The first one I have here is actually a bit older, but it was still worth covering even though a personal submission. Spreading The Disease have worked with this site for a while and I’ve had hit and miss feelings about most of their material, but I definitely found something to like in the band’s new EP, entitled Mindcell. There’s just five tracks here, but it seems to mix metalcore, groove and what I would consider to be a bit of English punk (where I will always recommend Gallows in that instance). “Obsession” comes out swinging with hefty core, hard-hitting grooves and that unexpected punk influence within the chorus. It has a bit of a melodic dip, but then comes back thrashing. “Voices” comes next with down tuned anger and a potent clean chorus that eventually rolls into chugs where it ends. Speaking of anger, the next cut is “The Anger Inside” which again rolls into chunky groove, maybe with a bit of a blue background. Hardcore shouts are also featured, making for an excellent protest track. “Waves” changes the whole mood as it entertains cool rhythms, balancing between heavy and light atmospheres. This is great, because it showcases a great deal of balance and shows Spreading The Disease as an evolving act, rather than one simply stuck on core, groove and thrash elements. “Conflicted” ends the record with a Nu-Metal vibe, once again showing that these guys aren’t tied to any style. I am embarrassed to say that I can’t recall the song here that truly resonated lyrically to me, something about “I’m the lone wolf” or similar. Maybe it is the fault of my laptop speakers as opposed to my listening app and earbuds, but I just don’t recall hearing that line. Maybe it was on “Voices” but I can’t pick it up. My hearing is not what it used to be. Anyway, I really identified with the message of that song. I could relate – and to me, that’s pretty damn significant.
Gahl actually released a new one this year too, this time under the name Wyrd. It was called Gastiir – Ghosts Invited and it seems to follow the same format of God Seed, just without all the electronics. That’s not to say that there aren’t effects on the album, but it doesn’t sound quite as industrial and instead features more of a familiar black metal tone. The record contains a few dazzling melodies as well as some guitar solos here and there and it has an obvious “ghostly” vibe. I’m not really sure why the ghostly vibe is here, but it is rather unique and a breath of fresh air from what I am hearing in the black metal underground. Yes, everyone and their mother can now make a black metal album in this grand digital age, but that doesn’t mean that the recording will be good or even unique. It’s refreshing to hear differences in vocal style as well, as we do get a bit tired of the common snarls and scowls so prevalent in the genre. I think the record got overshadowed by a slew of other black metal discs, but it requires more investment because of it’s spooky little atmosphere. Just perfect for the time of year.
Blut Aus Nord also decided to release a disc this year, but I honestly wouldn’t pay attention to the vocals. Throughout most of Hallucinogen I found myself more enticed by the melody compositions than anything else here. There are hints of shrieks and scowls, but honestly; they could have just left the vocals off entirely. This is in all actuality; what happens when a prominent melodic black metal act decide to make an instrumental album. Those always seem to come up every now and again with several bands trying their hand at either progressive or immersivity technical atmospheres, but you never hear an act of this size pulling off a record like that. I mean, I could always fill in the vocals but they would be about Mega Man or something. I strongly doubt people would want to hear an album with ferocious chanting fronted by a lyrical concept about Mega Man in space. Quite simply, the record is just too damn beautiful for anything else. The listen is very chilled and it makes me think I’m floating amongst the stars. Not to mention that a few classic rock riffs get thrown into the mix. However, I think I could do without the chant effects, to be quite honest – it would be great to have a version of this I could jam out (especially with some of these riffs recalling Battletoads) without it being quite so holy. It’s really hard to take it seriously when there are riff sections on the album that sound like Saturday Morning Cartoon themes. Even so, it is a blast and I think it would probably pair better with the recently released game Valfaris than the metal soundtrack that was composed for it. Now, this is a very strong statement; but if you consider the look and nature of Valfaris, a soundtrack like this is far more vibrant and it matches the surface of the planet, with a good mix of highs and lows. I almost considered muting the game’s music and doing a personal (obviously I could not upload it due to copyright) video where I played this album instead. Simply put, Hallucinogen is definitely better off as a background theme to something else, though it is still a rather cohesive experience in it’s own right.
There was a lot of praise this year for Mgla‘s Age Of Excuse, but I wasn’t feeling it for some reason. Again, there has been a lot of black metal passing by my ears over the past few months and I guess this one just didn’t gel with me. I loved Mgla’s debut album, but everything after that has just been kind of mediocre in my opinion. There’s obviously a lot of melody backing this mixture of Immortal and Emperor, but it isn’t anything I’ve heard before. Maybe a little bit of Blut Aus Nord and Deahspell Omega, but I’m seriously not understanding what you folks are finding here. I feel like I can look at your record collection and point out albums that sound exactly like this, which you probably haven’t listened to in a while. I get the “more of the same” that people want and I’m guilty of that too, people love to hear more of a sound that they are very familiar with and enjoyed in their younger days, but I’m just not nostalgic for this. There are much better black metal acts in Poland right now and I’ve covered them. And Poland gets plenty of my money as it is, because I’m constantly buying from GOG.
Now here’s a band that’s doing something different, and of course I’m talking about Gost, not Ghost – even though I admittedly enjoy a bit of that band every now and again being the boomer that I am. When Ghost first started out, it was a bunch of dub, DJ effects and black metal. I hated it. Then finally, the awesome power of synthwave came along and I unexpectedly fell in love with the band, or at least some of the songs here. You see, synthwave is coming to conquer because we deserve an apology for dubstep. Call Of Duty three-sixty no scope videos aside, of course. But that was the age of bro and now we’re in the age of bruh, so we just have to think of synthwave as a way to cope. “Relentless Passing” is a good sign of things to come, but “Wrapped In Wax” sounds like early Grendel and I suppose I dig that. I wonder what happened to him? As we keep going, we eventually get to the first great track which would be “Dreadfully Pious” which still needs a tad bit of retooling. The synths sound a bit too Mega Man and less new wave, which is a bit of an issue. The goal of proper synthwave is to sound like an eighties cyberpunk soundtrack, something John Carpenter inspired or influenced by new wave, but this sounds a bit too gamey in the synths for me. I don’t like it as much as Confrontational’s “Queen Of Vengeance” (but to be fair, there are few synthwave songs I like more) but it has the right idea. “Timeless Turmoil” is a joke, but another synthwave number crawls up here with much better synths. “Bloody Roses” feels more like Ministry’s With Sympathy, which is definitely the kind of sound that these guys should be going for. But it’ll be my luck and the next record will end up having no synthwave on it at all, which will be a shame as I’m getting tired of black metal as it is, and from the sound of it – these guys are too. “The Call Of The Faithful (Faithless)” is the band’s attempt at an instrumental synthwave track and it’s actually pretty good. The synths aren’t too overbearing, it has the right feel, reminding me of a neon cityscape. After that, we get into the best song on this whole album, “She Lives In Red Light.” There’s the right amount of Goth, the right amount of horror influenced synths and it still feels robotic. I’m gonna say it here and now, this is yet another lovemaking song for your robot waifus… which we don’t have yet, but soon will. So start saving up. “Ligature Marks” brings in the harsh vocals, but it still maintains a fair amount of new wave influence. Depeche Mode was certainly an influence. “Push” has even more Depeche Mode influence. These guys seem to be so good at this style, that I hope they’ll throw the black metal portions of their performance in the trash. Unfortunately though, that is not the case – but I don’t think the harsh scowls go well with the bouncy nature of the track and the electro-fuzz. The final experiment attempts to merge classic synthwave with black metal scowls once again, melding what feels like Pertubator with unnecessary harsh vocals. At the end of the day, it’s whatever. This is the only Gost album I’ve ever liked and maybe they’ll continue in this style. I like that there’s a shovel on the front cover, which means they’re telling fans that they’ll finally stop butchering black metal and continue to pursue this awesome synthwave style that they’ve embraced to go along with the revival of the genre that we’re experiencing right now. No one has fucked that up yet.