Review for February Metal Releases: Wrath, Earthsblood, and Evisceration Plague

Considering this is my first time reviewing albums, I'll explain a little bit in how I do my reviews. I'm not very linear like most magazines or internet sites that review metal albums. I tend to scope out everything in an album. Content, originality, aggression, lyrics, and so on, plus a band's personal notation in performance or structure. But I won't waste cyberspace with a wall of text and make it decent enough length to read. Remember, this is just my own handy-dandy review so don't always assume that I'm right. However, I bring up the good, bad, ugly, hidious, and but-her-face in most albums and express it aggressively.



Well lets dissect shall we?

Well, look at what the cat dragged in. More like look at what the hellcat dragged in! Anyways, first up is Lamb of God's blood boiling recent release, Wrath. My metal brethren from DotH were really looking forward to another mind-blowing, fist-pounding record from the metalcore beasts from Virginia. From the contents of the release, the results definitely don't disappoint. As you can tell differently from their last release, Sacrament, it would seem that they have gone away from the "Pantera-isque" riffs as quoted by the varities of metalheads. There are still some traces of Sacrament, "Set to Fail" is a prime candidate for this example. But, Wrath brings a blood vortex of malice and crub-stomping mayhem that proves them to be the new leaders of the metal scene. "Contractor" and "Dead Seeds" kicks the fuck out of your groin and launches you into a pit of throbbing "thrashism". Yet, its not only thrash-and-mash but ideal groove sections and bone-sawed rhythms such as "Broken Hands" puts enough mood into the mix. One thing that threw me off was the shockingly melodic and clean tones in Wrath. Especially the opening track "The Passing" and "In Your Words" but keeps the tightness of metal quality in hand, kicking it into overdrive . I didn't see this coming but ironically I dig how LoG is experimenting outside their brain-bashing genre. So the final thing to ask and probably every metalhead will say this, is this a possible Album of the Year? That would be a yes. Wrath has enough testosterone driven metal to make this a win.

Wrath's Rating: 95%





After putting their conceptual framework of a post-apocolyptic future with spine-shattering riffs into The Constituion of Treason, you would think God Forbid would put out another solid album. Well after hearing "Walk Alone" from one of their samples, I was hoping for a little bit more. After the release of Earth's Blood my worries were to be proved wrong. One thing you should notice from the other predecessor is a more refined and melodic work with the leads from the Coyle Brothers. Along with their polished musicship, more vocals are running towards Doc and Dallas. While this works well with them in most cases, in songs such as "War of Attrition", they tend to go overboard with it. "Empire of the Gun" is another case where Doc and Dallas's vocals are depended on. I don't mind there clean vocals in melodic sections, their ability to growl or scream with their counterpart, Byron, isn't as impetus. Yet, the knuckle crunching riffs left me deaf and satisfied. As it would seem Byron, black frontman of GF, didn't contribute as much to his vocals with his crew. However, Byron continues to bring a vicious roar to the album. While this album might be a departure from most albums with a somber tone like Gone Forever. The group brings enough crushing blows to be a solid addition to the increasing popularity of GF.

Earth's Blood Rating: 87%

Ah, Cannibal Corpse. You never cease to fuel my hunger for good ol' death metal. Adding another tasty morsel to their discography, number 11, Evisceration Plague. Erik Rutan (ex-Morbid Angel, Hate Eternal) is once again hired to produce a mind spliting album for CC. Hearing from the opening track "Priests of Sodom" , you can tell the similarities to their last album Kill. In a nutshell, this is part two of Kill. Fortunately, this is not a bad thing. Pat O' Brien brings more inhuman, sinister leads to the album and doesn't disappoint. Paul Mazurkiewicz gives a more accurate and pulse pounding blasts from the kit, Alex Webster with his classically heavy bass lines, and of course, George Fisher being George Fisher. In honesty, I can't really write more about this album to say that there isn't anything new here. Besides the fun of delicious gore from "Skewered from Eye to Eye" and "To Decompose", CC doesn't bring new tricks to the table. Mainly, that is the only problem with the album. However, don't overlook this album. Its another slaughter spree from the always appropriate CC.

Eviscearation Plague Rating: 85%

Hope you enjoyed. Keep metal alive. Feel free to give your opinions and comments. Thank you.

Censorship in Music (or our culture today)

If there is one thing that makes my blood boil in our culture today and that is censorship. But what really flips my lid is censorship in music. Aesthetics is a privilege in human rights and is our greatest pasttime. However, when aesthetics such as art or music is blocked because of being too graphic for our society, everything comes to a halt. Governments or organizations such as the PMRC target music that is offensive to our "so-called youth" or society. When I think of this, I have one thing to say: bullshit.



Censorship has been around for centuries and is a thorn in the side of culture in its long agonizing history. For example, when a book takes shot against politics or religion then the world thankfully agrees or deals a good argument to it and moves along. However, when we hear lyrics in music that is graphic or too explict, the world is thrown into calamity. What the hell?! Hammer smashed face?! Multilation?! Give it a rest. How is lyrical content like Cannibal Corpse no different from a B-horror movie or a grotesque slasher flick? The PMRC was the first organization to take action on graphic lyrical content in music. The PMRC lead a huge crusade into banning graphical contents that were too offensive for children or even adults and banned many albums from bands like Motley Crue, W.A.S.P, Venom, Judas Priest, Cannibal Corpse, and many others. They are responsible for our Explict Content label on all CDs today. However, the PMRC's activity died little after the mid 90s.

However, how has this been impacted today in music? Well many record labels today are very picky about what musicians release based on lyrical content and album art. But honestly why are we offended by this? Are we too civilized to find anything that defy our morality? Censorship is the cause of all this. Music is an art and expression that can defy any nature that is brought in place. Freedom of expression comes in mind and we indicate that with this right, we have the ability to say whatever, correct? Unfortunately, that is not the case.

Graphical content in music such as blood & gore, hell, satanism, sexual express, and others shouldn't really deem as offensive, in my own perspective. I like to take a band like Cannibal Corpse, for example, as to defend when it comes to graphical content. Before judging a book by its cover, think about what you might be experiencing. Most of there albums look like they came from undead horror movies if I'm not mistaking. Their lyrical content can be counted as the same. Are they trying to promote this? I don't think they are. The band itself quoted that they like to write gory lyrics based of horror books and movies and think a better to write. They don't promote it at all, they just want to have a good time. Now do you see a problem in that? I think not. This is why censorship is a bore to our cultural arts today, especially in music. To whatever extreme whether its gore, religion, politics, or sexual content, its more expression than promotion. Censorship takes out the fun in everything.

In conclusion, I believe music doesn't do any harm to our own kind. We take things too seriously. Our society is boring enough and economical to take music offensive in certain regions. We can never understand other cultures without even understanding our own.

Thrash is making a comeback (or is resurrecting in this case)

Well the title says it all. I've always dwelled with the idea of thrash metal will ever comeback to the fine age that it was during the 80s and and early 90s before being shot down in flames by the grunge sensation. However, what is the cause for me to relook through the history of this testosterone-built genre?



This month, I was trying to find some new bands to listen and add to my endless library of metal (I don't know why the fuck I'm still using iTunes but I'm starting to learn how to torrent so the problem might be solved sooner than expected). My fellow metalhead in arms, Andrew Thompson, suggested me Warbringer and thought "I might as well checked it out". I head to Youtube first to check to see if it is worth listening. BOOM! I felt that mind was flung back during the time when the Big Four had dominated the 80s. Thrash was the anti-mainstream music and held it close to their fans and metal heads alike.

Now, Warbringer isn't the only band to make a resurrection of thrash. Municipal Waste and Evile are valuable to the comeback of the thrash age (and I'll be seeing MW with Thompson and his fellow metalheads along with LoG and God Forbid). Municipal Waste brings thrash to its fullest but also a crossover/punk mix to their songs and creating songs that are at least two minutes tops. However, that isn't a bad thing considering that they bring the riffs, balls to the walls. Even though Evile isn't my favorite of the bunch, they have been quoted by many critics of "carrying the "whole genre's 'revival' on their shoulders". After listening to Evile's Enter the Grave, I wholly agree. And I was also touched by Ol Drake's tribute to Chuck Schuldiner by playing Voice of the Soul and proved to me that they don't mess around.

These promised new leaders are bringing a very bright future to the heavy metal scene and using the right formula to revive the sound of thrash metal. The main reason why I listen to metal and because of this genre. Metallica and Slayer were my very first bands that I ever listened to and allowed me to follow other bands and created my amoring of metal. But seeing that these bands of the new age of metal, I consider these three to be the "Big Three" of our generation. If these youngsters stick to their plan of promoting the good ol' times of thrashing and riffage then they have an unlimited amount of history that they will be making.

Why does Deathcore sucks?

I know what the metal heads say everyday "Metalcore sucks dick" "Metalcore isn't metal" and my favorite "Metalcore is just as worse as the Jonas Brotheres". Even though metalcore has its quirks most of the time there are bands that know to use the genre well. However, deathcore brings up a spectrum of disgust to the metal community and my bipolarity. I notice this because I went to a show down by Dirty Jacks in Over the Rhine (fortunately there were no gangsters or drug dealers on this day because it seemed to be a holiday for them) on Friday. Well I meet some cool dudes down there and talked with some of the band members who have similar taste of music as I do. The usual stuff about how awesome Cannibal Corpse is, telling our mosh pit stories, etc. Until my heart was pierced like spear decapitating someone's head by this comment: "Yeah, Job for a Cowboy is the best band out there." O_O



Now if this fucker didn't talk about Obituary with me or if wasn't wearing a Sodom t-shirt before talking about JFAC, I would've sacrifice his maggot ass to a wendigo (for those who don't know what a wendigo, check Wiki). Out of all the bands who disgrace the name of music, JFAC is the dictator. Why do I hate deathcore so much? I blame JFAC for this.



A year ago, I went to the Sounds of the Underground tour which had an amazing line-up and was a blast and worth going to. So who was the first band to go; brownie points for those who can guess before I say the answer........ding Job for a Cowboy. Now I'd never heard of JFAC, only through word of mouth of classmates and seeing the t-shirts in Hot Topic (god forbid, that was the mistake). Since Amon Amarth and In Flames wasn't due for a while, I decided to check them out. Seeing the fans were itching for the pit and the band as well, I was preparing myself as well.....Until I heard the song "Altered from Catechinization". This is where a 10-ton anvil falls on my head and splatters my brain matter all over the concrete. What the hell was I thinking?! I must say the pit however was fun and insane but I gave up after the first song because I was overwhelmed with dissapointment and decide to walk my ass outside to bang my head against the guardrail.



When hearing them, I was thinking Trivium. Why Trivium? Well Trivium needs to get their ass handed by Metallica because they are the carbon copy of them. Plagrisim anyone? But back to JFAC. Why do you say I was in a state of malice for this band? One, they took genre that I dearly love, death metal and molded it with the shit-infested breakdown riffs of hardcore. Congratulations! You created the genre known as deathcore! Yay! *bitch smack*



Unfortunately this wasn't the last time I experienced the horror known as deathcore. I went to the Mayhem Tour in Indiana and experienced a complete replica of JFAC. Enter Suicide Silence. You think you've seen scene kids at their worst, wait until you see this bunch. Considering how untalented these fucks are, I decided to see how tough these "scene kids" really are. And as I predicted, these "guys" crack like a boy's voice when hitting puberty. Fortunately, it was my last time ever listening to a deathcore band period.

Now I don't really hold a grudge against people who listens to these type of bands. However, if you consider talking a shot on death metal or say saying how terrible the vocals are, then I "accidently" will throw you into the iron maiden (no I wasn't talking about the band, but kodos for you thinking about them). So the one question I leave with is, how long do you think deathcore will be sticking around. For all we know, it'll probably stick around by the time of the end of the world, 2012. Or could shred them to pieces like a good George Romero movie. I guess it depends if you like wearing tight pants.