a great mix....Tomas Skogsberg is a genius doing this). The tracks here have subtle melodies as the ones you can hear in "Shadowseeds" which create a darker mood that is great in Necrophobic hands. 

Favorite tracks: "Dreams Shall Flesh", "Mourningsoul" and "Shadowseeds"

Contact: www.hammerheart.com

REVIEW: NAZGUL - DE EXPUGNATIONE ELFMUTH

 

NAZGUL - DE EXPUGNATIONE ELFMUTH (Elegy Recs., 2002 )

Produced By: Nazgul

Tracks: 1- Proemium, 2- Hult-Garth, 3- Elficidium, 4- Dies Festi..., 5- In Summis Montibus, 6- Nigrum Praesagium, 7- Impetus Quartae Lunae Novar, 8- Caelum Obscuratur, 9- Legio Draconarum orkian, 10- Natura Cadit, 11- Charcharon, 12- Solvitur Ad Elfmuth, 13- Bellum, 14- Epilogus

Cover Art by Vite

Recorded at Petit Studio

Here we have this band that plays "orkish black metal". In fact their music is black metal with many orchestrated parts mixed with some extremely fasta and raw parts. The vocals here are of different types, from the trollish (or orkish) type to a more guttural one to a bass spoken one. This guys know how to do an orchestral compositiona nd they show it through all this release...each of the songs here have a lot of keyboards and samplers that reflects the feeling that this guys want to transmit to the listener. When combined with the hyper raw guitar (that is mixed a little bit low for my taste) and the programmed drums this gives us Nazgul´s sound. The sound is good, specially on the keyboards (the main elment here) and the vocals (I prefer the spoken vocals because they give more atmosphere to the tracks). Lovers of atmospheric black metal will like this one for sure

Favorite tracks: All the CD, specially the orchestrated parts

Contact: www.elegymusic.com

REVIEW: MOURMANSK 150 - PSORIASIS GYRATA 3

MOURMANSK 150 - PSORIASIS GYRATA 3" (Independent, 2002 )

Produced By: Mourmansk 150

Tracks: 1- Skin and Internal Disorder, 2- Diagnosis, 3- Treatment, 4- Surgical Techniques

Cover Art by Unknownsickness

Here we have four tracks of pure experimentation with electronic sounds. Elemental sounds are mixed with electronics making this experiment in sonic madness. Mourmansk 150 knows no limits for their exploration of sonic boundaries, sometimes closer to noise and sometimes closer to ambient. Tracks like "Treatment" are more chaotic while tracks like "Diagnosis" have a different structure and show more coherence with spoken dialogues and sounds from some documentals from nazism and war. The compositions are quite long (more or less five minutes each) delivering a total of twenty minutes of pure exploration of sonic tapestries. People who enjoy this type of experimentation will surely find Mourmansk 150´s music interesting.  

Favorite tracks: "Diagnosis" and "Surgical techniques"

Contact: http://mourmansk150.free.fr

REVIEW: MOTIVE - DAMNED IF YOU DO...

 

MOTIVE - DAMNED IF YOU DO... (Independent, 2001 )

 

Produced By: Motive

Tracks: 1- Expose The Lies, 2- Spiral Fracture, 3- Religious Intent, 4- The Deep End, 5- Land, 6- Damned if You Do, 7- Almost Over, 8- Liberty

This is a previous recording from this powerful band and comparing this to the 4 song demo that we reviewed before you can listen to the evolution that this band has suffered, specially getting a better sound. Here we have all the other elements from Motive´s sound, the fast drumming (the double bass work is not so clear on this recording), the great bass work, the fast guitar riffs and solos and the vocals that later became more powerful and have been mixed in a better way. This is a good band for those looking for pure power and energy and some wild attitude.

Favorite tracks: "Spiral Fracture", "Land" and "The Deep End"

Contact: www.motive1.homestead.com