Rolling 2020 Metal Thread

that is a lot more like XXXtentacion than metal

Powerman 5000 are still around and have a new LP? Heh.

I wrote a piece on seven recent-ish, weird-ish metal albums for Bandcamp Daily. Perhaps some of you will enjoy reading it.

Surprised not to see Ulcerate and Khthoniik Cerviiks in there.

I wrote a whole article on Ulcerate back in May.

Ah, my bad, I'll check it out.

The Necrot album out today is...fine, but totally unmemorable. Other than the guitar solo on "Sinister Will," it's basically 40 minutes of rehashed Grave and Dismember riffs. These guys bring nothing new to the table at all.

"asleep forever" also has a cool solo, so there's that

can I get a fash check on the band Panzerfaust? I perused some lyrics and didn't see anything overtly sus but yknow...the name...

They’ve opened for Watain in the past!

For real though, I haven’t found anything damning about them, they just seem to be morbidly obsessed with war.

Morbidly Obsessed With War will be the name of my first thrash album

Be my guest. And your band name?

Mega Death.

Poutinefaust?

xp

Metallic Band

Panzera

ah yes, the all-panzerotti offshoot of Panera

my best friend in high school was actually concerned when he saw Santana's cd in a store. he was pronouncing it "Satan-uh".

he was wondering if they were problematic. I said "no, it's San-tan-a, Carlos San-tan-a, not Satan at all".

he said "still guy should think about changing his name, gives people the wrong idea"

he must have a hard time every christmas

Blame St Anne who begat Mary who begat Jesus. There’d be no Satan without her.

Re: Mortal. have to disagree with 'unmemorable'. i already feel like i will recognize any of this tracks in a future invisible jukebox. idk, their songwriting here is still distinctive enough to me, and full with twists and curves, that they can keep kicking off with 'you may have heard this before' to beeing remarkable

Three albums out today I was interested in. My opinions after one listen each:

Ulver - Their assimilation to a full-on pop band is complete. I miss the sound of the more transitional records and if you're gonna be pop, I would want songs a skoch more memorable.

Pig Destroyer - Fuck yes, only a 25 minute-long EP but so much fun! "The Cavalry" is riff after riff after glorious riff. And if there's a better time for Pig Destroyer to drop new material, I can't think of it.

Atomic Bitchwax - Shit kicking, a few hefty slabs that stick to my ribs, what I expect from Bitchwax and it doesn't disappoint.

ugh, fine I'll get the Pig Destroyer.

wondering if I'll like the Pain of Salvation. they've ranged anywhere from passable to outright unlistenable since after Remedy Lane, this one is tuneful, but I don't get why or when they went to this watered-down djent bullshit. I mean some start-stop staccato shit was on their older stuff too but not to this degree.

can someone smarter and more informed than me parse the Nazi allegations against Uada and tell me if they hold up?

i read the he-said-she-said and it seems pretty thin, but hoping for a second/third/expert opinion.

closer to gaudio's take on the Necrot. Necrot didn't exactly reinvent anything but I think they write dope-assed songs that i want to listen to many times.

the t-shirt they're selling on bandcamp is dope. not only back printing, but elaborate back of shirt artwork, which is pretty damn uncommon for metal shirts these days other than putting tour dates on the fuckin things

The Necrot album out today is...fine, but totally unmemorable. Other than the guitar solo on "Sinister Will," it's basically 40 minutes of rehashed Grave and Dismember riffs. These guys bring nothing new to the table at all.

have to disagree -- I think Necrot's feet are deep in Reifert / Corralesland, not Sweden. Dismember always stays connected to the melodic "hard rock" they grew up with, some of those riffs could be slowed down and put on a Judas Priest record, but Necrot has that filth.

I think they're great, there's a lot of hype for sure, but I also think they really sound like a BAND which is exciting -- death metal, both the hyper-technical kind and the OSDM revival that's now like ten years old, has availed itself of studio tech so much that the feeling that you might be listening to four dialed-in dudes going nuts in a room is often missing. The Necrot record absolutely feels like musicians playing together and for me personally that's why it connects.

The Necrot record absolutely feels like musicians playing together and for me personally that's why it connects.

Agree with this much for sure, and the record is absolutely enjoyable while it's playing, it made me want to bang my head while sitting on my couch, but less than 24 hours later I can't remember a single riff from it. So I just can't figure out what would inspire me to go back to it.

the demos Necrot released never connected with me but Blood Offerings was such a remarkable step forward.

I agree with JCLC. a lot of the riffs are actually earwormy to me too.

kinda regretting not doing the vinyl purchase now, but oh well.

can someone smarter and more informed than me parse the Nazi allegations against Uada and tell me if they hold up?

See here:

https://www.brooklynvegan.com/uada-respond-to-booking-compilations-due-to-false-allegations-of-nazism/

The hand-wringing over Messe des morts getting cancelled by antifa is pretty pathetic seeing as Graveland are literal nazis, but Uada strike me as short-sighted more than anything.

Agree with this much for sure, and the record is absolutely enjoyable while it's playing, it made me want to bang my head while sitting on my couch, but less than 24 hours later I can't remember a single riff from it. So I just can't figure out what would inspire me to go back to it.

I do hear you on this & I have this same issue with a LOT of music but I tend to attribute it to being old & having listened to gigantic amounts of music - for a hook to really stick with me after fewer than 3 plays it has to be, like, a Lin-Manuel Miranda chorus or something. Or a two-bar twin-guitar figure, something super-whistleable. Giant sax hook. In metal I find everything takes longer to sink in for me now, and I attribute that to my grey whiskers.

maybe also has something to do with the way music gets blasted out at a rapid rate too? for me it does, anyway. it's probably unhealthy.

I myself have no trouble with listening to something that's little more than just incantation worship or burzum worship or whatever. this is genre music, after all. but the bar to compete in metal seems absurdly high at this point. there are just so many bands from all across the world putting up cool stuff on bandcamp all day long. so, for me, the stuff that simply immediately strikes me as very high quality or the stuff that has some kind of narrative hook or a novelty element floats to the top in my brain and I keep spinning it. the afterbirth record is a good example of both. it both rips and I haven't heard too many other records that sound like it.

I would have played the hell out of this necrot record in the 90s if it were one of a handful of death metal cds that tower records had. but it's really easy to get distracted by something new and shiny now. but I liked the drumming. for death metal, it kinda swings. seemed like a solid 3/5 in a sea of 3/5 records after two listens. it could open up with time, but realistically, I'll prob go back once or twice and then forget about it.

so yeah, probably not a healthy way to listen to music. I've just been doing it a long time now.

New Necrophobic out in October.

the PIg Destroyer is nice, and interesting. first half, balls-out grindcore. second half, noisy ambient with occasional industrial.

albums longest track is kind of an industrial noise piece.

grind half is pretty ripping, which is enough for me. but wasn't quite sold on the industrial half myself.

pretty into this 200 stab wounds ep, kinda like if pissgrave slammed:
https://200stabwounds-maggotstomp.bandcamp.com/album/piles-of-festering-decomposition

anyone familiar with the other bands on maggot stomp?
https://maggotstomp.bandcamp.com/

only really know THÆTAS (who rule) and casually checked out fluids last night (mortician worship, not bad)

If you like metal covers of pop songs, Ihsahn has a cover of a-ha's "Manhattan Skyline" with Einar Solberg of Leprous singing.

https://open.spotify.com/track/6uJ2SZOE5L8ztpJBSn9PcW?si=pB5KBbQQQASUmNvVAQ745w

(And, if you like that kind of thing and didn't already know, I maintain an ongoing playlist of metal covers of non-metal songs: https://open.spotify.com/playlist/5ELFqIEIGDt9qkd96WgdMq)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=11&v=w-k1rXXMYHM&feature=emb_title

Even though I'm not a huge fan of YouTube reviews, I'll sometimes end up watching some of the BANGERTV metal reviews for some albums I'm curious about (like the new Necrot). I did get some cognitive dissonance listening to this new reviewer describe herself as a "huge, huge social justice advocate" while looking at the Burzum poster hanging behind her.

The NYTimes Popcast put out an episode about Riley and Power Trip. Nice to hear folks talk about them.

https://www.nytimes.com/2020/09/01/arts/music/popcast-riley-gale-power-trip.html

I miss my friend.

I'll have to listen, thanks for that link! I was always cautiously positive with Power Trip, but Nightmare Logic was so great and has gotten better with each passing year. I'm still sad I missed them playing with Sheer Mag last summer.

As for the Banger clip posted earlier, holy crap. I'm shocked they posted that.

The new Incantation is just… boring. Maybe they need to take longer breaks between albums.

ah, my first Power Trip show...I will always carry with me fond memories of goons with combat boots swinging their feet far too close to my head, helpfully presaged by one guy yelling "are you ready to die?!" as the band came on

Misery Index signed to Century Media Records, which is good for them after previously moving from Relapse to Season of Mist.

crossover/thrash shows were usually signals to me to get out of dodge re: pit. been hit by too many wayward fists/legs. sadly venues don't always afford you that luxury of being able to escape it and then it's every person for themselves.

I saw Power Trip twice I think, but never was a headlining act, sadly :/

I miss mosh pits :(

I don't think the Incantation is boring, it's Incantation doing Incantation. I guess the complaint would be that they are playing it safe, I personally still miss some of the doomy elements from Dirges of Elysium. If this was my first Incantation record I think I still would have dug it though, it's just not really much they haven't done before.

as happens too often now, i am checking out a band (power trip) i always meant to check out because someone died.

sorry for your loss EZ.

this is really great thrash.

speaking of the gone but not forgotten:

was happy the Pitchfork review of Metallica's new SM2 symphony thing (it's as bad as you expect) called out the version of anaesthesia (pulling teeth) done by the SF orchestra's double bass player...really cool, esp when he kicks in the effects pedals.

feels like it hints at something a lot more interesting that could happen w/metal orchestra than layer glop over metallica warhorses

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AOhmwFkrGjU

My wife had to stop at Target the other day and she brought me home S&M2 since she knows I like Metallica. Let's just say I appreciate the thought, but it's still sitting in the shrink wrap. I actually used the first one as study music quite a bit back in grad school, but I can't say I need to hear a sequel.

Unfortunately I never got to see Power Trip. I actually think I slightly prefer Manifest Decimation, but I was really happy to see that Nightmare Logic was pushing them to a whole new level of popularity.

I'm sorry, EZ.

Re: Incantation, dunno, it's the playing that sounds underpowered to me. I don't think there's anything wrong with the songwriting per se, they're just not bringing any sense of genuine conviction to the table anymore.

I miss mosh pits :(

― unpaid intern at the darvo institute (Simon H.), Wednesday, September 2, 2020 10:09 AM bookmarkflaglink

yeah, otm :(.

considering I was a dude that would go to 50+ shows a year, surprised at how well I've taken the lack of them this year.

Most intense mosh pit was at an Exodus gig at the Astoria when it felt like the floor was going to give way. Amazing. Least favourite was at a Xentrix (remember them?) gig, stage diving *over* the mosh pit and landing slap on my pelvis in the sludge of sweat and spilt beer.