image courtesy artist's bandcamp page

L.A.-based heavy metal / stoner rock quartet DEATHCHANT have released their sophomore album, Waste, on label Riding Easy Records, and you can watch the music video for track “Holy Roller” below.

The first thing to remark on is how the album was recorded: in a rented cabin up in secluded Big Bear, CA. According to T.J. Lemieux, singer and guitarist, “we packed a big-ass van and set up in the living room and kitchen, tracked it live, with overdubs after.” Despite the humble setup, the album has both a professional clarity and a hard-hitting brutality, especially on the vinyl version, which the author of this review was able to enjoy at maximum volume at a recent evening at Permanent Records Roadhouse in Cypress Park.

Track “Holy Roller” opens with cutting, rusty distorted slices of rhythm guitar at battle with dissonant feedback howls to arrive at your ears first, before both are shoved out of the way by a pummeling bass/drum combo. Soon, the vocals enter, sounding like a platoon of demented monks yelling unholy, apocalyptic incantations from inside a cave. Meanwhile, start-stop doubled guitar lines bring the chaos to a temporary halt, before cranking back up to break-neck speed, until the half-time bridge that offers somewhat of a breather before the song transforms into an ultra-sludgy, Hawkwind-style chug. It’s part sludge metal, part grunge, part Thin Lizzy in its dual lead guitar lines, but at all points it’s compelling. Which is all the more impressive when you discover that most of the band’s music is improvised (!).

Finally, extra points to the band for connecting all the tracks on Waste together with droning, abstract interludes, giving the whole thing a sense of oneness and cohesion. DEATHCHANT work hard to create a complete atmosphere and populate it with heavy riffs, hypnotic grooves, and dark sludge. Where they’ll take us next is anyone’s guess, but one can be sure it’ll be somewhere worth heading. Gabe Hernandez

 Seven Spires’ This God Is Dead feat. Roy Khan properly puts “symphonic” in “symphonic metal.” In places the 10 minute track is almost theatrical, showing as much DNA from Andrew Lloyd Webber and neoclassical experiments like Trans-Siberian Orchestra as Nightwish and Maiden, particularly in the harmonies early in the song. Any number of metal bands have tried to bring that heavy Handel energy, but the clean vocals on “This God Is Dead” genuinely recall a classical choir, not just 6 people with a combined 20 feet of hair trying to sound like one.

The heavy stuff isn’t quite as accomplished, less for lack of quality than a glass-smooth mix that takes some edge off the harsh vocals and thudding rhythm. Riffs and beats come fast and heavy, but the production is so clean and the melody so prominent that we lose any At the Gates-style snarl. The result recalls anime and videogame soundtracks, for good and ill: screams are screamed, heavy guitars happen, but the melody is so prominent and the mix so smooth it’s not quite music to mosh to.

That said, a few missteps in songwriting and production aren’t nearly enough to write off this beautiful beast. The track finds its footing in the second half, delivering demonic snarls, elliptic spoken word and soaring harmonies with equal aplomb. There’s nothing tongue in cheek here, thank God – we’re a little over metal bands that think metal is hilarious – just musicians who love the genre giving everything they’ve got. Respect. The lyrics deserve a special shoutout: the delivery may not be perfect, but the text achieves the rare goal in high-concept metal of interesting the listener as much in its righteously Gothic plot of remorseful ghost, raging daughter and rising demon as the music backing it.

In short, “This God is Dead” by Seven Spires is big, smart, fun and heavy, a righteous blast of epic scope in spite of a mistake or three. This is music to swordfight your possessed brother atop a burning cathedral to. Light some candles, crank headphones to 11 and bang your head. We certainly did.

Annihilus has released the first single, "Draw The Beast", from his forthcoming album, Follow a Song From The Sky, which is due out on August 13th via Federal Prisoner.

This is the Black Metal of Luca Cimarusti, and this is the follow up to his 2020 debut LP Ghanima.

You can catch Cimarusti performing a free DJ set at Sleeping Village on Friday, June 18th.

“I Will Not Be Your Prison, I Will Not Be Your Guide” is a challenging and -- if you have the taste for it -- rewarding three track release from Austin experimental metal band God Shell. The EP immediately throws the listener for a loop with “Skinwalker.” The discordant guitar riffs surprisingly remind me of chaotic no-wave/noise rock outfits like Sissy Spacek and Sleetmute Nightmute. The rhythms are jagged, with thundering drums and angular guitars. The song comes in phases, changing tempo but keeping a constant claustrophobic mood. The guitars squeal and screech, eventually overcoming the actual notes themselves, and as the drums gradually lose momentum, the song returns to the noisescape it began as.

The second track -- the semi-titular “A Prison” -- is more experimental. The introduction reminds me of Daughters’ “You Won’t Get What You Want,” before the beat suddenly collapses amidst a maelstrom of glitches, and shifts into a droning noise cut. A phantom-like drumbeat hides under one thick, sustained chord for most of the runtime, creating the sort of dark, oppressive mood that is so dense it almost becomes cozy. I say “almost” because the song is interspersed with unpredictable -- and at times startling -- stutters and skips.

Ender “Hagibalba” is the most straightforward on the EP, starting off with a catchy, toe-tapping riff that I was stunned to hear after the first two songs. Like “Skinwalker,” “Hagibalba” turns on a dime again and again, changing speeds and flipping from cacophony to measured playing. The drums stay consistently tight considering the whiplash-inducing song structure, providing the listener with a sort of light for navigating the strange progression.

All in all, “I Will Not Be Your Prison” is a release for fans of sonic extremity. The music is entirely un-formulaic and to-the-point. Where another experimental release might gish gallop the listener with semi-listenable,  tedious and indulgent pulp, Shell God explores new concepts with precision and purpose, keeping the listener engaged. The music is leaden, but when performed with such rawness and intensity it becomes irresistible.

- Tín Rodriguez

Fetid Bowel Infestation is a one-man, electronic metal outfit whose new album, “Born Into Darkness,” provides a gruesome addition to the slam and brutal death metal lineage. Flying in the face of the cliché that metal is the modern equivalent to classical music, Fetid Bowel Infestation comes from the lineage of brutal death metal that crawled from the primordial ooze, saw the virtuosic sweep-picking, finger-tapping guitarists and mechanically precise percussionists and shuffled back into the water to embrace a more chugging, more odious take on the genre.

The band bears comparison to Devourment’s classic slam death metal, with the electronic elements reminding me of German cybergrind outfit Libido Airbag. At times a bit of Mortician’s more neanderthalic tendencies creep in, though mostly by virtue of the synthetic drumming. The music is uniformly dank and sludgy, giving the whole album the claustrophobic ambiance of a damp, muggy catacomb. All of this might sound negative, but words like “disgusting” and “gruesome” are high praise for an album like this.

“Bathing in the Blood of Angels” begins with an atmospheric soundscape that suddenly gives way and thrusts the listener into the album. Downtuned guitars laden with distortion (HM-2 perhaps?) form a dense sonic jungle, while unnaturally low gutturals drench track after track. Throughout the album — as on the track “Wrath of Cerberus” — the meticulousness of the drum programming shows, with tasty fills and varied beats cutting through the swampish music like a machete. At times the drums even reminded me of the cybergrind flourishes one would hear on Agoraphobic Nosebleed’s “Agorapocalypse'.'

The electronic instrumentation and animalistic vocals work together to create a sound that is both mechanical and bestial. This is most evident on “Ancient Corpse Exhumed,” which employs screeches as well as the grunts and low growls that one hears throughout the album; all this over a precise, double-kicked rhythm section. The effect is at times dizzying, and almost always feels like a caveman bashing your head with a leg-bone. All in all, if you’re a fan of slam and brutal death metal “Born Into Darkness” is a disgusting delight.

- Tín Rodriguez