Cannibal Corpse - Chaos Horrific (Metal Blade Records) [Erick Willand]
Writing a review for a band as legendary as Cannibal Corpse can be a daunting task, right off the bat you have to figure out…where do I even begin. I mean it feels like only a few weeks ago they dropped Violence Unimagined, their 15th and possibly strongest album ever. That slab didn’t leave my play rotation for months.
Not to mention the addition and continued participation of the equally legendary Eric Rutan who comes with his own Death Metal pedigree stretching back decades and bridges songwriting, playing and production. This is Cannibal Corpse, the only Death Metal band a normie might recognize the name of thanks to none other than Jim Carrey. A band who’s lead singer is called Corpsegrinder yet is known on Instagram for winning stuffed animals from claw machines…you literally can’t make this stuff up.
Of course I’m not here to just give you a stream of consciousness rant about the history or weirdness of this legacy Death Metal act, I’m here to stick my head in the Corpse blender, get my brain shredded and then report back. So with no further fuckery, on to Chaos Horrific!
The opening track on this gruesome slab is fittingly titled Overlords Of Violence and it delivers within seconds, of course that should not surprise you. A blast from the guitars, a rumbling bass line and we’re off to the slaughter properly. Driving rhythm and guitar noodling in bucket fulls and there are no stops on this meat train ride as you are bodily hurled right into Frenzied Feeding. Fast and aggressive like a proper zombie chow down, until the slow part comes and it’s down right belligerent. Corpsegrinder is great at this moment, deep and gravel laden he just sounds mean and I’m here for it. I spin Frenzied Feeding again before being Summoned For Sacrifice by a thick swirling riff and thunderous drums. Rutan shines on this one and the chorus is just plain sing-along fun.
Blood Blind might just be one of my new favorite Cannibal Corpse songs, when you hear the fade in for “Subjugate, subjugate, subjugate!” you can’t help but get sucked right in. Prime work and sure to be a crowd fav in the live setting. Vengeful Invasion will also fall into that slot, the song's riffs literally stick to the inside of your skull. Leading of course right to the colorful title track Chaos Horrific and the riff assault begins instantly, a vicious, tight rampage like being locked in a metal box and tossed down a large hill but your descent is somehow controlled and precise. Such fun.
There’s so much meat on this album and Rutan’s addition to the fold continues to prove a very solid choice. Fracture And Refracture is brutal as you expect but with a cool almost lazy riff throughout the song that gives it a unique vibe and fits nicely with the solo, which is the best on the album easily. Pitchfork Impalement gives me classic Corpse vibes with its speed and swagger. Pestilential Rictus comes galloping in with some fun thrashy vibes and brilliant guitar work that feels crisp and amazingly well timed. Final track Drain You Empty has this same…touch. Both songs are just very well made Death Metal made by craftsmen at the height of their art and still enjoying it immensely. That comes through on this whole album.
And the cover art…Vincent Locke hits the tension of a zombie attack just right, what more can I say I’ve liked his work since his Deadworld comics. The verdict is simple in the end. 9/10
Australian extreme metal giants Thy Art Is Murder are back with 10 tracks of deathcore dominance. Their blistering sixth full-length album, released via their own label Human Warfare, shows signs that new directions are being pursued. Titled Godlike, Thy Art explores new dimensions and complexities without surrendering a single bit of the intensity you find in their older work. But instead of just delivering the hardest breakdowns conceivable, the emphasis is shifting more towards storytelling.
The band's growth in songwriting is instantly on display in the first track, Destroyer Of Dreams, with its opening breakdown. In addition to the blasting guitars, CJ's thunderous growl increases intensity of the track as he joins in with his deathly bellows and high screams. Without a doubt, this is the best start to a Thy Art Is Murder album. It's a glimpse of things to come, from the drums and palm mutes to the haunting lead guitar that joins sinister vocals. Blood Throne has some extremely fun groove sections whilst single Join Me In Armageddon has dreary melodies that successfully create an impending state of doom. Gang vocals during the chorus heighten the feeling of perilousness. It hits as hard as anything else they have put out whilst omitting blast beats.
Through its eerie low-gain guitar parts, Everything Unwanted throws gloom down strongly. This is the closest thing Thy Art Is Murder will ever get to a ballad. A gloomy, melancholy intro explodes into an unstoppable hit where CJ's vocals have more force. His low growls are definitely more prominent in this track. At the halfway point we get Lesson In Pain. A song that perfectly captures the extreme brutality of Thy Art, fusing ominous lead guitars with vicious deathcore riffs. Strikes of savage guitars and unnerving screams make it a fitting title. Title track, Godlike, is once more nothing short of brutal and features drummer Jesse at his finest. Corrosion perfectly captures the band's signature sound, which includes intensely exhilarating and chunky riffs, ferociously pounding drums and some of the best deathcore screams and growls in the album.
The main attraction throughout the album has been the louring grooves but, these take a backseat in Anathema. As a chaotic blast beat bridge bellows, the vocals become much more jarring. This led way to gloriously harsh riffs with a gruelling breakdown that sounds as unnerving as it does vicious at the tracks end. The final song, Bermuda, brings everything to a close. With a melancholic beginning and an eerie EDM beat, CJ poignantly growls while the track descends into even murkier territory. This stands out from the album's other songs. Unearthly guitars set the tone followed by CJ demonstrating new realms of guttural screams. His vocals perfectly complement the massive guitars and drums with such emotion. Bermuda as an ending was unexpected. The song wouldn't be as impactful in any other place but, it perfectly closes out a spectacular and sincere album.
With unrelenting effort, Thy Art Is Murder has arose as one of Australia's biggest and best extreme metal bands. Godlike is in my eyes vastly different from any previous Thy Art album. In terms of sound, I can only say that it is fuller than earlier albums. It still captures the spirit of their previous work but results in an album that feels enormous in comparison. Outstanding, 10/10
The Bites - Squeeze (Earache Records) [Matt Bladen]
Taz - Wake Up And Sweat, Vol. 1 & Shipwrecked, Vol. 2 (Eonian Records) [Rich Piva]
There are so many bands in the days when hair metal was huge that took the pilgrimage to the Sunset Strip and did their best to become rock stars. Most did not get much past recording demos and playing some shows with their own material. Some bands who were top level talents that had every reason to break through just didn’t. While some others who could barely hold their instruments became global superstars.
The first batch of demos on Volume One are raw, glam metal goodness with the lead singer, the talented Kent Kleven, sounding a lot like Brett Michaels, and are the types of songs with the right studio slickness would have put these guys on Dial MTV for sure. You can hear bits of a lot of bands that made it big from that scene in Taz, including a band from Baltimore, Kix, especially on the fun Rock N Roll Rodeo.
Volume Two starts out with four tracks produced by Rob Cavallo, who went on to work with a whole bunch of huge names that you would know, and you can tell the difference. These tracks sound like a heavier Cinderella. Shipwrecked is a hair metal banger, No Relation has a sweet riff and is dripping Sunset Strip sleaze, and Father McGee is catchy and would have been a great addition to a full length that never happened. Volume Two is for fans only for sure, as the next batch of demos are cool songs but pretty raw and the live tracks are really for the diehards who want to either relive of try to get a glimpse of what the band was like in person.
Sometimes life is not fair, and Taz is an example of this. They had the songs, the talent, the charisma, but just not the luck. Check out Volume One first of you are into this type of stuff and if you really dig it dive into Volume too. This was a lot of fun and frustrating, because give me these songs over most of what was on Open Up And Say Ahh any day. 7/10