Nile's buddies return at the same time as Nile with an obviously related musical offering, and a rather peculiar lyrical theme of muslims killing christians in the crusades. Still, pretty awesome offering all around, nothing I can particularly point at being wrong with it except it's not as sinister as some of their previous works. I like the further shift towards solid, tight rhythms, though I think the guitars could be a bit nastier and louder in the mix.
Track to Listen to - Arcana Heriticae, Inner Sanctum
Dethklok - The Dethalbum
The full length full album from the cartoon death metallers on Metalocalypse. Metal as fook, it sounds like one of the best mixtures of full on 80s squealy, octave-rich harmonised cheese and decent middle of the road death metal. Very talented musicians, these guys.
Track to listen to - Go into the water
Devildriver - The Last Kind Words
Better melodic stuff than ever before as well as more trickyl uncoal-chamberesque parts that further distance them from their past. Much, much better to listen to than Trivium, does all their good parts better, and all their worst parts aren't there. I still like Dez's vocals, I don't care what the anti-coal chamber crowd say, better than a million 'core bands.
Track to listen to - These Fighting Words
Dimmu Borgir - In Sorte Diaboli
I'm sure everyone who would care about a review of Dimmu would be familiar enough with the band already, so I'll just say it: good album, the orchestral stuff is probably better than ever before (except potentially the Stormblast re-recording that had the prague philharmonic), as is the guitar riffage. My only complaint is that despite the guitar riffage being awesome, the songs aren't quite as memorable as their previous bests. Maybe that'll change with time.
Track to listen to - The Sinister Awakening
Entombed - Serpent Saints
After the dirge that was Unreal Estate, I wasn't expecting this to be good at all. As it is, it's old-school thrash in death metal tunings, complete with bits where several people join in and sing the line and drumming that doesn't revolve around blasts. It's a worthy addition to their catalogue and just downright fun to listen to. I'm glad someone's still making music like this.
Track to listen to - Ministry
Machine Head - The Blackening
Modern thrash awesomeness that is better than every single Metallica album. I've loved these guys for ages, and while it's obviously more edging towards Iron Maiden style stuff than the ball-breaking Burn My Eyes album, it retains enough heaviness and aggression to be credible enough to buy.
Track to listen to - Halo.
Jesu - Pale sketches
My perfect type of chillout music; really fucking bassy, a cover of a RHPS classic, thick, full new-style doomy guitars and bass, and almost dreamlike rocky industrial dance setting the percussion and leads. I could imagine the ambient dance side of things being in the background of a happy ending on Salad Fingers, if such a thing were possible. Creepy but uplifting and melancholic, just tremendous.
Track to listen to - Don't Dream It
Nile - Ithyphallic
The new Nile, sounds like it continued straight from AotW, outstanding as always. Fast ones, slow ones, all sorts of egyptian sounding interludey bits and Egypt/Lovecraft themes expertly brought forth in the atmosphere and instrumentation.
Song to listen to - Even the Gods Must Die, What May Safely Be Written
Suicide Silence - The Cleansing
I'm generally averse to a lot of metalcore and hardcore punk, I'll say it now, it's not appealling to me for the "yell at parents" shrilly vocals and some of the time signature stuff grates on me, as well as a lot of the guitar tones. That's not to say the genres are devoid of really good bits here and there, but on the whole it's a bit of a turnoff.
This album is heavy as fuck, though. Grooves and aggression and well fucking low-tuned everything blasting out of the ass. This is probably the best deathcore band I've listened to, better than JFAC who are the best known band in the genre. Chuggy and malevolent throughout with cool little techy flutters here and there.
Song to listen to - The Price of Beauty
#1 Anaal Nathrakh - Hell is Empty and all the Devils are Here
I like this album so much I'm going to quote the review from here:
It’s easy to become jaded as a metalhead. The focus on fastest-loudest-heaviest overstimulation and glut of similar-sounding bands can reduce even the most ardent fan to a sneering elitist (as anyone who’s frequented metal web forums can tell you), and frankly I’m no exception. That’s why I’m thankful as fuck for bands like Anaal Nathrakh. Where the vast majority of groups I come across writing for this site offer little more than temporary satisfaction, these British maniacs are amongst the hallowed few who can make me forget my desensitization to extreme music and compel me to bang my head like I’m fourteen and hearing Slayer for the first time all over again. With Hell Is Empty…And All The Devils Are Here, they’ve done just that for the fourth consecutive time, and are well on their way to cementing themselves as one of the greatest metal acts of our era.
Anaal Nathrakh are most often classified as a black metal band; they were never a particularly traditional example of the style and at this juncture become even less so (this means that you corpsepainted basement-dwelling Darkthrone fellators can get the fuck out now before your delicate sensibilities are offended). Like Eschaton before it, Hell Is Empty… is an even blend of mechanized death metal, bleakly epic melody, and the preposterously violent BM of The Codex Necro. Once again the band benefits immensely from a clear, loud, modern production—no muffled drums or buried ‘grym’ vox here, thankfully. Multi-instrumentalist virtuoso Mick Kenney (Mistress, Frost, Exploder…or should I call him ‘Irrumator?’) has stepped it up again with an even more diverse and surprisingly infectious exhibition of hyper-intense riffing, from the precision grooves of “The Final Absolution” to the grave blastbeaten trem melodies of “Lama Sabachthani,” as well as absolutely nailing some tastefully brief solos on tracks like “Screaming Of the Unborn.”
Talented as Kenney is, though, even he is a little upstaged by the absolutely jaw-dropping performance of Dave Hunt/V.I.T.R.I.O.L.. There is no doubt in my mind that this man is one of the best metal vocalists of all time. In a genre where every singer is trying to sound possessed, Hunt actually does it, and it sounds like all of Hell is erupting out of his lungs every time he opens his mouth here. Hunt’s performance too has grown more diverse, and it seems that he’s learned to generate just about every vocal tone imaginable with his barbed-wire lump of a larynx. From his trademark head-exploding scream to br00tal inward gutturals to a whole arsenal of bellows, growls, grunts, yelps and screeches, the guy can do it all. To top it off, the fucker can still do spot-on Ihsahn (Emperor) cleans, and the four tracks on Hell Is Empty… featuring his epic singing (“Der Hölle Rache Kocht In Meinem Herzen,” “Virus Bomb,” “The Final Absolution,” “Shatter the Empyrean”) are amongst the most fiendishly catchy on the album. Don’t think for a moment that Anaal Nathrakh has abandoned their famed causticity, though. One listen to the impossibly intense blast of hate that is pure-BM closer “Castigation and Betrayal” will bring you right back to the Codex Necro days, and’ll probably leave you wondering whether this band is even human (signs point to ‘shit no,’ says my heavy metal magic 8-ball).
I really can’t say enough good things about this band, and the only real criticism I can think of is that this isn’t quite as much of an evolution past Eschaton as I would’ve liked. Where most black metal bands simply settle for a goofily cliché ‘evil’ persona, Anaal Nathrakh have actually achieved an aesthetic of utter misanthropic hatred. More importantly, they’ve made hatred fucking rock. Remember the first time you heard a blastbeat? This’ll give you that grand old feeling again. When people use the term ‘extreme metal,’ this is what they should be talking about. So I guess what I’m trying to say is, fucking buy this.
Songs to listen to - Virus Bomb, The Final Absolution, When the World Stops Turning, Sanction Extremis (Kill Them All), Der Holler Rache Kocht In Meinem Herzen
