Band: ANDEM

Country: Russia

Title: Doch' Lunnogo Sveta (Moonlight Daughter)

Label: Apollon Records

Year: 2009

Style: Power Gothic Metal

Review:

For some reason this one reminds me of the music Spanish Locomotive Music used to release some years ago, more Power Metal than Gothic Metal, but still the Gothic part is not insignificant. Andem is a band formed in 2005 in Moskow, and this is their second official full-length. containing 10 tracks, the album lasts for 45 minutes of very catchy and enjoyable metal lead by a very charismatic female vocalist. The keyboard part makes thier music sometimes epic and majestic, sometimes fantasy-like, sometimes even medieval sounding, and overall have a huge impact on their music although used as a background instrument. The guitarist uses simple but effective metallic riffs combined with melodic leads and solos, and the rhythm instruments (drums and bass) are doing the perfect job making sure there are no blank parts in their music. This album will appeal equally to both Power Metal and Gothic Metal fans. Good!

Their lyrics are all in Russian, some of you might not like them, but I for one love them (or better said I love how Russian sounds in such a band). 

Reviewed by Adrian

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Band: ARATRON

Country: Holland

Title: Horrifying Visions

Label: Selfreleased

Year: 2010

Style: Death Metal

Review:

I like what these guys wrote me in a short letter accompaning this CD, that they are very proud of this, first release of theirs. And they should be, after all it is their work they are talking about. 

Aratron is around since 2000, but line-up changes made the band innactive between 2002 and 2008, good for them, it's always good to hear about bands getting it on again, that means metal is still in their bones. And this demo proves that well, a 5 tracks effort lasting for almost 20 minutes, Old-School Death Metal with Thrash influences, simple but extremely effective, with the benefit of a crystal clear sound, a demo that keeps up the Dutch Death Metal banner. Nothing innovative here, but this is a perfect listening for all Old-Schoolers out there, I won't be too surprised if they get signed right away. Fast, ugly and honest Death Metal as it was meant to be.

Reviewed by Adrian

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Band: BANE

Country: Serbia

Title: Chaos Darkness Emptiness

Label: Grom / Werewolf / Zero Budget / Godeater

Year: 2010

Style: Black Death Metal

Review:

I guess everyone know that Serbia has one of the most effervescent Extreme Metal scenes in Europe nowadays, and Bane is somehow one of the leaders of this scene, a name that is getting more and more exposure day by day and I really hope they won't end up as the band they came from, namely Disdained, an excellent Technical Death Metal band that is now defunct, unfortunately.

I don't know if I'm fitted to review this album of Bane simply because I'm a fan of this band (and of Disdained as well) since their beginnings and I can say I pretty much know their potential. "Chaos Darkness Emptiness"  is, without a doubt, one of the best releases coming out of Eastern Europe this year, a perfect combination of Black Metal and Death Metal sung in a very vicious, evil and aggressive manner, but still keeping an eye on creating melodies, so this is not full on brutality, it's something more, and this is dued to their instrumental skills, these guys can and are creating an epic Metal music here, situated on the way of the nowadays Behemoth / Belphegor followers, but keeping a dirtier sound on the entire release. Not as shimy and overproduced as the latest Behemoth albums, Bane keeps its originality by adding parts of melodic acoustic guitars the '90's extreme metal bands used to incorporate in their music. I for one have nothing to complain about this album. Try it yourselves.

Reviewed by Adrian

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Band: BENIGHTED IN SODOM

Country: USA

Title: Hybrid Parasite Evangelistica

Label: Bad Mood Man Productions

Year: 2010

Style: Drone Doom Black Metal

Review:

Man, I just reviewed another band with countless official releases out and now I'm listening to one that has 26 releases! I thought this was their latest full-length since it's dated September 2010 (!), but I was wrong, they have already 3 more out! It's nice to have the necessary label(s) to back you up whenever you have a new album, and Benighted In Sodom found two good ones: Bad Mood Man and Obscure Abhorrence. They're lucky guys. 

"Hybrid Parasite Evangelistica" is a 6 tracks album lasting for 50 minutes. The music on it is surprisingly good, although at times it gets monotonous, this is the part where Drone Doom kicks in and it might appeal to that category of listeners. The Black Metal part in this music is actually a mid-tempo to fast DSBM with quite a good level of imagination in composition and the whole instrumental part sounds curdled and mature. I wouldn't have expected a band releasing so many CDs in such a short period of time to sound so good. I would recommend this album for the atmosphere on it, a sombre, depressiveand grim one. Thumbs up for the acoustic touches, too.

Reviewed by Adrian

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Band: CARDIAC ARREST

Country: USA

Title: Heaven for the Insane

Label: Ibex Moon Records

Year: 2010

Style: Old-School Death Metal

Review:

Cardiac Arrest was formed back in 1997, but only managed to release their debut EP in 2004, maybe that was dued to line-up problems or something, I don't know, but the important thing for that band is that since 2004 they have a quite intense and steady discographic activity releasing 1 more EP, 1 demo and 3 full-length albums. "heaven for the Insane" is the followup to 2 very well received albums released on Redrum (the first) and Epitomite (the second). Ibex Moon is the producer of this third opus, a 12 tracks effort lasting for 43 minutes of intense, aggressive Old-School Death Metal. Mid-tempo to fast (well, mostly fast) rhythms, crunchy sounding guitar riffs, primitive drums sound (end of '80's - beginning of '90's type of organic sound), low tuned machine-gun-like sounding bass lines and typical cavernous growling vocals, comprehensive though. The CD is catchy enough to bring them more fans, and the best thing in my opinion is its heavy as hell sound, a real Death Metal album. Still, not recommended to new school Death Metal followers...

Reviewed by Adrian

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Band: CEREBRUM

Country: Greece

Title: Spectrum Extravagance

Label: Lacerated Enemy Records

Year: 2010

Style: Technical Death Metal

Review:

Debut album for this Greek band that was formed well back, in 2002, but only released one demo prior to this full-length, that means the tracks featured on this debut album are composed long time ago and suffered numerous mutations in time. 10 tracks, 43 minutes of a mix between old-school Death Metal and the new trends in complex, extremely intricate Death Metal, and album I listened to for a couple of times during my work on something else. I must admit it was a pretty good experience, nothing distrubed me on this album, of course nothing left me mouth open (maybe except the drum-works and the guitar leads), but it kept my attention high without boring me one bit. Drummer on this release is none other than George Kollias from Nile, and so I can explain why the drums on this release are so complex and well executed. But still, the others in the band are not big names as George, and their high-class instrumental skills cannot be denied. "Spectrum Extravagance" is an album that leans more on the technical, maybe even progressive side than on aggression or brutality, but that doesn't mean this is not a Death Metal with balls, it only means you'll find yourselves carefully listening to its every part. Recommended!

Reviewed by Adrian

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Band: HELL MUNECO

Country: Italy

Title: Doom Core

Label: Gentle Exhuming Records

Year: 2009

Style: Stoner Doom Metal

Review:

Hell Muneco is yet another band where Frank Wells, the owner of Gentle Exhuming Records is involved and with this one I'm inclined to say he's an old-fashioned guy, as Hell Muneco plays a kind of Stoner Doom a la '80's, with a touch of the '90's depressing Doom Metal sound on guitar. So, add to that a Stoner Metal sounding guitar tone and a simple, but groovy rhythm section and you get what this band is all about. As I said, simple, groovy and quite catchy, a good band for followers of Stoner Doom (more for the Stoner ones though). This EP is composed by 5 tracks lasting for a bit more than 25 minutes. What it laks is a bit more low tone on both guitar and bass and I think that's all, the rest is quite good, we could hear more good things about this band in the near future.

Reviewed by Adrian

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Band: KAOSCENTRICA

Country: Chile

Title: South Hordes Arise

Label: Australis Records

Year: 2009

Style: Old-School Death Metal

Review:

As a veteran of the Chilean Death Metal scene (the band was formed in 2001), Kaoscentrica had the bad luck to release their debut album only after 8 years of existence, and from my understanding this may be dued to multiple line-up changes, a hard disease for most of the bands in the Metal scene. "South Hordes Arise" is a 10 tracks effort including songs from their 2003 and 2004 demos plus some new ones, so this is a release embedding 8 years of work and evolution. We're being presented a '90's kind of American influenced Death Metal with a solid personal touch, multiple parts of virtuoso displays on all the instruments: the guitarists work very well together creating a complex, interesing back-bone for the whole Kaoscentrica concept, the bass is very upfront and aggressive, the drummer sounds like he's in gym class, all the stretches he does are gym-class influenced for sure, this is one hell of a drummer, and the vocalist, Pedro, does a great job combining old-school growls with rasps. A 100% old-School Death Metal release focused on technical displays, recommended!

Reviewed by Adrian

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Band: LETHE

Country: Ukraine

Title: Nowhere

Label: A5 Productions

Year: 2010

Style: Dark Ambient

Review:

Lethe is a one man band from Kiev, Ukraine, and I'm dealing here with its debut full-length released after a demo in 2008 and a split in 2009, split released as StormChild who's the man behind Lethe.

Here we have 8 tracks in 43 minutes of dreamy Ambiental music made on synths exclusively although on the second track the waves effects sound like a distant Black Metal guitar riff and on the 6th track there's a TV news excerpt. The music flows softly, without any unexpected turns or twists, so this could be good for meditation and to take some relaxing spare time to dream about anything. The cover artwork is absolutely fabulous, thunbs up to Dmitry Mayatsky for doing it, and if I mention this is a CD in DVD box, you'll know it's another great addition to my A5 (and I'm no referring strictly to the label here) collection. :) Recommended for when you get home from a stressful day at work.

Reviewed by Adrian

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Band: MAL ETRE

Country: Switzerland

Title: Torment

Label: Kunsthauch Productions

Year: 2010

Style: Atmospheric Doom Black Metal

Review:

Mal Etre is a solo project started in 2007 by NP (aka Nokturnalpriest), "Mal Etre" is its debut album, a 7 tracks release lasting for 50 minutes. The music on this album is a combination of ambient keyboards, atmospheric effects, Doom Metal slow and opressive parts, acoustic melodic guitars all over, Black Metal simple guitar riffs passing from slow to mid-tempo, even fast rhythms sometimes, grim Black Metal vocals and clean parts here and there. NP manages to create a sometimes dreamy and sometimes cold atmosphere especially with his acoustic guitar parts and keyboards playing, but the bad part on this album is the sound of the drums, guitars (except for the accoustic ones), and Black Metal shrieks, they sound like forgotten somewhere in the back of a big hall, like there are two separate bands playing and being recorded symultaneously... The final result sounds somehow chaotic and unprofessional, and although I have enjoyed a lot his ideas, I cannot stand this sound. Sorry.

Reviewed by Adrian

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Band: MOLOCH

Country: Ukraine

Title: Isolation der Essenz

Label: Sabbathid Records

Year: 2010

Style: Ambient Black Metal

Review:

Holy crap, when I checked this band's history I was completely shocked, I've counted 61 official releases in their baggage!!! 61 !!! This is insane, Moloch, which is actually a studio project of a guy named Sergiy Gordiuk, worked with almost all underground Black Metal labels out there since its foundation in 2002. There are some other bands out there that release countless albums per year and unfortunately most of them are pure crap, so whenever I see a new band like these, I have a natural prejudice on it. This happened with Moloch as well after I saw its number of releases. The label, Sabbathid Records, is a new one as well, but already released 9 CDs, and this is not the only one that's so productive, there's a lot of $$$ involved in the Underground Black Metal nowadays, but that is both good and bad for the scene.

Enough with my thoughts on the scene and my prejudices, let's pass to the release itself. The look and package is professional 100%, good job for Sabbathid. The music is a combination of Ambient and Black Metal, such a popular combination nowadays. It starts with a slow to mid-tempo Ambient Black Metal track with monotonous 2-riffs guitars, amateurish drums sound (the playing is ok, and I like the fact they are live-recorded), which goes for the bass-playing as well, and surprisingly good desperate kind of Black Metal screams. The next is an Ambient key-driven track that's quite good. The third is another mid-tempo Black Metal track in the vein of the first one, maybe a bit more aggressive. The fourth is like the second part of the second track, the same sound and atmosphere, but overusing it becomes boring. Track 5 is, again, a mid-tempo Ambient Black Metal one with nothing that would make me listen to it again except for the vocals. And the closing one is another Ambient, of course, track made on synths, but this time the atmosphere changes is a Dark, cosmic-like one, that is again a monotonous one, but catchy, meditative and I've enjoyed it the most although it is a 25 minutes track... 

To sum it up I would say a NO to Moloch's Ambient Black Metal part and a YES to its Dark Ambient part, I would like to listen to a complete album with Moloch playing only keys and vox.

Reviewed by Adrian

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Band: NIERTY

Country: UK

Title: Acolytes of the Descent

Label: Misantrof

Year: 2010

Style: Blackened Death Metal

Review:

This one if Nierty's third album to date, available as both physical CD and free download from Misantrof, a net label with quite high popularity because it's owned by a member of Carpathian Forest. 

Nierty is a combination of Black and Death Metal with quite a messy, chaotic sound, a sound that makes it a bit hard to digest, at least for me. They say it's Black Industrial Death Grind, but I see no signs of Industrial or Grind inhere, who knows, maybe on their past releases. This one is, indeed a Blackened Death Metal, and a very good one if we speak about composition and execution without adding this horrible sound (again, some of you might like it, but not me, it's too messy and ruins all this great atmosphere). It's strange what I'm saying here, on one hand I hate this release because of its sound and on the other I love it for the music on it that's extremely catchy and interesting, just thing of the first Hecate Enthroned albums, how fresh and aggressive they were. Honestly, with a good studio recording this band will rip your appart, this is music to desecrate all that's holy. Strongly recommended (just because it's free download) for the ones of you in search of the new UK Black Death Metal leader!

Reviewed by Adrian

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Band: PHOSPHORUS

Country: Canada

Title: Crepuscule

Label: Selfreleased

Year: 2010

Style: Thrash Black Metal

Review:

Phosphorus was formed in 2008 and I'm listening here to their new (second, I guess) demo release, a CD containing 3 new tracks and one re-recorded, totalizing almost 20 minutes of Thrash Black Metal, a not so happy combination I must add. I'm sure their tracks sound aggressive and all on stage, but on CD this aggression part is lacking big time. That may be because of the mastering of this release, the final result sounds like when you throw a stone in the water and it creates waves, the same with the vocals here, when the vocals intervene the whole instruments' sound suffers a shock and feels like creating waves of volume... There are some good ideas though, especially on guitars, some pretty rad Thrash Metal riffs from old-school to new fashioned ones and some Progressive Thrash Metal attempts as well, the vocals are pretty much on the Black Metal path, but although the vocalist seem to have a great voice, vicious and cruel sounding, on this recording he sounds like he's afraid of using it, like he's struggling not to give his best... Also one other thing I've noticed, the lead guitarist has a predisposition for creating melodic solos, and that's great, he should use this more on the next releases. All in all I think they only need some more time to curdle the whole thing and they should be ready to try the scene with a full-length.

Reviewed by Adrian

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Band: REVEREND KILL

Country: Canada

Title: War and Conflict

Label: Mercykill Records

Year: 2010

Style: Melodic Death Metal

Review:

I did a review of Reverend Kill's second album back in June and I'm glad I get to review their new release as well. My question back then was on who really released the album, but now I think I got it, this Mercykill Records label seems to be the band's own label, or at least that's what I think, I may be wrong, too. Anyways, this new album is a 10 tracks effort lasting for 38 minutes. The music follows the same Melodic Death Metal path, but this time they are putting much more into it, their instrumental skills display is absolutely mesmerizing, it kept me interested from the begining to the end without any trace of boredom. I guess the band they will be most compared with is Amon Amarth, although Reverend Kill's lyrical part is based on a wider period of time, their lyrics are about all sort of wars from different very periods of time. Regarding the music on it, "war and Conflict" is based on melodic guitar lines combined with catchy riffs, fast and complex drum rhythms, important bass lines, and two types of vocals, one growling and one hoarse. The crystal clear sound makes it all more enjoyable. Great release, great band, recommended!

Reviewed by Adrian

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Band: RITUAL

Country: USA

Title: Ancient Tome

Label: Heaven and Hell Records

Year: 2010

Style: Traditional Hard'n'Heavy

Review:

Hell yeah \m/ it's not every day I get to review such music and that's simply because Pest Webzine's format is a different one, but once in a while I do like to listen to Hard'n'Heavy, especially if it's old-school flavoured, and in Ritual's case you simply cannot get more old-school than this. I admit it, if I were to listen to this music in my teens, when I was all into Sepultura, Obituary, Deicide or the likes, well... to put it delicately I would have hated it. But now it's like a breath of different (I wouldn't say fresh) air. 

This album is the first of a series started by Heven and Hell Records, called Lost Relics. There are 15 tracks inhere totalizing 1 hour of playing, a compilation of the band's material from the '80's: "L.T.M.P. (Let The Metal Play)" EP from '87, "Evil in Your Heart" EP from '89 and "Dark Star" EP from '89. These guys are rockin' that's sure, it's fun to listen to these tracks, and a bit nostalgic, I must add, but as good as they are on creating catchy rhythms and solid compositions they really fail on ballads, or at least the first one, "No Longer Feel" is really bad because of the vocal parts layout (the piano is really good). Anyway, the sound on this release is really organic and has that rebel atmosphere overall, although sometimes it becomes a bit amateurish (especially on drums). Recommended if you want to meet the '80's underground Metal scene from New Jersey.

Reviewed by Adrian

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Band: ROSE LAND

Country: France

Title: Au Mont des Soupirs

Label: Frozen Wing Records

Year: 2010

Style: Melancholic Ambient

Review:

This is a solo project coming from France, Rose Land is actually Eric Apollinari. Inspired by a place in the Alps called Roselend, Eric tries to present his imaginative world through music. Rose Land could be described as Melancholy Ambient Music, a light ethereal soundscape creted in major part on keyboards and synths, but how bizzare it could be, I can also hear some Negura Bunget-like guitars here and there, some simple electronic drums on a few tracks to help with the rhythm, and also some male and female clean vocals (more whispers than vocals) just to spice everything up. A very good music, but unfortunately I couldn't get into it much, maybe the fact that the tracks are pretty different one from another made me treat it like a normal release, not as a conceptual album. Anyway, if you're into this kind of music, check this out, it's pretty professional music.

Reviewed by Adrian

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Band: RUSTY PACEMAKER

Country: Austria

Title: Blackness and White Light

Label: Solanium Records

Year: 2010

Style: Alternative Stoner Doom

Review:

I was quite intrigued when Rusty contacted me and told me he's a follower of the Underground Metal scene, and that's because he plays a totally different thing than extreme metal. That's an admirable feature for any musician, to have a wide field of music "under his belt". 

Rusty Pacemaker is a solo project started in 2003, and the one I'm reviewing nowis its debut album as a band, but it is the debut album for the label, also owned by Rusty. 10 tracks, an hour of playing, a music filled with influences from different genres, a solid display of multiple emotions and of course, a demo of Rusty's instrumental and compositional skills. Most of the times the album is enjoyable, the tracks keep bringing new and new things to the table, but there are parts that could have been cut out or replaced by something else, parts that give you the impression they are there only to fill in the blanks. The acoustic parts are really relaxing and I think Rusty could use them more on the next release. The overall sound is good enough, except for the drums sound which is not that is bad or something, but it's a bit too raw for this kind of music, those are drums better suited for metal bands. Recommended album in case you're looking for something different and quite original.

Reviewed by Adrian

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Band: SIDERIS NOCTEM

Country: Ukraine

Title: Wait till the Time is R.I.P.

Label: Bad Mood Man Music

Year: 2010

Style: Doom Death Metal

Review:

This CD has nice ladies all over the place, haha, one more reason to buy it. ;)

It took 10 years for this band to release their debut album, quite a long time since they only have one demo released prior to " Wait till...", not a very productive band I'd say. This album (with such a gramatically incorrect title...) is a 7 tracks effort + intro + outro, played in a traditional, '90's like kind of Melodic Doom Death with all the necessary elements for such a release: female vocals, Death Metal-like growls and clean male vox, melodic keyboards, mid-tempo rhythm, it is a nice release, for nostalgics of those times (like me, haha), but it has nothing to stand out, it becomes monotonous after a bit and if the beginning tracks are quite well composed and catchy, the final is not something I would have liked to hear, it's like they struggled to compose some 3-4 more tracks to get this album out. Bottomline what we have here is a band with good potential, good instrumentists and good vocalists, but a big lack on composition and that can only be fixed in the rehearsal room, with patience. BMM's production is great, something every band wishes for...

Reviewed by Adrian

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Band: SIEGHETNAR

Country: Germany

Title: Endlosung

Label: Kunsthauch

Year: 2010

Style: Atmospheric Black Metal

Review:

Sieghetnar is a one-man-band from Germany established in 2005, with no less than 5 demos and 4 full-lehgth albums released so far. This one is a demo released by Sieghetnar in 2008 and re-released this year by US based label Kunsthauch. A one track demo lasting for almost 30 minutes of dreamy, fantasy-like soundscapes. This track is divided into 6 different parts, but honestly I have no idea where one ends and another begins, or even why the guy behind this project decided to name 6 parts in the same track, it has almost no vocals... Most of the track is, as mentioned before, an Atmospheric Dark music made on keys, synths and drums exclusively, but in the middle there is also a mid-tempo Black Metal part with guitars and vocals added, a very good part I must admit. What can I say to sum it up, I would have liked a bit more of that Black Metal on the release, but all in all it is ok.

Reviewed by Adrian

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Band: TOXXIC TOYZ

Country: France

Title: Mutation

Label: Nightmare Records

Year: 2010

Style: Heavy Thrash Metal

Review:

I was quite surprised when, after some spins of this album, I checked out this band's bio and found out they are from France. Well, nothing in their music made me think of France, I could bet they are from US. So yes, they sound 100% American, but that has a logical explaination as well, their singer, David McBee, is from US. I don't know if he moved in France or this is just a studio project between the French band and the US singer.

Toxxic Toyz are around since 2003, they have one album our prior to "Mutation", called "F.E.A.R." and released in 2007 by themselves. In February of this year they participated in a Nightmare Rec. contest and won a deal with the USA based label. Last month "Mutation" was finally released and the guys are starting an already promising career. This album proves a fantastic potential for Toxxic Toyz, a Thrashy Heavy Metal, very modern sounding but keeping an old-school feeling. The best thing about these 9 tracks (+ intro + outro) is that you can sense they are composed and played with great passion, you can feel the passion in each and every track. Toxxic Toyz is: a fantastic vocalist with exceptional qualities, both aggressive and melodic guitars (from razor sharp riffs, to enchanting acoustic parts and great solos), a Swiss-clock rhythm section and a crystal clear sound. This band has a bright future ahead.

Reviewed by Adrian

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Band: TRANSIENCY

Country: Italy

Title: Manqualm

Label: Gentle Exhuming Records

Year: 2007

Style: Doom Death Metal

Review:

This CD was released in 2007, so I feel I shouldn't review it for two reasons: have no idea if this is (still) available for the public and second I don't know if the band sounds the same or at least similar nowadays, but since I have received it from their label I have to review it, just for their trouble of sending it.

Transiency started out in 2002 and this is their debut EP, 4 tracks + intro totalizing 21 minutes of playing. The sound is awful, I would have worked more on this aspect, because even if this is old-school Doom Death it deserves a better, clearer sound. As I said, Transciency plays an old-school Doom Death with a few Gothic touches on the guitar part, I would say it sounds like a combination of old Amorphis and Celestial Season, both bands I used to like a lot back in the days. The guitar work is clearly the main element in Traransiency's music, although the others are displaying an important presence as well, but still, although the final work could be a good way to escape from the nowadays obsession of speed and technical skills, the band is not there yet, just check how many of such bands Solitude Prod. has under it's belt nowadays, much better than this. On their website it says they are working on a new EP, but I have no idea if that's still in works or when it will be released.

Reviewed by Adrian

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Band: VARIOUS ARTISTS

Country: Germany / Russia

Title: DER HEIDENSTURM VOL. 2

Label: Sturmglanz

Year: 2010

Style: Folk Pagan Black Thrash Metal

Review:

Sturmglanz just released this compilation, a meeting between Folk Pagan Black Metal bands from Germany and Russia, and a pretty good one I must add. The CD comes in a nice A5 package, simple but very effective, and regarding the music on it, here's my points of view on each band:

Yansen - seems to be a one man project founded in 2008, but with a pretty good discographic activity so far. Folk Black Metal with good sound, lyrics in German, and although the whole concept behind this band is about Nordic Gods and myths, this track sounds to me like an ode to the American-Indian heritage... check it our and you'll get why I'm saying this; good one, nevertheless

Leshak - a cover of Motorhead's "Ace of Spades"; light Thrash Metal (except for the somehow growling vocals) with accordion and flute, interesting combination that makes you find out more about this band

Vergeltung - Pagan Metal from Germany with female vocals, Black Metal-like screams and clean male vocals; good concept but the sound doesn't make justice inhere, it all seems not curdled enough

Gjallarhorn - Melodic Black Metal built on guitars, with a spice of violin; it seems to me that the band is not mature enough, seems that at least one of the guitarists would like to do more than the genre or his colleagues allows it; they are not there yet...

Asael - German band that actually sounds more Russian than the Russian bands on this releases, haha; this is because its members are of Russian origin. Interesting combination of Symphonic Black Metal with some Thrash Metal, but far from being aggressive or technical, it sounds like an attempt, an attempt to find their style

Veda - Folk Melodic Metal with a good instrumental execution, but nothing more, nothing to stand out, well maybe except for the female vocalist; the potential is there, though...

Morok - good Pagan Black Metal from Germany that sound, again like in Asael's case, more Russian than German. The sound is not perfect for what they are playing, but gives you a correct image of their ideas; melodic, mid-tempo to fast playing, not the best composition, but catchy enough to keep you listening till the end

Grai - Russian mid-tempo Folk Metal that I have actually enjoyed a lot; completed with keyboards, flute and female vox (both clean and growls!), Grai presents us here a very interesting track that made me check more about them and I must say we're dealing with a very good band; thumbs up, check out this band!

Blutnebel - German mid-tempo Black Metal with Heavy-Thrash like melodic guitars and a very good, evil vocal part; the overall mastering is not so good, it gives you the impression something's missing in their music, but it's not

Veliar - Symphonic Black Metal; catchy, aggressive but still melodic composition, sounds mature enough; good band

Thulr - Pagan Black Metal from Germany; I only like the guitars on it, melodic and quite original, creating a somehow unique atmosphere with the support of violin in the backgrounds, but the vocals and drums are extremely anoying, they ruin all the guitars/violin work...

Hildr - Russian strange Melodic Doom (Pagan?) Metal I have no other info on; I'm only curious if the vocalist is a he or a she because I wouldn't bet on my guess that is a she... The music sounds like '90's Doom Metal with melodic guitar leads and growling vocals on the background here and there

Nogroth - I'm not the biggest fan of this Humppa Metal style (I actually hate it), so I'll just skip this track, to be fair... Check it for yourselves for an opinion

Gmork - Melodic Black Metal band from Russia with quite a name in the underground, at least in the Black Metal underground; good atmospheres, aggressive enough, epic-sounding, all in all a good track, maybe a bit too short.

I strongly recommend this compilation to any Underground Pagan/Folk Metal followers, you have quite a lot of new bands to discover inhere. Looking forward to listen to the followup volume 3.

Reviewed by Adrian

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Band: VARIOUS ARTISTS

Country: World

Title: The Underground Trilogy Vol. 2

Label: Smouldering Earth Records

Year: 2010

Style: Extreme Metal

Review:

The Italian Smouldering Earth Records label is emerging from the underground as a fervent supporter of the scene with its Underground Trilogy compilation CDs. This one that I'm reviewing now is the second volume, I haven't had the chance to listen to the first one, but I'll review the third one in the near future, too. So here's what we get on Volume 2, in its 70 minutes of playing:

Abwehrschlacht - a band reviewed before in Pest Webzine, a Military-sounding Black Metal from UK with primitive sound but quite a raw and proud attitude

Moloch - I have just reviewed Moloch, take a look up if you want to read more about them; not my type of Black Metal

Apocryphe - a band I'm listening for the first time, very good Norwegian-inspired old-school Black Metal with atmospheres created by guitar riffs, the way it was meant to be; thumbs up

Garden Of Grief - Austrian GoG is next, a very good Black Metal with melodic guitar insertions and keyboards; the production could have been better, but this is a really catchy band

Svartnad - a Black Metal band from Sweden with raw sound, not the best one for what they try to do, meaning a Melodic type of Black Metal, guitar driven, with both screams and clean vocals, and acoustic parts; would like to hear this with a better recording

Desir De Mourir - by its name you can easily guess what we have here, namely DSBM all the way; not bad, but nothing to stand out either

Winterblast - Melodic Black Metal with too many instruments for such a bad sound; too bad, their composition seems pretty rad

Acimonia - mid-tempo to fast Black Metal with bad sound production again, the background keyboards have actually a higher or at least the same volume as the rest of the instruments

Immortal Empire - good, complex ideas, but maybe too much for its level of execution and for this ... primitive and synthetic sound; fast Black Metal with keyboards and slow, melodic insertions of guitar leads (a la Evol, but without the female vox)

Lutece - fast Black Metal  with an epic touch, a better recording than some of the previous bands, but still not enough; something about them remind me of Moonsorrow (the early years), and I'm not talking about their music here; good potential

Dark Desolation - fast Black Metal, aggressive as hell, especially because of the drum programming; solid Death Metal touches on guitars

As Vampiric Shades and Belial Winds - a Brazilian band founded in 1996 (!) but with only 1 demo out... Strange. The vocalist also played in Nauseous Surgery, a band I used to enjoy a lot; this one is a mid-tempo to fast old-school Black Metal with no other influences, pure and hateful, I like it

Beltane - a very prolific band from New Zealand, very present in the Underground Black Metal scene nowadays; except for the cheap keyboards at the beginning of this track, the rest is very interesting, complex and catchy; good job on guitars also

Veinen - fast Black Metal from Greece, old-school, primitive sounding, correctly executed but bringing anything original

Singhasari - a band featured on one of my compilations, too; raw Black Metal with bad recording, I hope they will record their next tracks in a (new) studio.

Reviewed by Adrian

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