Album Reviews

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    King Giant - Southern Darkness (2009)

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    After reviewing very good Stoner Rock bands from Poland in the last few weeks (Black River and Corruption), it’s very easy to determine that King Giant are from the USA and from the ‘Old South’ their brand of Stoner Metal has a nice Southern feel to it. With a hefty dose of lyrics about Drugs, Depression, Fear, Hate, etc. King Giant has a very catchy sound that hopefully gets them noticed by a bigger label in the future.

    Opening up with “Solace”, the band quickly shows what they are all about: catchy down-tuned guitar riffs with raspy vocals and a healthy Stoner vibe that prevails through the whole release and greatly captures the genre’s atmosphere. While many other releases are faster paced and more ‘hard rocking’, King Giant goes more Stoner/Doom Metal than average and we completely dig the rocking melancholic atmosphere that the band creates.

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    King of Asgard - Fi'mbulvintr (2010)

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    As you probably guessed from the band’s name, today we have yet another band from Sweden that plays Viking Metal. Featuring members of Mithotyn, Falconer and a bunch of other bands, King of Asgard plays a very generic Viking Metal with countless influences from Amon Amarth, Týr, to pretty much every other Viking Metal band these days, paired with some hints of Dissection and Primordial.

    As many other bands, in paper King of Asgard does sound awesome, since we used to love Mithotyn back in the day where Viking Metal was not as exploited as now. Falconer also has had good stuff over the years. But none of these musicians can save King of Asgard from falling in the pitfalls of sounding too much like somebody else.

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    October Tide – A Thin Shell (2010)

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    Originally a side project of Jonas Renkse and Fred Norrman from Katatonia, October Tide took by surprise the Death/Doom Metal world back in 1997 with their legendary album “Rain without End”. The band disbanded from around 2000 and finally returned in 2009 with only Fred Norman (not anymore with Katatonia) and Tobias Netzell (of In Mourning) on vocals.

    “A Thin Shell” marks the band’s return to the Metal scene and it’s a great comeback album for all of us Death/Doom Metal fans. With seven songs and over 40 minutes of music, this release has all the ingredients to make it a classic of the genre and continue the legacy of October Tide.

    • Posted By: Dark Emperor
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    Suicidal Tendencies – No Mercy Fool! / The Suicidal Family (2010)

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    As the second Suicidal Tendencies release of 2010, we have today “No Mercy Fool!/The Suicidal Family”. This release features re-recorded songs from their “Join the Army” release of 87 and a few songs (three to be precise) of Mike Clark’s and Mike Muir’s side project No Mercy.

    With the re-vamped recordings we get a nice up-to date sound to the “Join the Army” tracks and three powerful No Mercy songs get a bigger spotlight in this 2010 release. Immediately we can notice that the music sounds better than ever and that this whole release has the Suicidal vibe all the way.

    • Posted By: Dark Emperor
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    Locrian – The Crystal World (2010)

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    Every once in a while we get a release that makes us listen to it more than normal since it’s so complex and different that we can’t really craft a solid opinion about it with only 3-4 spins. This month we have Locrian’s third full-length album “The Crystal World”, the band plays a very experimental mixture of ambient, drone, and some Black Metal and Post-Rock elements. This might sound like a handful, but it actually works very well for the flow of this release.

    “The Crystal World” is a very powerful emotional ride that spreads through 6 tracks. With the first track “Triumph of Elimination”, the band immediately sets the stage for this dark and minimalistic journey. In the traditional fashion of creating expectation, this track starts building up with samples and drones that seem to be gaining momentum but they also seem to never culminate. The ‘culmination’ section for us that need it, comes in the next track “At Night’s End”.

    • Posted By: Dark Emperor
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    Gangrenator – Tales from a Thousand Graves (2010)

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    Hailing from Norway and featuring Kvohst (vocalist of Code and ex-DHG), today we have Gangrenator and their interesting sounding old-school Death/Grind Metal. This band feels like a tribute band to old-school Death/Grind and B movies, and they actually manage to pull of this feeling very successfully on the 13 tracks presented in this short but sweet release.

    During “Tales from a Thousand Graves”, we get a bunch of deranged tracks that last between 1 and 3 minutes of highly chaotic, but interestingly crafted music. Amoque Von Berlevaag does a very solid job in providing countless riffs that range from Grindcore to traditional Death Metal influences.

    • Posted By: Dark Emperor
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    Sarath – Siste Indre (2010)

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    Norway might suck at basketball, football, and countless other sports, however, they are number one in producing Black Metal bands that can release cold and grim releases that will hypnotize you from beginning to end. Sarath is yet another one of those Norwegian bands that can kill with their music and don’t even break a sweat while doing it.

    “Sistre Indre” is the band’s (one-man band) first ‘full-length’ release in almost a decade of existence, and we must say that it was well worth the wait. Featuring 4 songs and around 31 minutes of music we wouldn’t really can this a full-length album. However, due to the repetitive nature of the band’s music, “Siste Indre” feels much longer and completely crushing.

    • Posted By: Dark Emperor
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    Aenaon / Satanochio – A Parallel Zoetrope (2010)

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    All the way from Greece recently we got a very nice 7” split from Aenaon and Romanian Satanochio. In this short but sweet split we get to listen to another brilliant track from Aenaon and a different but equally intense song by Satanochio. Featuring one track per side, this 7” split is very nicely packaged and ready to become a collector’s item for fans of either band since it’s limited to 500 copies.

    Starting off on the Aenaon side, we get a Black Metal anthem with influences from Zyklon and other more experimental bands like Dodheimsgard and Ihshan. Aenaon since their mCD “Phenomenon” has immediately grabbed our attention and with “I, Tyrant” they show that they are masters at creating powerful riffs, interesting vocal melodies and blasting drum patterns that deserve the attention of any ‘refined’ Black Metal fan.

    • Posted By: Dark Emperor
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    Maniac Butcher – Masakr (2010)

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    After a ten year hiatus Maniac Butcher returns with a powerful Black Metal release that will surely send a lot of crappy Black Metal bands crying to their garage wishing they could craft such hate filled anthems of destruction. The band’s original members Vlad Blasphemer and Barbarud Hrom are back in top form and ready to spread disease through the world of Black Metal.

    With six songs clocking around 30 minutes of hate filled raw Black Metal, it’s like the band never left the scene. Featuring a crystal clear production, the band sounds as raw as ever and their music crushes since the first riff. Haling from the Czech Republic, the band writes are their lyrics in Czech, so we can’t really know what they are singing about but all we care about is how brutal and chaotic their music is.

    • Posted By: Dark Emperor
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    Broken Mirrors – Strong Enough (2010)

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    Hailing from France, today we have a very interesting EP from an unusual band that has a very fresh sound. Mixing some Thrash Metal influences with Melodic Death Metal elements and Children of Bodom like vocals “Strong Enough” is a short, yet effective release from a band that has great potential.

    The first thing that will pop out is the funky sounding keyboards, while they are very good, something just sounds weird about them. This alone will quickly grab you attention and make you interested in the band’s sound. They create nice a atmosphere that sounds very lush, but due to a low production budget they sound a bit too high in the mix. Not that we are complaining, but we just find it a bit odd.

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