BLACK SABBATH Paranoid (Get Back) lp 16.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
Essential.

BLACK SABBATH Past Lives (Sanctuary / Divine Recordings) 2cd 21.00
Forget about the Ozzfest reunion tours, this is live Black Sabbath (the BEST BAND EVER, sez Allan) from their '70s heyday, with the original, Ozzy-fronted line-up. Two discs worth of the heaviest of metal from the originators of the form. Super-exciting but for one thing: many Sabbath fans probably already have disc one, formerly known as the "Live At Last" album (recorded in 1973, released in 1980 against the band's wishes at the time -- 'cause they'd fired Ozzy and Ronnie James Dio was now their singer. Now, of course, they've got no problem with it). Still, one whole disc of previously (officially) unreleased live Sabbath is worth more than the 21 bucks this is going to cost you. And it comes with (while supplies of this handsome limited edition digipack version last) a poster and guitar pick, plus three bonus tracks too that aren't on the regular jewelcase edition.
Here's the track listing:
(Disc One) Tomorrow's Dream, Sweet Leaf, Killing Yourself To Live, Cornucopia, Snowblind, Children of the Grave, War Pigs, Wicked World, Paranoid, (Disc Two) Hand of Doom, Hole in the Sky*, Symptom of the Universe, Megalomania*, Iron Man*, Black Sabbath, N.I.B., Behind the Wall, Fairies Wear Boots. (Asterisks indicate bonus tracks only on this digipak verison.)
As a live band, Black Sabbath kill -- absolutely charismatic, energetic, and creative. And of course, HEAVY. Plus, you get to enjoy Ozzy's stage banter ("Are you high? Are you high? So am I!"), and variant, improvised lyrics/solos. In the middle of "Wicked World" on disc one, Tony Iommi gets a melodic, medieval solo, then they go into a jazz break, then jam on a whole 'nother riff, with Ozzy making up lyrics, that could have been a great song but never made it into the studio in this form, and then charge into "Supernaut", followed by a Bill Ward drum showcase, then back to "Wicked World"...
So, "Past Lives" is pretty incredible, from a musical standpoint. Of course, they could have included a lot more -- there's lots of pics from Sabbath's appearance at 1974's California Jam but as far as I can tell, no tracks from it. And where's "Blue Suede Shoes"??
Further complaints: although there's plenty of cool old pics of the Ozzy and the boys, and it's a nicely designed package, they should have gotten a Sabbath fan to proofread the liner notes (their third album is Master of Reality, not Masters of Reality, for instance -- and I think it's the Birmingham Town Hall they played at in 1972, not Burmingham Town Hall) but that's a quibble. What really does suck is that the tracks on disc two are given no specific dates and venues of recording -- it just says "recorded live at various locations & dates during the seventies". Lame! It seems from the track selection and Ozzy's between-songs comments that the majority of the second disc dates from around 1975, right before the release of their Sabotage album (they do "Megalomania"!!). Is this from the Philadelphia show recently bootlegged as a triple LP box set? Other songs are from their December 20th, 1970 show at the Olympia in Paris. I've got a bootleg of that and the tracks here certainly sound better than they do on the boot. Now, why the people who put this together didn't think we'd want to know where and when the tracks were from I can't imagine... But anyway, especially if you don't already have Live At Last and probably even if you do, this is an essential purchase for Sabbath fans.
RealAudio clip: "Snowblind"
RealAudio clip: "Hand Of Doom"
RealAudio clip: "Hole In The Sky"

BLACK SABBATH s/t (Castle) cd 14.98
Only one of the most important debut albums in the history of rock and roll!!! Essential.

BLACK SABBATH s/t (Get Back) lp 16.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
Only one of the most important debut albums in the history of rock and roll!!! Essential.

BLACK SABBATH Sabbath Bloody Sabbath (Castle) cd 14.98
Essential.

BLACK SABBATH Sabbath Bloody Sabbath (Get Back) lp 16.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
Essential.

BLACK SABBATH Sabotage (Castle) cd 14.98
Remastered version of the Sabs' most "prog" album, the masterpiece known as "Sabotage". Essential.

BLACK SABBATH Technical Ecstasy (Castle) cd 14.98
Really good, but perhaps not absolutely essential.

BLACK SABBATH The Dio Years (Rhino) cd 16.98

BLACK SABBATH Vol 4 (Get Back) lp 16.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
Essential.

BLACK SABBATH Vol. 4 (Castle) cd 14.98
Essential.

BLACK SEAS OF INFINITY / KANIBA /UGEGI AOIVEAE A SER The Trinity Of Non Being (Autumn Wind Productions) cd 11.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
From the same label that brought us the amazing Vomit Orchestra discs comes this killer 3 way split, an exploration of black ambient, dark ritual, ambient drone music....
Up first is Black Seas Of Infinity from Salt Lake City. Having started life as a black metal band, they now find themselves, exploring a much more minimal dark ambient world of haunting melodies, mysterious vocals and muted industrial percussion. The first track is based around a mesmerizing melodic fragment, a bit of minor key melody that is looped hypnotically over a strange rhythm that sounds like someone trudging through snow or old brittle branches, while over the top, a slowed down, slightly distorted voice intones a strange litany, making the whole thing sound like some sort of liturgical rite. The next track is a dense martial soundscape of grinding industrial drones and distant distorted drumming, a simple militaristic march, like Wiseblood meets Death In June, before eventually transforming into a roiling wave of low end rumble and whir. BSOI's final track is a 12 minute epic, a series of haunting low end sonic occurrences, situated around a strange rhythm that sounds almost like the wheeze and clatter of an iron lung, the sounds around it constantly crumbling like the tape had decayed, very textural and creepy, like a more industrial Jeck or Tim Hecker almost...
Next up Is Kaniba, who offer up their own creeping crawling blackness. A rumbling soundworld of thumps and bumps, distorted and wrapped in dense sheets of black buzz, there are rhythms, but they don't drive the music, instead they are small creatures that scurry amidst it's black folds. The second of the two tracks is much more spacious and possibly much more harrowing. What begins almost serenely quickly becomes a monstrous moaning living black shadow of sound. Listening is almost like cowering amidst the ruins as some unseeable shape soars above, it's shadow cloaking you in darkness every time it passes. A symphony of low end, almost sounding like an orchestra slooooooowed waaaaaaay dooooown, its epic fanfare twisted into a shapeless squirming blackened thing.
Finally, the strangely named Ugegi Aoiveae A Ser wrap things up with a 16 minute drone coda. Much more minimal than the other contributors, but just as bleak and oppressive. A ringing harmonic shimmer slowly slips further and further into darkness, the high end peeling off like flayed skin, revealing a murky cloudy expanse of dark sound underneath. A slow moving swell, a static, barely shifting wall of sound, layers upon layer, like some hellish Phill Niblock composition. Ultra spare and quite intense.
Plenty here for the drone obsessed, lovers of weird music, and all the black souls in need of dark musical mystery...
MPEG Stream: BLACK SEAS OF INFINITY "To Receive The Perplexity Of The Soul Of Liberation"
MPEG Stream: KANIBA "When The Hurricane Comes"
MPEG Stream: UGEGI AOIVEAE A SER "Alignment In Opposition II"

BLACK SUN Paralyser (At War With False Noise) lp 9.00
**SALE **SALE* *SALE**
What the heck's up with Glasgow these days? Until recently, Glasgow was all sunshiney jangle pop and brooding epic post rock. Or so it seemed. Maybe we haven't been paying attention. Maybe it's been a while since we took a good hard look at the seedy underbelly of Glasgow's music scene, but something sinister is definitely going on over there, cuz all sorts of filthy, brutal, heavy, sick sounds are oozing across the sea and into our cowering frightened ears. Next list we'll probably be listing a record by another Glaswegian crew called De Salvo, who are scary as shit, and here we've got the latest from Black Sun.
Black Sun is a bit of a name over there, but they're a new name to us, although it only took a few minutes of this filth for us to realize folks over here, especially the ones into massive dronedirgedeathcrush and slow motion ultra doooooom will likely be freaking out big time.
Three tracks, all 'versions' of the same song, the first, 19+ minutes taking up the whole of side one, is all lurching downtuned lumber, squealing harmonics, all locked into step with the pounding drums, the vocals tortured and anguished and WAY up in the mix, the sound somewhere between Khanate, Eyehategod, and Neurosis. About halfway through the sound simmers down a bit, a low slung softly churning bass rumble, clean minor key guitar lines all spidery and skeletal, warm whirring keyboards, that eventually slip into a groove that sounds uncannily like a slowed down Three Mile Pilot. Clean crooned vocals, laid over the woozy rhythm, before exploding back into stuttering metallic stop start lurch, gradually growing more and more noisy and unhinged.
The flip side takes the same track and jacks up the industrial vibe, way more low end crunch, a bit murkier and muddier, the vocals buried in the mix, little streaks of feedback peeking out from behind thick caustic slabs of rhythmic pound. Very reminiscent of Godflesh or Pitchshifter, relentless and machinelike, but wreathed in swirls of strange keyboards, and mysterious effects and all manner of fucked up guitar filigree. In some ways superior to the A side, at least to these ears. And finally, the second half of the B-side offers up the 'dub' version, which takes the more industrial version of "Paralyser" even further, the rhythm stripped down, the guitars processed and clipped, the vocals twisted and doused in effects, the arrangement all spaced out, the drums pounding one second, careening from speaker to speaker the next, the whole track actually is panned pretty hard, making headphones essential for experiencing the full dizzy drift. Definitely left us wanting more...
Essential listening for the usual suspects. If your favorite sounds are most often described with the adjectives doomy, crumbling, blackened, pummeling, crushing, heavy, crusty, metallic, slow motion, glacial, filthy, then my friends, you should prepare to kneel in supplication, and stare directly into the Black Sun...
LIMITED TO 500 COPIES, housed in a very Godflesh looking sleeve, with a heavy cardstock insert, liner notes on one side and strange bloody symbols on the other.
MPEG Stream: "Paralyser (Prison Of The Cross)"
MPEG Stream: "Paralyser (Dub Mix)"

BLACK SUN / THEY ARE COWARDS Code Black / First And Only (At War With False Noise) 7" 9.98

BLACK VOMIT Jungle Death (Rusty Axe) cd 9.98
It's been a while, more than a year in fact, since we last got a batch of TRUE SHEFFIELD BLACK PSYCHEDELIA, but it's finally that time once again. We were beginning to jones pretty hard. For those of you who can't quite figure it out from the name of the genre, this stuff is black metal, and psychedelic, and most (if not all) of the bands hail from Sheffield in the UK. Beyond that, this stuff is pretty hard to describe, from blown out grinding blackened psychedelic post rock to chugging in-the-red blacknoise to glistening soft focus krautdrone to pounding distorted sludge to processed machinelike buzz and stutter, and we're not even just describing the genre, most of the bands somehow manage to incorporate all of those elements into one fractured fucked up and seriously and gloriously schizophrenic sound.
We'd been waiting for a proper real cd (non cd-r) release from any of these guys, and while there have been rumors of a new Ice Bound Majesty full length on tUMULt (!), it was Black Vomit who were ultimately immortalized in aluminum and plastic first, thanks to those twisted freaks at Rusty Axe. But even by Rusty Axe's already freaky standards, Jungle Death is some seriously twisted avant heavy black weirdness. The sort of stuff that will have your standard black metal knuckle dragger scratching his head and reaching for the nearest Dimmu Borgir cd.
The metal component of black vomit is a sort of metal that sounds like it was cooked up by Tim Hecker, Philip Jeck, Aidan Baker and Justin Broadrick would have conjured up in some underground lair, with no small amount of black magic. Guitars that roar and howl, piled on top of one another until they're so thick, they threaten to collapse your stereo speakers like miniature black holes, the riffs grind and buzz, blurred and smeared into huge heaving walls of blown out white hot sound, usually weirdly processed too, so buried beneath the roiling surface, lurk all manner of electronics and glitch and hiss and static. Sometimes the heaviness stumbles into streaks of sonic black tar, slowing the sound down into some blown out glacial trudge, and even then, it's no ordinary doom, the sound glistens and glows, it's heaviness more a function of staring into some alien sun, the beams of light transformed into sound, wrapping you in thick sheets of effulgent buzz and black hued shimmer.
The various bits of skull crushing heaviness are balanced by some of the coolest drone and ambient music we've heard, from the rumbling, muted and melodic low end intro, that sounds like some creepy krautrock bassline slowed waaaaay down, to the glistening glitched out sun dappled shimmer of "Conderlint5", with it's mysterious alien voices and skittery crystalline textures, to the moaning lonely spidery guitar drift of "Last Cries Of The Lost".
The record starts out damaged, and just gets more and more fucked and freaked out as it progresses, looped tribal drumming wreathed in swirling static, laced with strange samples, gives way to stuttering processed electronic grind, which slowly transforms into a sea of warped drones and Oval like glitches, all smoothed out into an undulating underwater soundscape, wrapped in jagged shards of distorted crunch and sonar like beeps. A brief bit of indie jangle, all minor key strum and sad lilting melody, explodes in a flurry of crumbling stumbling ultra distorted post rock pound, before slipping into some almost Pop Ambient sounding drift, only to again transform into some impossibly twisted bit of cinematic mood music, complete with haunting strings, and dubbed out drums, finally opening up into "Dark Beloved Cloud", the longest track on the record, all Burzumy and murky and buzzy and blackened, woozy and off kilter, with more processed vocals, tons of effects, long stretches of tripped out psychedelic minimalism, before the pounding D-beat climax, and then a soft focus shimmery fade out, which leads directly into the record closer, a warm warped swirl of deeeeeep thrum, and slow moving melodic murk, again shot through with echo drenched voices and bits of electronic twinkle and glimmer, fading out into nearly 5 minutes of near silence. Weird.
But so fucking mind blowing. Totally wiping out any boundaries between drone music and black metal and ambient noise and electronic grind and whatever other fucked up sounds these freaks fuse into their totally genius and totally unique TRUE SHEFFIELD BLACK PSYCHEDELIA!!
MPEG Stream: "A Premonition Of Inevitable Doom"
MPEG Stream: "Deluge From Hell"
MPEG Stream: "Vigilance Night"
MPEG Stream: "Constdernt"

BLACK VOMIT / RAPE RACK split (Frequency Thirteen / Night Angels Serve) cd-r 7.98
More True Sheffield Black Psychedelia!!! Which is quickly becoming our new favorite microgenre. As the name implies, the sound is black metal, psychedelic, and of course from Sheffield in the UK. Although black and psychedelic only barely scratch the surface of what's going on with these discs. Post rock, blacknoize, krautrock, furious grind, blissed out ambience, hypnorock, all tangled up into fierce blasts of whatthefuck atmospheric heaviness. We've already listed amazing releases from Ice Bound Majesty, Skultroll and a split between Dukkha and Black Vomit (see the reviews on the AQ website for more on Treu Sheffield Black Psychedelia). And we were so smitten with Black Vomit, we figured we'd track down more from them.
So here's another blast of Black Vomit, this time teamed up with the equally distastefully monickered Rape Rack.
Black Vomit start things off with some haunting ambience, that quickly gives way to some crusty fuzzy drone, eventually erupting into some fuzzed out metallic groove, which transforms into some grunting psych power violence, the programmed drums occasionally shorting out DHR style, a blur of garage fuzz pound, murky blackness, and relentless hyperspeed krautrock. After a brief bit of ambience, the band kick out the jams on a super space-y, hyper processed Circle-style jam. Hypnotic, and relentless, the riff wrapped in FX, the drums slipping from motorik pulse to furious blast and back again, over the top, harsh howled demon vox, a weird washed out blackened krautrock, that after another brief bit of drone tranquility explodes into some straight up black buzz. Awesome. Black Vomit are like Immortal's Blizzard Beasts crossed with Circle's Zopalki. We definitely need a full length from these guys.
Rape Rack offer up their own take on black psychedelia, eschewing drums completely, for some intense textural black ambience, rough and gritty, hissy and crumbling, distorted and buzzing, melodies falling to pieces, being sucked under corrosive drones, the 16 minute epic that finishes things off, is smoother than all that, glistening shimmering cavernous expanses of digital buzz smeared into soft streaks of shadowy grey streaks.
Not sure about the last track, it's definitely too heavy and fucked up to be Rape Rack, maybe it's the two bands together, but it's a killer, furious lightspeed buzz, processed and heavily effected, the vocals deranged and over the top, huge echo-y bellows howling in clouds of reverb and delay, threatening to drown out the din below. A furious black coda, that leaves us wanting WAY more.
MPEG Stream: BLACK VOMIT "Dripping Red"
MPEG Stream: BLACK VOMIT "Witchtrial"
MPEG Stream: RAPE RACK "Gorgon"

BLACKDEATH Bottomless Armageddon (ISO 666) cd 14.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.

MPEG Stream: "Baphomet"
MPEG Stream: "Under The Spell Of Black Moors"

BLACKDEATH Fucking Fullmoon Foundation (ISO666) cd 16.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
Probably best known around these parts for sharing a split with Leviathan, Russia's Blackdeath are a pretty seriously grim entity in their own right. 2002's Fucking Fullmoon Foundation, one of our favorite Blackdeath discs, has just gotten the super deluxe reissue treatment, courtesy of Greek label ISO666. Now housed in an oversized A5 style digibook sleeve, complete with new artwork, the original cd booklet, stickers and a mini-poster, and with all things like this ultra limited.
So act fast, cuz this is the stuff!!! Pure, grim, cult, frosty, necro, dirgey, buzzing, midtempo, Burzumic and Mayhemic black metal from Russia! No keyboards, or corpse paint, or even long hair for that matter! Just simple, brutal, stripped down TRUE black metal. Swarming guitars, pounding drums, and anguished, tortured vocals (a la SF black metal legends Weakling) make up this nihilistic hellbrew of cacophonous brutality. Blackdeath are the brilliantly monickered duo of Para Bellum and Abysslooker, and Fucking Fullmoon Foundation will surely sate your unquenchable thirst for primitive grimness.
MPEG Stream: "Das Kriechende Chaos"
MPEG Stream: "Unholy Church"

BLACKDEATH Satan Macht Frei (Drakkar) cd 14.98

MPEG Stream: "Satan Macht Mich Frei"
MPEG Stream: "Unter Der Schwarzsonne"

BLACKDEATH / LEVIATHAN split (ISO666) cd 16.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
We were barely able to keep this in stock the first time around. And it went out of print in the blink of an eye. Some of the best material we'd heard from all time AQ black metal fave Leviathan, who teamed up on this disc with grim Russian buzz merchants Blackdeath. Pretty killer combo indeed. Well, for a limited time, this killer split is available again, in fancy new packaging. Now housed in an oversized A5 style digibook, with cool new artwork, the original cd booklet, stickers and a mini-poster. It's probably safe to assume that these won't last any longer than the original version did, so best be quick. Here's what we had to say about the music inside:
Hard to know what to say about Leviathan that we haven't said already. Quite possibly the most innovative outfit in black metal today. The man behind Leviathan, Wrest, has taken traditional black metal and turned it into something new and strange and completely out there, while somehow remaining totally grim and true to the black metal tradition. Here, he is teamed up with Russian black metal outfit Blackdeath, who specialize in extremely primitive buzzy and blurry black metal a la Burzum, Darkthrone and the like. The most remarkable thing about Blackdeath besides their simple droning fuzzed out riffs, and frosty atmosphere, is the vocals, a weird raspy warble, that slips from black metal shriek to weirdly anguished falsetto, reminding us a lot of SF BM legends Weakling. And the guitars are so thick and buzzy and blown out that you almost can't hear the drums, which lends the whole thing a super hypnotic drone quality that we LOVE. As if playing off of Blackdeath's primitive grimness, Leviathan hits right back with four tracks of his own full on grim buzz, but as with everything he does, no matter how true and grim the sound is, no matter how blasting the drums or buzzing the guitars are, there is always lots of stuff going on beneath the surface, or in the arrangements, not always easy to explain, just this intangible something that makes Leviathan's sound so unique and so much creepier and intense. Minor key melodies, weird stretches of industrial ambience, strangely affected vocals, haunting drones and bizarre soundscapes, all woven into the already twisted framework of Leviathan's uniquely hellish black metal. Fucking amazing!
MPEG Stream: BLACKDEATH "Der Absolute Bose"
MPEG Stream: LEVIATHAN "Derision"

BLACKDEATH / LEVIATHAN split (Niessedrion) picture disc 16.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
While we're waiting to get restocked on the cd version of this killer split (in the next week or two!), which flew out of here after our last list, we managed to get 30 copies of the picture disc vinyl version. Unfortunately that's all we're ever gonna get, so as always, act fast!
Hard to know what to say about Leviathan that we haven't said already. Quite possibly the most innovative outfit in black metal today. The man behind Leviathan, Wrest, has taken traditional black metal and turned it into something new and strange and completely out there, while somehow remaining totally grim and true to the black metal tradition. Here, he is teamed up with Russian black metal group Blackdeath, who specialize in extremely primitive buzzy and blurry black metal a la Burzum, Darkthrone and the like. The most remarkable thing about Blackdeath besides their simple droning fuzzed out riffs, and frosty atmosphere, is the vocals, a weird raspy warble, that slips from black metal shriek to weirdly anguished falsetto, reminding us a lot of SF BM legends Weakling. And the guitars are so thick and buzzy and blown out that you almost can't hear the drums, which lends the whole thing a super hypnotic drone quality that we LOVE. As if playing off of Blackdeath's primitive grimness, Leviathan hits right back with four tracks of his own full on grim buzz, but as with everything he does, no matter how true and grim the sound is, no matter how blasting the drums or buzzing the guitars are, there is always lots of stuff going on beneath the surface, or in the arrangements, not always easy to explain, just this intangible something that makes Leviathan's sound so unique and so much creepier and intense. Minor key melodies, weird stretches of industrial ambience, strangely affected vocals, haunting drones and bizarre soundscapes, all woven into the already twisted framework of Leviathan's uniquely hellish black metal.
WE WERE ONLY ABLE TO GET 25 COPIES. ONCE THEY ARE GONE, THEY ARE GONE FOR GOOD!!!
MPEG Stream: BLACKDEATH "Der Absolute Bose"
MPEG Stream: LEVIATHAN "Derision"

BLACKNESS / HAMMER OV QLIPHOTH V.I.T.R.I.O.L. / Monotheistic Supremecy (Thou Shalt Kill! / Res Adversae Productions) cd 17.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
Folks may not be able to pronounce Ithdabquth Qliphoth, and probably have no idea what it means, but that most definitely didn't keep the recent IQ disc from being a runaway hit around these parts. And heck, we sort of knew it would be, being heavy, noisy, blown out raw black metal from Russia, steeped in bizarre mythologies, the sound as fractured and fucked up as it is grim black and buzzing.
So in the interest of digging deeper into the Qliphoth mythos, we managed to track down a handful of these splits, not new, released back in 2006, but until now we had given up hope of ever getting them for the store. But here they are, we have about 20, not sure if there are more to be had, so if we run out (when is probably more realistic), please be patient as we try to get our hands on more, cuz needless to say, fans of freaky black metal and weirdo outsider blackness, as well as ANYONE who bought that Qliphoth disc, will most likely want (NEED!) this too.
Which is not to say that it sounds anything like Ithdabquth Qliphoth, because it doesn't really. The Hammer Ov Qliphoth here is wielded by Al-La-Sht-Orr, one half of the IQ duo, and his half of this split is a mournful, midtempo, doom drenched black metal. Minor key guitars, simple circular riffing, the vocals a murky growl, the drums simple and solid, the pace a glacial crawl, sometimes slipping into a slowish midtempo plod. Super evocative and atmospheric, morose and moody, probably more for folks into depressive miserbalist doooooom than black metal, but fear not, it's harsh and grim enough to retain much of its blackness. Three tracks, the first two loping dismal dirges, surprisingly melodic, the main riffs almost punky if they were faster, but slowed down, it almost sounds like Darkthrone at 16rpm, slightly dissonant, mesmerizingly repetitive, droney, the final track might be our favorite, a super sloooooow, spaced out plod, the vocals and guitars locked into a strange sea sick slow motion rhythm, tons of space, the bursts of crushing heaviness held together by spidery guitar melodies, the whole thing suffused with buzz and hum and grit, super distorted and in-the-red, but weirdly melodic and pretty. Worth it already for sure. But the other half of the split might be even better. It's definitely weirder, and way more twisted.
Blackness hail from Belarus, and are a duo, which only stops making sense once you hear them, since they sound to these ears, like one guy, a guitar and a 4 track. Ultra raw, stripped down buzzing black metal, but just guitars and vocals, no drums, no keyboards, almost like some sort of black metal Jandek. Our listening to scratch tracks from some classic old school BM record. The riffs are awesome, brittle and grim and definitely lo-fi, the vocals harsh and WAY up in the mix so they totally overpower the guitar, a surprising amount of melody though, very harsh and haunting, but really cool, odds are you've probably never heard anything like this, and hell we're dying to hear more.
LIMITED TO 280 COPIES. We have about 20. Might be the last copies we can get. Packaged in one of those oversized super jewel cases, with nice full color textured inserts, and each copy hand numbered.
MPEG Stream: BLACKNESS "V.I.T.R.I.O.L."
MPEG Stream: BLACKNESS "Hierogamy WIth Kali"
MPEG Stream: HAMMER OF QLIPHOTH "Monotheistic Supremecy"
MPEG Stream: HAMMER OF QLIPHOTH "Sepher Qliphoth"

BLACKSHAW, JAMES Celeste (Celebrate Psi Phenomenon) cd-r 14.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
Sure, all you drone obsessives and out rock freaks can't get enough Celebrate Psi Phenomenon, an endless fount of whir and rumble and skree and grrr and rrroooaarrr. But this new record from James Blackshaw is a whole 'nother ball of... um.. steel strings apparently. Celeste is made up of two 15 minute tracks (one played in open C major tuning, the other in open C minor) of totally mesmerizing Appalachian raga folk, performed mainly on 12-string acoustic guitar with occasional farfisa organ and cymbals. Fans of John Fahey, Jack Rose, Matt Valentine and all things free folk will be completely blown away. There's still an element of drone in the repetitive raga-like riffing, but this is mainly and most definitely a weird and wonderful modern avant bluegrass / folk record. Lovely! SUPER LIMITED AS ALWAYS!! NOT SURE WE'LL BE ABLE TO GET MORE WHEN THESE ARE GONE!
MPEG Stream: "Celeste Pt. 1"

BLACKSHAW, JAMES Celeste (Barl Fire) cd-r 11.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
Still can't figure out why a record as good as this is doomed to remain a cd-r. And why if a label could sell out its entire pressing in a matter of weeks, another label would then choose to reissue that record in another super limited run of 100 cd-r copies. But what can you do? Maybe it's the allure and collectability of cd-r's... Regardless, this is a damn fine record! So here it is, in a new spiffy pink flowery cover and hand numbered, so now you slow pokes who missed out last time have another chance!
Here's what we said about this record first time around:
Sure, all you drone obsessives and out rock freaks can't get enough Celebrate Psi Phenomenon (the label that originally released this cd-r), an endless fount of whir and rumble and skree and grrr and rrroooaarrr. But this new record from James Blackshaw is a whole 'nother ball of... um.. steel strings apparently. Celeste is made up of two 15 minute tracks (one played in open C major tuning, the other in open C minor) of totally mesmerizing Appalachian raga folk, performed mainly on 12-string acoustic guitar with occasional farfisa organ and cymbals. Fans of John Fahey, Jack Rose, Matt Valentine and all things free folk will be completely blown away. There's still an element of drone in the repetitive raga-like riffing, but this is mainly and most definitely a weird and wonderful modern avant bluegrass / folk record. Lovely! AND AGAIN, SUPER LIMITED AS ALWAYS!! NOT SURE WE'LL BE ABLE TO GET MORE WHEN THESE ARE GONE!
MPEG Stream: "Celeste Pt. 1"

BLASPHEMOUS CRUCIFIXION Crude Burial (Rusty Axe) cd ep 8.98
With a name like Blasphemous Crucifixion, you should know what to expect - raw, buzzing black metal with a nice suicidal feel to it. This one man (presumably) hate machine cranks things out in a highly noisy, atonal way with a pretty pronounced punk influence. In fact, this sounds a bit like some of the Russian black metal we dig so much (early Old Wainds, Nav, Meti Bhuvah), which is indeed a very good thing. While the songs on Crude Burial, expanded with some demo tracks from earlier years, sound like they were recorded in an air raid shelter during an actual air raid AND in a blizzard, you can plainly hear all the instruments creeping their way out of the mix like they are gasping for air, so it never gets too noisy to where this will be mistaken for some experimental artsy black metal. There's nothing too ornate about Blasphemous Crucifixion, nor does there need to be. This is some harsh, negative stuff, super primitive and free of all the progressive bullshit than can ruin so much black metal these days, and with song titles like "Urine-Soaked Tombstone", "Disgusting", and "Self-Inflicted", you should know whether or not this is your bag. We say hell yeah. Coming to us from the always right on Rusty Axe imprint.
MPEG Stream: "Urine-Soaked Tombstone"
MPEG Stream: "Poisoned Water"
MPEG Stream: "Broken Flower"

BLAST BEAST Evercrushing Death Splatter (Relapse) cd 14.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, MAINLY BECAUSE IT WAS AN APRIL FOOLS JOKE! HEE HEE! SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
Fuck yes. It had to happen. The mother of all grindcore bands has descended upon us and you have simply never in your life heard anything as monstrously bone-crushing as this. Featuring not one, not two, not three, but SEVEN separate vocalists, bellowing forth, respectively -- ultra gut-rumbling low, maniacally cat-butchering mostly low, illegally brutal low-mid, hardcore shout, slightly high yelp, catatonic maple screech, and tree-felling supersonic scream -- the almighty Blast Beast is augmented additionally by four distinct drummers, two of which do nothing but blast in tandem, virtually quadrupling standard drum speeds. One drummer is left doing fills and rolls incessantly while the last Batteronimus Maximus (supposedly his legal birth-name!) plays a 12-piece kit assembled entirely of bass drums, leaving the notion of double bass a thing of the past. In fact the liner notes of the record include certified testimony from the controversial Auditory Regulation Statutes and BPM Limitation Committee of Canada that an estimated 72 to 73 percent of the sound recorded on this release is physically too fast for the human ear to discern, registering only a piercing single note to people but deemed "highly unsuitable" for households including dogs or feathered pets. Still the few moments you can make out are fucking steam-rolling bulldozingly insane! Think Brutal Truth meets Discordance Axis meets Nile at Human Remains' practice space with the guys from Pig Destroyer, Cryptopsy, Morbid Angel and Mortician jamming along -- all at the same time! With a whopping 147 songs (eighteen minutes total) this release is simply too fucking brutal for words -- get this now!
MPEG Stream: "Fast"
MPEG Stream: "Faster"
MPEG Stream: "Even Faster"
MPEG Stream: "Holy Shit, That's Fast"

BLIND DOG Last Adventures Of Captain Dog (Meteor City) cd 13.98
Yet more stoner rock from the deserts of Scandinavia!

BLIND GUARDIAN A Night At The Opera (Century Media) cd 14.98
Jesus here it is, what might be the most highly anticipated 'power metal' release of 2002. German metal gods Blind Guardian are a worldwide phenomenon these days, even making headway in the US of A. At least, we here at AQ have been waiting ever since their 1999 "Nightfall In Middle Earth" masterpiece for another full-length installment of the splendid, grandiose power-pomp metal that these guys conjure up so well. And since they're such big Beach Boys fans, you know they put the those last few years time in the studio to good use. The obvious comparison Blind Guardian's music evokes is to Queen, what with their multitracked vocal choruses and Brian May style overdubbed guitars. It's like "Bohemian Rhapsody" done by Iron Maiden, but without the (intentionally) camp elements of Queen (or quite the brilliance of either band, but c'mon, that's a lot to expect). Indeed, BG may be a little *too* serious, 'cause if it's sheer absurd over the topness you want, they get outdone by sillier power metal bands like Lost Horizon and Rhapsody (but BG's still pretty over the top). Unlike the Tolkien-themed "Nightfall", this new disc isn't a narrative concept album, although several songs seem to share references to Jesus -- which makes sense, since now that the Lord of the Rings is such bigtime Hollywood fare, the next best thing would be the Bible... Anyway, it's a great album, as we expected, essential for fans of the genre and a great example of how amazing melodic, symphonic, epic power metal can be for curious 'non-metallers' as well. But we do have two complaints: Firstly, as mentioned, BG must be heavily into Queen, so you think they'd know that the album title "A Night At The Opera" was already taken -- by Queen! What's up with that? Maybe it's some weird German idea of a tribute. And secondly, if you've already picked up the recent "And Then There Was Silence" ep (reviewed on AQ-L #127), then you've already got the last 14 minutes (not counting the bonus track) of this disc -- didn't realize that was going to be an album track, oh well. But, quibbles aside, fans of uber-produced, epic metal have A LOT to enjoy here!
RealAudio clip: "Precious Jerusalem"
RealAudio clip: "Under The Ice"
RealAudio clip: "Sadly Sings Destiny"

BLIND GUARDIAN A Twist In The Myth (Nuclear Blast) cd 13.98
German power metal masters Blind Guardian take a long time between their albums. And there's a reason. No churning out of easy cookie cutter stuff here. Each BG opus is a magisterial production, epic in scale and breathtaking in execution. You can tell that they probably needed the three years since their previous album, just to record this. The Blind Guardian guys probably never see the sunshine, sequestered in a recording studio 24-7. But their pastiness is our gain! A Twist In The Myth is, of course, magnificent. All the bardic bombast and medieval pomp we could hope for! It's barreling full bore heavy metal (a new drummer, new energy?) with of course glorious, singalong choruses. In a uniquely spirited fashion, they've managed to mix Celtic folk motifs with much more modern metal moves on this album, successfully so.
And it bears repeating, Blind Guardian stand apart from their Euro-power peers with an extra dose of ballsiness in both the guitar and vocals departments.
FYI: true fans will want to stay tuned at the end of the disc for the bonus interview track, though we're not sure its inclusion rings as classy as this band otherwise is...
MPEG Stream: "This Will Never Hand"
MPEG Stream: "Otherland"

BLIND GUARDIAN And Then There Was Silence (Century Media) cd ep 8.98
It's not the long-awaited new full length album from these Tolkien-obsessed German heavy metallers, but it IS two new songs, one of 'em a bona fide epic clocking in at 14:07, and that's cause enough for rejoicing 'round these parts! We've been waiting for a follow-up to their amazing "Nightfall in Middle-Earth" for a couple years now, and this (along with the Lord of the Rings movie!) has really upped our anticipation! This uber-popular band (in German, Japan, Korea... and Middle-Earth, at least) specializes in Queen-meets-Maiden power prog pomp metal. But, unlike similar over-the-top contemporaries like Rhapsody and Lost Horizon, they somehow AREN'T as cheesy and absurd... No, you really have to respect 'em as artists. They have a certain dignity. You won't catch them running around in frilly shirts, waving swords (not that there's anything wrong with that, but...) -- indeed, in the cd-rom video that is included on this cdep, the band performs in t-shirt and jeans, looking a lot more like Kreator or some other non-fantastical metal band. But, musically, they surely create otherworldly, incredible epics. "And Then There Was Silence" has an ancient Greek theme, fitting for a band that themselves will someday be considered classic.
RealAudio clip: "And Then There Was Silence"

BLIND GUARDIAN Fly (Nuclear Blast) cd ep 9.98
Ouch. Three songs, ten bucks?? (Actually it was a more painful 13 but we knocked it down since that seemed like too much.) Um, well, you have to be a really, really big Blind Guardian fan to shell out for this. And we're guessing at least one of the songs will end up on their presumably upcoming album, making this even less of a value in the long run. However, Allan HAD to buy one for himself, not just 'cause he IS a really, really big Blind Guardian fan, but also 'cause they do a cover of Iron Butterfly's "In-A-Gadda-Da-Vida" on here, believe it or not. And he loves Iron Butterfly too. Of course, a pomptastic German power metal band doing that song is a bit of novelty. The other two tracks here are excellent BG fare, by the way.

BLIND GUARDIAN Nightfall In Middle-Earth (Century Media) cd 15.98
Wow. This first domestic release by veteran German pomp-prog-power-metallers Blind Guardian kinda blew us away (Andee and Allan that is). Expecting ultra cheese in the vein of Hammerfall, we instead found this to be immense, amazingly produced (like, 124 track) epic concept album, at once lush, melodic and aggressive. Imagine a more metallic Queen doing a record about J.R.R. Tolkien's The Silmarillion, and that's what you get here! No wonder they're so huge overseas.

BLODULV II (Total Holocaust Records) cd 14.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
I know we talk about buzzing, primitive, grim and frosty black metal all the time. What can we say? We love that stuff. But this Blodulv record is sooooo grim and ridiculously frosty and utterly primitive. And buzzing! Don't forget the buzz! The guitars are just a swarm of buzzing metal mosquitos, filling your ears with hellish blackness. The tempos are mostly mid, even the blast beats remain just on the edge of midtempo, and the vocals are hyper distorted, to the point of sounding like modulated white noise. And the riffs! The riffs hum and whir and drone, like some sort of devilish lullaby, a hypnotic siren's song that lulls you into a trance like state, all the easier for their satanic message to sink in. For fans of Burzum, Darkthrone, and all manner of ravishing grimness.
MPEG Stream: "Desolate"
MPEG Stream: "Stronghold"

BLODULV II (Knightmare) cd 13.98
This slab of black metal grimnity was originally unleashed upon the world by Sweden's Total Holocaust label. After being out of print for some time, it's now reissued in a digipack by a new label. Our prior review:
I know we talk about buzzing, primitive, grim and frosty black metal all the time. What can we say? We love that stuff. But this Blodulv record is sooooo grim and ridiculously frosty and utterly primitive. And buzzing! Don't forget the buzz! The guitars are just a swarm of buzzing metal mosquitos, filling your ears with hellish blackness. The tempos are mostly mid, even the blast beats remain just on the edge of midtempo, and the vocals are hyper distorted, to the point of sounding like modulated white noise. And the riffs! The riffs hum and whir and drone, like some sort of devilish lullaby, a hypnotic siren's song that lulls you into a trance like state, all the easier for their satanic message to sink in. For fans of Burzum, Darkthrone, and all manner of ravishing grimness.
MPEG Stream: "Desolate"
MPEG Stream: "Stronghold"

BLODULV III - Burial (Eerie Art) cd 15.98
We managed to get another batch of these black beauties in, not sure how long they'll last though...
Blodulv just continue to get more grim, more frosty, more creepy and blackened. How that's even possible at this point is beyond us. The last record, appropriately titled II, was about as grim as it could reasonably get, and yet their sound gets more and more impenetrably dense and buzzy. And we love it. This is most definitely not blazing fast black metal, this is more of the Burzum midtempo hypno-drone-buzz school. A doomy dirgey thrashy blackness, pulsing and throbbing, loping along with occasional stretches of grime-y vitriolic tarpit sludge. The vocals are recorded so hot and so blown out it sounds like the singer is standing right there in your face, shrieking with all his might, showering you with spit and sweat and blood (eww). So intense and so intensely black and heavy.
MPEG Stream: "Burial"
MPEG Stream: "Imperial Sanctum"

BLOOD CEREMONY s/t (Rise Above / Candlelight) cd 13.98
Been looking forward to this one! The debut album from this seemingly time-lost Toronto band, the latest in the current spate of retro-proto-doom-metal bubbling up from the underground. All the heavy '70s Sabbath/Pentagram riffs -and- occult vibe of a band like Witchcraft, with soaring female vox and a thick coating of vintage Hammond organ, spooky and bombastic. It's an equation along the lines of Atomic Rooster + Jacula + Jex Thoth, maybe. Yeah, we're down with this. And that's just after hearing the first song. Then track two kicks in with some proggy flute! With LOTS more flute to follow on the rest of this album. So now they've added some Jethro Tull to the mix... Black Widow, Uriah Heep, Rainbow, and a mess of other more obscure '70s acts could also be cited as references too, along with the much more recent likes of the aforementioned Witchcraft and Jex Thoth.
Now, if you hate Jex Thoth's singing, you might have a similarly tough time with Blood Ceremony, but we found that the lady here isn't quite as polarizing a proposition. And it's her dramatic vocals that gives Blood Ceremony their special sound, along with her flute playing. She's also the organist. But let's not forget the guitars... it's tough not to grow your hair long and sprout bellbottoms when exposed to these lumbering, loping riffs, all of 'em seemingly from the school of Sleep's Sabbathier-than-thou classic "Dragonaut"! Or imagine Electric Wizard given a medieval, madrigal makeover.
And the lyrics... "I see witches in the sky, flying toward the quaalude eye"?? Ok. These guys and gal are definitely "smoking black drugs from Satan's bong" (I think that's what they said). Speaking of witchcraft, the dark arts of pagan ritual are of course Blood Ceremony's main subject matter, on tracks like "Into The Coven". The grooviest black mass we've attended in a long time, right here. After spinning this for a while, if you find toads hopping about near your stereo, we wouldn't be surprised...
MPEG Stream: "Master Of Confusion"
MPEG Stream: "I'm Coming With You"

BLOOD CEREMONY s/t (Rise Above) lp 24.00
Now in stock on vinyl! We highlighted the cd the other day, saying the following:
Been looking forward to this one! The debut album from this seemingly time-lost Toronto band, the latest in the current spate of retro-proto-doom-metal bubbling up from the underground. All the heavy '70s Sabbath/Pentagram riffs -and- occult vibe of a band like Witchcraft, with soaring female vox and a thick coating of vintage Hammond organ, spooky and bombastic. It's an equation along the lines of Atomic Rooster + Jacula + Jex Thoth, maybe. Yeah, we're down with this. And that's just after hearing the first song. Then track two kicks in with some proggy flute! With LOTS more flute to follow on the rest of this album. So now they've added some Jethro Tull to the mix... Black Widow, Uriah Heep, Rainbow, and a mess of other more obscure '70s acts could also be cited as references too, along with the much more recent likes of the aforementioned Witchcraft and Jex Thoth.
Now, if you hate Jex Thoth's singing, you might have a similarly tough time with Blood Ceremony, but we found that the lady here isn't quite as polarizing a proposition. And it's her dramatic vocals that gives Blood Ceremony their special sound, along with her flute playing. She's also the organist. But let's not forget the guitars... it's tough not to grow your hair long and sprout bellbottoms when exposed to these lumbering, loping riffs, all of 'em seemingly from the school of Sleep's Sabbathier-than-thou classic "Dragonaut"! Or imagine Electric Wizard given a medieval, madrigal makeover.
And the lyrics... "I see witches in the sky, flying toward the quaalude eye"?? Ok. These guys and gal are definitely "smoking black drugs from Satan's bong" (I think that's what they said). Speaking of witchcraft, the dark arts of pagan ritual are of course Blood Ceremony's main subject matter, on tracks like "Into The Coven". The grooviest black mass we've attended in a while, right here. After spinning this for a while, if you find toads hopping about near your stereo, we wouldn't be surprised...
MPEG Stream: "Master Of Confusion"
MPEG Stream: "I'm Coming With You"

BLOOD CULT Midwestern Occult (Illinoisan Thunder) cd-r 8.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.

BLOOD CULT We Who Walk Behind The Rows (Rusty Axe) cd 9.98
Since we are reviewing the new Blood Cult / Enbilulugugal split elsewhere on this list, we figured we oughta give everyone a chance to pick this up too. Reviewing the split we were reminded how awesome these guys are, and we figured maybe folks missed out on this, so here you go, some seriously fucked up redneck black metal from these Midwestern miscreants.
Blood Cult are, as far as we know, the only purveyors of Redneck Black Metal around, or maybe more accurately the only ones who admit to it. And Blood Cult are damn proud of being BM rednecks, as their apparent theme song "Redneck Black Metal" proves (oh, and it's printed in huge letters along the spine of the cd!). This is the first proper release from this Illinois horde after a slew of cd-rs, cassettes and demos. Definitely their best SOUNDING record by a long shot, equal parts splatter rock, crossover, early black metal, NWOBHM, and thrash. Think Venom, D.R.I., the Accused - primitive and thrashy, noisy and chaotic, with some killer riffs 'n' some splattery chaotic drumming. They're definitely a little tongue in cheek for sure with some of the lyrics and song titles ("The Moweaqua Coal Mine Disaster", "Cheap Guitars", "Illinoisan Thunder", etc.). This boasts some killer cartoony artwork too, from the same label that brought us Enbilulugugal!!
MPEG Stream: "The Moweaqua Coal Mine Disaster"
MPEG Stream: "Redneck Black Metal"

BLOOD DUSTER Cunt (Relapse) cd 14.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
Never much cared for Blood Duster. Sort of a bad joke turned into a band. And not a whole lot has changed. Fairly generic grind, with occasional groovy '70s metal bits thrown in with lots of stupid between song samples. A look at the song titles should tell you all you need to know: 'Pornstorestiffi', 'Ijustfinishedsuckingoffmetalheadsinthemensurinals', 'Iloveitwhenjoepesciswears', 'Atracksuitisnotappropriatemetalapparel' and on and on. I mean, I'm all for being offensive and anti-PC, but to -really- be offensive -or- PC, you gotta put some thought and creativity into it. This is just puerile and dumb.

BLOOD FARMERS Permanent Brain Damage (Leaf Hound) cd 15.98
Finally re-pressed and back in stock!! Here's what we had to say about it back on list 199:
Doom! Not just doom...but maybe the best doomy release of the year, sez Allan...and it's a reissue. Of a demo tape, no less. New York's Blood Farmers (now defunct) recorded one self-titled album in 1995 for the (also now defunct) German label Hellhound, who are not to be confused with the Japanese label Leafhound responsible for this release. The Hellhound album was an obscure, now-out-of-print, but seriously heavy and deranged slice of doom-adelica in the vein of the masters Black Sabbath and especially Saint Vitus. But it turns out that the Blood Farmer's 1992 demo was easily as good if not better than their actual album (and has only one cut in common, "Bullet In My Head", which is a very different version here). Heads up, heads -- this starts with the 14 minute long psychedelic doom opus "Behind The Brown Door" ends with another 14+ minute epic "Deathmaster", a suite in five parts. Extended fuzz-wah terror ensues throughout those epics and all over the album as a whole, with guitarist Dave Depraved's soloing brilliantly channelling the heavy trippiness of Vitus' Dave Chandler. There's also more more concise rockers here like the aforementioned "Bullet In My Head" and "St. Chibes". Basically, imagine The Heads jamming with Vitus or Church Of Misery. Regarding the latter, the Blood Farmers share the same serial-killer obsession as do those Japanese doom freaks, but theirs is really more about the fiction films about the serial killers than the killers themselves. In addition to the original demo tracks, which are remixed and remastered, there's also a live bonus track from '96, itself followed by a hidden bonus track of ambient music/sound fx, accompanying a monologue, all doubtless lifted from one of the Blood Farmer's fave horror flicks. So if you'd like a severe dose of acid-sludge rock, look no further!
MPEG Stream: "Behind The Brown Door"
MPEG Stream: "Bullet In My Head"

BLOOD ISLAND RIDERS s/t (Invada) cd 14.98
Some stoner doom rockin' from the usually reliable Invada label (run by one of the guys from Portishead, oddly enough). But sadly, this one brings Invada's batting average down, not living up to the likes of The Heads, Atavist, Brain Donor, etc.
Mainly, 'cause oooh crickey the vocals are rough. Lines like "It's time for you to taste my wrath...oh yeah!" look better on paper than they sound coming from the totally "chainwallet" style singer. Plus some stilted singsongy almost rappy rhymes, no thanks. This would be way better if dude didn't sing. Hope he's also the guitar player or something, otherwise there's no excuse. Sorry.
MPEG Stream: "I Am The King"
MPEG Stream: "For The Sake Of Clarity"

BLOOD OF KINGU De Occulta Philosophia (Supernal) cd 15.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
It's been a while since we heard from Ukrainian black metallers Drudkh (and all of their albums seem to be currently out of print sad to say) or ambient side project Dark Ages (and of course Hate Forest, another band featuring the same members has been split up since 2005). So what has Drudkh mainman Roman Saenko been up to for the last little while? Why crafting an epic black metal album based around Sumerian and Ancient Egyptian mythology and history of course! And this is it. Blood Of Kingu, a swirling blackened blast of buzzing guitars, blasting drums, buried vocals, soaring melodies, and the occasional traditional folk interlude. The root sound is not that far removed from older Drudkh or Hate Forest, but imagine that sound a bit more lo-fi, a little more drenched in buzz, the riffing more looped and cyclical, the mood more majestic and epic, and you'll get an idea of the Blood Of Kingu sound.
Each track is a drone drenched slab of relentless riffery, furious and lightning fast, the drums careening chaotically beneath a thick layered wall of frenzied buzz, the vocals chanted and almost like throat singing, super low in the mix, giving the proceedings a sort of ritualistic vibe, with each song made up of only really one or two parts, creating a super tense, ultra hypnotic black metal mesmer, with the guitars swirling occasionally into gorgeous surprisingly melodic harmonies, while below, the track continues to churn and thrash violently.
Fans of Drudkh and Hate Forest and other Ukrainian black hordes absolutely need this, as do folks who love their black metal drone-y and hypnotic and trancelike.
MPEG Stream: "Your Blood, Nubia! Your Power, Egypt!"
MPEG Stream: "Mummu Tiamat"
MPEG Stream: "Stronghold Of Megaliths, Thorns And Human Bones"

BLOOD OF THE BLACK OWL A Banishing Ritual (Bindrune) cd 13.98
A brand new record, the third since 2007 (not counting the split with Celestiial, whose awesome new record is also reviewed this list), from these doom metal / postrock / black metal / doomfolk / black ambient alchemists, the same folks who explore the darker regions of the spirit with their black ambient project Ruhr Hunter, although it's hard to imagine there's any place darker than whatever strange world Blood Of The Black Owl draw inspiration from. The opening movement of this single 41 minute epic (separated into 4 parts) finds the band spinning a black web of grim churning low end, softly roiling, like staring into a black hole, a bottomless abyss, dotted with dying stars, while over the top a guitar is strummed, unfurling a crystalline arrangement of glimmering notes, hovering above the inky blackness, a strange unearthly black folk, nearly static, mesmerizing and trancelike, eventually drums come in and the sound shifts dramatically, to something much more abstract and rhythmic, a sort of spaced out doomic skitter, which grows more and more ethereal, the bass buzzing, and a fluttering flute, marking a folky segue into the second movement, a much heavier downtuned dirge, a churning riffy crunch, that quickly dissipates into a cloud of chiming tones, disembodied voices and blackened shimmer before flitting back to that riffy pound although this time accompanied by some new age-sounding synth.
The third movement explodes in a burst of blinding feedback, only to dissolve into a washed out, ambient doom plod, the drums a distant pound, the sounds hazy and druggy, a lysergic sprawl of blackened psychedelia, that gives way to the final movement, a dark, low slung, almost Bohren like stretch of slowcore crawl, all whispered vocals, softly strummed guitar, barely there effects, a hushed drift that slowly builds to a fierce pounding electronic flecked shoegazey dirge, with growled vox, tribal drumming, a glorious crescendo, emotional and intense, finally dropping out, leaving a single voice to call out, then silence.
Incredible as always, and totally recommended for anyone into avant emotional heaviness and mysterious sonic darkness.
MPEG Stream: "Intent (Movement I)"
MPEG Stream: "The Statement Of Will (Movement II)"

BLOOD OF THE BLACK OWL A Feral Spirit (Bindrune) cd 12.98
Not to be confused, as we sometimes (almost) do, with brutal black metallers Book Of The Black Earth, who also have a new album out, soon to be reviewed here as well. This band is the one whom we last heard sharing a dirgey split 12" with Celestiial. Here's there new full-length and, as we expected, it's some serious doom metal/post rock/black metal/ambient hybrid wyrdness from the same guy responsible for the shamanic, organic drones of Ruhr Hunter.
Ok, the first track, "Spell Of The Elk", mostly (gruffly) spoken and atmospheric, is cool enough but mainly serves as a 9-minute intro to track 2, "Crippling Of Age", when things really get intense, the guitar kicks into gear, the hammer drops, the fuzz explodes, the totemic blood of this black owl flows thick and dark. This is musick full of creepy guttural croakings, seasick shoegazing droned-out riffery, and some seriously doooooomic plod, along with sudden yet graceful dynamic shifts from apocalyptic destructiveness to introspective dreaminess, yeah!!!
Many of these nine fairly lengthy tracks seem like ceremonial mini-epics, with gentle keyboard melodies wandering in from some obscure '70s Italian horror flick soundtrack, haunted by heavy doses of fuzzed out riff-sludge, providing a terror-struck background to the disturbing internal monologue (prayer?) played out by the anguished, echoed vokills. So much of this is surprisingly beautiful, so much of it fantastically fuzzed. The mystic moodiness is enhanced by foresty flutes and bone rattles from Native American / New Age ritual amidst all the industrial-strength dirge. This is part Neurosis, part Godspeed, part Burzum. Maybe part Bohren, and even part Thuja too! Well, possibly an aboriginal Thuja, when it really quiets down and spaces out and enters the Dreamtime. One of those "metal" records we recommend to a wider audience of adventurous listeners for sure.
MPEG Stream: "Crippling Of Age"
MPEG Stream: "He Who Walked Away From The Fire And Laughed As He Bled"
MPEG Stream: "Void"

BLOOD OF THE BLACK OWL A Feral Spirit (Aurora Borealis) lp 17.98
Not to be confused, as we sometimes (almost) do, with brutal black metallers Book Of The Black Earth, who also have a new album out, soon to be reviewed here as well. This band is the one whom we last heard sharing a dirgey split 12" with Celestiial. Here's there new full-length and, as we expected, it's some serious doom metal/post rock/black metal/ambient hybrid wyrdness from the same guy responsible for the shamanic, organic drones of Ruhr Hunter.
Ok, the first track, "Spell Of The Elk", mostly (gruffly) spoken and atmospheric, is cool enough but mainly serves as a 9-minute intro to track 2, "Crippling Of Age", when things really get intense, the guitar kicks into gear, the hammer drops, the fuzz explodes, the totemic blood of this black owl flows thick and dark. This is musick full of creepy guttural croakings, seasick shoegazing droned-out riffery, and some seriously doooooomic plod, along with sudden yet graceful dynamic shifts from apocalyptic destructiveness to introspective dreaminess, yeah!!!
Many of these nine fairly lengthy tracks seem like ceremonial mini-epics, with gentle keyboard melodies wandering in from some obscure '70s Italian horror flick soundtrack, haunted by heavy doses of fuzzed out riff-sludge, providing a terror-struck background to the disturbing internal monologue (prayer?) played out by the anguished, echoed vokills. So much of this is surprisingly beautiful, so much of it fantastically fuzzed. The mystic moodiness is enhanced by foresty flutes and bone rattles from Native American / New Age ritual amidst all the industrial-strength dirge. This is part Neurosis, part Godspeed, part Burzum. Maybe part Bohren, and even part Thuja too! Well, possibly an aboriginal Thuja, when it really quiets down and spaces out and enters the Dreamtime. One of those "metal" records we recommend to a wider audience of adventurous listeners for sure.
MPEG Stream: "Crippling Of Age"
MPEG Stream: "He Who Walked Away From The Fire And Laughed As He Bled"
MPEG Stream: "Void"

BLOOD OF THE BLACK OWL s/t (Bindrune) cd 11.98
The ritualist forest flecked dark ambience of the band Ruhr Hunter has always managed to somehow transcend its ambient classification and appeal to the metal crowd as much as to the ambient drone crowd. Not sure what it is, the foresty bent, the bold Teutonic iconography, the music's distinctly dark elements, or maybe folks could just tell that some metal was lurking within them thar dark drones...
And as if we needed proof, along comes Blood Of The Black Owl, the buzzing black metal project of Chet Scott, the man behind Ruhr Hunter. And true to form, this is no run of the mill black metal band, Scott expands his baritone guitar / drums palette to include stuff like thunder gong and brass tubular bells, organ, young ox horn, antique celestaphone, environmental recordings and black clay ocarina. It's almost like a blackened metallicized Ruhr Hunter.
The sound is an hypnotic, repetitive midtempo Burzumic buzz, often slowing down to a dirge like crawl, each track a relentless trudge through mud and swamp, thicket and forest, the riffs looping and cycling, mantra-like, the vocals a guttural growl one second, an anguished wail the next, in the background are howling wolves, birdsong, strange percussion, a truly mysterious black brew. Much of the record dips into dark ambience, and being that this is basically Ruhr Hunter, those passages are captivating, a dark dreamy ambient interludes underpinned in places by slow motion riffing, in others by chantlike vocals, and still others by throat singing, it's all very haunting and mournful, but this is NOT a RH record, so those brief passages are merely transitions, the songs themselves, the riffs and the melodies, weave their own dark magic, dismal and depressive, as doom as it is black, a mesmerizing fuzzy landscape of black riffs and simple pounding rhythms, gloriously bleak, strangely dreamlike, and most definitely imbued with the spirit of some ancient black forest.
MPEG Stream: "Kills In Timber"
MPEG Stream: "The Thunderous Hooves Of Two Goats In The Sky"

BLOODBATH Breeding Death (Century Media) cdep 8.98
Three-song ep by a Swedish supergroup (guys from Opeth, Katatonia, and Edge of Sanity) who went into the studio to bash out this simple but very brutal tribute to old-school Florida death metal. Maybe you haven't bought a Cannibal Corpse or Obituary cd in a while, but this ep will bring back memories.

BLOODBATH Nightmares Made Flesh (Century Media) cd 13.98
The band that started simply as a way for a bunch of friends from a few well-known Swedish metal bands to get together, drink beers, and make some old-school (early '90s style) death metal for the fun of it has actually turned into a REAL band, and is now on their second full-length recording! Nightmares Made Flesh is the worthy follow-up to Bloodbath's 2002 debut album Resurrection Through Carnage, which was an album that got some major imaginary windmilling action around here. Well, actually we all think that hair-spinning (rather than head-banging) thing a lot of death metal guys do is stupid, and sadly none of us have long enough hair for that anyway. But what we're saying is that it was a brilliant album in its own right regardless of its origins in tribute and nostalgia.
A few things are different with this release -- for one thing, singer Michael Akerfeldt of Opeth has been replaced on the mic by Peter Tagtgren of Hypocrisy fame. But apparently, in order to help preserve the old "feeling", Michael did phone up the studio every few days to talk to the guys while they were recording this. You can imagine the conversations...Dude is it brutal? Yah, brutal! Cool!
The other members of Bloodbath are: metalmeister Dan Swano (Edge Of Sanity, Pan-thy-monium, Karaboudjan, Nightingale, etc.), plus two guys from Katatonia, and a new drummer named Martin Axenrot -- who sounds like he should be from a band called Axenrot, right? but he's actually the drummer from Witchery and Satanic Slaughter. With Axenrot on board, first album skinbeater Swano has moved from drums to guitar, and provides some excellent, distinctive, melodic soloing on this album. Bloodbath is still all about their influences (Swedish DM greats like Dismember, Entombed, and Grave, along the likes of Britain's Carcass who had a Swede in the band anyway). But Nightmare is just a little bit more modern sounding (maybe it's the drumming) and even darker...still throughly laced with (deadly-virus) catchy, crunchy riffage and appropriately sick lyrics. We've now got the domestic version that differs from the import by boasting cover art from the one and only Wes Benscoter, and having two bonus tracks, demos from the band's initial Breeding Death ep sessions.
MPEG Stream: "Outnumbering The Day"
MPEG Stream: "Draped In Disease"

BLOODBATH Resurrection Through Carnage (Century Media) cd 13.98
Bloodbath might sound like a generic death metal name, and that's kind of the idea. They're actually a Swedish metal supergroup paying tribute to the late 80's/early '90s death metal that they loved in their youth. Obituary, Cannibal Corpse, Carcass, Entombed, that kind of thing... Gory, grinding, blasting DEATH.
Bloodbath is made up of vocalist Michael Akerfeldt (mastermind of gods Opeth*), guitarist Anders Nystrom and bassist Jonas Renkse (both of AQ-faves Katatonia), and drummer Dan Swano (Dan Swano! he's been in a zillion bands, but we'll mention our favorites, Pan-thy-monium and Karaboudjan). They did a three-song ep a few years back, as a lark, and we never really expected a follow-up due to these dudes' busy schedules in their full-time outfits. But apparently the pleasures of unadulterated death metal beckoned irresistibly to them, and this "Resurrection" was thankfully at last spawned. And with this sort of musical braintrust, you know that Bloodbath isn't going to disappoint. Indeed they don't. Doomy, intricate, brutal, produced to perfection, and catchy in the blood-letting way that really only makes sense to death metal fans. Thanks guys!
*who have just released their eagerly anticipated new album, "Deliverance" (see nearby for our review) and we don't doubt the timing was coincidental...clever record company.
RealAudio clip: "Buried By The Dead"