A DUAL REVIEW: MENDEL (“OBLIVION”) AND PAUL WARDINGHAM (“THE HUMAN AFFLICTION”)

 Album Reviews  2 Responses »
Oct 272015
 

Mendel-Oblivion

 

(TheMadIsraeli returns to NCS with reviews of 2015 albums by two instrumental maestros — Mendel Bij De Leij and Paul Wardingham.)

Of the instrumental metal albums I’ve listened to this year, these two are definitely the top tier out of the bunch so far. There will be more multi-album reviews coming, in the spirit of clearing the way for the super big/important releases I’m also stoked about.

MENDEL: OBLIVION

Mendel is one of the most enjoyable instrumental metal listens you can partake of next to Jeff Loomis right now. Part Yngwie, part death metal, and all regality, Oblivion is an interesting listen that is so full of ideas it can also be rather exhausting — but in a good way. Continue reading »

I CHAOS: “MASTERBLEEDER”

 Album Reviews  2 Responses »
Sep 032015
 

I Chaos-Masterbleeder

 

(In this post TheMadIsraeli reviews the new album by the Dutch death metal band I Chaos, and we also have a stream of the first single from the new album.)

There’s going to be a bit of setup here, so please humor me.

I wrote a about a Dutch band named Cypher WAY back when I first started writing at NCS in 2011 (relevant pieces here and here) who had an unfortunately short life span. They were melodic death metal prodigies who never got off the ground in the way they deserved and still to this day, unfortunately, continue to be an unknown quantity to most.

Main man Tobias Borra quit music altogether for a few years, and that left bassist Joost and drummer Koen to seek new avenues of musical expression. One of those happened to be a band they both ended up in, named I Chaos. Continue reading »

FEARED: “SYNDER”

 Album Reviews  3 Responses »
Sep 012015
 

Feared-Synder

 

(TheMadIsraeli wrote this review of the latest album by Sweden’s Feared.)

I am shamefully late on reviewing this, although for good reasons, both pertinent to the music itself and not. I’ve been pretty high on the Feared train since the band released Furor Incarnatus, and Synder is really no exception to the consistent roll they’ve been on. My problem has been both that my life has become a whirlwind of chaos (which has made finding the time for blogging pretty difficult lately), and that this album is very hard to detail and describe beyond saying that it’s really good.

But I feel like now I can write a review that sums up my thoughts — and oddly enough it was sparked by a negative review of this album. Brenocide of That’s Not Metal, a website that’s in our own sidebar of other blogs, did a post that was a carpet-bomb of mini-reviews of various releases back in May (here). He wrote this about Synder: Continue reading »

THE BLACK DAHLIA MURDER: “ABYSMAL”

 Album Reviews  7 Responses »
Aug 272015
 

The Black Dahlia Murder-Abysmal

 

(TheMadIsraeli reviews the new album by The Black Dahlia Murder.)

If Everblack was BDM’s darkest record, Abysmal is the band’s brightest, brimming with a raw, incendiary energy that calls back to the band’s early days of Unhallowed and Miasma. With a distinctly higher quotient of Arsis-isms in the riffs (undoubtedly due to Ryan Knight’s influence) and an overall recommitment to the band’s love of pedal-point-intensive harmonized riffing, Abysmal is to these ears a refreshing record.

I felt Everblack was less melodic death metal, and more of a death metal album that had melodic parts in it, which I think was the band’s goal at the time. I thought and still think it’s in fact the band’s best record, and while Abysmal doesn’t hit the sweet spot for me that Everblack did, that may be because Abysmal just isn’t punching my personal preference buttons hard enough. That’s not intended to detract from the fact that it’s a great record, among so many others that BDM have produced over the years. Continue reading »

AN NCS PREMIERE: KINNEFRET — “SALVATION”

 Premieres  4 Responses »
Aug 172015
 

Kinnefret

 

(TheMadIsraeli introduces our premiere of a new song by Kinnefret from Oakland, California.)

Kinnefret were recommended to me by Ted O’Neill of Oblivion a few days ago, and after checking them out, I rushed to see if I could secure SOMETHING with these guys. I’ve only heard two songs, but I’m thus far 100% hooked. The low down: They’re from California, and three-quarters of the band are Iranian immigrants who fled so they could play metal. Artak Ozan, the band’s founder and central pillar has told me that he is actually a political refugee here in the US for having already gotten on the Iranian government’s bad side.

The music is death metal that touches on all eras of the style. There’s some old school stuff, some modern hyper-technical stuff, a good dose of melody, and some grotesque Suffo/Dying Fetus shit thrown in, all with an underpinning of distinct Middle Eastern influence and melodic tendencies. The music is wicked, and the guitar front — the thing I care most about — is playful, complex, and interesting. The dual vocal assault of Ozan and vocalist Chelsea Rocha is also pretty overwhelming, with Rocha having a beastly and powerful voice. Continue reading »

FEAR FACTORY: “GENEXUS”

 Album Reviews  14 Responses »
Aug 122015
 

Fear Factory-Genexus

 

(TheMadIsraeli reviews the new album by Fear Factory.)

I’m a pretty standard Fear Factory fan. Soul of a New Machine, Demanufacture, and Obsolete are the best albums; Digimortal was a nu-metal sellout with some keeper tracks; and everything Dino-less is awful.

Mechanize was a monster comeback record, seeing Burton Bell and Dino Cazares return with fucking Gene Hoglan, and it rivaled their early material while bringing in the more thrash and melodic edge of Dino’s other band Divine Heresy.

The band’s last record, The Industrialist (which ONLY involved Bell and Cazares, according to the only album credits I can find) was good, but I didn’t find it living up to the momentum Mechanize had. Continue reading »

AN NCS ALBUM PREMIERE: IN DREAD RESPONSE — “HEAVENSHORE”

 Premieres  10 Responses »
Jul 222015
 

In Dread Response-Heavenshore

 

(We premiere a full stream of the new album by New Zealand’s In Dread Response, with the following introduction by TheMadIsraeli.)

Melodic death metal and metalcore have been intersecting with each other for quite a while now. I’ve been a proponent of the idea that this has mostly produced mediocre music that should be of little interest, often resulting in little more than watered-down melodic death metal with clean pop vocals, riffing that lacks any technical edge, and a boring breakdown here and there. But In Dread Response have always consistently done it right, taking exactly the best aspects of both styles. The technical edge, ferocity, and speed of melodic death metal are in play, combined with metalcore’s emotive sense of melody, energy, and a vocal style that comes off as more emotionally charged. Think of early Killswitch Engage with Jesse Leech, except IDR are definitely about the more ferocious aspects of heavy music. And there are no breakdowns or clean vocals to be found here.   Zero.

Heavenshore is the band’s third album, and their best. I’ve not heard metal of the melodic sort this emotionally charged or this vicious in a long time. It’s also one of the few instances in which I truly feel an album is “perfect”, in the sense that there is no filler on it. Every song is distinct and equally great, and I never have an urge to skip to the next track at any point. This is as repeat-listenable as Alive Or Just Breathing or Slaughter Of The Soul, and I’ve been treating it as an album of like prestige since the IDR guys sent me the promo of it. Continue reading »

BANDS YOU SHOULD BE LISTENING TO: ARPHAEL

 RANDOM FUCKING MUSIC  8 Responses »
Jul 102015
 

Arphael-Ambigram

 

(TheMadIsraeli provides this introduction to the music of Arphael.)

So I’ve been trying to catch up on reviews I meant to have done months ago, and it just isn’t happening because I keep finding absolutely stellar musical discoveries and we keep getting promos I’ve been anticipating. This album, however, is from last year, by a lone Ukranian man whose name is unknown. Arphael is the alias of the project, and it is one of the most unique and badass slabs of titanic rib-cage crushing brutality I’ve ever heard. Ambigram is a gem from last year that somehow just got criminally ignored.

Now what does Arphael do? That’s really hard to articulate. It’s technical death metal, it’s djent, it’s industrial, it’s garage black metal cheesy cheap keyboards and vocals buried in the mix. The ultimate sound is otherworldly, alien, and completely disorienting, especially since the song-writing takes a tech-death leaning of lots of sections and lots of tempo changes. It’s also completely unrelenting. There isn’t a whole lot of breathing room in the hour or more’s worth of music; for some, listening to Arphael will be a genuinely exhausting endeavor. Continue reading »

CUT UP: “FORENSIC NIGHTMARES”

 Album Reviews  7 Responses »
Jun 232015
 

 

(TheMadIsraeli reviews the new album by Cut Up.)

There are a few death metal bands that just instantly turn me into a foaming-at-the-mouth violent super-brute — Hail of Bullets, Vader, and Bloodbath. Those bands are the epitome of no-bullshit consistently killer riffs, consistently savage speed, consistently relentless songwriting, and consistently skeleton-crushing grooves. Join Cut Up to that group.

Cut Up are a band who have a lot of pedigree due to the backgrounds of the members, and it shows. Forensic Nightmares is the most perfect death metal album I’ve heard this year, and it too turns me into a foaming-at-the-mouth violent super-brute at heart when I listen to it. Continue reading »

DAGOBA: “TALES OF THE BLACK DAWN”

 Album Reviews  2 Responses »
Jun 222015
 

 

(In this post TheMadIsraeli returns to NCS with a review of the new album by Dagoba, which is being released today.)

I’ve ALWAYS liked Dagoba. I’ve always seen them as a metalcore band, and one of the best and few worth listening to who’ve put out material in the last ten years. Their brand of the standard metalcore formula mixed with symphonic bombast and industrial precision has always really stood out, always sticking to a hefty, bruising attack. Tales of the Black Dawn isn’t really a dramatic departure, but it’s definitely the darkest and heaviest record they’ve done yet. I’m really digging what’s going on here. Continue reading »

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