Monthly Archives: April 2013

SKULL110

Posted on by
2

THUNDERBOLT, Inhuman Ritual Massmurder  (2004, Agonia)

The skull:
This one is very cool. The skull looks as if it’s embedded in a layer of sedimentary cave rock, thrown down by the gods as the earth’s crust was still molten and pliable, creating the traces of motion that appear on either side of the skull. The color of dried blood on the cranium suggests this was indeed a violently rendered death, the possessor of this skull presumably dying as fast as he lived.

The music:
It’s probably unintentional, but this Polish band sounds like super-fast melodic Swede-death circa 1995 — the good stuff like Sacramentum and Dissection — taken and then satanized to an even more extreme degree,  sped up so severely that it almost runs off the tracks. Or maybe just think of a melodic Marduk. In any case, this stuff is plain old shit-your-pants intense black metal, so well done that it’s hard not to appreciate, even if a whole album of this stuff gets incredibly boring near or even before the halfway mark. They broke up one album after this one, and although I’m not sure why, I imagine it would get difficult to top what they’re doing here. And they sure give Incantation a challenge when it comes to ridiculously evil-sounding song titles: “Everlasting Infernal Puissance” and “Impious Bewitchments of Aberration.”
— Friar Wagner

SKULL109

Posted on by
Reply

HATCHET, Frailty of the Flesh (2006, demo)

The skull:
Angry skulls chomping on band names are always welcomed by the Council. I think it’s safe to call the weapons flanking this skully fellow “axes,” and not hatchets, but I suppose that’s to be expected when you name your band after a prosaic and utilitarian tool. You gotta do something to make it look scary. Although obviously drawn in pencil, this cover transcends the shittiness of most covers thusly produced, even if it’s also clear that the artist decided that one half of his skull looked a lot better than the other half, and then just copied and flipped the good half for both sides. That’s the kind of shoddy, half-assed work we like to see around here. The band kept up this motif at least for a while, and there’s a second, entirely different version of this image floating around: skull biting logo, backed by axes. Hatchet clearly embraces the skull in a praiseworthy manner.

The music:
Hatchet are one of the better rethrash bands working the US scene these days, better than Warbringer, but not as good as Havok (nor as good as Hexen. I would love to make a 4H joke, but I can’t think of another young thrash band that starts with H. And Hirax doesn’t count, even if everyone in that band but Katon is a kid.) Their latest album has a bit more tempo variation and melody than most of their bedenimed brethren, but this early stuff is pretty uninspired, a joyless catalog of the three or four thrash cliches upon which the entire revival is evidently built. Hatchet are actually from San Francisco, but it must be said that as of 2007, they couldn’t even stand up to the third tier of bands from the first wave of thrash in that great city. They play tightly but there are no surprises in these songs, and the drumming is mercilessly stock. There can’t be more than five different beats on this entire demo, which is maybe appropriate since every song is basically the same tempo. On the plus side, Hatchet doesn’t sing about beer or moshing. I couldn’t actually find a copy of this demo to review, but I was able to find contemporary live videos on YouTube for all these songs, and then they were also all re-recorded for the band’s proper full length debut, Awaiting Evil. I emailed the band and guitarist Julz Ramos got back to me in minutes, but he’s out on tour right now, for at least a month, and couldn’t send me a copy of the demo. Sadly, the skullection can’t wait that long, but I appreciate his cooperation!
— Friar Johnsen

SKULL108

Posted on by
Reply

GRAVE DESECRATOR, Cult of Warfare and Darkness  (2003, Ketzer)

The skull:
Oooh, scary ritual skull. This slightly out-of-focus picture kind of looks ancient, although the bullet belt is likely circa 1985 or so. There’s also a silver pentagram that looks like it would make a bad-ass necklace charm, and the two candles burning liven up the party. The skull? He’s all “Don’t you dare steal my evil thunder, you candlestick, pentagram and bullet belt.” Looks like he’s mounted on the candle holder, which is pretty awesome. The cover itself would be a little more awesome if it weren’t an idea that you’ve seen a zillion times before. I’m guessing that the unoriginal cover idea is going to translate to the music inside…

The music:
I couldn’t be more wrong!!! Grave Desecrator play RHCP-style pop-funk, dressed up with dubstep bass throbbing and progressive folk whimsy, while hints of skronking jazz rock serve as well-placed segues. Nah, of course it’s orthodox black metal that you’ve heard a zillion times before. If you own Sarcofago’s excellent I.N.R.I., listen to that while simultaneously listening to Darkthrone’s A Blaze in the Northern Sky, and you’ll basically get Grave Desecrator. Two songs, 10 minutes, which makes the plagiarism at least tolerable.
— Friar Wagner

SKULL107

Posted on by
Reply

TORMENTED/BOMBS OF HADES, split (2011 War Anthem)

The skull:
Designed like a slasher movie poster from the 80s, this is a very classy cover. The massive, monocular, slightly bloody skull glares evilly, no doubt irritated by the tiny cobweb affixed to his slimy peeper. He’s got no jaw, but that just leaves more room for the songtitles, without creating a need to obscure skullparts. Basically, everything about this cover works as an homage, while still succeeding brilliantly as a big dumb skull. An unmitigated triumph of BDSery! Bravo!

The music:
Tormented are more or less straight-up Earache 1990: Entombed’s Left Hand Path with a faint but present trace of Hellbastard’s Natural Order, at least on their original track here, “Repulsion Fix”. This song is less ambitious than really anything Entombed was doing back in the day, but Tormented do their work briskly and professionally and “Repulsion Fix” is a very fun tune. Their second track is a straightfoward and fairly pointless cover of Kreator’s “Tormentor”. I can’t say I’m a huge fan of the first couple Kreator albums in any case, but I think the appeal is inextricably bound up in the energy and naivety that only earnest young men can deliver. Bombs of Hades are a grimier, grittier band although the basic template is still late 80s Stockholm. More Unleashed than Entombed, perhaps. I find this willful primitivism unappealing in the main, but BoH aren’t a bad band at all. Their original tune, in addition to the obvious Stockholm nods, also strongly reminds me of several songs on Sodom’s overlooked Tapping the Vein album. Maybe this is a coincidence, but if it’s not, I at least salute the band for that. They round out the split with a cover of Loud Pipe’s “Clean Your Head.” I’ve never heard of that band, but from the sounds of it, they were just some kind of D-beat band, making this cover even less essential and interesting than “Tormentor”.
— Friar Johnsen

SKULL106

Posted on by
Reply

VOETSEK, Voetsek  (2005, Deep Six)

The skull:
Looks like a raging troublemaker of a skull, this guy…horns, sharp fangs, wings. And he’s apparently laughing at YOU, cuz YOU are the one about to meet a horrible fate. This skull is gonna live forever. The lopsided eyes make this skull look that much more demented. The color is orange rust, not too far away from the color of dried blood. YOUR blood. Shit, even the band logo includes umlauts over the O and an upside down cross. Holy hell.

The music:
Amazingly, this EP is not all that metal in sound, despite the cover. At this stage Voetsek were more punk than metal, but their speed-freaked ferocity is something any fan of rabid thrash can get their teeth into. Eight songs blaze by in six minutes here, but it’s their later stuff that has a more metallic feel. This is their early Suicidal Tendencies to their later Cryptic Slaughter, if you know what I mean.
— Friar Wagner

SKULL105

Posted on by
Reply

CRYSTAL LAKE, Terror Machine (2007, self-released)

The skull:
It’s like, “how much more brown could this be?” and the answer is, “None. None more brown.” Any cover where the background is basically just noise should set off aesthetic alarms. Yes, I can see that there’s some barbed wire in there, and I guess some… pipes? but really, it just looks like a seamless tile for your evil desktop. It appears that the terror machine is really just an apparatus for skull ventilation, which doesn’t seem so sinister to me.

The music:
Modern thrash with death metal production values. Think Krisiun doing Dew Scented covers or something. Yeah, that good. A strong Slayer influences dominates the riffing, but this being a Brazilian band, there’s a thorough undercurrent of much sloppier oldschool shit derived from German sources. Vocals are a joyless barking. The band is tight, but the songs are dull. If you’re the kind of person who’s totally worn out your Carnal Forge discs, then I guess maybe you’d like Crystal Lake, but if you’re really that kind of person, you’re probably too irony deficient to be reading Big Dumb Skulls in the first place.
— Friar Johnsen

SKULL104

Posted on by
Reply

XANADOO, Mindless Purge  (2007, demo)

The skull:
An X-ray image of what appears to be an alien skull, or an advanced case of hydrocephalus. It’s incredibly simple, and we applaud that, but there’s hardly anything else to note other than this (and I would like all but the most dedicated Skullologists to leave the room now): Note that this skull (104), as well as skulls 102, and 98, all feature a skull with the left eye blacked out, or perhaps it’s the right eye that’s somehow illuminated. Yes, I have a life, and I know you do too, but…isn’t that weird? Class dismissed.

The music:
Singapore’s Xanadoo plays mindless thrash, hence the demo title, but that’s not necessarily a bad thing. It’s wholly derivative but not lame enough to call it Xanadoo-doo. Darn. This is for sure: whole lotta early Tankard goin’ on. It’s hard to find any more appropriate reference point for this than Zombie Attack — same frenzied speed, minimal distortion on the guitars, infectious riffs, vocals blurted out in earnest, frivolous lyrical concerns, titles like “Combat Thrash” and “Metal Mania.” The guitar solos are not all that improvised-sounding, rather kind of thematic and pretty memorable. Since this demo was released they’ve got a bunch of other material available — demos, splits, self-released albums and whatnot — but I’m surprised these guys aren’t on a label like Heavy Artillery or Punishment 18, considering there’s some kind of market out there for re-thrash. Case in point, an album title like Black. Death Grind. Shit! They know what they want and know how to play it.
— Friar Wagner

SKULL103

Posted on by
Reply

ILLDISPOSED, The Prestige (2008, AFM)

The skull:
Here we have a rounded, almost simian skull plummeting through the black abyss, leaving some kind of osseous vapor trail. It’s actually an eye-catching image, even if it doesn’t make a whole lot of sense. The photoshop work on the boney miasma is not very convincing, but the lighting and simplicity of the base skull image are quite nice. Ironically, the Council agrees that the digitial foofery dramatically diminishes the prestige of this cover, which, had it been just the skull, would have been through-the-roof!

The music:
Grooving mid-tempo death metal a la Gorefest, although obviously not as good, because no one does this like Gorefest. Illdisposed, from Denmark, add a bit of the requisite Scandinavian melodicism to the riffery, but the formula is basically song-oriented death metal reminiscent of the times when “song oriented death metal” wasn’t an oxymoron. I had never heard Illdisposed before this, and I have to say I’m fairly impressed overall. This is a pretty late release for them, their eighth, and they’ve been around since 1993, which made me wonder if their earlier stuff was better, and in fact, that seems to be the case. If anything, their more recent output is perhaps a bit too polished. The extra brutality of the earliest albums, while never overweaning, is definitely missed now. But while they seem to have maintained a remarkable quality in their songwriting over two decades, the vocals have always been kind of bad, a sort of mushy gurgle of a growl, the work of a guy trying way too hard to sound evil. You’ll get that with death metal, even some good stuff, but it’s still always a bit disappointing. I can live with the singing, though, because the music is good, and I think there’s a good chance I’ll even buy some of this stuff.
— Friar Johnsen

SKULL102

Posted on by
Reply

DESOLATION ANGELS, Feels Like Thunder  (2008, Cyclone Empire)

The skull:
Now here’s a skull that’s seen better days. At the present moment depicted on the cover, the skull is attempting to bite away at manacles that ensnare his wrists. Usually any sign of a skeleton disqualifies a skull from entering these hallowed halls, but even the limbs shown are partial, and not obviously connected to any kind of body. And without any kind of neck or spine bones visible, this skull floats in its imprisoned doom. The nasal hole is of a particularly triangular shape, as if the drawer of the skull lost his skull reference book. The skull also sports quite a bony bulge above his right eye, and that eye is clouded in yellow. You can tell this skull’s been through absolute hell, and he’s trying not to take it anymore.

The music:
Feels Like Thunder is a collection of 4 CDs anthologizing this well-regarded NWOBHM band’s studio, demo and live recordings. Their run lasted the entire ’80s decade, and while it’s on the darker, rawer, heavier side of that British metal movement, I’m still left a little cold with much of it. Some of the band’s material sounds like early ’80s Blue Oyster Cult when BOC were attempting a more metallic direction, and generally there’s a very likable vibe here. Lots of NWOBHM is just super-raw pub rock, but not Desolation Angels; this is heavy metal through and through. And although there’s a lot to like from the movement (Diamond Head, Angel Witch, Gaskin, Legend), I personally end up appreciating most of the other bands for what they kick-started without loving the music itself. And what they kick-started were the bands from the U.S. and German thrash movements, and the later speed and power metal also. Sorry, but Desolation Angels aren’t the avatars of NWOBHM perfection that many make them out to be, but to each his own…for my own, there’s still hardly anything better than Gaskin’s End of the World!
— Friar Wagner

SKULL101

Posted on by
Reply

SARCASM, Revolt (2006, On-Parole Productions)

The skull:
For as big and central as this skull is, this cover couldn’t be less exciting. It fails to properly capture true dumbness, and neither does it offer even a whiff of adolescent heavy metal cool. The motion blur in the lights and the fuzziness of the skull are obviously a desperate attempt to make any artistic statement at all with this cover, but what that statement is, and how it relates to the title, I couldn’t say. Nevertheless, this is probably the perfect embodiment of a color I would never have thought possible: neon brown. What could be dumber than that?

The music:
Slovenia’s Sarcasm started as a fairly typical eastern European thrash band, attempting a relatively melodic take on the genre but playing it with the precision of mid 80s German thrashers (note: not a compliment). It appears they took the 90s off, taking thirteen years to follow up their 1989 debut, and in that time they mellowed significantly, with Revolt sounding more like speedy traditional metal (bordering occasionally on power metal) than thrash. Arakain, a favorite of mine from the Czech Republic, made a similar transition, albeit with more grace (and much better tunes). Sarcasm are hobbled by congenital sloppiness: the playing is haphazard, the half-barked, half-sung vocals are rather bland, and no attention is paid to the details. But, the songs are generally pretty fun, with some good riffs that recall the better middle-tier European speed metal acts of the 80s, and the production is appropriately but not distractingly old school. About half the lyrics are in what I assume is Slovene, but the rest are in English, and it must be said that these are not good. Slovene (or whatever it is) is an excellent metal language, like Czech, but even when singing in their native tongue, they make some regrettable choices, notably the chorus to “Silicon Carne” which REALLY sounds like “Chili con carne”. I’d love it if this play on words was intentional, but it almost certainly was not. Revolt is maybe not quite good enough to really get excited about, but it at least stokes an interest in their other releases. Unfortunately, this appears to be the apex of their melodic sound (their lone release since is not as good), and the earliest, pure thrash album, while perhaps more successful on those terms, is not as good in an absolute sense. If I happen to notice the release of a new Sarcasm album, I’ll probably check it out, but not with a great deal of optimism.