Speaker 1: Hello, everybody, Welcome to That's Not Metal, your weekly rock,
heavy metal, hardcore, punk, everything heavy music podcast. We are
back once again, back to hopefully slightly more regularly you know,
scheduled programming. A couple of days later than we normally
are here, but a bit of a knock on effect
because last week hours at Bloodstock and did the whole
review there, and I'm sure that if you've been keeping track,
you know what's been going on. But today we are
here getting back on track with the monthly reviews bag
for the month of August. There are some my god,
maybe not the largest in like actual size of the bands,
but like records that are biblical in their story and
scale and scope and everything that we will explain as
we get into them. But it is a big old
time that we have got in store for you, So
thank you for being here. My name is Peren Haish
with me, I've got Sam Dignon, I've got Elliot Paisley
as well. I'm drinking a terrible tasting beverage but it
will keep me refreshed throughout this show. We had, like
you know, we've got I think a decent bit of
sort of live show bits and stuff that I think
will mostly sort of come back to next time when
we don't have as packed and agenda. But Elliott, while
we've got you here, what were you doing last week
where you like accidentally saw Paul the I know or something.
You haven't explained this very well to us, so well.
Speaker 2: I mean, it's kind of mad luck because I don't
really go to that many gigs, as I've kind of
demonstrated by mainly only reviewing festivals and that sort of thing.
And yet somehow I managed to go to two gigs
and two nights, which I think has never happened in
my life. And the first one I hadn't even intended,
as you've just alluded to, because I'd gone up to
Leeds for the next gig. But I went up a
day Onlays catch up with a friend and they said, oh,
let's try the Prudel Social Club and I said, oh,
that's the that's the venue I'm going to. And as
we're walking in, whose name do I see on the marquee?
Speaker 1: But Paul Deano.
Speaker 2: I was gleeful, she had no idea.
Speaker 1: Who it was.
Speaker 2: And I went in and you know, asked, like Pauliano
once tonight, has you already been on. It's like, no,
he's on soon. None of them seem to really know
who he was either, But I managed to catch a
few songs by the big Man, and you know, like
there's things about the Pauliano show that aren't great that
I don't really know his fault or things he can help,
you know, like his voice. I don't know how much
of that's in his control. Now you kind of go
and have to imagine that you're the Pauliano at the
Pauliano Show, Like they'll play the Iron Maiden songs and
you kin'd have to sing them and you know, a
couple of Guinness deep I was. I was more than
happy to do. And to be honest, I mean, I've
never seen Iron Maiden live and this is a setlist
I would like them to do because it was like
Rathchal Murders in the Room, Orgue, Remember Tomorrow, Drifter, Fansom
of the Opera. Interesting, No Iron Maiden.
Speaker 3: I can't imagine why, And.
Speaker 1: To me it's it was.
Speaker 2: It was a fun night. But he seemed like he
was in a bit of a bad mood, which I
don't know if that's has he got.
Speaker 1: A lot of because this is his isn't that band
It's like Paulo's war Horse or something. Was that the
band in question? But do they do?
Speaker 3: You know?
Speaker 1: Like I feel like it's one of those bands where
if you look at the records in the track list
there's some like just bizarre stuff where you know, what
are you doing? Does that factor into the live show
or is it just hey, remember killers?
Speaker 2: Yeah, it's literally just iron made in songs.
Speaker 1: I think this is.
Speaker 2: Paul which you know suited me fine, I'm not I'm
not too big on his solo material since I heard
literally zero seconds of it. Yeah, I mean he seemed
kind of pissed off, like he would do a song,
he would be bad on it, and then he would
blame the band, which I don't know if that's a
brilliant musical relationship, but yeah, if you're happy to go
and accept that, you'll hear great songs kind of badly performed.
I cannot recommend that.
Speaker 1: Incredible And as you say, that was sort of a prelude, accidental,
you know, serendipitous prelude to what you actually going to say,
which you went see Poison ruin.
Speaker 2: Right, Yeah, I mean it's I think this is their
first UK tour and.
Speaker 1: A show or two.
Speaker 2: But yeah, or first headline run. I'm pretty sure sure
they might have done like you say, they might have
done a show or two.
Speaker 3: Yeah.
Speaker 2: So I went back to the exact same venue, disappointed
that Paulianna wasn't making a second appearance, but happy with
what I was seeing.
Speaker 1: Instead.
Speaker 2: They were touring with mother and I don't know if
their toy with him. It much have been this one show.
But Mother Nature and Tormented Imp, who I already liked
from the band name Mother Nature like good start, kind
of hardcore punk in the mid wore mold like sort
of slow sludge your parts, really discordant riffs. They kind
of they sounded a bit like ceremony around like twenty
eleven twenty ten if you added a bit of a
scorn defeat kind of evil to it. So if that
sounds up your street, and it should be, then I
recommend checking out. I think they played like fifteen twenty minutes,
seems to get a pretty good response. Tormented Imp went
down really well. Like again, like I said, I already
liked them before I heard a note because they're called
Tormented Imp and they have this little mascot on their
T shirts and cassettes, which is just one of my
favorite graphics I've seen on a new band. And when
they came out, they stand in the same I don't
know if this is intentional, probably not. They stand in
the same information as Chris Barnzer a cannibal corpse, Like
you watch that footage from the Centuries of Torment thing
and it's almost like they've picked which member they're going
to emulate, like that, that's how it seems. And when
it kicks off, it's kind of first wave of Black
Melt inflected hardcore sort of but like live is kind
of like a crusty power trip, Like it's sort of
a big claim, but it's that sort of thing where
if you've gone for cross punk and if you're going
for Poison Ruin, I suspect you or open to that
sort of thing. At least it's like like powje because
I can't imagine someone liking this and liking this sort
of thing and not loving them. And I've gone back
and listen to the album and it's really really fucking good.
So again, if that's the sort of thing you like,
then check those outs. But the main event Poison Ruin
I don't think outside of maybe the Avenged record from
last year, I don't think there's an album from twenty
to twenty three. I've gone back to More Than Harvest,
which it kind of snuck up to my I think
it was number three on number four My Arms are
the Yearless, and it did that basically within a week,
and since then, I've gotten into the holdscography and I
come to learn that they don't really do bad songs,
and that was kind of comforting, where you go see
a band, you know, they literally can't play bad music tonight,
and what I wasn't expecting, I kind of I wondered
if it was going to be a super shadowy you know, Dungeon,
Dungeon Master, a Stets or whatever. It's like they've picked
four members from completely different bands. Because the guard and
guitar and vocals looks like the spits of Steve Albini
in nineteen eighty five, and he's got this really commanding presence,
but then stood next to him center stage, the bass
player genuinely looks like Tony soprano with a mullet. It's
like those two things side by side, and it kind of,
you know, it reflects the kind of crowd they attracts
because it was like hipsters, skinheads, metal kids, punks. Like
the variety of shirts you saw I think was probably
above you know, hardcore punk bands of a similar size.
And yeah, they were just unreal, Like they did seventy minutes,
which I thought was pretty bold, and think they've got
I think two records at a single, Yeah, and basically
non stop. I mean they might have paused for a
minute or two to do some dungeon synth, which you
know never gonna say no to. And it was just song, song, song, song, song, song, song,
And when the songs are that good and it's your
first headline tour of the UK, it felt like such
a power move. I just I think they're one of
the best bands to merge in the last couple of years.
Speaker 3: Like they formed it.
Speaker 2: I think they formed in the twenty twenties, and I
honestly think they're putting together a catalog of songs that
some classic bands would envy. Like you just look at
the track list that they played, and it's just it's
just sickening, Like closing on not Today, Not Tomorrow, which
I think is probably the most popular song. It's kind
of like a speed metal Sham sixty nine song, but
then it closes on this insane Celtic riff, which you
know it would put drop Kick Murphy's to shame. It's
such a bad boy way to bow things out like
it wasn't sold out, but I suspect it might be
if they came back, because they kind of buzz in
the room afterwards was just something else. I think that's
always the best measure because people then go come back,
bring and make kind of dedicate themselves to seeing it again,
which I have. I was just oh, I dare I
say it was better than Baudiana, but in then din't
play Murders in the Room Org.
Speaker 1: Yeah, Wicked band. If you don't know Poison Ruin, you
should definitely check them out if you're into just sort
of you know, grotty based level punk stuff. Today is
as I said, the reviews show, and on the docket
today we have the new albums from Winter, Sun, Nails,
Zealand Ardor Twin Atlantic, four Year Strong, Lepress, and Nil.
But we also have a decent bit of news to
get through, not only because we have some stuff that's
happened in the last few days to talk about, but
also there is some stuff that I wanted to touch
on that has happened sort of over the last couple
weeks that, you know, when we haven't done new shows
that I wanted to, you know, get the room's opinion
on because starting off something that I'm sure you know
everyone will have seen online but we haven't actually discussed it.
Last episode, as I said, was my review of Bloodstock Festival,
and I said at the end of that episode that
when it came to the announcement of the following year's
line up, the sort of lion's share of which they
announced at the festival, I said, rather than just sort
of me giving my take on it, I would come
back with these people here and you know, as said,
sort of get the room's opinion on it. So the
Bloodstock twenty twenty five lineup, as was announced at this
year's festival. The three headliners are I think everyone will
have memorized them at this point because it feels like
such a big kind of announcement Trivium, machine Head and Goodjira,
which also came with an announcement featuring a good what
is it like, sort of five ten fifteen bands or
something from you know, across the other stages as well,
so there is quite a bit of next year's lineup
to go on. Conversation will naturally drift to the headliners,
but there is stuff to highlight sort of below that
as well. First thing is, obviously, you know, asking, oh,
is that a good trio of headliners or whatever seems
like a bit pointless because arguably without dipping back into
a you know, a kind of eighties era classic band,
which is of note that there is not one of
those for the second year running now, because there wasn't
one of those this year when I went as well.
But without doing that, it is essentially as slam dunk popular,
a trio of you know, modern metal headliners, whatever you
could feasibly get for Bloodstock. And I think you've seen
in the reaction to this announcement exactly what I thought
would happen, which is that fuck tons of people are
going to go, oh my god, I need to get
to the Bloodsork next year, whether they are there you know,
regulars every single year like myself, and I know many
people out there this thing will be or people who
dip their toe into Bloodstock every handfully is whatever people
who've never ever been before maybe in people traveling in
for whatever it is. I think it's going to be
a pretty blockbuster year for them in terms of like
attendance and ticket sales and stuff like that. Even just
going from this because it is so like it was
a power move. Wasn't it particularly engineered to drop all
three of them in one go like that like they did.
It was a calculated big move to make next year's
Bloodstock a big one.
Speaker 3: I mean you would say those as like your like
best trio of download second stage or subheadlines you can
like a heavier end, Yeah, like that, Like you would
if if download book those as like your second stage
or your main stage like subheadlines, people would be like
lose their mind. So blood that's going to go. No,
these are our headliners. These are our like top bild bands.
This is like we're bringing in the big boys like
and for me again, like I know some people who,
depending on how you look at Bloods might find something
to nitpick. I couldn't think of a better like slam Dunk.
You're just going to see each night ninety or so
minutes of the best metal you can see, like with
these three headliners, particularly if you're talking metal in the
two from the two thousands onwards, like there are few
bands and so that kind of of like headliner capacity.
Speaker 4: Who I would rather see than these three at this stage.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean my initial reaction was this is the
strongest set of headliners they've had since twenty eighteen, which
I think that kind of still stands as a benchmark.
You where it was Judas Priest, Goodua and Nightwish. Where
for the thing that Bloodstock are offering, I really couldn't
think of a better three. So it was the first
time Judas Priest and Goodurer did it. But for them
moving more into this I say, new territory, They've they've
been doing it over the last decade or so, for
them making a move maybe away from eurocentric metal, that
sort of thing. Like you say, it's hard to think
of a better three because like Trivium, the goodwill that
they're having now is as much as they've had since
their initial you know, lack of a word word descendancy,
Machine Head returning to festivals and good year of the
metal band with maybe more eyes on them than anyone
right now in light of the Olympics. It's it's it's
an unbelievable hat trick.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean, you know, you say that maybe the
best Trier headlines whatever I think for me, if I
look at sort of the last five six years or
so whatever, twenty twenty two with Bohemo's Merciful Fate and
Lamb of God for me is like absolutely incredible. But
there are more niche factors at play with those. This
is the blockbuster Trier, isn't it. It's exactly that. Yes,
it's pulling as many people as possible, which kind of
opens up the you know, the age old thing with
bloodstock of like, is that even the aim which of
course from bloodstocks, you know position of like the actual
organized Yeah, fucking courses, they want to make money and
they want to sell tickets. Yeah, they to be successful,
So like, yeah, absolutely, go ahead, And you'd be chuffed
if you were, you know, one of the bluzzer organizers
and you put those three and you thought, yeah, fu,
we can, especially if you put them as they've done
all upfront and they know they can drop that bomb
on people. But what this obviously doesn't have is that
sort of slightly more niche factor that you know, maybe
other festivals don't quite cater for. And the variety, I
suppose is what I look at because it is three.
I mean there is like, you know, to say that Trivia,
machine Head, and Gageerra all sound the same would be mental.
And I think particularly if someone like Gajeerra, you kind
of have to remind yourself, Yeah, they were once a
death metal band, Like they have come from that kind
of school. So to say, oh, yeah, they're just like
Trivium is like a bit a bit wrong headed. But
it is three you know, mensely popular right now where
they are mainstream kind of metal bands, and you're pulling
on those classic pulls, those again more extreme polls, whatever.
It's slightly harmond in that sense, and it is it's
three things that will absolutely pull off those immense fucking shows,
any one of which might be the sort of steal
the night, you know, contender on any normal bloodstock. And
so I looked at that and when like, yeah, that's
clearly incredible. I am interested in the rest of the
bill to see what happens there. Thankfully we have a
fair bit of the rest of the bill, and for example,
Emperor subheadlining two Trivia, which is cool in that sense
because it's like, finally, you know, Trivia and Emperor gets
to play a show together. There's obviously a long standing
connection there, and I think some of us have wanted
that to happened for a while, so that's cool. I
don't know if Lacuna Coil and Lord of the Lost
are the other subheadliners that they're on that level.
Speaker 4: Apparently Lord of the Lost aren't. I think the cuon
O Coil might.
Speaker 1: Be okay, I mean those two that would slightly dampen
it a little bit and be like, well, that's not
it's not the best trio in the world. But yeah,
looking across the rest of this bill, which for me
is always kind of what seals the headliner you know question,
it's how is it supported? And then what kind of
we can you offering around it? And I should mention
that again, this was all pounced in the form of
a you know, a video kind of rollout that played
I think was right after clutch at you know, the
blood starts. So all of the three of us here,
I'm the one who saw this like play out in
real time, which also meant like one band at a time,
and you saw the reaction hilariously. The first band they
decided to lead with was Breed seventy seven, and so
you've got the entire fucking festival standing around waiting and
see what happens, and they go, ah, Bloodstock, Breed seventy seven,
and no one said a fucking word. Not the band
to lead with, surely, but you know, seeing the other
reactions obviously, like they left the headlines till the end.
I think Trivian was firsk. They did it in the
order that they are, you know, lightly for the day's
Trivian got a big cheer, machine Head got an enormous
cheer because, like I said on last week's show, I
think that they're basically like the Bloodstock band, and then
Gadjira got a cheer, you know, to equal machine Heads
absolutely brilliant. But going through in the surprises on it,
you know again we kind of heard there were rumors
going around what the three headlines would be, so the
others were surprise to me and what got the pops
out of me where Emperor I wasn't anticipating. And the
Black Dahlia murder as well.
Speaker 4: Which will be if you know, that's the one would
would have been the biggest pot for me.
Speaker 1: Yeah, which for me was being probably gonna be my
first time seeing the Black Dahlia Murder, you know, coming
back with Brian singing and everything, so that'd be big.
But they've also announced, like all of the Sophie stage headliners,
Me and that Man, Cataclysm, Static X and Obituary and
some of the slightly wild card choices, Creeper are playing Bloodstock,
which you know they're on the Sanguinar cycle. It's it's
basically a heavy metal record most of it. You know,
it sounds like Ozzy Osbourne and Ghost and bits like that,
so I it's the record to do it on. But
it is a bit of a like, you know, do
they have that you know following there?
Speaker 3: I mean they're playing well below their station. You look
at they're bigger than over here now, bigger than pretty
much every band above them. By the headliners, it's.
Speaker 1: Fair, yeah, they are.
Speaker 4: They're like they're doing the they're the ones the other
one's playing Wembley.
Speaker 1: Oh yeah, you're right that they are doing the let's
sneak in under the door here approach a bloodstop, which
is probably the right thing.
Speaker 3: I mean, that's what Bloodok tends to do with a
lot of these bands where they pull from outside the well,
they'll have them play below their station to say do
you fit here? And if you do, then they will,
you know, I mean look at Hate Breed, you look
at Skindred, things like that.
Speaker 4: They works their way up the bill. So yeah, I
think yeah, And then I think it's a solid book.
Speaker 1: And the other like real like jump out exciting part
for me. Three Inches of Blood who on the Sophie stage.
I think they're like, they're not headlined. They're doing like
the second from the top on the Sophie stage, which
is a really annoying slot that means you're right before
the headliner of the main stage. So it's slightly annoying
in that regard. But regardless, three Inches of Blood play
in the UK show. We've said that we wanted that
to happen so great. There were other things on this
line up. I've mentioned a couple of names that, like
you know, are not much to celebrate, I think, but overall,
clearly as a first gambit, the three headliners are fucking
massive and undeniably a like slam dunk victory of a
booking in terms of how they might support it with
the rest of bill and how they might offer some
of that slightly more bloodsnot diversity. I think you can
at least see the beginnings of it. So yeah, pretty
undeniably already one of the festival events next year.
Speaker 3: Yeah, this is for me as like a first announcement.
This is the most the most kind of swayed by
Bloods I've been in year one.
Speaker 1: Was the last time you went to Bloodstock twenty seventeen.
Speaker 3: I've not been since then, so I've been tempted a
few times, but there's always been kind of like someone
that's stolen me away with this is the one I've
gone like, ah, man, those headliners, never seen Emperor, Creeper,
Black Dahlia Murder, a bittery headloging the second stage after Gadjira,
probably like yeah, fucking yeah, that'll be a party there.
Speaker 4: There's some really cool stuff on there.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 2: I mean I've not been to the last two Bloodstocks
in any capacity. End of a Day twenty twenty two,
did the weekend in twenty twenty one, and did a
few weekends before that. By based on the strengthens, headline
is I will be there next year, and that doesn't
even get to Emperor, who you know, maybe my favorite
show ever was seeing Emperor and Bloodstock in twenty fourteen,
and I'm kind of I mean, I don't that we
know yet, but i'd be curious to see if that's
not going to be another album set or if it's
going to end up being a I don't think it will.
Speaker 1: Maybe because I've seen Emperor since they stopped doing anthems
and stuff and they have just started doing like general catalogs.
I mean, they open with a Prometheus track the last
time I saw them, so I would predict just hey,
it's Emperor.
Speaker 4: Just leave them at home this time, is all I
ask Emperor.
Speaker 1: Yes, which I would like to assume what happened. But yeah, anyway,
I think what you guys are both saying, which is like,
you're not necessarily like every year Bloodtock attendees, but you
are looking like you might be wanting to get to
this one. So many people will be thinking the same
going off of that. So that's the you know, the
kind of general vibe off of that something that happened
or announced while I was at Bloodstock and I got
back from that weekend and I have found about this,
you know, several days after the facts, and I went,
why the fuck is no one like posted this in
the discord or whatever.
Speaker 3: Said this has passed me by as well completely, and
I was in the news and I was like, hang on,
what the fun I've been listening.
Speaker 1: To this like the last week. But I got back
from Bloodstock and I was like, how has no one
posted this? Basically, we've got a new band on our
hands that has been launched by several members of Twitching Tongues.
There's a real God's sake, you know, there's a real
carousel of like positions those guys do because you've got
Colin Young here, who is the frontman of Twitching Tongues.
He's playing guitar. Alex who is the bassist in Twitching
Tongues is the front man and guitarist of this band.
I think the drummer of Twitching Tongues is like the
bassist in this band. It all they musical chairs. But
the banding question is called Holy Blade and they released
a five track EP, you know, debut in the whole
band that is Sam.
Speaker 3: So in a worship He's just the might hit play
and yeah, that comes spooking trop But then there was
like this like bassline coming and I was like, I
recognize what that sounds like, and then there's like I
was like, ah, I just want to cuddle this ep.
I just want to get to know it and be
friends with it.
Speaker 4: It I always the most like this is the most I've.
Speaker 3: Just kind of hit play on some and immediately been
just swept up and like this is everything like say
shameless in its nice fire worship, but who's doing this
sound at the moment, Like, Yeah, the last band's kind
of really been doing it was Creeper and they've kind
of moved away from it now, So I think it's
a little.
Speaker 1: You know, it's it's got that sort of nineties AFI
as like the sort of the foundation and the blueprint,
but obviously it's got a little bit more sort of
you know, contemporary hardcore there as well. Then obviously what
you know nineties AFI had or what bands like Creeper,
who ever kind of you know brought brought with them.
It is very like I meant, you've got no e'squ
Sam Again. I was at a festival when this dropped
and I came back and the media.
Speaker 3: Like just just was off my head. And I've been
so cup of other things like working with that that
I just it just slipped fine, and then when I
super as well, so I was like, how the fuck
did I miss this one? God damn it.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean the pitch here like I I feel
like I should like this even more than I do,
which makes me like a little impatient because I more
from this, But I really like it. It's really good.
It's grown on me with every listen. The songs are
really like, you know, getting their way in there. But
even like the intro track has maybe the best melody
on the Holy People that if we're not budger together,
were alone. It's kind of annoying that it's like only there.
But the last track as well, the self title like
Holy Blade track with Holy Blue, it's so good.
Speaker 3: Yeah, like when you got calling in some of the
backing vocal as well, where he's like some of that,
it just sounds huge. It's it's like it was all
those all like the like basslines and guitar melodies that
they sprinkle over it. That just reminded me of yeah, yeah,
all that. I was like, ah man, this is just
so art of drowning Black Ceil's and the sunset, Like
it's given me that, but you're out with a kind
of modern hardcore kind of punk flavor, and I'm just like,
does Colin Young need another band?
Speaker 1: You know, like.
Speaker 3: Like who knows, you know, he's he's been like you know,
samu Owen in that regard, where like he's got a
million million projects going on, but this has been where
I've gone like, I want more of this. Yeah, the
main focus at the moment.
Speaker 1: I think, you know Alec again, who's the base in
Twitching Tongue who fronts this band. I think he might
be one of sort of the driving forces of this.
And it's definitely like, yeah, some guy who's just sort
of there in the background of one of these other bands,
and it's like, oh yeah, yeah, brilliant, you can do
this as well. Really good, Elliott. Do you check this
out at all? Yeah?
Speaker 2: I gave you a fairly cursory listen. I mean it's
not really in my wheelhouse as much. You know, I'm
not Twitching Tons Fang Twitching Tongues fan, and I'm quite
casual on a five. But it did just put a
smile on my face. That's fine, Like the songs are
really strong, and I'll be honest, I was kind of
glad to have someone else doing the vocals, but I
think it makes more sense with this tapestry anyway.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 2: I mean, like I say, it's not aimed at me
in the same way, but it's still pretty good.
Speaker 1: Yeah, this is one of those new bands that turns.
I was like, right, yes, I want more of this please,
I'll take another EP tomorrow, thank you. I'll probably have
to wait a little bit longer than that, but yeah,
if you're looking out for a new bands from you know, established,
you know quality than this Holy Blade record, if it
did pass by the way it did us here is
really worth checking out. We also had announcement of a
new Devin Townsend record. It's called Power Nerd. It's out
in October October twenty fifth, and there's a title track
has been released from it, featuring Cheney Jaster. Although in
a very limited capacity, he seems to come in a
sort of shout a few words and like oh right, yeah.
But the Devin Townsend record seemingly a lot more sort
of like quick turnaround, urgency, immediacy than some of his
more recent stuff. He wrote the music for it in
eleven days out of a conscious sort of like I
normally take forever on these records, let's kind of turn
one out and the track does have some kind of
sort of zippy, almost like Devin Townsend doing a punk
thing sort of energy, so that will be coming. As
said in October, of course, always interested in what Devin
Townsend is doing. More new music that maybe does not
land in the same kind of way is that Motley
Crue have announced that they are releasing an EP call Canceled,
which is somehow not the funniest thing about this particular announcement.
That's that's the second line what they've led off with.
Presumably you know that original track they released a while
ago that was bad that we spoke about probably be
on there. But to go with this announcement of the
EP they've released, as you always do to accompany your
you know, announcement of your new record, is they've released
a cover of the Beastie Boys Fight for Your Right.
What do you think of this, oh.
Speaker 3: Elliot? When you message a group saying like, no, matter
how bad you think this is, it's worse, I was like, no,
it can't possibly be worse than my mental idea of
what he crew in twenty twenty four covering bes was no, no, no,
you're fucking right could like this is so bad? Like
I was just like, how have you done like a
song like this and taken all of the attitude out
of it? It's like the plight is like you've got
a fight.
Speaker 1: It makes the beastie boy you sound like powerhouse singers.
I don't know how that's.
Speaker 3: So bad? Like again, like I was like, thank god
the Blackout are no longer like the worst offenders when
it comes to covering this.
Speaker 1: Song, I've not I don't remember if I heard that
particular cover they least a whole bunch, didn't they. I'm
still gonna assume that's pretty bad. But they compared to
this God like, it sounds like I hate Motley Crue.
Speaker 4: Kick Start your Heart worth this? Kick Start your Heart
worth this?
Speaker 1: As someone who loves Motley Crue, as the one here
who loves Motley Crue, I hate Motley Crue. They are
I mean, because you know, I feel like they have
been there for a long time because we all knew
it because the live shows and everything. But you know,
the last record they released album wise was you know,
Saints of Los Angeles, which has recently established is Eliot's favorite.
So like you know that they weren't necessarily one of
those like Green Day whatever type bands in terms of,
you know, bands who were once great who are so
far that beyond that to the point of like even
comprehending them releasing something good feels insane. But now that
they are releasing music again, I think it's definitely time
to put Motley Crue in that particular category. We have
a wild piece of news here that feels like, again,
it's sort of riffing off of something that we were
spoken about recently, because when we did our Sepulteurer special,
we did dedicate a bit of time to talking about,
you know, the one sort of side project from one
of the members of Sepultaier that happened in that era,
which was of course nail Bomb Mats Cavalierra, his band
with Alex Newport from Fudge Tunnel, who made a really
fucking great industrial metal record that all three of us
were like, Wow, this is like one of the best
sort of you know, super groups, if you wanted to
call it that maybe ever produced in metal. And we
did speak a little bit about how there was one
point when Soulfly i think it was, went out performing
that record and we were like we'd kind of missed
this somehow, but would have been fun to see. Out
of the blue. Nail Bomb seem to have officially reunited,
although not with you know, the lineup, without its new
point involved. He's still, you know, taking a step away
from everything, doesn't really seem to want to be involved
in stuff, but actually will like build as nail Bomb
the band are apparently back, featuring lots of members of
Pig Destroyer randomly Travis and Alex from from pic Destroyer,
Adam Jarvis the drummer. He's gonna fill out the members
with anyone. You might as well take him from fucking
Pig Destroyer. But nail Bomb are back. That's mad, isn't it.
Speaker 3: You know there was a fear when we we we
do a special or we do something and it would
like summon activity, Like have we brought that back by
like you know somehow doing that and Meilbomb coming back
weeks later, I mean, really fucking cool. I don't know
how permanent this Nilbomb.
Speaker 1: Thing is gonna be, but yeah, will they make new music?
Will they just play the you know the album again?
Speaker 4: I mean, if they play the album again, if they
announced a tour for that in the UK.
Speaker 3: I'll be there like that, love to see.
Speaker 2: Oh can you imagine an album set a Damnation? Oh
what yes?
Speaker 1: Please?
Speaker 2: And it is weird because again, you know, it is
a nail Bomb reformation, but it's weird because it's only
one of the two people.
Speaker 1: Yeah. Again, they'd already done the album thing with soul Fly,
So what makes this so different to make it actually
worthy of being builders Nails this time?
Speaker 3: That's why I think there might be no music, something
new to add to the nail Bomb legacy.
Speaker 2: And if you're going to get people to fill out
a lineup, it should just be the lawyer to get
people from Pig Destroyer, like when Mick Mars left. Sorry
you don't make the rules.
Speaker 1: Yeah, and Aggrifroad, but those bees alter the States of
America is in fact less hellish to listen to that.
Whatever this Motley Crue you mean? But yeah, nail Bomb
back fucking mad. We also have worm Rocked have unveiled
their new lineup after you know, essentially the lineup that
recorded the Hiss album, which came out two years ago
and was so celebrated, you know, kind of disintegrated. We
saw them touring for a little bit with Gabrielle dupko
On filling in a live vocals and then at the
end of that tour VJs the drummer who played all
along that departed the band. But Wormrot have come out now,
basically announcing that the lineup that recorded their earlier records
peaking with you know, maybe their sort of first sort
of classic album, the Dirge Record, which is the record
that I got into worm on.
Speaker 4: That's that's why I discovered them when James maybe listens
to that.
Speaker 1: But yeah, so yeah, that lineup is back in action,
which basically means that Arif the vocalist who did record
Hiss and then left and didn't tour it live, but
he seems to be back now, which is quite surprising,
you know, only out a bit of a sort of
c J mcmarin and via a murder situation without hopefully
the whole thing ended. Maybe a bad comparison, but you
know what I'm getting at. But then also the drummer
Vitri who Elliott, you uh reminded me something I'd forgotten about,
which is the really bizarre circumstances in which he initially
left the band like ten years ago. Yeah, I mean
for a little grind called band from Singapore, Worm of
a surprising amount of law. They've got a lot of history.
Speaker 3: It's not just to go ye.
Speaker 2: But we essentially still don't know what's happened. But the
drummer just went missing and they said we can't contact him.
If anyone knows where he is, we hope he's okay.
Speaker 1: He's not into some like serious shit, but he's still
alive and he's back in the band, which is lovely news.
This is how we find out. But yeah, well again,
so the vocalist who you know left the band. Seems
like they're not going to record anything in his absence,
which is nice. And then again the drummer who went missing.
But the dirge era ane Ale Worm not back in
action and they've said that there will probably be new
music coming next year. So good stuff going on in
the worm Rot camp. Golder has left Demi borg Gear.
Golder is the bold member of Dimi Borge who always
looked some kind of like ice Goblin. He was in
Demi Borga for twenty five years and has announced that
hes played his last show and left that band and
maybe this is his reasoning for doing so whatever, But
he's also announced that in the process, his band that
he used to kind of prioritize before you know, Demus
sort of took over everything was his old symphonic black
metal band, Old Man's Child, quite a cult you know,
sort of beloved in sort of scenes of the underground
type band, and he said that, you know, Old Man's
Child is going to be getting back into gear having
left Demi Borgea. So that's quite cool if you're into
your sort of symphonic black metal stuff. Moving on to
live music news, particularly over here in the UK, we
have quite a few notable announcements going on and the first,
perhaps the biggest one, is that spirit Box have announced
that they are going to be playing a one off
UK headline date at Alexandra Palace in London on February
eighty thirteenth, which is the you know, the route that
all of these metalcore bands try and do, don't they
They they all when they get big enough they do
the one of Alexandra Palace day. And I would say
that this is like the most notably quick any band
has gone a.
Speaker 3: Quick dissension of them absolutely like unfortunately Snybe.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I was going to say the reason I can't
say that is that sleep Token did that insane jump
and you know, did all their sellout shows and everything,
but still in the ground scheme of things, pretty rapid
escalation where I've still not seen spirit Box because they've
we worked out we're talking about in the discord. They've
played about twelve shows or something in the UK, the
vast majority of which have been in London. But you know,
there they are again, and they and they and they've
popped up doing this enormous show with Periphery and Straight
from the Path can be suported form that as well,
which if you want to see spirit Box in the
UK next year, you're going to have to go to
this one apparently. But yeah, pretty quick rise to get
to that point.
Speaker 3: I mean, consume the last time they'd London they did
two sold up nights at the Roundhouse, which is like
about half the capacity of Vallei Palais.
Speaker 4: On a tour, like it makes sense that they would
be rising.
Speaker 3: I mean, I I'm sorry they've gone straight here, not
like bricks, not something, but yeah, if the momentums carrying
on the way, it is like I can't see it.
I can't see how they wouldn't like at least sell
it out or sell it very well. Yeah, and speaking
with that supporting line.
Speaker 1: Up, Yeah, so just a little a notable, you know,
sort of you know, rung on that particular ladder. Neck
Deep have also a UK tour for twenty twenty five, which,
if you are to sort of pop punk and you know,
melodic punk stuff, seems like it'll be one of the
sort of events of next year because Netdeck are bringing
along with them The Wonder Years and One Step Closer. Sam.
As a general neck Deep, you know, dislike it, although
you were fairly kind on the new album.
Speaker 4: I've softened on Neckdeep generally. Yeah, just trying to come
into London.
Speaker 3: The one tour I would actually go see one It's
not coming to London, Wow, Like I was like, because
I love that One Step Closer record, one of one
of my favorite bands, Like, oh hell yeah, I'll go
watch neck Deep. Five Eyes not coming to London, your bastards.
Speaker 1: Yeah, the one tour, Well, there you go, it's going
you know, quite a few other places. Yeah, so there
you go. Something that is happening in London is Run
for Cover Records are doing a showcase in London which
features a citizen playing the youth album in full, which
is in a bit of a glovely classic in that
particular scene. So that is happening. Road Burn have led
with their kind of twenty twenty five announcement of a
handful of bands, and the sort of the leading band
in the announcement is the reunited ky Lesser, who I
feel like I knew in my brain somewhere that they
hadn't been around for a bit. But the last time
Kyleer were a band was twenty fifteen, so like nine
years ten years by the time this happens, Caylester have
been off the scene, which feels a little bit crazy.
I was always like that sort of you know that,
you know, Georgian sludge scene whatever, Kylester are always on
the bands. I was like, sort of, you know, kind
of lukewarmed very casual on as opposed to being like
a big fan like a baroness or someone. But if
you die hard into that scene, then ky Lester were
a big part of it. Elliot, any sort of interest
in a reunited ky Lester, Yeah, I mean I.
Speaker 2: Really like Kylason for some reason, even though it didn't
seem like it was a messy breakup or Hiatis.
Speaker 1: Or whatever was.
Speaker 2: I just never gave the idea of them reuniting a
second thought. And yeah, I mean, for me, what's really
great about this is the announcement has made me go
back to Kyle Lesson, which, again twenty fifteen sounds about right.
I've barely listened to them since then, but went back
to Spiral Shadow and static tensions, and yeah, you know,
I agree that they're not as dizzying and brilliant as
the baroness Alms. At that time, they were a fucking
strong band. And again, talking about something like damnation, this
is almost an ideal kind of thing for them to
get I think, sure.
Speaker 1: Yeah, And then we'd also had some sad news that
Ulva's keyboardist and long time kind of you know, uh,
synthesizer programming whatever, that side of the band, the keyboardist
tore Elwizaka if that's their correct pronunciation there seemingly quite
suddenly passed away and Alva, you know, have been that
particular role in that band is very important because basically
since the late nineties, that's kind of you know, they've
changed sounds so many times, but that's always been a
hugely prominent side of them where I think you'd say
they're probably an electronic band for more of their career
than they were a metal band, you know, And if
you've you know, never listened to records like Perdition City
from the early two thousands, if you've never listened to
the more recent stuff when they went kind of in
a synthpop direction with records like Flowers of Evil, which
I fucking love that record so much. Again, a lot
of great work put in by by Toure onto that
whole stream of record one of the most idiosyncredit bands,
and again that's a very significant role in that band.
And also they've been in the midst of releasing They
were sort of doing the thing that something's band to do,
where they were releasing a series of singles and going
eventually this might make up an album, but we're not
committing to one. But you know, they they've released about
five or six songs or something over the past sort
of six months or so. And so I hope that
you know, whatever work or whatever they might be doing,
can you know, be finished or kind of brought together
in a way after this, because it does seem like
a very sudden thing. So so rest in peace right,
Let's move on to a little annoucement. I suppose of
what we are doing over on the T and M
Patreon this week, because we are bringing back the album club,
which I think was Motley Crue. The last one we did,
it went a little bit all over some while we
had other stuff going on, the Enormal, Separateury Special and
stuff that we did took over. But we have got
time next week after this show to throw in a
few album clubs, and so I will tell you what
they are right here. First off, we are going to
be doing an album that is turning forty years old.
The Banning Question are celebrating it and so on, so
we will too. One of the greatest heavy metal records
of all time. Also maya controversy and all sorts of
crazy shit. I have, of course talking about the debut
album Wasp from the band Wasp A Home of crazy
People and maniacs and all sorts going on there. Absolutely wonderful.
We're going to be talking about one of the great
punk rock records of the two thousands, with the Distillers
sing sing death House. We are going to be talking
about maybe sort of slightly forgotten or you know, you know,
flashing the pan kind of indie rock record, I suppose
Japandroids and celebration rock. And we are going to be
talking about one of the most boundary pushing, free spirited
but also due to that quite controversial black metal records
of the last fifteen to twenty years, Wattan's the Wild
Hunt Records. So that is coming to patron dot com slash.
That's not next week. Let us get on with what
we are really here to do. We've had enough show already,
so we have to talk about some albums and we
are going to start with if you can believe it.
I turned it to David Lynch there, but if you
can believe it, our first review today is Winter sun
Time two, not one, but two, the second one, the
second part. It exists, It's finished, It's about to be
available for everyone to listen. We have heard it. We
have audio proof detected with our ears that it exists.
I you know, I thought about maybe one of these
other albums would be lead review, because I don't think
Witness are the biggest band here by any means. But
who the fuck am I kidding? There is no story
with any of these albums, making it more of an
event than Time To. This is one of the most
daunted in how to approach it album reviews. I think
I've ever had hit guys, what the fuck Time To
is here?
Speaker 3: I think it helps out. We obviously did the Time
One album Club to kind of like pre face this
and get a lot of the law out there.
Speaker 1: I'm still gonna have to go over it and bite size.
It's gonna take a minute. I'm sorry, but of course
are you you you will do that.
Speaker 3: But in terms of like the big discussion, we have
done that, so like we don't need to go through
all of that again because fuck me, Like he's just
in saying about I suppose we can go through some
of the more ridiculous, more recent parts of it. Maybe,
but yeah, fucking hell, Time Too. It actually does exist.
And I'm not even a Winter su fan, and I'm like,
fucking hell, this album exists.
Speaker 2: I having received the promo, I'm still not convinced Israel until.
Speaker 1: I say it in that shot.
Speaker 4: If they delay in this last week, somehow we are
not over the finish line yet.
Speaker 2: Like it's I'm not sure I've ever heard something with
this kind of context. You know, this seems like fear
Inoculum and Chinese Democracy or whatever. But even you look
at Fear Inoculum, we don't really know how long those
songs were floating around for before they were made public.
For all we know, the songs were only a year
old by the time to release them.
Speaker 1: There is a.
Speaker 2: Comparable version of this album that existed in two thousand
and seven, maybe, do you know what I mean? They've
only just been considered ready for public consumption, And even
without the hilarious nature of the story that itself is
pretty daunting. It's it's a symphonic melodic death metal band
from Finland, commanding the same level of curiosity and grandeur
as something like Chinese Democracy. It's insane.
Speaker 1: Yeah, so we have an album to get into here,
but and you know, to tell the whole story of
its construction would be genuinely observed. As Sam said, we
did go over it at length in our album club
that we did earlier this year on the first Part
Time One, which was released in twenty twelve, one of
the funniest album clubs I think we've done, because the
story is just so mental. But to cut to the chase,
this is the most like absurd gestation period of a
musical project that I have ever personally experienced as a fan,
because even though technically it's not as long a wait
for like albums from the band because they've done stuff,
but like the actual story of how this was put together,
it puts the Tool album to shame. I think it
is funnier and more mental even than Chinese Democracy. I've
never felt like the existence of an album was as
much of a ridiculous alien concepts as this one, which
is why it's so surreal that we've heard it and
we're about to review it. It's definitely the funniest what
the fuck story about one of these mythical albums, isn't it?
Like The Weight and Stuff are other albums people just
sort of, you know, mean about, but the actual story
of how this happened is fucking bananas. Winter Sun is,
as Elliott says, the symphonic slash folk slash melodic death
slash power metal project primarily spearheaded by one Yari main
part the potted history. Just to get us this point,
if you are like totally new to WinCE and you
don't know what we're talking about. They released their debut
album in two thousand and four, It's an instant classic
of the genre. Nowadays it somehow seems very quaint and
very small scale, but it is a master work and
immediately had people chomping at the bit for a second
Winness Sun album. The album Time began work in two
thousand and six. For a timeline comparison here, that is
the year that ten thousand Days by Tool was released. Initially,
it's intended to be a single album. The drum tracks
for both Time albums, when it was conceived as one album,
were recorded in two thousand and seven. And we know
that because you may remember a news headline that we
lost our mind over at the start of this year
where the drummer Kaiharto was shocked to hear that Time
two was completed because he had not recorded any more
drums since two thousand and seven. If that statement is accurate,
the drums on this album that we are reviewing now
were recorded the year that Michael Bay's first Transformers film
was released.
Speaker 3: Oh but I was a completely different person.
Speaker 1: There are song titles on this album that were initially
posted on Yari's conceived track list for Time that appeared
back in two thousand and six. Two thousand and seven
delays begin heavily based to some degree in their literally
not being enough ram on Yari's studio computer to get
the hundreds of tracks of audio to work, which launched
years and years of technical upgrades and crowdfunding and all
the insane shit that has made Yari from Winteressor a
complete cartoon character an object of ayre for much of
the metal community. Eventually, the album balloons to such a
degree that is split into two, and Time one is
released in twenty twelve, the year again, just for the
timeline events comparison, that's the year that Jesse Leach rejoined
Killswitch Engage, and we are told at the time that
Time two would shortly follow the next year in twenty thirteen.
It is two thousand and two, twenty four the gestation
of Time two. The second half of it has been
for longer and funnier and more ridiculous to get your
head around then the initial eight year weight people had
for the first Time part. And there actually was a
Winter Sun album that came out like a good seven
years ago now in itself the Forest Seasons, but the
overhanging shadow of whatever the fuck Time two would be
and when it would come out and inherently the albums
are much more sort of batchet over the top proposition
than what The Forest Seasons was completely has dominated the
narrative for almost the entire time In the Winter Sun
has been a band, and they've been a band of
over two decades. Even the way throughout much of the
last decade, Yari has taken to social media for regular
updates on the completion of the five or so albums
he is apparently working on simultaneously, and there were extended
periods of like a couple years where time to progress
stalled at like seventy percent complete or something, while he
went off and started some other album that we won't
hear for another day. He is not normal, and Yari
has today basically lost almost all goodwill that people might
have once extended to him. He has, in the eyes
of many people, taken the piss so much to the
point that he has frequently labeled a scammer just for
what the process of creating this album has included over
the years. So you know, I don't know how the
fuck that disdain for him will register in the reception
of this album now it's actually out there. But as
we went in on Deep on our album Club that
We Did. Time One is one of the most batshit, preposterous, maximalist,
overwhelming experiences ever conceived in heavy metal. I regularly describe
it as the most epic in the true sense of
the word metal album ever made. If you've never heard
the song Suns of Winter and Stars, I would genuinely
say you have not heard the full capacity of what
heavy metal has to offer. It's like a rite of
passage hearing that song. There has never been an album
that sounded like that one through all of the preposterous
means of its construction. That's why The Forest Season, which
I think is a really good album on its own merits,
it just didn't do because people were trained to expect
what the time albums had trained them to expect, and
so time to a full twelve years after the first
part was released, there's about nine Transformers films now, aren't
there almost two whole decades since some of the music
that has made its way on for this was conceived and,
in the case of some elements like the drums, apparently
literally recorded. I barely know how to review this album
because am I reviewing this just as a new release
without any of that baggage. Am I reviewing this as
the second half of an overall project, the first half
of which I heard twelve years ago. Have you guys
wrapped your head around how to approach that at all?
Speaker 3: I mean, for me, obviously, being of the most casual
Wins fan who heard Time One a couple of years ago,
really liked it and never bothered to listen to more,
it's been kind of using me to go, you know what,
this is the second part to that album I heard
a couple of years ago that came out a couple
of years before that. Let's go, let's just let's just
say this as time to and I can detach the
baggage and I can laugh at the baggage.
Speaker 1: It's so far off in a way, I'm glad it
happened because it's just so funny and so memorable and
absurd a taga to.
Speaker 3: Me, It's a hilarious backstory that doesn't actually have much
impact because I don't have as much of a personal attachment,
So I actually found this kind of just was like, Okay,
how is this as an album?
Speaker 2: I kind of find it hard to get my head
around the context even now, even knowing the story because
depending on the month that Time One came out in
twenty twelve, that album might be closer to my birth
than this album.
Speaker 3: To that.
Speaker 2: More than half my life has been spent waiting, anticipating,
and being aware of the existence of time too, do
you know what I mean? Like, it's kind of impossible
to wrap your head around that. And also another one
of the things that I think is valuable about criticism
is that not let to say that a band will
hear it, but you know, if someone hears criticism of
their work, they can go, oh, well, next time, maybe
I'll apply that. There's no point thinking in those terms
when it comes to Winter Sun, because A it's not
going to make a difference to what Yari wants to do,
and B you won't know if it has made a
difference for another twenty years. So taking this as it is,
you almost have to see it as something removed from
the idea of a of a career arc or even
a future for the band, or it's passed the kind
of framing for an album that you require to understand
before you can start criticizing. It is so hard to
nail down.
Speaker 1: Yeah, because you know, straight up I like this album
an awful lot. I might even love it. I have
gained a lot of pleasure from it in my relatively
sure you know, a couple of weeks whatever short time
with it so far. But I don't know how to
weigh it against all that expectation from Time One, because
I heard that album when I was fifteen and this
one when I'm twenty seven. All of my years of
experiences with Time one and the songs of it, I
have not had the chance to replicate them with this album,
and in terms of the age that it hits me
to some degree, it probably never will to the same degree.
It's a new challenge for me how to even talk
about that album in this sense. Like I said, my
overriding feeling I suppose I would try to convey through
the means of this review is that I really like
this album. The only level headed and comprehensible way I
have to review this album, I think, is to talk
about it, and that in that sense the way that
we review any number of albums on the show that
don't have the baggage that this one does. But as
to whether this I don't know like completes the whole
that had existed after Time one, like I'm afraid my
only answer there right now is fuck nos.
Speaker 3: I mean, I mean that's fair. I think this is
gonna because you have that back, you have your own
backstorm in history with this out with time as a project.
Speaker 1: I've been in the trenches with Winter Sun waiting for
Time one since Nick Klegg was from actually sworn in
as the Deputy Prime Minister of the United Kingdom. And
I don't know how to quantify that experience with this album.
That is completely gonna alter your experience with it. And
as as you say, Elliott, you were a child, came
out like that's that's insane to me. And again for me,
I was just.
Speaker 3: Kind of like this has been like I could I
even again when I heard Time one must have been
twenty seventeen, twenty eighteen, something like that, like it's been
a long time since like that, because again that was like,
so why is good time one when there is no
time to? And then learning why there is no time
to was a fun part of the whole experience of
discovering Winter Sun. But for me, I kind of just
was like, Okay, this is part two of a double album.
It's taken long terms come, but how does it serve
as parts of a double album?
Speaker 4: Let's fucking go right.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean, for me kind of look at it
with a critical lens. I kind of had to compare
to the Foreigt Seasons in a way, even tho that's
a completely different style of projects, but the way that
that album came out, and because it was removed from
the Time one saga, I could kind of rationalize it
as a Winter Sun record, and I tried to apply
the same lens to this as much as I could.
And having applied that and not viewing it as I mean,
it's hard because it is called Time too, do you
know what I mean? It's very hard to not see
it in the context of the history and everything. But
I already know I like this a lot more than
the Forest Seasons, even if it is too early to
stack up against certainly Time one, and you know, the
self titled this album has brought me so much joy
the last couple of weeks, So I'm, you know, I say,
way too early to start talking about its position in
their legacy or anything like that. All I know is
Time two makes me happy.
Speaker 1: It makes me really happy to hear you say that,
because I didn't. I don't know peoplere gonna be to
you know, like time again, that that level of expectation
or whatever. How the fuck you know? Even this album,
like I said, the Forest Seasons I think is a
very good album, but it just crumpled under the light
of like what everyone was waiting for. And would that
happened to this as well? I don't know. It makes
me again, it like settles me hearing you say that
you think this album is great, And I will say,
if you compare this to The Forest Seasons, you can
I think you can definitely hear in this some of
the things that, like you know, weren't part of the
question on that that do make this. You know, this
is closer to Time One than it is you know,
the Forest Seasons they are, and you can hear those
things that make it part of the same kind of
you know series and whole. But even just like you know,
putting this on and hearing the intro track, it was
to be expected that it would have a track like
that because you know, if Time t was to mirror
Time One, then it would probably have like an extensive,
several minute long sort of film score style orchestral intro
leading into a big like proper opener, but putting it
on and hearing like a different one, a new one
to the one that exists on Time one, was a
really strange experience. You're like, oh, it's kind of familiar,
but you know, unfamiliar at the same time.
Speaker 3: So that was my main thing answer. I was like, okay, no.
It immediately pulled me in in the same way that
intro on Time one did, but it was I was like, oh,
this is this is different though you like you're not
listening to someone. This is again I'd have the familiarity
that you again have with that, but I could still
feel like this is the same but different. But again
it's got that gorgeous kind of like very traditional instrumentation,
super cinematic, super lash pulls you're right in now. I
was like, I feel like they're gonna if this is
what they're going for, then I can almost predict where
a lot of the turn Sam's gonna make if it's
gonna mirror Time One. But I was gonna like interant
see how much it does and how much it feels
like a different project. I guess because of how long
it took.
Speaker 1: Yeah, and just the funny note on that intro is
an extra part of the time story that sometimes gets
lost because even though it's like it's right there at
the center of the sound of them, just because of
all the contact is specifically the time albums, unlike the
other winters and albums, are really weeby albums, and they
do this thing that the other winters and albums don't
where they have this like specifically you know, sort of
Japanese you know, sort of or Chinese, you know, Eastern
kind of theme in the music where this Finnish man
indulges all of his love of Asian music.
Speaker 3: And I mean you're gonna look at like the album
covers as well, with the tree all that, Like even.
Speaker 1: Like the font on the album cover, which is like
it's like the I main send duties on font or
so it's like that feels like it should have been
made fifteen years ago. You know, it's like it's lost
in time somewhere. But hearing that and that element coming
back almost like transported me back in time twelve years
to like a more naive version of me or something.
Speaker 4: Playing your World of Warcraft expansion.
Speaker 1: Yeah, like hearing that, well quite video game is sounding
like it's sort of like, you know, sort of synthetic
U who kind of sound that's on this record that
feels deliberately video game inspired. But I was like, oh
fucking he, holy shit, that that's back. And just the
way my ears, you know, pricked up at various points
out this record of like, oh that's a pretty you know,
motif or whatever, that's going to come back like that,
just like I really like taking in and trying to
savor like every bit of time too. It's very a fresh,
interesting listening experience that is totally unlike my process of
going into listening to any other album we've reviewed.
Speaker 2: What I think is also called about that intro track
is that it also, as well as setting up some
motifs that are going to return to you later and
re establishing the East Asian flair that the first part had,
there's bits in it which they kind of tell you
you're in the hands of a madman, because these really
zappy kind of laser sounds since coming, which seems so
incongruous with the wind chimes, and I don't know what
they called with that sort of pleasant taptue that's woven underneath,
and it sounds like a mad idea, but Yari, being
a madman, is able to pull it off. And by
the time I listened to it the third or fourth time,
I was completely adjusted to it. But the first time
you hear it, you go, ah, this is not a
sort of level headed person who's just gonna, you know,
follow the rule book to create a particular atmosphere. It's
reassuring you that no, no, no, Yauri is still mad.
Speaker 1: Yeah. I mean in a way when albums like this
turn up, it's kind of a release when they turn up,
and it's funny you say, he's still mad, But like
it also makes sense, just in the sense that it
hasn't been overegged and crumpled into some indecipherable mess over
the decades of you know, creation for it, considering he
was also making five albums at once apparently, And you know,
this album in the canon of all the arms we
review this year is you know, surely of a you know,
master craftsman kind of quality, and you know, you get
out of the way. I don't think there is a
song here that comes close to being as good as
Sons of Winter and Stars, which shouldn't be a major
criticism because that's like saying there's no song as good
as Master of Puppets or Halla by Thy Name, But
when it's explicitly the second half of this, I don't know.
Maybe that's the fact. I don't know, I feel like
i'd i'd be capping my enjoyment of this album. If
that was like the bar, then it must clear, you know.
Speaker 3: So that was my thing Initially when The Way a
Fire k and I was like, this is this feels
like this is this album Sons of Winter and Stars.
And then when I kind of got landed in it
that I was like, oh, that chorus isn't coming, is
it right? Okay, recalibrate yeah, And then on repeat listens,
I've come to absolutely think The Way of Fire is
fucking outstanding, is one of the best metal songs of
the year. But it just it took me a moment
to kind of go, yeah, no, you're not getting one
of the greatest choruses of all time coming back in mine,
Like just have you have to just you have to
accept that, Yeah, because the way.
Speaker 1: The opening track, you know, goes into the opening sort
of song on a time record has been established to
be a thing, and you know, how do you echo
that moment? When the first track on Time One goes
into Sons of Winter Stars, which is one of the
craziest moments ever. But when the way a Fire hit,
I did have like, my it's not Sons of Winter
Stars in the same way, but my feelings took over
and my body sort of fell out from under me.
It's not as like, absurdly, what the fuck is going on?
How can my body take this? As like one of
the weaker starts is when it hits. But the power
and the force behind the melody that hits you there,
it is euphoric and dazzling, and I really do value
that moment, Oh absolutely.
Speaker 3: I think it's still this incredible. I think that song
is amazing when the way it just blasts in the
first couple of minutes of it, the amount of shit
that goes on in like the first minutes alone, of
all the vocals screaming.
Speaker 4: All the music, everything, it is like, again, it's so
hard to process it all.
Speaker 3: I need to don't that song five six, seven, eight
more times to really get all the things that are
going on it because it's like, what twelve minutes and
just so much insane shit. It was just that like
and again there is a great vocal on that kind
of the main question. Thing is incredible. It's sort of
thing that you'd be like, that is amazing. That just
all the praise, but it just it took click on first,
Liss and trying to just like accept the context of
it's not gonna be that magic moment that is.
Speaker 4: Just However, time I hear it just gives me chills.
It didn't quite hit me in that same way.
Speaker 3: And it's but after a couple of listens, I'm starting
to get similar kind of exhilaration. Every time that intro
finishes and that blast hits, I'm just like, we're off.
We're going into the like time sphere where yeah, all
of this insane shit happening.
Speaker 1: Because if you've not heard Wintersune before, particularly the Time records,
I've described him before as like extreme symphonic metal, not
in a normal extreme metal sense, but just in like
the maximalism and the intensity of how like orchestrally arranged
metal is delivered, and the scope of them. It is
the most like physically stirring, skyscraping shit and the way
a fire I think, by any anyone's standards hits that.
And you mentioned the chorus that is in there the
vocal line. Then he picks up when he starts singing
the main riff melody with the fire the Hardest One,
so rule so much. Yeah, I think this is we're
kind of touching on it now.
Speaker 2: But Winter Sun a band that combine a few different styles,
I'm not really all that keen on, Like, I don't
really like symphonic metal, melow death. I like the really
great stuff, but I don't have a lot of time
for it. Power mel same kind of story. And yet
the way they combine those things, maybe it's because they're
the other ones.
Speaker 1: Who do it quite like this.
Speaker 2: I find it just intrinsically euphoric. And when this song
takes off, you know, you're right.
Speaker 3: It's not as.
Speaker 2: Quite as dazzling as Sun to Winter and Stars. But
that's one of the few examples in this genre that
for me better is it because when this lifts and
it feels to you being launched into space. Bands have
had a lot of time to try and catch up
on what Winter Sun we're doing on time one, and
no one has. Yeah, so it's not like, oh, we've
had twelve years of bands kind of approximating the same thing.
And then winter Son has come back and you know,
delivering a slightly lesser version of it. It's like no
one's come close. So to even have a silver medal
to that sensation, it takes some doing.
Speaker 1: Yeah, And in fairness, you know, there's actually four full
songs here rather than the three on the last record,
so there is more music than on Time one, which
is nice after all that time, isn't it. But the way,
you know, part of what makes a such a kind
of master songwriter piss takery maybe in the process of
doing it is you know, you will hear melodies that
show up at the three minute mark, and then the
six minute mark and the nine minute mark, and they
hit with increasing magnitude for how your brain becomes kind
of tuned to them. And yet the second to second
insanity and moments of what can be crammed in there
around that is bananas. There's like a few second moment
of harpsichord blast in the middle of the way of Fire,
which is for a few seconds it dials the clock
back to me to like the early two thousands pound
metal scene of Rhapsody and all that stuff, and it
just sort of like it cuts through to some part.
I mean it's like, oh yeah, brilliant. So that yeah,
that first track really it It gave me that winter
sun feeling, which is all I could have asked for.
Really after all that Time one with the Shadows, that's
clearly your sort of you know, if we continue this
Time One comparison, the Land of Snow and Sorrow is
kind of analogue where it's stripped back in tempo just
to be like a really beautiful doomy ballad type song,
maximum melancholy, but with all of that symphonic weight and
wip and stuff added to it, does that very well.
The guitar lead that comes into the start before any
vocals or anything is like the drama of how a
guitar can enter a song is another factor. It's like, man,
you guys, just do everything extra, don't.
Speaker 3: When that sort of solo comes in not even a
minute into one of the Shadows, And you're right that
there is like just dramas the way to describe it.
Everything from like just the sort of the big doomy
guitar ords ringing out to the log of guitar leads.
There is so much like sorrow to them. But you're
right in the most epic, dramatic way, imaginable way, like
there's no there's nothing about Winton that's like a shrinking violet.
Everything is dialed up to the max the entire time,
even when they are being quiet. It is maximalist.
Speaker 1: Yeah, Like there's a moment in that really encapsulates that,
which again we spoke about Time one and the vocal
performances and how they are easily the thing that if
you are not one hundred percent fully brought in, they
will sound mental. In that song, he goes Caress Me
one more time and it's the most like holy shit,
what like fucking power metal yarling have we got going
on here?
Speaker 2: I mean, I don't know if we made the same
comparison in the album Club that Yari to me really
is like Cawthorn thing. Yeah, on the Viking Metal Bathroom records,
where he's not necessarily the best singer, And it's kind
of funny that for someone who's such a perfectionist, he
still insists on being the singer of his band. But
it adds to the charm.
Speaker 1: Like if they got.
Speaker 2: Someone like a Floor Jansen, someone who's classically trained has
the pipes for it, it wouldn't have that kind of
glint in the eye that Yari gives it. And before
we're saying about how maximalist this band is, particularly this
set of albums, you know, there's moments where you you're
assured you're not in the hands of some moron who
just wants everything to be completely dialed up all the
time just for the sake of it. Because the way
everything drops out for the solo, that's a considered move
that makes the song best, and it makes it all
the more exciting when the strings, horns, keys and choirs
come crashing back in and you know, again if it's
a reflection on the time one record, just going from
that all over the place, explosive epic on the way
of fire and setling into something a bit more linear again,
it's that sort of songwriting master class that, even if
it's not the most obvious thing about Winter Sun, it's
the reason you go back to the records.
Speaker 1: Yeah, it's funny because it's almost a dichotomy where there
are songs where you go, why has it taking you
twelve years to do that? That's just a very well arranged, sad,
slow song, But it does need reinforcing how song centric
these albums are because for all of the nuttiness and
the billions of audio tracks that break YAI's hard drive
or whatever, they do a tremendous job of putting the
song at the forefront and one with the shadows is
like it's impressive for the strength of the song, and
then all of the extra stuff kind of compliments that.
And again on just the vocal that it's a band
that you can't do by halves. You know that the
music is so absurd in high drama that to have
a vocalist do anything different wouldn't do. But there are
just really mental moments no.
Speaker 3: So like you know, the song focusing is I think
why I can really go with these these win Some
records in particular because they are again they are epic
like massive compositions that go that like most of songs,
there are over ten minutes, like there's like the two
short tracks and then everything else is big, but they
are still like there is all about like always moving
the song forward, having sort of memorable vocal hooks or
just like storyte with the songs. It is all about
like the songs standing up by themselves as well as
part of this grandaption that's a good way. I think
I can really go along with all winter Sundo.
Speaker 1: Yeah, the other moment on this that really kind of
lit me up on first listens, and when I was
getting to grips with like, okay, what are the songs
gonna be? Ominous Clouds into Storm, which ominous Clouds is
like a full on like Steve I fucking Joe Satriana whatever,
like guitar instrumental. And I'm not one hundred percent sure
why that's there. It's it's the kind of thing you describe,
but it just sounds so wanky, having like two and
a half minutes of that on the record, and it
is kind of funny that it's there. But you know,
in the context of these it's all about kind of
they give you those moments to compose yourself and then
bring in the next track for maximum impact. But when
Storm starts moving in like perfectly title, because it is
that sense of like the clouds rippling overhead in the
air changes and you can see them coming in in
the distance, and I, you know, I was getting like
actual tingles in my body as that like moves over
the horizon. The little it's a bit like the intro
track on ascendancy before rain, like running a little bit
the pianos and guitar lines and stuff, and then the
heavens fucking open and it is like the darkest maybe
most sort of like you know, dying of the Light
part of the overall Time saga.
Speaker 3: And there you go.
Speaker 1: Ah, there are all those audio tracks that broke his computer,
you know, like the fucking the violin runs and shit
through that song. The way that that song uses these
like again those quite traditional sort of neoclassical inspired power
metal guitar lines, which if you have any history for
laking this kind of music, you will have an affinity
for those kind of tricks. But the way Winnes's under
it incorporated into this like souped up personically upgraded hole
and they sound just like newly fucking expressive and desperate.
I feel like in that song like I am standing
like knee deep in water that is pouring down from
above me. It's so expressive and again a word that's
generally far over you that Winter's stun Up really are
one of the bands aiming for it. So cinematic.
Speaker 4: Yeah, like the running water is that the sound of
that of his swimming pool for this sauna.
Speaker 3: Yeah about a sw something. Yeah, that's a good shower,
it is, but no, you're that's storm and Ominous Clouds
is kind of like the entry to it hugely cinematic.
It is so vast and again you are like you
can feel, like I said this, the clouds coming over you,
the heavens opening up, and all that drummy. You've got
all these big choral blasts.
Speaker 1: Like guitar the year maybe probably, and that is ridiculous.
Speaker 3: That's like it's so heavy and so intense and chaotic,
but there is like just an amazing focus at the
same time to kind of just like create this world
building and tell this story. It's like it is the
kind of the work of a mad genius.
Speaker 2: Like I think, again comparing these two records and not
to half the halves here, but I think the first
three songs on Time really stand out to me as
a run, particularly the first two. That's what springs to
mind when I think of Time one with this one
Ominous Clouds to the end I think is basically perfect.
And I think you were saying about not knowing why
Omnus Clouds was there. I kind of agree because I'm
not sure it creates the image of a storm coming
because it starts to sound expressive. He just can't help
but sweet pick which he just has to show off.
But honestly, like the sound of the guitar, I don't
think I've ever heard a guitar sound like that because
you put the headphones on and I don't know how
they recorded it. It feels like your ear is between
the strings and the pickups. Like the level of fidelity
is almost like ASMR levels. And again, I don't even
know if that's the nicest sounding way to play the guitar,
but it it kind of makes sense in the context
of the record. And then when storm comes in, this
is like Gabba level insistent for about six minutes, like
it's got one gallop and it's just sticking to it.
It doesn't do the typical thing of a fast winter
sun song and throw you back and forth. It almost
has a craftwork level hypnotist quality where you're three minutes
in and you don't know how long it's been going
because new ideas are flashing in and disappearing again, and
it's all going at the same tempo. And then that,
like you said, maybe guitar solo of the Year with
that big van Elmstein over a kind of swaying funeral march.
I get like where does where does that idea come from?
Speaker 1: And then.
Speaker 2: Never wants to short change you. There's still about three
minutes of being in Japan left at the song, like
it's it's an insane.
Speaker 1: Sam You're gonna get so much listening out of this
when you're over there literally the time.
Speaker 4: Yeah, like this will be it when I'm just wondering
around like a shrine or something.
Speaker 3: I just have time like enjoying the vibes.
Speaker 1: Yeah, and then Silver Leaves to close, which is again
an extra track than what was on Time one, which
I guess, you know, if this is the closing part,
it has to have a different kind of closer, bring
things around, sort of sum them up a bit. It's
really warming that song because you know, again interesting youth,
that sort of synthetic instrumental sound, but that main melody,
it develops that for like almost three minutes or something,
and then the guitars eventually hit him with it, and
that is such an uplifting, assuring, like credits roll type moment.
Speaker 3: Silver Leaves is like, initially the easiest song for me
to wrap my head around. Because it does kind of
just move along quinte nically, not throwing everyone at once.
It progresses at a fairly steady pace. And so then
when when you get those guitars coming in were like
the about three minutes and when the metal like comes
back round, it is bombastic but like and full on,
but it is just a little bit more like I
don't honest say grounding, because I don't think you can
call anything abut this album grounded, but compared to you
know how, just like relentless and full on songs like
Storm and the way the Fire are, it is just
a kind of a nice way to sort of see
you through to the end in like epic cinematic fashion.
Speaker 1: Again, I feel like I'm in one of those like
pink cherry blossom trees for just about thirteen minutes over
the course that song.
Speaker 2: I think it might be my favorite song on Time too,
which I'll be like when I saw the Running Time,
I thought wouldna have another kaleidoscopic explosion of really crazy
symphonic power, mellow death or whatever, But it's it's a
thirteen minute ballad. I mean, it's if you get rid
of the more being in Japan at the end.
Speaker 1: But I love how Mental Witness on records sound. When
you describe it to people who haven't heard it, it's like, what,
what do you mean?
Speaker 3: Why are they good? I mean, I said its most
show forward song, and then you go, yeah, it's a
thirty minute ballad that also still goes absolutely mending for
the last couple of minutes.
Speaker 4: But it's like, was grand crescenda I'm like, yeah, but like.
Speaker 3: By Winter Sun sort of standards, this is quite like
grounded and settled for good at least six minutes of
its runtime.
Speaker 2: Yeah, and it's I mean, it's like it's their trail
of broken hearts. It's like there go At a big, sweeping,
kind of populous metal song, and that has always been
maybe a feature in Winter Sun that you kind of
have to dig through or accept the maximalism aspects to
see them. That sort of just great songwriting at the
heart of it. But it's also it's kind of refreshing
here how it doesn't really vary on the theme, Like
you get choirs here and there and the occasional shriek
in the background, but it's committed to the power ballad thing.
And it's because they've written a melody that is so
sweeping and so invigorating. There's really nothing you could add
to it to heighten the emotional stakes, if that makes sense.
I think, particularly closing out this saga, there'll be people who,
you know, people have been in the trenches longer than us,
and this is them basically at the end of a
sixteen year movie of their life. This is the credits
rolling on that.
Speaker 1: Yeah, and again that moment where it is like, if
only I can understand my dream. That's so emo and
so fucking extra ridiculous.
Speaker 3: Again, so musical theater all over it with his vocal delivery,
which again is some of the things I can go like,
I do quite like wor a bit of that, you know.
Speaker 2: But when it's going and you know you can feel
the book closing, I just started thinking like, hey, let's
forget about the delays that the saunas. It's all forgiven.
We're fine, we made it in the end. It Maybe
it's the fact it's the closing track that puts it
as being my favorite. Maybe if this was re sequence,
I wouldn't feel that way, But every time this came
back in, it just we've said it. It's the end
of a movie like it just you can feel the
credits rolling, and I find it impossible not skip swept
up in that.
Speaker 1: He's so silly. He's just such a ridiculous guy, and
he has engineered a situation where, to some degree, judging
the album will be almost impossible for people based on
his own ludicrousness and what we've done to get here.
But I put it on, and you're right, I can't
deny it. I respond to it, and yeah, so it
might sound weird us like, I don't know if this
matches up to Time One right now, because it's so
difficult to untangle from that album I have in my
head and my many years of experiences of it. But
I'm really enjoying Time to and I'm getting to grips
with it in a way that hopefully, maybe one day
I can put the two albums on back to back
and kind of appreciate them both as you know, something
that I am deeply ingrained in all the way through
right now. Obviously one half has a major head start.
Does this album live up to all of those years
of like hair tearing anticipation, I don't know, as Mama's ance,
And maybe it depends on how much stock you put
into those years and what come out the other side,
I don't know, but I do know that no one
else does that, and no other band's make records that
sound like this, Like you said earlier, in the twelve
years since Time one, there hasn't been, you know, a
acceptable stand in for something like that, that level of like,
whatever the fuck it is. He spent so many years
doing the crafting of the arc of the album, et cetera,
how each song informs the next, you know. I think
to some degree it will always feel slightly absurd that
I can go, yeah, I've heard Time too, and I
don't know if what the imagination conjured when we didn't
have it is precisely this album. But I can say
at the end of it all that I like Time
to and God knows we would have betten off some
hands for that, wouldn't we.
Speaker 3: I mean, I think this album, I mean, this is
incredible again, just kind of like taking this without the
years of baggage. I mean, this is eving you can
probably want from like an epic heavy metal album. But
I do understand that, like you, for most of you're
not going to be able to detach from it all.
But again is as good a Time On. I don't
think it's it's as good, but I think Time On
is like a special record fair enough. But I have
had an incredible time listening to this. I get a thrill,
like listen to every time I've hit play that. I'm like,
I can you know if Winterson decide to tour and
do the Time tour and just play, I'll go, I
will buy a ticket to that, decide to tour time
and just do these two albums as a thing, Like
I couldn't think of a better night of heavy metal
in a way like that.
Speaker 4: But yeah, for me, I'm just like, it is a silly.
Speaker 3: Preposterous vanity project like Time and I think that is
I think like, but it is the vanity project of
someone who clearly, like stupid as he is, is something
of a musical genius who just works in the most absurd,
daft ways. So how does that all come together in
the end? Like again, like how much stock you put
into the stupid bullshit the kickstarters that plays all that
like it's gonna be I'm sure again that will color
your your experience this, But I mean, if you can
if you can separate that and just listen as an album.
I think this is one of the real standouts of
the year.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean I want to echo all of that
because I think Winter Sun I think I was saying
earlier about me not really liking a lot of the
things they tend to pull from. They just have the
pixie dust, Like what they do can't be taught, it
can't be mimicked. And that's why people put so much
stock in these records. And it's why I mean, like
you said, and there's a lot we can't say right now.
Speaker 1: We don't.
Speaker 2: It's foolish to say whether you think it's better or
an equal to, or even really worse than Time It.
Really I have no idea because I've been so many
different people while listening to Time One, and I've had
this for two weeks, do you know what I mean? Like,
it's impossible to put those things side by side. But
what I take comfort in now is a, like you said,
I think it's one of the best metal records of
the year, and B And this is what I think
really is special is that I can anticipate a future
where I see them as equals, which is insane. Like
you think when Chinese democracy came out, how many people
were saying, Oh, it's a bit early to say, but
maybe this is as good as Appetite or I mean,
I think Fear Inoculum is a really good record, and
I remember listening to it and I made like a
whole day of it. I planned everything around to absorb
the album in the ideal setting, and I thought, Wow,
that was really good. But I kind of knew deep
down that I was never going to see it as
an equal to Lateralsis or Enema. Listening to this and
being confident in the future, I won't go, oh, yeah,
that Time Saga, that was one brilliant record and then
a kind of dud follow up, already knowing that that's
not going to be the case, and that when we
look back on the Time projects in the future, maybe
I'll see it as a double album of equal parts
worthy of of the demands it makes. I don't think
you can call that anything less than a triumph.
Speaker 1: It is out this coming Friday the thirtieth, and it's
not the only very long awaited event release that's coming
out that day. In fact, admittedly, the wait for this
next record looks like Pussy Numbers next to Winter Sun,
but It is quite crazy that Time one and the
first Time two even and the first Nails album since
twenty sixteen are already You see how I defaulted there
to Time one, like I can't have not even got
used to saying Time two yet. But anyway, the first
Nails album is twenty sixteen. They're arriving simultaneously, and if
you need one of these is a palate cleanser to
the other one who boy nails every bridge. Burning This
like normally, of course, would be the big talking point
of the day because Nails are I think I can
speak for all of us, because we've had this conversation
at length, extensively one of the defining heavy bands of
all of our musical lifetimes. We all, to some degree
came of age in an era when the band who
were the hot namee in fast hard extreme music, the
coolest band in the world for that stripe of hard
thing we are all becoming accustomed to ou at that
time it was Nails, and through thick and thin, through
whatever you thought their reputation was, whatever, I think it
is true that they defined an era the way that
you can generally kind of count bands on your fingers,
the way they do. We in fact, you know, did
a whole discography retrospective band special on Nails over only
that's not a Patreon at the start of this year,
which you know, for bands comparatively on the newer end
and on the smaller end, we only have done that
really with bands who really made a mark, even with
not the largest body of work. And over the course
of those like four hours or so of podcasting whatever
it was talking about a band who primarily dealing like
fifteen minute odd packages, we really spoke about what a
definitive band they were for us and an entire kind
of moment in time for our scene. So god, guys,
for a band that I have been a you know,
a huge fan of and they've never really been too
far away from me for well over a decade now,
the amount of Nails on the brain I have had
this year, it's been abnormal, right.
Speaker 3: Yeah, ever since we did that special, this is big
this and we kind of did it with the news
of Nails coming back, and I think this has been
possibly my most undispared album of the year. Like I
just completely again, like again as one who fell into
the trap of the strained relationship with Nails because of
all the chip.
Speaker 4: We covered in the special.
Speaker 3: Yeah, like exactly, I do have the bag. Like that again,
I said, I have that bag. I do have that
baggage of Nails. But fucking all of that, none that
fucking matters. Nails are back. I've got a new album.
It's seventeen minutes long. Fucking le let's just go like man,
because I needed again that Nail, the particular brand of
extreme violent music that Nails do. I needed a fix
of that. There are lots of you know, grind and
power violence, hardcore dream metal bands that kind of you know,
trading similar circles to Nails, but the way Nails do it,
there is something, There is an X factor to Nails
that like Tho, those guys were quite hiten. So I
needed that. I needed that fix, an old boy, and
I got it.
Speaker 1: And every single Nails release in you know, those classic
years of the band basically near perfect, every single one
of them is essential. That is again a high bar
for this album to clear the way that Nails so
abruptly fell apart as one decade transitioned into another one.
Here it was such a bizarre, underwhelming end if it
was to be one for a band who like did
burn so brightly the same three guys, you know, with
an extra member here or there, but you knew Nails
to be those three guys. They crafted those three albums
from twenty ten to twenty sixteen. When John and Taylor
both at the same time, dipped after a few years
of what were already quite frustrating years for the band.
When it just came to them being like, you know, functioning,
a lot of people naturally assumed that the band was done.
How many times in general do we have like two
thirds of a lineup leave and the remaining one guy
is able to you know, build it back up to
some semblance of what it was. And then Todd Jones said, hey,
don't worry, an album is coming and then went completely
radio silent for like three years. So Nails seemed pretty done.
But let's give Todd Jones' flowers here. He was true
to his word. Like I spoke to Todd Jones last
week for an interview piece about this whole process that
you can read if you want to go over to
not Fest. But he said, like, I'm just not the
kind of guy who announces things when I have nothing
to announce. But he was actually doing stuff, you know,
and I think that's who Todd Jones is. You might
assume that he's fallen off the face of the earth
or it's all falling apart or whatever, but behind the scenes, quietly,
he is actually putting in the work, and it's been
wonderful over the last few months or whatever, seeing that
behind the scenes work, like come to fruition with the
revamped return of Nails with a new, carefully put together
lineup and a new album. Given that Nails, you know,
twenty and nine to twenty nineteen is a perfect discography,
how tentative were you about like a new lineup? Would
you have been okay if Nails had like decided not
to come back.
Speaker 2: I guess I would have been okay if they decided
not to come back, because that's what I'd already adjusted
to you. I mean, like I had a few years
to get my head around Nails no longer existing. So
if that was to continue to happen, I mean, it
would sting that I never got to see it, and
it would sting that it was like the last thing
they did was that pair of singles kind of seemingly
leading towards an album, but at the same time, I'm
not normally the sort of person who has this train
of thought. I don't necessarily ascribe to the I'll have
a perfect career and then disappear. That's not normally what
I want my favorite bands to do. Like, I kind
of like seeing them change and do new stuff. But
with Nails, I could at least you go, you know,
maybe that was an appropriate end. It was it was
always going to do that, something that extreme, that intense.
It makes sense, And I'll be honest, I was slightly
skeptical at the idea of a new lineup with Nails,
even though Todd Jones is clearly the you know, like
the main songwriter, the kind of focal point in that band.
The other two guys would were no slouches and were
crucial to the sound. So I when Nails were coming back,
if I had any questions at all, it was mainly going,
what about the rest of them?
Speaker 3: I mean, for me, like I had in my head
that I was like, if now I was gonna come back,
if Todd Jones was gonna like get more back, I
didn't think he would bring in new members that weren't
up to it. That's why I never really had that
worry even though I agree, like you go like Nails
as a line of that initial they were so all
so good at what they were doing and that's what
created those like insane.
Speaker 4: Records, So like are they gonna be able to replicate it?
Speaker 3: But I just had my hands like, I just don't
think he would get a new line bringing back if
it wasn't going to be to the standard.
Speaker 4: And that's why I didn't really have that worry.
Speaker 1: Yeah, the album is, as you say, like seventeen eighteen
minutes long, and you know, we are people who have
said you've dissected every detail of records of that size.
It doesn't seem much after so many years. It's not
winness sometime too. But as a Nails fan you are
rubbing your hands together at that because there are so
many precisely timed explosions within those run times that there
will be a ton to appreciate and become accustomed to,
you know, on that kind of scale. The you know,
the novel trivia detail there is. It's the first Nail
studio album to be shorter than the one before it.
You will never be one of us seems like maybe
a bit of a limit at the moment of how
far they take that, and you particularly look at the
closing tracks on each album, and that's where the difference
is really made. But we're all Nails fans. We know
what we want from Nails. We can cut to the
chase and say, you know, I can't imagine that we
don't all agree this record destroys. And if the worst
case scenario was Todd Jones came back with some lineup
that was clearly not fit to lick the boots of
the previous lineup and somehow came out with some like
flop of an album that showed the lost of plot
or whatever. This obviously far and away avoids that whether
this will be your favorite Nails record or your fourth
favorite Nails record, I think we can establish that as
a bottom line, and that alone makes this course for celebration.
Because Nails produced three of the best extreme albums of
the twenty years, this one is at the very least
not a noticeable downgrade, and that inherently also makes this
fucking excellent. So to get into the nitty gritty of it,
unavoidably it feels like a bit of a new era
because you know, the first three Nails records came in
a sequence where there was a fluid, organic growth between
each one, and then we had a hard stop for
a few years, and now we're back with different musicians
in the equation. It's maybe not quite of a piece
with that particular era, even if the corn Nail sound
is incredibly you know, recognized by and obvious in terms
of evolution. We spoke quite heavily about how the Nails
album's almost shifted genre a little bit over the first three.
You know, despite being all on the surface being intense
grind power, violence, I would argue that you Will Never
Be One of Us is the most metallic, with the
most influenced from thrash and death metal, while you know,
I'm silent death back in the early days is more
like a deep most punk, a dbat punk record. And
the process of all of those things involved things like
the production and Todd's vocal and all these like teen
elements that overall built up that bigger picture and determine
which way one lenth or whatever I think you will
never be one of us, Whether it was intentional or
not on the part of Nails, obviously, it provides a
sort of foundation from which the new lineup builds on this.
I think if specifically you will never be one of
us is your Nails record, I can't imagine you not
finding times to appreciate in this because it is kind
of like they've taken that as the bottom line and
go on, right, what new stuff can we add on
top of that?
Speaker 3: See? For me, I've kind of almost like a kind
of like melding pot of unsilent death and you will
never be one of us, I think, because it's almost
like a back to basics kind of like approach. That
did make me think a lot of it of unsilent death.
I mean, like the first removed is a band or life,
because that is just such a dark, a pressure abum.
This doesn't necessarily have that kind of same approach, But
this is to me like the moment you just get
that scumming crusted rift kicking off on the opening track
on Imposing Will, and I was like, oh, fuck, yeah,
that is the sound of Nails to me. But I
do get it has still that kind of like metallic
like crunch and l like sort of punch to it
that that did remind me of you will ever be
one of us?
Speaker 2: See, I think we've all We've all got slightly different
reasons on this because for me and I don't know
if it's I'm putting the chicken before the egg or whatever,
the fact that this isn't you know, like you said,
there was a kind of natural trajectory over the first
three records, and the fact that this doesn't quite continue
that in the way that maybe.
Speaker 1: We expected it to.
Speaker 2: It kind of suits the fact that this is a
new lineup, because you can definitely tell that it's a
different Nails, but the Nails you get here I don't
think would be as suited to making the old records,
and that that lineup might not be that suit to
making this one because Nails Arms were getting more metal
with each one. And while I think this is less
death metal or maybe even less extreme metal than you
will never be one of us, it might be more
metal again because it's a kind of classic metal crossover
flare at points certain songs.
Speaker 1: Definitely, Yeah, I think in a way, I think what
you just described is a lot of my thoughts on
the album as well, but I've just sort of phrased
it in a slightly different order one. I mean, is
it shares those metallic elements, right, there. I think there
are areas on this which, as you're saying, kind of
develops that in fun ways, which for as like teeth
pulling and frustrating. The Creationist album undoubtedly must have been
for Todd to some degree, having to you know, reassemble
the band around him. I find this album to be
really fun and really liberating in the sense that Nails
are this like very boiled down to a pure essence
amalgamation of things that exist in the extreme music tree,
like thrash, grind, death, power, violence, you know, we've named
it Every Bridge Burning. To me is a record that
sounds maybe the most reflective of what I imagine the
musical personality of Todd Jones to be. Like the other members,
they've obviously slotted in and done a sterling job, but
as the primary songwriter behind Nails, particularly as all the
other members have changed, so he is the continuing factor.
This album has a really pleasurable, almost like fun house
mirror quality of like all of the different bits of
what you think of when you think of Todd Jones, right,
and the songwriting and the different styles he's played, they
all sort of show up over the course of these
like Blink and you'll miss it.
Speaker 3: Micro songs, Yeah, I mean i'd say like probably has
like the two most fun Nail songs ever on this
album and a couple of moments. But I do it
feels like it's kind of like less purely distilled hatred
and more kind of he almost as like tod Jon
is actually enjoying playing this album more than he has
done in the past, because there is kind of there
is someffal freeing quality I think to these songs that
just feels that like he's actually cutting loose a bit.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean, you can look at that in the
sort of vocal performance because his vocal style changed a bit.
Record and record, you look at something like a band
in all life, and thus the sound of someone being
burned alive and here he sounds rabid but not. It's
really hard to describe it. It's not in a miserable way.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean, there's a really almost like a should goggle,
like extreme metal. It's like one of the most inhuman
voices he's ever done. It's so just kind of kind
of you know, Flenny, but in a way that like
sits in the pocket and knows what you're doing.
Speaker 2: Yeah, it's you can hear the spittle flying out of
his mouth as he pushes the words out. It's it's
it's rather than being gustle and control, there's a kind
of harshness to it, which I don't know why, but
that denotes fun in the concext of this record.
Speaker 1: It's he's kind of.
Speaker 2: He's being the master of ceremonies, where in the past
he's trying to alienate everyone.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean the first track, title track, lead single,
just as it was with you and every one of us.
We spoke about it as the lead single. It goes,
it rips. It does have a slightly more thrashy edge
in the drums to me than what Tailor Young brought,
which makes sense because Carlos Cruz is the drummer and warbringer,
and it's a slightly detectable difference. But the moment in
that is the back end when it does what I
associate very much being a very trademark Nails trick, which
is midway through a song that started out fast, switched
into a more mid paced caver skull in and it's
just settling like, ah, yeah, this is Nails. And I
particularly love the part when it drops the double bass
that initially uses and then the drums lock in like
ACDC style, and the second go round of that riff
is even sicker than the first one, and the pulling
off of that trick just makes me lose my mind.
And I think the best one or that regard further
into the record the second half of the title track,
which again early on in the record, and that one
hadn't been released as a single, so that coming on
my first listen, that made me just fucking holler and
cackle and flip the table. It's that's I think the
moment on the record when any like lingering doubt or
apprehension or whatever just kind of flew out the window,
and I fully gave myself the album because oh my god,
I haven't even, like, you know, I've not got the
lyrics yet to make out what Todd says at that moment,
but it just sounds cool as hell, whatever the fuck
he's says to bring that in, and that like sick
as fuck entombed groove the skeleton riff. As those in
the know about the type of track of Unsilent Death
may say, it's it's the kind of trick that nails
are literally the best in the world at that exact
moment they do better than anyone else, and it's just
some of the most like fun, punch your head off
extreme music there.
Speaker 3: Is, and they do it so many times across this album,
like not always the same sort of way, but when
they pull that trick off again, to me, it's like,
that's the kind of like the two step riff by
nail Standards, that that one in the title track, but
it is so fucking sick, and I'm just like every time,
I'm just like, man, this is why we need nails Back,
because no one can hit this exact sort of groove
quite as violently but as fun as they do. It's
so cool.
Speaker 1: I kind of see.
Speaker 2: The first three songs are something of a suite for
that reason because they kind of build and build and build,
and then when it sounds like they're really really about
to lift off, your squalling feedback and then Punishment map
same sort of thing, same scalling feedback, put you on
the back foot. And then when that the Dan, when
every Bridge Burning comes in, it's it's like the ultimate climax.
It's the thing you've been like waiting for. They've been
engine you and then they hit it hit you with that,
and it's only it's only a reready been two and
a half minutes into the record, like you've not really
been waiting all that long, And yeah, it is just
it's like them doing a party riff, if such a
thing exists. I mean they do that immediately after this.
But you just like you say, that was the moment
for me where I went from going, oh, you know,
is it gonna be quite as good? Just go It's
again you're comparing the fourth best version of this at
minimum to everything else, and nothing else is as good.
Speaker 1: Yeah. And the bombardment of hooks in these micro song
formats you mentioned punishment Matt when he's barking that make
you feel the way you made me you feel, that
is just like pure Nails, fuck you, punch you in
the face. Incredible stuff trapped later on as well, for
like thirty eight seconds long. It just has all of
that murderous dog delivery, especially what we're saying again about
his voice and the kind of like gross slave equality
that's just really great on this. And then something happened
when Nails released the second single from this album, which
was the last one that I listened to as a
single before we got sent the album, and the thing
that happened is they made my dreams come true because
give Me the Painkiller. I can't quite believe that song
as a thing. I've heard it so many times now,
Like I've been listening to that song specifically consistently for
like a couple months. And you know, I'm sure that
a lot of you guys hearing have already heard that
already because it was a single. But I just need
to convey my excitement at this moment when Nails came
out with essentially a speed metal song, a track for
the speed metal maniacs through the prism of like Nails, grindcore,
power violence. You can literally hear it out in the
riff exciter Midnight Judas Priest, the natural extension of the
long held slayer Love in Nails, which is to go
back and go fuck it, let's put shon mercy riffs
in there. I am just so in the middle of
the ven diagram of who that is for, and that
track kindles such a childlike excitement in me for metal music.
Speaker 3: I mean for me, it's taking that and just channeling
it through Nails. Just go, oh man, this is the
greatest sound that can possibly exist. I swear to go
like it is give me a painkiller. Like when that
sort of shift happens, and I'm like, this is when
Nails become just so fun. Like I can't imagine being
into heavy music and not loving this song in particular
because it's just it is extremely as fast it is violent,
but it's so just like care free and life affirming
at the same time, and just this kind of like
fuck everything, let's crank out these shellos, just crank up
these rifts, slam out that DV coming out the solo,
like big vocal hook right before the solo comes in.
Speaker 1: It's so.
Speaker 3: It's so exciting, Like this to me might be one
of my favorite Nail songs. I'm just not stop listening
to this song in particular because that jolt everything that
comes in, it's kind of like this is the greatest
shit in the world.
Speaker 2: How many times before have we spoken about the lead
guitars and a Nail song, Like it's not one of
those points of reference we often reached for, But even
ignoring that, so far, so good. So what iff that
powers this thing? Along the fact that there's a legit
brilliant guitar solo in it. It's you know, before this album,
if you saw a longer than normal Nails track in
the track list, you go, that's gonna be the crossover song,
absolute dirge. And we now live in a world where
we can look at a new Nails track list, see
a longer song and go there might be some power
slide leads on this, like.
Speaker 3: It's the best of all possible timelines.
Speaker 1: Yeah, and that fucking that Painkiller give me the Painkiller.
Damnation festival isn't ready for that, you know, that double
based wall under that chorus and that dbat Kirk Blees sound.
But the bit ive I've mentioned where the before the
bridge with the cymbal chokes and the vocal stabs and
he goes, no hurt, no pain, let me do my
goddamn thing before that's like the coolest Nails have ever sounded. Like,
you know, I don't know if this is one of
my favorite albus overall. It's a very tough category, but
it's immediately one of my favorite Nails tracks ever because
it's just one of the cool that's exactly for me,
like best ideas, let's do like an eighty speed metal
or like a black thrash type song Naile style, and
the album is just for that Pieter genius totally justified,
and it's it's a really lovely moment of like organically
hearing like that's what these people are into, you know,
like Nails, like Motorhead, and they like Judas Priest, and
they go, let's sprinkle some of those old school sounds
in there and just experiment with what that sounds like
in the context of Nails. And it's that kind of
ethos that makes this record overall so pleasurable to me.
And the album pacing is like totally up to the
standard of what we know Nails to be, right, you know,
four varying shades of rippers up top and then track
five lacking the ability to process empathy brilliantly. It's the
point title styles back on lurking glowering chainsaw sound, which
on records to me, it kind of sounds like it's
sort of like sitting shroud in shadow, keeping its cars
close to its chest, waiting for the moment to strike.
But you know, live that main riff is going to
have people just moshfis going crazy stuff.
Speaker 3: From the get go, there's sort of slow chugging beat
down at the end of that song, and that does
make me want to throw hand yeah, and they like
speed that up and it's like, oh fuck yeah, Like
you know, everyone does the play the riff slam Like now,
I's like, no, we're going to do the beat down.
Speaker 1: They're a going to speed it up to make it
more violent. That's exactly what I was saying about. Kind
of again, hearing bits pop up that you know is
part of the wider picture because one of the most
like full on bouncy hardcore beat down type parts in
a Nail song in the bridge that sounds really fucking
crazy with particular tone and everything they have.
Speaker 2: I just a few bands do insistent better than Nails,
Like when they've got an idea, it's like a dog
with a bone, they'll they'll just go They'll commit to
it to the maximum degree. And there's almost no dalances
with new ideas on this song, for it's basically entire runtime.
You're just caught in the treads and it stomps you
over and over and over again. But again, a lot
it's we don't making so many comparisons with Winter Sun,
but when no band does it quite as well, as
them that's what they need to do. And I think
between this song despite as sort of hard and they
say sort of shadow it is and give me the Painkiller.
One of the things I found really nice about this
record was Nails don't sound like they're trying to keep
up with some sort of reputation, which I was kind
of concerned they might feel obligated too, because you know,
when you spend the best part of a decade being
the heaviest band in the world and then you come
back five eight years lacepling on how you're measuring it,
there might be some sort of expectation of that, and
here it kind of sounds effortless.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I really like that there's still a kind of
tangible DIY power Violand's edge, despite how like crazy the
record sound by comparison from like where that genre first
came from, but like Dehumanized just feels like you are
watching some crusty guys slug some instruments over their shoulder
and they knock that out on the spot, you know.
And there are again there's more sort of straight up
punk songs like Made Up in Your Mind, which has
that incredible you know in your head the first time
you hear it hook just really again great punk rock songwriting,
just this kind of warp beaed intensive delivery. And then
I Can't Turn Off might be one of the most
sort of back to basics punk rock songs that Nails
have ever done. And this is what I mean again,
all the different shades of what you imagine makeup Nails,
what are the bits of the pie chart, they all
like have a moment to shine on the record. It's
really nice.
Speaker 3: I mean I Can't Turn Off again. That that is
when we're gonna. Yeah, really we mentioned Motorhead. I was
like that kind of again, I kind of kind of
reminds me of that and that just like real just
like raw back to basics, like just punk raga with
big hooks like actual bounce to it in a way
that Noils don't always lean on it again really fun
and has like big rooves, big like rocking guitar solos.
Speaker 4: Again like that song and give Me the Painkiller just
the two hour kind of girl.
Speaker 3: Like those just really stood out to me on first
and it's kind of like these are like big moment
tracks where like now is going to like actually feel
like a rock band that have just become the most
violent heavy band in the world.
Speaker 2: And that to me is such a cool sound humanized.
Of the songs we've just mentioned, that's the standout for me.
It's it's just outrageous. And maybe it's because I have
a predilection for this sort of thing anyway. But when
that weird riff, which even though it's a trick that
is as old as this genre where you bring the
riff in and then bring it back later as a breakdown.
For whatever reason, maybe it's because I've been surprised by
some of the aspects of this record already. I just
wasn't expecting it. And when that comes in towards the end,
it's just We've said it numbers of it's just the
best sound in the world and a song that's what
fifty seconds long, a minute, and it has so many
catchy moments, some of which last a second and a half. Again,
just we've said it. But it's the thing that makes
now special.
Speaker 1: Yeah, the moment where this does sort of sort of
dial it back in amparentity, you know, and be one
of us is obviously it's the closer they come crawling
back on the album is an absurd song that's one
of the peaks in Nails discograpy because nothing else really
does it, and I don't expect Nails as a rule
to keep like inflating that element of what they do
after doing like an over eight minute song that strings
together so many weird riffs that's like a freakish Frankenstein's
abomination of a song. No More Rivers to Cross doesn't
attempt to really top it. But I'm still a mark
for Nails doing that on their albums because that, again,
that's one of those predictable tricks that just feels so
right in the hands of this band. Like if you
want any band to do the slightly longer slow Dooby
closer every single time, it would be Nails. It would
feel kind of wrong and unfinished without it if your
fifteen minute experience just you know, didn't end with a
cap that. Yeah, and it does, as is always the
rule fulfills the trick for me being one of my
favorite tracks on the album, the swinging evil doom riff
at the beginning, maybe some of the most sabbath ever
on a Nail song. While we're on the sort of
the trend of talking about some of those older bands,
if you here in there but the actual main rift
that it hits when it settles into a tempo. Fuck,
that's evil, you know what I mean, It's just evil.
It's so good, just all of that, you know, Celtic
frost and sepulture rifts that make you feel nasty, you know,
like simple slamming drum part. They just have this like
godlike instinctive understanding of how to deploy the tricks right,
not revolutionary tricks, but their control of them and their
knowledge of like when to pull back, when to detonate,
how to align a series of such moments in sequence,
is just masterful. And it's such innate natural talent for
the principles of what makes heavy music good and how
to preserve and maximalize that in such a strip back
to the purest bones of bit way. That's always what
has made nails good, and that's what's made them special.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean nails closers that we've said it that
they're kind of a stuff of legend nowadays, and this
one has in many ways a lot to live up to.
But what I think so cool about this is they
pull out a new trick whereas normally they do these
and it's kind of pound you into paste, Set you
on fire. That's the agenda of the Nails closing track.
This has a kind of sparse, like wobbly nature to
its rift. It's got this like woozy, seasick quality to it,
which it is arguably more effective following the last nine songs.
It just throws you off kilter and it's so much
more surprising and interesting for that. And when that last
sledgehammer riff comes in, when.
Speaker 1: They start fucking bending it about at the end of
It's so fucked up.
Speaker 2: They could play that for fifteen minutes and I wouldn't
get bored of it. Like it's just it's so good.
Speaker 3: I mean, that's it. It's like it again, they said,
like doing the slower dirgy track of the Clothes. That's
a Nail's trick that other bands you know have, kind
of like post Nails, everyone started doing. All the hardcore
bands ended their record on a slow, dirty song. But
when Nails can do it and kind of almost strip
it back to like a shorter version of it, but
still find new interesting ways to make that slow track
sound different and not just sounding them thrown back and
doing the same old Nails trick. That is what again,
where you get like, no, they're just really they are
great songwriters. They can do really clever things that I
think they don't get enough praise for sometimes because they
do find ways to make that same trick they pull
sound fresh, exciting and interesting, even on like the fourth
Go Round.
Speaker 1: Yeah, live up to expectation. Any disappointment.
Speaker 3: This this this hit that the explains with me, I
am I know, because I've just been so nails peeled
that I'm just like, just give me more of this.
Speaker 4: But I've had just like this album made me happy,
so happy every time.
Speaker 3: I hit play on it.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean to make the Last Winter Sun comparison
of this review like the way that I was saying
time to I came with going I don't know where
I'm going to rank that in the future, and that
feels like a success. I kind of feel that way
about this, Like it would feel weird to put this
above any of the previous records right now, But you
have some band to basically go away for eight years,
come back and release seventeen minutes of music and no
one feels short changed by that. I'm completely satisfied by it,
and I'm used to wanting more from them. But the
fact I still do is that's nice.
Speaker 1: Yeah, no chance nails every bridge burning. Right, So those
are two of the fucking biggest records of the year
for us, and we've spoken so intensely about those, but
we have a good handful more of other records that
have come out in the last couple weeks to also
talk about. And so next we are going to go
to maybe the metal record that the mainstream is most
interested into the bunch this week, zeal And Ardor with
Great The first two records that we've just spoken out
obviously there for us, but zeal And Ardor have become
one of the most surprising success stories the last ten
years in metal. I still find them quite hard to
pin down to a degree because it's you know, to
some degree that's part of their success and what's cool
about them, But the way they went from like underground
extreme metal adjacent project to I guess, how do you
guys like actually using like what kind of band are they?
What sort of sphere do they exist in?
Speaker 2: For you?
Speaker 3: I mean I always kind of it was like quite
sort of like the I don't say I haven't got
but like they kind of see that the kind of
artsier end of metal to me, I guess all the time,
just like all the different things they pull on. The
initial over picture that whole, like Chain Gang Cross, the
Black Mele that always feels like quite a sort of
trendy like artsy genre blend. But they that was always
what it was basically, But they've branched out to so
many other different things that I don't think they ever
do just sit into one particular genre natural area.
Speaker 2: Like, Yeah, it's a funny one because that's sort of
like I say, slave chant black metal thing is a
more avant guarde idea, but it's easier to put in
a box, so it somehow feels less avant guarded in
a sense. They've gone they seem more experimental by playing
with less obtuse forms of music like industrial metal, alternative metal, soul,
that sort of thing bleeding in some hours made them
seem like a more experimental band than they once were.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I agree with that. I really like the first
you know Zeleanarder albums. I was a really decently big
fan at that point in time. Then we had a
bit of a break in their output over the COVID period,
and it felt like that was the time when Zeleanarder
kind of shifted a little bit and they came back
post Pandemic a slightly different band. The third self titled
with you know the third album which was self titled.
I like that record if I put it on now,
I think it's like, it's cool and good, but it
didn't scratch specifically my itches in the same way. And
I have to admit I've not really gone back to
that record an enormous deal, but I know for a
lot of people them sort of tweaking that sound to
draw on like more contemporary you know, industrial metal or whatever,
even new metal at times on that did work for
the massively and it was a very popular record amongst
the t and M audience, and to some degree, albums
like this one are still gonna be viewed as a
band who are like on the up. How do you
feel about what Zeleanarder are doing now with Griefe.
Speaker 2: I think I kind of an opinion on Zileanarda that
I've not heard shen It's not really a major one.
It's just that it feels like the kind of majority
view is Devil is Fine. Was a show of real potential.
Stranger Fruit was them kind of maximizing on it, and
then the self titled was, depending on who you are,
either a kind of lesser form of it or something
even more interesting. I don't really like much of what
they've done since Devil is Fine, so I'm going into
this with a pretty different context to imagine a lot
of people. But I think this is my favorite thing
they've done since that record.
Speaker 3: I think for me this is a kind of moment
of kind of realizing it's like I respect and admire
Zi Leonardo more than I and I feel there's a
sort of cop out answer, but I do. This was
my asker, and like, how much do I actually like?
How much am I getting out of this as my
own enjoyment? And again I'm not, because again there's a
load of really impressive, cool stuff in that I do
like as a whole experience. I was maybe felt like
the most cold on first listen to a The Leonarda
record with this one than I had done to anything
they've done in the past. And I don't know quite
what what's changed to make me you kind of feel
a little colder to this one. But yeah, it's been
around that I'm kind of still trying to process because
I'm not crazy about this bios. I don't like bad
enough anyway, because I think it is a really impressive record.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I think it's probably for the best in terms
of their sort of creative longevity, that that initial like
black metal, Chain Gang Chant Fusion Point has like almost
completely fallen away. This record has barely anything to do
with black metal anymore. If you were timing this based
on like how long until something comparable to black metal
shows up? I guess in the very loosest sense. There's
a little guitar part and a scream at the end
of Fend You Off, which is tracked too, but it's
very light to black metal influence, and there's not a
lot of that real hellish atmosphere. What you're left with
is again vocal lines that have moved I think, more
into kind of general like you know, sort of R
and B and soul influences even a time rather and
just sort of explicitly like aping music from the seventeen hundreds,
and it's recognizable as Lenarder, but it just feels tremendously
far away from where this project started at this point
in time, even just like the intro track Weird as Fuck,
you've got some kind of like high ho whistling foundation
with man Well's like really you know, impassioned singing voice
and then full on video game since which like Manuel
who seems to use his band social media primarily to
recruit people to kill elden Ring bosses for him, it's
just like a weird headvuck of like what was the
initial seed of the idea for that track? You know?
And I find that quite hard to pinpoint with them
at times, and the last album it was quite erratic,
but it was still very aggressive and often in a
kind of perhaps intentionally throw you around all overplace kind
of a way. I found it to be. I think, Ellie,
what you were saying about, how like, even though it
was such a crazy idea to begin with, the pitch
for what Zeleanarder was initially was very kind of self explanatory.
I think the last record is when that kind of
stopped being the case. And that's definitely you know, continue
on here this album. I don't really know what this
is trying to do, Like why is it so subdued
and sullen? And like I didn't think i'd say this
about zeln Arder album. Even after the last album like
wasn't exactly for me in the same way they are
inherently so odd and ear catching. I think this record
is quite boring.
Speaker 3: I think it is quite slow and minimalist for a
lot of it that I like, some people might find
that really engrossing and kind of like get sucked into
the world atmosphere, but for me, it it did feel
like there was kind of it took a while to
find a song that like really hit for me. It
feels like Clawing Out was where they was that the
moment where I first of went, oh cool, that that's
you know, this big, mean industrial kind of song. It
takes an age to.
Speaker 1: Really hit any well momentum like fend You Off Killing Over?
Are You the only one now? All in the beginning
all really like langued songs and it just one now
is like feels like it's trying to aim to be
very serene and transcendental, sort of a ballad approach that's
also incorporated some of those Black netal leads into it,
but it feels like it never actually hits that jump
and it and then it just kind of fades out
and I don't know this. I think this is the
first Eleonarder record that I could and the last one
I liked, I was just sort of a bit confused
by it. This one, I think is the first one
I would say, I don't think I liked this record
very much at all.
Speaker 3: Okay, cool, So it's not just Mu's gone a bit cold, No,
I think it's I think it's a bit of a dud,
like because because I don't want to do it, because
I know how like world regards Ardo Art, and I
was like, I know something this had done.
Speaker 4: I thought, maybe this is just, you know, not to
my taste.
Speaker 3: But and again, there are moments in the sun I
think are still really great. I think, I say, clowing
Out is like this really menacing evil song that I'm
just like, I would like to be more of that
on there, and even some of like the more delicate
stuff I think is like I think Killanova is quite
cool actually, like with that kind of like minimalist groove
and those like percaussive elements that kind of drive it forward.
There's something kind of infectious to it. But it wasn't
wowing me, I guess, is what I think the problem.
Speaker 1: Like, Yeah, if both me and you are sort of
a bit more like, what's going on really on this record.
I'm curious as to, you know, Elliott's position in terms
of like this may be drawing you back in to Zeelandard.
Speaker 2: Well, this is what I was going to say. I'm
not sure I would even go that far because I
really don't care about Stranger Fruit or the Self Titled
or that much at all. So me say this is
my favorite record of there since then, isn't this sunny
me saying this is a brilliant record, and I love
what Zi Leonardo are doing here. What I do like
about it is it has the return of something which
I think was really missing on those two records, and
that's menace, which even though I think this maybe goes
further down the sort of smooth R and B thing
which I'm not always that keen on when Zi Leonardo
do it, the fact that they're able to blend that
with some degree of threat I think makes a big
difference because kind of the inverse of what we were
saying earlier about how by bringing in alternative metal and
industrial and that sort of thing, they seem more avant garde.
There's a weird thing that happens on some of these
songs where by combining really disparate things they seem more linear,
like fends you off combines. There's bits of black metal
in there, there's soul, there's post rock, but for a
lot of it just sounds like imagine dragons to me,
and that's a kind of overused slight against anything that
sounds Bombasted's art. It sounds like imagine dragons, but that's
really what it sounded like, and that being sort of
the first song proper, I was, oh no, not more
of this, But there is stuff that comes in later
which wins me around, like are you the only one?
Speaker 1: Now?
Speaker 2: I do quite like it sounds like happy songs for
happy people, Ira Magua, and when the vocals come in,
I think it really does sound like a fully realized
song and building to that explosive trouble black metal thing,
all the motifs that you know initially we sens stage
underneath that. I think that's a sign of where Ze
Leonard's strengths lie. And there's other moments on the record
which show them experimenting with stuff that I think really works.
Clawing Out, I think is one of the best songs
on the album, kind of a noise metal song, which
I don't think they've been doing too much of, and
these kind of nervous type whispers from Manuel punctuated by
what I can only really call grunts. Again, it's kind
of surprising out their ideas clashing together in a way
that sounds fresh again, and like I say, it sounds menacing.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I think production wise it's a bit dead and
like a little flat this album. And I don't wait,
I think those those moments where I like they do
try things that I think normally would really work. I
think again clawing Out, you both mentioned it, and it
is it's like track sick Sin. It's the first song
where we get like a real bit of bustle. Really,
but I even that ironically, I think it feels like
it's pulling its punches because it's going for that sort
of lurking sin as the whispering thing, and the muddy
production doesn't really do with any favors, and it's like,
you're so long to the record at this point, and
even what feels like a track that would again put
some style into it kind of feels a little bit
wet and a little bit brought back. And you know,
killing Over has that bass groove and that proagagama that
reminds me a little bit of what we were going
to talk about with the Lepres album, and it's kind
of cool and how it builds, but it's less fully
formed and much less well rounded in the sound. And
the guitars on this record overall sound really toned back,
and the drums have that like again slightly flat dead,
you know, not a lot of sparkle. Adds onto the
tour and they get a song like Disease, which for me,
the melodies on these songs aren't even really big anymore,
like they initially made their name on like you know,
Devili is fun and all that stuff, and it's Disease
is just sort of like shuffling about looking down at
its feet, and that's like a kind of baffling, kind
of bad song that doesn't really go anywhere. And I'm
a bit confused to what the audience is I suppose,
because like is this meant for be for like like
like Tool fans or Porcupine Tree fans or whatever. Is this?
You know, the last album felt like it was a
little bit more for like for Call fans or something.
Is this for like post metal fans? What's really the deal,
because to my years, it doesn't. It's not exemplary progmat
or like the former because it's so kind of curtailed.
It never really goes all out enough to be particularly
pleasing for like the big festival metal crowds like the
last album felt that was kind of working for. I
find this really frustrating a listen where it doesn't really
tick any box.
Speaker 3: I mean you mentioned like disease there to me because
that song like it's almost kind of like this sort
of laid back desert rock kind of thing going on
to which should I think quite soups with his vocals
on that, but it doesn't really burst to life like
it should do. On that chorus, like it feels like
I was like, oh, the course coming cool, and then
it's kind of like I do one if the production
is a bigger problem way right it thing makes things
sound quite flat. I mean I think on the heavier
songs again, like clowing Out and Frill are the moments
where I do think it does hit on something thrill
not being as menacing. But it's kind of almost like
this of Rob Zombies, kind of like industrial stomper that
feels like it should be the crowd pleas on the album.
I think, like those moments are cool, but they're a
bit sporadic and fume and far between us to the
moment where I kind of go like, that's that's a
big I do really like.
Speaker 2: I've long thought one of the weaknesses of Zelenard is
the vocal hooks. And it's funny you mentioned Thrill because
there's parts of that song I think are great, but
I think because it's not that hooky, but it sounds anthemic,
it hits me the way that the music on FIFA does.
Where do you know what I mean?
Speaker 1: This is not the album with the Bunch of Day
that I was going to compare to FIFA, But like you.
Speaker 2: Know, you know, you load that game up and there's
the same songs playing over and over in the background,
and they're kind of deliberately chosen to not be annoying.
They're just sort of generally peppy, hooky songs that sound
on pemic and that's kind of what some of.
Speaker 3: This sounds like.
Speaker 1: You're sorry, we're just watching your real time. Sam realized
what's happening in more of the but yeah, to get
back on track for this one, Yeah, I think, you know,
there's a couple of songs of that. The Thrill I
think is one of the better songs. Sugar Coat is
like a weir them, like a weird like regular John
Queens of Stone Age thing. Hide and Shade maybe more
sort of like old school Zeleanardo sounds a little bit,
but they don't really felt they're supported by much, even
the way like album paced, Like you know, they they've
always got these really long track lists past the first
album that can feel a bit jumble for me, And
this one is really the one where I have no
sense of what the arc of the album is and
how tracks are supposed to kind of interact with the other,
and it feels a bit like a grab bag of
demos or something. And the way that like Thrill is
like again an okay song that's just followed by a
useless synth interlude. It's like there's no sense of pacing
here at all. And again Hide and Shade, it's got
a bit more thunder in it, but it barely seems
to like progress as a song at all. It's pretty
first draft. And I at the start of this decade,
the experimentation of Zeleanarder I found to be a little
bit less complimentary to an overall product to where it
started out, and I find it hard to grow ask
a full picture of what they're really going for as
they keep branching further and further out this one, I'm
just lost as to what they're really doing. And I
respect the progression and how the band has gone beyond
what the initial gimmick was kind of presented as being,
but I don't think artistically it's particularly coherent or making
a lot of sense at this stage. And again, the
last album I think is good, but it's just sort
of again diving into the other direction. This one going
in a different direction again, but just I think it's
a bit of a turkey, I'm afraid.
Speaker 3: I think a lack of cohesion is definitely something I
can sort of see. Like with the sequencing, that was
one of the things that show me immediately were like
the opening track kind of felt like it was being
this intro, but then it doesn't actually lead into the
first like the following song. It just mean that there's
quite a disjointed field of this album, which I think
again might be where some of my problems come from
in that there's no mood to kind of immerse yourself in,
which is why I think should be like one of
the things Leleonardo should really be going for his immersion
and mood and like kind of selling a vibe to you.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean, I think I'm probably the most positive
about the struggle of the three of us, but I'm
not that passionate. Put that much of a defense because
even if it's my favorite Lenada record since Devil is fine,
maybe that's more of an indictment on me not really
feeling the two in between, because really my main positive
takeaway is there's some ideas that I think are interesting,
Like Sugarcoat. I actually think it's quite a cool idea
because it's a kind of it's an oxbo doing a
funk song, which I don't know that seems quite novel.
But yeah, a great deal of this feels like potential
rather than the finished article, And I don't know if
that's a great thing to be saying on a band
on their fourth record.
Speaker 1: Yeah, you know, there are the people who are really
into this band, fucking like are obsessed with them. So
I bet there will be a bunch of people right
now who think that, you know, we're being harsh but
we can help we feel and that's the Zeleanarda and grief.
And so we move on to uh oh, I wonder
what it could it be? It's Twin Atlantic and Meltdown.
And here we are once again reviewing an album from
a twenty ten's brett rock band. It might not be
a surprise that this is primarily here for Sam's sake,
although again I'm sure that there will be Twin Atlantic
fans out there. Sam, Twin Atlantic. The vibe going into
this album, and you know the reason it's been given
a place here is that you know, you and your
kind were were more excited going into this Twin Atlantic
album than you've seemed in a while. They have been
doing kind of weird rope stuff in the Wilderness for
several years, but the singles from this album, particularly Stuck
in a Car with You when that one dropped being
heavily described as like a return to four for them.
So this is you know, you were hoping a case
of one of these brit rock bands back in the day,
you were a fan of getting back in touch with
what you liked about them. A truth became moment if
you were That's an accurate descriptor of events, isn't it?
Speaker 3: Yes? No, that is absolutely I mean again, like I
would say, like the last eight years in particular have
not been kind to tow Atlantic fans.
Speaker 4: Their last good album was in twenty fourteen.
Speaker 3: Twenty sixteen was when the decline started, and it hit
rock bottom in twenty twenty two with is It Transparency? Whatever?
That album wherever that awful or awful album from twenty
twenty two is with get Famous on It?
Speaker 1: Like like that is like a genuine milkshake album, is
what I know?
Speaker 3: Is like yeah, like that album is terrible. I like,
you know, I didn't think like them Glad and uh
power what I didn't eve those would be goodbye because
you know like there were moments when that I didn't
think we're like terrible. So I was always like, ah, man,
twin landsk hat done. This is just a bit embarrassing now,
like the passion is gone. They're doing this kind of
like they were caught up in the Royal bloodification of
twenty ten's brit Rock and they chase that that lane
to its absolute like bottom of the barrel on on
Transparency just a terrible album. So I I'd written off
to an Atlantic. I had absolutely written off caring about
this band. So when Stuck in the Car with You
came out and I was like, oh, oh, they've reconnected
with that thing that they were good at, which is
kind of like just like right, uplifting pop rock from
the twenty tens.
Speaker 4: Cool, If they're going to do that again, I'll take
more of it.
Speaker 3: So I actually was kind of looking forward to this
album because I think like the first two to Atlantic
in particular are some of the best. They are abound
that people who didn't like twenty tens brit rock would
kind of go, you know what, they're on the all
right ones? Actually, Like that's why those early to Atlantic
records put them in that position, which is why I
think it was a real shame to see them go
in the direction they did.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I can certainly you know a test to that
being a general sort of theme at large, Elliott, My
position not Twin Atlantic is that I don't like them.
I never have, but just for the sake of the
sliding scale of these bands, right, Twin Atlantic at their
popular peak, so that is free in the great divide,
they are one of these bands I do not have
the most I if right like they are way too
like Bland and Podgy for my taste. Really, I've seen
them live like twice. I don't really know why, but
I am not one hundred percent without respect for Twin
Atlantic at their peak. I suppose like they're not human
at six, they're not the Blackout whatever. I don't care
for them, but I think more I just don't care
about them, and I don't pare them pay them much mind.
Those albums, as Sam was saying, sometimes held up by
people who generally don't give a damn about that scene
as ones they will take because that is a bit
of a theme that does exist out there. Are you
at all inclined to do that?
Speaker 2: If yeah, listen, it's it's not my sort of thing.
I'll be diplomatic, it's it's never been my kind of thing.
And to ain Atlantic, they have some nice melodies. I
find them to be completely toothless, which isn't necessarily a
bad thing, But if you're not swept up in the
songs of a toothless band, I find I'm very left
with very little else to hang my hat on.
Speaker 1: Is that What I was asking about was again, like
they're sort of the ones where people Champion. So is
this saying that you've never ever been into like Atlantic.
Speaker 2: No, it's not because I think they're terrible or I
think they don't write good songs at all. It's just,
you know, if you brought me only Revolutions this week,
I probably wouldn't have all that much much to say
about it. I'm just things of this kind generally don't
appeal to me, but Twin Atlantic are kind of for me,
mainly notable by their they kind of how uninteresting they
are to me, where something like you me at six
it can be funny, do you know what I mean?
Speaker 4: Or it can be funny when they on on transparency
they can still be funny.
Speaker 2: Well, I'll love to check that out, because this is
I just I feel basically nothing towards this music. You
might as well be asking me to review a Cotton
Bud like.
Speaker 3: It's like, I wasn't expecting you guys to be in
on this as much, but I was gonna hope you
released some kind of you know, it's.
Speaker 1: Well, you know, the review I think to some degree
was going to lean one or two ways, maybe depend
on when Elliot landed, because you won't be surprised to
hear that. I think this album is boring, so fucking boring,
get a personality. This new is so flavorless, colorless tap
water and unbuttered piece of bread for tea boring. So
to start with, Sam, what do you think about it?
Speaker 4: I think I don't think this is as good as
their sort of like first two albums.
Speaker 3: I don't think, Yeah, I like, but I do think
like as an album, I mean, it is a big
improvement on where they were.
Speaker 4: It's not kind of like return to my head before,
but I mean there are a couple of like really good.
Speaker 3: Songs I do like a lot that kind of remind
me why I like Twin Atlantic, Like I'm happy to
go with nice pop rock music when it's done to
a do again, like when you look at what's going
on in the sort of the pop rock sphere, the
pop way sort of laylight as now like they're fuck
all good stuff going on there a lot of the time.
Speaker 4: Now Twinlantic at their best on this album, do Hit Onto.
Speaker 3: I think like just really fun, quite sort of bright, uplifting,
catchy pop rock songs to me, which again, if you're
not if you do find that just to be a
bit too pleasant and nice that you're not gonna go
a bit fair enough. But I do think like, for
the very least, the opening two songs are Sleeping Stuck
in a Car with You, they really hit that that spot.
For me, I'm like, oh, yeah, this is wicked, but
like it doesn't it doesn't maintain that level of quality
for Out. I will I will admit that.
Speaker 1: Okay, what are the you know, because again, those are
the two singles that you've mentioned that initially people were like, oh, hey,
Atlantica Back, is there anything you know deeper into the
album that you hadn't already heard that is like, ah, man,
this is like genuinely among the higher quality of what
this band have you know, produced.
Speaker 3: I think there's like a bit in the middle of
that I said, get Out and the title track, which
are kind of like charge Up being on them. Swin
always quite another sort of the nicest slower ballady songs.
I think that's another very nice example of that. Get
Out is like just like bubblegum power pop, like under
three minutes, but it's all bright melodies and there's a
great bridge for me that goes into the final course
that lifts it that I think is really nice. I
think world Class Entertainment is actually doing the thing they've
been doing for the last two albums. In a way,
I'm like, ah, this is actually like not totally shit.
So you know, positives there, I guess like taking to
you'd spent a decades doing terribly and actually managing to
get something out of it. I quite like that song,
I think so in Texas the Coast song Sam with
an acoustic guitar, nice ballad, I'll go with that. There's
very little on this album I actually I dislike. I
think this is the nice, pleasant listen that I can
stick on and kind of go like when I'm in
the mood for just pleasant pop rock music with the
occasional kind of like John I'd say, is a bit
of a banger. This album hits the spot for me.
Tell me why it's bad.
Speaker 1: Well, I want I want to milk a little bit
more out of what potentially is you know of quality
in there? First, Elliott, did you have any sort of
moments that stuck out? Was like, oh, yeah, that's decent?
What is uh? Yes?
Speaker 2: So I didn't hear any of the singles going into
something in journal or less as blind as one could
Asleep I think has some really nice melody. It got
stuck in my head. The chorus on Harder, I think
is strong. Yeah, you know, nothing revolutionary, but just classically
nice pop songwriting done to a decent standard. Get Out
has some nice melodies. I think Lyft has a nice
sort of peppy gate to It bounces along quite pleasantly.
And again, one of the things I do quite like
about Twin Atlantic is his voice, which you know that
get Famous song. I can see that it has been
used for evil, But listening to this, I think it
does a great deal to make them feel somewhat less faceless.
I think I think a major part of their identity
rests on that, and I've heard people say it restricts
their appeal if Twin Atlantic had a more faceless voice
than this, and it wasn't tied quite clearly to a
distinct region they sometimes I just think they sound the script.
Speaker 3: That's because I agree, because I think, like again, the
problem with the last couple of albums is they were
using Sam's voice for evil, as you put it, like,
they weren't. They weren't deploying him to the best he
can hit, the best he can do. He's when he's
going like big sort of bright pop melodies. Again, that accent.
You can love it, I hate it, but it is distinct.
It is it was one of the things that did
immediately mark them out from a lot of their peers,
where it wasn't this kind of like like only self
seriouskin like faux American accent sort of thing that they're
all trying to do, like was big and Scottish and
like right, and that was one of the things. And
I think there's there's a load of that all over
this album. Again, like I don't think I don't think
it goes. I don't think they quite match the first
two songs. I think that is where they really hit
that sweet spot. Is it does kind of like put
its best foot forward and then kind of like settle
into pleasant versions of that sort of thing, which again
because where twin Lands could beIN so so.
Speaker 1: This in terms of like comebacks, this is not like
recapturing the glory days of like the Great Divide, but
it's more like, oh, it's the best thing they've done
since then, it's.
Speaker 3: The best time they've done in the decade. I think
at its height, it does come pretty close that were
those first two songs, but as a body of work
it doesn't quite hold up.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I mentioned truth to Kay is a bit of
a joke just because the narrative there was, oh my god,
you me at six have released their best album in
ten years, because it I.
Speaker 3: Mean, they had on that album well, but it was.
Speaker 1: Because it featured half an album that was just back
to the boring old top man slot that they poisoned
UK music with in the first place, and then half
an album that not even the people saying the album
was good could realistically defend because it had some of
the most embarrassing songs of that year and two bad
songs on it as it even every time that I
had to like entertain the idea that the album wasn't embarrassing,
a piece of my soul diyed, like, what are we
doing here? This isn't that bad because the half that
was a shit show is not present, right instead, this
is just the boring half. Because I have a similar
feeling of I can't bring myself to entertain this much
when it is giving me so little, and like, I
know that I'm just not the guy to review this album,
like if this was only me in my YouTube channel,
or something. I wouldn't bother reviewing this and I'd leave
it to the people who who care about it. But
you know, I think you, as an album, you do
have to give me something to talk about, and I've
just got nothing with this. It hasn't fulfilled its side
of the contract with me. It's not given me anything
to eat, it's not giving me anything of substance to
comment on. I think Stuck in a Car with You
is like an okay Foo Fighter song, you know, which
is what all these bands want to do. That's a
high as our ambitions go. That if that's what you want, decent, right.
I get that. I don't really, you know, like the
song that much, probably a notable part because I've never
really liked Sam that trusty as a singer. I find
him to be very thin and sharp vocally, a bit
like he's jabbing pins in your ears. And I think
production wise, I don't like this how this sounds much either,
and it kind of makes it worse. So it kind
of overall has this like thin, sort of shrill quality
that locks me out from really feeling that warmth that
I think is the major sort of selling point of
Twin Atlantic. But that song is as good as it gets.
The rest of this I can barely recall a thing
because it's fake rock songs for office parties and FIFA sessions.
I just think it is so profoundly flavorless and tepid,
and like, you know, we laugh at stuff like us
butt rock, like Godsmack or whatever, just for writing the
same profoundly undemanding, simple minded songs over and over again.
I don't see how this is much different. He's just
got a Scottish accent and rocks less hard. It's match
Box twenty, you know. The first two songs are again fine.
I don't when Sam, you know, being kind of irritating
a nasal. The maginay sin hook on the first song
is so annoying. But again, those upbeat songs that start,
I understand the appeal. Some of these songs are piss.
World class entertainment is awful, the worst kind of like
made for Match of the Day montage, dead behind the
eyes slop, then the lighter in the airshit on Sorry
is just like sopping piss dribbling down their legs. There
are songs that are like sub Jimmy World with all
of the dynamics removed. So like all of the beautiful
production that they have and you're just left with I
think like Harder or Meltdown just made me think of
like facsimile husks, like futures has been placed on some
kind of sandwich meat flattener and has come up to
the other side looking like morph. It's just like rock
music with every dimension of it extra removed, Like all
of the tangible edge and emotion and urgency and depth
or whatever else. They've sucked it all out, and what
they've left is a police outline of what a rock
album once was. The songs have no defining features. And
my thing is always again with this lot, if this
is a return to form, what have we returned to.
I've said this before jokingly, but the last Twin Atlantic album,
the laughably stupid one, the one where at multiple points
on the album he asks you what your favorite milkshake is,
and it has here you shut up, get farness. That
is the first time that Twin Atlantic made me feel anything.
It was shite, and I don't know what they were
trying to do, but it took up brain space in
my head more than anything they'd ever done, and they'd
started to mean something to me just through being funny,
right And obviously actual fans of them didn't like it
because it was shite. But now they've traded that back
in for nothing. And what you were saying about kind
of like, oh, yeah, they've got a bit of a
differentiating factor from the other ones. Beyond the fact that
they are the Scottish one, what is their actual personality? Right, Like,
when these bands retreat from their funny mistakes, they just
end up returning to like a vacuum. It's a scene
of bands whose only creative moves is doing the most
embarrassing shit you've ever heard in your life. And then
they return to being completely anonymous and unambitious again. And
again I'm not saying it's actually better, but I would
rather listen to that last album than this again because
it made me feel something and that's all I can
bring myself to feel about this album.
Speaker 3: I mean, one point you mentioned about, like the sort
of the subject world of all these kind of interesting things,
that is one of the things that does really hold
this out back from being a proper return to form
album for me is again those earlier records. They have
got that ambition, they have got that scope. I'm not
saying it's it's Jimmy World level, but they are. You know,
they're playing with a bit more to them. There is
more substance, there's more sounds, they'll kind of weave in.
They willing to kind of like put themselves out there,
and so that like they had strings and other interesting
bits going on on the ballads that that made them
more than just kind of like these album sounds terrible.
Speaker 1: I'm not making that up right. It sounds like so squashed.
Speaker 3: I don't know, I say it sounds terrible, but it does.
It does just kind of sound like they're doing what
they did before, but without the without the backing, without
the ambition, without the scope. So like I'm still getting
you know, the melodies and the nice sort of stuff
that I that I would turn into an Atlantic four.
But it does like feel like a kind of like
hard like I don't say, half past, but it doesn't
have the like the same kind of swell and gusto
that like songs like Free and make Beast of Myself
or Brothers and Sisters on those of the records did
where they did, they did sound like quite vast and
big for that that scene that they were more and
more were more ambitious and more impressive, more impressive. This
is just kind of like the songs that are They're
good songs, they're nice songs, they're pleasant, but they don't
they just there's nothing to kind of set them apart
that makes them stick the memory beyond maybe the first
cup Boy or remember those first two really catch you
good singles.
Speaker 1: For me, Yeah, I think you're you're echoing something that
I was thinking, which is, you know, apart from maybe
you know, for fans of this band stuck in a
car where you they were, oh yeah, that was a
really comeback single or whatever, but the album tracks on
this no one will remember in a few months time,
and that's yeah. So it sounds like you speaking for
the twin Atlantic fans in the room, Sam, it sounds like,
you know, you like this album and that's good, but
maybe even not as much as it's It is like it's.
Speaker 3: An album that I was like, I will take to
Atlantic being pretty good again and not embarrassing that they
were on Transparency or Transparent. I can't remember what album
was called that terrible album, but I'm happy for them to,
you know, be from I'll stick this album on a
couple more times and kind of like maybe take a
few songs from it, but it is it is like
it is the best some of the decade, but it
is not the kind of like grand return to form.
I think that that is kind of just how it
has to be, which is which is a shame because
the initial promise kind of hinted that it could be.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I think this is one of the most teppid
bands in the UK, retreating from their moment of being
funny and going back to just being a cotton buds
as Elliot said, So there's to an Atlantic and meltdown
right more melodic rock. Double continues with Four Years Strong,
a band who have been part of the furniture in
pop punk for ages. But we've spoken about them a
little bit more than usual in the last handful of
years because essentially pop punk has been in the shitter.
Even some of four Year Strong's more celebrated peers have
gone down the pan, and four Years Strong emerged as
the kind of unlikely champions are like, these bands can
still be good, particularly on their twenty twenty album Brain Pain,
which I guess that was around the time where this
sort of renewed appreciation Four years Strong emerged because the
album was a bit like an oasis in a desert
for this kind of stuff at that point in time.
So four Years Strong and their next moves, which have
resulted in this album it's called Analysis Paralysis, have become
a bit more anticipated than people might have initially expected
a few years ago.
Speaker 3: Right, Yeah, I think so. I mean like they basically,
you know, burst into the pop punk scene really promising start,
did one album that fucked it all up and had
to rebuild, and they're kind of the the kind of
like rearrival the moment what was Brain Pain, which kind
of got out and going like, oh wait, fory Strong
are actually still really good and again like you're writers
because everything about else around them had just gone to
complete shit. Like so it meant that people actually like
have cared the most about four Years Strong than they
have in a good while.
Speaker 1: Yeah, And so it's taken a little while as well,
four years for this new album, but it's ended up
being a decently anticipated album for the pop punkers out there.
You know, Elliott, Remind me again, we've just come off
speaking about a couple bands where you're like, yeah, it's
not really aimed at me. Whatever, I can't imagine that
this particulous area of music would be you know, your thing,
but any you know, sort of appreciation for four years
strong as we are saying, one of the better bands
in that field.
Speaker 2: I'm very casually familiar with their catalog. I've heard Enemy
of the World and it was either the self titled
Brain Pain one of the two. I've heard one of
their later records, and yeah, you're it's not really my thing.
I don't love this stuff generally. I think we probably
agree the best band of this kind would be someone
like a Data remember in their pomp, who what I think,
have a handful of really really good songs. I don't
even particularly love them, So the best that a runner
up can hope for, I think is that I like them.
So going into this, the kind of what I hoped
for was I'd come away going that was a good record,
that that was kind of as much as I would expect,
and based on their like you say, their general reception
and the kind of hypes arounding them now, I kind
of presumed that's what I think.
Speaker 1: Yeah, So with that in mind, you know, I think
that was a little weird at times and surprisingly sort
of slippery to get handle on how do you feel
about it?
Speaker 3: So the thing is, I had no idea how you
guys are going to feel about this album because this
is this is the weirdest four year Strong album, Like
outside of when they tried to do a radio rock
food Fighters album that everyone hated. This is like the
most kind of like, yeah, there's pop punk on there,
but there's other weird kind of like deviations into like
different things.
Speaker 4: It is genuinely sing a little bit different for them,
and that's.
Speaker 3: Why have they just taken the time to kind of go,
like what should we try, and like try a bunch
of different ideas and see what sort of sticks.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I think I can sort of sort of admire
that without necessarily feeling like this album is great. I like,
for you strong a decent bit. I think their best,
Like you know, handful of albums I would say, I
enjoy a lot, and I think this album has moments,
but I'm not one hundred percent on it. How do
I guess describe what the approach is on this compared
to the usual classic for Year Strong sound.
Speaker 3: The thing is, I don't know how to how to
because the songs do kind of like slip about betweens.
Like the opening song the half and half after for
is just like kind of extending into building. It's like
really regimented, like groove and beat that it's gonna do like.
Speaker 1: That nails pop punk. It's even got that sort of
whirring machinery type guitar sound really bizarre.
Speaker 3: It's like when they so they built up that rift
dropping when they do at the second time, they've got
these good jeer and guitars scrapes going over it like,
which again is like because they're they're a man who
trade on like pop punk with the beatdowns they they
they've always had that kind of slight hardcore touch, but
on this afterwart there's like really regimentd like right semi
industrial take on it. It's a bizarre way to begin it.
And I was like, that's weird. And then you get
bad Habit, which is classic four year strong bouncing pop punk,
and I was kind of like, where is this kind
of gonna go?
Speaker 1: Yeah, it's it's a weirdly erratic album. I think four
years young. They do have precedent for being kind of
left field, Like there's a song on Brain Paining that
always stits out of my mind. That really sounds like
that band Astronoid, and it was like, what the fuck
of all the bounds to kind of replicate that you
were doing it. But this is eclectic in a way
that again I admire at times and don't think fully
works at others. I said that first track immediately kind
of jarring when this album wants to go in that direction.
They still riff a lot harder than most pop punk bands. Yeah,
but there's also other songs where they like drop those
board entirely. Elliott, were you sort of thrown by because again,
particularly if you're not like super o Fai with I
don't know, lots of pop punk bands or whatever, this
is quite a like bizarre thing to get a handle on.
Speaker 2: Yeah, this is a strange record and one that I
don't really know what I think of it yet, because
in some ways, if Itel was really skittish and Unorthodox
has some of their heaviest, most feral material that certainly
I've heard, and lots that took me by surprise. But
on the other hand, there's something that will feels kind
of like pared down about this record, and I don't
know if it's the production or how regimented it is.
But it's kind of got these It sounds like there's
conflicting ambitions going on here. We end up with a
record that maybe could have been really good either way,
and kind of lands is okay. And I think it's
captured in that first song because on paper, it's mental.
Speaker 1: You know, it's two minutes long.
Speaker 2: There's this electronic pulse going through it, sirens, disco drum, groove,
whispered vocals, beatdowns, and yet I was amazed at how
bored I was.
Speaker 1: It's yeah, I think that's fair fair a good number
of trap to this record. I was a bit like,
that's a weird move, but I'm not really feeling a lot,
you know, we did. We got quite excited by the
single was It Daddy of Mine, where it's like basically
sounds like four years wrong doing it every time I
die song if again, they've they've like sometimes been like,
oh yeah, we can actually still go hard whenevery band
is like just stripping out the guitars or whatever. That
was like a cool, surprising move for a band in
this lane. And that is like a cool fucking song,
habit you mentioned it's like, you know, a decent modern
pop punction. I think to a degree. I'm always held
a little arms like by vocal production that sounds like
that and stuff, but there's a thick guitar bounce to it,
legit breakdown in there. And there's another thing they do
on this record quite a few times. I think it's
fun where they started doing these like turnstile unto others
like hush yeah and Uncooked does that as well. That
I was like, I want to see you dance, which
is straight out of the glow On playbook, but like
glue to four your strong pop pup melodies, and I
do appreciate that you can tell that four years Strong
like you wouldn't be surprised to see them wearing T
shirts wrapping some of the cool current hardcore bands, like
they feel like they've got their finger on their pulse
a little bit more than some of their peers.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I mean, like I realized that it took too
me a while to get it, but I kind of
love all these kind of just like weird deviations and
sort of other sounds channeled through again because I love
the core sound of four Years Strong, So I mean
that like channeling these other sort of things through that
is and I'm like yeah, cool.
Speaker 4: I love the dual vocal approach that I think it's.
Speaker 3: Funny because like productiblyst a lot of things I'm like
in theory, I actould hate the way this is produced,
but it just works Before You're Strong for me, Like
there's a lot of the things that a lot of
the sort of the pop metal kind of sort of
stuff goes on in production should really great to me
when other bands have done it, but here it just
kind of like sits in the pocket nicely and works
with the guitar tone because again, like as well as said,
they sort something I don't really ever really sand down
the guitar tone on this album. It's always still got
that crunch to it, which is what I really like
about For You Strong, Come on, there's melodies so when
You've Got Uncooked, which is like them doing this kind
of like bouncy dance punk number but with like these
actually kind of like crunchy guitars to it. I think
that's a really fun sound.
Speaker 1: Yeah, it's almost like at times they put that guitar
you know, uh, hecticness into what are kind of pop songs.
Like Yeah, again, some of the other things that I
think are you know, cool and give me more of
that sort of classic for your strong feel or some
of that slightly extra like fun hardcore feel, the little
sort of bouncing riff in Paranoia, and it does like
two through four totally in line with that kind of thing,
and that is a fun element that they you know,
they're clearly kind of riffing off of their stuff they're
inspired by at the moment. I think out of Touch
has one of the bigger choruses, and it's bizarrely as well.
It gives me this sort of like Devin Townsend a
Dick vibe where it's like a big, simple pop song
laid on top of like surprisingly involved instrumentation. And Roller
Coaster has these like sort of guitar scientists like squeals
and pops and stuff. There is invention going on there,
but there's also these like take foot off the pedal
chill songs that I'm not really sure what to make of.
Maybe it's me is like it's got some you know,
nice little guitar parts stuff in there. It's just bizarre
hearing them sort of take their foot off the gas
for that song and do these like kind of pool
side lounger songs and that song I think is kind
of okay, But then there are ones that I don't
think really work. Particularly I'm not a huge fan of Stfil,
which has that weird sort of chill pop production, weird
aim on it, and the bad song in the Batch's
dead End Friend, which are just the hook and the
production on it. It's like the part of pop punk
that I hate in twenty twenty four, you know, I
just can't like it.
Speaker 3: I still really like Jellen Friend.
Speaker 4: I think such stall level sa Fil.
Speaker 3: Like that was Almosking, like that is the one that
really threw me where you're again. It's like pure like
there's pure pop ballad with like auto tuned vocals and
then again they just slam up the big guitars. It's
like a jumble, like like that was the one song
where I kind of go like that feels a bit
of a weird missmash of ideas that I don't know
entirely how it lands. But like the more chill kind
of stuff like dead End Friend, or maybe it's me,
I kind of like this kind of like slacker sort
of college rock four year strong, lounging by the pool,
but again just doing it by their sort of sound
I'm totally cool to go with that.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I just I think the production for me is
a bit of an issue. And I think it's because,
like I said, this is trying to serve two ends.
Without this record, it feels like they're trying to make
their most out there, unhinged album and you're also a
much poppier one and much more pared down and restrained one.
And I rarely think the production serves either end. I mean, obviously,
that kind of clean drum sound and vocal production doesn't
serve something like Daddy of Mine, which I think is
actually a really good song. It doesn't serve it as
well as you know, we know what that song should
sound like. And then something like maybe It's Me. I
kind of feel like the melodies and the American football
isms that make that song interesting, they end up feeling
quite sanitized under that production job. For me, one of
the times where the production does work is on Better,
Get Better, which I think, for one of the songs
later in the record, is one of the strongest. The
electronic elements are an interesting addition. The chorus with the
core of vocals over the down tempo riff really inventive,
and the little guitar flourishes in the verse. There's enough
to keep the attention, and a slightly music production for
some reason actually serves that song, but a lot of
it for me, is quite badly hampered by the recording
doesn't let the songs off the chain.
Speaker 1: Yeah, maybe there's a bit of a sort of one
size fits all approach to the sound of it that
doesn't compliment how actually bizarre rat it the songs are,
and again there I think there are there are there.
I think there probably are some really good songs in
here that feel like slightly stifled, and again the full
pop rock pivots don't really work for me. I don't
think the the Closer is particularly good, but I did
there are quite a few songs in this that are
pretty solid and have fun ideas in there. It's just
kind of a mixed bag, and to a degree, I think,
you know, it's got some odd decisions that maybe all
take their time to sort of like sit in people's heads.
I'm personally not like the most invested in four year Strong,
so you know, I casually like them, So I don't
think this one is anywhere near the standout where like
even folks like me took notice of Brain Pain. This
is much much spottier, so it is a bit of
a deflation in that sense. But I think there are
probably more good tracks on it than there are bad ones,
and I think maybe this is the experiment after like
smashing the course out of Last Time, where they you know,
kind of just you know, try and keep things interest
themselves and so it is still more interesting than most
things in the genre, which are just sort of slop.
So yeah, I don't especially like this album, I don't think,
but I do kind of I think there are things
to appreciate in it.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I think that's right. I mean I think again,
it's after Brain Pain kind of really re established them.
It kind of gave them, kind of put them on
the sort of respected veterans of modern pop punks or
pedestal where they could afford to play around a bit
more on the follow up to without the risk of
derailing themselves again, which again I admire that for about
who have for the osten of the Records has been
doing great pop punk albums. I like that they've kind
of taken a swing at something different, and again, maybe
it does not work, but for me, because I just
really like what young to do and then being creative
with it. I've had I like, it is a bizarre
thing that to me kind of I'm but I've come
around to it just being this kind of wild, funhouse
of a sort of modern pop punk album that you
don't know where it's going to go, and kind of
I'm cool with that.
Speaker 1: Yeah, maybe if you are like a really big fan
of the band, you will appreciate that sort of you know,
sort of just surprising quality that it has so for
years strong and now Paralysis. Let us move on to
Lepres and Melodies of Atonement. Here we are another Lepress album.
It's been three years since the last one, but it
feels like the Lepress have been a very constant fixture
on our show in those years, because I having been
a big fan since about the mid twenty tens. I
made it a mission at one point to get Sam
into Lepress, after which they then released their last album
of Pelion and you totally fell from I seem to
remember it being on.
Speaker 4: Your Albums of the Year it was as of that year.
Speaker 1: Are you still a.
Speaker 3: Fan of particular Elepress Recordsterre, Yeah, it's not all I've
gone back to the most I mean, Cole is the
one that's actually kind of like really taken my love
right for Let for Us.
Speaker 4: Like maybe that was seeing it live and fall and
the album and all that, But I mean I'm.
Speaker 3: Kind of going, like, God down you Let for Us
in really my hatred of prog because like I have
so I'm like you were right to kind of sell
this band to me as as the one to get
into it. But yeah, I I they've become a kind
of fairly consistent fixture in my listening Let for Us,
which never would have expected at one point in my life.
Speaker 1: Yeah, that's good. And then as you've sort of mentioned that,
we then had Elliot join us on the show. Last year,
we saw Letpress play their older album Cole at Dannation.
We had a chat about that, and it turns out
Lepress are also a bit of a soft spot band
for you, and maybe the formative one as well. I suppose. Then,
you know, we've kind of mainly spoken about sort of
older Letpress with you Elliott, how are you sort of
you know, as we stand in twenty twenty.
Speaker 2: Four, Yeah, I mean for me, the run of Letpress
records that I go back to is by last or
two Molina, But I do think the last two are
really strong as well. I think it's only in comparison
to those that they seem ever so slightly lesser than
to me. But I think my fondness of Letpress extends
beyond just how good I think their albums are year
to year. They're kind of an island in as someone
who really loves progue if it's got a lot of
prog bands active now, they don't draw on the stuff
that I find enjoyable about it. And you know, we've
talked to at late the sort of tech metal thing
leaves leaves us pretty cold.
Speaker 1: Lepress are a fucking like prog oasis, and by that
I don't mean a banned oasis. I mean like an
actual oasis in a sea of like, oh God, I'm
dying of.
Speaker 2: First Yeah, exactly Like they combine those two things and
managed to avoid all the trappings that their peers don't,
at least in the last decade or two. And for
that reason, each one of their records feels like, oh
thank god, you know, this thing can be interesting, It
can be exciting, you can you can write great songs
in this style.
Speaker 1: Still yeah, just interesting in terms of where we're all
mentioning our elepress albums. For me, it's Molina and Pitfalls
in twenties seventeen and twenty nineteen, where like they and
I lined up the most lovingly. I've been a fan
since about Cold, particularly in the congregation, but then those
like fully like fucking maybe heart Eyes over It. I
really liked Apelian. I thought the pop direction that they
increasingly kind of added into, like the heavy prog metal
was considering.
Speaker 3: The opening song in that on that album is like
when that comes into my head every couple of days.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I still think about that, ah, but it's said
two for it. Really good melodies of Atonement didn't necessarily
have any expectations of what it would kind of, you know,
what would be its character as a record. I thought
logically maybe a further continuation of that, but they are
quite a kind of clastic turned out, maybe a slightly
interesting pivot point. I'm not sure if I think there
are some people out there who don't you know, who
sort of pine for the lepress of old and weren't
really into like the last two records slightly softer material.
This I think is definitely recognizable as the same bad
I don't think this is like backtracking on what they've
done or like undermining it or whatever. But I wasn't
expecting this record after the last one to be quite
a sort of like don't there anxious and frenetic, as
it's kind of turned out being.
Speaker 3: Like this was a lot darker than I was kind
of expecting after the last album. I agree, like again,
as it's kind of drawn a lot of the pop melodies,
lot the simp sort of stuff, but it is it
is like uneasy compared to you know, the sort of
the pure like skyscraper, float on a cloud kind of
pop bliss of the last album.
Speaker 2: Yeah, it's a weird one because there is a nervous
energy to this record that I don't think hasn't been
on that. I don't think it's been on the last
couple of records. But it's also.
Speaker 1: I think a kind of slower record.
Speaker 2: I do only hops from one idea to the next
quite as quickly as certainly some of the last couple have.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I think when I say they've not backtracked undermined,
it's still built on, like, you know, the way they've
developed using electronic elements and stuff like that. Some of
which I've even taken from like nineteen eighty synthpop or whatever.
They're kind of detectable in there, but it is based
here around some quite uh you know, oppressive songs at times.
The song Atonement on here uses that kind of slow,
sultry bass and almost like R and B fashion, and
again a landscape where a lot of metal bands have
like started embracing those sort of sounds whatever. But then
the frantic way the chorus comes at you on that
that lift part is insane, Like the guitar parts are
almost like scratching at you, almost like it's annoying. Like
I say, it had a kind of positive way, but
it's like it's kind of prodding you in the ribs repeatedly.
And the sort of declarative intensity in the vocal there,
it's much more like nervy and kind of darkened than
the kind of like, oh look, R and B influenced
prog or whatever. It's got a real sort of like, uh,
you know, a kind of horrific kind of element to it.
And there is a really brooding and heavy quality to
what they've like managed to turn their more current sound
into on this record.
Speaker 3: I think brooding is really because a lot of these
songs kind of start like quite minimalist, like very kind
of like electent bassed brooding, and then sort of build
into something. But it is like it does mean the
atmosphere kind of like floods you right away or you're
kind of into the darker vibes of it, and every
time it does then burst life.
Speaker 4: It's it's not like this big uplifting sound nooise.
Speaker 3: It's kind of like a kind of overwhelming like do
say panic, but just like wave of sounds kind of
smothering you in a way that it's like kind of
like hard to kind of pin down while still delving
these incredible pop perks that it's all because of you.
One that's already kind of like stuck me in a
tone and like that is huge and like sounds incredible,
but it is again it's it's not like uplifting in
the way that they were on the previous album.
Speaker 1: Yeah, like the sort of bass synth throb at the
start of Silently Walking Alone immediately very striking and it's
got that sort of pop edge, but in a really
like queasy, disarmingly heavy sort of way, like it's sort
of rolling your stomach over in its hands like putty,
and it hits a really punchy register as well. It
kind of gears into action a little bit quicker than
some of their more recent records and uses guitar sounds
in very like discordant, aggressive on the ear sort of way,
like the sort of horrid scrapes and words through the
verses limbo letter on almost reminded me of corn with
that sort of spooky guitar accents, like if you took
a baseline that was more sort of funk prog rather
than that field depercussion. But you know what I mean,
it's got that kind of clawing at you, scraping at
you sort of sensibility.
Speaker 3: Then there's got this like weird shuffle to it again
that just that that feels uneasy and kind of like
it can't settle down, like and the way that you
kind of playing it's almost quite danceable as a result
of it. But it just the way they kind of
approach it in this kind of unsettling, odd way, just
gives a song this weird vibe.
Speaker 2: I mean, Lepres have never been on the whacka whacka
end of prog, do you. I mean, they've always been
a bit more graceful tasteful than that. But like we
we said that the discordant, it's almost panic called the
guitars coming in. They have this real cool quality of
some sounding like they're disrupting the songs they're in suddently
walking along. If you took the guitar squawks out of it,
it sounds like Lepres doing a Bond theme. It's got
that huge historyonic vocal performance at the center of it,
but those squawking guitars matched with a time signature that
I can't white get my head around. It almost feels
like it's one thirty second off somehow. It just throws
you off balance in a way that for me makes
it still easily identifiable as progressive music, because that's something
that I've considered over the last couple of Lepros albums,
are how much of a prog band are they? Because
their songs are huge and catchy and sort of traditionally
enjoyable in it from a melodic perspective, but just throwing
in some a bit of lemon juice, it makes the
whole thing.
Speaker 1: A lot more interesting. Yeah, I mean the way that
they use like basically gent riffs even though that they
are a more minor component of what they do compared
to like straight up gent band. But they're one of
the only mands who have kept that element of sort
of nausea to them. And it's funny because, like you know,
with Sugar, that's their whole thing, lepres a whole load
of their thing is being very you know, glacial and
beautiful and pristine or whatever. But they have that bit
of like twisty contortedness in It seems a bit more
drawn back, but when it does drop in, it's very
much in that lane, and it's beyond bound to on
the surface seem way harder and more aggressive and more
heavy or whatever. It's kind of affecting in that way
a lot more so because of how they deploy it.
And again on this record, I don't think it'd be
accurate to go, oh, they've gone back to their roots,
they're more metal again or whatever. But yeh, because I
don't want to give the wrong IMPRESSI because a lot
of it is quite introspective and quite measured, but when
it does get to the heavy parts, it is a
bit more unsettling than they've I guess tried to be
in a while and even you know there are what's
the song where he does the fucking the harsh vocal
for the first time in ages like a sinking sunken
ship starts off so mischievous and fun in a kind
of like it's like a theme for an unsavory character
in a nineteen forties noir or something like some guy
with a name like the Rat, just very like slinkying around.
And then the second half it's almost like a leprous
giallo song with a kind of la la lab it's
going on in there, and Ininar just goes sick of mode,
and that is the only point where it's like, oh, Ship,
that's kind of old days lepers coming back in there
with that like blast of aggressiveness wicked track.
Speaker 3: And that's because again it's really like moodion seductive first off,
and then like he it starts kicking off. I was like, Oh,
he's getting angry in a way that I haven't really
of lots of let for us where it is all
pretty and poppy and all that is he angry and
then he lets that that scream and I was like, oh, Ship,
like this is really disconcerting, like within the album, like
and that's The thing is like with they said the
gender guitars, because they don't use them all the time.
The moment they do deploy them, they punch so much
harder than bands who just constantly trade on the same
gen riff. You never get numb to the sort of
the gen guitar sound on this album because it's not.
It's just one component that they deploy at the best
moments to give a song that extra kind of mp
for darkness or like just meanness. And I think that's
what I think, that's like one of the ace things
that let Us do, and that.
Speaker 2: Those bands that aren't as good as let Us, they
will write a kind of lousy gent riff and that'll
be all they've got. They haven't got a song to
hang on. Lepress will use it as an ingredient in
a song and like a sung can ship, that's not
a song really built around a riff at all.
Speaker 3: It.
Speaker 2: I mean, it's just as you say noir, because I
thought it almost sounds rhythmically like something like akin to
shell Ac. But when that harshness and manic nature comes
in later they write a sort of tech metal rage
against the machine song and just for a few moments
you go, that is a riff where a band could
build a whole sound around it and just ease off that.
You know, Veil of Maya would love that riff and
that would be all they've got. But Lepress are able
to write riffs that good and slip it into songs
that don't even really need them.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I do think it's about like this is an
example of how to do that kind of quite analogue
soundy pre reduction in terms of like the bass and
the drum grooves and stuff. Even when they are drawing
on like nineteen eighty pop or whatever else, it doesn't
feel electronically produced, but what it retains is this very
like live element. Like listen to the bassline on Faceless.
They're just extremely uh what you were saying, but almost
hands like it's on the kind of fly. It's almost
like there are bits on this record of like real
time creativity where you're hearing something that must be so
clearly deliberately arranged and thought over, but it sounds like
it's off the cuff, and there's just sort of like
dark playfulness to how it kind of unfolds, just like yeah,
just really fucking good bad, just like properly dialed in
octopus limbed but deeply connected in their chemistry. Band and
a singer who has you in the part of his hand,
the ending of it, of atonement when he just fucking
smacks it out of the park and all of that,
the incredible like hard edged pop pucks he sneaks as well,
because that's the other thing, Like he has this really immaculate, beautiful,
smooth voice when he wants it, but often on this
when he delivers a hook, he snarls it and he
gets the rock kind of creep in like stuff like limbo,
and it really does. And it's another thing that does
wonders in terms of stopping it feel like algorithmically produced slop,
you know.
Speaker 3: Like Faceless is a great example of something you just
sort of do there where that has like again like
this is like weird like fluid where they write the
songs like it starts of the piano, it kind of
builds and you get onto that whole never go alone
kind of refrain and you get this mental key change
coming in towards the end of that song. Again that way,
it's just like this dude is such an unhingeed focus
and what he can do. But it just like the
hundred commitment to everything and again the sort of brilliant
bounce of delicacy and just snarling power just makes these songs.
It gives you songs so much life.
Speaker 1: Yeah, another great Lepress record from bands who deserves even
more popularity than they already have. Right, this has been
a big old grab bag of reviews, so we're going
to end it now with Nil and their record The
Underworld Awaits Us All. One of the greatest death metal
bands of all time. I think we can say their
heyday in the early two thousands comes a good decade
after the initial peak of the deathnal genre. But I
think it's fair to say that the work that they
produced and the manner in which they were able to
sort of re energize that scene totally put them in
the cannon where you don't question putting them next to
Death and Morbid Angel and Suffocation and whoever else. You
also then have the matter of their consistency. This is
now their tenth full length album, and while I think
they might have some albums that are not as well
loved as their classics, and their rate of production has
slowed down, and whatever else, I think they are still
perceived as like operating at a level of quality that
is pretty close still to what people want from Nile. Elliott,
how do you perceive Nile's longevity and how excited might
you be at any given point for a new Night record?
Speaker 2: I think longevity I don't think you can really call
into question because, as am I get to in a second,
the last decade of Nile albums haven't quite blown me
away the way the classic run does. If you look
at Cascombs of Nephron Car Black Seas of Vengeance in
their Darkened Shrines, Annihilation of the Wicked, Ifphalic and those
Who in the Gods Detest, that is a run of
six as good as I think really any death metal
band has ever managed, you know, up there with your
morbid Angels, your deaths, cannibal corpses, and it's harsh to
hold someone or a band to that standard. But that
being said, it has been at least one since I've
loved a Nile album, but I always really like them.
Speaker 1: Yeah, we've done an album club when Annihilates and the Wicked,
and we will often mention Nil as one of the
great extreme bands, but we haven't actually reviewed one of
the new albums before. I don't think we did have
like as you're sort of saying, we had a short
little conversation before this about just sort of some of
their recent material. I think we have a slight different
perception where basically I think we both like all of
their records. At the Gator Cethu is their sort of
most widely derided and it has some execution problems, but
it's still got the themes who come to steal the
magic has deceased on it, which I think is a
classic Nile song. The last one, Vile Ninotic Rites, I think,
similarly had a sort of shinier glossier sound to it,
in a slightly more well rounded, less off putting for
people kind of way. I think our difference is, I
think what should be what should not be unearthed in
between those records in twenty fifteen is outstanding, and it's
very nearly at that peak Nile. I think I'd even
have it over if Ethanic of that sort of run,
and I think it sort of sounds, you know, a
bit out of line with those other two out aside,
because it is darker and heavier, and it has more
of that sort of musty unearthed tomb quality that I say,
sit with Nile at their best while having some of
the most like well written, direct catchy songs of the
modern era. Call to destruction evil, to cast out Evil
particularly is fucking amazing. So for me, I think I
generally agree with you, but just I want to point
out Nil have had for me within the last ten
years a record that nails a great deal of what
made them so brilliant in the kind of mid two thousands,
the underworld that waits us all. It's always a matter
of sort of wading through the hyperbole from publications that
won't actually stick with the public or whatever. But the
reception to it seems currently pretty good and maybe amongst
the better received records of their sort of latter career stage.
What do you make of that?
Speaker 2: Yeah, I think you know for me one of the
problems over the last couple of NYL records, And it's
interesting to me that you hear that in What Should
Not Be on Earth, because to be honest, I don't
is that sort of exhumed cryptic quality that makes the
special NUL material so special.
Speaker 1: It's the one that stands out of the last four records.
I think that does kind of have a sniffleert.
Speaker 2: Yeah, but I do kind of accept that that's broadly
gone now. I don't know if Nil are going to
make another album that sounds quite like that At the
Gates of Sethie had it, but I think that's mainly
because the production was just quite weird, so it sounded
so unlike another death metal album of its time. And
I think a major part of why I wasn't as
keen on Vold Nahlostic Rights as some people were is
without Dallas, I think there's always going to be something
slightly missing from the recipe because he has one of
the most distinct vocal styles of any death metal singer
and this real evil, demented tone that played off well
with Carl. So going into this record having sort of
adjusted to those things that I love so much not
being there, I was probably in a better place anyway.
And I think you're saying about it being more warmly
received than their last few records. Maybe I think that
is sort of how at it this album sounds, because
even if it's not as cryptic and exhumed as the
earlier stuff, I don't think they've sounded this fired up
since maybe those whom the Gods detest.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I think sonically this record is not miles off
like the last one in terms of like that kind
of clarity. And I agree, I think that that ultimate
like cavernous oppressiveness of their early records. I think he's
still gone from it. And like I said, watch It
Not Be on Earth is the modern record that comes
closest to evoking that. But generally I think Nile Records
are past sounding like fucking in their darkest shrines right
Comparatively their two thousand's work, I think Nil Do sound
a little bit more sterile now, and there is this
kind of ultra precise, finicky sort of sound on things
like the drums or whatever. I think this record is
quite speedy and aggressive a lot of the time in
a way that like eschews some of the you know,
I don't think of it this way, but let's just
call it some of the bullshit, right, Like it just
it kind of cuts away a lot of the extra
whatever and just goes pretty fucking fore throttle for a
lot of it in a way that maybe that is
what people who are really chiming with it are kind
of kind of hearing, you know, the first track like
it starts with again six and a half minutes song,
but you're just bombarded with like ballistic Eastern sounding, you know,
dual lead guitars, time changes, wild blasts. Sam. I'm curious
for you because you know, clinical tech death. I would
probably imagine the area of death metal that least grabs
your interest. Nill have so much personality and character already
built up inherent in their sound. I think, uh, you
know again, it's modern Nile, which maybe are you know,
cleaner and a little bit less kind of strange and
unearthly as they were in their prime. How does that
balance sort of strike for you? What side does it land?
Because I could imagine you really being bored by this record,
and I could also imagine just being like, oh fuck yeah, nil.
Speaker 3: Yeah, no, this is one while I was kind of like, oh,
that character, that personality kind of overrides the the more
kind of like sterile tech death stuff that I can
find a little doll.
Speaker 4: I really like this. I've not got every other Nile album.
Speaker 3: To compare it to. Again, I like just this kind
of had this just like this m a weirdly comforting
kind of listen to me where there was just sounds
on this album where it was like drum fills riffs
and I was I was like, I just like how
that sounds? Now, what have you done to me?
Speaker 4: Peren?
Speaker 3: But yeah, I think because this is so at it
like alongside all the mad technicality and like kind of
like guitar wankery that can sometimes find a bit tedious because.
Speaker 4: It's so going for the throat. At the same time,
I found it a really thrilling.
Speaker 3: Listen. Have you even got something like to strike a
Secret Fans? Which is just kind of like sub two minutes,
here's just a kind of crazy blast of riffs. I
was like, oh, fuck, yeah, that's.
Speaker 1: What kind of black metal EDGs that song it's pretty cool.
Speaker 3: Yeah, Like that song's really cool. But I'm not gonna
say the full song. I'll just gonna cale it chapter
the lead single. Like that song is manic. It's got
like I mean, that song is incredible. I think like
the riffing is like really intensely violent. It's really brutal,
but it's got like kind of fucking weirdly infectious moments
of hooks on it, like the way he screams feces
like it's like insane, but that song is just like
kind of just so attention grabbing. I mean, that song
is incredible.
Speaker 2: I think that's not only the best song title of
the year, and I think we should take a moment too.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I totally want to say the full song title.
Speaker 1: Well, yeah, I'm gonna go ahead and do it because
I think that, particularly when it was released as the
lead single. That's part of the joy of Nil is
every death metal fan stopped threw up their hands in
the air, went yeay chapter for not being hung upside
down on a stake in the underworld and made to
eat feces by the Four Apes. Yeah, just celebrating and
hell yeah, no one other than Nile is going to
write that song. Cheer every single time the title has
another word that scrolls by on your dreaming platform, you know.
And yeah, wicked track just sound of carnage. The first
like ten seconds of it are really fun, screamaric and manic.
The catchiest riff in it is like a minute and
a half in when it just does that like manic
tech thrash thing, And yeah, it's fun. It's pleasurable to
listen to, which I think is the key joy of Nile.
Now you know, maybe they're not so scary now and
so genuinely kind of as I said, unearthly, But a
track like that is plain old fun to listen to
if you are.
Speaker 2: A fan, and I I'll just there have so many
songs where one or two lines will just stick with
you forever, like that that one you mentioned off at
the Gates at Cethu. I don't listen to that more
that much, but sometimes my brain just goes Crocodiles are
the West.
Speaker 1: I do the same thing. It's so catchy that tune,
and this one I don't even know what.
Speaker 2: The words are when it's going the the feces. That's
just like in my head forever now. And when I
think of Niall, I'm gonna think of that song. And
that's pretty impressive for a death metal band ten albums
in to even have one song like that is a success,
and there's a few to strike with. Secret Fang Again
has his big chance under two minutes long brilliant change
of pace on the record Nakada to enter the Golden age,
that sort of criminally insane breakdown at the end with
what sounds like a gospel choir Like those choir.
Speaker 3: Vocals are mentally have they been used before? Are they
sort of something unique to this record, because again, like yeah,
I'm not again, I've got a lot of content kind of.
Speaker 1: Yeah, so I just want to get back to Nicada
to ends the Golden Age. I like the title of
that sounds like some kind of anime spin off movie,
you know, it's like it's just a game. Yeah, extensively
and again weird grooves in that where it's almost like
the process like uh, prog death Nil, I've gotten a
bit to that. But yeah, the thing on this that
I think I'm gonna associate with, oh yeah, that's the
thing they do on that record that I really like
is the choir parts. And like they've used weird clean
vocals and again sort of choir parts and stuff before,
but the ones on this record have a very distinctive
tone to them, and it feels like a deliberate thing
They've decided to play with a lot more on this
and it is again it's it's like Egyptian gospel choir
or something like a kind of congregation in an ancient temple,
like shouting things back at you. And it's really fun
then to me, Like that provides to me like the
best hooks on this record are really like, Uh, what's
the really really fucking catchy song? I think it's Overlord
of the Black Earth really fucking cool. And um, I
guess vocally you were talking Elliott about, you know, Dallas
Tollawaid part of the band at while ago. Nia'll have
this like try vocal set up where it's three guys
now but five. I think there's five in the band.
I think four of them do vocals now, fucking know,
I was thoughtly three Anyway, I guess I'll ask you again.
Carl's always there. Carl has had to train other people
to kind of fill those voids, as Brian, who debuted
on the last record, and there's at least a third
guy who is with a new guy on this record.
So they've been a bit of a state of upheaval
since doubt all A. Wade left and they're getting these
sort of voices coming into the fore. I guess, how
do you if that was an element for you where
you feel like that was sort of missing, how are
you sort of accustomed to it?
Speaker 2: I think getting at least two new people to come
on to replace Dallas is a good move because the
likelihood that you're going to find someone with that distinctive
style that suits Nile as well as him is basically
impossible for me. He was always on my favorite parts
of their sound, but getting two or three more people
to come in it does sort of add to the calamitous,
exciting nature of their music. I think if you can't
find someone with a similarly distinctive tone, it's good to
have a couple of distinct ones that you can deploy
at any one time. And I think they do a
really good job. I do think as well as the
production gripes that we've sought shared, it ultimately means it
doesn't feel like a fully fledged Nile record. Sometimes there's
moments on the album I thing I would actually prefer
to hear Dallas doing that. But I do think having
the two or three voices or four voices, whatever it is,
at any given time, I think it means that that
there's moments that lift that maybe wouldn't otherwise.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I think that just to go back to the
little general atmosphere idea, the atmosphere in Nil, which is
one of the key things that really elevated them from
being a sort of straight up tech death band it's
not a one size fits all thing. It kind of
comes from a couple different areas. Part of it is
the more overt sort of world building e elements, things
like orchestration, whatever, And I think the last record, well,
it writes a little bit heavier on that. Maybe this record,
like we said, quite brutal, quite straight down a line aggressive.
The other side where the atmosphere really comes from, is
like that sheer heaviness and darkness, and that like musty
dustiness of it, which does sound like, you know, the
old Nile records sound that they are thousands of years
old and like you've released some of a sarcophagus by
opening them. And I think in their prime Nile were
one of the best bands at creating that feeling just
through the heavy essence of their rifts before you even
added anything else. On this record, again, it's cleaner still
than those, So for a more brutal record and not
quite having that, I think that element is not the
strongest it's ever been, even amongst their last sort of
four or five records. But no, they're just great, and
it's just it's it's hard to hear this and not admire,
you know, the craft on display from guys who really masuds.
I realized as well. It wasn't Overlawds the Black Earth
I was thinking of. It's under the curse of the
One God, which has that under the and it's got
you know, that really ceremonial vocal element that really Again,
that's an extra element that I think is really fun
on this And as it's really like bending, contorting acoustic
folk at the end, very unsettling, they do at the
end detour into a couple sort of longer, more down
tempo tracks. True Gods of the Desert is like Nil
sad but true or some shit like that.
Speaker 3: Groove is like black album Nil against longer but it is.
It's like stomping groovy, like that's really cool.
Speaker 1: Yeah, And that has another of those hooks that Edi
just mentioned that will live in your head where it goes.
Speaker 3: It is written at the end in the Big you
might have been that one as well.
Speaker 1: Yeah. Yeah, I don't think I would say that this
is the standout for me of their recent records. I
would say this is basically comparable to the last one,
which is of quality and very good death metal to me.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I think I certainly prefer this to the last one.
I'd probably say it's about on par with what Should
Not be Unearthed for almost completely different reasons. I have
a almost seemingly unique love of Out the Gates of Cethe,
and I don't know if it's just the age I
was when it came out, or I like how quirky
it is. But for me, it's not the clear standout
of the last four if we want to divide the
discography up like that. But Nil are one of the
best death metal bands to ever exist. I don't expect
them to do anything that matches the run of the
first six, and if they're doing something to this standard,
that's great. I think this is just another really fucking
good NA record.
Speaker 1: Yeah, Carl Sanders is sixty one. He's the same age
as some of the guys in Saxon. He's about as
old as Brian Tatler is, and he's he's finding new
ways to write songs about monkey's sucking your skull and
throwing feaces it. It's pretty hardcore, you know. I love
the cover art as well. That maybe is one of
my favorites of theirs. I can totally envision Arnold vosslu
flying about inside that. So there you go nil the
underworld awaits us all. I felt like I was a
little bit negative at times during that episode, but sometimes
you just feel that way about certain batch and there
are absolutely some incredible highlights in there to feast your
ears on, so go and do that. Thank you very
much for listening with us through this review's brackets. We
will be back in you know, the coming week, as
said early, with an album club pack over and that's
my patrire where we were going to be talking about Wasp,
the Distillers, Japanroids, Wattaan a fiery bunch and also not
very far other times, but that's how we do it
over here. So you can go and find that at
Patron of the com slash that's not metal if you
are so inclined to, uh, you know, sit with us
for a couple more hours talking about some sick fucking music. Otherwise,
we will be back next week with a normal hype
blast to get you know, those flowing again. So we
will see you there, but for now, CHEERYO byye