CHAPEL OF DISEASE "Summoning Black Gods"

Death metal is not just music, it´s a way of expression. An artform. Chapel Of Disease is for starters a very cool name, it sounds good and it looks good when it´s printed. "Summoning Black Gods" could be a black metal title as well, but it really fits the cover. And yeah, the cover is also very attractive. Horror and death metal goes hand in hand. This german band is pretty new, and as their countrymates in Deserted Fear they play death metal with a dirty but amazingly headbangable style . They are kind of common in sound too, like cross between old Death, Morgoth and Asphyx. Their vocalist Laurent Teubl has a voice reminiscent of all these aforementioned bands mixed together. Raspy, throaty and crunchy. The music itself is like I said before very easy to like, not overly technical but with a lot of punch and great guitar riffing. The riffing is everything in music, and these guys nail it well. You will get NO slams, NO shitty pig squeals, but a lot of GREAT music and GREAT vocals. I really like the flow in the songs, you never get tired of them, cause there is always an interesting riff comin`, combined with a nearly perfect production. You get the sound of the late 80´s/early 90´s with a heavy yet raw production. You might like this piece of music, I do.

8,5/10

SCENT OF DEATH "Of Martyr´s Agony and Murder"

Death metal is one of my biggest passions in life, and I have heard a lot of bands through the years.  Today I am pretty picky, and I know after a few seconds or minutes if I will like the band or not. I heard within like five seconds that this was something really interesting. This band from Spain is something you have to remember if you like catchy, yet brutal death metal with a huge amount of dynamics and instrumental flawlessness. You will hear influences from bands like Hour Of Penance, Mithras, some Morbid Angel like riffing and the weird soundscapes of Gorguts. They have the ability to create something unique out of these influences, and you´re always eager to hear the next chord or rhythm change. Even if it´s very technical (and brutal) it never gets out of hand, and you will hear a lot of very cool and unexpected fretboard magic. I also really like the drummer Rolando Barros of this band, you can hear that he is talented and hopefully you´ll always like the outcome since it´s always tastefully done even while it is technical. What´s up with the vocalist then?  Death metal vocalists has to be at the top of the game to interest me and actually Sergio Alfonso reminds me of a mix of Luc Lemay of Gorguts and Fransesco Paoli of Hour Of Penance. Not bad, not bad.
This band has not paid me for this review, actually this band has the guts and talent to go on tour with a more well known band. Now!

9,5/10

HATRIOT "Heroes Of Origin"

This must be the ultimate metal family! Ex vocalist och Exodus and Testament, Steve Souza unleashes a sharp old school thrashfest with his two sons. Pretty unique in the metalworld. I stumbled across this band in a swedish mag where Massacre Records had an ad. I decided to check em out. And man, I wasn´t disappointed. Steve may be old but he sounds as pissed as ever, and his bandmates beats the shit out of their instruments, though very tightly played and there are plenty of catchy hooks everywhere. They are quite similiar to Exodus in sound, but hey do you mind? I remember when I heard "Impact is Imminent" and "Fabolous Disaster" for the first time ( a long time ago) and Steve sounds exactly the same today, weird, crazy and full of that throaty raspy voice which is almost impossible to imitate.(Well, Bobby in Overkill has kind of same voice, but he doesn´t sound this mad)As I said before I hear a lot of great riffs here, and the guitars sound like monsters, crunchy and crisp. A lot of good leads too. Well, the drummer Nick Souza is a tight guy when it comes to bash the skins of his drums, it´s thrash metal so it´s not overly technical but very good and with a lot of attitude and punch, he even grinds now and then.  The production overall is very good, not too clean and not too muddy. I like almost every song on this album, but among the highlights are "Suicide Run", "Weapons of Class Destruction", Murder American Style", "The Violent Time of My Dark Passenger" and "The Mechanics of Annihilation". You got a time of murderous riffing ahead of you. Don´t hesitate, this is great thrash metal! And by they way, look out Exodus..

8,5/10

ABDICATE "Transcend Through Sacrifice"

Pretty new band Abdicate on Sevared Records hit me like a sledgehammer a few days ago. I didn´t expect it to be this good. For starters, Sevared Records have released a lot of records lately with vocals I can´t stand. If you have read my reviews here, you know I despise pig squeals. But this band´s vocalist manage to stay away from which I loathe the most, most of the time actually. Abdicate reminds me of good and catchy mix of Sepsism and Suture. A lot of brutality, a lot of bonebreaking grinding but with enough hooks to make you wanna go wild in the moshpit. The production is pretty compressed, especially the snare, but it´s ok, I can live with it since the rest of the music slays in a very good way. It happens a lot, but you will not get lost among all the cacophony. In other words, you will always be able to follow the thread without feeling like jerk for not being able to keep up. Unfortunately, their new record has a lot of pig squeals...but that´s another story since this one is good enough to make me wanna listen to this record over and over again without being tired of it.

8,5/10

CRUCIFIED BARBARA "The Midnight Catch"

Swedish hardrock group with sleaze influences CB comes with another dose of  songs (often) on the rougher side of the coin. Vocalist Klara Force has a voice with enough attitude and sound, when she sounds angry and most dirty her voice oozes of cigarettes and whiskey. That is not often the case with female singers unfortunately, most of them sound too weak for my taste. Klara doesn´t sing harsh as hell all the time, but when she does, her voice is a lot above average female vocalists. Well, the first song "The Crucifier" starts of with an almost thrasy riff which makes me smile. There are a lot of good songs here, like the aforementioned and "Into The Fire", "Shut Your Mouth", "Everything we Need", but the song that had the most easily remembered chorus is "Kid From The Upperclass" The mainriff is almost juvenile but has a lot of punch. The most unusual song on this album must be "Count Me In", some type of ballad, but I can´t really take it in. It´s not bad, but it doesn´t fit on this album. I think they maybe wanted the song to be like a break in the middle of the record, to make us beg for more sticky riffs. The rest of the record got songs like "Rock me like a devil" and "Rules and Bones" which are good, but not groundbreaking. If you wanna listen to one of Europe´s best all-girl hardrock bands, listen to this but don´t expect every song to be a monster.  Anyway, they kick ass live that´s for sure.

7/10

DEEDS OF FLESH "Portals To Canaan"

DEEDS OF FLESH "Portals To Canaan"

My admiration for this band has never ended, though it has not been that great the last years, since I think they have already peaked with albums like "Trading Pieces", "Inbreeding..." , "Path of the Weakening" and "Reduced To Ashes", and also "Of What´s to Come" even if it´s a bit different. Very good albums with Mike Hamilton´s brilliant drumming technique as the No.1 musician, his drumming is just amazing. Though he hasn´t played on all records. Well, this new one has really needed some time to grow on me. As many people know they have turned more into technical death metal than just "brutal" death metal these days. Of course this is great, they have the songwriting skills and the instrumental skills, and this is very good according to today´s standards among death metal bands, leaning more towards the sophisticated style of playing. For me it has kind of grown a bit stale, since many of the bands tend to sound the same. A whole lot of wankery, (too) clean production and covers reminding me of something from outer space more than crude, dirty death metal with the intent to kill instantly. Deeds Of Flesh is a very good band and Erik Lundmark sounds like in the old days, still great. Deeds Of Flesh has not abandoned their old sound completely. Songs like "Celestial Serpents" "Xeno-Virus", "Hollow Human Husks" and "Portals To Canaan" kick a lot of ass , they incorporate plenty of their old style death metal in these songs except for maybe "Portals.." The record ends with a good but not groundbreaking cover by Gorguts. All in all this record gives you "bang for the buck" if you can stand their more modern style on half of the record.

6,5/10

LECHEROUS NOCTURNE "Behold The Almighty Doctrine"

Back again after a little hiatus. Busy schedule lately. Back again to review the long awaited new album from one of my favouritebands when it comes to creating brutal, technical  and crude death metal with one main goal, to destroy and demand the listener to really listen and not just "headbang" cause this is some intense stuff. Their first record was more generic, but still good. Generic can be good as long as it has some kind of dirty energy and personality. The last one was a real blast and this new one is kind of a natural continuation of their ferocious slab of violent music. You can hear influences from bands like Japan´s Desecravity, Hate Eternal at their most extreme times, Angelcorpse(the furious typical riffing now and then) and Malignancy(crazy rhythm patterns) add to that some black metal chords  but with their unique own twist, blackened horrifying death metal is a quite good description of this one. At first it can be a bit hard to take in everything that happens on this disc, cause there is wonderful controlled chaos goin´on. Both the guitars and drums play some really technical stuff, I will not mention twentyfive different kinds of techinques that are being used, since I am not really interested in musical theory but the music that is played as an artform. These guys incorporate pretty much everything you want from a great death metal band, maybe the rhythm patterns they use are at times a bit hard to digest even for the most diehard death metal fanatic. It´s very intense, not in a Origin way but it almost hurts when you listen to this, because of the extreme amount of bonebreaking passages that are not for the weak of heart. The vocals, that are flawless, clear and throaty at the same time with a lot of power, the riffing, the drums, that absolutely kill, he blasts tightly like a madman,and the production are all very in your face, actually they can all together break faces(!) I can feel when I am listening to this that sometimes I want more dynamics, cause some of the memorable songs got lost within all the whirlwinds of chaotic riffing and drumming. This one is excellent if you want to clear your brain and have an evening full of headcracking riffs. If you want something more easy to relax to , listen to "To Hell With God" by Deicide or something like that. Because this is death metal for musicians and people whom really like extreme, yet very good death metal with the intent to kill.

8/10