The other half of the disc contains more well balanced brutal death vomited by Nefas . Their 2 interesting songs pay tribute to Incantation and Immolation lessons ( and some other bands ending in “…ation” eheheh !!! ) . Substantially their sound is obsessive slow and dark even if sometimes there are accelerated parts . I’m waiting impatiently for their next album availaible in early november. Check out both them !
Archives: Reviews
BASTARD SAINTS (Ita): “Ropes Above an Abyss of Fury” split Cd 2001 The Flood
I’m proud to announce that Italian brutal scene is still alive and now it seems to live an excellent period : some underground bands ( and not only ) ,which have nothing to envy to the most famous coming from overseas . I’ve just received this promo MCD directly from Dahmer ( Bastard Saints vocalist ) and as he said it should be the first release coming from “The Flood rec.” a lebel born from the ashes of mighty “Headfucker rec.” The lenght time is equally divided, and both bands present 2 new songs . The first side hilights Bastard Saints total hydro chaos ! They’ve improved their skills , and now they’ve also a better production , so we can clearly listen every single instruments . Drum is faster than their previous release , guitar has a different sound but the original harmonized parts are always the same ( probably ” Zio” refers above all to Colo-grind-style ) ; the bass is more listenable here and there . Besides Dahmer do an incredible obsessive job on vocals squeaking and growling constantly ( you must see them on-stage : a really impressive emotionally involving tornado ) . Undoubtely their best release until now , so if the evolution goes-on , what we should expect in near future ?AUTOPSY (USA/Ca): “Ridden with Disease” Cd 2000 Necroharmonic
Tracklist
1- Human Genocide 2 - Embalmed 3 - Stillborn 4 - Mauled To Death 5 - Charred Remains 6 - Ridden With Disease 7 - Critical Madness 8 - Severed Survival (Live) 9 - Service For A Vacant Coffin (Live)I feel almost unworthy of reviewing a CD like this. The best Death Metal band of all times demo tapes and live tracks on one compact disc. Considering it’s really impossible to get hold of those legendary demos to this day, I think it was a good idea to reprint ’em on CD, and I am also glad it was Necroharmonic to do this and not Necropolis, Avantgarde or other major labels which are getting rich on commercial reprints of bands like BATHORY or MAYHEM. The man in Necroharmonic has fucking right tastes when he comes to good music. I have to admit that while he has one of the best fanzines around, even layout wise, the graphic eye on this release was probably blind, there are horrible errors of layout design which spring to the eye immediately, tiny pictures stuffed on the borders with no even fair idea of proportions and typographical knowledge but yet, the vulgar bad taste somewhat fits AUTOPSY (or better, ABSCESS) attitude. The cover artwork is fucking cool, a classic multi-tortured corpse painted the Mike Diana’s chilling way (which also does cover artwork for Roy’s Flophouse of the Freaks, see review), which is a sort of first school kid sketch and grossly splatter taste. But well, when it comes to the music, it’s something you barely stand. I felt so fucking enraptured when I got this on the reader I had my heart racing at 1000. One step far from Mental Funeral, with a vaguely more thrash sound (POSSESSED way), these demos are nothing but masterpieces of ALL the history of music. Add 2 perfectly recorded live tracks of two of their best songs “Service for a Vacant Coffin” and “Severed Survival” with a vibe and intensity to blow down a tower filled by concrete (like an airplane) and you get what this CD means. Not cheap at all but worth the pain, definitely.AWKWARD (Ita): “Outburst of Violence” Cdr 1999 s/p [demo]
Tracklist
1 - Storms of Living Hatred 2 - Baptized in Chemicals 3 - Nuclearized Sterile Wasteland 4 - Razed to the Ground (The Winter of Rats) 5 - Disintegrate, Cleanse, PurifyAWKWARD has been my second real band. I never
managed to build up a Gore or Death Metal band but in the end
we came together and made the first AWKWARD demo, in 1994. At
first my idea was to make it as much thash/core as possible, in
the vein of CRUMBSUCKERS / CRYPTIC SLAUGHTER for instance, but
as we developed and the line up changed completely, we ended up
much more modern in style, kinda new SLAYER meet KONKHRA or something.
I won’t rate my own band of course but here is an excerpt you
can listen at. It has nothing to do with this webzine nor with
Goregrind or Grindcore, but I think it’s darn violent anyway.AWFUL (Ita): “Absolute Reign” Cdr 1999 s/p [demo]
Tracklist
1 - Reevocation through regret 2 -Absolute Reign 3 - Along the bloodThere are two big weak spots in AWFUL’s music, which are a really penalizing production (I know they tried to record this promo at least 3 times, each time paying thousands of dollars, and never with satisfying results). The other is they cheat in recording session… after having seen ’em live several times, I can openheartly state that they are excellent musicians, maybe among the best 3 in all of Italy if we count only the Death/Grind department, but the drums are not this fast, on the contrary often they’re what block AWFUL’s perfomance, to the point several times I have even been a disappointed by the fact the drums can’t keep up with the string department. But back on this particular release, the songs here are something really impressive… hyperfast Death Metal… the vocals are sort of coarse, throaty old school in the vein of old VENOM (not surprisingly, the drummer/singer (aye, like CADAVER and AUTOPSY) is a die hard fan of old school Thrash Metal), and the music something really blindingly fast, one of the fastest releases I have heard from Italy, remind sometimes of SADUS in speed, but definitely hard to keep up with, as if dozens of riffs cross and link each other in a almost cacophonic symphony. On a guitaristic, level these traks are superb, and some of the concerts (which are highlighted by a good deal of covers, from bands such as NILE, CRYPTOPSY, VENOM…) have been a real show on endurance and technicianship. I just think the drums need to be a little bit faster, and then AWFUL would be complete… also I hope they will find a good recording studio becouse they’re also very cool guys and musically they have much to teach…imminent is their debut CD “Partition of the Endless Torment”.AURORA BOREALIS (USA/Md): “Northern Lights” Cd 2000 Nightsky
Tracklist
1 - Thrice Told 2 - Enter the Halls 3 - Images in the Nightsky 4 - Draco 5 - Sky Dweller 6 - Hydrah 7 - Dream God 8 - DistantThe man flaw I find in this band is that they’re basically nothing,
like our saying goes, neither meat nor fish, neither a thrash
metal band neither black metal. While I know there’s this recurring
obsession with glossy magazines and pretentious know-it-all in
the genre which find it amazing anything that cannob be easily
catalogued, this is clearly one of the times when a band is sufficiently
technical to gain attention, have a really intense network of
trade/publicity yet don’t seem to glue on me with catchiness.
Maybe it’s the drum machine but I don’t think it’s the only thing
which makes the thing so plain. AURORA BOREALIS is a two piece
band, they play not-so-convincing modern thrash metal here, not
so convincing but higher qualitatively scandinavian black metal
there. I won’t rate this as disastrous, but more of a “good
but they have no identity” classification. Already at their
second full lenght, it’s not surprising they got a contract this
fast, as they handle song structures decently, but I think I will
better sit and wait how the thing evolves like.ASSOCIATION AREA (Can): “Stop Motion Hasbeen” MCd 1998 s/p
Tracklist
1 - Tuck pack 2 - Steakwater 3 - Kaiju Flick Nights 4 - Grandular CementDamn. I think it’s easier to review MORTICIAN than a band like
this. From the very package and artwork, the band’s something
absolutely unusual, makes me feel like when I browse through used
records in stores and I end up in the experimental/noise/prog
sector. Makes me feel so fucking ignorant so you’ve been warned,
I am not the best person to describe this music, but I think I’ll
give it a try. The cover is some sort of brown carboard which
folds out in a lyricsheet… lyrics are either so full of those
American sayings that I am not able to get any meaning, or my
poor English completely casts me off of the play, I dunno, I can
say it’s the sort of brainy stuff you read in bands such BOTCH,
ICEBURN or LIVEFLIESONFLESH, I tried a bit but gave up immediately.
Take it the way you want, I feel more comfortable with more clear
cut stuff, yet this Cd makes my head spin trippy, like the last
two NUCLEAR DEATHs, sometimes it’s almost jazzy with clear cut
drum and bass, slow paced and crystalline, sometimes the vocals
get shrilling high, sometimes sounds like harmonized with a radio
noise effect , sometimes it gets the paranoid grunge feel of SLEEP…
dunno, if we had to rate the sheer braintwisting folly of ASSOCIATION
AREA, I don’t think MR. BUNGLE would fall far off, anyway, just
like the few bands which play this way, a matter of identification
is difficult and it’s their stronger weapon in the market of carbon
copied bands… they want to play it weird, and like to let the
listener try to identify it… is there something more frightening
that that you can’t catallog and understand? Whatever, I feel
unstelled and a bit anxious when listening to this stuff.