Wednesday, October 27, 2010

Football Soundtrack

Well the football season is in full effect and as usual my fantasy team is underperforming. Regardless of that fact, this is one of my favorite times of the year because football season and soccer season overlap. My two favorite sports are kicking into gear and asses are being kicked all over the place. The brutality of this football season is huge this year, hits are getting harder and excitement is growing. What I was thinking about was, “What music would be the best soundtrack to this carnage? “ And as usual, the answer to that question is METAL!!!! The speed of thrash, the brutality of death, and the pure balls of grind could be played at any football game and it would sync up just like The Wizard of Oz and Pink Floyd.

Imagine you are the quarterback for the Washington Redskins and you are lined up against the Dallas Cowboys and you see just across your front line a lion stalking you , never taking its eyes off you, and making you want to just throw the ball down and run for your hotel room. That lion is Demarcus Ware and he his waiting to burst through the line and completely obliterate you until you are nothing but a bleeding pile of putrid puss and feces. And there is no better soundtrack to that than Dying Fetus!
Dying Fetus – Justifiable Homicide

Chris Johnson of the Tennessee Titans is one of the best running backs that the NFL has seen in a long time. He is always capable of darting off on an 85 yard run and is always in danger of ripping well over 100 yards against any defense. The speed and technicality of his runs are reminiscent of thrash and all its glory. What else would make more sense for Chris to run against than Gama Bomb!
Gama Bomb – Zombie Blood Nightmare

The craziness that can come from offensive lines and defensive lines battling in the trenches is one that if filled with blood and sweat (and prrobably some other unmentionable fluids.) The O-line trying to push back the oncoming hordes of the enemy and the D-line trying to storm the castle that is the opposition can be a battle for the ages. With all the dirtiness and working man ethics of these two embattled opponents, grindcore would be the perfect music to ramp up their energy.

Saturday, October 16, 2010

Allegaeon - Fragments of Form and Function

One of the biggest trends hitting the world of heavy music today is the rise of tech death bands. These are usually younger groups that play death metal but put more of an emphasis on the technicality of their playing abilities rather than simply trying to be the most brutal or heaviest band out there. With these bands, you are always going to hear an increasing number of guitar solos that sometimes seem to defy the world of physics in their intricacies and blazingly fast drums that batter the listener with more blast beats than the average drummer can even fathom. One of the newest bands to bring their version of technical death metal to the masses is Allegaeon from Colorado.  Their newest album entitled Fragments of Form and Function is a searing display of the beauty that tech death can deliver. This is their first full length album and it is a great way to start off their career.  According to the Encyclopaedia Metallum they play melodic tech death, which is a great way to describe their particular adaptation of death metal.  They have all the technical aspects that bands such as Necrophagist or Anata have but they don’t get bogged down with trying to just noodle all over the fret board. They are able to demonstrate their prowess as musicians while also writing great songs that never bore the listener. The album kicks off with “The Cleansing” which has an almost symphonic feeling to it that rushes the listener with high-speed and increasingly technical riffs. The song progresses from that almost symphonic beginning to the brutal beat down that us metalheads are custom to hearing.  The blast beats arrive and drive this song into a dark alleyway that would scare even the most hardcore MMA fighter. The vocals continue this beating with a typical melodeath delivery that fits in perfectly with their sound.  A gentle (in comparison to the rest of the track) bridge breaks the gap to the solos that are simply mind blowing.  It is not something easily described as they are uber-technical without sounding dry and stale. They continue to drive the song while showing off their extreme technicality. There does not seem to be a bad track on this entire release however some of the standouts are “Across the Folded Line,” “From Seed to Throne,” and “The God Particle.”  These songs demonstrate the band’s abilities as songwriters in addition to showing off their increasingly amazing guitar work.  This has to be one of the better releases of the year and no one seems to be talking about the.  This is indeed a must have album for anyone that listens to death metal in all its varied subgenres.

Wednesday, October 13, 2010

Doom / Sludge / Stoner Playlist


When the term “heavy” was coined in correlation with music, it was used to describe a little metal band called Black Sabbath. Their sound resembled the effect of a thousand woolly mammoths trampling an entire village.  And the music that they created is the wonderfully titled genre called Doom, a name that simply exudes heaviness.  Two offshoots of this genre are stoner and sludge, subgenres that create a sound just as heavy in similar but different ways.  I have combined all three of these subgenres in order to create one of the heaviest lists ever. Get ready to be crushed!
Black Sabbath – War Pigs
Electric Wizard – Dopethrone
Acid Bath – The Blue
High On Fire – Hung, Drawn, and Quartered
Lesbian – Black Forest Hamm
Shrinebuilder – Pyramid of the Moon
Confessor – Condemned
Jex Thoth – Son of Yule
Bongzilla – Amerijuanican
Candlemass – Bewitched

Tuesday, October 5, 2010

Nekro Morphosis Promo 2010

Nekro Morphosis Promo 2010
The newest demo from Seattle black metal monsters Nekro Morphosis has arrived. It is a limited listening experience as it is only three tracks long and two of the songs came from their 2009 Split from the Clit with Drakul. Both “The Death of Morality” and “Walking With the Dead” emanated from this split and are a heaping dose of raw black metal and do not disappoint.  They both give a frigid feeling of death that will chill you directly to your bones.  There is a very raw, low-fi sound that has been created for these tracks. Blisteringly fast drums with fuzzed out guitars that sound like chainsaws ripping apart the flesh of the unworthy create the basis of this evil sound. Screaming, raspy vocals are added on top to complete the unholy sound that encapsulates these two tracks.  The newer track, and the one that kicks off the release is called “Under the Guillotine” and it comes with a much fuller sound. The production levels of this song are much clearer and denser sounding than the other two tracks. What makes this song so good is that it retains the raw feeling of the other two tracks while containing this sound that is much richer and will be better at gaining newer fans that are not into the really raw sound.  In addition, it has more of a death metal feeling than the other two tracks.  At times there are guttural growls that fit neatly into the flow of the vocals that bring an added dimension.  It shows the band’s ability to easily move between their black metal sound into that blackened death metal sound that is being heard everywhere these days.  What makes it worthy of being listened to, is that they don’t simply copy what Behemoth do, they bring those two sounds together and make it a raw noise that fans of both camps of metal can enjoy. All in all it is a very solid release that everyone should pick up. And what is great about this release is that the band has put it up for free for everyone. Download it now at http://www.megaupload.com/?f=S7FBMYC6. 

Friday, October 1, 2010

Grind Playlist

Dirty, filthy, sweaty, fast-paced, and pissed off. These are all way to describe the pure mayhem that is grind music. When you go to see a grind band play, it’s never in an amphitheater, or even in the larger clubs in your area. It is always in the smallest, seediest clubs or basements with no air conditioning and constantly has the smell of beer and vomit engulfing the room. When all you want is pure angry music that you can bash the walls in with, grind is going to be that choice. Not hyper-technical nor purely melodic, it is simple, fast, and always brutal. So come break a sweat to these purveyors of fury and rage.
Nasum – Wrath
Tard – Indecent Proposal
County Medical Examiners – Casper’s Dictum
Trap Them – Flesh and Below
Insect Warfare – Necessary Death
Agoraphobic Nosebleed – El Topo
Phobia – Rise Up
Repulsion – Radiation Sickness
The Berzerker – No One Wins
Brutal Truth – Denial of Existence