IMPETUOUS RITUAL - Blight upon Martyred Sentience Profound Lore Records This is PORTAL without the masks and let me be clear, after they (PORTAL) released Outre in 2007 the whole blackened noise mystique subsided. Sure people wanna say that IMPETUOUS RITUAL are/were not a extension of PORTAL. Just listen to the music ya fucking mary. Speaking of which, ten years later it's pushing the whole blackened death/noise/drone shtick to the hilt. But as a shit-worker for Profound Lore once told me years ago, "Hey I hate hipsters too but they buy our fucking records and we're making a killing off them." Yeah well I can't argue with sound business logic and back then I was really hating on hipsters. Nowadays hey, they buy up all the vinyl and keep the good people at labels in business. Now in no way would I call IMPETUOUS RITUAL or PORTAL a bunch of hipsters even though their music is simplistic and worse than drone. I mean they are from Australia. Plus to be a hipster in Australia you would have to be a unemployed office nerd girly man wearing a MEN AT WORK t-shirt, ya know to be ironic. Then you take the fucker out to the Great Barrier Reef and feed em to the sharks. But anyways IMPETUOUS RITUAL, brother of PORTAL, have not changed much since I first heard their 2009 debut, Relentless Execution of Ceremonial Excrescence. Now don't get me wrong, if you're stuck in a musical rut then hey just go for it. Once again this is blackened death, drone, noise, with a heavy emphasis on the latter. Basically they've taken what some USBM acts and Finnish BM bands have done previously, added the chaotic noise factor in and hey you've got (according to their promo) " [the] abhorrent album of the year (in all of metal). Look if you think this is dangerous then try growing a pair of balls, ya marys. https://www.profoundlorerecords.com/ https://www.facebook.com/ImpetuousRitual/ https://profoundlorerecords.bandcamp.com/album/blight-upon-martyred-sentience
SKELETHAL - Of the Depths Hells Headbangers Records Here we have two French headbangers who worship at the altars of ENTOMBED and CARNAGE. Not a bad way to go in life but not too exciting especially since there's plenty of this to go around. SKELETHAL started out in 2012, they put out a couple of short form releases (all of which can be found on the compilation Morbid Revelations via Pulverised Records). Finally they've got this full length here which is basically a homage to old school Swedish Death Metal. These guys (Gui Haunting on guitars / vocals and Jon Whiplash on bass / drums) were/are also in the thrash band INFINITE TRANSLATION. Then someone handed em a Boss HM2 pedal and their world changed. Yeah well in all honesty this old school DM revival was cool seven years ago. Since then whenever I hear these types of bands I just try to guess which original Swedish DM band's songs they're ripping off. Be that as it may, to me the only style of death metal worth a damm is that old school original sound whether from somewhere in Europe or here in the states. As long as the music rocks and the band ain't a bunch of poser hipsters than I'll give it props. So yeah this is cool. http://shop-hellsheadbangers.com/ https://skelethal.bandcamp.com/ https://www.facebook.com/skelethal/
PAGAN HELLFIRE - Distant Winds Return Nykta Records Multi-instrumentalist Incarnatus of Nova Scotia has been creating black metal since the late nineties under the name PAGAN HELLFIRE. In all of that time the artist has made a fairly large cache of full lengths, short form releases as well as compilations. The last full length, On the Path to Triumph, came out in 2013. Since then Incarnatus has been in a creative pause as it were, only releasing an EP Unmarked Fields Near Unknown Forests last year. Then again if you factor in that the guy has consistently put something out on a regular basis for seventeen years you could accept the fact that he needed a break. Be that as it may here we have a seventy minute compilation of old and rare PAGAN HELLFIRE tracks that were previously EP only cuts, stuff off of other compilations, along with bonus album tracks plus one previously unreleased track. Musically this is razor sharp and raw sounding second wave style BM with a definite Norwegian flair. Think what if Varg kept paving the path of his early material style before moving onto Filosofem. http://nykta.gr/ https://paganhellfire.bandcamp.com/album/distant-winds-return http://www.paganhellfire.org/
FROSTVANG - Avog Self Released There's this hot dog place in the town where I live called Hot Weiners. They cook southern red casing hot dogs which get charred black on the grill. The place is run by a Greek family. If you order ketchup on your hot dog then you'll get excommunicated from the restaurant. Which you should because ketchup on a hot dog is disgusting. The old grandmother, who used to take orders, would ask ya "do ya want your hot dogs black or BLACK?" The last time I saw her there I told her "I want my hot dogs BLACK like my METAL." So what does all of that have to do with a Swedish black metal duo who's album cover has a skull face in the clouds looking down upon a forest? Well nothing really but it's a good segue into the way some bands use straight up metal styles and incorporate them into the black genre. FROSTVANG opens this, their second full length, with a grandiose number featuring a traditional metal beat accented with a folk song structure. Think Scandinavian Viking Metal style for a reference but not so much of an influence. Musically Avog has a perfect balance of savagery and poetic beauty. The songs are not overly long, there's eleven in all and none over five minutes in length. There's plenty of second wave blackened vibe melodies hastened with agony lased somber attitude. For most of the time the songs have this "I'm Swedish and I'm pissed off" feel. Then again the vocals are being sung in their native language. Honestly when I hear "Stilla Morker" I wanna scream. Pain, anguish and harsh reality is here in a blackened landscape that pours in plenty of expanse atmospheric sustain. Of course this release ain't perfect. "Sista Vilan" sounds like whispered post BM bullshit. Afterwards it all falls into traditional BM with a hint that Quorthon (aka:Tomas Forsberg) in spirit is watching over things. In the end I'm kinda mixed because the beginning is great but the second half gets weak. https://frostvang.bandcamp.com/album/avog https://www.facebook.com/Frostvang
SATAN WORSHIP - I'm the Devil Iron Shield Records OK your band name is SATAN WORSHIP and your album is titled I'm the Devil. Do I really need to say more? Alright I guess I'll have to. Here we have a band which is a joint German/Brazilian project by Marc Reign (the latest drummer of MORGOTH from Germany) and two guys from the Brazilian band SODOMIZER (bassist/vocalist Leatherface and guitarist Max The Nekromancer.) Musically this is basically blackened punk/thrash with ten cuts spanning thirty five minutes of satanic fueled hate, speed and metal. On the surface I just wanna say OK we get it, you like VENOM and HELLHAMMER and move on. But after a bunch of listens I can say that there's a lot of coolness about I'm the Devil. For starters the sound on here is lo fi as if it could've come out some thirty years ago. I love the feel of the soloing, a total throwback to the past. Leatherface's vocals are also gruff, low in the mix and demonic sounding. The riffs are cool as fuck, simple yet have that punk feeling to em. Hey if ya wanna sound like a sick old wannabe VENOM band then I'll give ya a fuckin HAIL! http://www.ironshieldrecords.de/ https://www.facebook.com/satanworshipofficial
INDEMNITY - Bloody Minded Bullet Headed Art Gates Records Do people slam dance anymore? I mean really slam dance. I'm not talking about that pussy ass push and shove bullshit or that punching the ground shit. I'm talking about a real circle pit. I don't go to hardcore shows anymore for obvious reasons. People would look at me and think I was someone's grandfather. But I will be at DRI in August. Anyways I ask the question because if this band was around in say 87 or 88 then there would be a huge pit. INDEMNITY hail from Belgium, have been around for a dozen years and this is their debut full length although they do have a few demos to their credit. Musically this is hardcore at it's base, late 80's era since their secondary stake is metal specifically thrash. Then again they do float in some metal core influence, ala old New York Hardcore, on a few cuts. I know it's not cool to say but it is the truth. Hardcore has become so one dimensional so generic it's boring. It wasn't always that way. Yeah I know "oh it was so cool back in the old days." Well yeah it was because you could listen to ten hardcore acts and all would/could be different. But hardcore died in 86, yes it did at least the original momentum. What followed afterward is up to interpretation as well as opinion. As long as you remember unless you were there then your opinion is limited. INDEMNITY, on here, offer twelve tracks in around twenty minutes of loud aggro extremism. They have all the bells and whistles of typical hardcore fan subjects. If you're into it then there you go. Nuff Said. http://www.artgatesrecords.com/ https://www.facebook.com/Indemnityband
VIGILANCE - Hammer of Satan's Vengeance Dying Victims Productions Meanwhile in Slovenia we have this four piece act who are dubbed the new wave of blackened heavy metal. I know a guy in Canada who's head will spin when he reads that. So anyways VIGILANCE do mix traditional NWOBHM sounds with a mild touch of black metal aesthetics. The band has been kickin it for a decade now. Hammer of Satan's Vengeance is their third full length over that time. There's some good and bad going on here. When their singer attempts a heavy metal scream, while having a gruff singing voice normally, it's criminal. "As the Fires Burn" is a perfect example of this failure. Dude you're not Halford or King Diamond. On the plus side, musically this is pretty cool. They do have a certain early MAIDEN flair on a few cuts. Maybe if they dropped the blackened seasoning and stuck with tradition it would all be better. https://www.dying-victims.de/ https://vigilanceofficial.bandcamp.com/ https://www.facebook.com/VigilanceAdelsberg/
WELCOME TO EXTREME METAL MANIAC OR WHAT i LIKE TO CALL THE HOME OF EXTREME METAL.
Attention
In Jan. 2020 some not so nice person(s), who obviously don't care for Metal, decided to complain to a social media platform about something I posted. That got me banned from posting links there under the former blog title Scumfeast Metal 666. Fine I just changed the name to what you see now. Hey I'm still here and, under our present day situation, will be more extreme then before.
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Extreme Metal or Music is generally a form which is accepted by 1% of all of the music loving public. It is elitist in every way and that's important to those of us who call ourselves fans. The 99% of people who will not like it are Not Supposed To. The music wasn't made for them, "the masses". It's music that's for those who take things to that "other" level. There is nothing hip or fad about it. In fact I treat those two notions very harshly.
