LUX OCCULTA belongs to the tradition of Death Metal bands which find the use of keyboards useful to add flexibility and freshness to their songs. All in all I believe LUX OCCULTA didn’t need all this superfluous color to their song. Actually when they decide to play fast and tight, they’re quite able to create something interesting, luckily avoiding blatant flaws like the similar AETERNUS, but nonetheless overusing clichés of keyboard sweetness in a music that doesn’t fit the rest. Discard these parts and you get a decent Death Metal, leave these redundant CRADLE OF FILTH like amenities and you get a mediocre half gothic/half death metal hybrid which means little per se.
Archives: Reviews
LACRIMOSA (): “Elodia” Cd 1999 Hall of Sermon
Hahahahahahaha!!! First: it has nothing to do with anything Metal. Second, it has nothing to do with any kind of good music, neither rgood quality classical or opera. Third it’s pretentious and pseudo intellectual bullshit, which I hate by default. Fourth, the two guys dress like they came out of the carnival of Venice, you have to see them, especially the faggot. Fifth, thinking this is only a part of a longer “opera” is terrifying. Fuck off my player please.KRABATHOR (Cze): “Orthodox” Cd 1998 Morbid
Actually the best of KRABATHOR’s releases, “Orthodox” is Death Metal beyond compromises, played with razor sharp precision, quite interesting arrangements and a dose of heart. Not the most brutal band in the planet, yet they have personality, honesty and a good following which makes them a band of some fame in the underground. Clearly cut, clean Death and Metal guitars and a energic, accurate drumming create good class Death Metal which get stuck in mind. While I would give priority to other bands while shopping in the Death Metal distros, KRABATHOR have something which sometimes lack in other bands: they really have tracks which are clearly identifiable and different one from the other yet maintaining their identity.KILL II THIS (): “Trinity” Cd 2000 Visible Noise
Some sort of what those who have never heard of CRUMSBSUCKERS, CRYPTIC SLAUGHTER or DRI would call crossover. That is the music that in modern times has been interpreted as crossover. I’d say TREND, FEAR FACTORY, MEATLOCKER, MOLEST bla bla bla. Could no doubt have been a Die Hard release ahah. That sort of things you know. I am not the most talented to describe this music but I guess they might have been considered good if this promo landed in some glossy paper magazine for some million teenagers with broad pants, tribal tattoos and wool caps. Unluckily for them, I have to be honest to myself and to those who read this shit. This is as uninteresting as the million WHITE ZOMBIE clones which try to be trendy by dying their hair. I haven’t seen the pictures but something convinces me one of them, probably the one which use the spoken rap thing on the lines of the chords, has probably something marked Adidas on him. The disc features also guest vocals by singers of FEAR FACTORY and MY RUIN.JUNGLE ROT (USA/Il): “Slaughter the Weak” Cd 1999 Morbid
My expectations were honestly of something better. Not that the band is terrible, as they keep it pretty much in the slamming Death Metal of INTERNAL BLEEDING yet a bit less precise or mechanical. Guitars in the songs are constantly into cha-cha-cha sounds with guttural vocals and no accelerations or blastbeats at all. This style seems a bit limiting in my opinion, leaving a pretty uniform, bland hammering which just lacks of the right hand to create something really crushing (like INTERNAL BLEEDING named before, PYREXIA or SKINLESS are able to create). Not too bad but falls into the unremarkable layer of American Death Bands. Might get better with time. Maybe.INIQUITY (Dnk): “Serenadium” Cd 1996 Diehard
There’s something that almost remind me of some horror flick in the intro, such feeling you get when listening to THE MISFITS, which is soon replaced with some rather aggressive sort of Death Metal with guttural vocals and classically north European structures. The melodic parts are kept to the minimum, only falling for a few second into a vaguely horrorific feel, but the guitars never seem to take the fly, the right spin, although some fast almost grinding parts exists, it usually keeps on some vaguely contained level. There is definitely something good in INIQUITY, maybe its almost old school Swedish guitar sound, or the mid tempo Death Metal elements which on the other hand often end up being their weak spot. This music bores after a few minutes, I can’t do anything to avoid to point it out. It just doesn’t got the right ferocity nor the right fist banging feel. Buit they are somewhat prolific so who knows if they manage to get something better in the future.IN FLAMES (Swe): “Colony” Cd 1999 Nuclear Blast
IN FLAMES could have done to the term Swedish Death Metal what CRADLE OF FILTH has done to Black Metal, that is confusing a integral music style which was the most perverse variation of classic Death Metal in its purest form to a overly down tuned demoniac blasphemy, and bastardised it with something that anybody can listen to while in the car. Something nice and happy. Yet they somewhat are able to put me good mood just like Shania Twain or Cindy Lauper here and then. The warning bell I got what talking to a chick at a disco she was telling me that she was into SwedishDeath metal. I was damn excited and asked her opinions about LIERS IN WAIT, CERMATORY, CARNAGE, early UNLEASHED… when I realized she was a biot out of topic and she told me she was into Swedish Death metal bands like…IN FLAMES… At the point my heart skipped a beat. Of course that could last for no more than one song, as the rest of the music shifts down into such gay poser music for the masses that I can’t but imagine rows of these brightly coloured CDs close to the next Action Man and Pokemon action figures at the supermarket in the corner. Started as a mediocre clone of the first absolutely great DARK TRANQUILLITY album, the band has evolved into among the most plain, uninteresting ones from their country. On their escalation to their sold out style, they have integrated elements of pop, 70’s swinging rock’n’roll, and jingles that could be used for some interludes in a quiz show. If there is a single Death Metal thing within this album, point it to me, I can’t hear it. Even judging the band as a non-Metal band (as they are) what remains is absolutely uninteresting.