Gama Bomb: Speed Between The Lines (AFM)
New Haunts: Worlds Left Behind (Self Released)
I have to be honest, this album has given me problems. Not because I didn’t like it, because I do. It’s given me problems because I spend so much time listening to heavy metal, this is quite a long way out of my comfort zone. There are no guitars, distorted or otherwise, no blast-beats, no harsh vocals, or all the other stuff that I usually write about. This is not any form of metal, but it has a feel that I think could be associated with the feelings that some heavy metal gives you. New Haunts is Alice Sheridan, doing both music and vocals. What we get is minimalist electronica, with a little of an industrial feel to it, and maybe a little Gothic as well. Over this minimalist sound is Sheridan’s voice, which is breathtaking. In many ways, due to the minimalist nature of the music, this album lives or dies on the quality of the voice, so it’s just as well she sounds so good.
The feel of the album is dark and sombre; this is not pop music. Left Me Cold is slow, dark and moody, the vocal feels like they are searching for answers. The song Hymns, features a church organ, added to the electronica, giving the track a melancholic feel, in places Sheridan’s voice sounds a little like Kate Bush. The track Waves has a darker, electronic sound to it, there is also a slight distortion on the vocals, giving the track a stygian, dissonant feel to it, more of a darkwave aura. Same Medicine could be an Lana Del Ray track, in a universe where she is more bothered by making great music, than being successful.
I have really enjoyed Worlds Left Behind. Alice Sheridan is clearly a hugely talented musician. For a first album, this is really impressive. Dark, and sombre, but at the same time cathartic and achingly beautiful. It’s an album that proves how important it is to get out of your comfort zones occasionally. 8/10
Horrendous: Idol (Season Of Mist)
Idol is a very accomplished album from a band who clearly know who they are and what they are trying to accomplish. This is a very mature album, made by accomplished musicians. It is brutal, but also nuanced, ferocious but also intelligent. Very impressive piece of death metal. 8 / 10
Irreversible Mechanism: Immersion (Blood Music)
Some death metal is low fi and simple, just about brutality. Some death metal is technical and progressive. And then there's Irreversible Mechanism, who fly straight through technical and out the other side. Immersion is a staggeringly technical piece of death metal. The album is packed full of the sort of thing you associate with technical death metal; amazing solos, insanely complex riffs, inhumanly fast drumming, but this album also contains some beautifully progressive elements. The album constantly juxtaposes heavy passages with much more ethereal, softer, often electronic parts. The instrumental track Simulacra, is a dark electronic piece with an fairly ambient feel to it. There are also parts of this album that feel more like tech/djent/math metal. There are places where this sounds a little like Animals As Leaders, or Chimp Spanner.
The death metal parts of this album are deeply complex, dense and brutal, perfectly contrasting the softer elements. Some of these juxtapositions happen within songs. Footprints In The Sand, starts with clean, slightly echoey guitar parts, played in a relaxed, musing fashion, before heavier parts come crashing in. The track comes to a close with another softer section which seems to be influenced by Philip Glass. These are very accomplished musicians, that is without question.
This constant changing of moods could have been distracting, or annoying, but it is handled so well. Instead of an incoherent mess, we get a beautifully shifting, mutating, constantly changing album that is breathtakingly complex, but at the same time is an eminently listenable album. The album is brought to a close by the track Awakening. A track that mixes the softer, ultra tech/djent sound with the more brutal death metal style. The song feels huge and expansive, and is a fantastic way to end the album.
Immersion is a brilliantly constructed, hugely complex album. Some death metal fans might find it too complex, and will find the constant shifting and changing of styles problematic. However, if you have an open mind to what death metal can be, and you appreciate complexity and amazing musicianship, you should definitely check this out, you won’t be disappointed. 8/10
This is Gama Bomb's 7th album, coming 3 years after their last, Untouchable Glory. So, what have Joe, Philly, Paul, Domo and John got for us this time. Well, if you know Gama Bomb, there isn’t that much that that will surprise you, just a few tweaks to Gama Bomb’s signature sound. So, ridiculously tight, fast riffs. Screaming, technical, but very melodious solos. Thundering, beautifully rapid drumming. Great vocals with funny, imaginative lyrics. The band hasn’t messed with a template that works well, but has modified it a little to avoid getting stale. The changes are small, nothing as crass as getting progressive.
The track Alt-Reich has a section in the middle that has a slower, slightly more nuanced riffing style. The song Motorgeist has a chorus that is channelling Motorhead, and feels a little more rock and roll. Gama Bomb have always been a band that is open to humour, and this album is no exception. Bring Out The Monster is a great track, a neck-breaking headbanger of a song, which has funny lyrics and a great conversation between the monster and Philly. Obviously theres a track about 80’s action movies, in the song Kurt Russell, I’d love to see Kurt ‘Drinking Cider, Smoking Hash’, as described in the lyrics. Musically the band are absolutely spot on as well, these guys might enjoy a laugh, but are also great musicians. The solo on the song R.I.P.U. is stunning, really impressive.
I have always found Gama Bomb to be a band that gets how exiting thrash metal should be. This is one genre that should never be boring. The speed of the riffing, the humour, the great choruses, all combine to make Gama Bomb one of the most exciting bands in metal. I love their energy, it’s something that not many thrash bands can pull of. It’s apt that the cover of this album features a running man (possibly a reference to the film). As I’ve been listening to this album, I’ve tried to come up with an analogy of how Gama Bomb’s music makes me feel, and it involves running. When I was a kid, I remember getting an incredible feeling of excitement and invigoration from running.
Not just running, but running as fast as I could. Running so fast that if I tried to run any faster I would go head over heals and collapse in a heap on the ground. That is how Gama Bomb’s music makes feel, like I’m 7 and getting a huge thrill from being able to move myself at such speeds. I realise that this might not make any sense to the rest of you, but that is how it effects me. It makes me feel as excited as I was before life beat the joy and love of life out of me, before I became an adult, and had to stop having fun. Do your inner child a favour, and let them Speed Between The Lines. 8/10
New Haunts: Worlds Left Behind (Self Released)
I have to be honest, this album has given me problems. Not because I didn’t like it, because I do. It’s given me problems because I spend so much time listening to heavy metal, this is quite a long way out of my comfort zone. There are no guitars, distorted or otherwise, no blast-beats, no harsh vocals, or all the other stuff that I usually write about. This is not any form of metal, but it has a feel that I think could be associated with the feelings that some heavy metal gives you. New Haunts is Alice Sheridan, doing both music and vocals. What we get is minimalist electronica, with a little of an industrial feel to it, and maybe a little Gothic as well. Over this minimalist sound is Sheridan’s voice, which is breathtaking. In many ways, due to the minimalist nature of the music, this album lives or dies on the quality of the voice, so it’s just as well she sounds so good.
The feel of the album is dark and sombre; this is not pop music. Left Me Cold is slow, dark and moody, the vocal feels like they are searching for answers. The song Hymns, features a church organ, added to the electronica, giving the track a melancholic feel, in places Sheridan’s voice sounds a little like Kate Bush. The track Waves has a darker, electronic sound to it, there is also a slight distortion on the vocals, giving the track a stygian, dissonant feel to it, more of a darkwave aura. Same Medicine could be an Lana Del Ray track, in a universe where she is more bothered by making great music, than being successful.
I have really enjoyed Worlds Left Behind. Alice Sheridan is clearly a hugely talented musician. For a first album, this is really impressive. Dark, and sombre, but at the same time cathartic and achingly beautiful. It’s an album that proves how important it is to get out of your comfort zones occasionally. 8/10
Horrendous: Idol (Season Of Mist)
Horrendous are a 4 piece death metal band from the US. The band have been going since 2009, and Idol is their 5th album. The death metal on offer here has a definite progressive feel to it. The riffing style is about halfway between old school death metal and technical death metal. There's a complexity to the riffs, but the band never lose sight of the brutality that great death metal needs. The production on this album is really good.
This isn’t an over the top production, that a lot of death metal bands go for, no exaggerated pro-tools extremity. The sound is fairly natural, there is separation between the instruments. So you can tell what each member of the band is doing, so I can tell that the Bass work on this album is really good. I’ve reviewed so many death metal albums where you couldn’t pick out the bass from the other guitars, due to it sounding like a detuned mess.
The natural production on the album allows the songs to shine, and shine they do. The track Golgothan Tongues, has some really brutal riffing, but also has some really great lead work and fantastic harmonies. The band do a good line in mixing hard death metal with more progressive, thoughtful passages. Devotion (Blood For Ink) is a case in point; the first half is brutal death metal, but in the second half of the song has a softer section, with clean guitars and vocals. The track Devine Anhedonia starts slowly with progressive build up to a properly brutal section, before bringing the intensity back down again.
Idol is a very accomplished album from a band who clearly know who they are and what they are trying to accomplish. This is a very mature album, made by accomplished musicians. It is brutal, but also nuanced, ferocious but also intelligent. Very impressive piece of death metal. 8 / 10
Irreversible Mechanism: Immersion (Blood Music)
Some death metal is low fi and simple, just about brutality. Some death metal is technical and progressive. And then there's Irreversible Mechanism, who fly straight through technical and out the other side. Immersion is a staggeringly technical piece of death metal. The album is packed full of the sort of thing you associate with technical death metal; amazing solos, insanely complex riffs, inhumanly fast drumming, but this album also contains some beautifully progressive elements. The album constantly juxtaposes heavy passages with much more ethereal, softer, often electronic parts. The instrumental track Simulacra, is a dark electronic piece with an fairly ambient feel to it. There are also parts of this album that feel more like tech/djent/math metal. There are places where this sounds a little like Animals As Leaders, or Chimp Spanner.
The death metal parts of this album are deeply complex, dense and brutal, perfectly contrasting the softer elements. Some of these juxtapositions happen within songs. Footprints In The Sand, starts with clean, slightly echoey guitar parts, played in a relaxed, musing fashion, before heavier parts come crashing in. The track comes to a close with another softer section which seems to be influenced by Philip Glass. These are very accomplished musicians, that is without question.
This constant changing of moods could have been distracting, or annoying, but it is handled so well. Instead of an incoherent mess, we get a beautifully shifting, mutating, constantly changing album that is breathtakingly complex, but at the same time is an eminently listenable album. The album is brought to a close by the track Awakening. A track that mixes the softer, ultra tech/djent sound with the more brutal death metal style. The song feels huge and expansive, and is a fantastic way to end the album.
Immersion is a brilliantly constructed, hugely complex album. Some death metal fans might find it too complex, and will find the constant shifting and changing of styles problematic. However, if you have an open mind to what death metal can be, and you appreciate complexity and amazing musicianship, you should definitely check this out, you won’t be disappointed. 8/10