OUR LIST OF 2012’S MOST INFECTIOUS EXTREME METAL SONGS: PART 4

This is Part 4 of our list of the year’s most infectious extreme metal songs. Each day until the list is finished, I’m posting two songs that made the cut. For more details about what this list is all about and how it was compiled, read the introductory post via this link. To see the selections that preceded the two we’re announcing today, click here.

The songs I’m rolling out today make for a tasty but nasty pairing. Unless I miss my guess, they’ll root their way under your skin in a heartbeat and proceed to swarm your system, take command of your brain stem, and compel head nodding and fist-pumping — and maybe a “Hail Satan!” or two.

CHAPEL

Chapel are based in Vancouver, Canada and they released their debut album — Satan’s Rock ‘n’ Roll — on August 1 via the Irish label Invictus Productions. I found out about them via a recommendation from NCS patron SurgicalBrute and proceeded to write about them here. To crib from my own words about the album:

“It fucken rips hell. It’s not hard to imagine that if hell were real, this would be the party music of choice. Matching rock and punk beats with filthy riffs, burned-raw vocals, and acetylene solos, Chapel have created a virally infectious debut release.”

“Infectious” is the operative word for present purposes. There’s a lot of musical infection in Satan’s Rock ‘n’ Roll, but the song I picked for this list  is one called “Hell Breaks Loose”. It grabs hold from the first few seconds with a massively hook-y riff and never lets go. The vocals claw and bite like a demonic wolf, the guitars scream like shred creatures from hell, and those demon rock beats command a fuckload of headbanging respect. Here’s our next addition to the 2013 Most Infectious Song List:

“HELL BREAKS LOOSE”

[audio:https://www.nocleansinging.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/12/04-Hell-Breaks-Loose.mp3|titles=Chapel – Hell Breaks Loose]

GOSPEL OF THE HORNS

Despite the fact that Australia’s Gospel of the Horns have been periodically putting out music for about the last 20 years, I only discovered them this past fall, via a five-song 12″ vinyl EP released a bit earlier in the year under the name Ceremonial Conjuration.  Man, did it grab me hard. To quote from my own review in October:

“G.O.T.H. know how to riff your face like a barbed flail, snapping your head back and forth with one galvanizing chord after another. Trading off between punk rhythms, speed-metal fury, and mid-paced head-busters, G.O.T.H. have created one purulent mass of filth encrusted infection, each song bent on domination and every one very damned effective in accomplishing the mission. . . . For this kind of raucous blackened thrash, Ceremonial Conjuration is a near-perfect achievement and one of 2012′s best-kept secrets.”

In my mind, it was kind of a foregone conclusion that one of the songs on Ceremonial Conjuration would wind up on this list. The one I picked is “Awakening”. As you’ll notice pretty damned fast, there are stylistic similarities to that Chapel track, which of course is why I paired them in this post. Gospel of the Horns have a firm command of heavy rock riffs and beats, and they’ve concocted a damned addictive stew of them in this song, a stew that’s thoroughly drenched in black-acid vocals and laced with a flashy bit of guitar soloing.

Wait for the 3:12 mark (after the guitar solo) and be sure to have someone tell me if your head doesn’t start pumping like a piston, y’know, so I can notify your next of kin.

“AWAKENING”

[audio:https://www.nocleansinging.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/12/2.-Awakening.mp3|titles=Gospel of the Horns – Awakening]