/r/RABM/

Monday, December 18, 2017

Voland - "Voland 2" (2017)

VOLAND - "Voland 2"

Year: 2017
Genre: Symphonic Metal
Country: Italy

Track List:
  1. 1917
  2. Ottobre
  3. Dubrina
  4. Outro
Bandcamp / Facebook


Voland are an extreme symphonic metal duo from Bergamo, Italy. Lyrically, Voland sing of various facts from Russian history, theatrically interpreting tragically epic real events.

Their first demo was reviewed on our blog, check it out here.
The EP "Voland 2" was published this year in celebration of the 100th anniversary of Russian Revolution of October 1917, with songs directly referencing the work of poets, writers and musicians active in that time.

Their philosophy regarding music is simple: they do art for its sake and for theirselves, They don't wish to monetize on it and therefore Voland's music is freely downloadable from their channels and available in digital format only. All they ask in return is their music to be listened to and spread around.


M.

Monday, November 27, 2017

The Depressick - "Carcinoma" (2017)


THE DEPRESSICK - "Carcinoma"

Year: 2017
Genre: Post-Black Metal / Depressive Black Metal
Country: México

Track List:
  1. Lifeless
  2. Deceiver
  3. Nowhere
  4. Filth
  5. Black Scars
  6. Misdeeds
  7. Abyssmal
  8. Depression Anxiety
  9. Spleen Cancer
  10. Drowned
  11. Aqueduct Gpe
Bandcamp / Facebook

The Depressick was founded in winter of 2012-2013 by Old Skull and Detestas with the aim to express inner struggles, deep selfhate and melancolic feelings powered by oppressive, hopeless and misable landscapes from the daily life in Mexico City. Carcinoma is their new album were they continue exploring the miserable life in a big city as México where people seem to be so selfish, so unconcerned about others and their environment.

The artwork in this one (as in the last EP) was made by me. 

M.

Thursday, November 16, 2017

Funeral Art - "Cuivië" (2017)

FUNERAL ART - "Cuivië"

Year: 2017
Genre: Ambient/Black Metal
Country: Guatemala

Track List:
  1. Intro
  2. Esencia en mí
  3. La muerte de toda ilusión
  4. El rostro de Marbas
  5. Iniciación
  6. Lilith Ritus
  7. Outro
Bandcamp

This is a material loaded with pure magic, with lyrics about the awakening of consciousness and perception beyond what human eyes are destined to see.
With sounds wrapped in ritualistic environments and poetic devotion to Lilith!
Under the starry mantle of this night, the moon shines with radiance announcing the dark melodies of Funeral Art.
Lord Marbas is a reader, and supporter of this blog and the RABM movement and we have shared their first release, "La belleza oculta" here on the blog. Go to bandcamp to listen and download.

M.

Monday, November 13, 2017

Loukaniko y lxs perrxs - "Viajo con mis perros" (2016)



LOUKANIKO Y LXS PERRXS - "Viajo con mis perrxs" (I travel with my dogs)

Year: 2016
Genre: Folk-punk
Country: México

Track List:
  1. Salvate, escapate (Save yourself, get away)
  2. Viajo con mis perrxs (I travel with my dogs)
  3. Caminata fugitiva (Runaway walk)
  4. Complicidad (Complicity)
  5. Dime si estamos locos (Tell me if we are not crazy)
    (live tracks)
  6. Mancha de sangre (Bloodstain)
  7. Regresa (Come back)
  8. Una mañana (One mourning)
  9. Aquella batalla (That battle)
  10. Peter Young / animinimalista (animinimalist)

"Loukaniko y lxs perrxs" is a side project from members of Contra//Historia, openly Anarchist, with very beautiful and politic lyrics. In fact, this is one of my favorite projects ever.
Some of the tracks were written to the comrades that are right now hidden and escaping 
as a result of state oppression, also it's an album dedicated to all the comrades resisting... we can have better times.

Listen also to their first release here.

Thursday, November 9, 2017

Flagare - "Arder" (2017)



FLAGARE - "Arder"

Year:
2017
Genre: Post-Punk
Country: Argentina

Tracklist:


        1. Desacato (Contempt)
        2. Ebullición (Boiling point)
        3. Desollados (Skinned)
        4. Marea (Tide)
        5. Vacuum

Facebook // Bandcamp

"Arder" (To burn) is the first release from the Argentinian post-punk band Flagare. They are located in Buenos Aires and define themselves as anarchists and vegans, which is really clear in their lyrics. Also, in the Bandcamp bio you can read "We'll burn, day after day, before the atrocious reality that beats our senses, we're not going to accept indifference, we choose the disorder generated by our ideals' burning to keep us lit".

Musically, you can find a pretty straight-up post-punk sound, but with a strong emphasis on the atmosphere and textures, and a slightly raw but clear mix.

Oh, and this is my first time posting as well. I've been following the blog for a couple of years now, and recently joined to share some of the material I came across.

Tuesday, November 7, 2017

Gizzards - "Blue Death Demos" (2017)



GIZZARDS - "Blue Death Demos"

Year: 2017
Genre: Death Rock
Country: USA

Track List:
  1. Blue Death
  2. Alt Delete
  3. Sanctuary City

Well, Gizzards are an anarcho-communist death rock band from the USA, an interesting stuff regarding the genre. Influenced by Killing Joke, New Model Army, Sisters of Mercy, Chameleons, Godflesh, etc.

I don't have more information than that but they sound awesome and I thinks i'ts very interesting to have this kind of politics onto these music.

(Listen and download directly on bandcamp)

Friday, November 3, 2017

Sacred Son - "Sacred Son" (2017)

SACRED SON - "Sacred Son"

Year: 2017
Genre: Atmospheric Black Metal
Country: England
Tracklist:

  1. Cleave the Alicorn
  2. Apocalyptic Winter
  3. Ethereal Light (Interlude)
  4. Sepulchral Ritual

Belying the summery cover photo, the debut album of the promising solo project Sacred Son is like listening to a blizzard. Swirling vortices of icy riffing and harsh vocals meld through the album, with the cello-heavy interlude "Ethereal Light" offering the only respite from the onslaught. The overall sound is reminiscent of bands like Wolves in the Throne Room, who Dane, the lone artist behind this release, lists as among his chief inspirations, along with formative second wave Norwegian bands such as Darkthrone, Mayhem, and Immortal.

In our brief email conversation, Dane explained his motivation to create the album as well as lyrical themes; "I've been listening to black metal for a long time and I found myself at a point in time last year where my thoughts were regularly pervaded by riffs which I wrote down until I one day had enough material with which to write an album. Thematically I wanted the music to evoke images of snow, mountains and forests (imagery one might typically find on a black metal album cover) whilst lyrically the album touches on things like the ancestories [sic] of evil and the crushing indifference of the universe."

The album builds a distinct mood and atmosphere as it progresses, without sacrificing variety or producing a homogenised or boring sound. This lack of stagnation is refreshing in a genre that can all too easily devolve into lazy songwriting poorly excused by desire to build ambience; Sacred Son shows you can have both the freshness of interesting writing mixed with a hefty dose of atmosphere without either element losing out. I think his choice to keep the album relatively short at half an hour, with only four songs, was a good one, as it allows for a full and intense creative expression without the feeling of trying to fill time at any point. In short, I was impressed by this as a first release, I enjoyed listening to it, and I definitely recommend it to any fans of bands like WiTTR, Ancst, and Krallice, in particular. It's also available for pre-release on vinyl currently, so if the pretentious thrill of buying more LPs is as addictive to you as it is to me, it's well worth spending your money on.

I'd like to add an apology on the end of this, both to the bands who've been waiting so patiently for a review while I sort a few personal issues out and to my fellow writers on RABM for my not keeping up my end of the reviewing these last few months; everything is back on course now, and I look forward to bombarding you all with the backlog of brilliant albums I've been sent in the interim. Thankyou all again for being so patient.

T.G. 

Wednesday, November 1, 2017

Astraliste - "διάβρωση (Erosión)" (2017)


ASTRALISTE - "Erosión"

Year: 2017
Genre: Atmospheric Black Metal
Country: Argentina

Track List:
  1. Incesante (ceaseless)
  2. Turmalina (tourmaline)

Astraliste in a one-man project from Argentina. It is a band that tries to capture the landscapes and the feelings generated by being a human among nature.
With the poetry contained in the lyrics you can ask yourself, who are you? Who do you want to be in the immensity of the landscapes that surrounds you?

I know this is not strictly political, but the man behind this has been very supportive with this blog and with the ideas expressed here, so this totally has a place for us.

I took the photo used as a cover and it was a gift for this project and the beginning of it's music. 

Tuesday, September 26, 2017

Rampancy - "The Sublime Conquest of Nothing" (2017)


RAMPANCY - "The Sublime Conquest of Nothing"

Year: 2017
Genre: Black Metal
Country: Canada
Track List:
  1. Blood for blood
  2. Failure in the eyes of Jehova
  3. Schadenfreunde
  4. Choose your side
  5. Thy Kingdom
  6. Besieged
  7. Solitary march under a black flag
  8. Hanger 96 (Two forces balance)
  9. Dawn of the new order
  10. Insurrectionary extremist
  11. A.F.D.T.D
"The Sublime Conquest Of Nothing" is the fourth album chronologically and the first under the new name Rampancy following up from the 2014 release "Aftermath". Many of these songs are re-envisioned from their past as Anti-Freeze tracks found on other releases and some tracks are entirely new themselves.

Thematically, this album largely deals with topics of violence, hatred, betrayal, and insurrection. The songs expand on previous anarchist topics and declares open hostility towards a collective world enslaved by political machinery and an identity crisis.

Misconducters - "Boundless" (2015)


MISCONDUCTERS - "Boundless"

Year: 2015
Genre: Hard rock/Metal/Punk
Country: UK
Track List:
  1. The game
  2. Class of '84
  3. Pave the way
  4. Hunter and pray
  5. Boundless
  6. Plain conditioning
  7. Lurch
'It would be a bit hard to find a term that resumes this precisely, but it's definitelly not conservative/authoritarian/patriotic/sexist/racist at all, the idea of "Misconducters" has always been to make a sound free from fashions or trends, but it might be fair to roughly describe it as a well balanced mix between Hard Rock, Metal and Punk. 

DOWNLOAD

Tuesday, August 15, 2017

Repressione - "Col Sangue Agli Occhi" (2017)


REPRESIONE "Col sangue agli occhi"

Year: 2017
Genre: Hardcore
Country: Italy
Track List:
  1. Guerra alla città
  2. Huye hombre
  3. Cieli di piombo
  4. The game (INFEST)
  5. I giorni dell'ira
  6. Col sangue agli occhi
  7. Colpo su colpo
  8. Macho free zone
  9. About to crack (VITAMIN X)
  10. Happy time (xLIEx)
Bandcamp / Facebook 

Repressione are very good friends of this blog and a very supportive band with the movement. They are from Bolognia, Italy openly Anti-Fascist. 

Amethyst Falls - "Amethyst Falls" (2017)

AMETHYST FALLS "Amethyst Falls"

Year: 2017
Genre: Black Metal/Shoegaze
Country: USA
Track List:
  1. Awaning
  2. Through halogen eyes
  3. At the edge of the world our shadows singhing
  4. Hintergerdanke
  5. Painted Hands
Bandcamp 

Our friends from Orb Weaver Collective (who define themselves as "wild-seeking artist on the western coast of the United States, unified, living together at the edge of civilization, bout to their craft as musicians, painters, poets and performers") send us the newest ralease by Amethyst Falls (an amazing band from Oakland, USA that plays a mix between Black Metal, Dark Wave and Shoegaze).

Smuteční slavnost - "Zahrada krkavců" (2017)

Smuteční slavnost -  "Zahrada krkavců"

Year: 2017
Genre: Black Metal
Country: Czech Republic
Track List:
  1. Moc sžírá vědomí
  2. Zákonitost střídá chtíč
  3. Když procházíme světem
  4. Jistota na konci řady
Bandcamp / Facebook

"Strictly unorthodox black metal" tag-line was meant as a joke. But we mean it. We are not interested in taking any part in your orthodox, evil, role-playing. We use black metal as a tool, not as an idol."
Smuteční slavnost is back on the road. This is their newest release with very strong lyrics and a very 'solid' sound.

Also, you can take a look into their past releases we have supported here. And stream and download this one in bandcamp. 



Friday, July 21, 2017

Anarchist Wolves - "Kill the Fascist Seed EP" (2017)

ANARCHIST WOLVES - "Kill the Fascist Seed EP"

Year: 2107
Genre: Blackened Crust/Grind/Thrash
Country: USA
Tracklist:
  1. Smash the Fascist
  2. Malignancy
  3. Smoke Out the Rats
  4. Interlachen
  5. No Empires
  6. Post Truth
  7. Plight of Insurrection

Another brilliant solo project, this one from anonymous artist "Wolf Boy" in New Mexico.According to the artist, the album is intended to "fuel your outrage, to soundtrack your organizing and agitating, and to propel you into the streets to stop fascism." Worthy goals all round. 

The album is aggressively lo-fi and anti-commercial in all the finest traditions of the punk and black metal scenes that spawned it, paying homage to the greats of the genre with a clear influence from the Norwegian second wave. The dark tremolo picked intro to "Interlachen", resolving into furious crusty riffing, perfectly enacpsulates the violent mood of the album, along with its wide range of influences. The longest track on the album, "Plight of Insurrection" similarly utilizes mournful minor key ambience before shattering the atmosphere into shards of raw crust punk and militaristic drumming.

What I found particularly interesting was the blend of hardcore elements into the mix, with breakdown-esque sections surrounded by blast beats, punky riffing, gurgling screams, and the kind of tremolo picking in minor keys that is normally found in much more traditional black metal. That being said, this is clearly a black metal release, not a punk one. The warlike aggression in the music, the militant drumming, the incredibly provocative and threatening lyrics, and their vicious delivery all combine to make Anarchist Wolves an expression of not just antifascist rage, but the kind of revolutionary art this genre is so exclusively brilliant at producing.

T.G.

Friday, July 7, 2017

Kosmogyr - "Quiescent" (2017)

KOSMOGYR - "Quiescent"

Year: 2017
Genre: Black Metal
Country: China/ Czech Republic
Track List:
  1. Quiescent
Bandcamp / Facebook

Kosmogyr is a black metal project made collaboratively by two people from Shanghai and Prague.

Monday, June 5, 2017

Blight - "Basidium" (2017)

BLIGHT  "Basidium"

Year: 2017
Genre: Black Metal
Country: USA

Track List:
  1. Side A - Theocratic Mujahidin, blight
  2. Side B - Goodbye horses
Bandcamp 

Blight is an 'anarchist black metal' band from Chico, California with primitivism related lyrics and a blasphemous and political context in their background. Their music has a raw with a lot of rage in it. I don't really have more information about this project, but it has definitely a space in our blog...

Monday, May 29, 2017

Abkehr - "In Asche" (2017)

ABKEHR  "In Asche"

Year: 2017
Genre: Black Metal
Country: Germany

Track List:
  1. I
  2. II
  3. III
  4. IV
Bandcamp / Facebook 

"From the most remote crevices of the German extreme metal underworld come Abkehr, a new black metal entity from Northern Germany who’s genesis appears to have been sparked by unprecedented emotional and mental collapse and by an unfathomable pull toward absolute, devouring darkness. Abkehr were formed in 2015 in Northern Germany by sole masterminds Raash and H. with the intent of unifying under the black looming star of self-disintegration the raw misanthropic grimness of the most praised Norwegian black metal tradition with the atmosphere and desperation of depressive black metal, and the swarming majesty of US atmospheric black metal."

Fuatha - "Oblivion" (2017)


FUATHA  "Oblivion"

Year: 2017
Genre: Black Metal
Country: USA

Track List:
  1. Abandoned
  2. Cataclysm
  3. Ashes
  4. Prophetic dreams
  5. Oblivion
Bandcamp / Facebook 

Fuatha is an atmospheric black metal band from Chino Hills, California. This band focuses its thematic in the existence of the human being and the nature that survives around the progress.

Domini Canes - "Ethereal Flesh Conduit" (2017)

DOMINI CANES "Ethereal Flesh Conduit"

Year: 2017
Genre: Blackened Punk
Country: UK

Track List:
  1. Mortality
  2. Part I
  3. Part II
  4. Veil
  5. Part III
  6. Obsidian Temple Liturgy
  7. Shackles
Bandcamp

"Domini Canes is a one man project from the UK playing crust influenced black metal that deals with mans place within existence and the individuals place within society while taking influence from observing everyday life and the institutions which dictate life such as religion, government and popular (and not so popular) culture, hoping all the while for a time when people can be truly responsible for governing themselves"

We have already shared two of it's demos, and you can check them out here


Friday, May 19, 2017

Kremator - "Return" (2017)

KREMATOR "Return"

Year: 2017
Genre: Atavistic Mulchcore
Country: USA

Track list:

  1. Decrepit
  2. Agency
  3. Wander
  4. Permeated
  5. Thirst
  6. Together
  7. Sustenance
  8. Return
  9. Espere

Kremator is an undeniably unique project, and is almost entirely unlike anything I've heard before. Aiming to create nature-inspired atmospheric grindcore (christened "atavistic mulchcore" by the band's solo member), the highly experimental music makes heavy use of drums and guttural vocals in a style reminiscent of traditional grindcore, but differs in that generally no other instrumentation is used, save the recorded sounds of the artist breathing into a microphone. The only instance of traditional instrumentation in "Return" is acoustic guitar on the final track. 

Lyrically, the aim was to create "a mixture I would call atavistic anarcho-communism. The idea was to "Return" to a forest to get away from the destruction of life in a capitalistic hellhole of a post-industrial city." It charts the flight from civilisation at a personal level, escaping from "this decrepit city" in the first track, and slowly exploring and discussing the artist's ideology through the rest of the album. Most of the music was inspired by trips to the Yosemite and Sequoia National Parks, and it reads as an acutely intimate piece of art, with a tangible sense of, to use his own word, "atavistic" longing, a desperate desire for simpler life in a rain-shrouded forest, away from the choking filth we are surrounded with by modern society.

The final two tracks present, in very different ways, an impassioned and profound cry directed at those of us who cling to civilisation - in "Return", the lyrics provide the call directly; "The fires shall burn for you /Won’t you come and be with us /To be back in the wild". Once the echoes of "Return" fade away, the final track, "Espere", (a name which, I discovered after extensive Googling, is a first-person form of an old French verb meaning "to wait", "to hope", or "to expect") holds not only the lovely allusions in the title, conveying layers of meaning plain English couldn't hope to accomplish, but also the song itself is the only instrumental track on the album, 40 seconds of gentle acoustic guitar closing the album in a soft kind of melancholic hope for a greener future.

The music is extremely experimental, and is a long way from stereotypical easy listening, but despite the challenging sound the message beneath is heartfelt, deeply personal, and beautiful. Definitely worth a listen if you're looking to broaden your horizons.

T.G.

Tuesday, May 16, 2017

Nidstang - "Retribution Will Come" (2017)

NIDSTANG "Retribution Will Come"

Year: 2017
Genre: Raw Black Metal / Crust
Country: USA

Track list:

  1. Bind
  2. Ergi
  3. Nidstang
  4. Without
  5. Infans Solaris
  6. Envenomation
  7. Alucinari
  8. Cloaked in Emerald
  9. Abstruse Existence
  10. Bound

The impressive debut of this solo project, created by one of the members of Huldrekall and influenced by the ideals of DIY punk, opens softly with "Bind", an ambient soundscape of synthesisers grinding through slow changes and gritty texture, before tearing into raw black metal aggression and hardcore riffing in "Ergi", and the shorter track "Nidstang". The album builds in speed, becoming a juggernaut fast, heavy, raw black metal, the kind of lo-fi staticky goodness any crust punk worth their patches will be left swooning over.

Vocally it's uncompromising stuff, with pure ferocity howling through the mix in a boiling overflow of ruthless aggression directed at a corrupt and complacent status quo. At times the pace varies from blistering aggression to slower and heavier, more reminiscent of particularly rough metallic hardcore than crust or black metal. This is particularly developed on the fourth track, "Without". These pace changes allow the album a kind of freshness to each track, rather than stagnating in an identical format; it hits hard and fast, and leaves you reeling.

The album closes with another ambient track, this one with a subtly different mood and feeling to "Bind", more sorrowful and final, and called "Bound", a simple and direct end to an interesting and well-developed album. Overall it's an extremely impressive first effort, and there are few similarities to the artist's main band, Huldrekall - Nidstang is most definitely its own project, not a pale copy. Can't wait to see where this debut leads.

T.G.

Friday, May 12, 2017

Amethyst Falls - "Amethyst Falls EP" (2017)


AMETHYST FALLS "Amethyst Falls"

Year: 2017
Genre: Post-Black Metal / Shoegaze
Country: USA

Track List:
  1. Reflections in the fog
  2. Exposure
Bandcamp / Facebook

Amethyst Falls, a band from Oakland, USA. They play a mix between Black Metal, Dark Wave and Shoegaze. Personally i found this very interesting and it's an impressive project.
This came from "Orb Weaver Collective" who define themselves as "wild-seeking artist on the western coast of the United States, unified, living together at the edge of civilization, bout to their craft as musicians, painters, poets and performers" You can follow this collective here.

Also, if any of you are interested they gave me two downloading codes for this EP, so, write me in case you want to oiseau@riseup.net 


From this collective you should also check this bands:
Latona Odola 
( Dark Ambient / Folk)
Leadeater (Black Metal)
Loam (Dark ambient)

Ruinas/Raíces - "Untitled" (2017)


RUINAS/RAÍCES - "Untitled"

Year: 2017
Genre: Atmospheric Black Metal
Country: Argentina

Track List:
  1. Dos colores fundiéndose (two colors merging)
  2. Mis ríos abiertos, cayendo en tu abismo (my open rivers, falling into your abyss)
  3. Creciente (growing)

Ruinas/Raices is an atmospheric black metal project from Argentina, with very strong and poetic lyrics about our feelings and our human condition, even though the band doesn't reflect their politics in the project, they are into DIY, and strongly against right-wing politics, racism and every kind of intollerance, so I'm sure they have a place in this blog.

In their facebook I've found a very beautiful text that can summarize what the hole band means, it's originally in spanish but I'm translating it: "We constantly look among the rubble we've covered ourselves with; in the void that surrounds us, between all that has been lost and is no longer spoken. The distance grows with each step. We do not have certainty, we don't do anything but ask ourselves"  


Thursday, April 20, 2017

The Well-Wisher - "The colours fade" (2017)


THE WELL-WISHER "The colours fade"

Year: 2017
Genre: Depressive Black Metal
Country: Finland

Track List:
  1. Desperation is the beginning
  2. A never-ending day
  3. The ghosts of past mistakes
  4. The colours fade
  5. I don't need hope, I need death
  6. You're never prepared
  7. Time-distorting hatred
  8. The great grey
  9. Goodbye

The Well-Wisher is a one man band from Finland. We featured his EP before, because even though this project is not strictly political TR is our reader and has been very supportive with the movement, and with left-wing ideas.
I find this album very nostalgic and with a good sound, so I hope you can give it a chance.
The album is free for streaming and download in bandcamp, and here's a music video for one of the songs:



Tuesday, April 18, 2017

BVDK - "Architecture Of Future Tribes" (2017)



BVDK "Architecture of future tribes"

Year: 2017
Genre: Post-Black Metal / Electronic
Country: France

Track List:
  1. Snatcher
  2. Surreptitious cluster
  3. Nana buluku
  4. La langue sanglante
  5. Bahir dar
  6. Jericho's pride
  7. Dar es salaam
  8. Psalm 32
Ok, BVDK, is an experimental post-black metal band from France, the last year we featured their EP here. Now they came with this interesting mix between black metal and Ethnic music paying tribute to africanvoodoo, haitan voodoo and oriental culture in this record. Even if they don't speak about politics in their lyrics, they are supporters of the RABM
movement and causes like Decolonization, Feminism, LGBTQ+ rights, Vegetarism,
etc...

You can stream and download the album for free in bandcamp.

Saturday, April 8, 2017

Blackend Horizon - "Nerhegeb" (2016)


BLACKEND HORIZON "Nerhegeb"

Year: 2016
Genre: Raw Atmospheric Blackened Crust
Country: Germany

Tracklist:

  1. As Shadows Among Nephilim
  2. 56°30'09.3"N, 14°42'45.7"E
  3. The Third Week of Autumn
  4. A Parhelions Last Descending
  5. Now, I Am Become Death, The Destroyer of Worlds

Blackend Horizon, to some extent, defies genre labels. Moments of pure noise rear through waves of mournful ambience, crushingly crusty aggression mellows with atmospheric DSBM-esque melodies, and "Raw Atmospheric Blackened Crust" seems to fall short of complete accuracy when trying to encompass the real span and depth of this strongly anti-racist German solo project.

The opening track, "As Shadows Above Nephilim", is the second longest on the album, and uses the fourteen-plus minutes allotted to it to build a slow, ominous atmosphere, interspersed with ethereal shrieks, distortion-heavy riffing and keyboard work reminiscent of early Burzum (although in this case we can all be grateful the artist behind Blackend Horizon isn't a racist douchebag). Lyrically I read it as dealing with the insane willingness to poison and destroy the future out of misguided stupidity in the present - the lines "We gathered the children/We killed our future/We killed ourselves" best conveyed this sense for me. "56°30'09.3"N, 14°42'45.7"E" is much shorter, using a stronger mix of keyboards thrown through the harshness and melancholy of the guitar and vocal work to build a true sense of mournful loss, and the building of slow, depressive madness.

"The Third Week of Autumn" begins with sonorous bass plucking, static- distortion slowly building behind it before launching into a surprisingly gentle melody. Far and away the most depressive and atmospheric track on the album, the lyrics seem to deal with lost love, and a sense of hopelessness toward a future without that love in it. It was listening to this track that really impressed me with the vocals and how they were mixed in, with a hard-struck balance between raw intensity and emotion in the more black metal or crusty sections, without overbearing the ephemeral, ethereal softness the electronic elements lend some of the tracks, such as on the instrumental ambient track "A Parhelions Last Descending".

The final - and longest - song on the album, "Now, I Am Become Death, The Destroyer Of Worlds" opens with similar electronic softness, before making a rough transition to raw, ponderous riffing, and slow, heartrending howls echoing through the mix. The song flows through softer and harder passages, building to a sample of Robert Oppenheimer's comment on the use of atomic bombs in the Trinity tests, where he references the Bhagavad-Gita. The final slow, synthesized notes trail gradually to nothing, a fittingly mournful and understated end to a complex and engaging album. Overall I strongly recommend this and the artist's prior works as fascinating and intriguing pieces of underground artwork.

T.G.

Tuesday, April 4, 2017

Disacusia - "Tripalium" (2017)


DISACUSIA "Tripalium"

Year: 2017
Genre: Crust
Country: Brazil

Track List:
  1. Pronto para cair
  2. A retomada
  3. Deturpaçao Midiática
  4. Apelo
  5. Tripalium
Bandcamp

Coming from João Pessoa, Brazil, forming in 2009, Disacusia  are a crust band and in his first official studio work entitled "Tripalium", the band presents its indignation about the actions of domination and social control by the institutional power: Work as a mechanism of torture and imprisonment of the body and mind, criminalization of poverty, banalization of violence by the media, selectivity in punitive actions as a means of preserving and maintaining power over the means of production and capital. Crustcore / grind is the dominant sonority in the band, a style also characterized by opposing the oppressive practices of the system.

Download in bandcamp
-M

Ammophilia - "Forgotten death of miserable world" (2017)


AMMOPHILIA "Forgotten death of miserable world (demo)"

Year: 2017
Genre: Raw Black Metal
Country: Slovakia
Track List:
  1. Soaken blood
  2. Desecrated pride
  3. Curse this world
Bandcamp

Ammophilia, a raw black metal band from Slovakia. Even though they are a leftist band in their demo the lyrics are more misanthropic and depressing. In bandcamp you can download their music, and also, here is the link for their last song: "Away the Carpathians", that is about jews deported from Slovakia at world war 2. 

-M

Monday, March 20, 2017

Misanthropic Forest - "demo" (2017)

Misanthropic Forest - "demo"

Year: 2017
Genre: Depressive Black Metal
Country: Finland

Tracklist:
  1. Nothing but Whores
  2. Purging Fires of Mars
  3. Before Men There Were Others
  4. Victories over a Time There Was

As long nights close in, and winter's teeth are slowly bared by a snarling autumn, you could easily imagine the raw, visceral howls of this Finnish DSBM project carrying through a darkened forest in the blackest reaches of the night. A harsh, uncompromising paragon of underground black metal spirit, the debut release of Misanthropic Forest is challenging and grim. As part of their demo submission, they sent me a statement, as follows: "political issues are irrelevant in our context. Misanthropic Forest is about hatred towards human life and we refuse to be categorized as red, anarchist or any other politically motivated music." They explained their lyrical themes as being "about nature and misanthropy how humans are destroying world and how this planet will be better place without mankind". 

 The band originally recorded these tracks in 2014, but errors made in drum tracking led them to decide they could do better and that the songs needed reworking, and they hope to have a new album out, including improved renditions of the songs on this demo, within a year. That being said, their spokesperson made it clear they're in no rush, and want to really do the music justice. This demo was released so that the original recording would be available, to not let the session go to waste. They also declined to make their lyrics public at this time, as part of a conscious effort to allow the final album release to define the songs, as they plan to reveal some of the lyrics then.

Musically, the guitar work is fast, ferociously so in places, but carrying undeniable melody. The drumming is hard and aggressive (although I understand why they thought the recording quality let down the songs a little, even on a lo-fi underground release it needs improvement), and the vocals are desperate, lower and rougher than on some black metal releases, more in the vein of Hate Forest than Wolves in the Throne Room. The opening track of the demo, "Nothing but Whores", is tempered with a sorrowful ambiance, less outright harsh and confrontational than the other songs, surprisingly beautiful even in the midst of misanthropic melancholy. "Purging Fires of Mars" steps up the pace, allowing frenetic and aggressive guitars to the fore to build an atmosphere of violence and hatred. 

"Before Men There Were Others" is a harsh continuation of their establishing sound, with fast guitar and blast beats hammering through your ears, which drops off suddenly into the gentler, slower lead-in to "Victories over a Time There Was", which has the feel of "Nothing but Whores" far more than either of the tracks between. For all they are gentler bookends to the middle songs, offering a subtle contrast to the nihilistic ferocity that comes across unbridled elsewhere on the album, they are by no means gentle songs - they carry much of the same depression, rage, and sorrow of the rest of the album, only a little more restrained. Hopefully their full-length will be out before too long, so we can appreciate their music unhampered by technical issues. I'm looking forward to it.

T.G.