Tortorum - Katabasis (2014)

Considering black metal's reputation as one of the more 'evil' strains of music humanity has yet conceived, it's often surprisingly just how many albums fail to threaten or unnerve me in the slightest, and this is largely a symptom of the massive derivation and redundancy found within this medium. Granted, there are a lot of bands who have carved out their own identities within the expanded style, but too few can adhere to the base aesthetics and still evoke a chill. Thankfully, Norway's Tortorum, comprised of veterans from another of other acts (Aeternus, Dead to This World, Spearhead, Gorgoroth, etc) are one of this diminishing number, and their sophomore Katabasis is a fine example of malevolent black metal which capitalizes both on its conservative genre techniques and atmospheric embellishments to haunt the listener well past the midnight hour.

Yes, eerie atonal guitar passages picked through both tremolo progressions, spine-tingling melodies and even cleaner guitar tones; slathered in sustained, nihilistic rasps and not exactly something you haven't heard in the past...but written well enough that I must have busted through this not-insubstantial 53+ minutes of material four times before I even thought of what I could say about it. That's not to say there isn't a little extra padding or unnecessary repetition in a few places, but Tortorum generally reign in their tunes around the 5 minute mark and really only go overboard on the closer "Beyond the Earth and Air and Sun", a tune with a more spacious construction to it that allows for some malignant night-wind segues into whispers and moonlit guitars instead of just an endless loop of content. Add to this the general quality of the riffs, which are not entirely unique sounding but generally on the more memorable side...bluesy, mourning leads...tight drums on both the more prevalent double-bass/blasting extreme and the sparser moments...and last but not least, the great grooves manifest by the bassist that bind the entire experience into one shadowy stroll into the subconscious, and you've got one opaque plunge into sinister obscurity that won't soon evade your conscience.

Best of all, the production sounds absolutely ravishing, with an eloquent balance of airiness and meatiness relished with guitar lines that spring right out at you, angrier thrashing components which send the neck into strain-city, and just an overall seamless quality between tracks that takes into account a good deal of variation. There are moments where I felt the black metallic vocals could grow a little monotonous, and something even more psychotic might have made for an improvement, but Barghest is certainly adequate in terms of just meting out the traditional black metal vocal, and inserts a handful of lower pitched guttural growls so that it's not entirely one-sided. I guess I just wanted wails and screams over this shit, to enhance my own nightmarish investment in the proceedings. Otherwise, while not incredibly imaginative or too far outside the norm, Katabasis is a beast, a fully negative affirmation of its genre and just one of those black metal records which reminds you why you shunned society and started listening to the style in the first place. Fans of anything from Mayhem to Ondskapt to Shining to the members' other offerings would be wise to spend some time with this ghoulish drinking partner. Spite given musical flesh. Absinthe helpful but not required.

Verdict: Win [8/10]

https://www.facebook.com/Tortorum

Entartung - Peccata Mortalia (2014)

From the piano, whispers and ominous chants of its intro, to a series of raging melodic chord progressions threaded through its metallic content, Peccata Mortalia is another of those well-paced, thorough black metal recordings which thrives off its internal contrasts. A fulfilling experience in which you can traverse vast heights of suffering and desperate, longing valleys of fell glory, even if it's not the most unique of constructs with regards to the riffing patterns or instrumentation. Entartung was a name I had only a passing familiarity with from samples off their 2012 debut Krypteia, but then I'm slightly more likely to remember it this time, since this sophomore soars when it soars and offers just enough variation in pacing and conception that it never becomes exhausting...and seems quite a huge sound for just two musicians writing and recording everything.

The album is book-ended and bisected by piano shorts between 1-2 minutes in length, and these actually serve the express purpose of 'breathing room' against the longer, surging compositions like "Blasphemaverit in Spiritum Sanctum" and "To Conquer Immortality in the Depths", which are much in the melodic black metal tradition first manifest on the later 80s Bathory material (when they transitioned into Vikingmania) and Mayhem/Satyricon of the early-to-mid 90s. The differences here are that the chords are thickly wrought, the harsh rasped vocals are also barked out quite loudly in the mix, and the band implements a lot of atmospheric breaks to intercept any excess sense for repetition when they're raging along for such a swollen song length, in which the whispered, narrative lines return, samples from nature, or shimmering, slower guitars that balance out the moderately-blasted momentum of the usual fare. Tunes like "The Law of the Claw" have an eloquent but sinister vibe about them that really captures the 90s era when black metal was such a novel journey between the borders of majesty and savagery, and Peccata Mortalia is not a disc to put off purists.

On the downside, while the riffing progressions here are effectively bright, expressive and evil in equivalent quantities, they do suffer from the drawback of overt familiarity, faint variations on the many thousands we've heard through the past 20 years, and there isn't a lot of nuance or stickiness to how they've been crafted. The rhythm section sounds solid but bass-lines and drum sections aren't very distinct from many other bands, possibly because the duo focused more on assembling the guitars, vocals and lyrics. I enjoyed the piano bits and other atmospheric departures, but more because they really fleshed this out as an experience rather than were memorable on an individual basis. All told, Peccata Mortalia is a solid effort, just not one that is going to compete with, much less surpass so many others that have come before it. There are far worse ways to spend three quarters of an hour than in Entartung's eves, and the members' talents and familiarity within the genre are self-evident, but it's not an effort which is likely to resonate far into the future. That said, if you're into Arckanum's 2009-2011 material, later Maniac Butcher, Sargeist or Bathory's Blood Fire Death then this is worth a listen.

Verdict: Win [7/10]

Prostitute Disfigurement - From Crotch to Crown (2014)

From Crotch to Crown might arguably be the best death metal album title I've spied in some time, so coupled with the retro torture chamber aesthetics of the cover artwork, I was already somewhat sold on the experience before even hearing a lick. Fortunate then that Prostitute Disfigurement's initial reunion offering is just as good as it looks, an exercise in annihilation which takes all of about four minutes to induce whiplash, gonorrhea and a number of other conditions with which to remember it. That's not to imply that it's a 'classic for the ages', or that it's particularly unique in its field, but these Dutchmen have long settled into that moderation of brutality and technicality in which groups like Severe Torture and Cannibal Corpse have settled. Intense, violent songwriting takes the fore, while excess arpeggio noodling wankery is exorcised in favor of evil, surgical harmony spikes that recount Pestilence's Mallevs Maleficarvm, and the utter simplicity and derivation of much of today's nostalgic death metal is eschewed for speed, strength and punishment.

No, it's not the first or last time that a record of this sort will rip your face off, but what's important is that it RIPS YOUR FACE OFF. Down to the bone, and in some cases, beneath. The drums and guitars bounce back and forth between accelerated, busy blasts ("Only Taste for Decay"), which seem like the natural upgrade to classic Morbid Angel (Altars of Madness/Covenant) in their overall riffiness; and a number of active mid-paced progressions which seem just as immaculately designed to destroy. The rhythm guitars are broiling with notation, flying all over the place and there's really not a moment among the 41 here that I found myself in any way bored (exhausted, maybe). Not to mention, the leads feel vibrant and carefully designed to excite and titillate rather than just zip past with atonal chaos. Vocally, there are a lot of callbacks here to classic Deicide, largely through the pairing of blunt growls and rancid snarls, occasionally accented by clinical samples or horrific screams culled from the same gore/horror sources that have long inspired this act. The drums are like being pelted with a million bricks in succession, only they avoid the face and ears so you can still discern every painful impact. Bass-lines have a springy, agile presence but aren't necessarily the most robust I've heard, and yet so much else is happening that you might not even notice.

Lyrics are efficaciously disgusting in tunes like "Crowned in Entrails", which recount visceral acts that I do not feel comfortable in repeating, and the way this thing is produced is like the mating of a rhinoceros and a helicopter, constant staccato bludgeoning dowsed in dense riffing constructions that trample the shit out of you. Really, the only 'crime' about this would be that it's an amalgamation of another records that predate it, and lacks the inherent, distinctive characteristics that defined them as they arrived through and beyond the 90s, but for someone seeking out a monstrous, misogynistic splatterfest of both muscle and musicality, it's nothing at all to frown down upon. Sort of like those hi-definition Texas Chainsaw sequel/prequel flicks in how it re-imagines the spectacle of its inspirations, only From Crotch to Crown is much more consistent, concussive and enjoyable. I know this: if you hold records like Bloodthirst, None So Vile, Misanthropic Carnage, Effigy of the Forgotten, or anything by Lividity, Gorgasm, Deeds of Flesh and Mortal Decay in high regard, then this has plenty of bang for the buck, and I had just (if not more) fun listening through this as I did Deeds of Derangement, Left in Grisly Fashion, etc. Maybe not the most memorable of its class, but this is nonetheless pretty top shelf, trauma-inducing torture porn for the sadistic, masochistic and depraved. Worth the six year wait.

Verdict: Win [8.25/10] (stabbed and pounded faces)

http://www.prostitutedisfigurement.com/

W.A.I.L. - s/t (2013)

Resonance: some albums achieve it, and some are born from its womb. The latest eponymous title from Finland's W.A.I.L. could confidently be categorized to the latter effect, due to its heavily atmospheric tendencies. Blackened death and doom that seems so thoroughly conceptualized through the lyrics and liner notes in the tape's accompanying booklet that you have to wonder, what came first? The riffs or the decision to explore these philosophical/historical themes ranging from Buddha to Sparta? Note progressions and chord choices here are hardly as complex as the subject matter they support, but completely complementary to the ephemeral nature of the ideas expressed, and like the last s/t from 2009, the album possesses both a soothing and sociopathic sense of contrast cultivated through moments of controlled tension and tranquil release. The songwriting is not so memorable as the intellect of its author, unfortunately, but W.A.I.L. can easily hook your attention and keep it across a number of listens.

The greatest strength of this latest eponymous excursion is in its production, which for a cassette release is all too well balanced across multiple frequencies. Bass lines swell and groove with determination, providing a rich substrate for the highly atmospheric but still riff-wrought rhythm guitars. The drums thunder and crash, with fills that sound fantastic and just enough technicality that you could listen to them without the other instruments and still feel a sense of momentum. The vocals are definitely where W.A.I.L. steer slightly deeper into death metal territory, a wrathful guttural howl which retains some of the rasped edge of its parent genre but contributes massively to the depth and thoroughness of the recording. Lastly, the airier, dissonant guitars that explore the higher range of chords on the fretboard are balanced out with these substantial lower end riffs caught somewhere between the realms of black, death and doom metal, and the result is a fragile balance of both the accessibly heavy and sublime. What's more, the Finns have no qualms about the incorporation of piano segments, or cleaner guitars that help manifest emotional contrasts and climaxes through the track list...it sounds fantastic. Frankly, when I popped the tape into the sketchy cassette deck (which broke after only a handful of listens), I didn't expect such a robust and pensive experience...

...which, granted, is not a massive leap in style from the 2009 full-length, but I got the impression that they were aiming for something marginally less ominous and far more philosophical this time out, a feat which is handily achieved by the time the smoke clears from Side A. W.A.I.L. is obscure and intelligent without the requisite technicality or toilet-bowl production values that might entail, and they are easily one of the better acts I've heard in terms of measuring off their constituent sub-genres into a fulfilling, consistent whole which rarely traipses across the paths of many other Finnish acts I've encountered. Ample variation without any sacrifice of their roots, and plenty of lyrics and explanations to ponder when you've immersed yourself into the musical side. It never hides its influence, which are firmly in the atmospheric 90s black/death camp (specifically the Scandinavian masters), but it also doesn't sound too directly like any one in particular. If compared to its predecessor, Wisdom Through Agony into Illumination and Lunacy, I might lean slightly in favor of that, but the difference in quality is about a hair's width, and it's worth a chance for anyone with a preference for thoughtful, atmospheric, shadowy songwriting.

Verdict: Win [7.75/10] (by the law of all; lawlessness)

Gridlink - Longhena (2014)

Abandoning the Oni devil masks of their previous album covers for something more sleek and contemporary, one might also assume the music of Gridlink would follow the same course, but that's not wholly the case. Hands down one of the more curious and technical grindcore acts I've heard over the last decade, their third and final full-length outing Longhena is a breat...blast of fresh air amidst a largely stagnant scene of acts who perhaps too closely ape a small catalog of records from the mid 80s through the early 90s. In fact, structurally the music here seems to have evolved more from a dissonant post-hardcore aesthetic, dialed up to annihilation, rather than the more death metal-infused albums I usually come across, so this is more apt to appeal to fans of Agoraphobic Nosebleed, Discordance Axis, Melt Banada and the faster-paced Dillinger Escape Plan tunes over Napalm Death and Terrorizer.

What makes Longhena ultimately so listenable is its pinpoint musicianship and variation. Most of the tracks are cut of a comparable, spastic fabric, but they're not afraid to jump genres entirely, like on the scintillating ambient string/guitar piece "Thirst Watcher". Granted, I wish they would have offered 2-3 more instances of such broad departure as 'breathers' amidst the typical turmoil, but being a grind group, it's not like they waste a lot of time battering away...the entire track list has blown (or drifted) by you in 22 minutes; they never just stand their with their dicks in their hands, but piss and flail wildly about and then collapse in on themselves. The rhythm guitar progressions infuse a lot of hyper-thrashing picking sequences with a lot of jarring minors which give that impression of DC/NY post-hardcore being played on fast-forward, but they'll also splay out some surprise trad/power metal guitar patterns (like the intro to "Look to Winward") or a few slower bricks of power chords before they do their impression of the Road Runner. During a number of the blasted elements, when vocalist Jon Chang is meting out his most vulpine snarls, I was even left with the impression of a bit of hi octane dissonant black metal if it were bisected by jumpy, mathematical break riffing.

In other words, Longhena is simply not the most predictable of these sorts of records, and that goes a long way when tunes have to impress you in 90 seconds or less. The drums are naturally intense, blasts all over the place, but they're also exhausting, so I found myself appreciating the fills and change-ups more than the constants. Bass has a nice, low curvature to fill out the rhythm guitars, but they're such a driving force that it often feels understated when it's not veering away from the root notes. I've come across so much of the Swedish-style d-beat/guitar tone penetrating grind and what's being lately dubbed as Entombed-core that Gridlink's more direct, punchy saturation seems distinct and refreshing, and while Chang's rasping and raving might not seem all that unique for the style, it fits the riffing like a glove, capitalizing on the incendiary songwriting, brief flash-fires that speckle a distraught urban landscape. The album isn't as futuristic and fashionable as you might guess by looking at the cover model, who seems like she's about to pilot an EVA mech. It's not 'cubicle grind' or anything of the sort, but it's adventurous enough to retain the attention span of its audience, and even if not incredibly memorable, an intense swan song to leave us pondering while we reattach our heads.

Verdict: Win [7.5/10]

http://www.studio-grey.com/gridlink/

The Wakedead Gathering - The Gate and the Key (2013)

What separates Andrew Lampe's Wakedead Gathering from the lion's share of xeroxed morbid old school death metal approximations has ever been his application of compelling songwriting aesthetics to the medium. Be that a refined sense for simplistic melody over a primate punishing  undercurrent made legion by Incantation in the early 90s, or some other vocal or guitar effect rising to the surface, there is always going to be some focus in any particular song which helps it rise above the gloomy cavern core din that has been growing repeatedly redundant as it nears its second decade of nostalgic popularity. In short, if I had to short-list a dozen wayback-machine death metal abominations worth hearing from here in the States, The Wakedead Gathering would be on that list, and quite likely nearer the top than the bottom. The Gate and the Key, Lampe's second full-length, does not fail to deliver on the promise of its precursors, and gets better with each repeated spin.

Hell, I'd recommend this on the sci-fi/horror lyrical themes alone. I'm not positive if it's a unified or partial concept, but Lampe is a master of scribing a grotesque hybrid of cosmic and bodily horror sure to make one afraid for his/her life, much like you might have felt when reading the seminal works of Lovecraft or any of his spiritual successors down through the decades. It reads just as claustrophobic as it sounds, and even from the cryptic cover, which looks like a bunch of ancient pseudopods collected in some sewer manifold, the response is fear...fear and the unknown. This is further manifest through the dank, ominous gutturals that maneuver with a lot of syllabic punch over the subterranean, soil-rich rhythm guitars that serve as a womb for the apocryphal, man-ending lyrics being spewed forth. But where these are fairly commonplace aesthetics in the lieu of an Incantation, Autopsy, Immolation or Rottrevore influence, there is also a real knack for providing the unexpected. Whether it's a brisk, Eastern melody, a spike of airier dissonance, a bluesier doom death progression, or something which combines a number of these, like the fulfilling, eerie harmonies that erupt around the minute mark of "Hypgnosis", you simply can't pull your ears away. It's like an amorphous extradimensional siren in service to the Elder Gods...the creature will bewitch you with lush imagery and a taint of beauty before devouring with its many acid-slathering maws.

And none of it would work if Lampe hadn't also mastered the art of making his antiquated death metal sound eerie again, which is accomplished through the simpler techniques of tremolo picking or morbid chords. He can create a spectral, atonal immediacy ("Masquerade in Eminence") or slowly drudge away at your well being ("Vertex I - The Gate"), but either way, he's reaching deep into the well that birthed the genre, and pulling out inspiration from the sediment at the bottom rather than just a bucket of stagnant water off the top. The Gate and the Key is spectacularly claustrophobic and lo-fi while maintaining a strong sense of clarity. Both of the crud-caked rhythm guitars drive straight to your ears, while the double-bass, snares and cymbals carve out a cacophony against the sewer-scape, and the grumbling gutturals seem a direct channel for the ill intentions of the otherworldly, imaginary monstrosities this musician has championed...or at least I hope they are 'imaginary', because if not the future isn't looking so bright. All told, while I might have found individual tunes on the Dark Circles EP mildly more memorable than this material, there is much more of it here, and it's darker, denser...plumbing the depths of sewage and sanity while pounding humanity into a footnote. I kept thinking back to Gozer in the first Ghostbusters flick. 'The traveler has come!' Yes, it's already here, beneath your feet, seeping into the empty spaces of the Earth, making a meal of mankind.

Verdict: Win [8.5/10] (stench of words not uttered)

https://www.facebook.com/thewakedeadgathering

Profezia - Oracolo Suicida (2013)

I don't know what it is about traditional string instrumentation (violins, etc) and Italian metal bands that so often works for me, but I'm not complaining. They sounded brilliant on former Goth metallers On Thorns I Lay's seminal Crystal Tears, or even in the melodic death context of a Dark Lunacy, and they immediately transform the third Profezia full-length Oracolo Suicida into something both eloquent and reflective alongside the carnal, melancholic black metal riffing which stands as their foundation. Granted, that's mainly just the first, titular tune and not completely representative of the full 40+ minutes, but enough to hook you in for the remainder. Having had only a few brushes with the group's earlier material, I have to say I'm glad Moribund is re-releasing this thing (with new cover artwork), because I completely missed it last year and it's worth hearing at least once.

Profezia's black metal is perhaps best described as a union of Norse and Mediterranean aesthetics via the melodic chord choices, with a bit of Swedish suicidal structure circa a band like Shining or Greeks like Dodsferd. However, they're prone to take a few risks, like those graceful strings mentioned in the opener, or the more open and percussion-free architecture of "Sacra Tempesta" which incorporates some brooding clean male vocals before transitioning into the raspier black metal timbre. Further orchestral components are subtly layered into a few of the other tunes like "Nato Morto", and overall I'd say they grant us just enough seasoning that Oracolo Suicida is spared by default from seeming like another directionless, rambling black metal opus which I'd often equate with bands who perform 9 minute tunes in this field. Granted, the roots of this music are very often stock, mellow chord progressions which wouldn't suffice on their own, but it never seems as if the international team-up wrote these songs with the classier ingredients as an afterthought, so in many cases the riff-work is there for its familiarity, often traipsing into a more black/doom territory in the narrative pacing and groovier, thicker rhythms.

Vocals definitely have a bit of Kvasir's natural accent bleeding through, which makes them even more of a decrepit, hermit-like barking, while the drums and rhythm guitars feel very clean and accurate, the latter being so moody and downtrodden that the listener is immediately reminded of ancient or cavernous spaces where the light rarely shines, regions forgotten by civilization and thus intimately perfect for the black metal media. Actually, 'intimate' is the perfect word to describe Oracolo Suicida, because the somber production of the strings and guitars gives it a personal, claustrophobic feeling, though they often channel a more dissonant and spectral wailing effect like the close of "Futuro Rivelato", which then cedes to the warmer chords that herald "Il Gioco del Parassita". As an ignorant foreigner who often idealizes the European mainland to a ludicrous degree, I imagined myself wandering, alone, through Roman ruins, through the shadows cast by this antiquated architecture during a blazing midday, while underground spaces beckoned. The pacing might change up, and no two tunes sound entirely alike, but Profezia have composed a consistent, higher concept excursion into the bleakness which unravels our humanity; very listenable if you're into the moods and malevolent Romantic underpinnings of Greek, Italian and Portuguese black metal.

Verdict: Win [8/10]

Bleeding Fist - Death's Old Stench (2014)

Earlier run-ins with Bleeding Fist's 2010-2011 EP material did not prove illuminating, but this Death's Old Stench compilation, which collects a bunch of raw, unreleased content written over the past few years, has a stronger allure which can not only be attributed to some superior riff choices, but the very production 'flaws' which contribute to its overall atmosphere. The Slovenians have long championed the bestial aspects of black metal, channeling them into something unwashed, ugly and abusive, but that's just not a winning formula when the songwriting is the sort you've heard a thousand times before. While a comp and not a standard studio record, and likely to have some inconsistency in the mix of individual tracks, Death's Old Stench is one of those offerings upon which a perceived 'weakness' to some actually transcended into a strength of my own experience.

I'm of course talking about the distant, uneven mix of instruments here which often favors the volume of the drums over the vocals and guitars ("Holy Saint of Death"), or the very opposite ("Blackened Illumination") where they can only be heard tinnily rifling away under the ominous atmosphere of vocals and tremolo picked guitars. There is material here which seems infinitely more dramatic and creepy than what I've encountered before on Devil's Ferox or Macabrum Bestia ex Abyssus, and much can be credited to the vocals of Hellscream which shift between the nihilistic predatory rasps so typical to the genre and some yawning, clean chanted passages which often arrive unexpected in the midst of what is otherwise a traditional black metal 101 tune. Rhythm guitars are extremely raw, and often just cut off at the end of a song rather than using a studio fade-out; the riffs are hardly unusual, but provide the necessary balance of melody and malevolence which sculpted the black metal field of the early to mid 90s into such a huge thing. I don't really hear a lot of bass here, which was probably a conscious choice, but might have otherwise added a lot more depth and atmosphere, however that's my only hangup with the production aesthetics (or lack thereof).

From a pacing standpoint, the album might have just been a full-fledged release, since the alternations between incendiary blasphemy and more moderately paced, melancholic tempos really feel 'rounded' and complete, and there are a number of evil sounding intro/interlude pieces which are basically spoken word with the chanted vocal tone and then a lot of reverb. Only the mix of various pieces lacks cohesion, but the songs all flow with the consistency of liquid hellfire, or rather the heat vapors coming off some molten river in the Underworld and then wafting about its vaulted subterranean ceilings. Raucous enough to appeal to those genre addicts who favor demo level recordings, but definitely tighter and more fulfilling than just any random rehearsal-sounding record where you can barely make out anything but hissing noises and screams. I won't go as far as to say I was impressed, but as someone who certainly has an audio fetish for the primitive roots of the medium, which carried into some of my favorite albums (old Bathory, Darkthrone, etc), this was a fairly immersive 48 minutes of material which will hopefully translate into any future studio efforts.

Verdict: Win [7.25/10]

http://www.bleeding-fist.com/

Anarchos - Descent Into the Maelstrom EP (2014)

The mass invocation of throwback death metal these past 5-10 years has proven a double-edged sword, simultaneously reminding us of what it was we so loved about the genre to begin with, while beating those aesthetics repeatedly into the dirt via the lack of nuance and distinction by so many of these newer bands. To be fair, I'm in the position of hearing more of these than the average listener will, and few of those spewing forth from the underground labels are truly terrible. In fact, I dig a number of them, some even managing to shake free the cauls of convention on subsequent records and become something truly buzzworthy...but most of them seem to flash in and out of the attention span quicker than I can recite the titles of their albums. Unfortunately, Dutchmen Anarchos are one such case with their Descent Into the Maelstrom EP.

There's nothing truly wrong or ineffective with this material, but it's ultimately just another paean to the early 90s, fusing together traits of the Dutch, Swedish and Floridian scenes into a groovy, unimposing brand of death metal. They don't necessarily aim to ape any one particular influence, but musically there are just so many callbacks to their inspirations that the songwriting doesn't feel fresh or compelling. Thick picked tremolo passages, meaty chords and eerie, dissonant solo outbursts recount Obituary during their prime (first two albums), while a lot of the note formations weren't unlike older Asphyx stuff. Vocals are like a median between John Tardy's grotesque growls and someone more blunt and direct like a Karl Willetts, while the bass lines are almost entirely dissolved beneath the weight of those crushing rhythms. I thought the drumming was solid...the kicks also have a tendency to become absorbed into other frequencies, but there is a nice mid-range potency to the snare which helps propel the entire proceedings unto their brutal end. But, even if I though the production here was perfectly serviceable on the whole, it's really the riffs and transitions which feel pretty scantily thrown together and don't have a lot of staying power.

Descent Into the Maelstrom isn't particularly atmospheric beyond the dense mix of instruments, and it also isn't interested in taking any risks beyond just those of playing to the nostalgic death metal audience. Which might be fine, if the songwriting was excellent, but when you're adding your two cents to a genre with such a long history, which already involves hundreds of phenomenal albums, it's quite difficult to stand out. And I personally just don't have much interest in trading down for music that mirrors but never attempts to exceed that which inspired it, stuff I was listening to in the 80s during my teens...unless it's incredibly catchy and well done, which this isn't. Descent falters for me because it achieves exactly what it sets out to do. Beyond that, Anarchos don't really fuck around. This isn't a 'bad' recording. They're not incompetent on their instruments, and they don't write crappy riffs, but neither do they write exemplary ones. Big, burly, by-the-books death metal for inexhaustible purists who crave simplicity, or simply haven't gotten enough of what they already love; otherwise, I'd give it a pass.

Verdict: Indifference [5.75/10]

https://www.facebook.com/anarchos666

Ribspreader - Meathymns (2014)

Rogga Johansson's death metal proliferation certainly leaves him at the disadvantage of spreading himself a little thin, and Ribspreader itself seems to have been a victim of the process. This was actually one of the first of his projects I got heavily into, but beyond the first couple albums I felt there were some diminishing returns as far as my excitement level. Recently, The Van Murders and the Kult of the Pneumatic Killrod double album were both decent offerings, but nothing to whip me into a frenzy like his work with Putrevore or Revolting, and Meathymns sort of continues this process of meting out solid, competent but ultimately somewhat ineffectual death metal with a heavy emphasis on the Swedish sound that so inspired Rogga in the first place.

This is a concise record that knows exactly what it's on about. Beefy rhythm guitars with a lot of thrash and punch to them which I'd liken to a blend of Heartwork-era Carcass, Dismember and Entombed, though the riffs are about 50/50 hit or miss in terms of becoming engraved on the listener's memory. A handful of more melodic tremolo picked riffs strewn about the grisly landscape, and a lot of low-end to the album in general thanks to Rogga's impenetrably consistent guttural which anyone used to Ribspreader, Revolting or Paganizer would be intimately familiar with. The drums generally shuffle along at a d-beat clip or similar pace which works well with the sinewy muted guitars, with a snappy enthusiasm to the snares. Lead guitars don't play a major role here, apart from some sporadic melodies, and I also felt like the bass lines weren't heavily involved in building an atmosphere, rather just adhering to the guitars and amplifying that bass. There are a few atmospheric breaks with dirty but less saturated sounding guitars, but they're not quite effective, and I'd have a hard time imagining Ribspreader go any further down this route...though I admit that the thought of several of these tunes with "Chapel of Ghouls" style synthesizers added might be refreshing.

Anyway, as the album title clarifies, this is meat & potato old school death metal which bears the loyal seal that its creator has stamped on dozens of records in the past decade, and there's not a lot more to rave on about. If you've been listening to the genre for that amount of time or longer, then it's easier to dismiss this as another jaunt down memory lane, a singular direction which lacks nuance and distinction among even Rogga's own body of work.  That said, there's very little of this guy's output which lacks at least some capacity for charm, and though a lot of the tunes suffer from excess sameness, it was fun to headbang along for 20-30 minutes. Not much of a transition or progression from that 2004-2005 period in which Bolted to the Cross and Congregating the Sick were unleashed (still the best from this project), but fans of Grave, Unleashed, early Dismember/Entombed or the first two Bloodbath discs might find in this a reliable backup to their favorites. I continue to admire Rogga's zeal for the genre, but I can't help but think that if he trimmed down the number of creative outlets he was involved with, the remainder would be that much more inspirational. Meathymns was a pretty average experience among his considerable canon.

Verdict: Indifference [6.25/10]

https://www.facebook.com/pages/Ribspreader/148182408532846