| Cathedral - In Memoriam | Core - The Hustle Is On |
| Natas - Cuidad de Brahman | Beyond Dawn - Electric Sulking Machine |
| Iced Earth - Alive In Athens | Various - 21st Century Media Blitz 2 |
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Rise Above / MFN Cathedral
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First some background. The first four tracks in this CD are from an early demo recorded in 1990, and the final five are an early live recording from Holland in 1991. Together they bring the listener back to Cathedral's gloomy roots. It's certainly easy to see where Cathedral came from. This CD puts them very firmly in the early 90s Paradise Lost / My Dying Bride movement where everyone was doomy and gloomy. Compared to modern Cathedral, the first half of opener Mourning Of A New Day crawls slower than a blind arthritic leper with no arms or legs, and his penis nailed to the ground. A nice image, I know. In fact, one of the only clues which would lead me to believe this is actually the Cathedral we all know (and love?), is the blatant rip off in March of the main riff from Iron Man (and Electric Funeral elsewhere on the CD)! Some things never change... The live tracks just as good quality as the studio ones, and because some of them are a bit newer they have more of a Cathedral sound to them. Fans of very early Paradise Lost and My Dying Bride should love In Memoriam, but the rest of us probably won't have it at the top of our playlists. Verdict: Music from a bygone age |
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Core
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Following hot on the heels of Chrome Locust, Roadsaw and The Atomic Bitchwax, MIA's Core have come up with this platter of retro rock. Stylistically they take a bow to both the aforementioned Bitchwax, Fatso Jetson, and scene stalwarts Fu Manchu (the vocals only). Notice that I deliberately didn't use the S word to describe the music. That's because rather than going for the trippyness of Hangnail, they rely more on slightly out there rock riffs with a plentiful helping of fuzzy bass. For the most part it works quite well and the result is an enjoyable album. The only problem is, there's so much competition at the moment that I'm not sure this album stands quite so proudly as many of the others. Take the three I mentioned at the start for example - they all kick it's arse. It doesn't sound quite developed enough, and the adequate production could definitely be tweaked to give a better sound. The more experimental tracks towards the latter half of the album work better, but if that's what you're looking for you'd be better off buying Fatso Jetson's Flames For All. Verdict: If you've already got the best, now try the rest |
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Natas
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This is the second release from these Argentinean psychedelic stoners. They say their mission is to bring the listeners “an aural impression of the beauty and force of their native landscape” – cool, if more than a touch reminiscent of how a certain other famous stoner band did the same thing years ago for the desert around Palm Springs. The fourteen songs here are very trippy indeed, which can either be good or bad, depending on your viewpoint. Natas do spaced out, fuzzed-up, wah-wah infested riffs very well, that tend to happily float around the room and disappear up through the ceiling. The major drawback to this album for me is that it’s a bit TOO trippy and spaced out – they spend a little too long with echo effects, flangers and wah-wahs, while forgetting that they should actually play some songs at some point. Don’t get me wrong, I like trippy stuff, but this takes things a bit too far. After a couple of listens, it got to the point where I felt like telling them to stick their wah-wahs where the sun don’t shine on some tracks. Not that the songs were bad, just dull after a while – just when I thought a song would kick in, it refused to… When, on three or four songs, they actually do get into full swing, the songs are very impressive, becoming quite catchy. There’s an incredibly big influence of Kyuss dripping from this album, both on the slow jams as well as the rockin’ tracks, even down to the vocalist’s delivery. Yeah, true, countless bands sound like Kyuss, but I feel Natas may be borrowing a little too much from them in many places throughout this album. They describe this album as “Perfect road music, perfect sex music, perfect trajectories into space…” – I’d definitely agree with the last part, and if there was a bit more energetic tunes on the album, I’d probably agree with the other two statements as well. Verdict: More than a touch of over-indulgence with the spaced-out feel, but a cool album nevertheless. |
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Peaceville / MFN Beyond Dawn
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Ok, Elaine gave me this to review because she’s too busy with Uni work to do it. First off, I don’t have any information about the band, or indeed the song titles, just a CD. Reading the bands name I got the impression that I might as well listen to the new My Dying Bride album again. However with a title like Electric Sulking Machine, I figured that there might be more to this than basic gloominess. The first track kicks in with an intriguing mixture of acoustic pandering and what sounds like drum machines. In fact the whole album is quite lightweight, never really straying into ultra heavy mode. As with most Euro goth/metal there is a male and female vocalist who work well together, thankfully the guy also doesn’t decide to grunt his way through the tracks, unlike a number of Euro goth/metal bands. Having said all this stuff about goth/metal I actually feel the album would probably fit best under the Progressive Rock tag. It reminds me of The 3rd and the Mortal's In This Room with slightly less experimentation. Sometimes Beyond Dawn can stray a little into the bog standard sub goth areas but overall there’s a nice quirky feel to the album which lifts it above the dross. Perhaps in time the band will start developing their sound into more challenging musical arenas but for the time being Electric Sulking Machine is a fine album to sit and chill to. Rating: ********** |
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Iced Earth
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Oh my god. I think Iced Earth must have been listening to some of the bizarre suggestions that me and some of the other Attitude slackers regularly come up with to piss people off. Everyone knows that live albums rarely go down well, so why the fuck would anyone want one which lasts a whole THREE CDs !?! That's right, three CDs or five LPs. It's saving grace is of course that my promo copy is only one CD, so I have only been subjected to 1/3 of the experience. Not that it's actually that bad really, it's just that I couldn't possibly stand more than one CD full. For those who don't know, Iced Earth are one of the many bands who sound like a cheesy European cross between Iron Maiden and Dio (both superior bands in my opinion). If you like the sound of that then you'll probably lap this up. The songs are on the whole fairly strong, and don't suffer at all from being live performances. In fact, if I liked the band I would probably say Alive In Athens is a pretty good live album - the sound quality puts many studio albums to shame. If you're a fan already, you'll love it. Verdict: 2½ CDs too many |
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Various
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Century Media are one of the most active record companies on the metal scene. They have loads of bands ranging from Stuck Mojo and Strapping Young Lad through to Lacuna Coil and Moonspell. Oh yeah, not to mention their numerous hardcore acts like Stampin' Ground and Rykers. This album is more than just a label sampler, it also has a second CD containing all British acts from other labels. Starting off with the first CD, You are treated to the joys of Acrimony, Tiamat, Stampin' Ground, Stuck Mojo, Moonspell, Skinlab, Arch Enemy, Rotting Christ and Cryptopsy along with 11 others - 20 tracks in total. There are far too many to comment on each individually. Acrimony and Tiamat both have great tracks here, as do Stampin' Ground. The opening bars of their Lesion could easily be mistaken for classic Slayer. Basically, there's no stinkers and many cool songs. The second CD is perhaps the highlight from my point of view at least, as it showcases the best of the British underground scene - well, those with some label involvement at any rate. Medulla Nocte, Hangnail, Orange Goblin, Labrat, Shallow, Kill II This, Earthtone9, Freebase, Entwined, Raging Speedhorn, Solstice and many more - again 20 tracks. Many hit the mark, and the rest get pretty close. Entwined and Solstice both sound far better here than ever before. This is probably the best way for you to get to hear what the UK has to offer at the moment. This CD only costs £5 for 40 tracks, thats 12½ pence each. As I said in the news section of issue 13: Verdict: Buy it or die! |
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