Monthly Archives: September 2014

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DEMONICAL, Darkness Unbound (2013, Cyclone Empire)

The skull:
Another of the more densely-populated Subdivisions of the Big Dumb Skull Cover, the Screaming Skull is, more often than not, a cartoony guy. But not this guy. This is one tormented dome of bone. His wretched grimace conjures fear, misery, despair, doom and all the other fun stuff once can associate with meeting one’s end. But what’s with the doohickey affixed to the skull’s top left side? Skeletal remains of a blowfly? A petrified feather? A JFK-ish shard of bone caught just as a bullet grazes the dome? Write down your top 100 guesses and mail it to Big Dumb Skulls, c/o The Council. Only entries written in the blood of a virgin on aged parchment paper will be accepted. One entry per person.

The music:
This skull cover is exclusive to those who bought the limited digipak edition, the one with the cover of Kreator’s “World Beyond.” Skulls are worth the extra effort, and cash, so we applaud this marketing decision. The cover version is pretty much what you’d expect a death-blasted, de-tuned death metal cover of a Kreator song to sound like (the guitar lead is killer, very much respectful of Frank Blackfire while severely out-intensifying him). The original is better, but that’s usually always the case. As for Demonical’s originals, these guys clearly have the patented Brutal Swedish Death Metal sound nailed down tight. With a couple guys from Centinex, you’d expect that. It’s just so incredibly straightforward and unvarying that it gets old fast. And I love this sound, but by 2013, even the brootal-Swede-death revival has lost its luster. We will always return to the first generation when we want the real deal. Unless it’s Tribulation or Morbus Chron or the like, bands actually moving the style forward in leaps (Tribulation) and extra-wide bounds (Morbus Chron). But yeah, I’ll take Toximia or Uncanny over Demonical any day, even if this is undeniably pro and superior in what it’s trying to accomplish.
— Friar Wagner

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THE NEW BLACK, III: Cut Loose (2013, AFM)

The skull:
Sure, this was pulled straight out of the big design folder at a local tattoo shop, the page stained with drool and tobacco smoke, but if nothing else, this is the first BDS to prominently feature hummingbirds, so, congratulations are in order, I guess, to The New Black, who also hereby make their second appearance in the Skullection. Truth be told, their first album is also fronted by a big dumb skull, but I think we’re about sick of this stupid band, so the morbidly curious will have to Google that shit for themselves if they want to fully trace the origins and development of The New Black Big Dumb Skull.

The music:
The New Black are the sort of totally boring band who could be national stars if they were from Finland. They’re unfortunately from Germany, so it’s unlikely they’re huge in their home country, but I guess you never know. They have the glossy, shitty sound of a band trying to rope in a mainstream audience with something nominally “metal” but still totally safe, as if mixing Volbeat and Papa Roach were a viable creative strategy, or if the problem with Black Sabbath is that they sound insufficiently like The Foo Fighters. TNB (as I’m sure they’d like me to call them) are total pros, of course, but they’re also completely soulless. I’d rather listen to nazi black metal from France (not really, but please allow me the hyperbole) because at least those idiots believe in something and are making music for reasons that are not transparently commercial. You can imagine a songwriter in The New Black thinking, “Man, this riff would totally KILL in a video game or an energy drink commercial! The opportunities for cross-market synergy are just off the charts here!” If your main source for new music recommendations is VH1, then maybe The New Black could totally be your jam, but if you’re a metalhead with (some) dignity and self-respect, you won’t listen to this pap.
— Friar Johnsen

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FLOTSAM AND JETSAM, Metal Shock (1985, demo)

The skull:
Maybe I’m prejudiced against any comedy or mockery because I love the first several F&J albums so much (and I believe I can speak for the other BDS friar on that point, as well), but I always thought this skull design was completely killer. Dig the J stabbing its way through the chasms of the eyeholes, drawing blood to boot. The logo is one of the coolest and most stylish from the American thrash wave of the 1980s. Same can’t be said for the demo title font, which I swear I’ve seen used for “Live Wire” somewhere, whatever “Live Wire” is. I know I’ve seen it. And about a million other album and fanzine titles of the era. But yeah, the skull and logo? I’d wear a shirt with that on it.

The music:
Four songs here, only one of which appeared revamped on the next year’s debut, Doomsday for the Deceiver (“Hammerhead”). There is also, of course, “I Life You Die,” which appeared later, also revamped, on their perfect-expect-for-THAT-song second album. These versions are great — obviously rawer, but with a different guitar noodle here or a different Erik A.K. shriek there. Then we have “The Evil Sheik,” which boasts a variety of riffs that are all Armored Saint-meets-Omen, a few King Diamond-ish vocal moments, and an ending that is total Iron Maiden circa 1980. Overall it’s a good song, just not great enough to pass muster for the considerably speedier debut, and obviously the most derivative of any of the Jason Newsted-penned early Flots tunes. “The Beast Within,” now this is interesting. I always felt this song lacked something next to the other three, something that easily fit into a more traditional mold. It has that spandex-and-spikes vibe of the many bands of the era that had one foot in true heavy metal and the other in cock rock. I didn’t realize until today, in examining this skull and the music inside, that it’s actually a cover song. Weird choice too: a song from Stormtrooper’s EP, Armies of the Night (1985, Ironworks)Why? Was Jason Newsted out of ideas, or from Ironworks or Stormtrooper have some blackmail-worthy dirt on him? Incidentally, Stormtrooper featured guitarist Mick Sweda, who later went on to fame in King Kobra and then again in Bullet Boys. (No wonder I smelled hairspray.) I had to check out the original version, and it’s pretty killer, like a rougher, tougher early Ratt (and I love early Ratt). Very “early Metal Massacre comps” if you know what I mean. So, not a bad song, you just wonder why Newsted and Flotsam relied on it for their second demo. Weirdness.
— Friar Wagner

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NUCLEAR ABOMINATION, Nuclear’N’Fucking Roll (2010, demo)

The skull:
This skull is obviously related to this guy, what with the radiation symbol monocle, so maybe this is black metal? But not so fast: a black metal band would never use that kind of typewriter font for the title. That’s obviously the work of a crust or grindcore band. Except, hold on, that logo could only be for a thrash band (pentagram be damned!), and in the roshambo of logo/image/typeface, logo always wins. This is thrash. And so concludes today’s lesson in heavy metal visual taxonomy. This will be on the test.

The music:
If, looking at this cover, you suspected that Nuclear Abomination would sound like demo-era Toxic Holocaust, then I will applaud your stereotyping instincts, because that’s exactly what Nuclear Abomination sounds like. They’re maybe a little more thrash and a little less hardcore, but definitely in the same vein. Like Toxic Holocaust, Nuclear Abomination are a band with mediocre riffs, bad vocals, and a pervasive corniness, but Nuclear Abomination clearly take themselves (or himself, I should properly say) even as seriously as their (his) American counterpart(s). I mean, you wouldn’t name your demo Nuclear’N’Fucking Roll if you were serious, right? And you definitely wouldn’t name it that if you last demo was called Nuclear’N’Roll. But then again, what isn’t improved by more Fucking? Anyway, back to the Toxic Holocaust comparisons: Nuclear Abomination released this demo as a limited cassette, so it’s probably already too late for you to be a completist when it comes to this band, but then again, the hunt for all this rare crappy rethrash is definitely way more fun than actually listening to it, and if that’s the thing that really tweaks your nips, you’d better start penpalling with the most underground Frenchmen you can find, because you’re gonna have to dig deep for this one.
— Friar Johnsen

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DISARM GOLAITH, Man, Machine and Murder (2008, Casket)

The skull:
Man? We’ll take their word for it that this skull belonged to a male.

Check.

Machine? It’s sort of cyborg-y, this skull, and a fightin’ cyborg at that, judging by the bullet hole. So okay, a machine.

Check.

Murder? Do they really have to spell it out for us? This skull – which once carried the flesh and guts of a male member of the species – is a goddamn fightin’ machine, and if that red color behind him is to symbolize all the blood he’s bathing in after all that fightin’, then yeah, there’s a ton of murderin’ goin’ on in this cyborg skull’s warring world.

Check.

The music:
If Onslaught had kept Steve Grimmett on vocals and continued their evolution, kind of working backwards in the development of heavy metal’s sub-genre expansion, might have, in another album or two, arrived it a sound like the one claimed by Disarm Goliath, this kind of raucous yet classy, tough but melodic traditional heavy metal sound. Unfortunately D.G.’s Man, Machine and Murder EP is not recorded very well, and while the passion is clearly there, not even the most earnest delivery can help if the songs are mediocre, and these songs are mediocre without exception. The spirit is there though, so if your standards for traditional heavy metal aren’t sky-high when it comes to newer bands, then this will fit your craving for merely decent metal (I checked out another D.G. song, “Embrace the Abyss,” from their second album, which came out several years after this EP, and holy cow, it sounds a lot like Onslaught’s “Shellshock.” So there you go.)
— Friar Wagner

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VIRGIN KILLER, (2010, demo)

The skull:
This image is actually a little disturbing. It’s so grainy that it pretty much has to be a video screen cap, and although I guess it could be from some corny 70s horror movie, it looks a lot more like something that would have come out of Cambodia during the Pol Pot days. Why is this naked man (or boy?) holding a skull filled with sand, his hands wrapped in chains? Fuck if I know, and I’m pretty sure I don’t want to know. There’s no way there’s a happy story behind this, but let’s pretend. We’ll say that out of frame, attached to the chains, is the rubber seat of a swing, which this man is going to hang in a tree to delight the village children. But before he hangs it, he’s saying, “Here’s some shaved ice, to beat the heat! It’s lemon flavored. Sorry about the weird bowl, though. I was down in the basement yesterday getting out the Halloween decorations and I found this, so it was clean in the dish drainer today, and I figured I might as well get the most out of it. I promise it’s food safe! And hey, isn’t it funny that in America, it’s cold on Halloween? Not so down here in Colombia! Anyway, eat up, kids, there’s plenty for everyone, and I’ll have this swing up in a jiff!” And the children, living as they do in the peaceful nation of Colombia and knowing nothing of violence or skulls or virgin killing, happily tuck into the shaved ice and squeal with delight at the prospect of the new swing.

The music:
God, not another Colombian speed metal band! What have I done to deserve this? At least it’s not a rehearsal room demo, although probably this was recorded on a Tascam 4-track. In 2010. For fuck’s sake. Anyway, Virgin Killer sound like a really raw tribute to Vendetta or some other decidedly subprime band from Germany in the mid 80s. The vocalist amusingly splits the difference between Schmier and Mille, and again we’re talking 1986 here. This isn’t the worst thing of this sort I’ve ever heard, but it’s definitely pretty bad. Seems like the band got better fairly quickly, though, as their 2013 demo is listenable if still totally goofy. They have the silly energy of a Japanese retro band, where you’re not sure if the whole thing is a joke or not. It’s almost certainly not a joke, but it’s also almost certainly better to treat it as such. For your own sanity.
— Friar Johnsen

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SONIC REIGN, Monument in Black (2013, Apostasy)

The skull:
Technically this is a really excellent piece of artwork. It’s got a certain mood, and its realism is tilted just slightly into the realms of dark macabre vibes by the webby, shadowy slashes. But why? I mean, why? Why the fuck? There’s nothing happening here worth capturing in paint-on-canvas. And with band name and album title both so completely, underwhelming generic, you gotta wonder if a decent hired artist (or stolen piece of artwork from a coffee table book) is all this German band is able to muster.

The music:
Well, it’s boring. So much like the artwork it’s not funny. The guys can play well and they bring along with them a certain creepy atmosphere that’s made clear by the precision playing and modern recording. It’s basically like dull, middle-era Satyricon (Now, Diabolical; Volcano). It’s rendered very well but the actual ideas are shallow. There’s just not much to bite into here. Like the dull gray skull on the cover; like the band name that’s devoid of any real thought; like the retread, heard-it-already-a-thousand-times album title…it’s all so incredibly amazingly barely exciting.
— Friar Wagner

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ASCHENGLAS, Von Toten Gesungen (2006, demo)

The skull:
Though it looks a bit like a one-toothed baby monkey fashioned out of play-doh, I assume this is meant to be a human skull, placed as it is in a Catholic reliquary. Perhaps this is the skull of St. George. Not that one. I’m talking about St. George the Lesser, patron saint of curiosity. A pagan native of Africa, St. George was converted to Christianity and brought to the new world by a flamboyant missionary known more for his outlandish raiments than his piety. Though the earliest recorded deeds of George include a litany of criminal offenses, he would eventually assume the role of comforter and aid-giver, and was canonized for, among other works, miraculously curing a terminally ill little girl, although some scholars continue to maintain that the little girl was going to be discharged from the hospital anyway, and was in fact only there to have her tonsils removed. He was ultimately martyred by grown-ups whose places of business were destroyed during one of the saint’s periodic outbursts of mayhem. George was captured, bound, and finally murdered by lethal injection after biting a small boy, even though the boy dared George to do it, and even though the wound was a minor one. Today, the faithful pray to George for aid in focusing on boring tasks and avoiding the temptation to leap out windows to chase ducks.

The music:
Say what you will about BDS metal, but at least it’s usually not goth metal. Usually. Aschenglas defies the stereotype of BDSers as racist Frenchmen producing terrible black metal in their parents’ attic. Indeed, Aschenglas is the one-man bedroom project of a lonely Austrian who moans in German about the awful beauty of nature, probably. Musically pitched somewhere between Crematory and Type O Negative, Von Toten Gesungen is overwrought and ponderous, not to mention cheap-sounding. At least one song prominently features synthesized shawm. Though this demo is not entirely incompetent, it is mostly dull and comically pretentious. And, according to Metal Archives, “[t]wo songs feature programmed guitars only, although it is unknown which ones.” Now, there’s a first.
— Friar Johnsen

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SZRON, Death Camp Earth (2012, Under the Sign of Garazel Productions)

The skull:
Swear we’ve seen this before. But that’s probably skull fatigue talking. And really, after you’ve recently studied skulls smoking cigarettes while wearing headphones; skulls wearing ridiculous Egyptian headdresses drawn in black crayon by children; and skulls hatching human heads that are puking black blood…well, this skull is bound to lack impact. A less jaded skull aficionado would surely find this skull fearsome, its sight partially obscured by barbed wire wrap and a common runic character stamped onto its forehead, but after those other recent beauties this is like a trip to the frozen yogurt shop on the corner, where the spicy mango flavor pales next to the banana garlic, seaweed bacon and bubblegum catsup ones.

The music:
At times these Polish black metallers favor the wide-expanse, hugely majestic, all-six-strings kinds of chords that remind of those great early Borknagar records. When they’re not going all epic, though, it’s extremely orthodox modern black metal – seething in the right spots, vocals vile enough to fit the bill, shades of darkness black enough to conjure melancholy ‘n’ might…and boring as hell. I doubt any but the most insatiable black metal gourmand needs to sit down and dig in. Long songs, too: four of them in nearly 40 minutes. Please note that Metal Archives says this band’s lyrical topics touch upon “Anti-Humanity, Anti-Christianity, Death, Evil.” Fresh new ground for a black metal band, basically.
— Friar Wagner

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FAITH OR FEAR, Demo of Fear ’86 (1986, demo)

The skull:
Who’s not scared of pirates, right? I mean, when you imagine your worst nightmare, the most abject terror, of course you picture the Jolly Roger. THAT’S that kind of fear we’re talking about. And not just any pirates, either, but ’86 pirates, with goofy haircuts and clothes that are a patchwork of dayglo neons and corporate logos. That’s some serious shit-your-pants fear, right? Right?

The music:
Some people only know Faith or Fear as the band who donated guitarist Meritt Gant to Overkill, but in truth, Gant was only in the band for about a year. Anyone else who knows Faith or Fear is likely to consider them a very poor substitute for a great melodic thrash band like Forbidden. It’s not that Faith or Fear were terrible, because they were reasonably good. It’s just that “reasonably good” among thrash bands in the late 80s put you pretty far down the ladder. I always wanted to like this band more than I do, because I have a soft spot for thrash bands with melodic singers, but Tim Blackman just isn’t a very good vocalist. His range is pretty narrow (excepting a few screams) and he doesn’t do a whole lot with what he has. But, he’s not awful, and the music is crunchy and more-or-less well written, so even though Faith or Fear were a decidedly third tier band, I guess you could say they were one of the better bands in that cohort. This is their first demo, and while only one of these songs made it to their lone full-length (recorded before their reunion, I mean), their sound was more or less in place from the start. Again, imagine Forbidden, minus the trickiest riffs and most of the hooks. That’s Faith or Fear. Of course, hailing from New Jersey, Faith or Fear were more likely to sprinkle in tough guy posturing than their left coast contemporaries, but at least they never devolved into goofy silliness, a la Anthrax at their worst (or best, I guess, if that’s how your tastes run.) Obviously, if you’ve never heard this band, you’ll want to start (and probably end) with their 1989 full length, Punishment Area, and even if you get beyond that, there’s a new album (which I haven’t heard) and a compilation of rerecorded demo tracks (although not stretching back so far as to encompass this particular demo), so you’d have to be really, really into Faith or Fear to have any reason to listen to Demo of Fear ’86 and probably everyone who would ever be that into this band already owns an original cassette copy.
— Friar Johnsen