Tuesday, February 28, 2012

Black Breath Interview


1. Can you give us an update on what is going on with the band these days?
It's getting pretty crazy around here. We've got video shoots going on, flying out to SXSW, releasing a new LP, going to Europe at the end of March, doing a U.S. tour after that, doing some other fly-out stuff and Mexico, Japan, Australia, etc.

2. How would you describe the musical sound of the new album and how it differs from previous releases?
The new album is more metal.

3. What are some of the lyrical topics and subjects the band explores with the new release?
Desperation, anger, aggression, terror, death, evil, possession, lust and sin.

4. What is the meaning and inspiration behind the bands name?
It's named for a Repulsion song, but I'm told they got it from Tolkien.

5. What are some of the best shows that the band has played so far and how would you describe your stage performance?
We played some local shows recently that were fuckin crazy! They seem to be getting more wild as the months drag on, which is great. Other cool shows were Maryland Death Fest a couple years ago, the open air fests we played in Europe last year, our first Stockholm show, a last-minute Berlin show we played after a scheduled show last year was raging. The west coast is always fun. Our stage performance is full of hair and heads banging, kids flying everywhere (ideally), ears ringing, people letting loose. We try and play tight and sometimes it works better than others.

6. Do you have any touring plans for the new release?
World tour!

7. On a worldwide level how has your newer music been received by fans of death metal and crustcore?
It seems like reviews of the new record are fairly positive so far and that's awesome!

8. What direction do you see your music heading into on future releases?
Hard to say, we always have extra riffs laying around but we'll probably start consciously writing new shit pretty soon. We'll probably come up with some ideas on where we want to go next fairly soon. Stay tuned...

9. What are some bands or musical styles that have influenced the sound of the new album and also what are you listening to nowadays?
A few come to mind... Slayer, Autopsy, Repulsion, Dismember, Trouble, Black Sabbath, Entombed, Bathory, Metallica, Obituary, Witchery, Judas Priest, Scorpions, Dio, Discharge, Celtic Frost, Anti-Cimex, etc. My recent favorite records (not necessarily new though) have been Spooky Tooth - Spooky Two, The Devil's Blood - The Thousandfold Epicentre, new Bastard Priest.

10. What role does Satanism and Occultism play in the music?
It's an influence for sure. It's hard to fuck around with metal and not be into that stuff in some way. There has been some dabbling in blood-letting and trying to conjure up some dark shit, but nothing too crazy. For the most part we just do what feels good. If the song moves us in some way we do it.

11. Outside of music what are some of your interests?
Music takes up most of my time, but designing shit, movies, printing shirts, working on boats, skateboarding reading, cooking, and hanging out with buddies seems to take up the rest.

12. Any final words or thoughts before we wrap up this interview?
Final thoughts, final thoughts. Haha, thanks!
 

Tuesday, February 21, 2012

Megascavenger/Songs Of Flesh: Part 1/Selfmadegod/2012 EP Review


 Megascavenger  are  a  band  from  Sweden  that  includes  veterans  from  the  scene  with  a  music  style  that  I  would  describe  as  being  brutal  90's  sounding  Swedish  d  beat  death  metal  and  this  is  a  review  of  their  2012  EP  "Songs  Of  Flesh:  Part  1"  which  was  released  by  Selfmadegod.

  Drums  range  from  slow,  mid  paced  to  fast  drumming  with  a  good  amount  of  blast  beats  being  thrown  into  the  music,  while  the  bass  playing  has  a  very  dark  tone  with  riffs  that  follow  the  riffing  that  is  coming  out  of  the  guitars.

  Rhythm  guitars  range  from  slow,  mid  paced  to  fast  brutal  Swedish  style  death  metal  riffs  with  some  d  beat  influences  while  the  lead  guitars  are  very  raw  and  primitive  sounding  death  metal  guitar  solos  and  leads.

  Vocals  range  from  deep  death  metal  and  d  beat  growls  with  some  high  pitched  screams  being  thrown  in  at  times,  while  the  lyrics  cover  gore  themes,  as  for  the  production  it  has  a  very  dark  and  heavy  sound  to  it.

  In  my  opinion  Megascavenger  are  a  very  great  sounding  d  beat  Swedish death  metal  and  if  you  are  a  fan  of  this  style,  you  should c heck  out  this  band.  RECOMMENDED  TRACK  "Deathobsessed".  RECOMMENDED  BUY.

Saturday, February 18, 2012

Black Breath/Sentenced To Life/Southern Lord Records/2012 CD Review


Black  Breath  are  a  band  from  Seattle,  Washington  that  plays  a  mixture  of  Swedish  style  death  metal,  hardcore  punk and  rock  and  this  is  a  review  of  their  2012  album  "Sentenced  To  Life"  which  was  released  by  Southern  Lord  Records.

  Drums  range  from  slow,  mid  paced  to  fast  drumming  with  a  good  amount  of  blast  beats  being  thrown  into  the  music,  while  the  bass  playing  has  a  very  dark  tone  with  riffs  that  follow  the  riffing  that  is  coming  out  of  the  guitars  and  at  times  they  sound  very  powerful.

  Rhythm  guitars  range  from  slow,  mid  paced  to  fast  riffs  that  combine  Swedish  style  death  metal  riffs  with  hardcore/punk  with  a  brief  use  of  clean  playing  being  used  on  one  song  while  the  lead  guitars  are  very  chaotic  sounding  crust  punk/death  metal  guitar  solos  when  they  are  utilized.

  Vocals  are  a  mixture  of  hardcore  style  yelling  with  some  deep  growls  being  thrown  in  at  times,  while  the  lyrics  cover  dark  and  hateful  themes,  as  for  the  production  it  has  a  very  heavy,  powerful  and  heavy  sound  to  it.  

  In  my  opinion  Black  Breath  are  a  very  great  sounding  death  metal/crust/hardcore  punk/rock  hybrid and  if  you  are  a  fan  of  this  style,  you  should  check  out  this  band.  RECOMMENDED  TRACKS  INCLUDE  "Feast  Of  The  Damned"  "Forced  Into  Possession"  "Of  Flesh"  and  "The  Flame".  RECOMMENDED  BUY.
  

Monday, February 13, 2012

March Of The Hordes Interview


1. Can you tell us a little bit about the band fro those that have never heard of you before?
Hi!
We are from small town on south of Czech republic and our first band was crust/punk Deviace doby with female vocals (Ex-lex) but this wasn´t that kind of band which you want to listen to:) but we released 2 Cds around 2006 (demo and split with Samochotijoin very small series like 100 copies). Check it here /www.wagnum.blogspot.com/ .
After that we estabilished March of the hordes with urge to play old fashioned death metal with dark lyrics about filth warriors, drunk knights, strange visions...First record was a demo and  a split LP with Disbeatless...in that time we had to kick out singer and stop playing shows. Our last shit is a split CD with Escape the flesh on a  death metal label Lavadome records /www.lavadome.org/ from CZ. Check it or die!
Next release will be 7´´ with scandi crust folks Tommorows hell from Otrokovice (CZ) spring/summer .


2. How would you describe your musical sound/
Crunchy old school death metal with black metal, crust and rock´n´roll influences.


3. What are some of the lyrical topics and subjects the band explores with the music?
We like things like strange books, movies,music, apocalyptic shit so thats it. Our lyrics are not about politics, corporations and gore. Its about weird things which we are looking for.


4. What is the meaning and inspiration behind the bands name?
War

5. What are some of the best shows that the band has played so far and how would you describe your stage performance/
We played couple of nice shows with bands like Demonical, Gride,Escape the flesh, Fear of extinction, Disbeatless, Prumyslova smrt, Evidence smrti, Risposta etc. Hard to say which one was better! All these shows was great!
Our only performance on stage is drinking beers and headbanging.



6. Do you have any touring plans for the future/
Not now. We are going to play one gig on NMK fest IV.in Zittau/Germany and some shows in Czech republic but no tour plans for this year. We will see.


7. On a worldwide level how has your music been recieved by fans of death metal and crustcore?
Deathers means that is less death metal and crusties think that  is less crust hehe.
The reviews and feedbacks for the split cd are awesome of course.

8. Are there any side projects besides this band or is this a full time line up/
No one of is is currently member of other bands.


9. What direction do you see your music heading into on future releases?
More old school death metal with influences from dark places.

10. What are some bands or musical styles that have influenced your music and also what are you listening to nowadays?
We like a lot of different music but our common bands and influences are: Entombed, Bathory, Bolt thrower, Celtic frost, Hellhammer, Dismember, Nirvana 2002, Motorhead, Vomitory, Maim, Autopsy, Wolfpack,  Death breath, Hooded menace, Hellshock, Bastard priest, Wolves in the throne room, Jesu, Winter, Crux,Nifelheim etc.


11. Outside of music what are some of your interests/
Beer, books, movies, girls, beans, weed...


12. Any final words or thoughts before we wrap up this interview?
Turn off your pc and go to the pub!
Cheers!

Monday, February 6, 2012

Yog Interview

1. Can you give us an update on what is going on with the band these days?

1. Can you give us an update on what is going on with the band these days?
I guess we can say that we are “back on track” after more than a year of almost total absence. Lots of things changed after the record of Half The Sky, Alex wanted to spend more time on his studies so he left at the end of 2010, and Manu came back in the band right away. Then Matthieu became a father and we clearly felt he was not anymore in the mood of being a badass guitar player like before. In spite of this, it took an eternity until he got out, which put us in some sort of “stand by” for a huge part of 2011. And you know, with no gigs on the task list, you can’t get a release of your album by a label. Finally, a joke about Marc (our sound engineer) replacing Matthieu in the band turned out to be the best thing to do. He’s got the skills, the motivation, the spirit, he has been a friend for so many years, and last but no least he is the only one interested !!! So there we go, we’got a new guitarist and we are back on track. Half The Sky was released end of 2011 and we will be playing a few gigs this spring and then probably get back to creating new material for another recording session before the end of 2012.




2. How would you describe the musical sound of the new album and how it differs from previous releases?
Much more harsh, crude, gross. First because it was recorded by someone whose colour and taste is much more of a “right in your face” thing, and second because we needed to do it differently from the first album (Years Of Nowhere). The voice and the drums have been put forward this time, whereas it was the guitars that were last time. The next release with bear the perfect balance, hopefully !

3. What are some of the lyrical topics and subjects the band explores with the music/
We have no album concept in terms of lyrics, we just take what comes in. Yonni finished his studies last summer, he used to study philosophy, he therefore writes things that are more likely inspired from philosophical concepts he’s read and liked. I think of songs like “Solar Nature” or “Stones” that are inspired from things Nietzsch has written. Another one would be “Breaking The Spell”.

4. What is the meaning and inspiration behind the band name/
It was a stupid idea of our very first guitarist who thought this name had 2 sides : a funny side coming from the word “yogurt” and a brutal barbarian side if you say it out loud with a heavy voice… don’t ask me more about that ( ! We kept it cause it sounded good.

5. What are some of the best shows that the band has played so far and how would you describe your stage performance?
There has been a few good ones. Very probably we had the most fun when we played at that Dollhouse thing back in the summer of  2007. It was on a Saturday afternoon, with just a bunch of people composed of our friends, the organisers and visitors of this outdoor event the Dollhouse was part of. None of them was expecting that but they loved it. Great time. Great fun. We try to give the best on stage, living the music as much as we can. Hopefully, the ambiance is as crazy as the music.

6. Do you have any touring plans for the future?
We are still teaching our new guitarist (former guitarist who recorded Half The Sky with us, has left the band last Fall), so we have not yet been able to look too much into this. Still, we’ve had a few nice proposals for the Spring. We will be playing 2 shows around in March, then a 3 shows in France and Belgium and then the “release party” show on April 7th in our favourite local rock club. The first ones will be short shows because of our new guitarist not yet knowing all the songs, but he is progressing !

7. On a worldwide level how has your music been recieved by grindcore fans?
I don’t know how much we can talk about “worldwide level”… we are a small band, and we have never yet tried to move too much to the international. Even though the Years Of Nowhere album was distributed in a few European countries plus the USA, we have not received a lot of recognition. And then here and there, you get a message from a fanatic that has grabbed your album you don’t know where and tells you how much he loves your music. This is just awesome. Lately it was someone in Japan.




8. What direction do you see your music heading into on future releases?
It is very probably going to slow down a little bit, we think we have explored the extreme stuff enough. I mean by this the speed thing and the stamina you need to play this. You have to work hard to get these things to sound well. We love it of course, but lately we have been thinking of trying to get more fun executing the stuff. Trying to make things a little bit less “binding” if I can say so. It will never turn into a “easy to grab music” because we love the intricate stuff so much. But maybe more groove now and then. And also Marc, our new guitarist, is partially a kid of the industrial metal scene, which means “he likes the groovy stuff”. It will remain crazy, chaotic and heavy anyway.

9. Are there any side projects besides this band or is this a full time line-up?
When we hired Yonni, he was the singer of a local post-hardcore band called “Kehlvin”, which is about to release their second full length next April. I am also part of this band too, since they needed a second guitarist about 4 years ago. Yonni, toghether with Kehvlin’s other guitarist, is part of another project called “Clinical path”, a weird noisy ambient thing with lots of drones and sampling, bit of guitar and singing, and a writer reading his texts on top of it. A very strange but interesting experimental project. Last year I founded a rock band with Emmanuel (YOG’s bass player) for a single gig and it turned to be that cool, we kept the band. It does not bear a real name yet, but it’s growing and we plan to make a record before the end of the year. It is sort of mixture of things like The Hives, The Hellacopters, Queens of the Stone Age. Pretty cool.

10. What are some bands or musical styles that have influenced your music and also what are you listening to nowadays?
The bands that have most influenced our music are things like The Dillinger Escape Plan, Converge, Pig Destroyer, Napalm Death, Gojira, Ion Dissonnance, Meshuggah or Knut. But we do listen to much more stuff. Yonni is probably the one having the largest sonic experience in terms of hardcore bands. We do listen to all sorts of rock stuff, jazz, even some reggae. We all are great admirers of The Mars Volta. I do love the Foo Fighters alongside crazy things such as Hella, or The Cinematic Orchestra.

11. Outside of music what are some of your interests?
Beer and pussy. Bit of sport too. I think we all love watching cool movies. I love science-fiction above all.

12. Any final words or thoughts before we wrap up this interview?
We’re growing old, but we’re not finished ! ( We’ll have some more to propose this year I think. HALF THE SKY has taken much too long to get released, we will put out a new record as soon as possible. Stay tuned. Long live rock’n’roll.