Hardcore – Page 52 – Wonderbox Metal

LLNN – Loss (Review)

LLNN are an atmospheric Sludge band from Denmark. This is their début album.

Mixing Hardcore, Sludge and synths, the band create a dark sci-fi themed album that is quite apocalyptic in scope and feel.

Passionate, acidic screams ring out over a tide of crushing distortion, while relatively subtle sound-enhancements add texture and mood to the onslaught of heaviness. Lonesome backing cleans appear occasionally like a ghost in a maelstrom; spectral and mysterious.

Think Will Haven mixed with early Cult of Luna to get a good idea of where the band are coming from. It’s a dark and malevolent Post-Hardcore take on Sludge Metal and is almost as creepily atmospheric as it is oppressively heavy. Almost.

LLNN offer a hypnotic nihilism driven by a fatalistic acceptance of the fate of existence, which, paradoxically, also ends up being bleakly uplifting and empowering by the end of it. This is music to fall in love to at the end of the world.

Highly recommended.

Cut the Architect’s Hand – We Dig No Graves (Review)

Cut the Architect’s Hand are a Metal/Hardcore band from the US, this is their latest album.

Featuring a Hardcore base, Cut the Architect’s Hand layer Metal trappings on top of this, building an album that has depth and longevity due to its commitment to creating involving and engaging underground heavy music.

This reminds me of the extremely fertile cutting edge/violent Hardcore scene about 15 years ago, when it seemed that almost every band that came out from the US on labels like Trustkill Records were doing something new and interesting.

Cut the Architect’s Hand are torn from the same cloth as this era. Imagine the atypical wanderings of Botch mixed with the primal aggression of something like For the Bleeders by Vision of Disorder; this should give you a good idea of what you’re in store for should you delve into this record. And delve you should.

The songs are gritty and well-worn, like they’ve been harshly sanded down prior to being unleashed on the world. It’s quite a savage, unpolished sound, but it fits the band’s aggressive music and this is 34 minutes that you won’t regret spending.

It’s all very well-written and structured, with fast brutality and interesting riffs around every corner. Moments of introspective Post-Hardcore are dotted around here and there, adding further texture to already textured music. I like that each track has a distinct personality and something of its own to offer the listener.

Absolute top quality. Makes me quite nostalgic for the early 00s too, while also showing that although it’s not as commonplace these days, this kind of inventive and individual heavy music is still alive and well in 2016.

For fans of forward-thinking, Hardcore-based aggressive Metal.

Gadget – The Great Destroyer (Review)

Gadget are a Swedish Grindcore band and this is their third album.

Gadget play furious, vicious Grindcore that’s fast, angry and lives up to the high standards of the best of Swedish Grind.

The songs on The Great Destroyer have a modern sound that’s relentless and gripping. However, just boiling underneath the surface is enough remnants of old-school Hardcore swagger and energy to imbue the tracks with a real confidence and presence.

The singer’s vitriolic screams are a pleasure to hear; snarling, deranged diatribes are delivered with a passion bordering on insanity and the songs on this album benefit from the singer’s presence greatly.

These sharp, cutting tracks are like unstoppable slices of ultra-brutality, seamlessly performed with real fiery relish and a taste for all things bladed and dangerous. Occasionally the band slow things down to a groovier grind, but these parts are short-lived and soon degenerate into blast beats and high-speed guitars once more.

Snippets of tense melody appear here and there, just enough to enhance the songs without detracting from the main frenzied focus of the music.

I love it when bands play this kind of Grind – with a heavy, modern sound, a bleeding-edge disposition and more blast beats than you can shake a stick at, Gadget have the talent and skill to hold attention across these 27 minutes, and before you know it you’re left breathless and bewildered, wondering what just happened.

Highly recommended for all fans of quality Grindcore.

The Mild – Left to Starve (Review)

The Mild are a Grindcore band from Italy. This is their début EP.

Here we have just under 11 minutes of grinding Hardcore action. It’s sharp, nasty and liable to leave cuts.

The vocals are high pitched screams that sound absolutely scathing. The singer sounds pissed and I suspect he’s not entirely happy about something.

Each song rips along at a fair old pace, slowing down occasionally to mop up any listeners who somehow think they can get away without a good ear-bashing.

The fact that the band feel comfortable adding in some slower and mid-paced sections around the speedy main bits in such short tracks is welcome. This makes for a release that’s nicely differentiated and willing to think about pacing and not just the next fast part.

When they take their collective feet off the accelerator their Hardcore influences shine through and I can imagine them being really enjoyable live; high energy and blasting aggression clearly go well together.

Most enjoyable. Well done chaps!

Teething/Feastem – Split (Review)

Feastem are from Finland and Teething are from Spain. Both play Grindcore and they have come together to unleash this savage split on the world.

Teething start things off and offer up three tracks lasting four minutes in total.

Their music is fast, furious and full of aggression, just the way we like our Grindcore. They slow things down here and there and offer up some mid-paced groove with a Punk edge that adds to things quite nicely.

For the most part the vocals are halfway between shouts and growls, finding that sweet spot between the two that sounds harsh as Hell.

It’s a brief few songs, but enjoyable. Their blend of extremity and energetic Punk know-how makes them the epitome of Grind in many ways and if you like the style it’s hard to find fault with them.

Feastem are up next and also offer three songs, lasting a slightly longer five minutes in total.

Compared to Teething, Feastem have less of a Punk influence and offer streamlined, sharp Grindcore that has a more modern edge than their Spanish counterparts.

The tracks are full of blasting mayhem, not happy unless they’re doing their best to damage the listener’s ears by any means necessary. There’s a decent Extreme Metal influence to the guitars, although you can still hear the Punk/Hardcore influence too.

Scathing screams are the main mode of delivery for the singer, although deep growls do join in on occasion.

Another top quality Grind split between two bands that represent different points on the Grind spectrum in some ways. Which you prefer will depend on your personal preferences, and for me it’s hard to say – occasionally Teething’s more traditional approach wins the day, whereas at other times I love the blasting speed and modern delivery of Feastem. Either way, this is short enough to enjoy again and again and packs a punch regardless.

Highly recommended.

Seven Sisters of Sleep – Ezekiel’s Hags (Review)

This is the third album from the USA’s Seven Sisters of Sleep. They play Sludge Metal.

On this album Seven Sisters of Sleep combine a lot of influences from a wide array of nasty, extreme sub-genres into their potent brew of Sludge Metal. Doom, Hardcore, Death Metal, Black Metal, Grindcore…it pretty much all gets a look in at some point in these 50 minutes.

This is nasty music that seems to revel in the filth and dirt, with no stone of depravity left unturned or unsoiled.

This is a wild and dangerous ride through all things heavy, taking pit stops in the aforementioned styles and mashing them together with all of the subtlety of a maniac with a very big hammer. Having said that though, there’s a fierce guiding intelligence at play behind the scenes here, and the band obviously know what they’re doing with the material they have bloodily birthed.

There are a lot of giant riffs on this release and whether the band are playing fast, slow or anywhere in between, they steer this ship of gloom with unerring accuracy through the fog of Sludge. Or something. I think my metaphors got a bit out of control there. Regardless, think of Ezekiel’s Hags as the nastiest form of Doom, shot through with streaks of blast beats and a predilection for terror.

The vocals are every bit as nasty as the music, even more so as they have a real splenetic fury to them.

This is an exceptional release full of horrorful energy and a testament to what you can do with the variety and interest that can be had with Sludge Metal.

I can easily imagine fans of Ilsa, Serpent Eater, Secret Cutter, Colombian Necktie, Cult of Occult, Behold! The Monolith, Nightslug and Eyehategod taking a real shine to this. I know I have.

Grieved – Grieved (Review)

Grieved are a Swedish Hardcore band and this is their début album.

Grieved play dark Hardcore with plenty of venom and bite. This is a grim, nightmare vision of Punk and Metal, where destruction is commonplace and fear is everywhere.

Riffs are darkly emotive in a downbeat style and the songs take the positive energy of Hardcore and turn it in on itself, cannibalising and tearing at itself so that only the energy remains, inverted and corrupted. It is still a vibrant energy though, and these songs bristle with life and dark potency.

The singer screams out his words sounding like shattered glass given voice. His delivery is consistently engaging and has enough charisma and character despite essentially just shouting through these 29 minutes.

Across these songs the band show themselves to be adept at songwriting. These tracks are well-thought-out and have an emotive energy to them that’s undeniable. This is brought to the fore by the guitars and their interplay with the vocals, both of which are very satisfying in their own right.

There’s very little speed or urgency on this, it’s pretty much mainly mid-to-slow paced, revelling in its broodiness and building intent. When faster parts do appear, it’s like a coiled serpent has suddenly decided to strike.

I have really enjoyed this. I like that it focuses on songs and structure to deliver its negativity rather than overly relying on pure brutality or rage; this is more Born from Pain or Throwdown than Converge, although the positive message is entirely missing.

Highly recommended.

Interview with Spinebreaker

Spinebreaker’s début album Ice Grave is a muscular, thrilling ride through Hardcore-infused Death Metal that’s a vibrant and energetic take on the sub-genre. Make sure you’re wearing appropriate spinal protection and let’s dive in to the world of the breaker of spines…

For those who are unfamiliar with your band – introduce yourself!

Elliot: I’m Elliot and I riff and I sleep with an HM-2 under my pillow

Alex: I’m Alex and I do vocals and call people cowards in Spinebreaker

Give us a bit of background to Spinebreaker

Elliot: Alex and I wanted to start a death metal band so we did. Put out a tape and grabbed our friends to play with us. That’s pretty much it. All of us come from punk and hardcore so starting another band was just something we all wanted to do.

Alex: We are 5 hardcore dudes playing death metal with as loud and fucked up of a sound as possible.

How did you decide on the band name?

Elliot: We wanted to be so heavy that you wouldn’t just bang your head, you would bang your whole spine. Spinebreaker. Perfect.

Alex: It took us a long time to come up with one, so one day me and Elliot were hanging out and imagined what one of our friends looked like when he would head bang and get into a band that he likes, and came up with the name Spinebreaker.

What are your influences?

Elliot: Pentagram, Sleep, Saint Vitus, Discharge, Black Sabbath, Repulsion, Unleashed, Grave, Oi and punk music, and the mighty HM-2 of course.

Alex: My influences consist of mostly Scandinavian death metal bands like the obvious Entombed, Dismember, Unleashed, Grave, etc.
And then bands that don’t really show up in our music like my Slayer, Morbid Angel, Merauder, Hatebreed, Disembodied, etc.

What are you listening to at the moment that you would like to recommend?

Elliot: Gatecreeper, Outer Heaven, Vorum, Rixe, Crown Court, Vamachara, Bad Times Crew, Scalped, Funerals, Violent Reaction, The Flex, Lower Your Head, Midnight

Alex: The new Cruciamentum album from this last year was incredible, I can’t stop talking about it. Gatecreeper also rules, they’ve got a split with Homewrecker, Scorched, and Outer Heaven (which I recommend you all check out) coming out soon. And I’m always listening the my friends’ badass bands, Bad Times Crew, Vamachara, Funerals, Runamuk, Subtle Violence, and Scalped.

How do you feel you fit into the Extreme Metal scene in 2016?

Elliot: Sonically we fit but we’re all a bunch of hardcore and punk dudes so we stand out a bit. We all heavily support extreme music, we just have our roots in punk and hardcore.

Alex: I think we fit, just in our own way. We’re all hardcore dudes and act like hardcore dudes, running around and jumping on stage unlike most metal bands. But you know I think people can get used to that because that the way the music makes us feel. It doesn’t make me wanna stand there with my arms crossed when I like a band.

Give us a bit of background to Ice Grave – any particular concepts or ideas you want to discuss?

Elliot: We just really wanted something diverse. I like to throw in doom riffs every once in a while as well as some really dark and gloomy acoustic pieces to transition between songs. As far as concepts the only thing I really wanted to portray was heaviness. That’s it. Plain and simple. Filthy, loud, riff heavy death metal.

Alex: My lyrics range from death metal gory horror themes to just plain outrage about ignorance in topics about racism, sexism/feminism, homophobia, transphobia, police brutality and the black lives matter movement. Things that are out in the open to some but are still hidden in the dark to others.

How do you go about writing your songs?

Elliot: I sit in my room and crank my amp to 11 and just riff. That’s about it

Alex: Lyric-wise I think of a theme then a song name or a single line that I think can describe that theme I want to talk about but not be so obviously that the song is given away before you actual listen to it.

How did the recording process go?

Elliot: It was hectic but it always is and we expect that so working around problems isn’t an issue. We are all about being a DIY band so we record everything ourselves since our other guitar player Cole is an audio engineer. We love how all his stuff comes out so we trust him when it comes to the whole process. The only real speed bump was Alex having his awesome little girl right before we needed to record vocals but other than that it wasn’t anything more then what we are used to.

Alex: We recorded just about everything with our guitarist Cole in our other guitarist, Elliot’s living room and recorded the drums in one of our good buddies garage. Luckily Cole is an awesome audio engineer or we’d sound like garbage.

What’s your favourite song on the album and why?

Elliot: River Of Pain, Slithering Tyrant, Internal Bleeding, Withering In The Blizzard, and Fractured Existence. Why? I just like how everything fits together, just like it did in my head when I wrote the riffs.

Alex: Either River of Pain or Slithering Tyrant. Simply because those are my favourite lyrics I’ve written and they have the gnarliest fight riffs.

What does the future hold for Spinebreaker?

Elliot: No clue. Hopefully festivals and one off shows in areas we’ve never been. We all work full time and Alex has a child so big tours any more than a week isn’t really plausible.

Alex: No big tours or anything like that yet. We’ve got a fest in Van Nuys, CA. called Standing Hard Fest on January 30th. We’ll probably play some short tours of about a week at a time or less, some one off shows, and we’re always down to play fests whether it be metal, or hardcore.

Spinebreaker – Ice Grave (Review)

This is the début album from Spinebreaker, a Death Metal band from the US.

This is ugly Old-School Death Metal born bloody and ragged from the Hardcore scene. This means that the band combine the purity of their Death Metal heritage with the fire and energy of their Hardcore bloodline.

My, what a sound they have! Boasting a Swedish Death Metal guitar tone that their spiritual forefathers would be proud of, this is presented in a filthed-up package that fuses the feel of the era and style with a Hardcore edge and a touch of At the Gates and Carcass in the vocal department.

The end result is a savage demonstration of the fact that A) you don’t need to be Swedish to wield a chainsaw and B) there’s life in Old-School Swedish Death Metal yet; it’s not necessary for a band to simply rehash past glories.

Spinebreaker manage to successfully inject vitality and vibrancy into a rather stale, (but still very enjoyable), sub-genre. The inclusion of a Hardcore edge to some of the riffs adds a blood-pumping energy and the harsh screaming growls are a thing of gory beauty.

Whether ripping out giant grooves or pounding heaviness, Spinebreaker make everything sound dark, nightmarish and nasty, just as it should be. The spectre of At the Gates looms over the faster sections, (prompted for me by the vocals, but bleeding into the guitars too), and it’s a joy to hear this encapsulated by such a dirty Swedish delivery.

A very enjoyable 38 minutes.

Prolefeed/War All the Time – Split (Review)

This is a split between two UK Grind/Hardcore bands.

Prolefeed start us off with 15 tracks of pissed-off Hardcore, tearing it up straight away with fast beats and a razor-sharp guitar sound.

Even though the songs are all short, sometimes they do slow the pace down and give vent to their groovier side. Apart from this, it’s all Hardcore-fury as the band play fast enough to vent their rage but rarely enter blast beat territory.

The riffs are full of confident swagger and attitude, embracing their heritage and really going for the throat.

The vocals are high shouts, angry and harsh, just as we like it.

It’s a more Hardcore/Punk take on the style as beloved of Extreme Noise Terror and early Cripple Bastards, mixed with an Old-School influence à la Minor Threat and the like.

After this we have War All the Time, who contribute the final 11 tracks to this violent split.

War All the Time have an uglier, fuzzier, filthier production than Prolefeed’s sharpness, and benefit from a rounder sound in this regard.

Other than that there are a lot of similarities between the bands; short songs, (although on average slightly longer for War All the Time), Punk fury, swagger, attitude, fast but-not-blast-beats, etc.

The singer has a deeper shout than that of Prolefeed; a throaty snarl shouting belligerently across the tracks.

Like their partners on this split, it’s an enjoyable listen. On balance, I think I prefer Prolefeed’s contribution though as there’s a little more variety in attack, but both sides hit the spot for a bit of grinding angry Hardcore violence.

Have a listen.