I first discovered Corrosion of Conformity during the mid-’90s Pepper Keenan (guitar/vocals) era; by then, they had fully traded in the crossover thrash of 1985′s Animosity album in favor of the swaggering, metallic southern rock of Deliverance and Wiseblood. That’s the COC I had come to know and love over the years, so I was admittedly apprehensive upon hearing that the band had reconvened without Keenan at the helm to record their first new material since 2005′s underrated In the Arms of God. Would they abandon the smoked-out stoner-isms that had made COC so near and dear to my heart in favor of revisiting the crossover days of yore? Would Keenan’s absense leave an unfillable hole in their sound?
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Category Archives: sludge
Behold! The Monolith – Defender, Redeemist (self-released, 2012)
I’ve always been fascinated by power trios. It surely has something to do with my love of all things raw and stripped down, since it doesn’t get any more stripped down than tres hombres against the world, brandishing only electric instruments and bad attitudes. The power trio is the bare minimum of musicians needed to produce a full and complete sound within a rock or metal format (although I’m sure there are plenty of duos who would beg to differ… eh, fuck ‘em); it’s all about maximizing the minimal, and I’ve often found that power trios are inherently heavier and more powerful-sounding than these bands that feel the need to have three guitarists, two vocalists, four drummers, a percussionist, a keyboardist, a DJ, an acrobat, a lion tamer, etc… just listen to Motorhead, Venom, High on Fire or Hellhammer and you’ll catch my drift.
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DVD Review: Eyehategod – Live (2011)
Eyehategod has long been one of my absolute favorite bands, yet thanks to living in the asshole of the Midwest for all of my natural life (six months in California doesn’t count), I’ve never had the chance to experience their down-tuned Sabbath-ian scuzz-sludge live. Luckily, the band released their first ever live DVD (simply titled Live) late last year, and I think I can safely say it’s the next best thing witnessing the crawling chaos that is Eyehategod in person.
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Black Pyramid – II (Meteor City, 2012)
The world needs real rock ‘n’ roll more than ever. Have you listened to the radio lately? Go on then, have a listen to some of the limp-wristed, candy-assed, sub-Nickelback horseshit that passes for mainstream rock music lately and you’ll hear what I’m talking about, a bunch of preening jackasses who look like they stepped out of the pages of the Abercrombie & Fuckface catalogue, playing songs about having sex with sluts, drinking, doing drugs and having sex with more sluts. And I don’t mean that in a filthy/sleazy/awesome Venom or Motorhead way either. I mean it in a soulless, sac-less, nauseating, pristinely produced and utterly contrived faux-grunge frat-rock way, replete with vocals that sound like a cross between Eddie Vedder and a goat with a cob up its ass. Yes folks, we need real rock ‘n’ roll more than ever.
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THKD’S NUCLEAR NEW YEAR’S EVIL GIVEAWAY!
Thanks to you, the loyal readers, 2011 was the best year ever for That’s How Kids Die. I can’t believe the great response the blog has gotten over the course of the last year, and I’m honored that so many of you are willing to take time out of your days and nights to read my incoherent ramblings on all things heavy metal.
So, in the spirit of giving something back to you, the readers, and to kick off another year of THKD with a bang, I am proud to announce our first ever giveaway!
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Blitzkrieg #8: Oooh Baby I Like it Raw (from the Trashmen to Transilvanian Hunger)
In a recent conversation about music, my wife pointed out that I tend to gravitate towards stuff that is very raw and simplistic. I believe “garagey” was the term she used. She’s absolutely right. I guess this has long been the case, but I had never really thought about it consciously until she brought it up. I mean, I’ve certainly done my fair share of writing and espousing the virtues of raw, primitive music, but I never really considered just how much my listening preferences are dominated by these characteristics.
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THKD’s Top 10 Metal Albums of 2011
WARNING: The following year end rant contains numerous piss poor attempts at humor and a healthy dose of cynicism. Reader discretion and a grain of salt are advised. THKD cannot be held responsible for anyone suffering from a severe case of butt-hurt as a result of exposure to this rant. Thank you for your support.
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Wolvhammer – The Obsidian Plains (Profound Lore, 2011)
I’ve spilled enough digital ink griping about modern metal’s overabundance of sterility and dearth of originality to fill a book in 2011, which makes it all the more satisfying when a fist in the face like Wolvhammer’s The Obsidian Plains comes along. Actually “a fist in the face” might be an understatement, because this Minnesota wrecking crew isn’t just delivering a knockout blow to candyass modern metal with their sophomore album, they’re slaughtering it with a flurry of filthy, blackened riffage and punishing rhythmic ferocity.
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Morne – Asylum (Profound Lore, 2011)
It’s taken me quite a while to wrap my head around Morne’s Asylum. I’ve been listening to it off and on for a little over a month now and I’m still not sure I fully comprehend the band’s intent. But I’d like to think that I come a little closer every time I put the album on. I recently found a quote by Victor Hugo that makes me think I might be on the right track.
As a means of contrast with the sublime, the grotesque is, in our view, the richest source that nature can offer.
Metal is often grotesque. So many metal subgenres revel in ghoulish imagery, content to wallow in their own filth, espousing the virtues of death and decay. But heavy metal can also be sublime. Nowhere is this more evident than on Asylum, a recording that can best be described as a search for the sublime through heaviness. It’s the kind of album I want to get lost in, to totally immerse myself in its mesmerizing sonic realm.
It’s something about the guitar tone. Milosz Gassan and Jeff Hayward somehow channel ghosts through their amplifiers, pushing air that crackles with spectral electricity. The unearthly distortion comes in waves, crashing against the rhythms before crumbling into the aether ever so slowly, leaving phantom trails in its wake. The effect is haunting. I find myself thinking about it long after the album is finished, like faded memories of past lives.
As hypnotic as those guitars might be, they aren’t the only key component of Morne’s audial alchemy. A layer of keyboards lingers just below the surface, an oh-so-subtle embellishment to Asylum‘s wraithlike atmosphere. There’s more than a bit of the Peaceville Three in those keys, lending the music a stately, gothic quality. Gassan’s hoarse, bellowing vocals recall both post metal and the crustier side of hardcore, adding a touch of grit and aggression to Morne’s otherwise heavy-yet-ethereal approach. Simple, propulsive drumming keeps the rest of the band anchored to the Earth, while the bass guitar rumbles away like thunder muffled by thick windowpanes.
Ultimately, Asylum is like a flower, slowly coming into bloom to reveal untold beauty, only to wither away and die, its wilted petals scattered to the four winds. Over the course of the album’s hour long duration, Morne proves that heaviness can be a means for achieving an end other than the grotesque. Whether or not they have truly achieved the sublime is up to the individual listener.
Disma – Towards the Megalith (Profound Lore, 2011)
At first the old school death metal revival was refreshing. Since its early 90s heyday, death metal had become overly produced and overly technical, a bloated, sterile, wank-fest that had absolutely nothing to do with the guiding principals the genre was founded upon. In other words, the death had been taken out of death metal, replaced by endless sweep picking and squeaky clean production values. A seemingly endless legion of bands were either cranking out spastic, antiseptic anti-songs, picking the bones of Slaughter of the Soul, or otherwise dragging death metal’s name through the cesspool (and not in a good way).
Of course, for every action, there is an equal and opposite reaction, so along came came a slew of bands flying the flag of old school death metal, attempting to take the genre back to its unholy roots. Some of them were impressive upstarts (Vasaeleth, Impetuous Ritual, Grave Miasma) some of them had been here all along (Nominon, Vomitory, God Dethroned), but the vast majority of them weren’t worthy to lick Bolt Thrower, Entombed or Incantation’s boots. Putting the death back in death metal brought with it a dearth of innovation and attention to craftsmanship. I can live without the former, but the latter is an absolute necessity.
Enter New Jersey’s Disma. Featuring legendary ex-Incantation throat Craig Pillard, as well as members of the long-running Funebrarum, Disma aren’t a bunch of wet-behind-the-ears kids who just discovered death metal. They’re a group of battle-tested veteran musicians with a thirst for devastation, and no other modern band to date has managed to capture the old school death metal zeitgeist as well as they have on their debut full length, Towards the Megalith.
Towards the Megalith is heavy. Impossibly heavy. It might just be the heaviest death metal album of the year, hell, it might be the heaviest death metal album of the last five years. The guitars and bass are de-tuned to the bowels of hell and drenched in distortion, and Pillard’s vocals are so abyssal that they actually add another layer of heaviness to Disma’s slow ‘n’ low sonic assault. You might think that all this unabashed pursuit of heaviness and distortion would lead to a murky Incantation-esque sound, but Towards the Megalith retains a high degree of clarity without sounding overly slick. In fact, being able to hear the filth dripping off of each individual instrument just makes it that much heavier. Hey, did I mention that this album is heavy?
The other immediate highlight of Towards the Megalith is its tempo. Although the band does pick up the pace occasionally, the bulk of the album is characterized by lumbering, doom-y passages, like a horde of legless zombies slowly dragging themselves across a desolate graveyard turned quagmire in search of flesh, their rotting entrails leaving a trail of putrescence behind them. I’ve always been drawn to sludgier tempos over the relentless blastbeats that characterize modern death metal, and the album’s glacial pace, combined with it’s aforementioned sonic weightiness makes for a totally suffocating listening experience, the musical equivalent of being buried alive in concrete.
I’ve talked a lot about a lack of “futurism” in death metal of late, but I’m also a big proponent of the idea that progression simply isn’t necessary if a high level of craftsmanship is present. What Disma lacks in innovation, they more than make up for with an unwavering desire to be the heaviest fucking band on the planet and an inherent understanding of what makes compelling traditional DM. Forget reinventing the wheel, Towards the Megalith crushes it into dust.
