Jesus Christ. What’s up with this edition? It’s completely bipolar somehow. There are a bunch of albums rated an 8/10, and the rest is all 5/10 or lower. We did not intend this February Part 3 to become the “bad releases dump”, but I guess here we are. I can’t recall any other edition that was as bipolar as this one. Guess that’s what happens when you distribute the albums randomly.
So now it’s time for my random ramble. If you’re not interested, here’s the Spotify playlist with all the recommended tracks and you can go on and read the reviews. Otherwise though, stick around a bit longer. I asked Jonah to give me three words and an idiom, and I should make something of it. The words he gave me were: “void”, “banana” and “mountain”; and the idiom he gave me was “in a nutshell”. Not the easiest combination, but here we go:
The void, such an ominous subject. It’s been the subject of many a metal band. Doom-adjacent metal acts in particular like to write about it. For a literal interpretation, if one thinks of “the void” as a black hole, then it becomes insanely heavy. In black holes the gravity is immense and crushes absolutely everything. Not even light can escape it. The metaphorical interpretations of this are endless and all fittingly depressing for doom metal.
However in another sense, it’s also a strange concept. It hosts an inherent contradiction. The moment something enters the void, it’s not void anymore. Especially not when that something is a banana, or, if you’re a male, your banana (I guess that’s what happens for trans people who undergo surgery). I always imagine a mountain of thoughts and feelings must have passed through a person before they’re ready to undergo such a change. Opting for it to chop chop and disposing it into the void is not a light decision. Tying it back to music, I’d say this would be an excellent lyrical subject for a doom metal album. Just imagine all the depressing directions one could take it. Endless, just like the void.
Darkened Horizons – Silentium Universi (US-TX)
Style: Melodic Death Metal (mixed vocals)
Related links: Bandcamp | Spotify | Facebook | Metal-Archives page
Review by: Jonah
To be entirely frank with you guys, I had a hard time writing this one. Darkened Horizons has managed to write a melodeath album, a genre I generally am very fond of, that is so incredibly underwhelming that I was at a loss for words for the past few weeks as I attempted to write about it. Yet, the show must go on, so here’s my best attempt at talking about this album.
As soon as you start, two things become apparent. One, the production job feels flaccid and hollow, and is doing the music absolutely no benefit whatsoever. Second, the music sounds like melodeath. If you threw Scar Symmetry, Dark Tranquility, and In Flames at an AI that composed music, and told it to generate songs that sounded like those bands, this album is what you would get. The vocalist sounds like Christian Alvestam with a cold and the instruments are just shy of being good. They sound competently played, but entirely devoid of any creativity or nuance.
This is just barely an adequate melodeath album. Just barely. But honestly just go listen to one of the greats, or one of the more exciting recent bands in the genre like Be’Lakor. You really don’t need to listen to this one.
Recommended tracks: not really
Recommended for fans of: Scar Symmetry, Dark Tranquility, In Flames
Final verdict: 3/10
The Apocalyptic Fist of the Black Death – A Bridge to Worlds Beyond (US-OH)
Style: Death (harsh vocals)
Related links: Bandcamp | Spotify | Facebook | Metal-Archives page
Review by: Josh
This is the first time I’ve ever listened to a metal album where most of my listening experience consisted of wishing for the band to stop playing metal. The Apocalyptic Fist of the Black Death plays in a sound that’s a mix of psychedelic rock and death metal with a bit of hardcore thrown in, and I hate to say this, but they completely fall on their face when they’re trying to play metal. The riffs are stale and repetitive, the vocalist is very clearly a novice, especially with his high screams, and the combination of low-quality programmed drums (or at least I hope those are programmed) and blast beats often leads to a sound similar to that of post-anal sex fart. On top of all this, the band members often make mistakes when playing. Not incredibly often, but just enough to take me out of the song. I want to find something to like, but there is nothing that stands out as great or even good during the metal parts.
At times, though, the band dips into instrumental sections. Sonically, these are a massive, almost bipolar departure from the death metal sounds that the band also showcases throughout the album. They have a tendency to be overlong and meandering, but they’re a definite step up from the metal parts, as they’re actually enjoyable at times. The frequent mistakes from the metal sections are still present, and there are still questionable choices made throughout these sections (the dissonant chord in “Broken Blossoms” is just about the opposite of tastefully used), but hell, compared to the alternative I’ll take it.
By now you may be thinking, “How does this band slide between psychedelic rock and death metal? They don’t sound good, so it can’t be clean, can it?” It cannot. At times I wonder if this band has heard of song structure. Even verse/chorus structure would be a step up from the songwriting on this album, as each track meanders between various riffs and genres like a stumbling drunk. Songs start and end arbitrarily. To exemplify this, check out the ending of “Crucial Ties”, where after five minutes of mostly banal metal, the vocalist screams, “Because I just slipped on a fucking banana!” and the track cuts out. To make matters even worse, most of the songs on this album transition seamlessly into one another. This is normally a neat thing to do, but on an album like this, it only serves to further compound the arbitrariness of how each song is written.
Production quality here is generally mediocre. Everything sounds like it was recorded through a phone mic, and the shoddy mixing leads to instruments treading upon each others’ ground quite frequently.
There are good ideas here, but the execution of them squanders any potential that they may have had. I would say that with time, this band could capitalize on those ideas and create something great, but The Apocalyptic Fist of the Black Death have a long way to go before they even get close to doing that. With that, for my general opinion on this album, simply look to the name of the first recommended track.
Recommended tracks: Intolerable Vibrations, Broken Blossoms, In My Fevered Dream
Recommended for fans of: Death, Paradise Lost
Final verdict: 3/10
Revoltons – Underwater Bells Pt. 2: October 9th 1963 Act. 1 (Italy)
Style: Power/Traditional (clean vocals)
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Review by: Matt
Revoltons is a band that’s been around for awhile, sporadically releasing music since the early 2000s. This latest one took eight years, though it sounds relatively modest – no overblown orchestras or wankery to be found, even though the title sounds more pretentious than the new Nightwish. Actually, this album’s concept is refreshingly grounded, dealing with the events surrounding a real life dam-breaking disaster from an unusually personal viewpoint. That is, a lot of it depicts a named family having their home destroyed, searching for each other in the rubble, and other small details that are hard to convey through a metal song. Not a bad place to start from, though it will always be weird to hear “eating breakfast” sung.
Musically, this is pretty straightforward power metal, leaning towards traditional or thrash at times. There’s also some soft rockish acoustic parts and a couple of clean interludes that get proggier than the rest of it. I wish those more colorful chords would have made their way into the songs proper… The riffs are serviceable, sometimes nicely heavy, but bland, and the solos are clunky. The vocals are a high rasp akin to Kai Hansen, and the first song leads you to believe you’re in for some solid German-style speed, but none of the others reach the same level of energy or catchiness. There is a hint of flavor in “Hypnos and Thanatos”, as well as the album’s epic “Grandmasters of Death”, but overall it was making me pretty impatient by the end. To be honest, I put on a funk album afterward and it was like a weight lifted from my shoulders. I relearned how vibrant music can be.
While competent overall, and even displaying some finesse with the conceptual trappings, Underwater Bells Part 2: Bell Harder didn’t cut it for me. Everything on here is basically just ok, and not even a sympathetic concept or Blaze Bayley dropping by to do a hammy Messiah impression can pull mediocre riffs and choruses out of the mire. It’s average in every way… So 7/10, am I right?
Recommended tracks: Danger Silence Control, Hypnos and Thanatos
Recommended for fans of: Gamma Ray, Iron Maiden
Final verdict: 5/10
Lazuli – Le fantastique envol de Dieter Böhm (France)
Style: Prog Rock (clean vocals)
Related links: Spotify | Official Website | Facebook | Instagram
Review by: Andrew
Lazuli, a French progressive rock group, has been around for a couple of decades. Known for their eclectic songwriting and use of unconventional instruments, Lazuli has remained a cult classic for almost two decades. With influences ranging from world music to electronica, Lazuli have continued to innovate throughout their existence as a band. Before I began preparing this review, I admit I had never heard of Lazuli before. When reviewing an album from a band new to me, I like to go through their previous albums and see how they’ve evolved musically and see how this is displayed in their newest efforts. Going back through Lazuli’s discography was a great journey; I really enjoyed most of what they had to offer. A great blend of eclectic prog rock and the previously mentioned influences, the music was refreshingly unique. However, things took a turn once I reached Le Fantastique Envol de Dieter Bohm.
Not unlike its namesake precious stone, Lazuli’s Le Fantastique Envol de Dieter Bohm left me feeling blue. There are a lot of great ideas on display in this record; however, none of them really stuck with me in any meaningful way. Even with their wide array of instrumentation including such offerings as the french horn, marimba, and even a custom instrument called “La Lléode” – an “over-exciting midi-electronic plug-guitar instrument,” the music feels middling and uninspired throughout the album’s duration. There are some motifs repeated throughout but none of them are particularly interesting or help to evoke any sense of continuity. The bulk of the album consists of mid-tempo female vocals over the admittedly interesting instrumentation with the occasional minimalistic solo or instrumental passage. Nothing is memorable – the fact that the entire album is in French definitely does not help (if you speak French this does not apply to you). After nearly a half-dozen listens of the album, I don’t think I could describe any specific moment from Le Fantastique.
Maybe there’s something I don’t understand about this album. Maybe I don’t get their songwriting. Regardless, I did not personally derive much enjoyment from Le Fantastique. There is a lot here that could be fantastic but it simply did not click for me. Your mileage may vary.
Recommended tracks: Sol, Dieter bohm, Dans les mains de dieter
Recommended for fans of: Unitopia, Phideaux, Karmakanic
Final verdict: 5/10
Skyforest – A New Dawn (Russia)
Style: Folk/Blackgaze (mixed vocals)
Related links: Bandcamp | Spotify | Facebook | Instagram | Metal-Archives page
Review by: Sam
This album is gorgeous. Do you like Agalloch? If the answer to that question is yes, go listen to this album. If you haven’t heard them, go listen to this album anyway, because damn it’s a good one.
A New Dawn is, in a sense, a very easy to describe album. It takes the Agalloch template in terms of atmospheric black metal, injects some more symphonic folk into it, makes it less bleak and more dream-like and cruises from there. This is an album that does exactly one mood, but does so extremely well. It all just sounds breathtakingly beautiful. The mix is almost more like something you’d hear in a YouTube mix of psychedelic music than anything metal, focusing completely on enveloping you in the atmosphere. The symphonics take the forefront and other elements serve mostly as a supplement to them. Whenever there’s harsh vocals, they feel like a distant whisper rather than the dominant fierceness usually seen.
I’ll try to describe the atmosphere more metaphorically now. I already mentioned it sounded dream-like, but really the proper word is “romantic” (in the art style sense). It’s no coincidence the album art looks like that one famous painting of a man standing in front of a misty landscape from the romanticism period, as that is exactly the sort of feeling this portrays. It’s a sort of grandiose, melancholic, yet very warm and elevating feeling that makes you feel like you’re flying above a grandiose landscape as the sun is in its golden hour. Or rather yet, like the low sun on a quiet winter day as you’re taking a walk in the snow. You can almost smell the forest as you’re listening to this album.
Overall, A New Dawn is a gorgeous album. This is the sort of album you reserve for special occasions like going on an LSD trip or moody walks in the cold at sunset. I don’t see myself returning to this that often as it pretty much does only one thing for the entire duration, but for that specific mood, it’s absolutely perfect.
Recommended tracks: Along the Waves, The Night Is No More, Heart of the Forest
Recommended for fans of: Agalloch, Eneferens, Saor
Final verdict: 8/10
The Dark Atom – Evolution (France)
Style: Instrudjental
Related links: Bandcamp | Spotify | Facebook | Instagram
Review by: Chris
I really don’t dive much into explicitly djent bands that much anymore because I have found the “genre” pretty saturated since the early/mid 2010’s. The bands from that era that have stuck around are either progenitors of the style, have the science so down that they exceed the others, or moved into a different direction and learned ways to incorporate other pieces into it to evolve themselves. Unfortunately, there have been plenty of instances where new projects come up that provide some decent material but nothing that alters to what already has existed (or will continue to exist). Evolution by The Dark Atom falls into this category.
Don’t get me wrong, this release has some solids grooves in it, such as the very beginning of the album on “Something Wrong”, which opens with a brooding djent riff with some welcome odd cymbal placement. However after that it falls immediately into the trap of synth arpeggiators under a metalcore-esque chug. In their bio The Dark Atom notes they also take some influence from deathcore, and the moments where that influence pops up is probably where I found myself most intrigued, such as the earlier parts of the song “Astral Player”. Though again, the inevitable descent into the slightly different than last song dissonant chugs just gets old after a while.
There are flashes of great ideas in some of the synth and piano lines in the softer moments, but they often get quickly overwritten by guitar parts, they are bookended by or in some cases that occur over them intermittently. I would file this album under one of those that really isn’t for me and I don’t feel is necessarily anything new or exciting to the scene, but for fans of instrudjental music in general I bet this would be a decently solid addition to a playlist or similar casual rotation. It definitely is competent and decently produced, I just don’t find it especially engaging.
Recommended tracks: Something Wrong, Escape the Raptor, Moon Runner
Recommended for fans of: Anup Sastry, Chimp Spanner, The Helix Nebula
Final verdict: 5/10
Sectile – Falls Apart (Ireland)
Style: Groove (clean vocals)
Related links: Bandcamp | Spotify | Facebook | Instagram | Metal-Archives page
Review by: Stephen
I had the pleasure of interviewing Sectile shortly before the band released their newest album Falls Apart, so if you missed it be sure to check it out! I also was able to attend the band’s LP on the I&W discord server, needless to say I have had the pleasure of spinning Falls Apart quite a few times. So what can you expect from this album? Let’s take a look.
As I mentioned before, I was able to attend an LP that some members of the band hosted. During this a question about influences came up, and I was surprised to hear that Tesseract was a major influence. A lot of times when you hear that, what you get is a band that is almost a Tesseract-lite. That is not the case here. There is much more of a throwback feel to Sectile’s own unique sound. Progressing through the album, I was reminded of a lot of different bands from different eras. Some of those being Alice in Chains, Leprous, Jane’s Addiction, The Contortionist, Katatonia, and a little sprinkle of Tesseract. Using those four bands to describe one band, probably doesn’t make sense to read, but to me it means that Sectile has their own sound. Which, in the current prog scene, is a feat itself.
I enjoyed the album, but my two favorite tracks off the album were “Black Cloud” and “Daggers”. Both were really awesome in their own way. “Black Cloud” was dripping with passion and a foreboding and haunting feel that was capped off by a tasty piano outro. “Daggers” has a much more in-your-face feel to it, and the second half of the song really demonstrates the musicianship of the members of Sectile. “Daggers” might be my favorite off the album for it’s killer riffs, great writing, and creativity.
There were a couple issues I had with the album, but they were mainly minor ones on the production side. I felt that some of the heaviest parts could have used a little bit more punch. Overall, Fall Apart is definitely not an album to miss in 2020. It won’t be my album of the year, but it’s one of the better albums I’ve heard in 2020.
Recommended tracks: Black Cloud, Daggers, and Dying of The Lights: Purpose / Silence / Aethernity
Recommended for fans of: Any of the bands mentioned above
Final verdict: 8/10
Phonomik – Brain Bleeder (Denmark)
Style: Alternative/Heavy (hair metal vocals)
Related links: Spotify | Facebook | Instagram | Metal-Archives page
Review by: Tyler
Every so often I stumble upon a release that I don’t know what to feel about. Either the sound is too monotone and sounds like they are phoning it in, or the sound is great, but the production ruins the experience, or the song writing is stellar, but the performance is terrible. Sometimes there are bands that have an overwhelming ‘shrug’ as the impression they leave. Brain Bleeder could be one of those albums, but to an even wider extreme. There are parts that are sound and feel awesome, and then there are bits where if I could roll my eyes further back, I’d finally meet the gerbil that keeps the lights on back there.
Right of the bat, the production is pretty great all the way through. The mix is solid, the vocals sit right in front and soar through every song, the album sounds great. They knew what they were doing. Every other aspect of the album tells a different story. The overall feel of the album is disjointed. There are moments where you are being crushed by awesome riffs, crazy lyrics, and heartfelt performances by every band member. Right away, “Suffer” gives that vibe. A really disjointed riff that sounds totally bizarre, with absolutely insane vocals and lyrics that immediately made my ears perk up, I thought I was in for something really special. But then the chorus kicked in, and I got some super cheesy mid 90s heavy metal tribute band that honestly sounds like a big cliche. It left me whiplashed. And as I kept going through the album, I mostly got the latter.
Really, that first song is in a realm all of its own. Eventually, the vocals that I really dug at first, this sort of naslly, raspy timbre that really did fit in with the feel, soon became pretty grating By the time the album was over, I didn’t want to hear it ever again, but the review must go on as they say. Almost every other song here sounds like a Megadeth B-Side. The solos, the song structure, the overall tone and sound just reminded me of a genre that, really, I felt has said all it needed to say about 20 years ago. That’s not to say Phonomik did a bad job, they emulate the sound very well, but other than adding some more modern aspects like some death growls in the background, there wasn’t much that they added to the conversation. I will say, however, as cliched as those choruses are, a lot of them are super catchy and they stuck with me, so there’s that.
I came into this album with huge hopes from my first impression. These guys know how to hook folks in, like a timeshare. You get the thing you want right at the beginning, but then you have to make it through the rest of what they are about, whether you like it or not. This one is a shrugger for sure. As someone who doesn’t subscribe to the genre these guys are about, they did a fine job I suppose. I’m not sure if the cover of “Rebel Yell” was totally necessary though. Oh yeah, they cover “Rebel Yell”.
Recommended tracks: Suffer
Recommended for fans of: Megadeth, that video of Vince Neil where it seems like he doesn’t even try to sing Kickstart My Heart
Final verdict: 4/10
Red\shift – Grow. Decay. Transform. (US-MN)
Style: Sludge/Metalcore (mixed vocals)
Related links: Bandcamp | Spotify | Facebook | Instagram
Review by: Jonah
What is the correct length for an album? This is a question that has been constantly, and relentlessly debated by music fans for decades, maybe none more so than fans of prog. Progressive bands are particularly prone to releasing albums approaching the 80 to 90 minute mark, and for many fans of the genre, including myself, that’s just too damn long. I like my albums to be a concise 40 to 50 minutes, or maybe an hour if it’s really good. So when I saw that this debut album by Red\Shift was 76 minutes long I started dreading it immediately. With a debut of this length I always immediately assume I’m dealing with an inexperienced band that couldn’t figure out how to cut songs that just weren’t quite good enough, rather than filling the whole album platter with exceptional pieces of music.
Well in this case I was definitely right. This album is too long, and there are absolutely songs that could’ve been cut. BUT, the good songs are very, very good. This album is a motley assortment of styles that remind me of bands ranging from Mastodon, to BTBAM, to King Crimson. This wide assortment of styles makes for some consistently exciting, engaging, and fresh sounding music, as do the incredibly tight performances. Besides a couple minor vocal mis-steps everything here is pretty flawless. The guitar ranges from doomy, sludgy and metalcore riffs throwing in every trick in the book: from Gojira-esque pick scrapes to incredibly convoluted, chaotic sections straight out of a BTBAM song. It’s all fantastic, and the bass chugs along very audibly. The drumming is technical and honestly incredibly impressive, and with every member of the band providing vocals the performances are varied and really quite interesting.
So while this album is absolutely, 100% too long, I think it is also an incredibly good piece of music. Hopefully the band learns to edit themselves a bit more in the future, but regardless I will be keeping these lads on my radar and absolutely cannot wait to hear more music from them, because this is a really damn fine album.
Recommended tracks: Lungfish, Bees, Copelandia
Recommended for fans of: Mastodon, BTBAM, King Crimson
Final verdict: 8/10
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