EPIC MUSIC AND MOVIN’ PICTURE SHOWS

(DemiGodRaven checks in with some quick music updates . . .)

Let us all reap the rewards that a little extra time given to a disc can provide. Mechina have uploaded the titular single of their new disc Empyrean, and it is fucking excellent. The band have been one of my favorite recent discoveries as their hybridization (holy shit, spellcheck says that is a word! I was going nuts while typing it. Just constantly repeating, “You’re a fucking idiot for thinking this is real”) of death metal, industrial, one part Fear Factory (mostly in the vocal work, their lead vocalist sounds similar to Burton Bell’s old singing voice), and sci-fi philosophy have bought me hook, line, and sinker.

“Empyrean” is a shorter song but is one of the first chances we’ve gotten to hear anything solid from the new disc since they delayed it in January back to May. It still has amazing orchestral work, driving drum beats, and those vocals just seem to be getting better and better. (after the jump, a new video . . .)

And now a little music video from Sacramento metal-ers Jack Ketch. Jack Ketch are a tech-death/death metal band that I’ve known about for a little while now. I saw them open for Misery Index back in 2010 and was really impressed with them. It’s tech-death in some senses, but it is very bare bones. There isn’t a whole lot of sweeping or endless blast beats. It has a very start/stop stuttering style and it sounds like metal by way of some heavy Sadist influence.

I was able to review their release Bringers Of The Dawn, and again, like Mechina before them, their sci-fi aspect and philosophy on that disc really won me over. The whole album has a really slow, grinding quality, and “Enslavement Of Man” is probably their most mainstream song, since the whole thing is one endless chug after another. However, I still find find a ton of entertainment in watching their bassist just spiderweb his way across that whole fretboard.

This is their first official music video and it’s pretty well done. The story aspects, like a lot of story aspects in music videos, tend to be on the cheesy side but the performance stuff is solid. At least it’s not five dudes + warehouse. Instead, it’s five dudes + painters plastic in a warehouse. Also, it looks like the some of the story chunks were filmed out by that old water treatment set of buildings you find when you follow Broadway out of town to the river. Not saying that’s exactly it, since I don’t know the details of where the video was filmed, but go figure: post-apocalyptia with monsters and what not, happens to look like West Sacramento.