Crisix are a Spanish Thrash Metal band and this is their third album.
This is an endearing mixture of old-school Thrash and modern know-how. It’s fun without being stupid and authentic without being retro nonsense. I approve!
The album boasts a strong production that’s crisp and clear, lending the songs a sharp edge and professional veneer.
The singer grunts, groans, shrieks and screams his throat hoarse throughout these 39 minutes. Alongside a plethora of backing and gang vocals, he provides an energetic performance and one can’t help but wonder if he survived the recording process with his sanity intact.
As would be expected from the style, solos and leads are tossed around like they’re going out of fashion, alongside so many punchy riffs you could knock someone out with them. With some minor movie and Hardcore influences too, there’s a lot of catchy material here.
There’s a lot of enjoyment to be had on From Blue to Black, especially if you like early Anthrax and Pantera and always wondered what it might sound like if they collaborated on a Thrash Metal sideband. It probably wouldn’t sound too far off how this does.
This is the second album from this one-man US atmospheric Post-Black Metal band.
This has a rich, warm sound, making it clear very early on that Entropy is all about the emotive content and taking the listener on a journey.
High-pitched near-static screams are employed to provide a focal point for the colourful music. I favour this brand of ultra-shrieked screams for this kind of extremely atmospheric Black Metal, so was not disappointed to hear them when they first appeared. Deep growls also appear here and there; these are unexpected but work well alongside the mellifluous music.
These songs have a good grasp of mood and feeling, effortlessly played out across long tracks and glorious soundscapes. This can be essentially seen as one 72 minute piece of music broken up into smaller slices, but however you look at it it’s an extremely effective work.
Featuring elements of psychedelic, progressive and depressive Black Metal, this is very atmospheric and richly textured. Resplendent melodies, extended guitar solos and understated synths all enhance the flavour of the emotive riffs and Entropy is an album to be savoured and enjoyed in its entirety.
I’m very impressed by this, and it’s criminal that this will effectively get no real exposure other than a few lucky people that stumble upon it; it really is that good.
Blackened Death Metal can sometimes be a bit hit or miss, but with the début album Miserable Miracle from French band Mithridatic, it’s a definite hit. It’s a very strong album in more ways than one, and I was curious to find out more, so I caught up with their guitarist Romain Sanchez to find out what makes a miserable miracle…
For those who are unfamiliar with your band – introduce yourself!
Hi! Firstly Mithridatic is just a band in the middle of a plethora of bands, created in 2007 in Saint Etienne France. Our inspiration is in old school death metal with some modern touches. We try to make an uncomfortable feeling, and to give much violence and power to the auditor. We pass by diverse styles of extreme metal such as doom, or fast as death brutal and using dark atmospheres of black metal.
Give us a bit of background to Mithridatic
Mithridatic is formed by 5 musicians all from the same region in France.
The drummer Kevin Paradis joined the band for the release of our demo “Hunt Is On”. Since Kevin’s entrance to the band we brought our style to a faster way, more extreme music, more hostile and oppressive. We are musicians with a lot of different influences. It allows us to pass by various styles of rhythms and various feelings. By the opportunity to have in the team musicians with a lot of technique, we want to achieve our goal: to give extreme music and to accomplish ourselves with our skills.
What are your influences?
We all have different influences, but I am going to begin my influences: the groups which marked me the most for making our song tracks are Morbid angel, Slayer, Arkhon Infaustus, Mayhem, Immolation, Angelcorpse etc. Mithridatic is a mix of an heavy atmosphere with ultra fast beats!
What are you listening to at the moment that you would like to recommend?
At the moment I would like to recommend Dead Congregation, Portal, Lvcifyre, Conan.… and I know Guitou is into Kerasphorus, Abhomine and Peter Helmkamp’s other works these days…
How do you feel that you fit into the wider Extreme Metal scene?
We still have a long way….But we are very enthusiastic to expose our music in various situations, we just want to play more and more!
Give us a bit of background to Miserable Miracle – any particular concepts or ideas you want to discuss?
The main idea of this album is to overcome different kinds of harmful situations… we describe nocebo effects, social anxiety, precarious existences…lyrics are inspired by some writings from French authors like Antonin Artaud, Henri Michaux etc. and some strange movies…Guitou had a kind of surrealist approach for its works for this album. We tried to create a ‘bardo’ state and to give a transcription of our anxiety and sickness…and this is also the way for the next album. Miserable Miracle is an important album for us because it’s our first “official” album for almost 10 years of activity. We hope the first one of many others! It also marks our entry into the French label Kaotoxin and Miserable Miracle has a better exposition than our old productions very underground. We also changed our habits of production by recording in two professional studio “DLM Studio” and “Sainte Marthe Studio”. We are all satisfied by results and by the sound of this album between old school and modern stuff. Kevin our drummer decided to record in a most natural possible way to get a sound close to our live performance. We wanted an organic and human sound.
Tell us about the album artwork
Damien Guerras’s illustration gives a free interpretation….I’m going to speak to you about mine: it represents the Adam and Eve tree in our world and society! The perversion of humankind have exceeded all the limits, the tree decomposes. The poison of perversion intoxicates our nervous system….This is a pessimistic picture of our miserable human condition.
How do you go about writing your songs?
I lock myself at home with my guitar for several days to record many riffs. It’s long process and sometimes inspiration doesn’t comes. I need time to get into a negative state of mind. Sometimes it can go very fast for example riffs of “Dispense the Adulterated ” and “Oxydized Trigger Sabotage” were written in the same week…Once riffs are recorded I send it to Kevin. It helps for structures of tracks and he makes his personal drum parts. Then we discusses of our ways to develop harmful songs…In rehearsal Alex and Remolow also composes with the material for bass parts and leads guitars. To finish Guitou places his vocals…The lyrics process is a quite difficult to describe because it’s an everyday process…. Miserable Miracle is a team work and everyone gives its personal style or feeling to get the riffs richer. Everyone is involved in an extreme vision of life and music.
How did the recording process go?
We recorded all the songs in the DLM Studio in Saint-Etienne and the mix/master was made by the Sainte-Marthe Studio in Paris. We decided to make the mix/master in Sainte-Marthe Studio with Francis Caste because we like his works on Svart Crown, Arkhon Infaustus, Kickback or Cowards for example. Francis Caste is a great professional, very fast, and an effective worker. Dupont Ludovic of the DLM Studio allowed us to record without stress at 20 minutes from home with a very good analogue equipment. Everything is very well.
What’s your favourite song on the album and why?
My favourite song of the record is surely Oxydized Trigger Sabotage…I like the particular atmosphere of this track. Doom and tortured. The vocal performance by Guitou is awesome!
What does the future hold for Mithridatic?
The maximum of gigs to defend our music on stage. We hope to build and to acquire a solid place in extreme metal! We will work on new material as soon as possible! We have a lot of motivation to make a second album and to make good shows!! See you on stage!! Thanks for your interest!
Abstracter are a Sludge/Doom band from the US, and Dark Circles are a Hardcore band from Canada.
Both of Abstracter’s full length albums, (Tomb of Feathers and Wound Empire), feature regularly in my listening. And with good reason; their brand of heavy, blackened Sludge/Doom is expertly done. On this release they contribute 2 tracks, lasting almost 20 minutes in total.
Barathrum starts off showcasing the band’s blackened aspect, with dark, murky blast beats charging through a sea of tar. This rather quickly spends itself, leading into a slow, sludgy crawl through murkiest waters as Abstracter embrace their dirty Doom side. Occasional forays into speed and groovier territories comprise the remaining running time, with the singer’s thick growl accompanying you the entire way.
If you haven’t encountered Abstracter before then this song is as good an introduction as any into their harsh, underground Sludge Metal.
But we’re not done yet, as there’s a second track; Where All Pain Converges. This is a little longer than the first and generally a bit slower and more considered. If Barathrum showcased the band’s harsher side then this one showcases their more atmospheric. That’s not to say this isn’t harsh and heavy, (it is), but that it also has more of a blatant emotive quality to the guitars than the soul-crushing nihilism of the first. Mixing slower sections with some more upbeat parts, the overall mood is maintained throughout and Abstracter once again show why they’re so very good at what they do.
After this onslaught of despair and misery, we leave Abstracter to wallow in their pit of pain, and approach, timidly, Dark Circles. This band offer up a different form of gloom with their characterful brand of dark Hardcore. Being familiar with their previous work on MMXIV, it’s good to catch up with them again and here they give us 4 songs, lasting just under 13 minutes.
Ashen starts us off with a squeal of feedback before violently picking up the pace with the band’s dark blend of abrasive Hardcore. One of the things I like about Dark Circles is their ability to inject an emotive bleakness into their raging chaos, engaging the listener and prompting them to move closer, despite the inherent danger. The second track Void follows on in a similar theme, (but with added atmosphere), and both initial tracks blur by in a haze of anger and distorted malice.
After these typically short and nasty affairs both of the next tracks are much longer by comparison, relative to this split and to their work on MMXIV. Isolate starts immediately, all blackened teeth and bile. The longer playing time allows the band the opportunity to flesh out the more atmospheric side of their sound that briefly reared its head during Void. This shows itself to be an apocalyptic Sludge/Doom influence, heavy and foreboding, before the Hardcore energy picks up once more.
The final track is called Epilogue (Quietus) OP. 28 No. 4 and is a little different, as the name suggests; here the band give vent to a dark ambient side and swamp the listener with a slow-building tense piece of drone that creates a nicely unsettling and worrying atmosphere.
Both bands have contributed some very nice work to this split release, and although they do play different styles they also have more than enough overlap and similar themes to complement each other perfectly. As splits go, this works a treat and is definitely one you should check out.
Inherit Disease are a US Death Metal band. This is their third album.
Combining some technicality and lots of brutality, Inherit Disease play a classic USDM style that allows them to showcase their love of the genre and all things brutal.
The music on Ephemeral combines speedy aggression with some chunky slam riffs, producing 39 minutes of utterly depraved brutality.
The singer’s vocals are sickeningly deep, stopping just short of descending into the kind of ridiculous pignoise burping that tends to ruin bands. His voice is as ugly and as gruesome as the music.
Ephemeral is unrelenting and harsh, rarely stopping for breath as it chops, hacks and carves its way through the tracks. There’s something very satisfying about this kind of music. It’s just so timelessly appealing; despite what other musical trends and moods might take you, Death Metal will always be there. Waiting. Lurking. Ready to strike.
I like that the more you listen to this, the more you enjoy it. It’s an unstoppable juggernaut of groove and blasting, easily absorbed by anyone who has a taste for bands like Deeds of Flesh, Suffocation, Cannibal Corpse, Severe Torture, Dying Fetus, Defeated Sanity, etc.
For a solid fix of heavy brutality and death-dealing, Inherit Disease have got you covered.
Cult of Luna are a Post-Metal band from Sweden and Julie Christmas is a US solo artist and ex-member of such bands as Battle of Mice and Made out of Babies.
This is the second album from Canadian Death Metal band Corprophemia.
Playing savage Death Metal that has elements of the brutal and technical styles, this is a modern approach to the genre that injects a bit of Deathcore and slam into the mix to further increase the violence factor.
Canada seems to be very good when it comes to this kind of thing. Fellow Canadian Death Metallers such as Cryptopsy, Deformatory, Pronostic, Antlion and Unbreakable Hatred to name but a few have all released some top quality music in the not too distant past and we can now add Corprophemia to that list as well.
The singer has a fine set of lungs it seems, with his clipped barks reeking of aggression. His is a very satisfying voice and perfectly complements the precise and exacting nature of the music.
So what of the music? It’s well-played, well-written and well-recorded. This pretty much covers all of the bases and all that remains is for this to be played at full volume to annoy the neighbours.
The band use crushing rhythmic riffs well and mainly sound like a combination of the dynamics and technicality of Cryptopsy, the staccato brutality of Beneath the Massacre and the sheer violence and cold assault of Coprocephalic. Add some snippets of cut-short melody here and there and brief ambient synth interludes between tracks and you have a very compelling 30 minutes.
This is the latest EP from Polish Blackened Thrashers Bloodthirst.
I enjoyed their last album Chalice of Contempt, so this new EP was gratefully received. Here we have over 20 minutes of scathing Black Metal and 80s Thrash influences.
These songs continue the band’s previous path of combining second-wave Black Metal with atavistic Thrash elements, striking the right balance so that they’re poised between two styles, waiting to strike.
Blast beats and spiky riffs blur by in a whirlwind of energy and dark melodies. The songs have personality and the band embrace the roots of both genres, forging them together down the path they want to take.
I find it easy to be turned off by Black/Thrash a lot of the time, but I do enjoy Bloodthirst as they seem to have that intangible special something that raises them up to be greater than the sum of their parts. It’s the songs, of course, and the feel of them. Glorious Sinners just hits the spot for me and does what it sets out to do very well indeed.
A professional production rounds the package off, and Glorious Sinners is an eminently enjoyable listen.
Kampfar’s seventh album Profan is like a fine wine that just improves over time. Their bassist Jon Bakker gave me some insight into their world…
For those who are unfamiliar with your band – introduce yourself!
I’m Jon, the bass player of Kampfar.
Give us a bit of background to Kampfar
Kampfar came to life back in 1994. Over the years we released 7 albums via different labels. We are currently signed to Indie Recordings and our latest release, Profan, was out November last year. The last 13 years we have been a 4 piece, doing several tours in Europe and North America.
What are your influences?
We were teens in the 80s so naturally our favourite music and inspiration comes from that time. Can be everything from Heavy Metal, Thrash and early Black Metal like Kiss, Bathory, Celtic Frost, Sodom etc. Of newer times everything that makes a difference might inspire us.
What are you listening to at the moment that you would like to recommend?
There are some cool records being released nowadays. Personally I like Tribulation, Alfahanne, Mgła, Melechesh, Secrets Of The Moon and so on. I’m also into new thrash bands from Norway actually. Inculter, Reptilian and Nekromantheon rocks.
How do you feel about the Extreme Metal scene in 2016?
As I mentioned above there’s still hope for Extreme Metal. The new trend is to be different, and that may not be a bad thing. I’m pretty sick of bands trying to copy others though. It’s enough with one Abbath creature and one band like Darkthrone…
Give us a bit of background to Profan – any particular concepts or ideas you want to discuss?
The whole idea behind Profan is to dig as far down in the filth as possible. It’s a search for hope and a journey to see if there’s anything that can save mankind. If you follow the lyrics the answer is pretty clear. There’s no hope, no hymns, no chants and no mercy. But there will be fire!
Tell us about your songwriting process?
Our process works with sharing ideas. It’s a long process for sure. One song is changed many times before everyone is satisfied. Then we meet in the rehearsal room and check the live potential.
How did the recording of the album go?
Everything went very smooth. The recording was done in different levels and places. Bergen, Pärlby/Sweden and Oslo. We’re very happy with everyone involved. Jonas and Stamos did an excellent job for us.
What’s your favourite song on the album and why?
That’s difficult. I have favourites for every mood. Daimon is a killer live song while Tornekratt have a great groove and wildness.
How do you see your sound developing in the future?
To the extreme. We will not do another Profan nor Djevelmakt. If we ever find the inspiration for a new album, we will do it. If not, who knows…
What’s next for Kampfar?
We’ll play live as much as we can. We have a good package of excellent live songs now, and now its the time to get it out to the world.
Krigsgrav are a Black Metal band from the US and this is their fourth album.
This is long and expansive Black Metal with a melodic edge. It’s vibrant and exploratory without losing focus and across these lengthy tracks the band take the time to unfold their vision of what Black Metal should look, feel and sound like in 2016.
If you take the depressive core of a band like Forgotten Tomb and add some Post-Black Metal influences, then you’ll be in the right area of where Krigsgrav lurk. Elements of depressive and melodic Black Metal round this out, as well as some aspects of funeral Doom.
With a decent recording the band’s compositions take on a dark life of their own. All of the instruments sound clear and precise, and I always like an album that you can hear the bass on, especially when it makes a valid and noticeable contribution to the music.
Additional instrumentation appears here and there, adding extra tools to the band’s repertoire and deepening the depths of sound that they create.
The vocals are notably impressive; ragged screams that sound like the singer is ripping his throat out are enhanced by the occasional deeper growl and some powerful cleans.
The songs describe harrowing tales of misery and hopelessness, set against a backdrop of just enough light and possibility so as to make the dark atmospheres all the worse. The mixture of lighter sections and heavier, blackened distortion work well and the build/release Post-Metal mechanic is used effectively in a Post-Black Metal environment.
Waves of Degradation is an impressive listen and has more than enough content to compel you to visit it again and again.
Crisix are a Spanish Thrash Metal band and this is their third album.
Wonderbox Metal 