The general Metal discussion thread

[Visutox 188]

In case anyone cares: the new Hooded Menace album just leaked, and it's solid as fuck. I'm gonna give it more spins, but I really dug it. 

[Visutox 188]

I've seen quite a few end-year lists thus far, and I was gonna ask you guys to share yours or at least give some of your favorite releases... But then I realised I'm rather interested to know what are some of your most disappointing releases from this year? There have been a few for me, for example:

 

Enslaved — E 

That album was bland as fuck and didn't make me feel anything throughout the whole thing. What I found most frustrating is probably the fact that when I felt like it was going somewhere, it just kept tragically going nowhere.

 

Falloch — Prospice

I didn't know these guys were releasing this so it's not like I was expecting anything, but let's say that I was excited to hear this new one. It did nothing for me and actually just managed to frustrate the hell out of me since I love their two previous albums. Tragic.

 

Al-Namrood — Enkar 

I enjoy these guys music and I admire them for their history and bravery, but this new album just felt boring to me and I was looking forward its end throughout the whole thing. Too bad.

 

Feared — Svart

I'm not gonna lie, I expected something. The previous one wasn't that good, but I was hoping to hear something similar to Synder... The first single they dropped for this album was a warning, and I didn't pay attention. 9 tracks, 25 minutes and only 2 good songs.

 

Uneven Structure — La Partition 

I tried to like this album, I honestly wanted to like it but I couldn't. I don't know what type of result they were going for with that production, but it was a total miss. And even when I managed to go past that prod, the music itself was meh. A few good songs towards the end, but that's it.

 

Moonspell — 1755

Was excited because I actually liked the samples they dropped and the context of the album's theme/lyrics, and when the album came out I did quite enjoy it. But as I gave it more listens, I ended up realizing it was quite mediocre for Moonspell standards. Such a shame.

 

That's some of mine, didn't want to make it too long. 

 

Btw I'm also interested by your favorite albums as well so if possible, drop yours! 

Edited December 18, 2017 by Visutox

[Bear 1817]

I'll throw together two lists sometime before the week ends.

[Bear 1817]

Vexovoid's debut album is up on their bandcamp: https://vexovoid.bandcamp.com/

 

 

Progressive thrash clearly inspired by Vektor, Voivod, Black Fast and Droid. It's not very original, but it really does the job to say at least. I'm really diggin' it!

[Bear 1817]

 

 

Sweet!

 

[Bear 1817]

 

 

 

Windhand and Satan's Satyrs split release with each act contributing two and three tracks. I enjoyed the first Windhand album when it was released, but now I don't really listen to it anymore. It's a decent Electric Wizard clone, but nothing more. The later outputs I find to be straight up awful.

 

So to be honest I wish Satan's Satyrs had just released these three tracks as an EP. Diggin' the cover art tho. Looks neat!

[Bear 1817]

 

Quote

The recording and mastering of the new IMMORTAL album is completed.
The band´s upcoming new full-length album has been produced by Peter
Tägtgren (Abyss Studio) who also produced «At The Heart Of Winter",
"Damned In Black", "Sons Of Northern Darkness" and "All Shall Fall"

Demonaz and Horgh comment: 
"We have put a massive amount of energy into this, and wanted to deliver our absolutely best.
It has been a pleasure to finish the studio process and most of all being stoked 
about the final result. Peter Tägtgren has done an outstanding job in producing and 
mixing it. We now look forward to have it released, and are excited to share our 9th 
full length with you all."

The album will be released by Nuclear Blast Records in 2018 (release date will follow)
and will contain the following tracks:

"Northern Chaos Gods", "Into Battle Ride", "Gates To Blashyrkh",
"Grim And Dark", "Called To Ice", "Where Mountains Rise",
"Blacker Of Worlds" and "Mighty Ravendark"

The line-up on the album is:
Demonaz (vocals, guitars)
Horgh (drums)
Peter Tägtgren (session bass)

 

While remaining a bit sceptical, I cannot deny my curiosity here. I really hope they've gone back in time to a thrashier, darker or grimmer sound.

[Bear 1817]

 

 

 

Track from the upcoming Drudkh album. Sounds great!

[Bear 1817]

 

 

New D666 from an upcoming album or EP.  Not quite as good as their previous album, but it sounds good. Very heavy and speed metal sounding, but I get som viking-era Bathory-vibes from it too. The mix is bad tho, but I hope it's better on the actual release.

 

[Visutox 188]

Immortal, Drudkh and Deströyer 666 (they're releasing an EP) and the year just started. Damn! Really looking forward to listen them all.

 

I've been able to check out some new releases so far, but most of them were leaks. My favorite for now is undoubtedly that Summoning album. 

Albums from Harakiri for the Sky, Shining and Abigor are also great!

[Bear 1817]

Other enjoyable albums so far:

 

Viölence - MotörDemon

Filthy black/speed metal inspired by Venom, Midnight, Mötorhead, Bathory and so on. Incredibly catchy stuff. "We worship chaos, whisky is our wine, our death is brewed and our witches are divine."

 

Luzifer - Black Knight

Occult heavy metal in the vein of Mercyful Fate, King Diamond, In Solitude and so on. To be quite honest I've only heard the first track, but it's brilliant heavy metal. And consider the quality of the EP I can only assume that the second track is fantastic too.

[Jigsaw9 6783]

Just listened to that new Satan's Satyrs song (Succubus), sounds cool! Has a bit of a Black Sabbath vibe to me. Nice.

 

Super interested in that new Immortal album btw.

Edited January 13, 2018 by Jigsaw9

[Bear 1817]

Wasn't very impressed by the new Satan's Satyrs myself. A very ordinary track with nothing unique or special to it. Both Wild Beyond Belief! and Don't Deliver Us gave us something new, unique and fresh at the time of release. Die Screaming and this new track does not. It's not bad, but I'll rather listen to Electric Wizard tbh.

[Bear 1817]

 

 

This album is gonna be so damn good.

 

 

[Bear 1817]

 

Damn, that's the cover art for the upcoming EP by the recent death metal giants Rude. They've given us two of the finest death metal albums in recent time and I can't wait for this to be released.

 

 

I'm really diggin' the new cover art for the upcoming Cist EP too. Like Rude, Cist draws a lot of inspiration from mid-era Pestilence, old Death and old Morbid Angel, although much thrashier. They've been superb up until now, and I don't expect this to be any less.

[Bear 1817]

 

[Visutox 188]

On 14/01/2018 at 4:03 PM, Bear said:

Damn, that's the cover art for the upcoming EP by the recent death metal giants Rude. They've given us two of the finest death metal albums in recent time and I can't wait for this to be released.

 

 Omg I so cannot wait for this to come out! 

 

Some interesting names have announced new albums so far, among which I remember : Obscura, Between the Buried and Me (double album), Memoriam, Hypno5e and  Violet Cold (trilogy). I'm obviously not mentioning those who have been cited above. (Drudkh, Immortal, Rude, and so on)

 

Bands such as Saor, Sulphur Aeon and Enthroned are (or are about to start) recording new stuff.

 

That leaves me thinking that 2018 has enormous potential musically, let's see how it goes this year. 

Edited January 18, 2018 by Visutox

[Lestat 2167]

Went to see the first show of the Black Twilight Circle's mainland tour yesterday. And I have to say, this was an experience all itself. I felt as if I were witnessing an ancient Aztec ritual of some sort, the ambience was just dark, raw and utterly mysterious. They compiled Dolorvotre, Arizmenda, Blue Hummingbird On The Left and Volahn for this night (I think they are switching through bands as the tour progresses?), and it was quite the perfect lineup for the evening, I would have to say.

 

I hadn't heard much of Dolorvotre previously as I have just recently been going through the entire Circle's discography as of late, as I had only really dived into Arizmenda, Shataan, Axeman and Volahn. Thrashy and raw and they therefore compose themselves on the side of the more 'traditional' raw black metal sound in the Circle. Eduardo 'Volahn' Ramírez himself is on vocal duties and distorts himself through all sorts of ritual incantations with vocal pedals and through the mask he's wearing. They were loud and chaotic (but that speaks for itself here in this case), and they pitched off the night perfectly. They were great, but I did not find them to be the most admirable name in the group. Either way, their final track 'Worship Black Twilight' pretty much made the night already.

 

 

Next up were Arizmenda and they were my favourite performance of the night. Juan 'Murdunbad' Cabello is a sick, wailing monster and I just cannot describe his possessed screams and howls and it literally felt as if I stood on the edge of hell here. The entire ambience changed from Dolorvotre, and I have to commend these musicians of being capable of setting such a different tone with different bands mostly compiled of the same musicians. If you are in need of a psychedelic and unhinged black metal trip, choose an album by Arizmenda to listen to, it will surely do the trick — just know that the experience is only complete when seeing them live as they are much more derailed and frenzied on stage. They only played for half an hour and somewhere I wished they and Volahn exchanged positions, but seeing as Volahn is the Circle's main entity, it is understandable that they receive the most stage time. 

 

 

Blue Hummingbird On The Left place themselves in quite a different setting with the usage of traditional South-American instruments replicating the sounds of animals calling throughout. Cuauh Youalli (Eagle Night) for instance is supported by an instrument that imitates the sound of an eagle in flight, and a pletora of flutes are also used. I am uncertain if they changed vocalists or if the vocalist simply cut his hair, either way, if this was Tlacaelel I could not quite recognise him by looks alone. I had only listened to BHL's EP 'Bloodflower' quickly before departing for the night, but if it were him, he sounded a lot heavier live. He looked genuinely haunted, barking away with bulging eyes and temples throbbing and the term 'bestial war metal' isn't far off when it comes to describing them, relying heavily on themes around Mexican history and the gods of war (Blue Hummingbird On The Left is a direct translation of Huitzilopochtli, Aztec god of human sacrifice and warfare). Unfortunately the sound system failed them and somewhere their sound was less distinct than the previous two groups, but I blame this purely on the sound technicians as everyone was complaining about it. Either way, they were unexpectedly my second favourite act.

 

 

Somewhat delayed, Volahn entered the stage a few moments later than planned and therefore the night lasted longer (not that I could complain, though!). This is Eduardo's primary entity and the Circle's main focus, and everyone can see why. Their entire appearance is a little more polished and every riff sounds a little cleaner. They were the only group who played for an hour but they didn't drag, which was quite the pleasant surprise. What is also surprising is that for being the main act, they don't carry the most specific sound and are more in league with Dolorvotre here (same vocalist, go figure), but they pack a punch with whatever they deliver, which is pretty much blast beat heaven. They were obviously a great closer for the night and I went home very satisfied. Let's hope they'll do this again in the future.

 

 

I'm hoping to add some more (professional) pictures later if they are added on Facebook somewhere, as I didn't take any myself. I didn't bring much cash so I only bought a t-shirt, I figured if I wanted to collect things by this movement the best way to approach is Discogs or Bandcamp, their releases aren't as extremely underground and difficult to find as I thought.

Edited January 20, 2018 by Lestat

[Bear 1817]

A few other releases to look forward in 2018:

 

Myrkraverk - Nær døden

 

Myrkraverk have since its birth in 2007 only released two EPs in 2009 and 2011, and now the debut album is here. Both EPs are very good. Flk/black metal inspired mainly by Isengard, with Infamroth from Throne of Katarsis and Skuggeheim.

 

Deathstorm - Reaping What Is Left

 

Violent thrash metal inspired by the two first Kreator albums, Morbid Saint and demo/debut by Sadus. The cover art is really disappointing though. 

 

Previous covers:

 

 

 

 

Really diggin' these covers. Album should be good anyway.

[Jigsaw9 6783]

New Mammoth Grinder album "Cosmic Crypt" just dropped. Groovy filthy deathy pummeling fun.

 

 

[Bear 1817]

 

 

 

Two tracks from the debut albums of Austrian black/thrashers Transilvania. I really liked their debut EP and split and was very much looking forward to this, and so far I am diggin' it. Nice, epic and majestic. Really 90's atmosphere and stuff. This will be good.

[Bear 1817]

 

 

Uada just finished their recording of the new album. Again, great cover. Love how it's basically just a different version (past/future/another dimension/what?) of the first cover. That is very interesting. Loved their first album and look forward to this hella lot.

 

 

[Jigsaw9 6783]

18 hours ago, Bear said:

Uada just finished their recording of the new album. Again, great cover. Love how it's basically just a different version (past/future/another dimension/what?) of the first cover. That is very interesting. Loved their first album and look forward to this hella lot.

Amazing! Can't wait!

 

Also, Blood Music just posted the first new song from Lychgate's upcoming album that will be released on 30th March.

 

 

I'm not really sold yet, but they wrote that this is the outro track anyway. So hoping the rest of the album will be a bit more interesting/varied.

 

In other news, I've been spinning the new Tribulation record lately, very cool stuff.

Edited February 2, 2018 by Jigsaw9

[Bear 1817]

 

 

 

New track from the upcoming album. Catchy stuff. Very Dissection-esque, but that's very fine with me.

[Bear 1817]

Some interesting news regarding Sodom is that Tom Angelripper kicked both the guitarist (1996-2018) and drummer (2010-2018) and got himself three new members. Frank Blackfire who played on Expurse of Sodomy, Persecution Mania and Agent Orange (as well as Kreator's Coma of Souls) is back on guitar, Tormentor/Husky from Desaster is in on drums and some random guy from a random band is also in on guitar. I haven't liked a Sodom album in ages, but with these guys I can see the band taking a 180 and go more old school and less melodic again. 

 

Liked their new band pictures too, albeit I get a bit trend-feeling of it all. But that's OK. Looks very old school and very thrash metal, and judging from the pictures I wouldn't be surprised if there's elements of black metal in an upcoming album.