Archives: Reviews

I live each Bizarre Leprous release as a pleasant event , because this Czech label is completely devoted to the most putrid goregrind around . Now it’s time for German’s Utopie .

I’ve never heard this combo before , but , ..ouch…, they play uncompromising , raw , and guttural porn goregrind in the excellent Dutch way ( Gut/ Dead / Mucupurulent/ Cock & Ball Torture above all ) .

They combine typical brutal-death mid-tempos , breaks ,and more fast parts . Lowtuned guitars procreates tons of riffs well structured ; but the main thing , is the 2 types vocals opposition (one extremely guttural as a T-rex with intestinal pains , the other , a sort of more shouted growling ) which creates a morbid atmosphere . Lyrics are completely involved in porngore perversions or human health-care as showed in “stop viagra , smoke pot” or “short erection” ( which will surely delight your girlfriend ) .

Definitively a must for your collection !

Basically, this band could be associated to the New Hard Core School, heavily into chugga chugga riffs slapped with your shoulder close to your ear while striking your feet to the ground of the stage. What differences them a bit is a varied use of vocals, sometimes straight and clear HC, sometimes nasal high pitched screams mostly associated with Black metal, sometimes singing a nenia above the rest of the instruments as if to hum along the guitars. Sometimes almost rap (reminds me of a BRODEQUIN interview when they accused many so called Death Metal American bands to play rap with low tuned vocals which is not entirely false in honesty). Thell UNSUNG don’t obviously care to be integralists of a genre per se, preferring to walk the natively American sonorities above. Nothing wrong with it, if I even fairly liked any of those.

Bathed in the dim, artificial lights of its monitor in his crammed room, Michele moved his left hand towards the pile of cardboard sleeved CDs left to complete for review. Tired and with horrible black eyelids he gave a stare at yet another CD. Then he saw them. The vampire dressed in black. The black cat. The black wings in the back of the chick. The name of the band. Twilight AND Opera. The title of the CD: “Midnight Horror”. Michele sighed in distress. He had mixed feelings of nausea and resignation. With a long breath he slide the disc in the DVD player in his puter and starts to hear what he already imagined. Cacophonous have some brilliant bands, such as EBONY LAKE or SIGH. But then they appear to have a obsession for orchestral Metal. Unluckily, sometimes things go smooth, some other times, there are flops. And TWILIGHT OPERA is one of those. The delicate mechanism of engines and tires which create an interesting experiment fails from the very second this CD begins. Banal. With lots of keyboards and among the worst vocals ever, Michele felt he couldn’t bear this for much more. After a shirt piss and washing his face, he got back to his room, and uncaringly piled it among the other DIMMU BORGIR mediocrities.

Compared to “Daimonion”, a moderately warm release, this second CD on Pagan surpasses any expectations I had. Actually the music could be considered to be what OPPRESSOR have always tried to do: technical, crystal clear, intricate Death Metal played with flawless, excellent musicianship. Actually OPPRESSOR never really made it, as a mediocre vocalist and music which goes repetitive on the long run, have never got into my top ten. But this release has the “shining” in it, it has what most of overly technical bands forget: soul. This band is 3 times more complex than MALEVOLENT CREATION while keeping that fast, the DEATH of “Human” spring to mind in a purely scholarly view. The production would maybe be a bit too plastered if the band was different, but this intricacy of riffs, solos and pervasive drum beats only surface in its completeness with such a production. Sometimes skill is paired with class and TRAUMA, now and I repeat, NOW, have reached the right balance of elements, after over 15 years of practice, and the music itself shows it.

From the envelope (a huge brain wrapped with two blue ribbons), I knew it couldn’t be anything very good. But its worse than my expectations. Prog (they call it this way right?) Metal at its finest ahah, just like saying distilled faeces. I don’t hate it with all the passion I hate classic and epic, but that doesn’t mean I could even consider listening to a whole song.

Apart from playing one of the worst covers of MANOWAR’s “Thor” (the connection between THERION and epic, proud stuff escapes me at the moment), THERION lazily resides in a half Hard Rock/half Heavy Metal limbo which might recall a bit of JUDAS PRIEST. Damn donì’t ask me to review this in detail, I really can’t stand this music. Obviously much worse than JUDAS (they have no intertwined solos to entertain you in the moments of discomfort) and with some vaguely Arabic feel, they have definitely abandoned the ecological motivations they had when they were still somewhat Death Metal. As far as my memory doesn’t betray me Matti from DISMEMBER did even sing with them in their demo. Oh yes, I’ll better put that one on than listening all through this until the end.

The intro reminds me of a classic Italian movie by Pupi Avati called “The House with the Windows that Laugh” although being German I didn’t understand a fuck. The music itself is in German, like a slightly more masculine version of GRIP INC. and RAMMSTEIN (but the latter might be the language to confuse me). All in all very squared, almost military new school crossover with a hue of originality, and electronic obsessive churning riffs.