Eco war is another and very painful to listen release by Hellbastard. And like we mentioned on their latest full length release, the band should have stayed dead. Since they clearly have nothing new to provide to the current Metal scene.

For a band that are the ‘creators’ of the Crust genre, this band disappeared for 2 periods of 10 years. And let me tell you, there are some bands that should stay dead and Hellbastard is one of them.

With a very weird and old school sounding album “The Need To Kill” features a very awkward selection of tracks thankfully are very short. Some of them are fun to listen for a few minutes, but then they get ‘weird’ and I loose complete interest.

Recorded during the band’s 2008-2009 tours of the USA, we have “Alive”. This review is for the CD that comes with the DVD, not the DVD itself. Featuring 12 tracks of the band’s very impressive catalog of songs, we couldn’t have made a better selection into which songs made it to this CD.

The recording quality for this live CD is very impressive, and sounds crystal clear. We might add that the songs sound way better than when we saw them live. You clearly get the full Meshuggah aural assault when you listen to this CD.

Today from the UK we get Annotations Of An Autopsy a handful or pissed off Brits that have taken the Death Metal scene in the UK as their own and made it their bitch. After their some what weak debut album “Before the Throne of Infection”, the band is back with their latest aural assault and is a big improvement.

“The Reign Of Darkness” features 11 tracks of Death Metal at it’s most brutal. Filled with meaty hooks and catchy riffs, this album is ready to blow your head clear off.

Filling the void left by an awesomely technical band but with horrible vocals like Arch Enemy we have Arsis. Arsis for the people that don’t know them yet, play Technical Melodic Death Metal in the same vein than Arch Enemy does, but with a more suitable vocal sound that does not get annoying after a couple of songs.

Hailing from the USA, Arsis is not new to the metal scene they have been around since 2000 and have released three full-length albums before their latest opus “Starve For The Devil”.

We usually get quite a few bands that claim to play Melodic Death Metal, but fail miserably to deliver an engaging and entertaining album. Marionette is an example of a band that DOES deliver, and their album “Enemies” is one of the best Melodic DM albums we have received in quite a while.

“Enemies” starts off very aggressively and all over the place, so we immediately expected the album to suck. However after the first 60 seconds, all this changes and you can hear the quality of the bands music, and it hooks you into listening to the whole album.

Calling the music of Sybreed complex is a complete understatement of what the band does with “The Pulse Of Awakening”, their third full-length in their 7 years of existence. The mixture of elements in this album is as long as the list of ice cream flavors Baskin Robbins has.

Analyzing the band by layers, we can see the main underlying Metal foundation the band has, but it’s not just a regular ‘plain and simple’ Metal foundation. The band chooses to use very complex time signatures and polyrhythmic composition in the vein of Meshuggah, Xerath, etc.

Having an impressive career spanning almost 30 years (including the three ‘breaks’ the band has taken) Suicidal Tendencies are one of the most recognized names in Crossover / Trash Metal, and are considered by many the fathers of this genre.

The band did not start in this genre, but they made their start playing Punk and evolved into one of the most influential bands in the early Crossover scene. We have hear the band’s releases for years and while never getting completely into them, until you get to see them live.

Hailing from the USA we get this very young and promising Heavy/Trash Metal band called Age Of Evil. Most band members can’t legally but a drink but they can rock the shit out of many bands of this genre.

“Get Dead” is the band’s latest release that features 2 new songs (“Cruel Intentions” and “Get Dead”), as well as a few covers (“Slave To Grind” of Skid Row and “Electric Eye” from Judas Priest), and 2 live songs. You can clearly see the Judas Priest, Iron Maiden and even some Metallica influences in the band’s sound.

Boasting members of Shining, Naglfar and Midvinter among other great bands we have the Swedish Black Metal monster called Bloodline. The band plays Raw Black Metal with some Industrial elements, reminding me of the legendary Mysticum at some points.

With their impressive line-up the band does not fail short on delivering a very distressful aural assault that is not for the weak. Rooting them selves in raw Black Metal, and adding marvelous ambient elements, we get a perfect back drop that will make you have nightmares and feel what real Black Metal was all about.