death rock

Rainbows in the Dark: Christian Death — “Evil Becomes Rule”

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Do I really need to give you a primer on Christian Death at this point?  They’ve been around for over forty years, and while their membership has been a little inconsistent (to put it mildly, but we’ll get there), their overall impact on the musical landscape cannot be understated.  Even if you somehow have never heard of them, they fall into a category of bands that I find the history of unique and captivating.  They are your favorite band’s favorite band, and on their most recent release, Evil Becomes Rule, they double down on just what makes them so appealing across a wide spectrum of artists and fans.

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Profile: Andrew Lanza of Chain Gang Grave

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Acidic and grimy are just a couple of ways to describe Chain Gang Grave‘s sound on their debut full length Cement Mind. But, even that is a bit of a limiter. Death rock, death metal, sludge, noise, punk, and hardcore are the genres covered across these nine tracks which, on paper, sounds ludicrous but the way this two piece approaches this amalgamation is nothing short of astounding and electric. The production trudges through the sewers and that’s just part of this album’s glory; it’s nasty yet holds a ton of fuck you punk energy, its fangs are sharp yet wildly off kilter. This is one of those albums that comes along and kicks your teeth in but never lets go. What more can you ask for? Just ahead of this beast seeing the light of day we had the chance to pose our set of Profile questions to guitarist, bassist, and vocalist Andrew Lanza and the results can be found below. So, dig in and get your fill. Be sure to snag a copy from the links provided within.

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Second Circle: Bloody Hammers and Miserable

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  • Bloody Hammers - Songs of Unspeakable Terror

In Dante’s Inferno, the second circle begins the proper punishment of Hell, a place where “no thing gleams.” It is reserved for those overcome with Lust, where carnal appetites hold sway over reason. In Nine Circles, it’s where we do shorter reviews of new (ish) albums that share a common theme.

Happy 2021! Everything is fine! I swear! At least in terms of music everything seems to be fine. Right when I was thinking there wouldn’t be anything of note to grab my ears in January (sorry, but Tribulation still fails to do anything for me, so we’ll let others on the site rave) up pops two bands that trade in the kind of music that instantly strikes a chord in my metal heart. So let’s use this edition of Second Circle to the sinister pomp of Bloody Hammers and the killer old school thrash of Miserable…

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Rainbows in the Dark: Dead Register – “Fiber”

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It’s nearly a given at this point in heavy music that genre lines are far more blurred than they were even ten years ago. As the tendrils of post-metal, ambient music, and shoegaze crept into black metal, death metal, and doom metal (and vice versa), it suddenly became much harder to classify bands with a rigid genre tag. The same has happened with a good amount of music tangential to metal: Post-punk has always been viewed as the big brother (or father, even) of goth rock, new wave, and industrial, but the beginning of each sound was fairly self-contained in its origins until artists started integrating more textures. It’s interesting, then, when all these worlds collide at once; Atlanta-based trio Dead Register have crafted an absolutely stunning debut with Fiber, which seamlessly coalesces influences from gothic rock, shoegaze, doom metal, and some “post” tendencies, both rock and metal.  Continue reading →

Album Review: Tombs – “All Empires Fall” (EP)

OldThunderKY6 Comments

tombs_allempiresfallAfter some lineup changes in the rhythm section and the addition of keyboard/synth player Fade Kainer, Brooklyn-based metal outfit Tombs return with a fresh batch of songs on their new EP, All Empires Fall. While the previous full-length, Savage Gold, was a cleanly produced and mechanically executed collection of black/death metal that had some tendencies toward death rock, post-punk, gothic rock, and industrial, All Empires Fall brings back the more atmospheric and visceral sound of 2011’s Path of Totality while removing the rough edges from that album and further honing the band’s pitch-black, brooding sound, while never sacrificing an iota of attack.  Continue reading →