Speaker 1: Hello everybody, and welcome to That's Not Metal. We are
your weekly rock and heavy metal podcast, and we are
here once again at the end of the month round
at the end of the month, lately before four the
review show for the fourth month of the year, April.
We have got a pretty nice little selection albums that
have come out about to come out that we want
to talk to you about, and so we're going to
get into that over the next couple of hours. But
first off, let's do the usual, the intro stuff. Hello,
my name is Parenhish with me as usual for the reviews,
We've got Elliot Paisley and Sam Dignon. Sam Elliott, Hello,
how are we doing? Yeah?
Speaker 2: Good, I mean, I'm excited for reviews this We're We've
got some of my like fite realms of the year
so far, sort of like not good to spoilery, but
there are some big ones this month.
Speaker 1: It's a pretty good one for Sam.
Speaker 2: I think, yeah, like, yeah, I'm read, I'm excited to
chaut about these albums and there's some real good stuff
to talk about this month.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I think after last month, which did have some
good stuff in it, but obviously had that pretty arduous
metalcor Gordler at the beginning, this is like.
Speaker 2: Oh well I've left that behind.
Speaker 3: That that is like it's memories, Like yeah, this is
like the Alca the Alca Celts after the hangover. It's
just it's we're free now.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 1: It's funny you say that because like, obviously the albums
that I am still listening to from like the previous
couple of months are my favorite ones, you know, and
like my favorite stuff that we did towards the end
of that reviews episode last month is still basically like
my favorite stuff that I'm like absolutely like, you know,
kind of still on the brain with this year. But
this is I think a much cozier selection. From top
to bottom. We have got to talk about the new
Death Heaven album reviews also from Scowl Employed to Serve
in Human Nature, Messa, and Final Dose. We've got a
little bit of news to start off with, and I
guess we can just do the little kind of round
up of rock at Code Shell, which you know, not
always the top story, and I guess it wouldn't be
the top top story, but there was enough to talk about.
The Misfits played. It's not really newsworthy, but I just
always take notice of when they go.
Speaker 2: They didn't humiliate us Danzig like was on good? Was
was well behaved? Yeah, like, I mean that's worth noting
his Danzig was well behaved.
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, fair, No no strange merch or anything there.
Courtney of Plumt came out with Meghan the Stallion to
do her little spot. The only clips I could see.
She was sort of like a little bit awkwardly hanging
her out at the back of the stage like a goon.
But you know, nice to see her appearing and making
the most of that little cool Megan.
Speaker 2: This sound did shout out like Courtney from fucking Spirit Bods. Yeah,
like you got the proper acknowledgment. Lest that's nice.
Speaker 1: Absolutely. I wonder how many people in the crowd knew
who the fuck that was still, but you know, nonetheless
good to see it. David Drayman wants to talk to
Billy Armstrong and tell him why bombing kids is good. Actually,
after Billy der Armstrong changed the lyrics of Jesus s
Burbia to be a reference to the Palestinian genocide, which
I feel like it's only fair. After we did rag
on a New Green Day song last week to you know. Also,
you know, give our Jews when they do something, you
know kind of legit and cool, so yeah, good on you, billy. Elsewhere,
people on Twitter were surprised that people at Speed couldn't
like mosh properly and weren't busting out their full on,
you know, fucking sound and fury developed mosh move. It's like,
what do you expect?
Speaker 2: I was like, oh, oh, is this really?
Speaker 3: Like?
Speaker 2: I know, we have to have our late like most
discourse every month, but come on, cochill. At the very least,
it's cool to see a co chiller crowd actually get
involved in a hardcore band like Speed and try and
like try and wash and try and stage dive like
fuck it. If the fore main good like they're taking
part in that rocks, well it's good for.
Speaker 3: Me because I I think I can mosh And then
a story like this comes out and go, oh I've
been doing it right so something yeah eatly like it's
it's an education for all.
Speaker 1: Of us, absolutely, But I think the main takeaway from Coachella,
I think for us should be a Weezer who a
how bizarre newsworthy thing? Is this already? That the story
is already Weezer played Coachella several days after Scott Shriner's
wife is shot, Like that is already something going on.
But apparently Rivers Cuomo at Coachella has stated that in
you know, recent weeks whatever, they have been out there
in La making a Weezer movie. Now do we a
believe Rivers Cuomo? And he's not just decided to say
that on the day which would be on form, but
b a Weezer I mean, obviously we're all buying our
tickets day one, Like whatever fucking that is?
Speaker 2: Yeah, I'm seeing it.
Speaker 1: Yeah, But what the hell do we make of the
news that there could be a Weezer movie motion picture event? Like?
Speaker 2: What? What? What? What is it going to be? Is it? Is
it like a band documentary? Is it a like it's
like semi autobiographical story about the rise of Weezer? Are
they like playing themselves? Like there's so many possibilities that
a Weezer movie could take that I'm like fascinated by it,
and I'm like this, like I don't know if it
would be good, but I kind of just like it
is enticing as a prospect, isn't it?
Speaker 3: Like what? This is particularly funny because the last six months,
I've seen like Weezer forums and that sort of thing.
People are going, where are Weeze? It's been over two
years since you've had any new music, and god, like, yeah,
well that's they're all going, well, maybe they're sort of
taking it seriously and they're going to finally take some
time and release. And then this news has come out
and they go, oh, well, for fuck's sake, yeah, maybe.
Speaker 1: There will be a soundtrack for the movie, Like absolutely,
it'll be all like fucking wild Stallion Ship, like that
song they did for Bill and Ted. The first movie
that popped into my head is like a reference point
for this is that weird al movie that came out
with Daniel Radcliffe. I can imagine it being like a
you know, a tongue in cheek kind of by opic
like that. Maybe Weeze will play themselves. I wouldn't be
surprised if they had, like, you know, again, almost Daniel
Raagliff scenario of.
Speaker 2: Like you I could see Daniel Radliff.
Speaker 1: Maybe they'll do it again. But yeah, but like I
can imagine them doing some kind of biopic. And remember again,
this is like pulling a morsel out of the depths
of my brain from when we did the full length
Weezer special, when I dug up every bit of stupid
internet history that we have ever done. But when they
appeared in that Fred video and it was just like
them and it's like, oh my god, it's Weezer and
he met them. I can imagine some kind of biopic
like that happening. And then weez Are themselves appear for
like a scene there was like.
Speaker 2: Like really shitty Christmas movie from like two years ago
that weeze were in just as like a guy's band,
and they were just and they played like a Weezer
song at the end. I was like, the fuck are
you doing Weezer? Like this is like the real like
low point of being a Weezer fan post weez Yeah,
my exhaustion with that band. And then in this terror
movie I was like, oh god, it's not a good time.
Speaker 1: Like I say, my my my instinct is a a
comedic you know, tongue in cheeks or of postmodern you know,
faux biopic. But maybe it will be really really serious
and that will be the thing that took us all
off guard. Maybe it will actually be like you know,
Rivers really pouring his heart into something, the most he's
done since Pinkton Pinks in the movie Oh God.
Speaker 3: Well, actually, now that you've you've just said that, I
have heard rumors that Weeza the next time is they're
reworking some songs from songs in the black Hole. Could
this be the movie musical? Oh rock opera? Holy shit,
that's an idea.
Speaker 1: Wow, hell, it's gonna be the full on the Weezer
space Opera. I mean, matter if we got like, you know,
Weezer's version of the Wall or something, but like in space.
We've been talking about this thing for about two to
three minutes and we've already thrown out so many good ideas.
I can't wait to see all of them be ignored,
but hopefully some of them. So yeah, absolutely the top
story of the week. Weezer movie. Fuck off Leek Token,
it's no really sleep Token UK top ten hit with
their single Caramel that came out recently. It's doing, you know,
similarly pretty damn well in like, you know, the US
Billboard charts you would expect. There's a YouTube show that
I watch of a guy who like rounds up the
Billboard one hundred because it's some of the only way
I ever hear of some of the people who are
actually like enormous, but nothing rock ever ever gets in there.
I think the only thing that in like recent times
to where it's been like, oh, you know one of
our bands was when Lincoln Park released The Emptiness Machine
and that got into like you know, the billboard and
all that. You know, a new band like sleep Token,
I think, you know, we all kind of see it
coming in a weird way. I'm not surprised, especially when
you know, what does the song Caramel actually sound like?
It sounds like everything that's on the top one hundred, right,
but with you know, a bit of a riff at
the end.
Speaker 2: There's a blast beat at one point, isn't there?
Speaker 1: Yeah, But I think this is just one of those
like fucking hell another like you know, Notch on the Belt,
another record fucking you know, smashed. At this stage, it
feels pretty almost uncontroversial to say that Sleep Token are
the most popular breakthrough bands since I mean, at least
bring the horizon. But certainly I think in terms of
immediately short time, yeah, like like clip my chemical Romance
really is what we're talking about. Last like actual cultural
event of a band like that, so fucking a yeah,
I like I.
Speaker 2: Said, I think it was what it was. It was
that selling out the O two in a day. I
was like, yeah, don't better get sleep Token. Like whatever
my feelings are on them, like that, I've decided like
the Bents and Boon of metal at this point, like
that's that is how I view them, and that like
they are identical, but yeah, fuck it, they're huge, Like
I ain't got nothing to say anymore for life.
Speaker 3: Yeah, and you know, to give them some credit. I
listened to the song, and I do think it's maybe
the first time that I've a sleep Token song and
that thing people say where our pop fans will like
it will be this crossover thing. It's the first time
that that makes sense, and that seems to be back
to by the numbers and the fact that I have
something nice to say about it makes it maybe the
greatest sleeptoken song to date. So if one of them
is going to go in top ten, it might as
well be my favorites.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 1: I mean I don't share those feelings necessarily, but again
in terms of them breaking through every conceivable thing, and
I think just acknowledging as we said, the scale that
we're talking about. I think this is a good cementing
as ever, you know they are where they are. Let's
move on to The Dirty Nil who have also pretty
rapidly got another album coming out. Their album can be
called The Lash, which I hope is about just like
I know, a pub crawl or something, but it's going
to be out on the twenty fifth of July twenty
twenty five. I was really I was taken aback by this.
I was like, wasn't there any one just like last
year or something, but two years.
Speaker 2: Ago to be about two years to like from Yeah,
they almost like close.
Speaker 1: Yet absolutely so you know, they churn them out as well.
And there's a new song out called the Gallop of
the Hounds, which combined with the album cover, it looks
like the Dirty Hill are, at the very least aesthetically,
I don't know how much they're sound necessarily is developing
that much, but at least aesthetically they've just decided that
they want to at least appear as a heavy metal band.
Speaker 2: The things that as the single there is like genuine
kind of like heavy metals touches in there, Like I mean,
they've always had like some of the sort that like, yeah,
it was away a bit more Metallica, i'd say, but
this is the person there's kind of like iron made
in Leeds in the kind of the Dirty Nails melodic
punk thing, and I'm like, yeah, cool like that. They're
the band with the characters of that. Of all the
melodic punk bands that I love, they're the one with
the character to pull off Gaga behavior Metals if they
they lean into that, I'm excited. Yeah.
Speaker 3: I mean. One of the things that marks this band out.
One of the reasons I like them so much more
than so many the other melodic punk bands of their
milk is that heavy metal thing. And I mean seeing
the album cover for the first time, it just it
speaks to me a lot a sort of spiritual level,
that sort of look that make it look like an
old tape.
Speaker 1: Yeah. I like the way it actually looks like a
cassette te where you've got like the trap list down
the side that.
Speaker 3: Is yeah yeah yeah, and the song like you say,
like a bit more unmaide in there. It's a cool
switch by guess, because often the dirty Hill end of
Metals more like thrash, Yeah, something a bit more trad
is a coolot, especially because the last record, which you know,
I think we're all very positive about, felt a bit
more like a a continuation from FUNCKR than the previous records.
The first few records are quite easy to tell apart,
so if this one is the heavy metal one as
a characteristic, it's definitely something to be excited about.
Speaker 1: Yeah, And so when that comes out in July, I'm
sure that many many people listening will be all the
fuck over it. So there you go, the new Nil album.
A few tour announcements. Over in the US, Alice Cooper
and Judith Priest have announced a big old co headline tour,
which is a you know, very nice evening for fans
of the nineteen seventies and early eighties, I suppose, but
you know, in a huge US tour, bringing Corrosiona Conformity
along as I Sport Act as well, which is certainly
sweetens the deal. Over Here in the UK, some smaller
tours but perhaps no that's exciting better. Lovers have announced
a full on, you know, European but also you know,
a UK tour. They're bringing along sixty eight and gray
Haven and they are playing in you know, kind of
a various few cities around the UK, including some smaller places,
like they're playing in Liverpool, they're playing in Torquie, Portsmouth, Bournemouth,
so you know, nicely better lovers kind of getting out
a little bit more there as well.
Speaker 2: Kind of guys, this isn't coming near my way, but
it's it's cool to see them sort of come back around.
There's like very good live and if it is coming
to you, I would recommend going to see them.
Speaker 1: I didn't even take notice of the fact that there
is a London date on that.
Speaker 2: Yeah, not a London date on this one night, which
I'm I'm fine with you and know they've played London.
I've seen him a bunch of times. Yeah, they've played
London a load, So like it's fine. I won't be selfish,
but yeah, if it's coming there, you go see them
because they are really good live.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I've never seen a Josh Scoggin band, so so
maybe this would be, you know, the time to go
and see six.
Speaker 2: Six year are good kind of pairing as well with
them and that there's an there.
Speaker 3: Yeah.
Speaker 1: Into Armor have announced a handful of UK dates around
their appearance at arp Tangent Festival, so if you would
like see inter Arma and you're not going to Art
Tangent Festival, then you have a few opportunity to do so.
They're playing in London, Glasgow, Somerset obviously some actually is
Arttangent Festival, and also Leicester, which I'm really annoyed that
after my planned trip to Leicester earlier this year fell
through because not enough people bought tickets. Now another band
I would absolutely go and see. I have played Leicester
instead of anywhere actually closer to me. I want to
fucking see inter Armor again, particularly headlining, but you know,
a few chances to see them. I know that their
last album was actually maybe the most popular to date
amongst the you know, the t and M audience. So
new into Armor tour dates in the UK and also
something that I can make and I'm very excited about
is Portal have announced their first European and UK dates.
I think these their first UK dates in a decade.
They haven't been here since I think it was Temple's
Festival twenty and fifteen, which is a marker of an era,
isn't it. But I actually a good handful of UK
dates London, Glass Go, then they're hopping over to Ireland
for Dublin, coming back to the UK for Manchester. I
have my ticket to go and see him in Manchester,
So gonna see the big Clock or the big tentacle
or whatever he is. Elliott, you are a tempted to
go and pay your respects to the Clock?
Speaker 3: Yeah, I mean I was thinking of it anywhere, and
then when I saw the thing about being the first
shows in the deck, which someone has completely passed me by.
I don't know where that's got it. I smiled in
my head they'd been more recently than that, but I
should have been looking at the clock.
Speaker 1: He Yeah, I think that the Loon the London date
has vacuous opening, and I'm actually very jealous of that.
I wish they were doing the whole thing because you
know that Vaculo's album review couple monthsgo still very very
good doing. Courage people go and check that one out.
And then we're going to end the news just paying
our respects really to another you know, kind of icon
of heavy metal to have have passed away this last week.
The classic nineteen seventies period drummer for the one and
Only Judas priest Les Binks passed away, who Lesbinks, you know,
only played on two Judas Priest records. He played on
Stained Class and Killing Machine, and the drumming position is
the one that Judas Priests kind of most regularly swapped,
you know, over the years. I tell they got Scott Travis.
But considering that, you know, maybe aside from Scott Travis
obviously has had thirty years in that band, Les Binks
is maybe like the the name of a drummer in
Judas Priest who you would hear name dropped the most.
And I think the reason for that is you put
on Stained Class and that drum intro and exciter is
one of those moments that is kind of like heavy
metal drumming being pushed forward a little notch a song
like Excited. So I regularly kind of cited as like
kind of the almost like the og speed metal tune
to the point that maybe the greatest speed metal band
just lifted their name from it, and that was the band,
but as a performance on a record, and then go
into the Killer Machine as well. That's the period where
Judas Priest most clearly lock into the like chrome steel
metallic far lost zone that we sort of know Jews
Priest to be in and you gotta imagine them getting
a dumber like Les Banks on that record was kind
of part of what helped spur that on.
Speaker 3: Yeah. I mean, like, to me, he is the guy
that pioneered that double bass thing. I feel like every
time you watch a sort of documentary with heavy metal,
they look to overkill. But that came out a year
later when size and it's basically like it's the same
sort of thing. And I struggled to think of many
people in the history of heavy metal who have had
like as densely classic a run with a band because
he's in the band for what two years, and the
terms he puts out our staying class killing machine and
lest we forget unleashed in the East fucking right, Yeah,
is a contender for like arguably one of the most
classic metal live albums there's ever been. And you know
he's the guy on that. And you know, Scott Travisty's
had thirty five years in the band, He's had like
more time to sort of established himself in that sense,
But in just two years, Les Binks was able to
mark himself as, like you say, maybe the sort of
silver medal position in the Judas Priest thing in terms
of the one you're going to like you to name
job and those records as them transitioning into like you say,
that more heavy metal chrome thing. He brings so much
like excitement if you're part of the part to those records,
Like there's so much more explosive and fun and frantic
than the records that came before. And even though he
was only on those two, you can tell that on
the records afterwards. He's sort of the one that laid
maybe laid the blueprint for the sort of drummer that
Judas Priest required to make that leap forward.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean you could look at the you know,
the drumming intro on Painkiller as almost just being like
a decade a long from what the intro of Stained Glass,
you know, kind of set out there, and I think
you've got a writing credit and beyond the Realms of
Death as well, which you know, like one of the
great all time certainly of that era, you know, metal ballads.
And I know he was actually kind of active until
you know, relatively recent recently doing appearances with Kk's Priest
as well, so he was kind of still you know,
appearing and make himself known. So as said, you know,
like I think Elli's put it very well. There very
little dense period of the records that he's most known for,
but they are records that really and his you know
contribution to them specifically really helped forge the DNA of
heavy metal as a whole. So I listened to Stained
class this morning. I recommend everyone else go out and
do the same, and then slap on killing Machine while
you're at it. So yeah, rest in peace, Les Binks.
Let us very quickly mention what we have got going
on in TNM land right now. First of all, last
week we embarked on a brand new band special that
we are doing that we are gonna, you know, kind
of get wrapped up downe and dust within a sort
of a month or so. But we started on the new
special on one of the fight first and final words
in metalcore none of them poison the well, and our
first part we spoke about their origins and their first
to most centrally pivotal to the DNA of metalcore and
the trajectory of albums that was being opposite of December
and tear Slash. Here we couldn't quite work out, but
we think it's Teir Tear from the Red Sam this
was a special that you were, you know, chomping at
the bit, very very giddy getting into It's been a
beautiful thing listening to those records. I'm looking forward to
in a you know, a couple of weeks time when
we get into the latter half and we've got like
at least one more like regularly name dropped sort of
classic album, but also some very underdiscussed stuff which I'm
look forward to getting to as well. But when we
look at the part we've just done, the first leg
of the Poison the World career, what are your sort
of reflections on that podcast that we did.
Speaker 2: I mean, to me, it was just a bit like
excited flailing about talking about those two albums and just
kind of be like, yeah, but that drum and that
snare sound and that breakdown and that bit and the
lyrics and just all of these things are kind of
coming to me like it's all so good, Like obviously
have December is the one where again just like that
snare sound like is just perfect that album, Like I
listened to the album so regularly at this point because
it's just such an easy twenty eight minutes of like
perfect like completely flawless metalcore, but just kind of like
as well just talking about like the debut, going back
the EP and and the kind of like how much
they've already got figured out on that EP and just
again like metalcore for all its you know, real metalcore
discords right now, like them reinventing a sort of a
like a sort of growing new genre and then kind
of just like defining the sound of it for the
next how many years to come. It's such a like
cool kind of like Journey to Track and again just
two like timeless classic Metalcorp albums that like. And it's
been really nice to Savio see people in the discord
coming like you know, I've ne reaction listen to Poison
in the World before opposite of December Snare sound.
Speaker 1: Yeah, it's just really good. Yeah, I think on that
as said we said Born announced it, and we said
on the special itself, it's a band who are very
very regularly name dropped. They are a band who their
influence is almost spoken about more often than I know
people maybe knowing the records to a degree, And so
if you know, you kind of need that impossible, Okay,
I actually finally need to go and check out those
early Pointon and Wild records and see what they did.
I really hope that's something that we can and you know,
encouraged through the special. But as we said, talking about,
you know, what they actually did for Metalcore, what are
the specifics of what they changed, because Metalcore does exist
before Poison, well we speak about you know, Integrity and
Earth Crisis and Coalesce, all these bands exist, right, but
what do on you know, that first EP and the
Office December and then what do they quite heavily expand
on Tear from the Red as well, which wuld be
one of the highlights of at least that first leg
for me, being like Dan, there is a leap between
those two records alone, you know, just dialing into what
did Poison the World do differently that made them so
important and made them kind of the blueprint for the
following twenty five years is the good conversation that we
were having all over there. So that has just gone
up on the that stile. Patreon as said, you know,
kind of in a couple of weeks will come around
and we'll finish it off and do the next part.
But before then, as is, you know, usually customary. We've
got a review show right here, so therefore we've also
got an album club pack coming up, and so I'm
gonna let you know what is going to be, you know,
discussions that are going to becoming very vers in. It
feels like it hasn't even been a month since, you know,
the last one where we were speak about, you know,
integrity to mention them, but also Heaven and Hell and
these other great things. But we do have always we've
always got more records to talk about. So firstly, something
that was suggested by Elliott here as like we do
have to do the big dogs every now and then,
the albums that are everyone does know them, but sometimes
you've just got to go, damn, this shit is really
worth everything that people say about it. We're gonna talk
about Megadeths nineteen ninety thrash metal masterpiece rust In Peace,
and Sam's pulling a face, but you know, Rusting Piece.
Speaker 2: Is doing I know, I know, I know, you know.
Speaker 1: And I like making you suck it up and talk
about how great Megadeth actually were sometimes. So you know,
Elliott was like, has Rusted Peace never been an album club?
And I was like, that seems wrong. You might be right,
so we're gonna do it. Then we are going to
talk about one of the angriest, heaviest records for one
of the all time great heavy bands, Killing Jokes two
thousand and three self titled record. It's going to be
a hoot, even though it's actually really fucking miserable for
very very good reasons. But what a record. Then ahead
of an appearance at Outbreak this summer, it's about that
time where we kind of preview something going on there
and as it was the thing in the very first
announcement that I think people were like, oh my god,
they're coming back to the UK. We're going to be
doing Sunny Day real Estates, Emo Landmark record Diary. And
then in the underground slot we are going to be
talking about one of the almost like the it's a
comeback album, but it's also a standard setter for what
the new thing was going to be. We're going to
be talking about Gore Guts, one of the ultimate progressive
technical avant garde even death metal bands, and they're twenty
thirteen album colored Sands, one of the heaviest fucking between
that in killinge it's a heavy episode, but there we
go those are going to be the album club discussions
coming up next week if we, you know, are our
own time, which we bloody well should be, so there
you go. That will be what happens That is going
to be on patron dot com slash That's None Matter,
along with the current Poison the World Special and the
recently completed you know, Black Sabbath non ads years. Everything
we've done is over there, and your support over there
is what keeps this podcast a float all these years,
So thank you very much. Let us get into what
we're actually here to properly do, which is the reviews
episode for April, starting off with an album that came
out at the end of March because March was too
damn busy on its own, right, Butts, we've got some
good stuff to talk about, and we're going to start off,
as said very different energy on these first couple of
reviews at the Gate in the last reviews episode we did.
We've got a couple of hot, hot, hot records. We're
gonna start with Death Heaven and their album Lonely People
with Power, released through Roadrunner. Kind of surprisingly, we are,
you know, we're later on this than everyone else because,
as I said, March was so so busy we had
to sit on something. But it means we have been
able to see that this album has actually gone down
with quite a bit of critical acclaim, and I'd always
expect that to a degree with Death Heaven. I don't
think even though you know, Infinite Granite understandably split people.
I don't think Death Heaven have ever had like a
poorly reviewed album. But as I say, at least critically,
there seems to be almost a renewed burst of enthusias
for Death Heaven that I've observed as as this one
has come out, like a lot of people throwing out,
you like the album of the Dimensions or whatever. This album,
you know, a good two three weeks on from its release,
seems to have really kind of lit a fire into people.
Speaker 2: I mean I can vouch for that. Like again, I
liked Infinite Granite, but it was kind of like a
like okay, kind of hinges on where did they go
following on from this? But when I got this and
I was like, ah, Death Heaven are a special band,
Like they are one of like the genuinely kind of
like high marks of like what artistic heavy music should be.
This album has completely gone, like we we we really
got to like appreciate that we're in a time where
death Evan are active, because I think this is fucking spectacular,
this record, and it has made me appreciate Infinite Grantite
even more as a kind of like interesting. And I
guess because because they did, you know, incat they went
pure shoe gays on that, it's meant them coming back
with this album. It's felt even more exciting because I've
kind of like we've kind of had a few years
without this kind of Death Heaven sounds, so I kind
of fully get why everyone is fully just like salivating
over this.
Speaker 1: Well.
Speaker 3: I mean that Death Heaven released four fucking brilliant sort
of post black metal records in seven years, and it's
been that much time since the last one in that
style like Infinite Granted, I have warm sort of overtime.
I was pretty disappointed by it when it came out,
and I think it's mainly because that scene feels fairly oversaturated.
So even though Death Heaven came along and did a
really good job of doing it, yeah, I was reserving
judgment on that record to see what they did next.
And you know, three and a half four years later
them coming back with this, it does feel like in
terms of critical acclaim aspects, everything sort of lines up perfectly.
It's like you come back with an exceptional record that
you know, takes the best stuff from your controversial record
and you know, shapes it into something new, in something
where fans new and old. I kind of I find
it hard to believe that you would like Death Heaven
and not this record.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I think, you know, I still like to hold
some level of ownership over them as an extreme band,
because I do think they, you know, are I think
this record gets pretty metal. They're playing Damnation at the
end of the year. But we are still talking about
a band who this album has been reviewed in Forbes
alongside like us, right, they are still in like a
bit of a field of one, and I think we're
at the stage where we are, you know, sort of
Death Heaven, you know, eleven twelve years ago, whenever they
might have been in the midst of some kind of
like black metal culture war or whatever where. Even though
they were the most critically acclaimed heavy band on the
planet in twenty thirteen, their name also seemed to come
with like, oh, do you love them or hate them
whatever fifteen years in. Now they basically outlasted all of that.
They've got six albums under their beout now, and I
think we can just talk about them being like one
of the modern grapes, which has Sam you know, very
much led in with you know they are and you know,
we appreciate those bands while they're here being that great.
I think this album is as much a kind of know,
a cementation of where Death Heaven, of what Death Heaven
are and you know, what they have been over all
these years as well as much as it is anything else.
And it's like it's funny. I don't think Death Heaven
have like I don't think they would do a self
titled album. I think they're two, like know, concerned with
poetry and exploring their individual ideas one to one. But
it's almost like an album that just off the sound
of it and how it feels. I could imagine this
being Death Heaven's self titled album. You know, like there
are you know, there are surprises and kind of alarming
passages and stuff as we'll get into. But I put
on this record, and maybe more so than any other
Death Heaven record, I felt just a sense of sort
of assurance about it, like you know, Infinite Granite is
or even all very correct. Human love is kind of comforting,
and it is cushiony, lovely kind of sounds. But it
was almost more like knowing where I'm kind of at
with it, I suppose, more so than maybe some previous records,
which felt more and the discovery to a degree. I
was gonna do a little bit of a you know,
sort of a show of hands on who liked Infinite Granite,
who didn't. I really like that album. I think, you know,
for as much as you could say about them moving
into a you know, something that is less distinct and
is more overcrowded or whatever, I still think there was
tons of you know, immediately identifiable Death Heaven in it.
It wasn't like they just went and made like a
narrow Head album or something like there was it's full on, yeah.
I mean even at the end when you know, mom
baster happens and stuff that's only happening from from Death Heaven.
I really loved seeing them touring that album and then
seeing the different side of Death Heaven in the live
environment when they're performing, like you know, like great Massive
Color and those songs which I think are fantastic. I
think it is. You know, it's like Alcest Shelter or
Wolven the Throoms, Celestite or whatever. Like you know, albums
I'm happy to have in the catalog, even if they're
not going to be positioned as like the definitive article.
I also wasn't really at all surprise when the follow
up would go a bit more metal, because as those
precedents demonstrate, I think of these bands kind of do
a lot of the time right as part of the creativity.
And the band who released Black Brick right before Infinite Granite,
like you know, they were going to be both and
as said the infant Grant even had that little bit
of kind of black metally taste at the end. With
that in mind, I wasn't going into this album with
what I've seen from a you know, a limited but
still out there group of people are like, oh thank god,
it's so much better than Infinite Granite. It was more
like a you know, what have we got? And yeah,
I mean I think we can all agree. I think
they're for me. There's six for six on the albums.
I thought Infinite Granite was great, I think this one
is great, whether it is, you know, the top end
of the Death Heaving catalog is a different question maybe,
but I think we are just fundamentally we're fifteen years
into a continue, really very rewarding journey that we're going
on with them.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I don't know. I like the things. I don't
want to like the sparage in Phinic Grantwe because I
do think the album is like really great. It was
just kind of like a and again I wasn't I
wasn't saying like death and when they were definitely want
to band in the sort but it was kind of
like a if they do, do do we kind of
lose like like a special band to just being like
a really great band. But I just think the thing
is that thing about them as well, is it's not
just a kind of like we're back to doing someun
bay forrig and whatever. It's I mean, you're right, is
it in the sort of self type like this is
the most Deaf Heaven album where it's kind of covering
all of the sort of like because again, each of
the previous albums has a kind of distinct over to
it because like ordinary Coruption Human Love, whilst's still kind
of in the sort of black best thing. It's way
more kind of like floaty and kind of like has
weird kind of like album Yeah, and then yeah, there's
the indie stuff. There's you know, the Brian May style
guitar lead work and all that sort of like things
things like that on there. So like they they've they've
got distinct characteristics of each albums, and this some kind
of like takes bits from all of them and it
seems like sort of sows all together in like really
cohesive package whilst bringing in kind of new experimentations as well.
And I just think it just creates such a like
immersive and rewarding listen.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I mean Death Heaven I think are one of
those bands who, in some ways in a slightly funny
position because their second album is long cemented as a classic,
so they no longer have to chase that thing anymore,
in the sense that whatever Death Heaven do, they'll always
have that and I suspect they won't ever release something
which surpasses it as the classic Death Heaven record. But
in many ways, like you've both said, this is the
most definitive Death Heaven record because all the things they
try across their records they're all present here, and I mean,
we're all going to start, you know, frocking out brilliant.
This album is, I'll be honest. First few listens I
liked it, but I wasn't head over heels from the
old and it was kind of torture trying to get
my thoughts straight, because when Infinite Granite came out, I went, ah, well,
you know, I like this. They're good at it, but
it's not quite as special as what they were doing before.
With this one, it was like, you've got the recipe perfect.
But for whatever reason, I wasn't connecting with it in
the way I connected with the first four. And I
don't know why, because I've not had some Eureka moment.
It's not like it's had to click with me. I'm
already familiar with their sound. I already like it. But
forever reason four to five listens in, it totally cemented itself.
And now i'd give Infinite grant it maybe a seven.
Everything else is at least a nine. This is in
that echelon, like the echelon of the Nines. Plus I
associate it in that sort of company.
Speaker 1: Now, yeah, I'm maybe sort of similar in terms of like,
you know, it has continually you know, impressed me on
repeat listens, and maybe part of it is it was
quite a surprise seeing so many tracks on a Death
Heaven album, because I know, obviously there are the three
incidental interlude tracks, but even that that leaves nine songs
and the standard or Death Heaven, you know, what's a
heavier black metal influenced one is more like kind of
five to seven songs, you know, and we've not got
any songs over ten minutes, which is maybe something that
they are, you know, carrying on that approach of infinite granite,
that sort of conciseness, but the amount of the song
still it turns into I think it's their longest album.
And so the digesting process was different than me when
I put on you know, the breakthrough Days of some
Bathe into New Bermuda, It's like I've got four to
five huge pieces to get my head around. Yeah, this
was almost more like, so what is every single song here? Like,
what does every track kind of do and offer to
the you know, the overall kind of parcel, And you know,
we get quite a lot is you know, it spreads
its wings a decent bit and you know, the thought
was when we got Magnolia that it would be their
most metallic album, certainly since New Bermuda. And there is
something about this coming on like the tenth anniversary of
New Bermuda that feels quite fitting. But there's also much
more to it around that kind of parameter, and it
does feel like, you know, basically the the the compositional
lessons and stuff and the things that they've developed across
every album since sun Batha all kind of like you know,
pop up here in some you know shape, shape or form.
I do like just to go into the metal side.
It's from you know, New Bermuda on. When they do
metal riffs, they have this real just like compact punchiness
to it, which is different to you know, some Batha
and certainly Roads supposed to Doda, and you know, it's
not even the most brutal example of it, which comes
later on, but like just the opening riff on Doberman
when it starts is expressive and it's got a sonic
depth to it, but it's also really like a wallop
and just that you know, throughout the rest of the
album is I think just one of the best sounds
that a metal band has at the moment.
Speaker 2: I think that's the thing. Is the thing that opening
guitar part on Dobman, I was like, ah, I mean
it was so just immediately like this is what I
want from death and the sort of the river that
begins Magnolia is the one for me in terms of
just like smacking on the face and just sounding so nasty,
but like, is that kind of like intermit between the
receunding nasty and then beautiful and uplifting kind of all
at the same time. And I think it's it's the
sound that that like the best Evan really hits on
for me, is is that like making black metal sound
like the most gorgeous, like life affirming music ever, like
which again I wouldn't be saying many other black metal
bands do that for me, but Death Heaven have that
magic and they do it so many times across this album.
Speaker 3: Which the way they slalom between those two things because Doberman,
you know, as much as the beautiful, serene end of
Black Melt is sort of Death Heaven's calling card, this
is so ferocious, like it's so hard hitting and but
you know when it goes in that sort of downbeat, rolling,
lasting thing it's as good as black metal this stripe gets,
and there's just a real punchiness to it, which contrasts
so nicely with so much sort of post black metal
or black metal, black gaze, or whatever you choose to
call it. It could almost feel so ethereal to the
point of almost feeling like ambient music. And it's so
shapeless that even when the hard hitting moments come, they
don't really land anything. Whereas in a quite different way
but not too dissimilar, sometimes this will hit in a
way that doesn't feel that feels related to something not
loose you. I mean, like it's that sort of in
your chest. Yeah, I mean, and that sounds a bit
mad on paper, but you listen to this record and
you remember the stuff they were doing on New Bermuda,
and suddenly it makes a whole heap of sense. And
the way that it's not just you know, heavy song
lights on heavy song, lights song. The songs themselves offer
up both sides and Doberman as the first track proper
if you are to be excited by a Death Heaven record,
I struggled to think of what would be a more affirming,
comforting sound than something that both nasty and beautiful.
Speaker 2: There's like before like the bit where it goes like
really dreamy and soft. In Dobman, there's a bit like
it's like like actually like stompying heavy and light. That's
like the not loose sort comparison to come through because
you hit that and then it just drops out into
full sort of dream part and then you know that's
kind of just gonna build to this like final crescendo,
and it's like, yep, over like one song, you kind
of you hit everything I want from from Death Evan,
and I know there's still gonna be so much more
for this album to offer. But it was like Doberman
Interomagnoda was just kind of like such a assuring like
I'm in for the long haul with this album. I
know it's an hour long and there's a lot of songs,
but those two just sort of they just set me
in the mood, and I was like, I'm just gonna,
you know, just sit back and let the album to
kind of wash over me now and just take in
every little treat that there is.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I think Magnolia has pretty much cemented itself as
like everybody just fucking loves that song and immediately like
is rabid. To see it live, it reminds me of
you know, Brought to the Water, reminded me of like,
you know, from the Catworm to the Coil, but in
even tighter like four minutes right, which again you compare
this to a new Bermuda, for example, that has the
reputation of being in their most kind of metallic album.
But it's more the extremes of like you will get
either end in one song right this again, look at
the structure of the album. It's maybe a little more
defined track to track. I think maybe when you hit
a track you an't going to get an insane surprise
at the end of it so often, but it's more
about how they interact with the songs around it. So
Magnolia is pretty wholly a metal song. There are other
songs that a little bit more wholly kind of pretty songs,
and Magnolia is a case where it just pays off
brilliantly because the rift power in it. Uh you know,
I already when it came out as a single, went
crazy over that middle section drop in it, which is
a riff so good. I have been listening to other
songs and just thinking wouldn't it be good if that
Magnolia middle riff just came in here, like you know,
it's just like it's one of the best, Just like
riff moments in heavy metal this year, Daniel Tracy is
still the fucking man. Like that kind of opening fill
that he comes in with its equal parts kind of
like enslaved and converge. And I like when you can
hear a bit of thrash in Death Evans guitars, because
I think that, you know, they have this reputation of like, oh,
it's you know, it's it's black metal played by indie
kids or whatever, but they're also so clearly fucking metal
kids like that that's Metallica in stuff like that. You know,
the peak of Dobam, which I think is what you're
talking about, is the kind of the you know, like
my Iris only has black views in that part and
it is, you know it. Kerry mccauy's special talent is
maybe being as good a metal guitarist as he is
an indie one. The Garden Route really flips into that again,
slightly more indie touch of that little softer approach on
the drums and stuff like that, and you know, hearing
specifically Daniel Tracy switched from Magnolia into that approach and
not miss a beat is just like, you know, sublime,
but on that you can hear some of those like
h more like almost like goth influences that were on
a very correct human love and that kind of glistening
element kind of moves into that.
Speaker 2: Yeah, and the gun there's a few songs on there
that have that really kind of like glistening yeah Goth
aspect to it. But the guy Reson was like, the
driving on that is so good. The way he kind
of just like shifts around on those beats, it's like
you're not like playing Shapada. And it is one of
the more kind of like slightly shoegayzy or indie songs,
but it's there's just such a like energy to the
drums that propels it forward. And like this is a
like again, if when they're not playing the most heavy stuff,
it feels like there's a metal band playing these songs
in just the enngine in the attack on them. That
means it never feels kind of lethargic or like a
bit soft to the touch. It's always got that kind
of engine rumbling in it.
Speaker 3: Well, I mean, one of the bands that Deaf Heaven
have always reminded me of, and they grasped one of
my favorite elements of the band in question is Moguay,
and so many people just they rip off Maguay by
going right quite part loud, quite loud, quite loud, nice nasty,
that sort of thing. Death Evans seems to really understand
that band's use of tension, and this song, this one
in particularly, it really reminded me of something like Common
Die Young, which that whole record is basically bracing for
the lost. Yeah is it? I think it's punk rock
and cody yeah like, which is like the first two songs. Yeah,
so completely forgot that that might be the connection I'm making.
But the way that album goes noisy, Death Heaven are
willing to employ that here. And you know, it's a
bit of a cliche people going, oh, post rocks actually
the heaviest style of music in the world, but Death
Heaven as a band can make it feel that way
because on the following song Heathen, where they exaggerate that
dynamic even more, it sounds furious.
Speaker 1: Yeah. I would also say that in the Garden, Root
and Heathen are like almost like verse chorus structured more
than you Know, So I think again that's something they've
taken almost from Infinite Granite, where all the correct human
love and certainly Before you Know is much more that
kind of linear approach, whereas these songs do have, like
you know, Heathen is like a banger in a way
that only Death Heaven would put together a you know
kind of a banger.
Speaker 2: I love that on Heaven. The melody it's the guitars
of the chorus melody like yeah, because you're just screaming
on those choruses and it's nice, but you've you've got
that guitar line just playing through that chorus, which is
so catchy and kind of uplifting, and I think that's
such a like cool trick. And again, like when sort
of the back end of that track, when it like
doubles down on the metal side after the sort of
the pushing pow of like the indie and the metal
on the first half and it just kind of let's rip.
It's again, just such a satisfying thrill when they do that.
Speaker 1: Yeah, and another song kind of later on into the
track list, but sort of following in that similar sort
of style, is body behavior, which it kind of is
quite upbeat in terms of how it skips along. But
George on it vocally, he sounds a little bit like
Mic from inter Armor when he does that real kind
of like kind of curling edge, you know, developing the
vocal thing. And the lyrics seem to be more of
like a almost like a character based story than what
we're used to from Death Heaven. It's you know, it
seems to be about some kind of like grooming or something,
and it reads more like a pig destroyer song, and
it really has this kind of you know, it's got
a tension and a sickliness within that, like you know,
you could call it a more lightweight kind of thing
they're doing, but it doesn't feel that way. I think
some of those songs are you know, they're they're very
compact and immediate and stirring are in a way that
some of the other songs are more stretched out.
Speaker 3: Especially I mean we've lightly skips over like especially next
to Revelator, I mean, it sounds even more light footed
and you know, more of a soft touch compares that one,
because that is as much as that Magnolia Riff is
one of those great heavy metal rifts of the year,
Revelator might be the one better than it.
Speaker 1: Revelator's fucking nuts.
Speaker 3: It sounds like frost Bit and Gojira, Like it is
so out there and so just almost obnoxious in a
way that Death Heaven basically never are.
Speaker 1: Yeah, it makes it. It's like two notes, isn't it.
It's like a full on just tornado metal rift. The
tone on it is fucking crazy. It's like there's three
of that riff, like almost like you know, coming at
you at once from different angles. But the note, the
riff itself is just that super insistent black metal, and
uh yeah, I think it mighttually be the most kind
of you know, blast beat heavy like fast one. It's
that I hope that one is really going to make
it into live sets.
Speaker 2: Is that blastbe that come after like the sort of
the acoustic passage in the middle where it's all drops out,
goes quiet, and then that blastby hits as a fucking
jumps girl. I was like, ah, fucking hell, that's so
like so powerful.
Speaker 1: Yeah, And I was gonna bring up that song maybe
later on because in terms of it relates to the
sort of interview tracks, but we should point out in
the middle. There is the song Anmethyst, which is the
longest song on the album, certainly the centerpiece of it.
And uh, that is almost where I go, like, that
is what if you want to show someone what Death
Heaven do. It's like from the moment that sort of
looping you know, like slow divy but more goth and
more heavy you know intro that then obviously developed into
a full on, you know, post black metal song. It's
like that is that's the Death Heaven thing. That just
feels like magic.
Speaker 2: Yeah, that's the song where again like just the sort
of immersive, slow burning that like main guitar melody that
they kind of loop back to again that where they
put it all they put out all the right times.
When it goes in the middle with the blast beat,
it is breathtaking. There's like the spoken word bits and
and there's all the kind of all the different elements
of Death Heaven, like we said, they're all over this album.
This this song is like kind of like condensed it
into like I saw what a perfect eight minute package
that like outside of you know, dreamhouses are kind of like, well,
here's your first death Evan song that you need to hear.
Atheist is in that kind of caliber of like, if
you want to showcase this band, here you go.
Speaker 3: Yeah. I think this is the best song on the record,
both in theory, in printle and in actuality because in
eight minutes it captures everything that Death Heaven a gold
standard at and why they are one of that defining
one of the defining rock and metal bands sort of
their generation across all sub genres. When you think of
this time in the future, you'll look back and think
of Death Heaven, and I think it's stuff like this.
It's it's not just that they were doing stuff that
you know, very few people have thoughts to even do before,
but do it to such a standard that it's kind
of impossible to ignore or denight. And like, first listen
to this, like you don't know when it's going to
hold a blow torch up to your face or if
it's gonna let you breathe, and just alternates between those
two things. The eight minutes just disappear, and I think
itscause and everyone on the song is on unbelievable form.
But the leads are made my favorite sets of leads
on the record. The vocals just an out of this
world's performance. The rhythm section being that tightly wound. It
just whether it's going slow or fast, it just moves
through with.
Speaker 2: I don't know it.
Speaker 3: It's so natural that you're you're not conscious of how
many parts you're actually listening to, which is with songs
like this, that's really the trick.
Speaker 1: Yeah, what do you think of the the incidental tracks? See,
there's three interludes.
Speaker 2: I think the fact there's three of them and where
they're placed they become like an essential part of the
fabric of the record. Like I think they're like really,
I think the second one is kind of like the
most significantly in life fleshed out because.
Speaker 1: That one with is Boy Matthews from Boy Harsher.
Speaker 2: Yeah, and so they do those kind of things like
because that again that kind of comes out of amathere,
so it kind of takes me into the next chunk
of the record. It's but like even they're core, they're
they're like they're kind of the more experiment or like
playing with soundscapes and atmosphere. This one has that kind
of the eerie sort of spoken vocal and then that
horrible kind of noise section towards the end. It's it's
a really coold, and then the other two aren't as
kind of like because it's kind of been a through
line through the album, they feel necessary as kind of
stringing it all together.
Speaker 3: Yeah, And I think they're different enough despite all sharing
the same name, they're different enough from one another where
each one warrants its place, like if sometimes with albums
like these, where they put intoludes about the record, they
kind of all just do the same job, whereas this
was very deliberate in that you can tell that they
had they knew what they were setting up with each
of these interludes, and they knew where they had to
arrive by the end of it. And it means that,
you know, other records, you might just go, oh, you know,
I've heard them a few times. I don't really need them.
I can't. I can't see myself listening to this record
and skipping them.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 1: I mean it's different to so Somebaye that has three
interlude tracks on it, and those feel like almost like
continuous tail ends of the songs themselves, that it makes
the album kind of feel like one continuous piece to
a degree, And like I'll be listening to somebody sometimes
and I'll forget when one of the big songs has
actually ended, and that I'm like two minutes deep into
the interlude. Right, These are more like act breaks, like
they do feel like they announce themselves a little bit more.
I got to be curious to seeing on like a
on like an LP, like you know, to presume like
a double LP, which you know where they end up,
but they do. They more like act breaks, and two
is the most you know, elaborate one and we get
a full on like industrial harsh, more like something you'd
expect on a Full of Hell album, like a really
harsh industrial thing. It's more aggressive than I would expect
an interlude to be. And again, like on my first look,
the other previous bunch of songs are largely sort of lighter,
prettier songs, And on my first listen, I was like, okay,
I need something, you know, basically that came in at
the exact moment I needed it, particularly then when it
follows up with Revelator, which just completely that's the exact
moment in the app where I needed that level of like,
oh yes, you know, just completely unhinged Revelator again, really demonic,
horrible song. And then on the other side of you know,
you've got body behavior after that, and then the third
interlude there's Wenonah, which it doesn't sound exactly like it
there are you know, there's difference in how they write riffs,
how they're recorded, whatever, from the last like twelve years.
But were Noona is I think perhaps the closest to
the Sunbathea sound they have gotten since Sunbatha because it
is exaggerated, pronounced light speed kind of bliss. It is,
you know, a seven minute burst of you know, fireworks
and sustained kind of sunrays beaming down in your face.
It is that you know, my blood Valentine on steroids.
Huge that you know, like when the guitar sound opens up,
when it really goes, it's like such a cacophonously loud,
inhuman but bright wall of sound. And I didn't expect
the album, you know, on the album at that point,
after you know, several albums between you know, some bather
in this to suddenly get this like almost like last
tip of the hat to you know, that thing that
really started it off with them having filtered in all
these other influences. It was nice to just be like,
oh and have that burst at the end.
Speaker 2: I mean like when it was I was like, oh, cool,
slow build, yet building, and then it comes in almost
like other than a minute or star like build. You
are just hit with that like big crescendo almost right away,
and I'm like, oh, yeah, no, this this just sparkles.
This is that that bright, uplifting and just life affirming
kind of like I love music when it sounds like this,
when it just kind of like hits me like a
wall and all my emotions come pouring out, and I'm
like few bands can kind of just do that, and
there is a magic to win definitely, and it is
just like like Black Gays post Black met Wabit, it's
just the most blissful, like just like wonderful version of that.
And it's and it's just it's such a great trick
that they can put out like this like second to
last track on the record, and they're going to go like, yeah,
here you go, here's you know, you're going to feel
all the emotions on this one. It's so good.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I mean, it's They're one of the only bands
who I feel really evoked that thing of what must
have been like to hear Loveless in like nineteen ninety one,
because melodically, it's so happy and major key, but it's
so devastatingly loud and abrasive. Yeah, that is almost too
much to bear. And it's sort of how do you
step that up? Where you have to start? You have
to leave jangle pop and alt rock and go into
extreme metal to really maximize that. And when this shifts
into the major key territory towards the end, it's it's
the only word for it is euphoric. It's like you say,
it's fireworks. It's big, dazzling universe explosions before your eyes.
It it's that sort of thing where it's you almost
can't describe it. You do just have to listen to
and hear it for yourself.
Speaker 1: Yeah, and then there's a song the Marvelous Orange Tree
at the end, which I'm always surprised as another song
after the Fat right, because we Ona feels like such
a you know, pecan tree sort of moment. But the
Marvel's orangery is almost just like the kind of cherry
on top of what we've kind of achieved with you
know when, I'd be surprised if they played that song
without playing Winona immediately before it. You know what, I
mean in terms of, like, you know, the great critical
acclaim for this album, I, you know, Elliott similar to you.
I mean, obviously I liked it, but on my first
goes of this, I was like, this is very very good.
I don't necessarily know if I'm seeing the you know,
like best since Sunbather or whatever sort of appeal, and
I don't necessarily feel that way, but they are, you know,
six albums in and they've already transformed several times over.
This is like bringing everything they've you know, kind of
undergone over these years almost up to speed. And it's
like this is almost like the new Death Heavan model.
You know, It's like this could well be a you know,
it's a reset from where they or on Infinite Granite,
but in a way that it's just like a foundation
of everything that can then go from kind of here
on out.
Speaker 3: Well, that's what's so exciting about this record is it
could be there. It could be them going, you know,
we learn all these lessons over the first five album six,
it all comes together. Let's see where we go next,
or into them going this is like the coder the book. Yeah,
on the first half of our career, and maybe we'll
throw all of it out next time, maybe won't be
able to recognize anything that's here. And at this point,
even though I have my reservations by Infinite Granite, I
trust them and I'm fascinated to see what comes next.
And if either way, I love this record. I mean,
if this is the end of Death Heaven in this guise,
then what a hell of a way to bow out
doing this thing. And if it's kind of them opening
up the doors of the brave new world. You know
how many bands can boast having a sound that feels
totally theirs.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I think, you know, it was maybe the least
revelatory Death EAVN album. To me, it was the least
like I've had a real again the transformation that they've
undergone kind of time and turn again. But this has
the you know, it's got the structural and kind of
melodic directness of Infinite Granite, even if it is obviously
heavier than Infinite Granite. It's got the sharp, pointy edges
back from New Bermuda. It's got that kind of gothy
sort of disconcombobulation, sort of experimentation that you had on
bits of ordinary Carprema Love And as we said, even
that little bit of taste of some bath at the end,
and I am, you know, I'm liking it more and
more and more. And it's pretty obvious that at this stage,
you know, Death Heavan they aren't putting anything out that
they really haven't really you know, put their all into.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I think this is probably they're just a band
I trust to like, Like again, it's like I guess
infinite grantite, So it's one of them, like whatever does
to make I have absolute faith that there's going to
be something rewarding to get for me, even if it
comes four years later, whether that reward like truly hits
Like I'm just so like willing to let Death Heaven
go off into whatever ventures they want to do now
and I'm along for the ride.
Speaker 1: Yeah, And it's you know, it's it's still an extreme
out extreme metal album, if you want to say, it
kind of belongs to that that will immediately impress you know,
the largest amount of people more than basically anything else
in it's lane. And it's almost like it's kind of
only in competition with you know, their own works rather
than you know, anyone else. It's just like, you know,
it's an album from the Big Boys. So there you go,
Death Heaven, Lonely, People with Power, our other you know.
Lead review comes from Scowl. It's an album called Are
We All Angels. It's their second album, and it feels
more and more like with every release. I mean, this
is the third major, you know, kind of significantly publicized release.
Scowl have been positioned as a big deal and this
album after you know, the the places they started appearing
after the first album and then the psychic dance routine
kind of be built on that. This is where we've
been like, oh yeah, this is like being positioned as
one of the real, like breakout albums of this year.
They've just done their you know, the other week, their
late night TV debut or was it Stephen Colbert? So, Sam,
what is it about Scowl that you think has taken
them very quickly? Right?
Speaker 2: You know?
Speaker 1: Back to twenty twenty one is when the fifteen minute
long album How Flowers Grow came out, and at that
point in time, they were you know, one of a
number of hardcore bands with like little short, catchy names
who could go on to do something. And now they
seem to be you know, sniffing some of the rare
air of your you know, Turnstiles, et cetera. They got
pushed to the moon really quickly that they were playing
Coachella and you know, appearing on a tack of bell
and all these kind of things, and you know, it
is a nonsense attitude. But that's why there are some
people out there who have been like you know, industry
plant whatever, even if they're largely just suspicious of colorful
haired women, like you know, the idea that Scowl appeared
and then got pushed them move very very quickly in
terms of that push. Why do you think Scowl have
been the one who have kind of like you know,
been given that baton.
Speaker 2: Well, I think like because it's like easying with that.
The whole intro pars like that so comes up. You
get people from like the hardcore scene, they're like no
scale of being fucking legit from day one that they
came up through the scene. So like there's that, but
for me, it was and it almost immune because of
like ambition beyond hardcore that they that right away like
they did. You know, I love the Holthous Grower album,
but it's you know, just a fifteen minute, ferocious hardcore
punk album with like one song that kind of like
shows like, oh, you know, we're doing a few little
different things, but it was on that side diction. They
showed quite early, and they're like, Okay, we don't want
to be confined, we don't want to be constrained by hardcore.
We don't want to be seen as just a hardcore band,
so we're gonna show our ambition early and again, like
maybe the greenhead vocalist like, is you know a marketable
thing like that? There's that That's maybe why some people
who wouldn't necessarily latch onto hardcore have latched on to
scal so quickly. But I think it's a combination of
just showing ambition, showing a kind of like savviness to
like still be true to hardcore, but push yourself well
beyond those spaces that But they've been able to very
quickly on album to step into spaces well beyond hardcore,
Like Turnstarle It took a couple of albums. Scowl have
kind of gone not like shortcuted to it, but they
they've kind of shown that, like we want to, you know,
show that straight away while still being true to who
they are.
Speaker 1: Yeah, Elliott, you know i'd go to Sam first on
the scale stuff, but you were very keen on psychic
dance routine as well, and then you had it like
your EP of the year or something. So, you know,
when we were talking back then a couple of years
ago about what you would like or imagine seeing on
a you know, a follow up, just to recap, we
had one album of pretty out and out, bloodthirsty hardcore,
just all screaming two step stuff. Then we had an
EP that very suddenly unveiled this kind of whole potential
of them to tap into this kind of melodic alternative side,
and that very quickly turned them into one of the
most kind of like hotly tip coolest bands in the world.
What were you thinking or expecting in terms of, like,
you know, a second album follow up to the EP
that really kind of broke them in that way.
Speaker 3: One of the things I loved about that EP, wash
and I think I said this at the time, was
they did what basically all bands should do when they
releasing EP, which is it's a free hit, try some
stuff out. If it works, go further if not, nothing lost. Yeah,
and seeing them explore alt rock and power pop and
how good is it they were? I definitely wanted to
see more of that, but I also I wanted whatever
came next to Harness that sort of free spirited energy
that that EP has where you put it on the
first time and you don't know from ten seconds to
the next where they're going to go. And could they
sustain that over the course of a record. Maybe not,
but the prospect of them doing that was so appealing.
That's kind of what I was hoping for. But what
I was expecting was kind of what we have here,
which is a record that makes me, you know, I
find myself asking are they still a hardcore band?
Speaker 1: Yeah?
Speaker 3: And I don't even say that as a criticism, but
just as a you know, as a mark of how
different this is from the first record. You're questioning if
it's the same genre.
Speaker 1: Yeah, let's put a pin in an particular question for
a moment. Could we will come back to it in
just a second. But yeah, Like in terms of I think,
you know, psychic dance routine, the surprise is kind of done.
They're like, oh my god, Scour are doing this right.
They are like they have fucking like you know, radio
hit standard songs in them, which you didn't see coming
on the first album. That's the surprise at the way
and what you were saying, like, are they able to
you know, reinvent themselves over? I mean this is like
a you know, over thirty minute album that's basically twice
as long as any release they put out before, right.
Speaker 2: All their life music beforehand and then some.
Speaker 1: Yeah, the first album and the Psychic Dance Routine EP
together is shorter than a thirty minute album, right, So
there is slightly stretching how much they could realisticly reinvent
themselves over the course of something like this. So I
don't think this has that about it in the way
that the EP did, but in terms of just like,
you know, realizing what you wanted that to be there,
I guess you know, has this happened? Done it?
Speaker 3: Yes, I'll tell you I think this record is very good.
I wouldn't go as fars say that I think it's
great as a record. There's stuff that they develop on
this record that I'm really keen on, and there are
moments on here that made me go that might be
the best stuff you've released so far. But I do
think that quality dimension, which is maybe too much for
a herculean task to put on any band to sustain
that level of excitement over thirty minutes. I don't think
they've quite brought that feeling over.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 3: If I can see if they decided, well, let's exchange
that and write some fully fleshed out songs that really
explore each of these individual ideas, I can see why
they've made that swap. But for me, it's not quite
as sort of visually exciting.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I generally sort of agree. I think this album
is really really fun, it's really really strong. I don't
think it quite blows my hair back the way that
the EP did.
Speaker 3: But let's go back to the hardcore question.
Speaker 1: I suppose. Yeah, we speak of Scowl in terms of
hardcore because that's where they come from. Hardcore bands are
very hard to separate from their roots culturally, even when
they actually start to sound different. And I think there
are bits on this where you go, oh, that spit
that like moment. There is so hardcore. More so, I
think it's just an out and out punk rock record. Yeah,
it has, you know, sharper mushier moments at times, maybe,
but it's a suns out punk rock record, and you
know there are bits of that again. Psycho Dancer Uteen
has those like kind of nineties harder end of Green
Day moments on it, which I love and I think,
you know, hardcore releases. I think this is a pretty
fun thing to come out of that world this year
in terms of like punk rock, hard hard edged but
melodic rock. This year clearly one of the very best
things that will will will happen in that world. And
you know, kind of looking at it just as what
it is. Here is a set of like you know again,
thirty minutes of songs that will have bits that will
make you kind of two step and marsh, but more
so they're just gonna make you kind of, you know,
bubbily jump around in a funny, sunny frenzy. It's it's
a great time. And Sam, this is where I imagine
you'll probably like absolutely love it.
Speaker 2: I mean maybe I am just a mark for this
band or this sound. I just fucking love everything about
this album. This is what I want rock albums to sound. Yeah,
it's really good because because here's the thing, Like Ie,
it's not a hard album, but it's rock music played
by a hardcore band. You can still tell they're a
fucking hardcore band from the drums from the guitar tone,
from the way they attack the risks, even on the
sort of the mold parts, Like like even on songs
you know, like whether it's slower, there'll be that switch
up where you're can go like ah, that's a fucking
hardcore band locking in right there, Like yeah, this is
this is me music. This is like because it has
got that bubblegum power pop mix with kind of like
bounce around punk rock mix with kind of like just
ragged hardcore in there. Mix with the kind of like
cool nineties or rock grungey sort of stuff in there
as well. It's it's so me this album, And I'm like, again,
I can recognize that maybe like it's not as kind
of revltory as Psychic Dance Routine was, But I hit
play on this and I'm just so happy the entire time,
and I want to listen to it again immediately afterwards.
I can't, like again, like this is gonna be a
very bias, Like I'm just too much for a mark
for this to.
Speaker 1: To be too critical about it. Only it is biased
because they do it very very fucking well. Well.
Speaker 2: I do think I like, I agree, I think that
there is that, but I think you'll be able to
offer some a bit more of like the critical kind
of like nuances. Well, I'm just like, yeah, but the
bit in tonight, I'm afraid where it goes fast at
the end is fucking electrifying, and it's like one of
my favorite things to happen this year. Yeah.
Speaker 1: No, I mean in terms of criticisms, again, I don't
really have many. All I'm saying is that I think
if you put the next the bands who are like
at that tip of the hardcore mountain, whether it be
Turnstile or not Loose or whatever, maybe Scowl seem like
they play with a more certain set of limitations and
building blocks, right, but they are for a godsend for
like punk rock with catchy.
Speaker 3: Pop hooks, right, you know, yeah, that is a whole heart.
Speaker 1: Yeah, and it's nice to have something doing that that
comes with those tangible hardcore ethics and as you say,
that real spark of danger still you know throughout it,
And you know, I would compare them more so to
you know, some of the definitive TNM bands often ones
that we've either lost or haven't been too active recently.
I was obviously we've mentioned Milk Teeth before in relation
to you know, I think they did a thing in
the UK that no one else has come close to
in their absence. When this album goes really spiky, it's
one of the only things to have come along since
that has tapped into a little bit maybe what Marmosettes
were bringing ten years go. It's that level of like
spiky energy but also pop blood command as well, who
happily are still around, you know, killing it today.
Speaker 2: But I mean, like you did just send these bands
that are like just some of my like fair yeah,
just doing that, like.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I forgot to put the new bloo amand single
in the news earlier, but like you know, they're still
around doing that thing great but just lively punk rock
you don't have to think about them too hard kind
of songs, and they aren't afraid to kind of clay
your eyes out like a cat. This is a strong
set of them. I think Special was a very clear
lead off track. Like I think for all of this
album is that in terms of immediate uh you know,
kind of like almost like dollar signs in your Eyes
melody is a bit of a step up above most else.
I think that really like beautiful wash Over you Hook
that's still pacy and energetic, and the way it feeds
in the little bounce off kind of ear worm backing
vocal is really well done. But even that has like
you know, uh, it's a two step pace. Even though
it it feels sort of melancholic, it is rattling at you.
I almost feel like that needs like a Queens of
Stone Age slash turba Negro style one note piano hammering
that chorus just to pop it off really, you know,
make it perfect.
Speaker 2: I mean that thing is that I love it, like
because Cat when she's singing, she's quite like laid back
and sort of reserving the thing she's belting out. A
lot of the melodies, it's quite like quiet and almost
to me whispered. But it just plays so brilliant against
the band where it never feels low energy, even if
she's not, you know, screaming, and then and then like again,
the moments where she does go like that, that build
of tension and sort of the bridge of special is wicked.
I think Babe is like the closest thing you'd say
to what like scour beforehand when that song comes in
and it's just this ragged punk rock with a screaming
and then a sort of bouncy bubblegum chorus. I'm like that,
that's the sort of you could put that quite nicely
alongside some of the stuff on the Psychic Dancery TDP.
But it all just can like the way the album
begins with that, that that one two punch of like
this is kind of like big nineties rock. You could
put this on a to like there are songs that
it's coulda be on the fucking coolest soundtrack and movies
like that. It's got that vibe to it, but with
that element of danger, and that just I fucking love that.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I mean the level of chorus, particularly in the
first half of the record, even though my favorite course
isn't in this section but special Babe, not Heaven, not
Hell or not Hell, not Heaven Tonight. I'm afraid they
don't make a habit of wasting them And basically all
of them have been stuck in my head at one
time or another, and I think, you know, I think
you're right, pund that may be compared to their direct competition,
for lack of a better word, like maybe they do
have more obvious limitations or at least play within the
limitations a bit more, but they might be one of
the better ones at that pop hook songwriting like turnstile
off a cop with some a lot underwater boy, you know,
I mean where that could be an MGMT song and
none of bat an eyelid. But in terms of hooky,
you know, milk teeth akin melodic songwriting, they absolutely smash it.
Speaker 1: Yeah, and Sam, you used to wear bubblegum In regards
to the specifically the chorus on Babe and I have
the exact same word written down, because that does like
you're saying that the riff in that is scowl from
five years ago, right, But when it comes in with
the just that that does feel like, oh ship, you know,
you're you're really exploring like the little, tiny little pockets
where you can almost effortlessly bounce along something like even
Tho when they start putting a looking like ooh ooh,
just those like little you know, with like just hummable
little things in there.
Speaker 2: Like that that's all over them? How high is all
like that?
Speaker 1: Hey?
Speaker 2: Hell yeah, that's They're all across this record, and they're
just these great little earworms that they just sort of
tuck into these songs and then they're concise, like punchy,
like songs that are not wasting time, but they're all catchy.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I want to go back to you were saying
that Kat as a singer, she almost like she doesn't
actually sing very hard, like she doesn't overly say things.
She does exist in a like, uh, you know, almost
like effortless, too cool for school sort of tone. And
I think on my first listens, my instinct maybe is
I connect a little bit more with singers who are
gonna fucking throw it at you. And there are points
where I almost wanted to, like I wanted to coax
her out of that little shell a little bit. But
on repeat listens again, just the way they're they're like
placed in the songs, whether it be that little popping
part in Babe or whatever. You know, I can't deny
she does it well and she finds the pockets to
utilize that style well. And it means there are little
moments when she actually does go slightly beyond that. Like
there's the song let You Down, where about about six
or seven songs in it's like at that point I
was like, Okay, I need to slightly sell this beyond.
And that's the point Ice again. It was like saying
fucking Revelator on the death of an album. It comes in,
it's like, oh shit, you're she's moving higher into the
fucking like, you know, into into the zone and puts
a little bit more air into it. And I like
that they're not adverse to, you know, doing that, so
it's not every single chorus delivered in that exacting kind
of way.
Speaker 3: That's my favorite song on the record, comfortably. I mean,
for a lot of this record, I am sort of
oh that sort of sounds like Navana smashing Pumpkins, Green Day, Turnstile, whoever.
And you know, they're great at all those things. That
song reminded me of and that we've covered recently on
one of the album swaps and one of the best
old rock albums of the last decade plus, Crying Beyond
the Fleet and Gales, And there has been nothing quite
in that style in nine years or in the eighties
since that band broke up, and that sort of sunshine
on your face, euphoric, fizzy pop songwriting.
Speaker 2: I've got again fizzy in my notes written about that
exact song, like they're cliches, but like Scout hit those
cliche marks that you make you want to say these
things it is.
Speaker 3: It's just when that comes in that to me is
like as good as this record is, that's the clear
standout and it's the moment on the record that made
me feel most like the Psychic Dance Routine EP did
not because it is as wild and free spirited in
you know, it has compared one song to a Holy EP,
but it captures that same sort of anything's possible. I
mean it just it just puts you in a good
mood listening to it.
Speaker 1: Yeah, and again it's not it's not one of my
favorite songs on the record, but the hey, how hig
are you think? Just the alliteration of it feels like
it's designed to plant itself on your head. There are
again those slightly weird uh you know, alternative rock, but
not just the boring thing that we will imagine with that,
Like it's slightly more off the you know, Beaaten track
kind of pulls with stuff like fleshed Out, where they
have this like weird discordant side to them. I again,
you think about riffins like it dance routine right that
and it's strange thing fleshed Out is like unsane slash
helmet goes bubblegum pop, and you know it's like.
Speaker 2: It's like sleazy bubblegum pop. Yeah, like the riff can
like SLINKs along in like a mocking way. But again,
it's just got these like fun sort of like poppy
vibe and it's.
Speaker 1: Got this weird robot monotonous hook, which is obviously what
they're aiming for their They're not doing a sing along
pop punk thing there. It is a quite harsh alien
approach to pop punk and I like that. And you
can kind of feel the California coming off with them
with that kind of you know, like sunny surf energy
of maybe what like drain doing like out and out
you know, heavy hardcore and that kind of slightly airy,
breathy California accent that she has again on like how
high are You and stuff like that. But I think
it's just commendable. I think how much they have naturally
integrated that, like having the clean vocal and that melody
as an arsenal even when they are basically playing hardcore
songs right again, like Babe and the first songs we're mentioning, like,
you know the way that they have after that kind
of first pull of psychic dance routine. Basically, what you
want to do is go like, kay, can you you know,
utilize that more consistently over something like this? And in
that sense, I think that they they do that, and
I think you can expec from this point. You know,
when they do fast punk songs, you could just as
easily expect them to be all sung as they are
all you know, screamed, and they will kind of you know,
flip between both in that regard.
Speaker 2: But I love a song like Cellophane, which is like
got a big OLC and like ignorant hardcore riff. It's
one of those sort of like more like if you
change the vocals, this would be a pure hard.
Speaker 1: That's the most hard bit of the record. That sounds
like Madal picking up.
Speaker 2: Yeah, it's like it's got a beat down sort of
moment in it, but again it's just got those bubblegum
pop vocals and it's again that's somethings like I don't
get enough of that, and I'm like, I love that
kind of like like contrast between like I say, it
just a fi swinging like like ignorant hardcore song with fun,
catchy pop melodies and then to me, I'm just like
this is this more bad? Should do this? It's so
much it's so cool when it's done right. And I
mean that those are the sort of moment where I'm
like this where Scout have that kind of X factor
for me that has kind of just mark the matters
of the wave of you know, the one word sort
of snappy hardcore sounding bands. They have been the one
I've latched onto the most because they they're the one
pulling out songs like.
Speaker 1: This, yeah and the last song and there's a couple
of like slightly woozier songs in a row towards the end,
but then the last one they go, you know, here
fucking the circle jerks, just fast hardcore. I like that
Scale have that in them.
Speaker 3: I agree.
Speaker 1: I mean, I think, you know, the fact that they
are doing what they're doing so kind of kind of
clearly speaks for itself. I think of the the really
big hardcore bands that we mentioned a lot, most of
them got their start in the twenty tens. Even if
they're reaching new heights in the twenties, Scowl are pretty
clearly the you know, popular, definitive band of this particular
you know, last couple of years generation.
Speaker 2: Yeah, you'd put it like them in speed and kind
of like other to that are clearly really stepy.
Speaker 1: I think Scowl a lot more more to them, more
star powers and speed.
Speaker 2: And that's why I would say is I think like speed,
if you just want the pure hardcore, you know, you
can just go go down for speed, but Scout have
like a higher ceiling where I think they could go
to some really cool places.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I mean I think this record is I've said
I think this is really good, and if they can
harness that thing, that's maybe it's just not possible to
stretch that over thirty minutes. I'm totally open to that.
But to be honest, I kind of realized during this
review I'm being a little Lord font Law. Again. It's
another batch of fucking great punk rock songs and it's
like with bubblegum choruses and bits that remind us of
unsane and I'm complaining that it's not odd and surprising enough,
so I'll shut up. This is like like really hard
again for a sophomore record, a really bold step and
again proof of my theory that when you do an EP,
do some weird shit because it will give you the
guts to take a leap like this, and I think
this is substantially better than the first record.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I agree with what you were saying in terms
of like almost ple having to take a fort as
and being like, yeah, cool, that's fucking great. Clearly, Like
even if you know, of the three releases, the psychoedantyuteene
Ep right now is clearly my favorite one. But I
look at this and I go, well, what we wanted
you to do really was take those lessons and kind
of meld them just into your identity. And in terms
of like going, this is you know, album number two,
major release number three, this is what Scourly is, this
is what we do altogether. This does it, and it
does it in a you know, it's still pretty snappy, fun,
you know, made for just repeat lessens kind of way.
And considering like we we barely review most of what
counts as mainstream rock, Like what are radio songs in
twenty five if the radio even exists, right, but the
kind of rock songs that should fill that role. You know,
we are more removed from that A T and M
than maybe we've ever been. But here is something that
is right on that vanguard of hardcore visibility, but you
also don't even really have to like hardcore that much
to like it. You can, you know, just have fun
with this.
Speaker 2: Yeah yeah, I mean again I said, this is what
I wish more rock music sound like I wish it had.
This melody is just fun. But a band to are
this sort of dialed in and like again a gatata
in that has a bit of like grip to it
and a drum sound that is like a proper drum
sound and doesn't feel like it's been programmed by a
million computers to sound as big as possible.
Speaker 1: Yeah, so new scal album. You probably really heard it,
but there's our take on it. Are we all angels?
We're gonna move on to a band that I hope
everyone is very familiar with by this point, Employed to Serve,
we're going to talk about and their new album is
called Fallen Star. It's coming out this coming Friday, ahead
of when we've released this episode, the fifth album from
Employee to Serve. It's ten years this year since the
first one. Greater than you remember, We are definitely old,
We're definitely grayer that we remember at this point. But
I think this is a moment where we can look
at that ten years, we can go what a cracking
decade that has been for this band, because I think
there's something about Employed to Serve where, you know, they're
very familiar to us here in the UK right, like
we've there've been such a staple presence for so long.
I think a lot of us probably feel like we
know what Employed to Serve do, even though they have changed,
because you know, in that decade they have mastered mathcore,
they have gone into like kind of more progressive leaning,
you could even call it like slightly post hardcore territory.
They've gone all out moshmode, pitstir and metal and now
here on album five, on the cusp of you know,
like a new decade for them, we've got some new
flavors again. And I think whatever your favorite Employed to
Serve record or era is, I think a lot of
us will maybe have different ones that we most feel
that sense of like this is my one, and whatever
you may think of what they end up doing on
this new one, there's something to admire there, and I
think this is a moment where we can just look
at that and appreciate just what a consistently engaging band
that they have been.
Speaker 2: I think that's it. They've never released the same album
twice like they they They've always had a unique flavor
to each album. It's been each album always been exciting
to listen to because we're like, so what are we
getting this time? You know, like are we getting? Like no,
it's allful emotion. That was just the most like dulled in,
just like here are Moss songs that you are going
to stomp about to, and then you know, we're like, well,
here's just big riffers. Here is just like big metal
songs that you can bang your head to, and I'm like,
there's not the biggestep between them, but they're still different
flavors of it, and it's always just a nice sort
of fun thing to be like, so what have you
got for me this time? Employed to serve? Yeah?
Speaker 3: I mean, I think of all the bands of the
T and m Era, I can't think of many that
I have an artistic trajectory that I think is cooler
than theirs in the sense that most bands of their
sort of this is that first record, that sort of panic,
calld frantic hardcore scene. Most of those of those bands
don't have the imagination or the will to even attempt
let Let's alone succeed at crossing over that arena metal
thing the eventually they do on the last couple of records.
A lot of those bands, even if they're great, they
don't sort of keep the listener on their toes all
that much. And like you're saying part about everyone's got
their their own favorites, those are actually the bands I
typically prefer. I prefer when bands don't have one. You know,
this is the thing we do. We have one classic
album of that and the rest is just variations on
that theme. Whatever your taste lends you towards, you'll have
a different favorite employee to serve record and any and
all of them I think are as credible and justifiable
as the others.
Speaker 1: Yeah, and it's the fact that they've actually been able
to still be around to achieve that because so many
of the crop of UK bands that I would see
employed to serve alongside, you know, eight ten years ago
we Lament, you know, Black Peaks and Heck and you
know Palm Reader have just gone. Bands that have come
through since employed Survey and Ithaca are gone, and it's
nice to have someone from that scene actually been like
be able to undergo the evolution that some of those
other bands, we can only imagine what they could have
gone through. Right Whereas it's like themn's Svalbard really who
you know fittingly Serena has a spot on this album.
They're like almost like the survivors of that generation of
UK bands who have been able to endure and actually
blossom in the way that we would hope for all
of them. And I think for that reason a lot
of us feel you know, affection for them. I feel
such admiration for them in that regard. And when it
comes to the you know, quite polished, pretty accessible, groovy
metal records that employed to serve in their current incarnation
have been making. They're one of the only band honestly
doing that at the moment in the whole world who
I would consistently look to as like something I actually
care about, you know, because it's like, yeah, we have
something to talk about with an employer to serve record
when even in that kind of you know, like big
arena metal thing, it's not boring, it's not just you know,
cookie cutter. Conquering. Their last album is fucking brilliant. A
Turner Forward Motion was great. Conquering I think was greater.
And there was something about that Damnation performance last year
and they played it that felt like it was like
wrapping up the cycle for that in a bow, which
had taken them, you know, supporting Kajira, you know, festival
may stages or whatever, all these things. I almost felt
at the end of that it's like Employed to Serve
have completed that sort of like Lamb of God, Machine
Heady new wave of American heavy metal via Woking hardcore,
you know, thing that they developed there and I don't
know if they're making an album of just that thing
that is better than that one. So yeah, where next?
And I guess that is the question that Fall and
Star asks, and it does so in some you know,
uh familiar but also enough surprising ways.
Speaker 2: Yeah, this is one again, like because you know we
had you know that that first single, and we will
kind of be like this is this is different. This
is doing new things that we didn't really expect Fromployed Service.
So asking like, is this employed shot at the casuals
to try and like capture some of that audience, because
I want to see the counts. I mean, like they
this is them doing because I think at points you
can say, this is them doing commercial metalcore that we
rag on so much, and so that that's that should
like in theory set off alarm bell, shouldn't it if
we're saying employed are are doing that? But I don't
think it is just that. I mean there is again,
there's so much more on this album there. There's there's
so many kind of like other flavors they put on
this album. I think it's a really interesting This has
been the longest the moment that like the hardest employee
to about for me to wrap my head around in
terms of like not hahim planning, but like, yeah, this
is so fucking gonna love this. I'm kind of like, hmm, okay, cool,
I need to you know, mull over this for a
little bit and taking what you're doing, which again I
think is actually in a way a positive to the
album because it's it was not something I necessarily expected
from them, and and it's gonna take a little while
to again still fully figure out my my thoughts this album.
But it's good. That's why we're here, you know. It's
more interesting I'm to discuss as a result.
Speaker 3: I mean, for me, the last two records took a
little bit of a while for me to get my
head around, particularly Conquering, which I really wasn't sure about
until I saw them with Good Year, and then suddenly
it all clicked somewhere back to that record and liked
it much more. But at least with those records, there's
a pretty succinct elevator pitch some you basically did at
the beginning. It was like, you know, there's the Marsha
one and then the big one, like you can you
can sum up quite nicely. Whereas this one it's like
you say, it's it's is that there shot of the casuals. No,
but it's also got the most heavy metal leaves they've
ever had in it. Obvious chorus that I thought sounded
a bit like a data Remember, it's just the combination
of things is not as clear cut and maybe like
decisive as it had been on the previous records, where
that's the vision, has it fulfilled or not? Yes or no?
You know we all think the answer is yes. This
time it's like I don't know exactly what the thing
if they if they had you know, a north star,
if you will, for this record, I don't know exactly
what that is. And I find that kind of fascinating.
Speaker 1: Yeah, in a similar way, I don't like if you know,
if they had something written on a blackboard in the
studio while that they would look to, I don't know
what that is written on, you know, On this record,
it feels more like they've just kind of gone, what
if we tried this? And then over here, what if
we you know, I've had this idea, what if.
Speaker 2: We did this?
Speaker 1: And that could be very very messy, But there is
something about this way, Like I say, there are parts
in this which are almost like the most well clearly
the most accessible to your everyday random whatever, the you know,
kind of average center of the ven diagram metal Head
in twenty twenty five is. But there's also the weirdest
stuff maybe they've ever done that I can't, I can't
you know call it that. Yeah, I agree. It's the
first employee to have album that I haven't like, immediately
loved all the way through, and like, you know, it's
in this like when I got Conquering, I got the promo,
I was fucking hollering and cackling the whole way through
from my first listen because of so many bits in it.
This is not quite hot in the same way. It
feels more like it is again just surprising, and you know,
at various points that are delighted by it as well.
And when we got a tonguement, you know, we were
were more pronounced sentive melody. There are bits on this.
I think they're putting more emphasis on texture, you know,
than the last two albums. I was kind of expecting
that it did. You know, when we got Treachery at
the start, I did I for goo, Oh yeah, hang on,
we are still talking about a fucking metal band because like,
not a second to settle in it, just a single
snare hit, bam, you're off. And then what I can
only assume is Sammy directly aping and doing his own
version of the Angel of Death scream.
Speaker 2: Like things because I listened to was doing seeing what
I listened to like prior to Lisa's album. So I
was like, that was kind of okay, I thieve that,
And then I hit playing and got Treachery and I
cackled like I could not stop laughing at that riff
with like Sammy doing that scream. I was like, oh cool, No,
you haven't mellowed out too much. You're still employees.
Speaker 1: Yeah, but that scream moment, which is just it's it's
so it's funny right in a good way, because it
reminded me of, like you know it, it's a marker
of their character. I think it's free spirited. Yeah, it's
joyous and free spirited. I think the fun that has
shone through him employed to serve, particularly since they started
playing you know out and help metal come through great.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I mean, like you said, the only song i'd
heard from this before I was Atonement, which was the
one that I thought sounded a bit like A Day's
Remember at points, and then Treachery kicking off like that.
I mean with that snare tone, it's just shit. It's
so fucking loud, like it's so in your face, it's
so at it. And yet somehow that the whole thing
sounds like it could fit in an arena setting. They
just sound at this point, they sound so confident doing
this sort of thing. It's it harks back enough to
those early records in terms of approach, because it's just
so like white hot aggressive, but taking the lesson of
the last couple of records and having that real muscled
up sound, it it touches on that thing that Lamb
of God had pre sacrament like before they sort of
setled into those liquid grooves and they just sounded like
an insane, unhinged metal band. And getting that as your
track one is such like a statement of intent even
then doesn't necessarily follow that path it's carved.
Speaker 1: Yeah, And I think one of them maybe the key
thing that has kept me to engage with employe to
serve when a lot of what counts for like more
mass appeal heavy metal has kind of fallen off in
my interest is I can hear how enthusiastic the people
in this band are for you know, like the history
of their art form. And yeah, a lot of you know,
heavy music in this kind of lane have a very
heavy tone. It will have heavy parts, it will have
the drops and stuff, not a lot of actual riffs.
Like I feel like rifts are less important today than
they have maybe ever been employed to serve big riffers.
And yeah, I think the way that they do like
the modern chuggy heavy thing, but also with the flare
of heavy metal, I think I don't think people quite
recognize what a difficult balance that is because so few
bands have actually done that right, actually using like the
whole threat board, like you know, doing those little runs
that Sammy does, and that's just a big, you know,
selling point all the way through it, as it had
been for the last you know, several records. When I
think about the slightly broader side of Employed to Serve,
I think on one rung of that, you have the
Warmth of a Dying Sun, which feels like a maybe
a bit of a standalone record in their catalog that
the things that they were doing there in regards to
like building crescendos and stuff like that, like the more patient,
long form bits of what they tapped into there. And
you know, while like again I've praised plenty of what
they've done since, I think if there's one thing in
their music that I do miss a bit, is that
thing that they did on that specifically that one record.
This has more emphasis again on like texture and you know,
like yeah, quiet and loud, harsh and soft and stuff
then the two albums they've done prior to this one,
But it's not going back to what that Warmth of
a Dying Sun thing was. It is a little bit
more like you know, stuff like the title track and
on Break Me Down, they are more out and out
clean passages and more kind of overtly melodic. And again
that's some of the stuff where like I don't necessarily
know if I am like fully in yet on like
let's say the minute or soo intro of the song.
Me down right, I don't know if I'm fully there
with it yet, but they feel like again that they're
like deliberately trying to go we've not added that into
our music yet. Can we kind of eke out a
little bit of, you know, something something fresh kind of
from moving into those alleys.
Speaker 2: I mean that's things like the title track. I was
kind of like that is doing you know, the sort
of the soft, clean kind of verse, bigger course thing
that that. Again, I do a social of law contemporary meticals,
and I was like, do I like employees of doing this?
I mean I think first, I mean, you get that
like intro where you get this piano, but then that
riff hits and Sammy's doing those like pinches all over
that riff and kind of like, yeah, they are just
frying better rifts to kind of like punctuate the heavy
moments more. And then like it does it does do
something that I'm fair we shouldn't like, but just by
the way employees of go at it, and they managed to.
It's a tricky balancing act of trying to do something
that can be you know, more commercial, without it sounding
too water down into the shit we rag on like
all of you know last month's reviews ragging on, but.
Speaker 3: Like the riffs.
Speaker 2: If the song on the title track had the fucking
stop gent riff that all these bands have, I think
I would hate it. But they are employees are better
than that, and they are writing proper rifts that are
metal rips, as you say, that are just way more
interesting and are way more inventive and creative and fun
and just nice to listen to.
Speaker 3: Well, this, to me reveals what makes those medical bands
who rag on so much worse because, like you say,
on paper, this shares some similarities with it, but you
listen to this and the production isn't stale and static.
It sounds like a band. The riff is interesting. It's
not just that stock gent riff that could be copied
and pasted from anywhere else.
Speaker 1: You know.
Speaker 3: The two vocalists have personality and you know, sound like
they care, do you know what I mean? It's fairly
basic fundamental things But it makes a difference, doesn't It
makes all the difference because when I listen to stuff
like the title track, which, like we say on paper,
has a lot in common with the stuff we rag on,
I don't get that same feeling.
Speaker 2: Now.
Speaker 3: I don't know if I like it as much as
the stuff on this record that is perhaps more attuned
to the stuff that I typically like, the stuff that
depends on hardcore and extreme metal and that sort of thing.
But if that thing they if that came out as
the mission statement of this is the sort of thing
employees of a folding into the recipe this time that
should set off alarm bells. And the fact that upon
listening to the record, it doesn't really I mean, that's
that's worth applauding in and of itself.
Speaker 1: Yeah, And even though like you know, break Me Down
has like a weird kind of looping percussive electronic element
in there, and there are bits of like you know,
full like almost like eight string kind of sounds on there,
but at least I go, yeah, it comes on a
vikingdom come as well, and I can hear that. I'm like,
you've actually heard at least nothing by my sugar, right,
as in the album not nothing. It's not just the
xerox of the xerox, you know, And I think the
experimentation feels genuine and it hasn't come at the expense
of the power that you're here for. Like if this
was like, you know, the last Ghost in Side album
or something, you got a song like Familiar Pain, which
is just like classic that's it.
Speaker 2: You go from break Break Breaks Me Down into Familiar Pain,
which is all out frashing with blast beats and again
bits of black metal and two step riffs, like it's
all there, like you just you're hearing all those beats.
I'm like when they're making the deviations again like has
symps to have like that sounds like you could be
on an a heavy metal album at points, Like some
of the simple stuff on that, like.
Speaker 1: I'm actually I'm I'm impressed with a restraint that they
haven't just basically borrowed Rainbow and the darks keyboard. It's like,
you know, it's happening there.
Speaker 2: Simps that do sound The only thing that was like
they don't sound that kind of like opening sim that
is on Holy Diver, that song like basically the very
modern metal core version of Yeah. It's relatable and that
that makes it more interesting.
Speaker 1: And Atonement was like a bit of a curve when
we heard it at first, but it's so clearly one
of the metal ear worms of the year, Like that
chorus pops into my head. Yeah, it's all the time.
And you know the bit with Will Ramos at the end,
maybe he's got a little bit of the kind of
like the throw all, kind of a teeny bit of
the sleep, a teeny bit of the sleep tokens or something.
But I think on you know, in a vacuum on
its own merits, I probably wouldn't have you noticed or
pulled that out at all. And speaking about how still
unmistakably heavy metal, it is actual fucking guitar solo that
feels like, you know, like the sun kissing your ears
at that point, it's great.
Speaker 3: I do.
Speaker 1: I like the bit in the middle of just like
reading the track list when I can feel the man
o war rippling off of Brother stand beside Me until
now or by Kingdom Come, like have I put fighting
the world on, not against it? It's great and you know,
I think it's fun. How I often lament Conquering should
have really been like their kind of big international breakthrough
album on the level that we've seen from and I
can not loose or someone on their last album, like
the songs and the riffs are certainly in the same canyon.
But I like on this you can see like over
a decade of grind they started to tap into some
places and so they've got you know, here's Will Ramos
and here's Jesse Leach right like they're you know, they're
collecting them like power stones a little bit, and they're
you know, commanding a bit of respect from these like
serious pillars in the likes of Jesse Leach and the
thrash on that Jesse track when it starts that intro
is absolutely nails. It's brilliant.
Speaker 2: Yeah no, like Jesse EAT's song. It sounds like exactly
what imployed on with Jesse to do. Is that them
kind of doing the sort of the frashier end of
naughties metalcore, which like fuck yeah, please just give me
more of that. I think the Will Ramos guest spot
is the one that's kind of gonna do the most
for them. I was going with you gonna go oh,
I came here for Will Ramas and I discovered this
band house cool, Like, that's great. Justified the guest spot
on that alone. If more people arecovering played Serf because
there was like Jesse Leet's guesting with this album not
my favorite guest spot on the album. I like, that's
a really tray one. I think that song it's fucking outstanding,
And it's the moment like the Big soor Devate's experiments
on the album that I think is my favorite moment.
Speaker 1: I completely agree. And I feel like I'm having a
weird Daja vou thing with this because right when we
got you know, Atonement coming out and Okay, we're gonna
be a more textured melodic record whatever, stuff Like the
type of track fall and Start is maybe what I
could you know, I could expect coming through. Following on
in that regard, when we get that song, right, we've
had Gate Creeper doing their surprise Paradise Lost song.
Speaker 2: I didn't know we were gonna.
Speaker 1: Get one here. Why have we got an employee to
serve goth metal song? I'm very here for it?
Speaker 3: What the hell?
Speaker 2: I love that those gothic clean guitars though they are
like just again, they have that shimmering like again someldone
were saying one that The Death have an album withou
those kind of gothic moments. It reminded me of that.
Or there's that kind of like lush, like clean guitar sound.
It just like listens. It's such a creative swing that
I'm like, I'm so glad employed to have took this
on again on an album that has, you know, some
of their most commerc minded sort of metal songs. You've
got this, this, this tucked in there and it's amazing.
Speaker 1: Yeah, it's got those draconian times vibes, it's got those
nocturnal clean guitars that you know, you'd expect one like
an unto others song, and it works, and it's it's
got that still kind of hammer swing of employee to
serve but through this kind of like sparkly starlight filter
on an album where as we say, a few songs
before they were doing the kind of low gent you know,
eight string thing. It's a bit mad how much of
this album actually does like come together and work considering
and that's the part near the end of the record
where I went, I didn't fucking see this coming, and
I'm you've you know, you've tapped into my Heart on
that particular record, and again.
Speaker 2: Serena song guests spot being that like angelic crystalline vocal
she died that just sounds so pretty and I'm like
it again just adds to the text of that song
in a way that feels like just a great use.
Speaker 1: Of her vocal. Yeah, I think Serena she fits that.
There's quite a lot of songs out there actually which
have you Serena Sherry guest spots now and quite a
lot of time it's almost like it stops dead and
go now we're in like a Starbard song. She's very
integrated into the mood here. It is that, you know.
Speaker 2: I mean, it's just that that they are like clearly
like just great friends and they've kind of just bounced
off each other like let's let's make this work.
Speaker 1: The chemistry is there, yeah, but they've really written a
song that makes it work.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I think, like we've spoken about it quite a
lot now, But if there isn't that's going to define
this record for me. In the Employees of Canada, is
that word texture, Because it's not just maybe the most
interesting collection of textures they've tried, but it's they managed
to weave in really interesting ways because we sort of haven't.
We didn't touch it all that much. But that Jesse
Leach song, which feels a bit like a victory lap
for the band. There's a slightly symphonic edge to that
song where it's not you know, it's not going all
night Wish or Flesh Gold of Poplyps or anything like that,
but there's a sort of dramatic undercurrent of synth on
that track, which again I just think it's it's the
sort of thing that even on the last record it
seems would seem like a bold move, and them arriving
at that thing here with Jesse Leach into it, just
it shows a boldness and a willingness to along with
the Paradise Lost tune like try new things, even on
the record that is ostensibly reaching out to people who
might have no connection to those those scenes whatsoever.
Speaker 1: Yeah, and it feels like an album mainly of just
trying to keep themselves on their toes, Like it feels
like it's just challenging themselves off again, like what if
we were to try that, what if we're to go
here and cool that it's this way and it's got
that different energy about them and I think there's probably
going to be people who you know, maybe certainly aren't
blown away by it on first less because it doesn't
do the thing that they have expected employees serve to do.
But you know, give it a few goes and I
think there will be some them, you know again, some
satisfying and you know, rewarding experiments and stuff that they're
going on within it, while still I think, fundamentally all
the time just ripping your head off the way they
have done. So they employed Serve record Fall and Start
that is coming out this Friday, and as well as
employed to Serve, we've also got a you know, a
UK band who are on their label releasing an album
the same day this coming Friday, Inhuman Nature on Church
Road Record. Their album is called Greater than Death. We're
coming hot off the heels of the Warbringer album last month,
which that album rips so much. I think that might
have thrash album of the ear tied up. But if
you are wanting more and you need, you know, your
need for thrash cannot be sated. We hear in Human
Nature Greater than Death. This band had been around for
a little while. They released one album actually just before
the pandemic. We've spoken them about them a couple of times,
mainly appearing at festivals like Bloodstark or Damnation, and I
you know, when I came across them, I thought, oh,
you know, cool, We've got this kind of new wave
of like, you know, crossover leaning thrash bands that have
come through after Power Trip, High Command, in Forced, Vicious Blade,
you know, all good bands. We've reviewed all those bands before.
Here's you know, someone doing that in the UK, hoping
maybe they can kind of compete on a similar sort
of level. They're a fun live band. The first time
I saw them, they did a crossover thrashified color of
Breaking the Law and that won me over completely. And
as you can tell from that, a lot of heavy
metal going on. If you like the sound of the
word steel, then you know there's probably something in here
for you. They have been you know, releasing EPs and
splits and stuff for the last bunch of years, but
now we've actually finally got a second full length album
after that first pre pandemic. One greater than death metal,
isn't it.
Speaker 2: Yeah. This is just like Crush Killed Destroy, just all
out fresh, attacking it like that. It doesn't do anything
you probably haven't heard before. But you know what, I
saw a song called Possessed it. I was like, I
hope the course of that is then guess what it
fucking was. And I was like, there we go. Anything else.
It fucking rocks.
Speaker 3: Like you know, in six years have passed in reality,
but six years have not passed in the land of
in human nature. If the last album was nineteen eighty five,
this is also nineteen eighty five. We have not been
flown into the nineties from there, like, we are still
firmly in old school crossover terchill with that heavy metal flare,
and if you're anything like me, that's absolutely fine. Everything
he has present and correct Slayer riffs, Anthrex Gang vocals,
dri speed, some shred not you know, nothing's out of place,
nothing's amiss, And for the thing that it is, I
think it's very high quality.
Speaker 1: Yeah, it's you know, raisor pointed thrash metal. I do
like that again, continue on the Man of War thing.
It's got a distorted voice, epic voiceover intro like it's
gonna be a tremendous taiale and spoilers it's not really
a tremendous tale. But you know into you know, dawn
of inhuman Nature. It's such a cannonade like racing drum
opening blast.
Speaker 2: Yeah, here we go, Like I really.
Speaker 1: Fucked up guitar toe. Of these crossover records that we've
reviewed this last couple of years, this might have like
the ugliest oldest guitar tone. Like it's really it sounds like,
you know, the walls of the underworld toilets. Like it's
just a particularly scummy kind of version of what that
thing is. The snare drub is just really like fat
and low rather than like have that more sort of
tinny crack thing. It's just it's a low gut punch
every time instead.
Speaker 3: I to me, it speaks to that thing doing the
sepulcher a special not that long ago where those early
extreme bands where they're kind of working out the outer
limits and they're still teenagers, and you just get these
really eccentric production styles that maybe weren't even intended by
the bands, but it was just the nature of what
they came out with. I love the inhuman nature who
probably have the wherewithal an understanding to technically do something
a bit more polished, but they don't. They go for
something that's scummy and weird and totally their own, and
it just means if it was so much more alive
behind the eyes, Like it sounds like a bunch of
people who've got together and gone, let's make the craziest
metal record we can and if to me again, that's
just a recipe for greatness.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean for me, like this is this is again.
It's got that element of danger to it. It feels
a bit live wire and just like a bit like
like just really at it again, like the wather the
rifts come at you when they when they do slow down,
it's meaty and chunky and like throwing its weight around.
Like Sermons for Annihilation is just riff after rift and
dive bombs, and it's all just kind of like, yeah,
just keep doing this thing. I mean, I was laughing
when like you get like fortss Delusion, which is like
on the longer tracks. It's like it's a longer track
because the first two minutes is just kind of like
there's one big riff and they just ride out for
like two minutes and then just go into a normal
kind of track from there. I was kind of like
that's fine, you know, you're a five minute track. Why
not just do a sick riff for two minutes and
then just do your normal song. I mean that was
really fun and it made me laugh when it happened.
Speaker 1: That made me laugh as well. It's like, is this
gonna be like, you know, your like thing that should
not be all something like Nope, it's again you mentioned
the secultary. This gave me sort of like a Rig's
Belieth Remain sort of energy. But it's just like, let's
just do a stupid riff for two minutes at the
start before going fast.
Speaker 3: That will do.
Speaker 1: Sure fine? I really again go and Possessed a Die,
which I think maybe is the standout like actual song
on the record because it's got those like you know,
authentic nineteen eighty five Exodus destruction, that little up and
now threat ball thing like the gang shouts. It's it's
a song that's straight off of like the mid pace
sections of Bonded by Blood and like I'm all about that,
And then they land on the breakdown bit of that
song and.
Speaker 3: It's just like what if we've what if?
Speaker 2: What if?
Speaker 1: It's like so dumb, very very heavy, you know, it's
a pritty nuts and bolts record for the most part,
like Observatceivennhilation has one almost like sort of slightly pointed
schildern irish sort of melodic solo which does stand out
a little bit because there's not a lot like it
really on the record. It's a pretty satisfying groove that
it just sits into for a lot of the time.
Madman's Cage the most over Slayriism song, which like it's
not like every single song is a Slayriism song, and
the way that we talk about like you know, Spirit World,
Last Time or Enforced or whatever, like you feel like, yeah,
exactly like that song comes in, it's like goes ah, okay,
this is the Slayer one, and it's got a full on,
like you know, a kind of Slayery breakdown type part.
The production, like you were saying, it is raw in
a like you know, it serve I'd be more than
like it's not like fucking morbid visions out of tune
or something like. It is competent, but yeah, the vocals
are very echoing in the mix. I was thinking about
that again. The last Thrash record we reviewed is the
war Bringer one, and that has this very charismatic vocal personality,
and you get moments like that, kind of like swing
the hammer away drop in that record. There's something a
little bit like that before the solo in Dawn of
a Human Man, but you don't really know what he's
saying what he's doing because he's kind of a mile
away and it's pretty obviouscated, I go, well, maybe you're
slightly hampering your ability to really sell a hook there,
but it is, you know best, Jill, And in Lines
of the Sand there is a gang vocal chant of
their own band names. That's an immediate, guaranteed live pop.
Speaker 2: Yeah, that was what I was like, Hey, that popped
me on the record, so like thumbs up there.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 3: I think if we're comparing this that will Bringer record,
that's more like nineteen ninety one rust and priest practice
what you preach a bit more intellectual, yealy proficient, like
well realized thrash metal. This is much more nineteen eighty
five and probably not even from the Bay Area, do
you know what I mean? This is maybe from like
Minnesota or something. I'll tell you what. That has a
charm of its own and the way this combines, like
say Slayer, that slow riff in forested delusion sounding like
candle Mass or something like when it gets a bit
speed metally almost like Helloween in the melodic department, and
like you mentioned death but spiritual healing Era a bit
of that folding into the mix. It's hit a lot
of touch points that just happened to appeal to me.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I think, you know, judging it very harshly, it's
a little rudimentary, like is it the best or most
distinct crossover the record that we've had of Like, I
don't think so. I know, I think this is more
that kind of like upstairs room of a Camden pub,
just blood and beer sloshing about energy. It's not necessarily
as like you know, like when I think about like
the Vicious Blade album from last year that's really like charismatic,
you know, and gripping or high command are actually quite
involved and compositionally kind of engaged. Yeah, when they do
those longer songs and stuff. But this is like fast
and scummy and it pumps your blood up, which might
just be what you need. Dead and Bury the final
song of the record also like you know, bang a good.
Speaker 2: Again gang vocal shout of the of the of Dead
and Buried, Like, I think this is a very hard
album to dislike. Yes, it is quite basic, but it's infectious.
It's just kind of like it's a nice like you
don't have to think much when you put it on,
but you will smile if you have any interest in
kind of like fresh music. It just it just hits
the right sort of spots and I think that's nice.
Speaker 3: Yes, yeah, I don't think there's gonna be like if
you massive crossover appeal for this band, but it is like,
if you like the thing, it does have crossover appeal
if you see whatever. Yes, anyway, So I for me
it works like it's something's going to set the world
on fire. But if you have an appetite for this
sort of thing, I think it will associate you.
Speaker 1: Yeah, firmly that in human nature greater than death. Let's
move on to going. I think it's that's like slightly
bigger than human nature, but I feel that we're going
into the slightly artsier underground realms. We're gonna talk about
a band called Messa and their album is called The Spin.
First time review for us Messa, I was quite surprised.
It is actually the band's fourth album, that's my ignorance
clearly there, because the first time I heard this band
was their last album, Close, came out in twenty twenty two,
and it got quite a bit of underground acclaim. I
thought it was pretty good. I thought maybe a little
bit overemphasized for kind of the stage they had actually
gotten it too. Yeah, it's way too long, but I
was like, there's something to keep an eye on there
of an interesting mix of styles. Elliott I wondered if
you maybe had, like, you know, more of an ongoing relationship,
and you suggested that prior to you know, doing this
with Mesa, you were also kind of, I guess slightly
similar to myself there in terms of like being about
that you hadn't fully gone in on. Yeah, they're a
band that I know a few people that are absolutely
mad for them, But for Damnation, there are a few
people going, oh, that's going to be one of the
bands of the whole event. I think I was familiar
with their name beforehand, but I soon wasn't familiar with
any of their music. So I'm going into this with
I would feel comfortable saying call it no prior knowledge
apart from the passionate consistence of a select few people
in my life who think I'd love it.
Speaker 3: Yeah, that's fair.
Speaker 1: And you know, with that in mind, the chat around
this album I thought was a little bit too much
to ignore at this point because I mean, just to
demonstrate in you know, the the last twenty four hours
from us recording this, I think that's about at least
two different people have posted into the That's not my
old Facebook group. It's clearly like going down well with people.
And I think particularly I was hearing some of the
talk about maybe the direction they decided to go in
on this record. They've moved from kind of sort of
you know, like artsy underground labels Fart Records onto more
in the spotlight Metal Blade Records and Messer are an
Italian doom metal band, just to give them the sort
of background with some sort of progressive leanings. And I
could see why off the back of that album close
like they would turn some heads because it's quite you know,
quite weird. You know, it's very lush, quite broad in
its stylistic reference points, and it's certainly ambitious, but some
of the stuff that they were beginning to touch on
there in regards to doom, that's a bit more ethereal
washing over you in a sort of ambient capacity whatever.
I think this album goes a lot further into like
developing a coherent identity for themselves and like realizing what
it is I think they're after, and in a more
appealing digestible package as well, because it's doom. But this
is also absolutely for the Goths. And when we say,
you know, gothic doom, you might think of that, you know,
Paradise Lost My Dying Bride type thing. It's not really that,
and it's not really you know, sort of type of
negative either. It's more like Doom come from this, like
fuzzier orange amp stoner doom the kind of foundation. But
over the years, I guess, in particularly here, they've smothered
that in like the Cure and Susie the Banshees and stuff,
and on this it's made quite a a beguiling little
kind of flavor and world of an album. I think.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I mean, I'd gone into this with the expectation
this was going to be some real glacial, patient doom metal,
but based on just maybe the name, the logo, I
don't know, seeing them on the Damnation Bill, that was
the immediate scene and start that I would reach for.
This is as much as it's doom metal or even
stone metal. There's eighties post punk, there's goth dare I say,
like jangle pop bits of it, and I happen to
love all that stuff, So I'm glad this is what
it is. I prefer getting this sort of record then
another Glacial Duma, which again is something that I'm into.
But this was just purely enjoyable. I mean, it wasn't
like some of those bands, even the ones I love.
You have to be in the right head space to
sit with them putting this record on, as I've done
a few times now. It's just a treat because it
draws on so many things that I find effortlessly enjoyable.
Speaker 1: Yeah, me too in that regard. Sam, you know a
band who I think there are there are other records
in their catalog again are like maybe a little bit
more like what Elliot's describing in terms of like you
gotta fucking sit with them for a bit. This, you know,
it's not it's not to say it's it's all just
like you know, the Scowl record, but that immediate goffy
edge and those kind of you know, almost like four
on the floor, dance bits at points and those like
guitar leads and stuff. Does that go a little bit
further in terms of selling it to you?
Speaker 2: Yeah, I really love parts of this record. I find
other parts of it a little tedious, but I do
generally have a good time listening to this good I think,
like the first three songs are like fucking unreal, Like
the album starts so strong with that opening run like
up too, fire on the roof. I'm just like, yeah,
this is so this is this is a bit of
me with that kind of like glacial like goths lickness,
but were like like far those minds were like that
Magat was Magahart. Yeah, like that kind of like dancing
kind of like post punk but with that kind of
like rougher attitude and golf and brab like there's there's
that sort of stuff on that, and I think it's
really cool. It does again, I think a few parts
dos me a little bit, but the most part I'm like,
I'm never kind of like, oh, I don't even listen
to this because it's you know, it's forty minutes. It's
quite an easy digestible for the most part. Version of
this sort of thing, which I do I do find
quite nice.
Speaker 1: Are you talking about the slow parts when they let
the brass take over?
Speaker 2: Yes, I am let the bass take over. I've become predictable.
Speaker 3: I like those bits quite quite a lot.
Speaker 1: Just sticking with the earlier Gothy sections for a moment,
I think it's it's maybe less overtly mess than their
other records, but in a weird way makes it more
direct because it does have that like kind of slight
dance floor energy to Yeah, I guess I think it
kind of picks up about you know, in the second
half of the opening track, Void Meridian, and then it
carries over it at the races, which that riff sounds like,
you know.
Speaker 3: Postman is so cool on that.
Speaker 2: I love that opening riff, Like.
Speaker 1: Yeah, but you know, bands like Nought or Missiles or
whatever that we brought up of, like you know, a
postmar manterer around at the moment.
Speaker 3: It's totally that.
Speaker 1: School and it is it gives it an immediacy, which
which works for them because I think again sometimes they
have been a little bit more up in the air ephemeral,
but I feel like on this one they generally have
a central kind of pulse that kind of helps guide
and anchor them. I do think like when they lean
into the smokiness, it can really work as well. Like
the latter half about the races very much works in
that regard the singer, she you know, she's got a
kind of softer sort of delivery where she's somewhere between
that traditional like Jinx dawsony you know, Johannah from Lucifer
kind of witchy doom vocal and that you know MORSUSI sue, uh,
you know, goth kind of vampires thing that's happening there.
And it's a cool kind of uh middle ground that
she finds there.
Speaker 3: I think she's got so much Morrissey in her voice,
and I think the way it plays into this band
is so interesting because the Smiths are They're a bit
like Death Tones for me in that I absolutely love
the band themselves. Almost everyone who rips them off or
even attempts to sound like them or even covers their
songs sub human scum there. They're no good and Morrissey like.
Speaker 1: Maybe not the best choice of where as we're talking
about Morrissey, the.
Speaker 3: Magic of Morrissey, but that's the wind has been taken
out of Yeah, yeah, we know. The sort of the
utility of Morrissey, as I said, yes, is that when
like the music's really busy, he sort of manages to
soar over it and sort of a through line through stuff.
That's why, you know, angular and hard to skit your
head around. And then when it's really soft and gentle,
he's the kind of resonant quality that carries you through.
And she seems to have taken that element of his
singing and sometimes even adopting is like vocal mannerisms and
applying it here means that these, like I say, more
dance floor filling goth rock songs, they just have this
like errudite, dramatic quality to them that I think that
they would lack if it wasn't there absolutely.
Speaker 1: But then they also have led Zeppelin, and that's kind
of like another angle because I want to go back
to the song Fire on the Roof, which is again
a lot of this record is quite you know that
that sultry goth thing. Fire on the Roof is a
seventies hard rock song that has like a kind of
almost like a perturbatory John Carper to sort of like
Bassynthia at the start, but then very much like a uh,
you know, it elects that kind of seventies rock soul
takeover with the chorus, which is a really good fit
for them, where they put the vocal thrust right at
the center. It's got a really great seventies rock lead
that perst in voy. Meridion has a bit of that
as well, and you know, it means a bit more
business as like an actual tune that I'm used to
kind of Messa doing or who usually take their time
a lot lot more and I was into that.
Speaker 2: I mean those things. I was kind of like when
I got Fire on the Roof, like those first of
a single, was like, oh cool, and they was like,
oh this is you like just with a bang, because
it's still got that kind of golf dancing, but it
has got like big rocking guitars. I feel like Immolation,
which is you know, starts as a more kind of
pure piano ballad. It then gets that big guitar solo
that is again properly rocking that comes out. It's very
grand sounding. I think they've got a real good, like
at their best on something. They've got a real good
command of drama, both in the vocals and the music
that do that do make the best moments on this
really pop up.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I can't believe Fire on the Roof wasn't one
of the kind of advanced single tracks from it. Like
I really hope they, like, you know, for example, Come
Dan Nation they put that in the set because that's
like clearly the obvious, like actual rock song on it,
And I'm that wasn't a single. But yeah, the record
it's like forty minutes and that's about like twenty plus
minutes shorter than their last one, and it is to
me it feels more like, you know, seven songs that
really kind of make sense together and less like His
and a sprawling hour of music and you can kind
of cherry pick the bits that best work, which is
sort of how I felt about that last album. This
it feels like, here's like a you know, forty one
minutes or whatever it is. I can kind of I
want to return to it as like a mood and
a piece unto itself about it being kind of too
strenuous or demanding. And again we're mentioning Doom. It's not
like that heavy an album sonically for what you think
of as Doom. It's just got tons of atmosphere and
tons of like you know, kind of noir gloom about it.
Speaker 3: Yeah, and I think in that second half that thing
we were saying that was so cool about the first off,
like the efficiency of songwriting and the focus and the
atmospheric qualities. Even if the form of the songs changes,
that's will carries through. I think, you know, something like
the Dress, which genuinely sounds like King Crimson, like it
sounds like it could be off Red. That's sort of
bleeding saxophone, those discordant riffs. You know, you compare this
song to something that's on that record, and it's half
as long. It's much easier to follow. It feels like
the band are super deliberate in what comes next to
It has a very natural song structure to it. So
even if it's not doing the same thing of filling
dance floors, it still feels like the approaches at least
somewhat comparable. So it doesn't just feel like a record
of two halves which you can easily separate and discard
one or the other. No, I think all seven songs
here have like something they offer to the album. And again,
maybe some of these are the ones that slightly test
Sam's patience a bit, but like I mean, Immolation with
the beginning with just having the piano is so like
Noirrish jazz lounge. Like the second it starts, I've got
like a nineteen forty suit on and a cigarette in hand,
and like it is, you know, having that to their
advantage more than just being like a fuzzed out stone
of doom band works. And then you get into the Dress,
which does after that kind of gothy opening riff, goes
like legitimate like Loane trumpet on the balcony, that old
cliche going back and forth with like a legitimate jazz
league guitar, and it's pretty you know. That's probably my
favorite bit of the song, more than actually the riffy section.
That's like the playoff between there is like pretty raptron.
Speaker 2: I mean, I think like the song, like the dress,
it was probably one of the moments I'm less kill
on the record. I'd feel a lot more negative about
it if this was, you know, an hour long album
and there were there was a lot more of this.
I'm like, I'm finally, you know, if you're gonna do
your eight minute songs on a four minute record, cool, fine.
Speaker 1: You're allowed your one moment of noodling as a tree.
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, fine, and like like I tune out a
little bit, but like that that like Melbourne that comes
out of like the sort of the jazz solo trumpet bit,
Like that's really cool. After some like so you know,
you're still doing quite dynamic, interesting things within these aim
minute songs. And again then they follow with Reveal, which
is like them going kind of Western. Yeah, and I'm
like cool, like fair enough, you're gonna sound was just
in between you two eight minute songs. I'm fine with that.
Like again, not crazy about those songs, but you you've
sounded in between them a song that I find really
and again it's got This song was like sabbathy like
iron Man coded rifts in the middle of that this
kind of like Western song. So like that, there's tons
of like interesting ideas. So even if again not crazy
all of it, I can admire the the the approach
and the swings they will take.
Speaker 1: Yeah, Reveal, I want to remind you this band are Italian, right.
This isn't like you know, Wake Last Month, where it's
like that's a band from you know, the deep South
of America. Why the fuck are we in the Bayou suddenly?
Really and then it goes into the fast like it
it's like a blast beat doom rip of iron Man
slash Carnival Jesus Hitler riff like I swear to God,
it's crazy, Like.
Speaker 2: That is really iron Man codd like a unique spin
on it. I mean, that's like really cool.
Speaker 3: It manages to evoke Carnivore but still sounding like dramatic
and earnest. It still feels somewhat in keeping with, you know,
the reference once we're making earlier the Smiths and Susie
in the band she Is, it still feels like it's related.
It's the same band doing those two things. And I'm
much more interested in them doing that in a forty
minute package than a sprawling sixty minute package where they
sort of I haven't heard that record, but maybe sit
more in one zone now.
Speaker 1: It's more that it's kind of sparser, I think in
terms of like where they're really drawing the stuff together.
This I think concentrates the mood a lot more and
the songs are more efficient and yeah, like you know,
when I mentioning a song from Carnival's Retaliation, I would
expect that to be on the Human Nature album, not
this one. Yeah. I mean I've been at a play
for this band where I kind of like the things
they're playing with, but I felt like they should and
they're just maybe click a little bit more immediately and
emotionally than it does, because I mean, you know, like
my album of the Year last year was Chelsea Wolf.
This like's me written all over right, but this is
the first I've heard something of theirs and gone like,
that's really good. I should definitely like spend more time
with it, you know, easily for me, their best one today.
I would say, you know, if you like stuff like
Kingwoman Hangman's Chair and it has that like Doom with
a slightly more eccentric goth you know, tinge Windhand, if
they were from a moody European goth bar rather than
you know, the American South, even though as we said,
there is a sudden Southern bit in there, as they're
playing Damnation at the end of this year, and I
would be tempted to see them off the back of this.
So and I know this record has you know, gotten
probably even more acclaim than we've given it just there.
So that's Messa with the spin, give it a bash,
you may well really really like it. And finally our
last album we are going to go to Final Dose
an album called Under the Eternal Shadow, another London based
band after In Human Nature, which would be a pretty
nasty bill, wouldn't it, But this one going even nastier.
And I put this one in because to end off,
I didn't necessarily know what we'd think of the Messer album.
I didn't necessarily know what people would make of you know,
the things on the Employed to Serve album they're doing differently.
But I heard this and thought, there's no chow answer.
We don't all like this. Like this just screamed something
that the three of us would all be.
Speaker 2: It got a bit of all of us in it,
hasn't It is like a bit of all of us.
It's got you know, the nasty biscuits in black mal
are you pairing? It's got a load of raw like
punk energy, and then just a bunch of like weird
experiment to it.
Speaker 3: When he loves hiss like virgin.
Speaker 2: Like one man. But yeah, no, I was like, yeah,
this is isn't it? I was like, again, a really
hard am to dislike. It's not reinventing the wielding andything
radically different. I haven't got loads of notes on this.
Just like I like that dB, I like that rif
it's nasty sounding, I'm being a good time, Like yeah,
I mean, I.
Speaker 3: Said at the top of this that after the modern
metal called Gauntlet, this reviews packed, feeling like a bit
of a fresh breath of fresh air. I don't know
if there's a fresher and breathier breath of fresh air
than settling down this twenty three minutes ten songs a
set of crusty black metal tunes under the name Under
the Eternal Shadow. The cover having like the ladding male
and instead of studded leather gloves, he's holding an axe.
The frame around the picture looks like that, and the
band logo looks like that. It's you know, it's like
a bottle of eye percac when you've swallowed poison. Like
it's kind of grim, but you feel so much better
for it.
Speaker 1: You know. The best thing about that cover art, right,
you can tell the guys wearing like a chain mail hood,
but he's also like barely visible in the darkness, like
he's fucking skinner rink or something like it's it's a
perfect image a chain mail wearing night terror in your
peripheral vision like that. I knew I would love this
straight from the cover art absolutely. Also it comes out
on Wolves of Hades, which is the label that gave
us Dodd's read, So I think you can expect that
kind of like you know, that meeting of like black
metal and hardcore from them usually that's what this is.
This is it's maybe a black metal record, but it's
also in equal parts really a punk record. It falls
into that crossover boundary of one of the most satisfyingly
evil and lively sounds when it is explored. And you know,
bands in that kind of realm as someone like Devil Master,
who I think do it with maybe more like flamboyance,
more eccentricity. Lamp of Murmur have a touch of that
to them, but they've gone down the more kind of
like Epica more all Route, Final Dose just do it
with like you know, blood spat in your fucking face.
And there are I do think you know when you
say about the notes, there are flavors through this where
I think it actually like it. It's for like twenty
three minutes of like blackened punk or punkin black, whatever
the fuck you want to call it. It is actually
quite a colectic within what it does with that. But
you know, scattered, sprinkled over just a foundation of that
just comes together really fucking nicely.
Speaker 2: Oh yeah, you say, like like right off Spring, for example,
has a bit of drama going on for like the
first forty seconds, and then it's d beats and then
you've got some weird hired vocals like like we're green vocals,
and then a riff. It kind of like just sprinkles
in these kind of like odd ideas amongst all the
kind of blast beats and D beats and nasty riffing,
and I'm like, cool, I'm fine with you throwing just
like odd little curveballs amongst the sound that he's just
so like immediately like satisfying to listen to.
Speaker 3: Yeah.
Speaker 1: I like bands who play with the energy of punk
music but are clearly you know, like ingrained in black
metal culture enough to beat into dungeon synth, which you know,
like like like Poison Ruin for example. I feel like
like dungeon punk is maybe the best term I can
come up with to describe exactly what this is. Like
crust or hardcore with dungeon synth and black metal textures.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I mean poison Ruin was one of the first
things you came to mind for me. Maybe it's just
the chain mail I was looking at.
Speaker 1: Yeah, even though they're nowhere here as like blackened as this,
but it's again the dungeon punk thing.
Speaker 3: No, no, it's the same thing.
Speaker 1: Word.
Speaker 3: You know, when someone first pitched that scene and they said, oh,
they're like an OI band, but with dungeon synth, you
I can't even fathom side. And you know, just two
years later, seeing this and hearing that as a combination,
I have you know, I have no questions. I just go, Yeah,
sounds fantastic. Put all those things together, like three great
tastes that taste great together, like this sound will probably
a good review out of me, even if the songs
weren't good, because I just as a combination of things
that just so like intrinsically appeals. But there are so
many like standout moments on this record.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 3: Sometimes if a band just puts together a kind of
neat idea, that's theirs they can get by. I feel like,
especially within Black Mole, that you can get pretty far
on that I mean, if you have not, I wouldn't
say it goes fast like a novelty, but a selling point.
Sometimes that can be enough to sustain you for a
certain record of this length. But listening to this, you
just you can rattle off the number of cool moments
that make up this record. I'm thinking, I don't even
really know where to start, but like the second half
of where that acts, when it goes down tempo that
sounds like a Nails beat down, it goes so fucking hard,
and it's that's on the record where just moments ago
we were saying, oh, it sounds a bit like you know,
Dungeons and Dragons like synth music.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean, I make no mistake of the last
kind of thirty Days thing. This is the fucking ripper.
Like this album just absolutely will not calm down, even
when it is actually miserable, but it's scathing. The black
metal blasts in Eternal Winter is so full on, and
when the rift ships there's a lot of that kind
of like boo but that kind of punk tempo on
this it's just really like satisfying. And when they take
that rift at about thirty seconds later, just lay into
it even more stupidly. That's the moment where I just
start hollering and then I'm just doing that for the
rest of the record. Basically, the rifts are simple, very graspable,
very again you can hear like genuine old fast hardcore
in that, but with like black metal blood dripping off
the gata tone kind of applied to that, like those
slashing chords. I'm gonna highlight the song Revenge right near
the end, which those like punk toms like do do
with that rift coming in just absolutely gets me going
is right away.
Speaker 2: I mean I go back to Eternal Winter, there's literally
just the big howl before that rift comes in like that,
that's the character on this anwhere like you can have
like a wolf for playing that riff and it's so
fucking sick. Revenge is one where I'm like, that is
like the most is like bull doze you over, like
crosspunk hacking at the ribs. He's like vomiting out those
vocal lines, and the drums are just like get harder
and harder as the song goes on. I'm like trying
to destroy the drum kit by the end because it's
just that.
Speaker 3: Hard the drum pound on that song it's like he's
given up on the d be because he doesn't think
it is energizing enough. He just decides to hit the
high hat, the snare, and the bass drum all at once,
all at the same time. It's basically a gabber drum pattern.
I mean the absolutely go and apologize to Trey as
because clearly that is a good idea, you know, like
it took a few years to really work out how
to use it. But it just sounds so aggressive mentioned
him again, But listen back to them like best your devastation,
and it's just a guy who he's so excited to
play the drums. He just has to hit everything as
hard as gain as fast as he can. That sort
of energy and something that is much more accomplished than that.
It does just sort of like turn up to eleven
at the right moment. Yeah, and I'm quite impressed on
how much the songs do pack in. I think a
song like where that act fits in like a lot
of time changes and the final riff is legitimately quite
climactic because of that. And go back to the song
right a spring track three. You've had two basically punk
songs at the start. Suddenly we have a DSBM kick
like that goes into like slow depressive, Like it's got
that feel of like I'm like howling bleeding out in
a bath tub under a full moon, and the felt
is just like really crying out in anguish. But then
it just doesn't sit in that for like too long
because it's spliced in with the punk, and you have
like Locked in the Black Dungeon, which again really goes
to that like DSBM misery and pain. They have like
slower you know, Celtic frost or dark throwne sort of breaks,
but then they'll top them off with like quite creepy
weaver the clean guitars, which is a nice touch.
Speaker 1: And then you mentioned as well like that like slightly tuneless,
clean vocal, folky melody that comes in. There's a right
of spring and the song wretched as well, and it's
like something from like like an Eyes and Guard or
like an old night Gorgaroth record or something that kind
of like kind of just teetering over the edge of
sanity on the punk, and I like that as an addition,
it's just a bit unhinged and a bit kind of cowalling,
isn't it.
Speaker 2: Yeah?
Speaker 3: And I locked in the Black Dungeon, that sort of
borderline spoken words section. It feels so for an album
that's already pretty out of the art of the ordinary,
that bit feels out of the ordinary among the out
of the ordinary, and that just gives way to these
haunted house twin leads sections, and it's it just fallows
an internal logic that only this record and bands of
a remotely similar style will been to or like Wretched
opening with a sort of bottom style drum fill and
then be interrupted by the song that it's introducing.
Speaker 2: It's just little things like that.
Speaker 3: It just that they throw you off balance, and not
in a way where it's trying to go, oh look
how wacky we are. It just makes it more exciting,
lively listening experience.
Speaker 1: Yeah, this has got like a harsh industrial interlude as well,
called Servant, which is very much like further drag you
into this sort of like torture Dungeon. Even I want
to have the fact that the full on Dungeon scent
interlude even that has the guy screaming on it, which
normally black metal does not happen normally actually at the break,
whereas this is just like a really like you know, sadistic,
cruel kind of record, and then it ends on a
folks song, you know, a little bit of acoustic guitar
at the end, and it's just a very tight run time.
Quite a few flavors, makes it deceptively eclectic, even though
it is actually packaged very cohesively together under this banner
of like what are things you could imagine being captured
by that album cover? They will appear over the course
of like the twenty three minutes of the album. It's
a fucking nasty little record. This it's a real pit
me up. I hope this band, you know, pop up
somewhere live this year. I'm kind of surprised I'm not
playing Incineration in a few weeks because London based, they'll
be perfect. There you go that. Yeah, but Final Dose
is his name of that band. Very fun, evil record
under the Eternal Shadow, and that is the end. Are
maybe slightly the shorter than usual, but certainly won't be
for long. Reviews bag for this month, Thank you very
much for listening. We say it won't be for long
because obviously on this coming Friday, when you know those
employ to serve and in human nature cup record comes
out is one of the biggest weeks of the year,
not only in terms of quantity, which the Hyperblast next
week is going to be fucking long, but got a
new Ghost album. We've got a new Machine Heead album
as well. There's all sorts coming out beyond that into
next month as well, that we will be talking about,
of course in depth on the next incoming reviews episode.
But those are a bunch of records that we want
to talk about this time. We recommend you go check
them out. Thanks everybody for being here and for listening.
Next up from us, as said, you know, next month
we'll have those reviews, but in the meantime, before then,
we've got the first part of our Poison the Well Special.
We will have the second part of our Poison the
Well Special coming up fairly fairly soon. Right before that,
we have the album Club Pack that is coming up
with the likes of Rest in Peace, Diary, Colored Sands,
Killing Joke. That is going to be as usual as ever,
fun and just gonna be awesome talking about some of
those records. So if you want to get involved with that,
then patron to Coom Slash That's not Metal is the
place to be.
Speaker 3: Otherwise we will be with you very very soon.
Speaker 1: I enjoy I know everyone who's seen Ghost. At the moment,
it looks like a great time. Yeah, and we'll be
back with all that cheers.
Speaker 3: Bye bye.