Monthly Archives: January 2014

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FALL OF SERENITY, Grey Man’s Requiem  (2001, Voice of Life)

The skull:
Pretty crappy design choices here. First, all that damn brown. Of course, brown as the “new black” was just gathering steam in 2001, so we’ll give them a pass on that. [Note: the image here looks more reddish-brown than the brownish-brown one my review is based on.] But the skull itself — could those four gold horn-type things on its forehead looks less attached to the forehead? They seem to just sort of float there, as if they’re implied. They’re definitely not actually affixed, in which case they’ve got no business hanging around. Horns are serious business! Same with those silver-y jaw-horns or whatever the fuck. And I’m not going to bother wagering a guess as to what all the other bony, horny junk is behind him. It’s actually nothing, really, just a mass of random stuff that looked cool at the time to whoever designed this thing on his lunch break. The poor skull itself kind of gets lost amidst all this horny brown nonsense.

The music:
After being inundated with a ton of average average black metal, average death/thrash/black metal, and average thrash metal (and above-average in the case of Mad Maze, skull358), it’s almost refreshing to get back to some good old Swedish melodic death metal from Germany. Almost. One thing’s for sure:  Germans do love them some In Flames. Remember Night In Gales? And Fall Of Serenity do it just like that, and they do it well enough, offering a style somewhere between Whoracle and Clayman-era In Flames. Of course, there is absolutely nothing original going on throughout Grey Man’s Requiem, it plays on the same old SMDM characteristics you’ve heard reeled off by countless bands through the years. But if you keep your standards low and cannot get enough of this stuff, you could do worse. It’s just what I’d expect out of a horn-laden gold skull in a field of brown, from Germany, circa 2001.
— Friar Wagner

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LUCIDO, Demo 2 (2007, Inquisitoris Ex Mundus Novus Productions)

The skull:
With its stark woodcut-style design, this is actually a very sharp, cool, distinctive skull. From the chin to the nose, there’s not much to say. The lower half looks nice, and if the artist had rendered the top half in the same style, this would still be a cut above most BDSes, but it appears that the acid kicked in around the time the artist got to the eyes, and he just rolled with it. The pentagram feels a bit forced, but those massive will-o-wisp eyes are awesome, and they make the whole cover. My hat goes off to you, unknown French metal demo cover artist!

The music:
I couldn’t find any music from this demo, but I was able to track down the band’s first demo (and only other release), the equally brilliantly titled Demo 2005. It’s weird sloppy French thrash metal with some punk and black metal influences. The vocals are a kind of blackish troll growl and are quite lame. The music is shambling and disorganized, but its made with the same buffoonish charm that animates, say, Obsessed by Cruelty. Of course, no one really likes music that inept as a rule, unless they first heard it as a kid or it was made long before they listened to metal. Coming out as this did in 2005, well, it’s a little late to the party. Lucido even seem to know this, as they labor to play messy music with something closer to the basic instrumental proficiency people demand these days, but trying to have it both ways never works well in these contexts. Lord knows where they went, musically from here, but Metal Archives seems to think they ended up playing black metal. If so, well, that was about the Frenchest thing this band could have done.
— Friar Johnsen

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DIABOLI, Kirous  (2004, Northern Heritage)

The skull:
Some sort of Neanderthal skull here, apparently taken by surprise in the seconds prior to his death. I’m guessing death-by-meteor, the way he’s looking to the skies in bewilderment. And wait: does he look like he’s chewing on his own teeth? Or maybe his dental hygiene was that deplorable.

The music:
Either memory fails me, or Diaboli have changed. I remember hearing some of their ’90s era stuff, and it was incredibly primitive, with a bedroom 4-track sort of sound to it. But no, the band’s fourth album, Kirous, sports a thick bottom-end, a tight rhythmic foundation, and a punchy, crisp recording job. Lots of depth and quite heavy, the Celtic Frost-isms are clear throughout, although not as blatant as something like Usurper or Cianide. And indeed, there’s nearly as much early death metal atmosphere here as black metal. It sure as shit doesn’t sound like anything typical of Finnish black metal. I’m impressed, or maybe “surprised” is the better word, because as solid as this is, I still wouldn’t spend money on it.
— Friar Wagner

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AGMEN, Dethroned (2004, Ravenheart)

The skull:
Now that’s what I’m talking about! No Photoshop, no flames, no fucking bullshit. Just a dude in ridiculous bracers gripping a real live skull. That even kind of looks like a genuine piece of bone, and not some plastic replica. It’s still not a very interesting image, but with this cover you know what you’re gonna get: authenticity and boredom. Huzzah!

The music:
I’m not so well versed on Czech black metal, I’m afraid to say. I’ve heard Root and Masters Hammer (neither of whom are particularly pure as black metal goes) and, well, Agmen doesn’t sound like either. This is semi-melodic but generally fast black metal that sounds like something Swedish from the late 90s. A band that’s still all about the darkness and evil, but who also kinda like Dark Tranquillity or something. Think Mithotyn minus the folky bits. It’s not bad, though! Not super awesome, but pretty decent for this sort of thing. Some good riffs, relatively tight songwriting, and sound that’s much better than I was expecting. About the only obviously lame element is the singing, which is half croak, half rasp, but even the vocals are not a deal breaker. I’m probably not going to buy it, because my melodic black metal needs are pretty much already met, but if I was even a little bit more into the genre, I might bite.
— Friar Johnsen

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NOCTURNAL BREED, Triumph of the Blasphemer  (2005, Painkiller)

The skull:
Originally released on the Hammerheart label with a non-skull cover, this version is a 10″ on Painkiller. In one of many skull cover motif subsets, here we have the popular skull-mounted-on-upside-down-cross image. This guy has horns, but they’re dwarfed by monstrous incisors that I understand doubled as kebob skewers. The dude was popular at his friends’ backyard barbeques, and is here immortalized on an inverted crucifix made of pork rib bones. Not sure who the blasphemer is, or what he’s triumphant about.

The music:
These kinds of EPs are usually such a scam. One new song, some live songs, and some covers. Nothing you would ever listen to with any regularity. Nocturnal Breed have long been upholding this very dry, direct, no-nonsense death/thrash attack thing, and they’re very good at it, but every single thing I hear by them fails to stick, even if it sounds okay as it breezes by. They pick out a W.A.S.P. song you don’t often see covered (“I’m Alive”) and a Death song you always see covered (“Evil Dead”). Special mention goes to the song title “Screaming for a Leather Bitch.” Yeah! This reissue adds an extra track with a live version of “Maggot Master.” If that’s enough for you to seek out the Painkiller version in addition to your original Hammerheart version, you’re way more diehard than me, pal, and congratulations on being so committed to leather bitches and maggot masters.
— Friar Wagner

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DISMEMBER, Hate Campaign (2000, Nuclear Blast)

The skull:
Although the original cover for this album also featured a big dumb skull, the limited vinyl release on Night of the Vinyl Dead features this finer BDS, although to be fair, neither is especially awesome. They’re both variations on the “skull swathed in flames” motif, which is basically always achieved through Photoshop hackery. Oh, how we would love to see someone build an actual fire around an actual skull! I think the closest we’ve come is the melting wax skull used twice by Oz and featured early in the Skullection. Every burning skull since then has been magic-wanded, feathered, and pasted with malice onto some stock flame texture. Laziness campaign!

The music:
This is the second of Dismember’s, “Sorry! We’re still cool!” albums after their half-hearted effort following Entombed’s ill-considered detour into death rock. To their credit, pretty much all of their post-death-rock albums are better than all of Entombed’s, and Dismember’s sellout album, Massive Killing Capacity is better than Wolverine Blues et al. But at the same time, excepting maybe the very first one, none of Dismember’s albums are total killers. They’re always very good, capturing basically everything you want in the Stockholm DM sound, while still never really rising to the level of “classic.” Others would disagree, I’m sure, and really, I probably sound more down on Dismember than is fair, because they’ve been good more or less their entire career, but there’s a reason they’re always compared to Entombed and not the other way around. And these later albums all admit a certain amount of In Flames or Arch Enemy style melodicism in a way that always sounds a little craven and opportunistic. Dismember might be a first tier Swedish death metal band, but surely the next band below them is the top of the second tier. They hang on by a thread, in other words.
— Friar Johnsen

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DESYBES, RN 6-32-4  (2007, self-released)

The skull:
I’m almost at a loss for words. This cover is an affront to big dumb skull covers everywhere, the very definition of laziness and it displays utterly horrid taste in design. DEATH TO FALSE SKULLS!!! They can’t even come up with a decent title for this EP. None of this bodes well for the music.

The music:
The four songs here are well-rendered but hopelessly faceless modern metal, masquerading as rocking melodic death/thrash. I guess. Although not exactly pristine-sounding, the style of the music here and the look of the dudes has me thinking they’re going for a Scion endorsement, or maybe even a Converse ad. They’d take a small cash infusion from Jagermeister too, if offered. But the music? I guess maybe Gurd meets Soulfly meets a really bad Soilwork song, but that’s being entirely unfair to Soilwork. The world doesn’t need more shitty groove metal, especially French groove metal.
— Friar Wagner

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PAIN CONFESSOR, Turmoil (2004, Megamania)

The skull:
This guy was clearly just discharged from the Vic Rattlehead Institute of Osteoplasty, having opted for not just the iron staples to close his jaws, but also some kind of bone graft to actually seamlessly seal his top and bottom jaws together. Quite sharp! The staples in the forehead seem a bit excessive, but isn’t that always how it goes? Once you get some work done, each additional procedure seems less like a big deal, and before you know it, you’re ending up on some Buzzfeed listicle called “23 Bony Tragedies”. This guy isn’t at that stage yet, so hopefully he’ll heed the advice of his buddies, who will all tell him he looks great now.

The music:
I’d heard Pain Confessor before this, but I remember them being a bit more brutal. Maybe I’m thinking of some other band, because this is an amalgam of modern (circa 2004) Scandinavian death metal and thrash, and latter-day Sentenced (although that influence is mainly limited to some semi-melodic singing in the choruses.) Actually, this is pretty solid stuff, if a little unimaginative. At least it’s hooky. Pain Confessor bring a little more to the party than your average Soilwork knockoff, and they even remind me a little of one of my favorite melodic death metal also-rans, Withering Surface (if only their fourth, and weakest album.) I have enough stuff like this in my collection that I don’t need to run out and buy any Pain Confessor, but if by chance I had picked up this disc in the 00s, it would be good enough to squeeze some other similar thing out of contention. You might call that “damning with faint praise,” but around here, that’s nearly the best kind of praise you can expect!
— Friar Johnsen

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TREPANADOR, Trepanador  (1994, demo)

The skull:
This artwork metal enough for ya? Holy crap. His flesh may be gone, but he’s still got eyes, fangs and tongue. This guy’s night of mischevious hella-fun is just gettin’ started! So, technically, yes, this is a form of trepanation, a drill with a humongous bit slammed into the uppermost part of the skullcap. Perhaps not one of the most subtle ways to achieve the pressure relief or increased blood brain flow that the procedure’s adherents are looking for, but it’s not the most subtle of surgical interventions in the first place. Then, plug that shit into a Marshall amp with the cord provided and you have the sound of METAAAAALLLLL!!!!

The music:
If you couldn’t have guessed from the cover art, this is a thrash metal demo. These Argentinians entered the game pretty late, so it’s not surprising that theirs is a completely redundant form of thrash metal. The vocalist’s guttural bark is a complete turn-off, too. To be fair, he mixes things up by employing a hysterical high-pitched wail that sounds appropriately panicky, if also lacking any real control. Musically it’s very fast and aggressive, not unlike Schizophrenia-era Sepultura, but not so like it that you should seek it out. It’s all quite dull, unfortunately. A variety of tempos are mixed up nicely, and the ability is here, it’s just that Trepanador lack the ability to compose anything approaching a memorable song.
— Friar Wagner

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SUICIDAL HOLD, Suicidal Hold (1998, self-released)

The skull:
This guy killed himself by digging a hole next to a wall and then pulling the dirt back in on himself, leaving only his head exposed. It took days for him to die of thirst. Plenty of passers-by offered to help, tried to comfort him, but he always refused, and was so eloquent in making his suicidal case that no one argued with him or sought to dig him out against his will. In fact, so moving was his story that many of the people who spoke with him in his final days return periodically to the spot, where his now fleshless skull still remains, and drop a single rose in his memory, I guess because his sadsack story was all about how his girlfriend dumped him at the prom while they were dancing to “Every Rose Has Its Thorn”, then she married some singer from a local grunge band and had a couple kids or something. Whatever. The dude was a poser for liking Poison and the world is better off without him.

The music:
The Gods of the Skull must be smiling on me at the end of my vacation, because my last two skulls have completely eluded me, musically. This is supposedly thrash, and with a name like Suicidal Hold, I’m more than willing to believe that, but as they’re also Italian, the likelihood that they were any good is pretty slim. I mean, I like Bulldozer as much as the next guy, but let’s be honest: Italy has never been a thrash metal hotbed. But, who knows? Maybe they were just too good for 1998, when power metal was ascendant and the rethrash craze was nearly a decade away. Maybe they were totally killer, but the scene just wasn’t ready for them, and they broke up after this one amazing EP. Anything’s possible, we tell ourselves.
— Friar Johnsen