Pretty gloomy, merging elements from black metal to post-rock and creating sometimes contorted butcheries, other moments twisted, spacy, atmospheric, ambient passages, from Cork, Ireland, Altar Of Plagues strikes again with their second full-length album and four dark, epic, tumultuous tracks. Formed in 2006, they take influence from several differerent acts such as Emperor, Björk and Arvo Pärt. The bands untraditional aesthetic and approach to the music has led to a wide variety of listeners and this may be seen by the diverse range of acts Altar of Plagues have toured with, including Isis and Mayhem, as well as having appeared at festivals that focus on ‘extreme’ metal and festivals that encourage experimentation and diversity. Read more Altar Of Plagues – Mammal (2011)
Reviews
Amnesis – The Pier (2011)
Terry Gilliam’s film, “12 Monkeys” (1995) was inspired by, and takes several concepts directly from the pretty obscure French film “La jetée” made in 1962 by Chris Marker and known in English as “The Jetty” or “The Pier.” The film, by the way: black and white, runs for 28 minutes and the plot is quite simple, the main character – appears as “The Man” – is a prisoner in the aftermath of the Third World War, in a destroyed, post-apocalyptic Paris where survivors live underground in the Palais de Chaillot galleries. Scientists research time travel, hoping to send test subjects to different time periods “to call past and future to the rescue of the present”. They have difficulty finding subjects who can mentally withstand the shock of time travel, but eventually settle upon the prisoner, whose key to the past is a vague but obsessive childhood memory of a woman (who features obviously as “The Woman”) during an incident where a man was killed on the boarding platform (the jetty) at Orly Airport. Read more Amnesis – The Pier (2011)
The Horrors – Skying (2011)
When you’re bloody bored or just feels like you’ve got it all, you stair down to your shoes and spit off something “new”. So, what the heck is shoegaze?! Shoegazing (also known as shoegaze) is a subgenre of alternative rock that emerged from the United Kingdom in the late 1980s. The name was coined in a review in Sounds of a concert by the newly-formed Moose in which singer Russell Yates read lyrics taped to the floor throughout the gig. The term was picked up by the NME and Melody Maker and they used it as a reference to the tendency of the bands’ guitarists to stare at their feet—or their effects pedals, seemingly deep in concentration, while playing. So, it’s not quite a subgenre, we’re just re-labeled something. Just like nobody’s emo anymore, everybody are metalcore, perhaps it sells better. I’m just scared to ask what the fuck is Nu gaze? 😆
Back in 2007 I kind of like “Strange House”, the debut album by The Horrors. It wasn’t about “shoegazing”, it was punk rock with horror and gothic rock shades and aromas, it was raw. I’m not gonna lie to you, I think I missed “Primary Colours” in 2009, or I just can not remember it in that mindless grinding of releases. I’m getting too old for this. Read more The Horrors – Skying (2011)
Copacabana Club – Tropical Splash (2011)
This year I stumbled into a couple of excellent Brazilian bands from quite different genres – not that I actually care about labels – , starting from The Tape Disaster and MindFlow to the Campbell Trio and Lisabi. Copacabana Club reminds me of another great Brazilian band: Cansei de Ser Sexy, and by the way, after a three years gap, their new album entitled “La Liberacion” will be released at the end of the next month. So, Copacabana Club have the same kind of vibe and groove, labeled by some as New Rave, they mixing indie pop with 80s funk, rock with pop and push you directly to the dancefloor. Their mixture it’s very fresh, pumping, energy full and catchy, but it’s also kind of glamorous and retro, still absolutely now days, fresh. And “Tropical Splash” is filled with one by one catchy songs, from the anthematic “Peach” to the provocative “Sex Sex Sex”, the minimalist “Pas Toujours” and the catchy “Just Do It” or the bluesy “Darling”. Read more Copacabana Club – Tropical Splash (2011)
Planeta Imaginario – Optical Delusions (2011)
Combining elements of classic British progressive rock and jazz, not so popular genres nowadays, probably may seem commercial suicide, but this extremely exciting eight piece band from Barcelona, Spain, delivering an absolutely groovy and colorful mixture of jazz, jazz rock and progressive rock, their music overlapping the classic sounds of the 60s and 70s, but introducing modern, avant-garde textures, glows, experimental turns and subtle colors, creating unique, new musical fusions.
Founded in Barcelona in 1999, the band is named after a radically creative children’s TV show from the early 1980s – Imaginary Planet. Their music should appeal to listeners of such diverse artists as: Anekdoten, AKA moon, Area, John Coltrane, King Crimson, Avishai Cohen, Steve Coleman, Deus ex Machina, Gabriel Faure, Gilgamesh, Hatfield at the North, Pat Metheny, Nucleus, Soft Machine, Van der Graaf Generator, Frederic Mompou, National Health, Weather Report, Kenny Werner, Frank Zappa, and John Zorn. Read more Planeta Imaginario – Optical Delusions (2011)
Exes For Eyes – The Amsler Grid (2011)
From Canada, this band bring to the surface the perfect balance between raw hardcore and groove metal, merged into one the energy and the strength of the classic Pantera sound and some of the now days schemes of metalcore and a nice twist of southern rock delivering powerful and brutal, but still catchy and sometimes quite melodious metal anthems perfectly suitable for an extreme moshing down in the club. Songs like “Romanticize the Struggle” (over 8 minutes) are disturbing mixture of Pantera/Down like elements with a nice addition of modern, metalcore-like elements will give you a pretty good teaser of what’s Exes For Eyes essence. Most of their songs (“Feel Again”, “Stop Thinking Start Feelin'”, etc) are almost classic groove/southern metal anthems, Pantera fans are mainly targeted and for sure will be absolutely delighted, Exes For Eyes brings southern riffs back to metal as only Pantera managed before, but still, Exes For Eyes sounds quite as Exes For Eyes and their almost old-school metal comes quite refreshing while lately most of the bands struggling only to copy the now days trendy so-called metalcore cliches and recycling the same patterns. Read more Exes For Eyes – The Amsler Grid (2011)
Given The Day – In Search Of Eden (2011)
Powerful, cutting, groovy – Pantera-like – riffs, grinding tempos and exciting breaks, melodious passages are merged together in the work of these two guys from San Diego, California, and currently they are looking for new band mates playing drums, guitar, bass and keyboards. Garett Chambers – vocals and Mike Burrows comes in the footsteps of bands such as We Came As Romans, Sleeping With Sirens, Emarosa, Attack Attack! All That Remains, August Burns Red, Of Machines, Saosin, Lower Definition, etc and “In Search Of Eden” is a colorful, flowing metalcore album up to date, Garett brings raw vocals, but shift to clean singing while Mike delivering very good riffs and some nice guitar solos. These 11 songs are absolutely ok and promising, my only problem with this “genre” is that everything is quite predictable, too many bands/artist are playing the same kind of patterns, it might be trendy, but it’s full of cliches. Still, I think Given The Day have a good start, I really enjoyed Mike’s riffing and generally his guitar work, Garett have a strong, powerful voice and if they will manage to find their own path, detach them self from the trends, Given The Day have quite potential. Read more Given The Day – In Search Of Eden (2011)
Black Spires – — (2011)
“This is a collection of demo’s, not a real album,” and it’s available for FREE DOWNLOAD at the band’s Bandcamp page. Black Spires are a new band from Ghent, Belgium, consist of Olivier Copejans – music, vocals, guitars and programmed/played drums and bass, and Kristof Luyckx – guitar, working together since 2010. Imagine H.P. Zinker playing Pink Floyd songs (the 1967-1972 period) in a garage. It’s quite exciting, a little bit psychedelic, but cutting, drowned in the garage/noise rock approach and sound. Slower, tensioned moments are twisted into explosive, noise rock avalanches, they use exciting shifting of moods and themes, maintaining an intense groove, alternating subtle, sometimes acoustic moments with intense and inspired rock themes, noisy releases. Read more Black Spires – — (2011)
Crossfade – We All Bleed (2011)
Flowing directly from the boiling veins of Korn, Crossfade reaching to their third album and “We All Bleed” is a dark, intense trip, Ed Sloan and his band mates managed to put together a gloomy, but beautiful, dark, but intense material, proving that their more than just some trend followers, they have their own touch and style, and managed to writing a couple of intense and exciting songs. Actually, “We All Bleed” are over 48 minutes of tumultuous flow, kind of trip to Hell and back, but showing us sometimes sparkling from Heaven, breaking cracks to leave the light comes trough.
I think Columbia Records in 2008 were – as usually – impatient when they kick them out, “We All Bleed” is an excellent work and Eleven Seven Music (also current home for Drowning Pool, Papa Roach, She Wants Revenge, Mötley Crüe, Lit, Vince Neil, Blondie, etc) were inspired to sign them. Read more Crossfade – We All Bleed (2011)
Stardown – Venom (2011)
Merging the rawness and intensity of Pantera with the gloomy and twisted moments of Korn while Ardentis sung on a scale from howling brutality up till clean vocals which sometimes reminds me of Burton C. Bell (Fear Factory) often then of Jonathan Davis (Korn), Stardown includes leaders of Russian metal scene from Amatory and Korea and delivering an extremely intense and powerful modern metal album.
Following “Insi Deus” which was produced & mixed in Denmark by famous sound engineer Jacob Hansen (Maroon, Raunchy, Volbeat), “Venom” was mixed by the same Jacob Hansen while all the drum tracks were recorded in Australia by the drummer Richard Evensand (ex-Chimaira), also featuring guest star Alex Pavlov from Amatory and leader of the band Ardentis. Read more Stardown – Venom (2011)
