ALUK TODOLO s/t (Implied Sound) 7" 7.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
Holy fuck, this record is amazing! You'd never guess it, but Aluk Todolo is the occult trance rock side project of French black metallers Diamatregon. OK, maybe it doesn't seem that off the wall, Diamatregon definitely dabbled in strange rhythms and distinctly non-black metal sound forms. But this is definitely something else altogether. Ominous krautrock rhythms over Einsterzende style industrial clatter, some lost seventies psych rock holy grail channeled through modern post rock. Dreamy and dark and mesmerizing. Hypnotic guitar lines and simple shuffling rhythms that build into clattery propulsive jams, all clanging angular riffs and dense tangled drumming. VERY This Heat like, and reminiscent of the late great Laddio Bolocko. Some sort of dangerous and mysterious postrock / krautrock hybrid, lo-fi but thick and dense and amazingly heavy.
Gorgeous packaging, white and silver on black, a fold out die cut sleeve with a Japanese style obi, and a cover image that manages to be totally familiar ('got yer nose') but somehow creepy as hell.

AMBER ASYLUM Bitter River (Profound Lore) cd 13.98

AMBER ASYLUM Frozen In Amber (Neurot) cd 14.98
Reissue of the debut cd from this atmospheric local group, that uses classical chamber music instrumentation to create dark, beautiful sounds akin to a black metal Rachel's. Black metal? Well, this was originally released this by Elfenblut, an imprint of now defunct British label Misanthropy, famous as the home of Burzum! And, for further "heavy" credentials, we should mention that band leader Kris Force has played with both Neurosis and Swans. This was previously only an import, and now boasts three bonus tracks exclusive to this new version!

AMBER ASYLUM Garden Of Love (Paradigms) cd 12.98
We've been out of stock on this for a while, but just got restocked on Paradigms stuff, so another chance if you missed out before!
Originally released as a super limited 10", local moody metallic chamber ensemble Amber Asylum's latest Garden Of Love is now available on cd, again limited, this time to 750 copies, packaged in a mini lp style sleeve wrapped in a hand stamped brown paper outer sleeve, and includes the previously unreleased bonus track "Serenade" available only on this here cd. Four brand new tracks that take Amber Asylum's gothic strings and vocals sound even further out, having now expanded their lineup to include former members of The Gault and SF black metal legends Weakling. The opening track is quite possibly the best thing we've heard from them, a brooding dramatic soundscape of intensely moody strings, and anguished melodies. Locked in by simple almost programmed sounding rhythms with haunting operatic vocals drifting ghostlike through the mix. Sounds a bit like Skepticism with a string section, and you know that is a very good thing. The second track heads into almost Goblin territory at points with super aggressive pizzicato strings, bows sawing away at the strings emitting truly ominous melodies. The rest of the record is far more tranquil, expansive, romantic, epic, melancholic yet hopeful, with delicate crystalline piano figures, very subtle strings and sweetly plaintive vocals. So nice.
MPEG Stream: "Garden Of Love"
MPEG Stream: "Autonomy Suite"

AMBER ASYLUM Garden of Love, Autonomy Suite, Still Point (Bio-Fidelic) 10" 9.98
First we've heard from local moody metallic chamber ensemble Amber Asylum in quite some time. Rumor is there have been label problems, but you'd never know it from this amazing self released 10" (other than it being, um, self released). Three brand new tracks that take Amber Asylum's gothic strings and vocals soun even further out, having now expanded their lineup to include former members of the Gault and SF black metal legends Weakling. The opening track is quite possibly the best thing we've heard from them, a brooding dramatic soundscape of intensely moody strings, and anguished melodies. Locked in by simple almost programmed sounding rhythms with haunting operatic vocals drifting ghostlike through the mix. Sounds a bit like Skepticism with a string section, and you know that is a very good thing. The second track heads into almost Goblin territory at points with super aggressive pizzicato strings, bows sawing away at the strings emitting truly ominous melodies. Side B clocks in at a little over 12 minutes, and is far more tranquil, an expansive, romantic epic, melancholic yet hopeful, with delicate crystalline piano figures, very subtle strings and sweetly plaintive vocals. So nice. Available only on limited edition 10" vinyl!

AMBER ASYLUM Songs of Sex and Death (Release) cd 15.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
Ignore the new age blurbs on the back of this cd, this is a beautiful piece of Morricone-style dark cinematic bliss from San Francisco violinist/vocalist Kris Force, featuring a revolving cast of guests, including John from A Minor Forest.

AMBER ASYLUM The Natural Philosophy of Love (Release) cd 14.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
2nd album (and domestic full-length debut) of atmospheric chamber music from this acclaimed San Francisco band, sort of the goth-metal answer to Rachel's. Not that this sounds metal at all, it just seems to be the eerie classical music thing that appeals equally to Satanic Black Metallers, "dark ambient" aficionados, and so forth - and the group's association with Neurosis adds to their metal cred.

AMEBIX Arise! (Alternative Tentacles) cd 14.98
Awesome reissue of this seminal crust classic. Heavy and noisy and brilliant. Includes 2 bonus tracks!

AMEN-RA s/t (Hyper Tension) cd 22.00

AMESOEURS Ruines Humaines (Northern Silence) cd ep 11.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
We had sort of given up on ever getting this in stock, which was killing us. One of our favorite records of last year (one of Andee's top 10), a record some of us listened to EVERY DAY, over and over. Heavy and buzzy, but so beautiful and relentlessly catchy. Sure we've had black metal records in the past that were 'pretty'. Catchy too. But those records took their hooks and their soaring melodies and wrapped them all up in spiky blackness, subtly catching our ear beneath all the buzz, the prettiness more a byproduct than a reason for being. But Amesoeurs are completely different. It's almost like some shoegazey, indie druggy drone rock band decided their blissed out indie jangle needed more, well, BLACKNESS, and thus enlisted a corpsepainted frontman, with a demonic banshee shriek, to wail and gnash his teeth over the band's nearly perfect buzzing pop.
From the first notes of the opener "Bonheur Ampute" you're hooked. If you didn't know what was playing, you'd probably be thinking it was some lost Swervedriver track, or some modern band channeling My Bloody Valentine and Ride. The music is that gorgeous. The guitars are thick and heavy, a little buzzy, but they glisten and sparkle, and well, jangle. The opening riff is so impossibly catchy, sort of minor key, but only barely, this is simply perfect pop music wrapped in a thin layer of buzzing blackness. There's no denying it. A loping riff, underpinned by strummed acoustic guitar, while over the top guitars keen and soar, melodies intertwine, harmonies drift and shimmer, even the black metal shriek starts to transform into something less evil becoming more just another element of the blissy poppy buzz. Near the end of the first track, all the other instruments drop out leaving just the acoustic guitar, and when the band kicks back in, they go for it, transforming the track into some otherworldy buzzpop, that original riff ringing out, but over the top some gorgeously melodic underwater, blooping Pinback like bass lines and soaring angular guitar melodies.
The second track begins with a haunting spidery Slinty guitar line, minor key and skeletal, hovering in a wide open expanse of dark shimmer, when the band lurches into action, the main riff sounds like some classic Maiden hook, transformed into a loping pop song, the band eventually ramp it up, the drums becoming a double kicking blast, the vocals shrieking, but the main melody remains and the song becomes a haunting emotional minor key buzz drenched slab of shoegazer black metal, complete with acoustic breakdowns and a mysterious percussive coda.
The final track opens up with another gorgeous tangled bit of clean guitar, that turns into straight up clean ringing indie jangle, but surprises us with ethereal female vocals, which transform it into some nineties sounding dark pop like Velocity Girl or something. Eventually, a buzzing guitar joins the fray, and by the end, it's another swirling blackened slab of blissed out buzz. So fucking awesome.
Black metal record of the year! Of forever! And that's assuming that this even counts as black metal... Either way, this is absolutely essential. Black metalheads don't be put off by the prettiness, we love us some Antaeus and Katharsis and Darkthrone and all that, but this is just so goddamn good. And all you indie rock mix tape makers, try blowing somebody's mind by slipping one of these tracks into your next mix, right there between Spoon and Pavement. The perfect black metal gateway drug...
And be sure to check out Amesoeurs mainman Neige's other bands, Alcest, who take the blissed out pop thing even further, and Peste Noire, a more black, but equally strange and pretty outfit.
MPEG Stream: "Bonheur Ampute"
MPEG Stream: "Ruines Humaines"

AMESOEURS Ruines Humaines (Northern Silence) 10" 13.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
One of our favorite blasts of black buzzing beauty available on vinyl for a super limited time, with new artwork and a printed insert.
Here's what we had to say about Ruines Humaines when we highlighted the cd on the list a short while back:
We had sort of given up on ever getting this in stock, which was killing us. One of our favorite records of last year (one of Andee's top 10), a record some of us listened to EVERY DAY, over and over. Heavy and buzzy, but so beautiful and relentlessly catchy. Sure we've had black metal records in the past that were 'pretty'. Catchy too. But those records took their hooks and their soaring melodies and wrapped them all up in spiky blackness, subtly catching our ear beneath all the buzz, the prettiness more a byproduct than a reason for being. But Amesoeurs are completely different. It's almost like some shoegazey, indie druggy drone rock band decided their blissed out indie jangle needed more, well, BLACKNESS, and thus enlisted a corpsepainted frontman, with a demonic banshee shriek, to wail and gnash his teeth over the band's nearly perfect buzzing pop.
From the first notes of the opener "Bonheur Ampute" you're hooked. If you didn't know what was playing, you'd probably be thinking it was some lost Swervedriver track, or some modern band channeling My Bloody Valentine and Ride. The music is that gorgeous. The guitars are thick and heavy, a little buzzy, but they glisten and sparkle, and well, jangle. The opening riff is so impossibly catchy, sort of minor key, but only barely, this is simply perfect pop music wrapped in a thin layer of buzzing blackness. There's no denying it. A loping riff, underpinned by strummed acoustic guitar, while over the top guitars keen and soar, melodies intertwine, harmonies drift and shimmer, even the black metal shriek starts to transform into something less evil becoming more just another element of the blissy poppy buzz. Near the end of the first track, all the other instruments drop out leaving just the acoustic guitar, and when the band kicks back in, they go for it, transforming the track into some otherworldy buzzpop, that original riff ringing out, but over the top some gorgeously melodic underwater, blooping Pinback like bass lines and soaring angular guitar melodies.
The second track begins with a haunting spidery Slinty guitar line, minor key and skeletal, hovering in a wide open expanse of dark shimmer, when the band lurches into action, the main riff sounds like some classic Maiden hook, transformed into a loping pop song, the band eventually ramp it up, the drums becoming a double kicking blast, the vocals shrieking, but the main melody remains and the song becomes a haunting emotional minor key buzz drenched slab of shoegazer black metal, complete with acoustic breakdowns and a mysterious percussive coda.
The final track opens up with another gorgeous tangled bit of clean guitar, that turns into straight up clean ringing indie jangle, but surprises us with ethereal female vocals, which transform it into some nineties sounding dark pop like Velocity Girl or something. Eventually, a buzzing guitar joins the fray, and by the end, it's another swirling blackened slab of blissed out buzz. So fucking awesome.
Black metal record of the year! Of forever! And that's assuming that this even counts as black metal... Either way, this is absolutely essential. Black metalheads don't be put off by the prettiness, we love us some Antaeus and Katharsis and Darkthrone and all that, but this is just so goddamn good. And all you indie rock mix tape makers, try blowing somebody's mind by slipping one of these tracks into your next mix, right there between Spoon and Pavement. The perfect black metal gateway drug...
And be sure to check out Amesoeurs mainman Neige's other bands, Alcest, who take the blissed out pop thing even further, and Peste Noire, a more black, but equally strange and pretty outfit.
MPEG Stream: "Bonheur Ampute"
MPEG Stream: "Ruines Humaines"

AMESOEURS s/t (Profound Lore) cd 14.98
Finally! After three, years, France's Amesoeurs release their debut full length. And it's pretty shocking when you think about all the fuss these guys (and gal) have stirred up, with only FOUR songs to their name. FOUR songs in THREE YEARS. And yet, people were obsessed with those four songs, ourselves included, but hell, those four songs were fantastic, magical, barely black metal to the point where we had trouble understanding why metalheads liked it at all, but that's the thing, it managed to transcend, the songwriting is amazing, the arrangements, the production, the riffs, and mood, the ambience, Amesoeurs really are something special.
And it's not like they were doing nothing for the last three years, mainman Neige, managed to release records by his other bands, Peste Noire, Alcest, Forgotten Woods, Lantlos, in fact 3 of the four members of Amesoeurs also play in Peste Noire, but don't be expecting any of that gnarled raw black weirdness, no, Amesoeurs as most folks already know is all about melody, songcraft, it's more post rocky and shoegazey than buzzy and black, at least most of the time, and never more than on this new one. Vocalist and bassist Audrey Sylvain takes center stage here, singing most of the songs, helping Amesoeurs create a gorgeous lush sound that is so far removed from black metal, even blasts of buzz or furious riffing can't take away from its pure poppiness. Some of these songs sound like a band who should be on Slumberland not on Profound Lore.
Anyway, Amesoeurs starts off with a blast, some Joy Division-y bass, some mathy angular post rocky guitar, simple stripped down drumming, very moody and tense, almost new wave sounding, distant strings swell, until the guitars explode and the whole track is infused with buzz, creating an impossible hybrid, gorgeously achingly melodic and epic, but so buzz drenched and blackened, if the whole record had played out like this nonstop, people would have been flipping their lids (even more than they already are), but then that would take away from what makes Amesoeurs baffling and brilliant.
The second track, "Les Ruches Malades", shows no signs of blackness at all, the guitar has some bite, some crunch, but the main riff is more jangle than buzz, the bass throbs, the drums are super tight, and Audrey's vocals are front and center, this is one of those tracks that make it hard to believe metalheads get into this band at all.
Then it's back to more epic emotional blackness, buzzing, thrashing, soaring, but still jam packed with melody and moodiness, suddenly shifting to some hard rocking shoegazey jangle pop, peppered with bursts of Katatonia-like groove, before slipping into more loping rainy day bliss pop. Musically, the follow up "Recueillement" is more of the same, but here Neige adds his own shrieked black metal vox, which sound really odd draped over the minor key jangle beneath, but it also sounds kind of cool, a bit jarring for sure, but in a good way. Blackened and emotional and intense.
And so it goes, most of the record loping and jangling and shoegazing, occasionally offering up a bit of black buzz, and at least one track, "Trouble (Eveils Infames)" is pure blackness, all thrashing buzzing frenzied fury, no pop to be found, but that's the only real moment of grimninty to be found, the record is much more about melody and mood, the heaviest it gets is when Neige shrieks over some woozy melancholy jangle, and then there's the title track, that is SO new wave, straight up Cure worship, right down to the bass line and the chiming guitar parts, although Amesoeurs give it a cool twist at the end adding an awesomely jagged chugging riffy outro.
The record closes with another Katatonia style chunk of melancholy doom pop, although again, Neige roughs it up a bit with his blackened vokills, and after a brief stretch of silence, the record closes with a secret track of distorted drum machined and blurred buried melody.
Of course WE love it. C'mon! It's like if Black Tambourine were actually Black METAL Tambourine, plenty of Katatonia, Lifelover, all that off kilter blackened pop too, but it's obvious Neige and company are black metal masters (Alcest, Peste Noire, Forgotten Woods, Mortifera, right?) so even the poppiest moments are infused with a bit of blackness, no matter how subtle, and when the band do kick out the jams, like on the record opener, it's heavy and emotional in a way few other bands, black metal or otherwise, are capable of.
It might take a few listens, for some folks here it still hasn't clicked, then again it might take just one, we were smitten halfway through the first song, but then that first ep is still probably one of our most listened to records of the last several years, and if you're really in need of some blasting blackness, obviously this might not be the place to look, thankfully you don't have to look far, Neige has at least one or two other bands that'll have you covered, but if you're looking for something, gorgeous and twisted and black and dreamy and poppy and heavy and mysterious, well then, this friends, is it.
MPEG Stream: "Gas In Veins"
MPEG Stream: "Les Ruches Malades"
MPEG Stream: "Recueillement"
MPEG Stream: "Amesoeurs"

AMESOEURS / VALFUNDE split (De Profundis) 7" 10.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
Recently, we've been marveling at the fact, that otherwise troo, grim, cvlt metalheads, seem to be totally smitten with this new wave of blissed out dreamy, barely metal black metal. Most notably, Alcest, who are more My Bloody Valentine than Burzum, and Alcest mainman Neige's other not very metal project Amesoeurs. Sure that stuff is epic and sweeping and gorgeously gauzy, but it's barely metal, let alone BLACK metal. But here we are, anything from either of those outfits is like black gold to the black metalheads world wide.
Well, if the most recent Alcest had you wondering about the above, then this single will definitely be the true test. We'd been waiting ages for a new Amesoeurs record, the last ep, was an all time favorite around here, still heavy, but also mathy, and post rocky, and pretty damn shoegazey all at once. Well this most recent single, one brand new song, jettisons all traces of metal entirely. The result is pretty great, but it's hard for us to imagine metalheads digging this much. More than metal, it sounds like nineties indie rock, college rock, the female vocals are way up in front, over a jangly guitar, and super sunshiney major key melodies, hard not to think of stuff like Jale, Helium and Scrawl, which is not a bad thing at all, just a not very metal thing. But it's a killer song, and back in the day, these guys would have been huge on Simple Machines or K or one of those labels. Can't wait to hear what they do with the next full length.
The flipside features a band called Valfunde, which is essentially the exact same band, except with the addition of Peste Noire mainman Famine, and he brings a little bit of metal and a whole lot of what the fuck to the proceedings. The first Valfunde track begins much like the Amesoeurs track, strummed clean guitar, a bit of jangle, minor key, but over that, another guitar, super distorted and woozy, spills out a convoluted and stumbling sea sick melody, the sound is maniacal and druggy, almost like someone is constantly and randomly twisting the tuning pegs while the guitar is being played blindfolded. The result is a song that sounds a bit like a funhouse mirror sea shanty, dizzying and completely and awesomely fucked up. The second track is the only sort-of-metal thing going on here, with a midtempo Burzumy buzz, creepy haunted house organ, while the vocals are delivered in a raspy demonic shriek, eventually joined by soaring epic guitar leads, not as damaged as the first track, but still pretty freaky, in that distinctly Peste Noire way.
Good stuff for sure, but metalheads be warned, everyone else, as long as you're up for some weird shit, this might just hit the spot...

AMESTIGON / ANGIZIA (Napalm) split cd 16.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
Two baroque Austrian black metal outfits on one cd. Angizia in particular is especially weird, with pretty keyboards and very demented vocals - one customer who heard this thought it sounded like Magma...

AMOCOMA Go To Hell (tUMULt) cd 11.98
Originally released as a super limited, hand made cd-r, now finally available as a proper cd, with all new artwork, remastered, and with TWO bonus tracks not on the original cd-r. Skip down to the end of the review for a bit about the bonus tracks, but before we get to that, here's what we had to say about the record when we first reviewed the cd-r:
The first thing that struck us about this debut release from Amocoma, a mysterious black metal horde from right here in San Francisco, was the cd-r cover art, a child-like pen and ink drawing of a pile of heads, but instead of being bloody or gory or horrific, they're sort of more cartoonish, like a whole slew of stick figures were decapitated, their heads tossed in a huge pile, beneath the scrawled band logo, wreathed in clouds of smeared ink. We were definitely intrigued. AndÊif anything, once inside, we were even moreso...
Amocoma traffic in an ultra lo-fi, muddy murky blackness. It's definitely black metal, there is plenty of buzz and blast and howled vocals, but at the same time it's sort of stumbling and noise rocky, it's probably a little of both, but it's all rendered nearly indistinct by the incredibly FX drenched lo-fi production.Ê
Beginning with dreamy swirls of soft focus harmonics and distant rumbles, it doesn't take long for the band to lurch into action, a simple hypnotic riff, looped over andÊover, almost sounding more like a bass than a guitar, and not so heavy as it is trancelike. The drums are mechanical and repetitive, the vocals are howled and swathed in reverb, spread out over the proceedings like a black cloud, so much so that at times they just sound like another layer of buzz. And the more you listen, the more pretty it sounds, sure it's raw and harsh, but the melody is so hypnotic, and the swirling clouds of distortion and reverb give everything a sort of soft focus shimmer.Ê
We're definitely reminded of WOLD, in the sense that these little fragmented pop songs, are rendered black and buzzy by the application of super saturated distortion, tape hiss and amp buzz, reverb and delay, so even at its heaviest, it's washed out and abstract, and downright dreamy. The drone element is through the roof, and it's impossible not to hear Tim Hecker or Machinefabriek or any one of those masters of smeary dreamlike sound. At some points things get super psychedelic, like halfway through "Small Dark Sea That Was A Body" where the guitar drops out, leaving just the drums, to sort of pulse and putter in a wide open expanse of soft swirl, while drifting above are all manner of glistening guitar harmonics, spacey FX sparkles, and warm warbly melodic hum.
The tUMULt reissue tacks on two new tracks, the first, a brief three minute blur called "Crumbs", dense and chaotic, the vocals a processed bellow, buried beneath soaring saturated buzz, while all around swoop and swing furious tangles of fractured guitars and warm riffy blurs, which gives way to the nearly 12 minute closer "You Shall Yet Rise", which begins as a long sprawling creepscape, rife with synthesizer swells, and bits of crumblingly distorted guitars, it almost sounds like a black metallized Expo '70, spacey and tripped out, until the song suddenly lurches into an ultra poppy almost Viking sounding groove, all over driven and super distorted, hinting a bit at the pop that underpins much of Amocoma's blackness, the track swings wildly from corrosive blast to pounding almost doom, but stays wrapped around that weirdly fuzzy poppy galloping Maiden-y main riff, which stays looped, repeating mantra like, reminding us of a blackened Circle in fact, as the rest of the guitars get more and more tweaked and twisted. Even though it's a bonus track, this might just be one of our favorite tracks on the record!!!
Damaged and dreamy, freaked out and fucked, one of our new favorite slabs of black blurred beauty for sure...Ê
MPEG Stream: "Cowards Live Forever"
MPEG Stream: "Small Dark Sea That Was A Body"
MPEG Stream: "These Are Your Chocies...Darkness"
MPEG Stream: "You Shall Yet Rise"

AMOCOMA Go To Hell (self-released) cd-r 10.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
The first thing that struck us about this debut release from Amocoma, a mysterious black metal horde from right here in San Francisco, was the cover art, a child-like pen and ink drawing of a pile of heads, but instead of being bloody or gory or horrific, they're sort of more cartoonish, like a whole slew of stick figures were decapitated, their heads tossed in a huge pile, beneath the scrawled band logo, wreathed in clouds of smeared ink. We were definitely intrigued. AndÊif anything, once inside, we were even moreso...
Amocoma traffic in an ultra lo-fi, muddy murky blackness. It's definitely black metal, there is plenty of buzz and blast and howled vocals, but at the same time it's sort of stumbling and noise rocky, it's probably a little of both, but it's all rendered nearly indistinct by the incredibly FX drenched lo-fi production.Ê
Beginning with dreamy swirls of soft focus harmonics and distant rumbles, it doesn't take long for the band to lurch into action, a simple hypnotic riff, looped over andÊover, almost sounding more like a bass than a guitar, and not so heavy as it is trancelike. The drums are mechanical and repetitive, the vocals are howled and swathed in reverb, spread out over the proceedings like a black cloud, so much so that at times they just sound like another layer of buzz. And the more you listen, the more pretty it sounds, sure it's raw and harsh, but the melody is so hypnotic, and the swirling clouds of distortion and reverb give everything a sort of soft focus shimmer.Ê
We're definitely reminded of WOLD, in the sense that these little fragmented pop songs, are rendered black and buzzy by the application of super saturated distortion, tape hiss and amp buzz, reverb and delay, so even at its heaviest, it's washed out and abstract, and downright dreamy. The drone element is through the roof, and it's impossible not to hear Tim Hecker or Machinefabriek or any one of those masters of smeary dreamlike sound. At some points things get super psychedelic, like halfway through "Small Dark Sea That Was A Body" where the guitar drops out, leaving just the drums, to sort of pulse and putter in a wide open expanse of soft swirl, while drifting above are all manner of glistening guitar harmonics, spacey FX sparkles, and warm warbly melodic hum.Ê
Damaged and dreamy, freaked out and fucked, one of our new favorite slabs of black beauty for sure...Ê
MPEG Stream: "Cowards Live Forever"
MPEG Stream: "Small Dark Sea That Was A Body"
MPEG Stream: "These Are Your Chocies...Darkness"

AMORT Dschungel / Fieber (Orobas) cassette 4.00
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
Another two songs from one man slow motion doom merchant Amort. We keep hoping for a full length, maybe even an lp or a cd, but there's something about this slow seep of Amort's miserablist music that just seems appropriate, the sound of some massive black beast painfully excreting each and every sound, captured on tape, which does in fact enhance the sound, this one especially, as some of the notes were so blown out, the tape so saturated, that it actually sort of made us dizzy listening to it on headphones.
While past missives have focused on ambience, sounding more cinematic, riffs and stretched into long sprawling dirges, the sound here is much more primitive funereal doom, at least on the A side. The guitar massive and churning, the vocals as deep and demonic as possible, any more and it would just turn into a puddle of black sludge. The cinematic element is restrained to haunting little interludes, a creepy speech over a gurgling sea of hiss and electronic burble, the massive riff always poised just out of earshot, ready to crash down and swallow everything whole.
The flipside begins with gently picked downtuned guitar, the low end cranked, a thick pulsing rumble, another guitar unfurling a plodding chug, another loosing little trills of high end shimmer into the blackness, the vocals again, a gurgling black cloud. But with a little flutter of clean guitar surfacing here and there, drifting through the throbbing black expanse.
Transparent green cassettes in black and white covers, and with a black and white hand numbered insert. LIMITED TO 100 COPIES!!

AMORT Weird Tales (Orobas) cassette 4.00
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
This cassette just showed up in the mail one day, with a short note asking us if we wanted to sell it in the store. Hard to tell what it would sound like: band called Amort, two songs, cover image an oil painting of wild horses, very striking, but still no clear sonic picture. The tape came wrapped in a flyer, with the words "Slow end sonic destruction" printed in thick black letters across the top. Our first clue...
So we threw it on, and were first greeted with the sound of lilting piano, notes hanging suspended in wide open expanses of near silence, but soon that piano was joined by a slow lava like flow of glacial riffing, a downtuned low end thob, a la SUNNO))), Earth, Corrupted, but draped over a delicate slowcore background, then in came some incredibly low, gurgling vocals, and suddenly all was revealed to us, gloriously hauntingly beautiful slowcore sludge. The massive riffing and monstrous vocals, drift in and out, often leaving just a lilting minor key guitar, to gently pick out the melody, hushed and minimal, like some sort of super abstract post rock, before the guitars pour back in and the vocals croak forth, but even at its heaviest and sludgiest, it's strangely pretty, the melody a minor key lament, the sound more murky and muddy than pummeling and heavy, like Corrupted covering Low maybe... The tempo gets upped a notch or two, sounding like the band might lurch into full on rocking, but instead, the riff just loops over and over, becoming more of a rhythmic drone than an any sort of actual rock riff, eventually fading to black.
Side two creeps along similar ground, beginning with abstract minor key guitar figures, allowed to unfurl and drift through an empty space, joined by simple piano, before launching into a slow motion ambient doom, all burnt out guitar and reverb drenched vocals. Very reminiscent of the Tomb Of... cassette, a strange melding of abstract ambient piano and dirgey doom drenched sludge. The interesting thing about Amort is there are no drums, this is all just huge walls of guitar, harsh demonic vocals, and tinkling piano, on the second track, the guitar becomes weirdly harmonized, creating super tense harmonic melodies, like some displaced Iron Maiden lick, slowed down to 2 or 3 rpm. This track two sort of wanders back and forth between forlorn slow motion cabaret, just piano and undistorted guitar, and pummeling drone doom crush. But in the hands of Amort, they sound so perfect together. The ultimate post rock downer doom...
LIMITED TO 100 COPIES!!!

AMORT Winter Songs (Orobas) cassette 4.00
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
Brand new tape from one of our favorite purveyors of 'ambient slowcore doom'. Influenced heavily by bands like SUNNO))), as well as bands on the blacker and more metal end of the sonic spectrum, Amort, have their own unique angle, at once mysterious and cinematic, heavy and atmospheric. Like most of their songs, the proceedings start out with plodding abstract piano, throbbing low end notes, ringing out and reverberating, drifting in vast expanses of near silent hiss. With hushed whispered vocals, and the occasional distant wail of anguish and oddly, NO DRUMS (although it took us a while to even realize there were no drums, the sound is so thick and dense). Eventually, the guitars roll in like some thick black fog, and the band becomes some sort of black glacial beast, slithering and lurching in slow motion. The piano picks out mournful melodies beneath a thick wash of rumbling crumbling distortion. It's definitely closer to Thergothon or Skepticism that SUNNO))), not so much a static drift as a plodding trudge, the guitars beating against each other, pulsing and throbbing, the piano pounding away, buried way down in the mix. Sort of what you might imagine SUNNO))) covering Low might sound like, or even some Mazzy Star / Khanate mash up!ÊEssential listening for the ultra-doom obsessed, and slow core fans looking for something a little darker or heavier should definitely check this out....

AMORT Winter Tales (Kreation) lp 15.98
Now on lp, a killer compilation of jams from abstract doomlord Amort, mostly culled from various cassettes, that we've raved about on past lists, but with an unreleased track included to sweeten the deal...
Amort is one of our favorite purveyors of 'ambient slowcore doom'. Influenced heavily by bands like SUNNO))), as well as groups on the blacker and more metal end of the sonic spectrum, Amort, have their own unique angle, at once mysterious and cinematic, heavy and atmospheric.
This collection begins with the sound of lilting piano, notes hanging suspended in wide open expanses of near silence, but soon that piano is joined by a slow lava like flow of glacial riffing, a downtuned low end throb, a la SUNNO))), Earth, Corrupted, but draped over a delicate slowcore background, then in comes some incredibly low, gurgling vocals, and suddenly all is revealed to us, gloriously hauntingly beautiful slowcore sludge. The massive riffing and monstrous vocals, drift in and out, often leaving just a lilting minor key guitar, to gently pick out the melody, hushed and minimal, like some sort of super abstract post rock, before the guitars pour back in and the vocals croak forth, but even at its heaviest and sludgiest, it's strangely pretty, the melody a minor key lament, the sound more murky and muddy than pummeling and heavy, like Corrupted covering Low maybe... The tempo gets upped a notch or two, sounding like the band might lurch into full on rocking, but instead, the riff just loops over and over, becoming more of a rhythmic drone than an any sort of actual rock riff, eventually fading to black.
The next track creeps along similar ground, beginning with abstract minor key guitar figures, allowed to unfurl and drift through an empty space, joined by simple piano, before launching into a slow motion ambient doom, all burnt out guitar and reverb drenched vocals. Very reminiscent of the Tomb Of... cassette, a strange melding of abstract ambient piano and dirgey doom drenched sludge. The interesting thing about Amort is there are no drums, this is all just huge walls of guitar, harsh demonic vocals, and tinkling piano...
The flipside begins like most Amort songs, with plodding abstract piano, throbbing low end notes, ringing out and reverberating, drifting in vast expanses of near silent hiss. With hushed whispered vocals, and the occasional distant wail of anguish and again, NO DRUMS (although it took us a while to even realize there were no drums, the sound is so thick and dense). Eventually, the guitars roll in like some thick black fog, and the band becomes some sort of black glacial beast, slithering and lurching in slow motion. The piano picks out mournful melodies beneath a thick wash of rumbling crumbling distortion. It's definitely closer to Thergothon or Skepticism that SUNNO))), not so much a static drift as a plodding trudge, the guitars beating against each other, pulsing and throbbing, the piano pounding away, buried way down in the mix. Imagine a Mazzy Star / Khanate mash up and you might be getting close!
The next track begins with gently picked downtuned guitar, the low end cranked, a thick pulsing rumble, another guitar unfurling a plodding chug, another loosing little trills of high end shimmer into the blackness, the vocals again, a gurgling black cloud. But with a little flutter of clean guitar surfacing here and there, drifting through the throbbing black expanse.
Essential listening for the ultra-doom obsessed, and slow core fans looking for something a little darker or heavier should definitely check this out....
And in addition to those previously released grimdoom jams, the record tacks on another slow and low epic, the previously unreleased "Desert Of Ice"!! Sweet packaging, the lp housed in a super thick black and white sleeve, the record pressed on nice thick vinyl and LIMITED TO 500 COPIES!!

AMORT / IVES split (Boue) cd 9.98
Latest from long time aQ fave one man ultra doom outfit, Amort, here expanded to a quartet, with extra members handling gong, keys, saxophone and extra guitar. Here teamed up with crusty black metal punks Ives.
Amort offer up a single 14 minute track, the begins with haunting female vocals, over deep reverberating piano, and rumbling low end drones, very ritualistic and choral, it's not until nearly 3 minutes in, that the song splinters into what sounds like some sort of abstract free jazz doom, the gong rippling out thick metallic waves of sound, the sax skronking and squeaking, all wrapped in thick whorls of rumble and thrum, a monstrous ominous slo-mo creep, until finally, the song proper kicks in after about 5 minutes, an impossibly glacial chunk of slow motion doom sludge, drumless, and surprisingly melodic, the melodies nearly pop, but the guitars oozing and blackened, the vocals a demonic gurgle, a strange combination for sure, this filthy downtuned evil sound, but the song itself almost happy, like some pop song slowed waaaaaaaay down and then filtered through Corrupted and Nortt and Bunkur, the prettiest, most melodic slab of ultradoom you'll ever hear. It does build, and get louder and louder, there are spidery guitar leads, and more piano, but the sound never gets any less melodic.
Ives are pretty much on the other end of the sonic spectrum entirely, spitting out blasting, thrashing crusty blackness, minor key riffing, furious pounding drumming, harsh vokills, sonically quite akin to the punkier Darkthrone sound, or classic Discharge, but for every bit of D-beat pound, the band unleash a blast of face melting black metal buzz, the sound lo-fi, but still heavy and frantic and frenzied, brutal and blasting, galloping and churning, crusty but plenty grim and black. Killer stuff from both bands, the Ives stuff is from an old cassette, so a little curious to hear more recent stuff, and Amort, well, we can never get enough of their/his gloriously abject slow motion piano pounding dismal doom...
MPEG Stream: AMORT "In Bed With Decay"
MPEG Stream: IVES "A Tangle Of Hair And Bone"
MPEG Stream: IVES "Feral"

AMORT / THE COMFORT WIVES Black Blood / Locusta (Orobas) cassette 4.00
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
Tape number two from ambient slowcore doom outfit Amort, whose first tape we dug heavily. A dense drifty blend of SUNNO))) style ultra doom, and lilting Low like atmospherics. This time they're teamed up with the strangely named Comfort Wives, who based on the name were ready to be disappointed by, but just like Mom always told us about books and covers, The Comfort Wives actually kick up a pretty mean din. The strange thing is how different Amort sound here. Actually to be honest, the labeling is sort of confusing and we just assumed Side A was the Comfort Wives but in fact appears to be Amort unless the tape was mislabeled. Either way, both sides are awesome, we'll go by the label for now. So Amort sound much more like a band, than a man crafting bleak dronescapes on his own. A plodding midtempo, noisy blackness, huge guitars so low and blown out they threaten to overwhelm the whole recording, which is in no way a band thing, in fact, it's the sort of guitar sound most bands would kill for. An in the red throbbing downtuned buzz, wrapped around a sort of melodic noise rock. The sound here is not so much black metal as it is taking bits and pieces of black metal and incorporating them into their own sound. And the sound here is more of a mournful minor key midtempo dirge rock, with super catchy melodies, simple drumming, some cool harmonies, all wrapped in a blacker than normal production, with some harsh howled vocals. Like a poppier, noise rockier version of Bone Awl or Beherit maybe? Cool stuff regardless, but a strange direction for Amort, while The Comfort Wives end up sounding more like Amort did on the last tape, but somehow darker and doomier and sludgier and much more black metal. An epic and corrosive sonic sludge, that unfurls like some thick black fog. Slow minor key guitar figures drift amidst wide open space, vocals gurgle and growl, all swallowed up by a MASSIVE glacial downtuned dirge, before the low end abates and leaves a simple strummed, almost out of tune guitar to sort of meander, before the blackness falls again. This is not so much BM as ultra doom, or black ambience, the guitars rumble and reverberate, single chords stretched out over vast expanses, the vocals another layer of low end, the riffs so slow they seem to be single plodding thuds that ring out and bleed into the next crusty note, a bit like Abruptum, a ritualistic black minimal doom, epic and murky and hellish and muddy and massive and seriously scary...

AMULET s/t (Monster Records) cd 12.98
Long-haired guitar rawk from the obscure Midwestern band known as Amulet, circa 1980. Reissued for your hessian pleasure by Monster Records, alongside the likes of Ultra, Full Moon, and Truth And Janey (all of whom we've previously listed). Amulet started off in '78 as a cover band doing stuff by ZZ Top, Van Halen, Hendrix, UFO and suchlike. Though a popular local concert draw, they still barely managed to save enough dough to record and self-release this album in 1980. No money for overdubs, so it's got that live feel, appropriate for their party hardy high power hard rock format. How much you're gonna like this kinda depends how you feel about lines like: "She was seventeen / young love machine" (from "Just Like A Woman"). Good times badass boogie rock wank fer shure. Actually, they had a heavier, more serious side too, with religious/philosophical themes ("Do You Live Again", "Life Is Living"). But don't look for a lot of sophistication and deep thoughts -- this mostly about groovy stuff like the unintentionally funny "Funk 'n' Punk" or "Radar Love" re-write "Person To Person". Fun and authentic.
RealAudio clip: "Sea Of Fear"

AN ALBATROSS Freedom Summer Live (Kitty Play) 12" 10.98

ANAAL NATHRAKH Domine Non Es Dignus (Season Of Mist) cd 14.98
Look out! The Anaal Nathrakh attack continues, with the long-awaited full-length studio follow-up to what was pretty much THEE black metal album of 2002, The Codex Necro. Domine Non Es Dignus is still a mighty juggernaut of dense and diabolical black metal, but the Anaal guys have also introduced some new, more melodic elements, including some clean vocals that will make you think you're listening to a Hammers of Misfortune album for a moment. Seriously. And while some might look askance, we're stoked that they're always willing to do something new, while remaining necro to/at the core. How necro? Well the first song is a blast of distortion lovingly entitled "I Wish I Could Vomit Blood On You....People". So no, they haven't mellowed. You can expect a mind-boggling blend of wretched noise, blurring speed, distorted buzzsaw guitar, belching gargling throat-sore vocals, keyboards piled high, and yes, some oddly operatic male singing that makes this even more bombastic than they were before. Seat belts and crash helmets required -- except that seat belts and crash helmets aren't cool (or necro) so I guess you should just die, that's what these guys would want anyway. See you in hell.
MPEG Stream: "Do Not Speak"
MPEG Stream: "Procreation of the Wretched"

ANAAL NATHRAKH Eschaton (Season Of Mist) cd 14.98

MPEG Stream: "Bellum Omnium Contra Omnes"
MPEG Stream: "Between Shit And Piss We Are Born"

ANAAL NATHRAKH Hell Is Empty, And All The Devils Are Here (Feto) cd 14.98
Wow. Does the dictionary definition of brutal have the words "anaal nathrakh" in it? Well it should. We've loved this brutal British band for years, from back in 2001 when their devastating debut The Codex Necro blew us away with its ultra-extreme black metal, uh, necro-ness. Well, what's amazing is that Anaal Nathrakh (their name comes from one of Merlin's incantations in the movie Excalibur, btw, if you didn't know) has evolved, from raw black metal to a more melodic hybrid of black and death metal, with some crusty punk grind etc. thrown in, maybe having to do with their inclusion of members of Napalm Death for live gigging and some studio sessions too. And yet, they've stayed about as brutal as can be, even with the clean vocals (i.e. actual singing, and not just cookie monster grunts or shrieking vokills) that pop up on some tracks, amidst the other sorts.
The blasting drums are insane, the keyboards deranged, and the guitars killer -- it's quite a piece of work they have here for those into both the necro, and the slightly more nuanced. Frenzied yet technical. Maniacal yet melodic... you get the idea. If you liked Codex's follow-up Domine Non Es Dignus, or the one after that Eschaton (which we bizarrely failed to review, though the black metal fans here all own it), then get set for another treat. And if you're a black metal dissing death metaller (if that breed still exists at this late date), well maybe this album will be the one to win you over...
MPEG Stream: "Shatter The Empyrean"
MPEG Stream: "Genetic Noose"

ANAAL NATHRAKH Hell Is Empty, And All The Devils Are Here (Feto) lp 19.98
Another chunk of vile blackness available as a chunk of not so vile blackness (i.e. vinyl!)...
Wow. Does the dictionary definition of brutal have the words "anaal nathrakh" in it? Well it should. We've loved this brutal British band for years, from back in 2001 when their devastating debut The Codex Necro blew us away with its ultra-extreme black metal, uh, necro-ness. Well, what's amazing is that Anaal Nathrakh (their name comes from one of Merlin's incantations in the movie Excalibur, btw, if you didn't know) has evolved, from raw black metal to a more melodic hybrid of black and death metal, with some crusty punk grind etc. thrown in, maybe having to do with their inclusion of members of Napalm Death for live gigging and some studio sessions too. And yet, they've stayed about as brutal as can be, even with the clean vocals (i.e. actual singing, and not just cookie monster grunts or shrieking vokills) that pop up on some tracks, amidst the other sorts.
The blasting drums are insane, the keyboards deranged, and the guitars killer -- it's quite a piece of work they have here for those into both the necro, and the slightly more nuanced. Frenzied yet technical. Maniacal yet melodic... you get the idea. If you liked Codex's follow-up Domine Non Es Dignus, or the one after that Eschaton (which we bizarrely failed to review, though the black metal fans here all own it), then get set for another treat. And if you're a black metal dissing death metaller (if that breed still exists at this late date), well maybe this album will be the one to win you over...
MPEG Stream: "Shatter The Empyrean"
MPEG Stream: "Genetic Noose"

ANAAL NATHRAKH In The Constellation Of Black Widow (Candlelight) cd 14.98
Anaal Nathrakh isn't just "extreme" metal. It's extremely extreme metal. And only an extremely extreme metal band could manage to combine all the stuff that AN do, ferinstance just in the vocal/vokill dep't, everything from necro black metal shrieks to death metal grunts to, yes, clean majestic melodic singing too. And the vocals are only ONE of the insane things about this album. We can't really classify this UK band, they're part hyperspeed grindcore blurr, part black metal mayhem, part power metal majesty (but that part is buried and rotting under even more blasting black/death brutality). Let's just say our extreme metal needs have always been met by a session of Anaal Nathrakh abuse, and THIS album is definitely doing the trick as expected... A dense, chaotic, utterly over the top assault of very very extreme, very very metal. Yet amidst all the intensity, Anaal Nathrakh somehow can cram in a catchy chorus or melodic hook (or weird electronically glitched out part) alongside each ultra distorted, utterly outrageous throat-torn scream or chunk of crushing grind frenzy. Fans familiar with their last few albums know the score. For those new to Anaal, we could say maybe imagine old Carcass mixed with Watchmaker mixed with Immortal mixed with something with actual singing, sometimes. But nothing you can imagine will really quite prepare you... you've been warned. The liner notes say it best: "We will fucking kill you."
MPEG Stream: "In The Constellation Of The Black Widow"
MPEG Stream: "I Am The Wrath Of Gods And The Desolation Of The Earth"
MPEG Stream: "More Of Fire Than Blood"

ANAAL NATHRAKH Passion (Candlelight) cd 15.98
The return of this grinding extreme black metal duo, another blast of sonic sickness that offers up everything we've come to expect from these guys, insanely furious riffing, impossible blasting programmed beats, throat shredding vokills, twisted, convoluted arrangements, seemingly continuing in their quest to create the sickest, blackest, buzziest metal ever. But weirdly enough, for as heavy and black and buzzy things are this time around, there's also a lot of other weirdness going on, which seems at odds with their core sound. But you know how we are - the weirder things are, and the less they make sense, somehow the more the record in question hits the spot. So Anaal Nathrakh circa now, are mixing in lots of clean vocals (something they began doing back on Hell Is Empty... or thereabouts), dramatic and almost operatic, giving much of the music here a Borknagar or Code vibe, not to mention, even the heaviest bits here are surprisingly melodic. Plus there's twisted stretches of effects drenched tunefulness, some downright psychedelic flourishes, midtempo grooves, industrial ambience, tripped out electronics, all woven into the band's core black buzz, and while on the surface, it could seem like weirdness for weirdness sake, it actually sounds more like those various not-strictly-black elements were borne out of vastly improved songwriting, cuz goddamn these songs are catchy, the riffs are killer, and none of that weirdness sounds at all out of place. Sure, a lot of the time it doesn't sound as much like Anaal Nathrakh as it does Khold or Code, but often those moments splinter into some blurry black blast that couldn't be anyone else.
As much as we loved their debut Codex Necro way back when, this new one, as different as it is, might just be catching up...
MPEG Stream: "Volenti Non Fit Iniuria"
MPEG Stream: "Drug-Fucking Abomination"

ANAAL NATHRAKH Passion (Candlelight) lp 24.00
NOW ON VINYL!!
The return of this grinding extreme black metal duo, another blast of sonic sickness that offers up everything we've come to expect from these guys, insanely furious riffing, impossible blasting programmed beats, throat shredding vokills, twisted, convoluted arrangements, seemingly continuing in their quest to create the sickest, blackest, buzziest metal ever. But weirdly enough, for as heavy and black and buzzy things are this time around, there's also a lot of other weirdness going on, which seems at odds with their core sound. But you know how we are - the weirder things are, and the less they make sense, somehow the more the record in question hits the spot. So Anaal Nathrakh circa now, are mixing in lots of clean vocals (something they began doing back on Hell Is Empty... or thereabouts), dramatic and almost operatic, giving much of the music here a Borknagar or Code vibe, not to mention, even the heaviest bits here are surprisingly melodic. Plus there's twisted stretches of effects drenched tunefulness, some downright psychedelic flourishes, midtempo grooves, industrial ambience, tripped out electronics, all woven into the band's core black buzz, and while on the surface, it could seem like weirdness for weirdness sake, it actually sounds more like those various not-strictly-black elements were borne out of vastly improved songwriting, cuz goddamn these songs are catchy, the riffs are killer, and none of that weirdness sounds at all out of place. Sure, a lot of the time it doesn't sound as much like Anaal Nathrakh as it does Khold or Code, but often those moments splinter into some blurry black blast that couldn't be anyone else.
As much as we loved their debut Codex Necro way back when, this new one, as different as it is, might just be catching up...
MPEG Stream: "Volenti Non Fit Iniuria"
MPEG Stream: "Drug-Fucking Abomination"

ANAAL NATHRAKH The Codex Necro (Earache) cd 15.98
Available again! And now with 4 bonus tracks from Anaal Nathrakh's Peel Sessions, recorded on John Peel's show in December of 2003, with members of Napalm Death in the band!
Thank God (or Satan) that this record is as good as it is, because of all the trouble we had to go through to get it (this was several years ago mind you, when this disc first came out way back near the millennium)! We became aware of British black metal act Anaal Nathrakh from first seeing ads for this album in Terrorizer magazine (the UK's metal version of The Wire), then Terrorizer named it record of the month, and then one of the top 40 records of 2001! Yet no metal distributors in the United States had ever even heard of Anaal Nathrakh. Not even the band themselves could help us out, and the one distributor that did offer the album only had TEN COPIES. Our tiny little store wanted at least twice that many.
But, many frustrating conversations and unproductive emails later, we finally got The Codex Necro in stock and are happy to report that it is as heavy, as weird and as completely cool as we had hoped. And now several years later, the world is finally hip to Anaal Nathrakh, enough that this here disc finally got a deluxe reissue with bonus tracks. The formula is blasting black metal mayhem of course, but A.N. up the intensity a notch as well as mixing in all sorts of fucked weirdness: bizarre ambient electronic soundscapes, creepy cloying melodies buried in the mix, strangely hypnotic vocal chants, light speed fuzzed out blast beats, found sound interludes, and totally processed and INSANE vocals, from growling guttural bowel-shaking grunts to maniacal high pitched, electronically fucked-with shrieks. Plus the riffs are ultra catchy, and the guitars are so distorted and recorded so hot, it feels like demonic claws are being scraped across your ear drums. Take the raw, "necro" sounds of Nordic black metal pioneers Darkthrone and give them the bombastic force of the best-produced, over-the-top Cradle of Filth stuff, and you're thinking Anaal Nathrakh. When they say necro, they mean it. And they say it a lot. Like in the liner notes: "Anaal Nathrakh plays Fucking Necro Exclusively!...Fuck Everything".
MPEG Stream: "The Supreme Necrotic Audnance"
MPEG Stream: "When Humanity Is Cancer"
MPEG Stream: "Submission Is For The Weak"

ANAAL NATHRAKH Total Fucking Necro (Rage Of Achilles) cd 14.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
What could be more 'necro' than the debut album "The Codex Necro" from the truly disturbed, demented and totally necro UK black metal outfit Anaal Nathrakh?? You know, the ridiculously-hard-to-find black metal masterpiece we raved about last year? Well, how about their demos? Thus this disc is appropriately titled, as it contains both of AN's early demo tapes, plus some equally necro bonus tracks. If you loved "The Codex Necro" like we did, you'll be happy to know that "Total Fucking Necro" is just as good -- in fact some folks think it's better. It's a bit less bizarre than their full length, being much more melodic and traditional in the Norse style. Which is not a bad thing. There's definitely some major Mayhem worship going on here (witness the TWO Mayhem covers) as is evidenced by the distinctly "De Mysteriis Dom Sathanas" sound. But even then, their very own cult-necro-blackened weirdness is quite present as well. Demos, side projects (Frost, Mistress): it seems these guys are necro geniuses and can do no wrong -- we await their upcoming "When Fire Rains Down From The Sky" ep with grim delight...
NB. And for those of you who dropped the ball first time around, we've just managed to get a few copies of "The Codex Necro" back in as well!
RealAudio clip: "Anaal Nathrakh"
RealAudio clip: "Necrodeath"

ANAAL NATHRAKH When Fire Rains Down From the Sky, Mankind Will Reap As It Has Sown (Earache) cd ep 12.98
Available again! And now with 3 bonus tracks from AN's BBC Rock Show Session, recorded in March 2005!
A new half hour, six-song blast of total fucking necro mayhem from these UK metal maniacs. A blast it is, a worthy follow up to their godlike The Codex Necro album that was one of our favorite records from way back in 2002. On this ep, the duo of VITRIOL and Irrumator seem to have shed the overtly weird bits that made The Codex Necro so instantly distinctive, production-wise. No studio fuckery, no space-y ambience, no found sounds, no samples. Just 100%, furious, lightspeed, grim black metal. Which is just fine -- the songs and performances speak for themselves in sinister tongues, without the need for sound fx to tweak things further. This is simply some seriously sick, blazing fast, dark and damaged black metal indeed, with insane blast beats, all sorts of off-kilter stops and starts, maniacal leads, and last but not least, a litany of ghostly howls, anguished screams and cries of utter and abject fury -- some of which are provided by guest cult black metal vocalist Attila Csihar (of Mayhem, Aboyrm, and Tormentor infamy)! We also like the fact that there are photos of the band members on the inside and they look like librarians! Necro librarians that is.
MPEG Stream: "Cataclysmic Nihilism"
MPEG Stream: "Never Fucking Again"

ANAL CUNT Fuckin A (Patac) cd 11.98

ANAL CUNT It Only Gets Worse (Earache) cd 15.98
More grinding noise and bad taste from the best worst band in the land. Furiously blurry grind bordering on Merzbow-style noise and the most ridiculous/offensive (read:really offensive) song titles ever (odd, since in the early days, they didn't even bother with song titles): 'Your Kid Killed Himself 'Cause You Suck' originally titled (pre-lawsuit) 'Connor Clapton Killed Himself 'Cause His Dad Sucks', 'Rancid Sucks (and the Clash Sucked Too)', 'Being Ignorant Is Awesome', 'I Gave NAMBLA Pictures of Your Kid', and a bunch of others we can't even print.

ANAL CUNT Morbid Florist (Relapse) cd 8.98

ANAL CUNT Picnic Of Love (Off The Record) cd 10.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
Notorious grindcore jokers A.C. change tack entirely and record an album of sensitive acoustic love songs--really they do. They've pulled a Ween on us.

ANAL CUNT The Old Testament 1988-1991 A.C. (Relapse) 2cd 14.98
Last list we raved about UK crust / noisecore combo Sore Throat, and in that review, we mentioned that perhaps, besides making some of the most amazing and brilliantly brutal music EVER, they were also most likely directly responsible for these guys, the late great Anal Cunt, who over the years have been equally beloved and reviled, maybe better known to most for their ridiculous and often hilarious and even more often offensive song titles, not to mention their violent and brief live performances, but fans of extreme music, have know for ages, that these guys also made some seriously kick ass noise. And yeah, we mean noise, cuz while they are often classified as metal, in the early days, their sound was more like short, sharp concentrated bursts of Merzbowian white noise, each 'song' a burst of feedback drenched chaos, all tangled riffage, amp buzz and drums-down-the-stairs anti-rhythms, peppered with the occasional stumbling melody, or buzzy guitar grind, these tracks are fierce and feral and furious and easily some of the most face meltingly kick ass grind/noise you'll ever hear.
Not for the faint of ear, the tracks gathered on these two disc are the band's earliest, and thus most raw and unpolished (if anything they ever did could be considered polished), with most of the songs lasting mere seconds, and so many tracks that on cd, and even on record, there were clumped together as whole records, here the tracks are whole record, whether it be the "47 Song Demo", "The 88 Song EP", or various splits with other noisemakers like the Meat Shits or Seven Minutes Of Nausea. Probably the most remarkable track here is the "5,643 Song E.P.", which besides featuring a little piano intro(!), also happens to be what is essentially 16 Anal Cunt tracks playing at once, over three hours of music, crammed onto a 7", and onto two track here, those 16 AxCx jams on top of each other, blasting and stumbling simultaneously, and other than sounding way more dense and thick and HEAVY, it still sounds like pure AxCx sonic chaos. Fans will definitely want this, tons of rarities, lots of stuff on cd for the first time, loads of pix in the liner notes, as well as detailed notes on each song from AxCx mainman Seth Putnam from before he died earlier this year (R.I.P.). And while many metalheads will fail to see the appeal, anyone into noise and grind and pure sonic punishment, no doubt already understands. Andee AND Allan approved, and wholeheartedly RECOMMENDED!!
MPEG Stream: "1st Demo"
MPEG Stream: "88 Song EP - Part One"
MPEG Stream: "5,643 Song E.P. - Part 1"
MPEG Stream: "Another E.P. - Part 1"

ANAL CUNT (A.C.) The Early Years: 1988-1991 (NG Records) 2cd 21.00
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
Previously released as two seperate, hard to find cds ("Old Stuff Part 1" and "Old Stuff Part II") on two different labels. Now some crazy person at NG Records has gone and released this new version, compiling (as it says) the early works (i.e. demos, singles, and compilation appearances) of this notorious blurr-core, noise-metal, very un-pc band from Boston. Over 7000 "songs" to be found here, spread over two cds. That's mainly thanks to the presence here of the tracks from the infamous "5,643 Song EP"... Now for most reviews of A.C. discs, we'd simply pick the best song titles and leave it at that, 'cause offensive & funny song titles are what A.C. does best. But the material on here dates from back when A.C. didn't supply titles (or lyrics for that matter) for their "compositions". So that leaves us to make a case for the musical rather than humorous value (or musically humorous value) of these tracks. Oh boy...well for all you experimental jokers out there, the aforementioned "5,643 Song EP" features the songs playing at the same time! There's actually three hours of material compressed onto the original 7", and it took twenty hours for them to record it! Compares favorably to the Francisco Lopez disc we made record of the week last list... Then there's the "Unplugged EP" tracks, where A.C. takes their screaming metal chaos into the acoustic realm for some unique results. And, any fan of John Zorn or Masonna should really check out A.C. as well, on general principles... truly a classic band, American outsider improv "genius". If not musical genius, then comedy genius. Sure, you or I could have recorded more or less the same stuff on your parents' stereo much like these guys did for their first demo (disc one, track one), but you have to admit that you'd never record so much of it, for so many years, or play such crazy shows. We (Allan and Andee anyway--in fact, A.C. was the first interview Allan ever did for his old 'zine) love this band. For you collectors, note that there's material on these cds not found on the original singles and such. And for novices, we also recommend A.C.'s "Morbid Florist" ep and "Everyone Must Be Killed" album to start with... The cd booklet includes detailed liner notes about each track/release written by A.C. mastermind Seth Putnam. All hail!

ANAPPARATUS Through The Eyes Of Assailants (self-released) cd ep 5.98
We listed a split record between these guys, Anapparatus, and a band called Llange a while back, both bands doing their own version of the metallic post rock thing. Llange were definitely more of that sort of Godspeed / Explosions thing, but Anapparatus took their post metal whatever and injected some serious screamo into the mix, which definitely hit the spot.
When we got that split, they also sent us a handful of an older ep, and boy what a difference a year or two makes, the Anapparatus of old shows no sign of post rock, or post metal, or whatever you want to call it, instead they are full on mathy post punk screamo metal grind. Furious tempos, insane drumming, incredible riffing, buzz and blast, howled vocals, every song a lurching, sweat soaked, basement destroying, ultra dense math metal workout.
Sure they bliss out here and there, get all moody and doomy now and again, and there are melodies and hooks everywhere, and the recording is so good, the band sound loud and heavy and like you're right there in the pit about to get crushed by a volley of stage divers, but even in the frenzied fury of these short sweet songs, they also manage to inject a little Drive Like Jehu into the proceedings, making for some serious dense, complex post punk heaviness. No idea why these guys aren't HUGE, but we've practically been listening to nothing else since we first got these in.
Packaged in a full color sleeve, pressed onto one of those 3 inch cds embedded in a 5" plastic disc, super striking looking, and a killer bargain, eight songs, 22 minutes, 6 bucks. WAY recommended.
MPEG Stream: "Scars Of Separation"
MPEG Stream: "Within Nightmares"
MPEG Stream: "The Inner Workings Of Jelousy"

ANAPPARATUS / LLANGE split (Burning Bridge) cd 7.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
You know, you think by now we'd be sick of the metallic post rock thing, the slow builds, the epic crescendos, the mathy drumming, the explosive metallic blow outs, the spidery riffage, the Godspeed like ambience, but fuck it, we're not, we LOVE that shit, especially when someone does it right. Or does it differently. Mixes it up a little while retaining the bits that made us dig that sound in the first place.
Thanks to aQ pal Dave S. for the heads up on these two bands, both of the math rock post metal whateveryoucallit variety, but each with a distinctly different take on the sound. Anapparatus is the band that lured us in, their sound is sharp and hard, heavy and metallic, but with a total screamo edge. Howled vocals over churning minor key riffage, super powerful drumming, all locked into a loosely post-metal framework, lots of long stretches of tribal understated rhythms, chiming guitar harmonics, soft sheets of feedback, but then when the heavy parts kick in, and the vocalist shrieks, it's magic, like if Godspeed or Explosions In The Sky recorded for Gravity Records in the nineties. Some of the riffs are SO catchy, and the band unwind terse super tight mini-epics, that manage to sound super controlled but sprawl wildly at the same time. But it's definitely the vocals that seal the deal, transforming what was already a killer mathrock band following in the well worn footprints of Isis and Pelican and the like, into something intense and passionate and angry and aggro and fuck it EMO. Way mathier than any of the above mentioned bands, and so much more impassioned, this is post metal punk rock for sure. All three tracks destroy. We'll definitely do our best to track down more from these guys.
But Llange aren't too shabby either, although right off the bat, their take on the sound is a bit more traditional, but like we said, it's a sound we love, and Llange do it well, wrapping guitars in soft billowy reverb, the drums weaving a dense framework for the soaring guitars, the arrangements flowing organically from slow brood, to heavy moody dirge, to full on blown out psych jam to shimmery near balladic drift. The band does get almost metal at times, but chooses to remain just this side of full on downtuned crush, which suits them just fine. The closer adds gorgeous crooned vocals to the warm whirring synths and tight mathy drumming, the melodies sweetly melancholy, building to a seriously heavy finale that would most definitely give Conifer a run for their math rock post metal money...
MPEG Stream: ANAPPARATUS "Labyrinth"
MPEG Stream: LLANGE "Far Above Us And Way Below"

ANATA Conductor's Departure (Earache) cd 14.98

ANATA Dreams of Death and Dismay (Season Of Mist) cd 14.98
Described as Morbid Angel meets At The Gates, Sweden's Anata play relentless and pummelling melodic death metal. While their last record -was- really great, it was definitely plagued by their blatant Morbid Angel worship. On 'Dreams...' they make a huge progression, still heavy and intricate and almost catchy, but much more uniquely Anata.

ANATA Under A Stone With No Inscription (Wicked World) cd 14.98

ANATOMI-71 / NEMO Anatomi-71 Vs Nemo (split) (Rage Of Achilles) cd 10.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
From our pal Duncan at Rage Of Achilles comes this thrashing, pummelling head banging death/splatter/grind/metal doubleheader. Two bands we'd never heard of, battling it out, both pretty awesome. The first 21 tracks, almost all clocking in at a minute or less, come courtesy of Anatomi-71. Crusty, sort of lo-fi, not-quite-hyperspeed grind. Two vocalists (or one doing double time) grunting growls and hellish screeching. All furious and fast and complicated. Good stuff, but the final 12 tracks are where it's at! The band Nemo are responsible for these, and they are soooooo fast, and so insane sounding. They incorporate lightning speed drum machines, video game samples, and all sorts of bizarre bleeps and blips and buzzing into the mix, turning their metallic grind into some sort of grindmetal alien video game soundtrack. This stuff is so nuts it's kind of hard to even describe. If I was making a horror/alien invasion/splatter flick, the is the music I would want as the soundtrack. Think some fucked up mix of the Locust, Orthrelm, Agoraphobic Nosebleed, Crom Tech, Man Is The Bastard, Space Invaders, Galaga, Missle Command, Joust and Rastan. Or the best death metal video game they never made for the Commodore 64! Fucking great!
RealAudio clip: "Fever Dreams"
RealAudio clip: "Robosong II"
RealAudio clip: "Du Ar Inte Ni Med Mig Gubbjavel"

ANCESTORS II (Youth Attack) 7" 9.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
We didn't think it was possible, but with their second record, Ancestors have managed to get louder, heavier, more distorted, noisier and weirdly enough groovier. Short and not at all sweet, a bunch of songs jammed onto a 7" (or a cassette if you swing that way), a relentless blown out blast of blackened ultra distorted metallic punk. Or black metal. More likely somewhere right in between.
Not to be confused with THE Ancestors, the stoner rock outfit, Ancestors have a rich punk rock pedigree (Charles Bronson anyone?) but since the old days the sound has moved way further into the black, think Bone Awl, Akitsa, Ash Pool, Malveillance, Zarach'Baal'Tharagh, that sort of relentless blackened crusty metalnoise, furious and frenetic, a wall of chaotic crush infused with blast beats and buzzing riffs. Record number two is so ferocious, it's a wonder it can remain musical, but it does, BIG time, in fact, it's weirdly way more musical than the first record, more melodic, with more of a groove, more slow parts, but that only makes them sound that much more fucked up and brutal.
Hissing white hot distorted fury, the riffs crumble and melt, the drums pound and thrash struggling not to get swallowed up by the churning blackness, and then the vocals, holy fuck, they are SICK, ultra distorted, processed, some sort of inhuman howl / shriek / gurgle, like Abruptum meets Popeye meets Merzbow, but sometimes so warped it almost sounds like it's not in fact a voice, but some sort of malfunctioning synth. Amidst all this blown out noise drenched damage, the guitars occasionally explode into awesome blasts of super technical and angular post punk squiggle, but all blackened up. There are also hooks and catchy melodies, and the songs slow down to offer up a CHUG, or a fragmented groove, before bursting back into action, overall, the whole record manages to sound way more polished and refined, without losing an ounce of vitriol.
The record even finishes off with a weirdly gorgeous bout of midtempo moodiness, but the band manage even with that, to make it sound abrasive and caustic and catchy as fuck.
Beautiful packaging, the 7" comes in a super abstract full color sleeve and insert, printed inner sleeve, very little in the way of information, pressed on thick white vinyl, LIMITED TO 333 COPIES!!! The tape is also limited, and features the same abstract full color artwork, and the same dearth of info...

ANCESTORS II (Tour De Garde) cassette 7.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
We have ONE copy left of this otherwise out of print cassette...
We didn't think it was possible, but with their second record, Ancestors have managed to get louder, heavier, more distorted, noisier and weirdly enough groovier. Short and not at all sweet, a bunch of songs jammed onto a 7" (or a cassette if you swing that way), a relentless blown out blast of blackened ultra distorted metallic punk. Or black metal. More likely somewhere right in between.
Not to be confused with THE Ancestors, the stoner rock outfit, Ancestors have a rich punk rock pedigree (Charles Bronson anyone?) but since the old days the sound has moved way further into the black, think Bone Awl, Akitsa, Ash Pool, Malveillance, Zarach'Baal'Tharagh, that sort of relentless blackened crusty metalnoise, furious and frenetic, a wall of chaotic crush infused with blast beats and buzzing riffs. Record number two is so ferocious, it's a wonder it can remain musical, but it does, BIG time, in fact, it's weirdly way more musical than the first record, more melodic, with more of a groove, more slow parts, but that only makes them sound that much more fucked up and brutal.
Hissing white hot distorted fury, the riffs crumble and melt, the drums pound and thrash struggling not to get swallowed up by the churning blackness, and then the vocals, holy fuck, they are SICK, ultra distorted, processed, some sort of inhuman howl / shriek / gurgle, like Abruptum meets Popeye meets Merzbow, but sometimes so warped it almost sounds like it's not in fact a voice, but some sort of malfunctioning synth. Amidst all this blown out noise drenched damage, the guitars occasionally explode into awesome blasts of super technical and angular post punk squiggle, but all blackened up. There are alos hooks and catchy melodies, and the songs slow down to offer up a CHUG, or a fragmented groove, before bursting back into action, overall, the whole record manages to sound way more polished and refined, without losing an ounce of vitriol.
The record even finishes off with a weirdly gorgeous bout of midtempo moodiness, but the band manage even with that, to make it sound abrasive and caustic and catchy as fuck.
Beautiful packaging, the 7" comes in a super abstract full color sleeve and insert, printed inner sleeve, very little in the way of information, pressed on thick white vinyl, LIMITED TO 333 COPIES!!! The tape is also limited, and features the same abstract full color artwork, and the same dearth of info...

ANCESTORS Invisible White (Tee Pee) cd 17.98

ANCESTORS Neptune With Fire (North Atlantic Sound / Tee Pee) cd 14.98
Not to be confused with the -other- Ancestors, the noise drenched, blackened lo-fi, blown out raw as fuck punk metal outfit, no, this is something all together more stoned and groovy, spaced out and ROCK.
Don't know too much about these guys other than they're a 5 piece from LA, and man can they riff with the best of 'em. Two looooong songs, one nearly 17 minutes, the other almost 22, each a sprawling stoner rock psychedelic groovescape. Think Kyuss, Monster Magnet, Hawkwind, Earthless, Dead Meadow, Acrimony, Los Natas. The songs are less proper songs, and more epic jams, the actual verses and chorus and vocals relegated to popping up here and there, while the majority of the song is spent rocking the fuck out, unfurling majestic sun baked soundscapes of riff and groove and killer leads EVERYWHERE. Occasionally, the songs bliss out, and get all tripped out and druggy, with soft Santana-y guitar squalls, and tons of effects, but those parts inevitably build and build until suddenly the song is back in full swing, the band lurching and lumbering and grooving relentlessly. This is the sort of jam band we can get behind, epic heaviness and endless riffery.
The second track is almost Melvins-y at the beginning, howled vocals over slow churning guitar grind, before slipping back into something way more sixties and psychedelic sounding. Like the super kick ass outro of every killer space rock song all stitched into one epic mega-jam. Near the end, the track blisses out and transforms into a loping moody dirge, with reverbed guitars and haunting female vocals way off in the distance, finally kicking back into gear for the last few minutes, a whirring minor key organ making the groove seem melancholy and strangely funereal.
Killer stuff for sure. Any one into heavy heavy post rock, stoner rock, riff heavy jams, sweet leads, or ANY or any of the above mentioned bands will most definitely dig this.
Housed in a sweet digipak with awesome artwork by Arik Moonhawk Roper!
MPEG Stream: "Orcus"
MPEG Stream: "Neptune With Fire"