Root - The Temple In The Underworld

I can think of no better album to cap off Czech Madness Month than Root's magnificent 3rd full-length from '92. This is where the band really started branching out of black metal into more classical metal territory. Big Boss crooned as never before...Blackosh slowed things down, sometimes into doom (I don't think a song like Aposiopesis happens without the influence of a band like Citron)...and perhaps most significant was the addition of a crackerjack young drummer name of Rene "Evil" Kostelnak, the drummer from Blackosh's incredibly powerful death/black/atmospheric side project Crux. Evil added such creativity to this squad of visionaries that he just pushed them over the edge into sublime waters. This may not be as complete an album as The Book or Black Seal...but the band were perfecting their craft by that point...here they are still young and hungry, biting at the chain. Hell, Big Boss still had hair!!
P.S. I've included the bonus song Prohibition in this link...one of the most kick-ass Root songs ever!!

The Temple In The Underworld

A Tribute To Maniac Butcher

 A RAWAR Beast of + tribute to the most orthodox band around. Features covers by Inferno, Rehtaf Ruo, Avenger, Thy Winter Kingdom, Darkstorm and Impending Doom. Barbarud and Blasphemer are definitely two wild and craazzeee guys!!

Beast of/Tribute Part I
Part II

Hurricane Playlist!

For those of you ridin' the storm out, hehe.

Krabathor - Cool Mortification

Totally killer death metal from '93. Krabathor were underrated as hell.

Cool Mortification

Doga - Doga

Shades of Mercyful Fate, Armored Saint and even the immortal Sacred Oath flow through Doga's veins. Pure metal in the ancient style that contains a lot of the pop elements that make olden Czech metal so interesting.

Doga

Citron - Radegast

All time heavy metal classic from '87, and boy could their singer belt it out with some gumption...Radegast is doomy and dreamy, tapping into a unique atmosphere that very few bands attempt, let alone pull off. I'd say these guys were a big time influence on Root!!

Radegast

Už Jsme Doma - Uprostřed Slov

Although I've only recently gotten into these guys, they have quickly become one of my all-time favorite bands. 1990's Uprostred Slov perfectly displays their mastery of Gypsy-avant-pronk-RIO-inflected Wagnerian-ska!!

Uprostred Slov

Törr - Armageddon

Törr tear it up for the first time with their debut full-length from 1990! This band was something real special in the annals of thrash and the burgeoning second wave of black metal. Prepare for...

Armageddon

Moriorr - Cholera

Idiosyncratic Czech thrash from '89 with a sometimes doomy-dissonant atmosphere and a vocalist that's a dead-ringer for Attila Csihar. Unique sounding to say the least!

Cholera

Exhaustor - Nekrofilie

Raw, dirty, uncompromising. Goddamn this is filthy...this is so filthy that I don't even think Philthy Taylor would go near it, and that's really saying something!

Nekrofilthy

Dying Passion - Secretly

This one is kind of fey, I won't lie...Plenty of flute and chick vocals galore...it's enough to drive Mr. Barbarud clear out of his knee braces, but I'll be damned if it's not an enjoyable listen. Secretly will unveil it's charms slowly and seductively like a sensual gypsy striptease...the sweetest taboo.

Secretly

Loretta - Loretta

All chick band. A gimmick? I'm not sure, but the music itself is pretty strong. Loretta play pretty standard female-fronted heavy metal (think Doro and Warlock), but with that little something special that the Czech's bring to the table...and that little something extra special that 5 gals bring to the table, va-va-va-voooom!

Poor Loretta

Gravity - The Window To The Unknown

Sci-fi grinding madness that has some wonderfully alien riffing...Gravity mix it up a bit with clean guitar passages and unpredictable song structures...Czech out the grim head-destroying cycle of insanity that is the last 3 minutes of Suffocate Yourself. Holy Shit!!!

The Window To The Unknown

Vuvr - Pilgrimage

Another incredible album from the Czech-Tech school of Death jazz Fusion...VERY heavy on the jazz. Sounding like a bastard offspring of Atheist's Elements (especially the Choy-ish basslines) and some Miroslav Vitous type action...add some Voivodian chordal dissonance to the mix and Voila!! Really Fantastic stuff!!!

Pilgrimage

Pessimist - Longaevus

More of what I'm christening Czech-Tech (clever, eh) from a couple of the dudes responsible for the Mindfuck that is Mindwork. Pessimist (def not to be confused with the American band, or the million other bands named as such) play a sparser more sparkling brand of jazz inflected death than their sister band. The album has a whole alien ecological theme going on and at times sounds like the death metal soundtrack to an Outer Limits or Psi-Factor episode (anyone remember that show?) I think these guys like Sadist a whole lot, cuz I'm picking up on a similarly chilling atmosphere that those Italians do so well...airy, slightly atonal keyboards...fusion lead guitar, catchy not overly complex rhythms, and a warm fretless bass tone that complements things so nicely. Pair this one with that Mindwork album and you can't miss.

Longaevus

Mindwork - Into The Swirl

Mind-blowing death jazz fest heavy on the Cynic-(c)-isms with a strong Extol/Atheist vibe. The dynamix are exemplary with quiet jazz exploding into solos that would make Canvas Solaris cream with envy. Definitely one of my favorite tech death masterpieces from the last couple of years.

Into the Swirl

Modrý Efekt & Radim Hladík

Had to repost Mr. Hladík's hot joint with Modry Efekt from way back in '74. Hladík is just a wonderfully expressive guitar player as evidenced by his virtuoso performance of Cajovna...

Modry Fire

Olympic - Zelva

A bit of a history lesson here in the form of these Czech psych greats debut album from 1968. Funky, fresh and formidable, Zelva set the stage for all these great Czech bands you hear today, and of course introduced an unsuspecting world to Mr. Petr "Krest" Janda...but that is a tale for a different time...

Zelva

Sad Harmony - Somnabul

What an underrated band!! Their full-length from 2006 reminds me of a more psychedelic version of Cale's magnificent alt-rock album Uncommon Excursion; which makes sense because they were made around the same time and share the vocal talents of Skunky, who is in fine form as always. This one's good for those chill Friday evenings after work when all you want to do is kick back and relax. Go ahead and pour yourself that Krusovice tmavé...Skunkers would approve.

Somnabul

Asmodeus - Sabat v Carnegie Hall

Asmodeus charm us yet again, this time with the intriguingly titled Sabat v Carnegie Hall...now immediately you should be thinking of the Japanese Sabbat duking it out with the NY Philharmonic, and you wouldn't be too far off!! Quirky and technical and sounding quite a bit like old Mekong Delta with a dash of Ephel Duath. This is an absolute jawdropper.

Sabat v Carnegie Hall

Death Sentence - Awaiting The Cinnamon Dawn

Death Sentence was Ashok's main band before he joined up with Root, and it displays his fine guitar skills with all the inherent Malmsteenisms that he so stupendously flaunts nowadays. Awaiting... is some seriously classy heavy death-ish metal with tons of good atmosphere and good vibrations. Quite honestly, this shits all over similar bands such as Opeth...just going to show it often matters more what land you call home or whose cock you do suck; more so than the quality of the music. FYI, I await the Cinnamon Dawn every night. I put some of that shit in my morning oatmeal...it's delicious.

Cinnabon 

Monasterial Crypt - Stárí

Doomy death metal with chick vocals and loads of charm, putting me in mind of Peruvian greats Yana Raymi...sure to leave you yalping for more.

Stárí

Kaviar Kavalier Triple Header

A Necrocock triple post...not for the faint of heart!!!

Dreams of Caviar

Klinik

Studio Y

Gemini Gem

So as some may know, !T.O.O.H! broke up some time ago much to the chagrin of tech-death freaks everywhere, but what some may not know is that they are still making music under the name Gemini Gem!!!

As the above video can attest, bros. Schizoid and Humanoid (aka Jan and Josef Hilarious) are still as wild as they were in !T.O.O.H! but this time they are performing strange prog rock, or as they call it "post new-wave or individualist fusion rock". Sounds very Czech, which means it sounds very goood!! Seems they might be taking a page out of our boy Necrocock's book of weirdly necroromantical sleaze, and they still kept the Frenchy wigs! If anyone out there has this album (I believe it's called UFO Acri), or knows where one can obtain it, please share the love.

!T.O.O.H.! - Pod Vladou Bice

The best grindcore album ever made!...if this can even be called grindcore...fast, technical, drunken, explorative, explosive, frantic, folky, avant-garde and just plain unorthodox...an evolved creation of international proponderance...nods to Uz Jsme Doma, Immolation, and certain breeds of technical hardcore (Lethargy + Shai Hulud), but boy Humanoid's vocals put it in it's own place...no one can or will ever sound like this band did, and that's a fact.

Under The Reign Of The Whip

Asmodeus - Den zuctovani

Quirky thrash death from '94 that is a bit more furious than most romantic Czech bands, but still retains that brutal gypsy sound!!

Den zuctovani

Decay - What´s E...?

Majestic progressive brilliance of a death metal band...basically everything I love about death metal and metal in general wrapped into one nice little Czech package. Imagine Therion and Xysma all melted down to their core elements and reassembled in an old eastern bloc factory...Decay indeed. How is it that I have not heard of this band before?! Much like that Supuration post from a while back, this one is turning heads and blowing minds.

What's E...?

Lykathea Aflame - Elvenefris

A further development on the tenderness v. strength proposition that was developed in their Appalling Spawn daze, but this time featuring upstart drum superstar Tomas Corn...so the percussion is much tighter and adventurous this time around. I'm actually not as high on Elvenefris as a lot of people seem to be...it is long-winded at an hour and some change (honestly, most tech-death albums wear out their welcome after about 30 minutes), but there are truly breathtaking moments sprinkled throughout (To Give and Flowering Entities springing instantly to mind); not a perfect album but brilliant in it's own audaciousness.

Elvenefris

Vacuum - Climbing My Sky

One of the reasons that I love doing this blog is that it gives me the incentive to seek out obscure albums that I might never otherwise come across (found Vacuum on RAF666 which is one of my fav blogs for old obscure metal releases). Vacuum is one of these gems that fit in perfectly with the romantic strain of Czech death metal that I love so much. The sound on Climbing My Sky straddles that line between bewilderment and empowerment sort of like Amorphis did on Tales From A Thousand Lakes or Phlebotomized did on Immense, Intense, Suspense...

Climbing My Sky

Heiden - Obsidian

Pretty killer black'n'roll reminding me of the Estonian Loit's patented flak'n'roll or even the militaristic Norwegians in Vreid. Heiden retains an insatiable black metal characteristic letting blastbeats emerge from all the midpaced hellfire...I even hear some postrock guitar lilt in the mix, so there's a little something for everyone!

Obsidian