2022...a forgettable year or no?

It's over 6 weeks into 2023 and I guess I have barely even looked at this thing since last year. Things come up and I'm determined that I could write something about that...then I get lazy and forget. Some of the ideas are still floating around, but considering we're already well into 2023 and I'm just now taking the time to finally compile my Best of 2022 list...well y'know. Anyhow, it was quite a busy year in 2022 for M and myself. Concerts were a thing again, and while I didn't go to enormous amount of them, I did take the opportunity to see a few bands live. It seemed that metal shows all clustered around each other, and they all took place in Baltimore, Maryland. Roughly an hour away from my abode and extremely inconvenient to trek to on a week night. That said, I was able to see the Rotting Christ/Borknagar tour, Amorphis/Uada, Dark Tranquillity/Kataklysm/Nailed to Obscurity, and Nile/Incantation all in relatively short succession last spring. There was also the 2022 edition of the Maryland Deathfest. I'm not gonna try to recall every single band that played, but some highlights included the Cavalera brothers performing songs from the "Beneath the Remains" and "Arise" albums...which was way more awesome than any expectation I had it would be, as well as seeing Pyrexia, Hypocrisy, Immolation, Monstrosity, Massacre, Blood Incantation, Dark Fortress, Necrophobic, Sacramentum, Trypticon, Obituary, and Carcass. Quite a wild list of bands I just typed there, eh? Of course, there was an unfortunate pall over the proceedings as someone decided to "stage dive" from the top of a parking garage on the first full day. Towards the end of the year, I had the opportunity to finally see Mercyful Fate again, with Kreator, and Midnight opening. Of course, the following night I found myself at another venue, this time the famed Black Cat in Washington DC, to see Katatonia perform the best set I'd ever witnessed by them, thought the opening acts for that show were largely forgettable (I believe it was The Ocean and a newer act called Cellar Door?)

THIS was awesome.

Beyond that, there were some ambitious adventures undertaken by M and I. There was an adventure to South Dakota, where we saw nuclear missile silos, bizarre metal sculptures, and a hilarious group of Indian tourists remarking about the pitfalls of hiking outdoors at Badlands National Park. Said trip also led us to Devil's Tower in Wyoming and several days at a casino with an amazing view and the best hot tub ever outside of Denver, Colorado. Another adventure took us to the redneck riviera in Florida for a week, a work trip for M actually resulted in me getting on an airplane for the first time where we spent too much money in theme parks I'm sure, there were multiple weekend trips to Cincinnati and Louisville because "bourbon", and perhaps the highlight was a week long adventure to the Canadian maritime provinces of Nova Scotia, New Brunswick, and Prince Edward Island. Halifax is a beautiful place full of friendly people who kept tipping M and I off to amazing places to eat and indulge in adult libations. PEI is absolutely beautiful in its own right...with rather tasty food in Charlottetown. (Also; crazy ass Canadians who swim in the freezing cold ass tidal Gulf of St. Lawrence.) Warning though; that Confederation Bridge has a $50 dollar toll and they hit you with it when you try to leave PEI (that's Canadian Dollar, so probably like $37.50 or so USD.)

This brewery was across the river from Halifax in Dartmouth, Nova Scotia. Ended up closing the place down with a very friendly older fellow who had traveled to the States on many occasions and seemed to be talking us into staying in Nova Scotia.

 Last year was one of adventures, but also general restlessness. For me, after grinding out a second post-grad degree, there's a sense of "what's next?" but also hesitation because of a slow-rolling recession where trying something different right when the bottom of the economy may collapse at any moment. Meanwhile, we have Russia invading sovereign countries like it's 1920 again, China engaged in amateur level chicanery involving spy balloons, a town in Ohio facing ecological catastrophe, and public spaces in my country have basically become shooting galleries for any delusional incel with a grievance. Certainly not optimistic times we live in. But hey, I did whitewater rafting for the first time in Colorado last year without dying and managed to not vomit on my first ever flight. Between that and an awful lot of interesting tours coming through later this spring, I feel like I can at least sufficiently distract myself away from impending doom. 

 And with that...my listening habits in review for 2022.

Most Disappointing Album/Trend/Thing in 2022

I thought the new Lamb of God album, Omens, was pretty uninspired. I don't look for that band to be elite or among the most interesting from a creative aspect, but I do tend to look at them as a band I'd expect to release competent, hook filled collections of songs. I thought their eponymous release in 2020 was excellent, with an incredible production clarity. This time? Bleh. 

That said, and I feel like I've got a rant to deliver on this topic, but I think the worst thing happening in the "scene" is all of the internet crying about "gatekeeping." Essentially, as best as I can tell, if you don't share someone else's opinion about a particular artist...especially if that artist happens to be popular or flavor of the month...then you are guilty of "gatekeeping." The inability to call certain bands trash when their musical output sucks seems to be suffocating. Are people incapable of being offended? Has the rash of school shootings made the young crowd scared of upsetting anybody by suggesting they disagree? I dunno, but that bullshit is weak sauce. 

Honorable Mentions

Allegaeon Damnum

Ard Take Up My Bones

Arkaik Labryinth of Hungry Ghosts 

Baest Justitia

Belphegor The Devils

Blind Guardian The God Machine

Candlemass Sweet Evil Sun 

Cosmic Putrefaction Crepuscular Dirge For The Blessed Ones

Fallujah Empyrean

Fetal Blood Eagle Indoctrinate

Gaerea Mirage

Ghost Impera

Hath All That Was Promised

Kuolemanlaakso Kuusumu

Organectomy Nail Below Nail

Psycroptic Divine Council

Saor Origins

Shape of Despair Return To The Void

Strigoi Viscera

Temple of Void Summoning The Slayer

Wake Thought From Descent

Werewolves From The Cave To The Grave

Zeal and Ardor Zeal and Ardor

Top 10 of 2022

10.) Katharos Of Lineages Long Forgotten

 Party like it's 2002? This Swedish band had been around for a minute, but 2022 was the first that I heard of them. Still, they perform the sort of ambitious, over the top sort of bombastic almost theatrical sounding black metal that was en vogue from around 1998-2008 or so. Some bands like Agathodaimon have returned from dormancy to release albums in this style as well, so maybe once that stupid nu-metal fat goes right back to hell like it should, we could see an updated take on this much like Insomnium Bezelbubs had done in 2019.  

9.) Stabbing Extirpated Mortal Process

Holy fuckin' Devourment worship, Spiderman! This is text book TXDM style, full of pulsing blasts, clangy snare, guttural vocals that sound like gasping for air, and those swaggering grooves that are the trade mark of brutal death bands from Texas. You're not getting anything revolutionary here, but this is work of love for fans of this type of death metal, who in recent years have been frustrated by the proliferation of more "deathcore" oriented bands like Ingested who may be perfectly listenable but suck up the proverbial "oxygen in the room" that would otherwise allow artists like this to shine.That said, Stabbing's execution is top notch and not to be denied. Play this at high volumes and frighten your neighbors. 

8.) Soreption Jord 

A Swedish death metal band that sounds more California-tech death than either Gothenburg's melo-death or Stockholm's more punk-ish HM-2 bands. Lots of stop and go riffing and syncopation that maybe has a spiritual ancestor somewhere in its distant DNA of fellow Swedes Visceral Bleeding or Spawn of Possession. Perhaps where Soreption fits is as a melding of both of those aforementioned Swedish bands except with a cleaner sound, a bit more precision, and lot more song craft. Jord is a very catchy short and sweet 31 minutes.

7.) Origin Chaosmos 

 Origin have been playing this relentless, cataclysmic style of tech death for over 20 years now. Hell, how many pedals and drum triggers has John Longstreth gone through by now? At any rate, Origin has always delivered the goods to some degree of exceptionalism, but Chaosmos may rank among their best efforts, matched only by their legendary Informis Infinitas, Inhumanitas album from 2002. What sets this one apart from some of their prior efforts is there's an increase in "dynamics" here; while the blastbeats almost never cease for the 30 some minutes this one goes there's plenty of chugging riffs balanced by almost lofty tremolo picking that then lead into downright video-game-ish cosmic sounding tones. Origin has figured out to add enough "color" to their "palette of sounds" to be interesting and not just background music. 

 

6.) In The Woods... Diversum

In The Woods... after their reformation are not the same band they were in their original 1990's incarnation. That era of the band was a product of the black metal scene and while they clearly had progressive tendencies long before the rest of that scene did until bands like Borknagar and Enslaved explored their identities further around the time In The Woods... broke up or became inactive following the Strange in Stereo album. Post-reformation, they still have the harsh/clean vocals dynamic but a lot of the black metal tendencies have subsided in favor of a more epic, proggy, somber metal style. Two great albums (Pure and Cease The Day) with then-newly hired vocalist James Fogarty followed...and I was fortunate enough to witness an amazing set by this version of the band at MDF in 2017. Unfortunately, Forgarty and his abundant creativity departed the band following Cease The Day and once again the most prominent role in the band has a new voice.This time it's a gentleman named Bernt Fjellstad who I had initially mistaken for JB Christoffersson, the voice of Grand Magus and formerly of Spiritual Beggars as well (I think he was on SB's On Fire album?) Any time a band changes vocalists, it can run the risk of ruining a great band...or it can lift a band to a new level. Or in the case of In The Woods... with Diversum, it just marks a new chapter as I think Fjellstad does a fine job with both his exceptional clean vocals and acceptable harsh vocals but In The Woods... isn't going to suddenly after nearly 30 years of existence shoot up the pop charts or anything ridiculous like that. That said, musically this is a further refinement and perhaps slightly more epic, darker sounding path that began with Pure. All in all, a more than solid effort. 

5.) Desecrate The Faith III

 When I first discovered this Texas death metal band in 2017 and heard Unholy Infestation, I thought they were a fantastic representation of that chunky, groovy brutal death metal sound. They fit well among the Prophecy's and Devourment's and Infernal Dominion's of that localized death metal scene and I would have been excited to hear them continue in that direction. Instead, they went for a sound far more aligned with Severe Torture, which is to say that they've got all of the brutal elements of the TXDM style, but write actual songs where riffs reappear and songs build up to guitar solos that act as cathartic release. When the term that a band is "maturing" gets used, normally it means they're getting soft or adding a bunch of fluffy froo foo nonsense to their sound. That doesn't apply here. Desecrate the Faith has "matured" without losing one iota of their venom; they've just improved as songwriters. 

4.) Amorphis Halo

 Amorphis has been around since what...1991? I think that's when the Disment of Soul EP came out we're talking a band that's been around over 30 years again. Their early years involved a lot of exploration as they shifted from a doom/death band into some kind of progressive folk/death metal act then into a smoother pop prog/metal band then whatever the hell those 2 albums with annoying saxophone were called. They then kicked out replaced their previous lead vocalist with Tomi Joutsen and kinda discovered their "identity" on Eclipse as something between "folk metal and goth-pop-rock meets death metal with underlying 70's prog indulgences" and have put it on cruise control ever since. I feel like for the time that coincides with Tomi's tenure as vocalist, only The Beginning of Times failed to live up to an expected level of quality that Amorphis delivers on each album. As Amorphis has now become what could be termed a "legacy" act, I think they get the short straw when it comes to most AOTY lists from the various reporting outlets online, especially because they've got a clearly distinct, un-imitated sound. So an album like Halo, which sounds aligned with the rest of the Tomi Joutsen-era of the band, may fly under the radar despite the fact that Halo is just a great collection of songs crafted by a band at the peak of their abilities. That can be enough, can't it? 

 

3.) The Halo Effect Days Of The Lost

Let's be honest, this is a bit of a played out style of metal in 2023. The Gothenburg melodic death metal sound that was initially popularized by At The Gates, Dark Tranquillity, and In Flames was a mid to late 1990's phenomenon. By the mid-2000's, the genre seemed to gravitate towards In Flames in particular, and hordes of bands like Children of Bodom, Soilwork, Norther, etc looked to fill that space as In Flames themselves became angsty, whiny emo-ish nu-metal following Reroute to Remain. Meanwhile, New England hardcore bands took inspiration from Slaughter of the Soul and the modern metalcore movement was born around the same time. Eventually At The Gates would reform and have since released 3 albums, while Dark Tranquillity morphed into a different sort of entity, still rooted in melo-death but a lot more atmospheric in nature. In Flames, on the other hand, has been a shitty band for longer than they were a good one at this point as they've become that far removed from the trilogy of albums (The Jester Race, Whoracle, and Colony) that made them underground darlings for a moment in time. Over those years, attrition and turn over in the band saw key song writer Jesper Stromblad depart as well as most of the original In Flames lineup...a lineup which in its infancy included Dark Tranquillity vocalist Mikael Stanne. Maybe it was nostalgia, or boredom, or a desire to give the current brain-trust of In Flames the biggest middle finger possible, but Stanne, Stromblad, along with 3 other former members of In Flames formed The Halo Effect, and recorded the album that logically should have come out between Colony and Clayman. To call this "death metal" feels like an incredible reach despite Stanne's predominately growled delivery (he basically sounds the same as he does in Dark Tranquillity here from their Projector era) but as just an album of well crafted, catchy songs with some aggression, some punch, and a whole lot of memorability this excels. For me, there's so much nostalgia in that because it's everything that was amazing about downloading mp3s off of Angelfire websites and hours spent in online chatrooms discovering new artists during a time when the European metal underground was fresh and exciting to me. Nostalgia is a power force. This album has gotten a TON of listens. Whatever novelty it lacks, it scratches an itch that hasn't been scratched in a very long time. 

I don't think its a coincidence that In Flames decided to go back to playing something closer to this style after they saw all of the hype and love that The Halo Effect got for this album. 

2.) Immolation Act of God

Death metal kings doing what they do. Dark, ominous, haunting, pummelling...hard to believe these guys have been doing this for so long. Also hard to believe that they keep doing it at this level of awesome. 

1.) Undeath It's Time...To Rise From The Grave

It was really close for me between this and the new Immolation record, as I feel like those 2 releases are the step above everything else that came out in 2022. I think I'm giving the nod to Undeath mainly because it's new and they've got a little bit of novelty about them. I want to say this is their second album, and it's filthy, grimy Cannibal Corpse worship from their early Corpsegrinder days (think Vile or Gallery of Suicide.) There's nothing fancy here, as I believe this band almost takes pride in sounding like a bunch of lunkheaded cavemen. Still, there's some good riffs abound and I think they do a pretty good job of capturing the mid-90's Florida DM style. It sounds grimy and raw and not particularly technical, instead it just wants to get drunk and punch you in the face a few times. When executed well, that's a style I can get behind and Undeath did a great job on this one. 

 

 

And there you have it. My Best of 2022. Truth is, I haven't bought as many records in 2022 as I did the previous several years. I still love the genre and get excited to explore new record stores and such...I just simply didn't find as much that excited me in 2022. Especially among newer bands.Hopefully 2023 sees that change, though so far the purchases I've been most excited about have been Katatonia, Obituary, ...And Oceans, and upcoming releases by Enslaved and Insomnium. I think the only "new" bands that have gotten my attention so far this year are Defy The Curse and Nothingness. I guess we will see if I can actually motivate myself to sit down and write when the notion is in my head over the course of 2023.

 

2021: It was...um...a year?

Two weeks into 2022 and I haven't gone through the customary ritual of drafting a list of albums I enjoyed over the previous year. It's not because I stopped listening to music, because I definitely haven't. I certainly have continued to buy and enjoy albums by establish artists and newer bands alike. It has been, however, quite a year since the last time I posted an update on this little blog. The last 365 (+14) days saw my country almost experience a successful coup, a pandemic that developed a solution only for conspiracy wingnuts who pop dick pills and oxycotin all day to suddenly become skeptical of "Big Pharma" to reject en masse, and the price of everything to spike up because, y'know, more demand than supply in an economy that's underpinned by cheap labor. On a personal front, I was worked nearly to death feeding 'Murica while I finished my MBA (with a 4.0 fuckers!) and M got a new job, but we also found time to have some some pretty amazing adventures in places like Terlingua, Texas, Las Cruces, New Mexico, Jackson, Wyoming, and Bar Harbor, Maine. I even let M talk me into a week in Orlando visiting theme parks.

Getting lost in damn near Mexico with M and a stack of random metal records is my happy place.

 

 

True story: M used the unfortunate death of my grandmother as an excuse to drag me here.

Buffalo are massive animals that either plod about or can suddenly go 45 mph and bludgeon everything in their path. That makes them like the doom/death of the animal kingdom.

Would you believe this was taken on Memorial Day weekend in Maine? Kvlt as fukk.

With a vaccine, live events have begun happening again; I was able to go to a hockey game and tentatively have a couple more of those planned. I still haven't been to a metal show since December of 2019, but my tickets for MDF in 2022 are valid and who knows, maybe I see a show or two before then. Of course, I have some other stuff in professional world to look at; updating my resume and obtaining some post-degree credentials but largely it's kinda time to relax and take a breath. With a lot of uncertainty about what this year promises to bring, I don't know where or what I'll be doing. I do feel confident that the soundtrack remains the same. 

 

This movie wasn't a satire of 2021, it was a fucking mirror. I really hope 2022 is somehow miraculously less depressing...

Biggest Disappointment of 2021

I think that a silver lining of the pandemic, if there is one, is that it forced bands off the touring cycle and it kinda forced them to spend more time refining and revising the albums they'd end up releasing, which in turn meant that overall quality of releases was much better than recent years. I don't think I bought or took an interest in any albums this year that didn't basically satisfy the itch they were meant to scratch. I live in a bubble of course, so I'm sure I could pick up an album that would let me down...but nothing comes to mind for memorable suckage. I mean, if you shoved a Rob Zombie or Five Fisted Circle Jerk(?) album in front of me I'd expect that to suck; the bigger surprise would be if it didn't (supposedly according to at least one online arbiter of metal that I respect was posting that the new Cradle of Filth album doesn't suck, which would be a considerable surprise to me.)  So I'm just going to stick with the fact that I didn't get to see any metal live and in person for two full calendar years now as my disappointment. If anything, I don't think there was a release that I heard that made me say "that's an all-time great album" but just a whole lot of really good quality releases that made it a bit difficult to separate the best of the bunch. I imagine that I could create a different list on another day and still feel good about it. 

(If someone wants to tell me why Spiritbox is supposed to be cool I'm all ears because I'm kinda sick of seeing them blowing up my Social Media feed.) 

Honorable Mentions

A Pale Horse Named Death Infernmum In Terra (SPV)

Aborted Maniacult (Century Media)

Aeon God Ends Here (Metal Blade)

Baest Necro Sapiens (Century Media)

Becerus Homo Homini Brutus (Everlasting Spew)

Be'lakor Coherence (Napalm Records)

Black Hole Deity Lair of Xenolich EP (Everlasting Spew)

Blood Red Throne Imperial Congregation (Nuclear Blast)

Burial Inner Gateways To The Slumbering Equilibrium At The Center Of Cosmos (Everlasting Spew)

Carcass Torn Arteries (Nuclear Blast)

Crypts of Despair All Light Swallowed (Transcending Obscurity)

Deiquisitor Humanoid (Dark Descent)

Diabolizer Khalkedonian Death (Everlasting Spew)

Dread Sovereign Alchemical Warfare (Metal Blade)

Endseeker Mount Carcass (Metal Blade)

EyeHateGod A History Of Nomadic Behavior (Century Media)

Felled The Intimate Earth (Transcending Obscurity)

First Fragment Gloire Eternalle (Unique Leader)

Flesh Hoarder Relic Of Putrescent Filth (New Standard Elite)

Fossilization He Whose Name Is Long Forgotten (Everlasting Spew)

Full Of Hell Garden Of Burning Apparitions (Relapse Records)

Harakiri For The Sky Maere (AOP Records)

Hooded Menace The Tritonous Bell (Season of Mist)

Hypocrisy Worship (Nuclear Blast)

Laceration Demise (Rotted Life)

Monolord Your Time To Shine (Relapse Records)

Moonspell Hermitage (Napalm Records)

NecroticGoreBeast Human Deviance Galore (Comatose Music)

Nightfall At Night We Pray (Season of Mist)

Ophis Spew Forth Odium (FDA Records)

Panopticon ...And Again Into The Light (Bindrune Recordings)

Pathology The Everlasting Plague (Nuclear Blast)

Portal Avow (Profound Lore)

Soen Imperial (Silver Lining Music)

Stabbing Ravenous Psychotic Onslaught EP (Comatose Music)

Swallow The Sun Moonflowers (Century Media)

Tribulation Where The Gloom Becomes Sound (Century Media)

Werewolves What A Time To Be Alive (Prosthetic Records)

White Stones Dancing Into Oblivion (Nuclear Blast)

 

10.) Wolves In The Throne Room Primordial Arcana (Relapse Records)

After John Haughm decided to edge-lord a little too hard and the other members of Pillorian decided to pack up shop, Wolves In The Throne Room kinda took up the altar of "band that sounds closest to Agalloch that you're gonna find in 2022." Which kinda makes sense given that WITTR also call the Pacific Northwest home. An example of a band that I came a bit lately towards but now I'm enjoy the chance to delve into their entire discography.

9.) Alluvial Sarcoma (Unique Leader)

Is this deathcore? Progressive death? I dunno. It's definitely modern for the genre, with lots of huge riffs, big breakdowns with lots of space to breathe, etc. Seems to fit in well with the modern Unique Leader sound I guess; it feels more dynamic than you'd expect but still oppressively plodding yet pit friendly. 

 

8.) Cannibal Corpse Violence Unimagined (Metal Blade)

Zero surprises here; it's a Cannibal Corpse record that sounds like a Cannibal Corpse record. That said, Eric Rutan is the best thing that ever happened to this band. The fact that they remain this extreme as they've become 50 year olds deserves a lifetime achievement award.

 

7.) Alustrium A Monument Of Silence (Unique Leader)

These guys sound so tight and technically proficient that I initially mistook them for part of the Quebec tech-death collective. It's not just their ability to doodle on their fretboards though; Alustrium infuses their brand of tech-death with catchy hooks and actual song structure; there's melody to be found amongst the varied growls and ceaseless bombast of drums. Busy yet restrained in all of the right ways.

 

6.) Khemmis Deceiver (Nuclear Blast)

Along with Pallbearer and Spirit Adrift, you could almost consider Khemmis part a "big 3" of American doom since the 2010's. Each band draws back to the foundations of the genre to achieve something classically inspired albeit in different ways. Pallbearer writes haunting dirges, Spirit Adrift occupies something of a 1979-1982 era of doom meets cock rock currently, yet Khemmis retains the huge riffing and sludgy heft of doom in what they bring to the table. Deciever is less bass heavy (makes sense; this time around the bass guitar parts were performed by the two guitarists), but still full of downtuned grimy agony and a varied vocal delivery; this time around the growls are slightly more prominent. If Pallbearer aims for loftier "high art" and Spirit Adrift seeks to be the soundtrack for taking psychadelics and getting into an orgy with gals who have the "big bush", Khemmis seeks to crush you with misery, while occasionally adding some swagger with it. 

 

5.) Aenigmatum Deconsecrate (20 Buck Spin)

Bombastic blackened-death from 20 Buck Spin. Aegnimatum delve into multiple death metal adjacent subgenres while remaining a distinct entity, combining a bit of Athiest with the dischordant progressions of 2nd wave black metal, but delivered with the ferocity of Nile. Trying to find reviews that give points of reference to compare these guys to is difficult, but that speaks to the distinct character of what they've put together here. The meandering bass guitar lines underpinning all of this cacophony is a nice detail.

 

4.) Pyrexia Gravitas Maximus (Unique Leader)

Holy fuck. I'm sure there's a ton of recency bias here but this is the best album this long running NYDM band ever released. And yeah, I'm including the legendary Sermony of Mockery record with that. This album is so good it makes me want to revisit that post-Sermon discography, because until now I don't feel like these guys ever lived up to that album following it's release. That's not an issue with Gravitas Maximus, full of chugging slams, breakdowns, gravel throrated growls, and steady doses of blastbeats and double kick runs. When this style of death metal is executed at the competency that Pyrexia displays here, it is hard to beat. At just 25 minutes or so, it comes fast, hard, and leaves you speechless. At number 4, I may be underrating this one. 

 

3.) Obscura A Valediction (Nuclear Blast)

Is this the 5th or 6th album this German prog-death troop? I dunno, but as someone who felt deeply burned by Opeth when they went limpwristed 10 years ago, Obscura has scratched that niche well in the years since. There's fretless bass lines, lush accoustic interludes, plenty of the fretboard wizardry to appease Cynic fans, enough venom to fit comfortably alongside the catalog of post-Human era Death, and still enough hooks and songcraft to make A Valediction a sufficiently ambitious if familiar journey. It gets a ranking rather than honorable mention because of their peerless execution. 

 

2.) Eye of Purgatory The Lighthouse (Transcending Obscurity)

Holy fucking Edge of Sanity, Batman! Everything about this recaptures that mid-90's era of ambitious death metal that sought to progress while maintaining the focus on riffs and aggression. The production and tones all gives vibes of Sunlight Studios...in spirit if nothing else. It all makes sense when you realize that the most prolific guy in Swedish death metal, Rogga Johansson, is the mastermind behind this band. Rogga, also the driving force of other more caveman-esque bands like Paganizer, Ribspreader, and Those Who Bring The Torture gets a pass for the "lack of originality" here since we're essentially discussing a seminal figure in the "non-Gothenburg" side of Swedish death metal. Big riffs, melodic leads, a use of keyboards that takes an appropriate backseat to meaty riffing. I get it that you could just listen to Purgetory Afterglow or Crimson and get the same experience, but I still can't help but feel like Rogga did an outstanding job of breathing fresh life into previously used template.

 

1.) The Crown Royal Destroyer (Metal Blade)

I'm not sure if anyone else will hold this album in this level of esteem, but in a year that's hard to separate between a lot of really good albums, I think this may be one of the albums I listened to the most. This is ham-fisted Scandinavian death metal that borrows elements of thrash and melodic death metal to bring forth a filthy yet well produced, crushingly heavy slab of bangers. Songs like "Motordeath" are respect-filled nods to influences such as early Metallica, and I can confidently say that "We Drift On" is the best song never written by In Flames or Amon Amarth. Royal Destroyer is a confident effort by an established, well polished band who know what they do well. 

       

I guess now that I'm done with my university studies (for real this time!) I'll try to update a little more than once annually. I felt like I had some topics I wanted to riff on, and I may well get around to them in the next few months. In the meantime, I'll "shout out" to establishments both real and virtual that kept me supplied with metal over the last year.

Brick and Mortar Stores:

The Sound Garden- Baltimore, Maryland

Vinyl Altar- Philadelphia, Pennsylvania 

Bull Moose- Maine and New Hampshire (especially Portsmouth, NH and Portland, Me)

Extreme Noise Records- Minneapolis, Minnesota

Twist and Shout Compact Discs, Records, & DVDs- Denver, Colorado

Waterloo Records- Austin, Texas  

Online Shops and Distros

Comatose Music  

Everlasting Spew

Night Shift Merch 

Season of Mist USA  

HorrorGorePainDeath Productions

Hell's Headbangers 

 

At least it's over- Best of 2020

Whelp, did this year suck or what? 2020 is one of those just abysmally awful years like 1939, 1929, 1860, 1349, etc…that was just tremendously awful for the entire planet. Here in the United States, we’ve been governed by a kleptocrat with the support his cult of the “stupid, ignorant, and desperate” who are fearful that a brown person somewhere somehow has a dollar more and a shinier smart phone than they do. Said orange faced kleptocrat has done fuck all to respond to a pandemic that as I type this, has killed more than 300,000 Americans who may not have otherwise kicked the bucket except for the malice and incompetence of this pitiful, weak, small quasi-man. Oh, then there was the fact that when cops were seen literally murdering a black man on cellphone video by choking him out, that after the initial shock subsided, we got more of the same “can’t we just all get along so I don’t have to worry about my property being stolen” bullshit. Heaven forbid the fucking police have to abide by the same doctrines regarding the use of deadly force that our military does. 

 

That whole thing about those who don't learn from the past...etc...

Not that the other side of the political aisle has done anyone any favors either. Diamond Joe, strategically speaking, barely won under the stupid ass rules that govern our elections despite having 7 million more votes. This was mainly because Team Blue would rather pander to token “representation” rather than deliver a meaningful actual change that may ask our economic and business elites to sacrifice a marginal percentage of their monopolized wealth for the good of everyone else, at least at its highest levels of leadership. And your arm gets twisted into voting for this bullshit, because your only viable alternative to going along with the diet soda version of Republicanism is so bat-shit incompetent they throw away a previous administration’s pandemic response playbook and since getting beat in an election are currently peddling some bizarre conspiracy that somehow Hugo Chavez’s rotting corpse has conspired with China’s Winnie the Pooh and the “Epstein/Clinton Reptilian Pedophile Crime Syndicate” to swing votes via rigged voting machines that somehow managed to allocate votes to Biden instead of Trump, but didn’t alter any down ticket races to give Biden a legislative majority. Yeah, this shit is wild… and by wild I mean comedic stupid and bound to get worse because Y’all-Qaeda thinks government mandates to wear masks and limit gatherings of people to reduce the spread of Covid-19 is somehow is an oppression of their freedom. 

 

Did I even mention that RBG dropped dead and was replaced by the Queen Bitch of Gilead, and for that we are now under his watchful eye, or at least that of a 6-3 conservative dickhead Supreme Court majority, with a president-elect too fucking pussy to stack the court, create new liberal states, or otherwise lock in some changes for the better? Don’t worry, I’m sure there’s some snarky socialist types lounging their parents basements with a bachelors degree in sociology along with a mountain of student loan debt, but at least those heroes come armed with a bag of dirt weed, Cheetos, internet pornography (or at least pics of AOC’s feet) and some dank memes to bring about “the revolution” once they’re done playing Animal Crossing and listening to Chapo’s Trap House. 

Look, they make me laugh too sometimes but if you think that these clowns are gonna bring about your political revolution, then rest assured that our elites can sleep well at night.

Fuck my country, man.

That’s a lot of political ranting and run-on sentences but the last 4 years of Trump’s awful reign has been exhausting in an all consuming way unlike anything else in my lifetime. It’s been the car wreck you want to take your eyes off of but you just can’t. That said, 2020, like much of the last few years, has been more positive for M and I than perhaps the public at large. I type this 4 classes away from completing my MBA from a directional state university with a Division 2 football team; I even have a 4.0 GPA to boot. M and I managed a couple fun trips, including adventures to several National Parks in Colorado and Utah, a lovely few days on the beach in Georgia that left us both so sunburnt as to be red as tomatoes, and we made to Oklahoma and New Mexico for the first time which has us down to 3 remaining states to visit to have completed the entire United States. I even managed to lose 50lbs. Sure, I need to lose another 50, but it’s a start, right? Hah.

It hasn’t been all fun and games though. M had her work hours briefly cut back at one point, my annual college football road trip got shit-canned, and I haven’t been to a fucking metal concert since December of 2019. I didn’t get to see either of my 90 year old grandmothers for Christmas this year, and my plans to finally get on an airplane were thwarted, as M and I had intended to make it to Las Vegas for Psycho Las Vegas in 2020, as well as to swing by a couple of National Parks (Death Valley, Grand Canyon, maybe Zion?) in a loop.

I’m not sure what 2021 holds but at least in theory the vaccines for our new plague are now starting to be distributed and by mid year we may be able to actually have fun again if we manage to live that long and/or if there’s any restaurants or concert venues that aren’t boarded up by that time. Until then, I’ve got another semester of college coursework ahead of me, some time spent screaming at the TV as the Green Bay Packers will get destroyed in the playoffs by a team with a strong running game, the Washington Capitals will grow older and waste more of what’s left of Alex Ovechkin’s prime, and hey, maybe a little more of Assassin’s Creed: Valhalla to keep me occupied. With that said, here’s my take on the year in heavy music for 2020.

 

Our hero in DC is only getting older, and once he retires we're not winning shit.

Most Disappointing Record- Katatonia City Burials

I was a bit surprised to reach this conclusion, but this album came out back in April and I had almost completely forgotten it was a thing. I know that M listened to the song “Lacquer” a lot and I don’t think the album begins all that badly, but it ends up just being completely forgettable background music. Katatonia’s style is already relatively subdued for a metal band, but I thought the previous album “The Fall of Hearts” was amazing. I’m certainly willing to embrace and sit down with post-metal type stuff and don’t demand blood and gore as you, clearly bored individual reading this, will note on my actual list, but City Burials just didn’t have staying power or memorability. An example of a band I just expect more from.

Honorable Mentions:

Anaal Nathrakh Endarkenment
Athme Mephitic
Bedsore Hypnagogic Hallucinations
Benediction Scriptures
Contrarian Only Time Will Tell
Convocation Ashes Coalesce
Deathwhite Grave Image
Deeds of Flesh Nucleus
Demonical World Domination
Desolator Sermon of Apathy
Devoured Elysium Extermination Policies
Disavowed Revocation of the Fallen
Earth Rot Black Tides of Obscurity
Gaerea Limbo
Hinayana Death of the Cosmic
Incantation Sect of Vile Divinities
Incinerate Sacriligevim
Khora Timaeus
Molested Divinity Unearthing the Void
Napalm Death Throes of Joy in the Jaws of Defeatism
Necrophobic Dawn of the Damned
Necrot Mortal
Paradise Lost Obsidian
Shed The Skin The Forbidden Arts
Skaldr Scythe of Our Errors
Solstafir Endless Twilight of Codependent Love
Ulthar Providence
Vader Solitude In Madness
Valdrin Effigy of Nightmares
Void Rot Descending Pillars
Werewolves The Dead Are Screaming
White Stones Kuarahy
Winterfylleth The Reckoning Dawn

10.) Spirit Adrift Enlightened in Eternity

M will challenge me on this pick, as she seemed to prefer this band when they just played slow and frontman Nate Garrett didn’t express himself as an overconfident rock star in interviews, but I appreciate that Spirit Adrift didn’t repeat the same album they had released on twice previously. In a miserable, depressing kind of year where nothing about society seems capable of functioning properly, there needed to be an album that offered…ummm...well…hope and resilience? The chorus of the opening track to this album makes that manifestly clear and I’d dare say a bit of an internalized slogan for myself this year.

“If we make it through the night, we will ride into the light.” 

 

9.) Xibalba Anos En Infierno

I discovered this band while hanging out with a homie at the last college football road trip, and I had some anticipation for this release. It’s exactly what I was hoping for, sludgy and grimy, a good bit raw, heavy as all fucking hell, straddling the line somewhere between old school death metal, 90’s hardcore, and doom. I dunno if they’re actually doing anything new, but they certainly sound fresh to these ears. 

 

8.) Valkyrie Fear

Speaking of the retro train, Valkyrie delves deeply into the same well of 70’s and early 80’s rock that bands like Graveyard, or In Solitude, or Sumerlands indulge in, complete with theatrical guitar work, extensive harmonies, imperfect but effective clean vocals. In a world where Ghost has become one of metal’s biggest bands, there’s clearly a space for quality bands like Valkyrie to occupy and I’ve certainly redeveloped my appreciation for these kinds of classic sounding bands. 

 

7.) Godtrhymm Reflections

Take early Paradise Lost, Saint Vitus, and maybe a bit of the first Pallbearer record, let it simmer for hours, then run it through a strainer of Serenades-era Anathema, and you’ve got Godtrhymm. Godrhymm is the labor of love produced by Hammish Glencross, recently exiled from My Dying Bride, and who had previously also played in legendary doom metal act Solstice. This is plodding miserable stuff, with riffs that are both massive, monolithic, yet memorable and vocals that reach for that territory Nick Holmes was treading in during Gothic and Shades of God. Absolutely top notch. 

 

6.) …And Oceans Cosmic World Mother

A welcome return, and they avoided some of the weird experimentation and bizarre indulgences of their later records to just focus on ripping, melodic and somewhat symphonic Scandinavian black metal delivered with precision. You always wonder about reunion albums and if the band should have even bothered, but I feel pretty comfortable saying that this album is well balanced between its ferocity and it’s melodicism, sharing most in common with the band’s debut The Dynamic Gallery of Thoughts, which I also recommend if you can find it. A welcome throwback to that vibrant mid-late 90’s period of black metal. 

 

5.) Cytotoxin Nuklearth

I feel like this is a year where I heard a lot of really good, but not great brutal death metal records. Not that “elite-tier” anyhow. I mean, Molested Divinity’s Unearthing the Void was awesome and the Disavowed reunion was much welcomed but while I enjoyed the new Defeated Sanity album, I wasn’t nearly as impressed with it as other fans of the brutal death metal sound. Nuklearth, however, stands out. Cytotoxin scores points on a couple levels; their Chernobyl gimmick is original, their musicianship is next level, and they bring both the technical and the brutal in equal abundance. Nuklearth rips hard, furiously blasting while also providing those breakdowns without going overkill on it.

 

4.) Uada Djinn

A vocal minority of the tr00 brigade will complain about this album. The rest of us, who like ugly heavy music, will see this for what it is: the album where Uada escaped the Mgla comparisons and became the Judas Priest meets Dissection band they always were aiming for. This record opens with a post-punk sounding drum beat and ends with one of the absolute most epic Iron Maiden inspired guitar solos ever recorded in metal. Yeah, listen to the last 3 minutes or so of “Between Two Worlds” and tell me that’s not what you hear. Much like Behemoth has proven, just because you draw from many non-metal influences, it doesn’t mean that your extreme metal has to become “less metal” as a result. 

 

3.) Wayfarer A Romance With Violence

I love everything about this album and consider it a possible top album of the decade if not for the two albums above it; one of the best and most close together top 3 albums I could rate in quite a bit of time. Wayfarer really dives in deeper with the “cowboy western motif” as A Romance With Violence is very much more conceptual than previous Wayfarer releases; closely examining the westward expansion and just how grim and chaotic reality was for settlers in a lawless hinter-region of the United States. If you’ve ever driven across the Western United States, the vastness of the distances between cities is enormous and the hours upon hours just on the interstate can be relaxing in its solitude but it could also be scary, as mother nature unleashes ferocious storms and many of the folk who live in those rural, geographically isolated outposts can be rather rough around the edges, if you’re lucky. Wayfarer captures all of that perfectly, as they blend their black metal with clean, semi-acoustic spaghetti western vibes seamlessly, capturing the wild west for the morbidly dark, death and despair filled wasteland that it was. 

 

2.) Ulcerate Stare Into Death And Be Still

The idea that a 3 piece band can sound this heavy, this fierce, this ominous, this dark, this…horrifying? Ulcerate is the darkest, most terrifying sounding act in death metal at this point, as their 6 to 8 minute compositions have gradually moved away from their clankier, most discordant elements of their early sound to something that still is connected to that, but pulls at you with greater, almost black metalish despair without any high pitched shrieks or corpse-painted silliness. This is guttural growls and some of the most impressively bombastic drumming in any death metal band ever. While accessible…by Ulcerate’s standards, this is far removed from the caveman brutality of the 90’s and certainly a challenging record for people who may prefer their death metal…dare I say less intellectual? For those who want an involved, captivating listen that builds to peaks and crescendos instead of verse/chorus/verse, this delivers in spades. I was convinced it was going to be my number 1 album, except for the band that follows…

 

1.) Pallbearer Forgotten Days

With their 4^th album, it’s just time to stop only thinking of Pallbearer as a tremendous doom metal band, but just flat out the best band active in metal in 2020. The tr00 d00mmmm crowd will dislike the shorter song lengths and faster tempos, but an album that’s easier to listen to is no crime. Rather, the fact that Pallbearer can write songs at different lengths and tempos and still sound haunting, miserable, and full of raw, sludgy goodness is a feather in their cap. The fact they’re playing up to their classic rock influences while still foundationally being a slow band who play long songs full of low end sludge I think has only made the band even better to listen to. 

 

Fuck You, Pay Me: the T-shirt Edition.

So on my social media feed, I just read this article where Cradle of Filth frontman Dani Filth is quoted saying that he'd love to get his band's shirts into Walmart because he'd like the money. Walmart, as I'm guessing the 3 of you that are reading this are aware, sells band merchandise for a variety of well known, mainstream rock artists. For example, their website offers a wide arrange of hideous looking KISS merchandise from many resellers.

Unfortunately, the KISS Kasket is not among their offerings.

Of course, they also sell stuff right on their shelves, and as crazy as it sounds to a 40 something like myself, there's kids who are out there wearing Nirvana t shirts from Walmart that couldn't name a song by them. Metal has it's rules of conduct, and only wearing a band's shirt if you actually listen to that artist is most certainly one of the core tenants. So while the likelihood of someone running afoul by buying a Metallica replica tour shirt at Walmart in Bumfuck, Indiana is rather unlikely, should more obscure bands be trying to get their shit into Walmart?

You can't name their third album or their original lead singer either, you fucking poser.

I get that Dani Filth is a tiny little drowning kitten of a metal vocalist in a band that has only ever written a smattering of good songs entirely by accident but I don't think he's wrong to have those aspirations. If anything, it'd be brilliant given that while CoF themselves might be a bit too edgy for Walmart, for other bands to get their merchandise on shelves would represent a revenue stream at a time when bands aren't really selling their music (outside of a few luddites like myself who still buy CDs or the vinyl snobs who have money to re-purchase their entire collections) band merchandise represents probably their best income stream besides touring and playing shows. It also promotes awareness of the bands themselves, which you'd hope would lead to people streaming their music on Spotify or YouTube and eventually buying a ticket to the concert, or ordering the album on vinyl. Or another shirt when 18 of their peers also have the same shirt that they bought at the same Walmart.

It's pretty likely that the teenage'd me would be rather confused, but with the disappearance of record stores in every shopping mall and music sales in general, trying to cling to an old model because it represents some idea of "cool" or "true" just doesn't make a lot of sense. If musicians or artists want to devote themselves fully to their art, they need a revenue stream to finance their endeavors. That's why so many bands have expanded their merch from just t shirts to shot glasses, thongs, action figures, and yes, the KISS Kasket.

I just want to remind you again that yes, this was a thing!

I guess this has all been shaped by two semesters taking post-grad classes in Marketing, but if your goal is to make your band bigger and promote awareness, then by all means you should not just be producing merchandise branded with your band, but you should be pursuing an "omnichannel" approach to distribution. Not just at concerts, or through a bandcamp website, but if you can pull it off, by getting it into a big box store. Get it in front of people in as many ways as possible, and perhaps it's time for me to come around and reshape my own thinking. Instead of saying you already need to know the band before getting the t-shirt, maybe the year 2020, getting the t-shirt makes the kid search the band on Spotify. Maybe in the near future having an eye catching logo and creative merchandising really will be just as important as the music itself for successful bands (after all, fans who are wearing your band's logo across their chest are literally providing free advertising for your art.)

Marketing Genius. Still sucks at vocals.

I'm agreeing with Dani Filth. Interesting times we live in!