Equirhodont - Black Crystal

Part Deaux...

Tudy

Igor

Ashok

BigBa

Tha Way

Equirhodont - Equirhodont Grandiose Magus

BigBa and krew continue on with the epic story of Kärgeräs, and get all down and proggy wit it.
Ashok cutz loose of course.

Grandiose

Root - Kärgeräs

What can I say about Kärgeräs. My favorite album of all time? Top 3 at least…I’m taking this one to the desert island with me that’s for damn sure (Nothingface and Fish Rising would be the other two I suppose). Unbeatable atmosphere, emotion, chops, and imagination. The absolute pinnacle of what metal can be, even when it’s hardly metal at all.

Sweet Nation Kärgeräs

Durlin Lurt - Him Jenson

Wu-Tang slams meet Sesame Street jams.

Him Jenson

Törr - Institut Klinické Smrti

One of the best thrash releases ever, never mind from the Czech Rep., I mean ANYWHERE!! And just like the cover, there is no fucking around. Hailz Vlasta!!

Schoolin' Death

Tudor - Demos

More old idiosyncratic Czech thrash in the vein of Drakar. A bit more Root-like in their demeanor but still poppy in an excellent and utterly confusing way. Take a song like Plast for instance, these guys must have been high as a kite when they recorded it!  Who thinks to sing that way? Completely lo-fi and 'bout as earnest as you can get, these demos from ’90 and ’91 encapsulate the weirdness that is Czechslovakian metal.

Zombie & Skeletor

Drakar - Let Draka

Czech metal week dudes, gonna start things out with Drakar's Let Draka, very special idiosyncratic thrash that sounds sort of unlike anything else. "Dragoon musick of Prague Mystic Metal"? I could say this sounds like Master’s Hammer with the obfuscated Oriental guitar lines, but this is much more classic metal…almost poppy at times.  I’m gonna hate myself for saying this but maybe it’s a little like Def Leppard and Master’s Hammer got together and smoked the peace pipe. Dive bombs and fancy guitar runs a plenty and some vocals that might make you scratch your head in bewilderment, what can I say these “Crazy Boy’s” could play.

Dragoons

Midnight Oil - Diesel and Dust

Midnight Oil on a grimmer than thou blog? Well, it is GPM, so what do you expect?! This is a damn fine album passionately performed by some very capable musicians. Of course best known for Beds Are Burning, but Dreamworld and Bullroarer are definitely cutz not to be trifled with.

Diesel and Dust

Todtgelichter - Angst

Probably the best black metal album released in the last few years…I know I said that about Rossomahaar and MGLA but these Krauts have them beat. Imagine Nagelfar’s Srontgorrth combined with The Postman Syndrome’s Terraforming the result is so awesome that if I would’ve known about it sooner Angst would’ve topped my Beast of List for last year no questions asked. So many key tracks on this album but I guess it says something that Subway is the number one played song in my itunes. Addictive, depressive, enlightening, stupendous!

Angst

Bethzaida - LXXVIII

Finnish death metal that fuses folky riffs with a Voivodian pacing and dissonance. Much like the underrated Dark Heresy did on their lone full-length.  Plenty of flute too, so suck on that. 

78

Absonant Cadence - Inside Out-Life

This Canuck band played some very imaginitive, technical death metal... unfortunately the production really, really sucks.  But that's OK! If you're like me, sometimes you listen to music for the ideas in it and not the overall sound, and believe me, there are about a million ideas flying around here.

Inside Out-Life

Blackdeath - Katharsis - Kalte Lieder Aus der Hölle

One of the better black metal albums from last year, and I'm just catching on to it.  Imagine those crazy nutters from !T.O.O.H! playing obscure black metal...I think that's a fair assessment.

Katharsis

Drawn and Quartered - Return of the Black Death

Drawn and Quartered from Seattle. Murky old school death with some personality, and of course the most awesome death metal video of all time.

Return of the Black Death

Nader Sadek - In The Flesh

Way waaay better than I expected. They pretty much left all the arthouse bullshit I feared at the door. For those that don't know this band features Flo (Cryptopsy), Blasphemer (ex-Mayhem) and Steve Tucker (ex-Morbid Angel)...so imagine a sound that combines Once Was Not, Chimera and FFTTF (complete with underwater vox). Not as good as all that, but moooore than decent.

In Thy Fleisch

Martyr - Warp Zone

Technical mastery par excellence from one of Canada's best.

Warp Zone

Forest of Impaled - Forward the Spears

One of the best black/death albums to ever come out of these United States.  Featuring a young M Kolar on bass and journeyman Duane Timlin on skins. "I want to see those fucking heads piled to the sky!"

Forward the Spears

HARK! It's A Crawling Tar-Tar - Dorr Darp Gelap Communiqué

Indonesian experimetal hardcore/grind band that have some sort of H.P. Lovecraft, or maybe Lewis Carroll preoccupation...I really can't tell. Well, anyway this is a fairly unique release, and Indonesia actually does produce a good bit of heavy music... Siksakubur anyone?

Tar-Tar

Amputated Genitals - Family Bloodbath

Blast. Gurgle. Gurgle. Blast. Brutal. Sick. Lickety-split.

Family Bloodbath

Spiral Architect - A Sceptic's Universe

How many metal albums can you name where the bass is the lead fucking instrument?  Norberg absolutely KILLS on this one!!
The absolute be all and end all of tech metal!!!

A Sceptic's Universe

Conception - In Your Multitude

Bombastic Norwegian power metal that used to have Mr. Roy Kahn in it's ranks.  Don't expect any cheese on this one...just awesomeness.

In Your Multitude

Appalling Spawn - Bestial, Mystical, & Spiritual (The First Spawn)

Pre-Lykathea Aflame band, and believe it or not I actually prefer this to Lykathea Aflame! In essence its the same core sound...oddly ephemeral, yet brutal riffs set against wild and loose drumming...but Appalling Spawn is much dirtier, much grimier. Less progressive sure, but still more forward thinking than 99.6% of the death metal that's ever been released.

Appealing Spawn

Sakaratul Maut - The Land Called Mahsyar

Sakaratul Maut is (was?) a raging one man death metal band from Singapore. Ya'll know Singapore right? That's where they cane people for looking at someone cross-eyed. Pretty cool place, I suppose if we had more canings in the states there'd be alot less misbehavin'. Well it seems to have worked for Mr. Maut cuz this is some tight and well put together drum machine driven dirty death-thrash...vocals could've used a little work though, sounds a little like Goat Thrower in that respect.

The Land Called Mahsyar

Cromm Cruac - Cromm Cruac

Cromm Cruac are a Dutch band that specialize in hard hitting death metal well learned in the Voivodian school of unorthodoxy. They released this galloping little curiosity last year to little acclaim, but believe me when I say it's a gem. Totally ripping funky in a good way, Technical and offbeat Dutch goodness.

I'm hunting waaabits!

Thrashing Relics: Volume 1: Underground Thrash Metal from Finland 1987-1990

Great compendium of late 80's thrash/death bands from Finland!! Featuring the likes of Lycanthropy, Mengele, National Napalm Syndicate, and my personal fav, Morphosis......
.....Fuck in your moosh!!!

Thrashing Relics

Adrian Belew - Lone Rhino

Adrian Belew was a simple Kentucky boy who rose to fame as a wild-ass guitarist (and vocalist) for Zappa, Talking Heads and later on the legendary King Crimson. Lone Rhino is his first solo offering full of magical wistful numbers that seem to conjure the pizaaz he would dose out on Crimson discs Discipline and THRAK.... Animal Grace is a hard driving piece with a twisted melody line and bold vocals, Adidas in Heat reminds me of the Seinfeld theme song, while the title track renders a pathos that belies its humorous subject matter. This is definitely a weird album, but it's a grower.

Lone Rhino

Skullface - Live In Death Chamber

Holy shit this is brilliant!! Awesome old-school madness from '83! Just take one look at the cover and you'll know whether you need this hot little roaster or not.  Me? I couldn't live without it.

Niceface

Kapital Extreme Music: French Black Metal Hate

Some of the best and grimmest in Frenchie Black Metal...featuring the likes of Psychotik Grin, Hakenkreuzzug, Pagan Assault and Peste Noire. Ripped from an old cassette tape I got who the fuck remembers where, this is underground as hell and sure to satiate that most pernicious of bloodlusts.

French Black Hate

Sort Vokter - Folkloric Necro Metal

"Recorded under the influence of THC"... and listened to under the influence of THC!

Folkloric Necro Metal

Woodland's Edge - Liquefied In The Molten Bowels of Earth

Totally DIY Midwestern style droning black/death with tech metal flourishes.

Liquefied In The Molten Bowels of Earth

Dark Heresy - Abstract Principles Taken To Their Logical Extremes

Super obscure technical death metal from Britain circa 1995. Brilliant stuff, mixing the busy guitar work of Carcass and Atheist with acoustic seance passages. If you love super dry productions, you will really dig this sound.

Abstract Principles Taken To Their Logical Extremes

Behemoth - Satanica

This band used to be halfway decent, but as Knish Varggoof so eloquently put it "There goes Nergal from Behemoth with a big fucking penis-horn on his forehead, so...he may put it into his asshole, it's right place..."

Satanica

Brick - Secured In Darkness

All I know about Brick is that they were from St. Paul, Minnesota, they only released this full-length in '97 and they played the weirdest brand of brutal death metal I have ever heard in my life.

Secured In Darkness

Holy Dragons - Polunochnii Grom

Kazakhi Power Metal mutherfuckers!  It don't get no better than that!!

Polunochnii Grom

Aletheian - Apolutrosis

Weird-ass Christian Tech-Death.

Apolutrosis