Epoch – Sacrosanct (2017 Reissue) – Belgium’s Epoch prove with a great and almighty fury that it doesn’t need to take an entire hour’s worth of blistering brutal death before you are barreled headfirst into the ground, bleeding in submission. Originally released independently on their Bandcamp in 2015, a physical version of the record is now available for distribution courtesy of Lavadome Productions. Obviously the label thought it was a killer release that deserved a widespread distribution and I’d have to agree with them on that. The sort of brutal death metal that these guys (or guy – I can’t really tell from any of the information I have here) play mixes well within some fiery tremolos and obscure progressive tinkering. This mixture can give it an almost hypnotic effect, making one feel as if they’re being swallowed by a tornado of sorts. Noting that, we’re also getting a familiar machine-gun approach to the drumming but not in the sense that it contains consistent blasts, which I’m thankful for. The drummer actually seems to know what he’s doing behind the kit, and such a backbone only makes the hot winds of fuzz and death sound all the more interesting. The vocal approach on this one is absolutely frightening in some instances, not giving us the sound of a wimp behind the microphone, but an enraged and possibly deadly individual who knows how to sing right from the gut – literally. It almost feels as though he pulled his stomach out and allowed it to communicate it’s thoughts on the recording. As I stated earlier, there are moments when the tone of the record becomes a tad more technical than you might expect, which is the very reason why it should be hunted down at all costs. This is a level of technical death not unlike Wormed or even Demilich at times, and will no doubt astound you if you’re able to get your grimy mitts on a physical copy of it – which thanks to Lavadome, should now be possible. The amount of experimentation that has been tapped into the level of death metal that is on display for this one is almost legendary.
As for the future of the act, it is unclear. According to Metal Archives, the only current member of the act is R. Polon, who is also currently in the active bands Omega Centauri, Santcus Nex, Alarde Esperpénticoa and Heksenrijder among others. Needless to say, he still has several other projects to keep him busy, regardless of whether or not this act continues. Of course, the main problem with Epoch would be topping Sacrosanct. At this point, I’m not sure if it’s even possible. Without a doubt, Sacrosanct is one of the most groundbreaking death metal related experiences that I’ve heard from this genre in quite a while and that should mean something. I remember falling in love with it after the very first listen, and I’m sure that you will too. This is the more intelligent and unique side of death metal experimentism that we just don’t hear every day, especially in the deathcore and triggered-drum era. Definitely pick it up if you haven’t already, as it is definitely one of my top death metal releases of the year, and will stand as one of the best death metal releases of all-time for me.
(8 Tracks, 36:00)
10/10
Doomster Reich – Let Us Fall (2015) – A bit of an older release, but still worth mentioning, this EP marked what was the Polish doomster’s last recording for a good while. As of right now they have a single entitled “Seven Seals” but that one comes nearly two years prior to this recording. It is interesting that the band’s debut album The League For Mental Distillation, comes just one year prior to this release, meaning that some of the pieces here could have been cast-offs from that release. Three of the seven tracks are covers as well, so that’s worth keeping in mind. Covered here are pieces from Pentagram, Bedemon and Saint Vitus, which are all fair efforts as far as I’m concerned, with the real treats being delivered later on in the performance.
“The World Must Die” starts us off with a mixture of what sounds like doom mixed in with a sort of bleak sludge as frontman Rasz (Deathlust, Flagvm, Persecutor) offers up a kind of unexpected and rowdy vocal performance. It almost comes off a bit ravenous here, which adds a nice touch. “Hidden Path” comes next, with a bit of a dirtier and slightly more frightening vibe. That remains until the band become trippy, which is where they truly excel. Rasz and guitarist Markiz (Architect Of Disease, Deep Desolation) shove a fistful of acid blotter tabs into the cut, which only serve to accentuate the piece even though it sands down the spikes a little. The Pentagram cover of “Forever My Queen” rolls into groove and pumps in a rather prominent solo section amidst some hefty jamming. It’s a relatively short song that comes in and out quicker than a radio-play number. The next original piece is a literal goliath that seems a tribute to LSD and all of the trippy zippy things about fuzzy doom metal. It’s also quite lengthy, coming in at nearly eight minutes. The track sounds like a literal drug-trip and only continues to ride with the vibe until it seems to find Jimi Hendrix on some floating rock out in the middle of space, where Rasz and Markiz work to channel him. Not surprisingly, it has a sort of “jam band” nature to it, but I honestly feel like I’m getting a buzz just from listening to it. Works for me!
Though I’ve enjoyed the original having heard it admittedly not so long ago, the band’s cover of the Saint Vitus classic “One Mind” sounds much better than the original. As much as I enjoy the cheesy camp of legendary frontman Scott Reagers (and I do mean enjoy it), there’s just something about Rasz’s vocals here that change the whole song for me. I’ve listened to it four times today, because it’s taken on a sort of new life for me. Reagers was trying to go for a bit of a psychotic tone with some of the vocal lines and there are a few outlandish howls here and there, but I really like what Doomster Reich have done with it. You see, Rasz already has a bit of a raspy voice and it feels like he has a throat full of razor blades at times, which brings an unexpected sort of anger to the performance. Go ahead, read the lyrics again if you’ve forgotten them. When you tie that sort of anger and frustration to these lyrics, it seems to work better for the song. I feel the passion here and it just works. I love how during the repetition of “no one understands your mind” the vocal tone just seems to lead more and more towards insanity, which I think Reagers was trying to do (and did manage to hit perfectly on a few songs) but Rasz seems to have taken the microphone from him at this point, and really delivers something new, fresh and a little disturbing. It’s just the delivery and vocal tone behind it that really starts to reverberate in my head, no doubt I’ll be listening to this one a great deal because I always feel like that guy in public that no one can figure out. Everyone is always talking about something different than what I’m thinking at the current moment and it almost makes me think that I might be crazy, as I certainly don’t think on the same flight-path as everyone else. As the lyrics reverberate over and over in my head, the dark and bluesy overtones of the piece seem to demonstrate my own lack of sanity. I simply love it.
The next track performed here is the band’s last original recording for the album, but it is a real whopper and shows that they should very well have a more fitting place at the table of doom. It is essentially a mixture of the genre at it’s darkest and most satanic, but with an added psychedelia that spikes the satanic punch bowl with a little more LSD. Then things sort of get a bit bizarre after that, which again – is a plus. It might sound like your CD player is on the fritz and about to explode, before the next track comes in. The final cut we have here is a cover of Bedemon’s “Serpent Venom.” I’m not familiar with Bedemon as much as I am Pentagram and Saint Vitus, so let’s learn a little about them. First of all, these US based doomers have been bootlegged for years and it wasn’t until ’05 before a compilation of all that good stuff was released from the original master tapes, which happens to include this song. They are known for featuring former members of Pentagram, The Obsessed and Macabre. The track itself is very dark and dreary, drawing heavily on Sabbath before they “lightened up a little” and that too, is a good thing (there have been quite a few of those on this album). It’s a short piece, but nonetheless effective and makes me wonder why this Polish act haven’t gotten as much attention as they should. Clearly, I’ll be listening to their cover of “One Mind” an awful lot, but there are no doubt myriads of trips in which one can partake with this recording. Doomster Reich just plain known how to play good, memorable and downright meaningful doom. There’s no doubt about that. The album is a bit longer than most EP’s and feels like a full-length album. Even if some of these were cast-offs from the earlier released debut, I’m sure as hell not going to complain about it. Good doom is good doom, and Let Us Fall gives me the right amount of creepiness, trip factor and even some unexpected angst that comes off as a very fulfilling release in the genre. Wish I’d heard this one a bit sooner.
(7 Tracks, 43:00)
8/10
Ibyss – Hate Speech (2017) – Here we have an interesting situation, in which I have to use my abilities as a music journalist to do what I feel is right. Ibyss are an amazing German industrial band with an electrifying EP that reminds me fondly of acts like Godflesh and Killing Joke. The band seek to bring “industrial music back to it’s underground roots” and offer up an “assault on the progressive sound complex of today’s heavy metal.” Problem is, German media is very politically correct these days and the band is taking heat for their album title and some of the lyrical content, which I couldn’t even garner any offense to. Obviously there’s nothing of the Nazi party here, and I know that other than Nazi related materials, German is usually quite open-minded. They’ve given us the mecca of fetish in their red light district. Or at least, they did. If things have gotten this out of hand, then there is literally no telling as to how much they’ve cracked down over there.
Now I’ll be honest. I’m not really digging the album’s opener “Faceoff” very much and even on this second listen, it feels a little flat. It very much feels like a demo of sorts from these guys, in an attempt to get their bearings for the rest of the record. Also, it more or less just repeats the same couple of phrases over and over again. When I first heard this one, I thought it was pretty weak and had a lot of Fear Factory worship. I was kind of letdown immediately, assuming that this would be the whole album. But it wasn’t. “Faceoff” is just a weird fluke that is in my opinion, an awful way to start an album. Due to the track’s simplicity, it also feels like it overstays it’s welcome, which is definitely not something you want in an album opener. Despite all of that, we get an interesting twenty-three minutes of music that shouldn’t disappoint you in the same way that the aforementioned did. “Bois Ton Sang” actually makes me think a little bit of Doom grooves (and I do mean the PC game Doom) along with a creepy little lead that snakes in and out as hefty German missiles seem to launch from frontman Jens’ gaping hole. As for the guitars, programmed drums and and bass work, that is all handled by Nihil. Both guys manage to deliver exactly what they claim to bring to the table, which is “two guys, two guitars, riffs, shouts, growls, programmed drums and distorted bass” and sounds much better than you think. After the Doom node, there’s a piece called “Home Is Where The Graves Are” where Killing Joke (or Prong, if you like) seem to appear as an influence. Jens nearly mirrors that classic vocal style as Nihil even adds a worthwhile guitar solo into the mix. Sometimes the approach can be a little peculiar, but that only adds to intrigue for me. As for “Like Drones” I hear a bit of Fear Factory, but a more stripped down and raw version that sounds better without all the gloss. Think “Demanufacture” and you’ve got it. The band rolls in with “Senseless Ordeal” next, which is the longest song here, coming in at seven minutes. It is a bit slower and plods more than the other tracks, as it also offers some cleaner vocal lines amidst a few spurts of heavy shouts and loud guitars. It’s definitely different territory than I’ve heard prior from the band and it’s by no means a wash. They’ve demonstrated a different side of themselves here and I’d like to see if something more becomes of it in the future. The album ends with “Frontlines” which kind of brings the Fear Factory/Killing Joke vibe back a little. Maybe I’m reminded of early Mushroomhead a bit towards the end as well?
In any case, the record seems to be just as good as the band’s ’14 debut Obsidian, and though shorter, it shows a lot of potential and more or less excites me. The influences have been aptly named, (the band also cite Nailbomb, Ministry and Pitchshifter – this must be early Pitchshifter) but they display in the band quite beautifully, leaving us with a very solid release that does everything that the record was made to do. It is a bit unfortunate about the German press, but I haven’t really heard anything that I feel is offensive in such a manner that the media would hammer down on it, especially since the lyric material is more or less anti-religion and corruption, enslavement and those sorts of things. The same kind of crap I sing about, really. Germany must have really stepped up it’s social justice game or something as this is pretty tame. Unless the album cover is really that frightening, which astounds me. This is nothing, Germany. As far as the US is concerned, there’s nothing wrong with this album. I quite like it, and I think fans of all the acts I’ve named in this observation will as well. At least, I hope they would. I think you’ll agree with me about “Faceoff” though, it just doesn’t hit as hard as the others for some reason. These guys definitely have what it takes to matter in the industrial scene though and hopefully someone will recognize that.
(6 Tracks, 27:00)
8/10
Eve To Adam – Odyssey (2017) – Through scouring the web, I’ve been able to unearth a very interesting story regarding New York rockers, Eve To Adam. If you check out the band’s official website, you would see that these guys were signed to Sony/Red on their fourth album, Locked and Loaded. Apparently, there were some good reviews and suitable publicity, but things must have went right down the tubes for some reason or another. In any case, the band have a new website which is self-run (even though both pages are still online) and according to the info I’ve received here, the band were told that “they would never work in music again.” As horrible as that sounds, that’s the industry for you. These guys originally played a tour with Falling In Reverse and New Year’s Day, which are two acts I cannot stand – but thankfully, their sound is much more tolerable. On their latest release Odyssey, they prove that they have the right amount of catchy hooks to reel me right in, and from the very opener “Altitude” I was sold. I literally had the hooks from “Altitude” and second cut “Tongue Tied” (more so that one) stuck in my head on constant repeat while I unloaded trucks for about five hours. So yes, these hooks are catchy enough to get stuck in your head for many hours or more and you should keep that in mind. But isn’t that what we want from rock music in the first place? There’s nothing overly complex here, but the band hits hard where it counts and where the radio will like it especially. They may not have the backing of the almighty Sony this time around, but the digital age is working to prove that musicians don’t exactly need to rely on major labels as much as they used to. As you might expect, the record is only a mere thirty-seven minutes long and features no track of a greater length than four minutes.
But what’s interesting here, is that the kind of rock they’re playing here involves heavy use of keyboards. Sure, keyboards have been used here in there for a long time, but this almost sounds like a mixture of Breaking Benjamin and Stabbing Westward, making for a sort of bass-heavy synth rock that comes in just a little different than you might expect for the genre. You see, this is basically what happens when a hard rock act collaborates with an electronic musician, almost creating a more radio-friendly and less cyber-goth kind of Celldweller. It’s different, which is why it really stuck out to me. The disc sounds a bit scratchy, and that’s in the electronic effects – because again, this is electronic hard rock music with even beat-based drumming to boot. Take the single, “Tongue-Tied” which not only features some incredible rock shredding, but a backing that just isn’t normal for anything in American hard rock music. You can name all the bands you like, but Godsmack, Three Days Grace, Skillet, Shinedown and so many other mainstays have never traversed this kind of territory. I mean, who in their right mind is going to tell the drummer to buzz off and decide to use beats and whirls instead? And even if it did happen, who is going to be able to meld these two parallels together without it sounding like crap? These guys, that’s who. As soon as I get to their third song, I find that it isn’t filler either, making for three hits in a row, literally one right after another. Sure, it’s simplistic. There aren’t any major textures to be had, with nothing to be found in the realms of avantgarde wizardry; but insofar as the electronic and guitar compositions are concerned, Odyssey truly takes us on a journey.
Take a listen to “Emergency” and you’ll hear fucking chiptunes, which I think is genius. I would definitely listen to more modern rock if it was mixed in with 8-bit synths. But that’s not all, as the chorus for this one is yet another killer. I think I like it better than “The Price” which I felt was bland, even though the band strangely chose it as a single. I shook my head a little on that, because “Emergency” not only features one of their strongest hooks, it also forces fans to listen to chiptunes which are alien to this kind of music, and that could be beneficial. Not even Klayton is messing with chiptunes yet (for reasons that still escape me. No love for 8 and 16-bit games, bro?) which I find surprising. I suppose if I was in charge of the band, this would be the song I’d want a music video made for. Hell, put the band in a video game style scenario for the track and it’ll go perfect with the chiptunes there. The internet will either love or hate it, and because of the weird mixture of rock, chiptunes and video games, it would at least get some hits. Seriously, who else is mixing this level of electronic tinkering into red-blooded American hard rock music? That being said, it is still exactly as I’ve described and other than the electronic influence, you aren’t hearing anything out of the ordinary as far as the song-structure is concerned. But if you love electronica and hard rock, you’ll definitely find something here. Maybe Imagine Dragons are doing something somewhat similar, but this record hits far harder and has a bit more of a downtuned edge that I tend to like a little more than that song that keeps telling me “welcome to the new age.” Maybe those guys need to check this one out and get a glimpse of what they should be doing with rock music.
For the very last time, you need to remember that this is electronic rock. Don’t think that you’re getting the usual Shinedown or Three Days Grace record with this one. Even though those guys might be guilty of trying a song or two in a similar style to this, none of them have ever thought about taking on a whole record where electronics are the focus. For that, I have to give Eve To Adam major respect and hopefully they’ll inspire other artists to add a little bit more of a digital edge to their performances. Having just flown through the entire album a second time, I can’t say that all of the songs stuck with me as well as others, but that’s to be expected of any record on planet earth as taste is obviously not universal. I did walk out of the experience humming some of the cuts that I preferred a bit afterwards, so that should tell you something. Odyssey is a rather interesting experiment and I’d certainly recommend listening to a few of the singles first to see if you like it. It’s a unique touch on a familiar style and I can’t get too upset about that.
(10 Tracks, 37:00)
7/10
Blacktop Mojo – Burn The Ships (2017) – Hailing from the Texas, these hard rockers bring me a style of the genre that reminds me a little of UPO, a band that I haven’t heard in well over fifteen years. I don’t know what really happened to them, but the very beginning vocal lines of opener “Where The Wind Blows” feature a sort of chant-like vocalizing that isn’t very common for this genre, which has always been very “straight to the point.” It also features a little southern twang, so that listeners don’t forget the band’s roots. “End Of Days” carries a little bit of early Creed with it, but punches in a few bluesy grooves as well. I could definitely cite Creed as an influence here, but they more or less laid the groundwork for the modern rock genre, far before the sappy “Higher” came out a little later. This is further referenced on the title track, which continues to pound me in the face with downtuned guitars and an extremely catchy chorus that serves to be a sort of anthem for shows like Vikings or even Game Of Thrones. I’d be surprised if a game developer didn’t ask to use this as an anthem for their product later on down the road. I could almost hear the “You have one choice left… FIGHT OR DIE!” used in a commercial, which shows just how much mainstream potential these guys have.
But Blacktop Mojo aren’t just hard rock riffs and catchy choruses, as more than a few notable guitar theatrics appear here and there to show that the band’s axeman Ryan Kiefer is actually capable of playing his instrument. With several hard rock bands these days, you don’t really get the kind of solo performances that I think we deserve. I know that I was very upset to see much of the solo content removed from the latest Disturbed record. Even on a bit of a sappier number called “Prodigal” that will have modern rock radio stations practically drooling all over the floor, we are greeted by a rather tasteful rock solo bit that shows listeners that they are not dealing with amateurs here. These guys have played with the “You Name It” of hard rock royalty, as familiar acts like Aaron Lewis (Staind), Candlebox, Drowning Pool, Puddle Of Mudd and more as well as having released a debut just a few years prior in 2014. As we get back to the album, we’re presented with another sort of ballad called “Shadows On The Wall” which oddly comes right after the last ballad, a decision I find kind of odd – but whatever. In any case, there’s a unique guitar tone utilized here that differentiates itself a bit from the previous, even though the solo effort utilized in the piece is almost non-existent. After that one though, we’re treated to a real whammy in “Sweat.” They really should have made this one a single, because I can think of about a thousand hard-working southern laborers that would blast this one loudly out of their truck speakers. It’s a sort of red-blooded anthem to the American worker and feels like it could have been a missed opportunity, especially since folks around here love songs that express how hard they work everyday. It’s also not a common topic for hard rock music, but has lyrics that I feel a great deal of workers will relate to, especially if you work manual labor. This is pretty much the “Grade A USA” way of getting things done as far as I’m concerned and it’s going to appeal to a hell of a lot people. The next cut, “Pyromaniac” actually has a video though (and we have it right here at the bottom of the review) and comes in as a slow burner with an equally nice rock solo, which would undoubtedly work on the radio and probably is already playing on some stations, no doubt. It’s definitely radio rock, but it’ll sell for sure.
Moving on, we have “8000 Lines” which is the longest song on the album, including some unexpected acoustic passages in an attempt to build some texture in a style that doesn’t always include it. I have to commend this extra effort put into instrumentalism, which probably will be one reason that it never sees radio play, but the extra depth is of course appreciated. The next one here is “Make A Difference” which plays between ballad and rocker, making for yet another radio rocker. The lyrical theme here seems to revolve around whether or not anyone will remember you or your contributions to this planet in the next couple of thousands of years, and no – probably not. After all, even our most accredited contributions would be ancient history by then. Don’t live for tomorrow, live for today. “Chains” comes off as equally peculiar, because it’s a “stick it to the man” kind of song calling for rebellion. I agree with the lyrics here, but I think that I liked Iced Earth’s take on it during the past two albums a bit better – not to mention Jon Schaffer’s side-project, Sons Of Liberty. Still, it’s the same concept.
I normally wouldn’t use a paragraph break here, but I feel that the next song calls for exactly that. Interestingly enough, this band actually attempted something that takes a really large set of cojones. In short, they decided to cover the Aerosmith classic, “Dream On” and actually put it on the album. Now, I’m of the school that believes nothing can actually top the original version of this Rock N’ Roll classic that I literally grew up with and remember loving quite a bit when I was five and exposed quite a bit to rock music – which may have had an effect on my tastes today. In any case, the band does manage to nail it with solos intact for the most part (Joe Perry is a tough man to beat) and frontman/rhythm guitarist Matt James does manage to perform Steven Tyler’s classic falsetto with a near-perfect pitch. I wasn’t sure if he was going to hit it, so I was practically sitting there just waiting to see if he could do it because he hadn’t offered anything in that style for the whole of the album. But lo and behold, he actually manages it, and in the end I would have to consider it a fair cover that represents both the originating band and this act proficiently. That leaves us with the final cut, which is not advised to listen to if you’re depressed or suicidal. I mean, this is the kind of song that they would play back in the nineties on a commercial where I’m being shown distended bellies and asked to “feed the children for just a few dollars a month” or I’m being shown abandoned dogs in a kennel. The track is called “Underneath” and though it would sort of work as a lighter moment onstage, it kind of feels odd being the closer and ending the record on such a sad note. The “Dream On” cover should have been the cloer to the record, with this one thrown somewhere in the middle. Burn The Ships had a lot of high energy, only to depress the hell out of me right at the end. I feel like I’m being asked to watch a video about suicide victims with something similar to the Goo Goo Dolls’ “Iris” in the background, which Pepsi actually used in a high school movie years ago to talk about the dangers of drug abuse. I guess they think that if you use really depressing music and show junkies in the background, you won’t use drugs. I mean, you shouldn’t use addictive substances that can ruin your life and those around you period; but I think marijuana was one of the substances they tried to Refer Madness to us back in the late nineties along with heroin and cocaine. “Oh, I shouldn’t’ve done that weed! Now look at me!” Damn you, Pepsi. As if you’re not putting a drug into your soft drinks to begin with. A drug that a hell of a lot of us are addicted to, me included. (To be fair, my drug of choice is the majestic Dr. Pepper, not Pepsi. We’d have them as a sponsor if we could.) Aside from all this, the end result of the piece is very unexpected and I was not looking for a funereal moment at the end of my rock record. But you know, some people are really going to dig it and that’s expectable. Just kind of felt a little like Staind’s later material, where Lewis sang about how horrible life was for a number of years and became a millionaire for it. Hmm… that gives me an idea! I’m sure I can come up with depressing lyrics for an acoustic rock side project in which every single song is melancholy and hopeless. I’ll go out there with plain clothes and my head hung down, while the lights dim and Bill strums a few teary chords as I nearly cry into the microphone. We’ll be showering in money!
Alright, again – I kid. Honestly, I kid. But this is what you come to The Tower for right? Personality. That’s what I deliver (and honestly, I don’t kid – that sounds like a great idea) as well as honesty and you’re getting that here. If I’m going to judge Blacktop Mojo properly at this point in their careers, I would say that they are headed for rock stardom. This is the kind of music that literally prints money, and if they can get out there with the right amount of coverage and publicity, they’ll be the next big thing in American rock music. There’s no question about it. I guess seeing an act like 21 Pilots getting the Grammy for best rock performance when they aren’t even a real rock band in my opinion, is kind of a crushing blow to the genre when we’ve got acts like these guys out there still doing it in the underground. About twenty years ago, Blacktop Mojo simply wouldn’t be making this kind of music in the underground and would have been picked up by a major label. Again, no question about it. If this record had been released around the time of the nineties rock boom, these guys would be looking at a Grammy nomination right now. But because the name of the game has changed so much with the advent of the internet, things have also changed quite a bit for them. That can’t be helped, but at least they’ve given it all with a very solid hard rock album and I have to respect that. As to whether or not these gentlemen become famous, that would all depend on how much America still cares about it’s modern rock scene. We’ve become so influenced by pop music these days that the new Metallica record has already been confirmed to feature Lady Gaga in 2018. So yeah, we do need some kind of rock performance in the world that actually deals with hard, pounding guitars and not whatever in the world 21 Pilots were doing. Hopefully, there’s still hope here. Rebellions are built on hope.
(12 Tracks, 51:00)
8/10