Rebel Extravaganza

Heavy Metal And Other Occasional Musics And Cultures

Album Reviews

ALBUM REVIEW RATING SCALE:
**Please note that this rating scale serves as a reference for albums reviewed prior to 2023.
Numbered ratings will not be added going forward, in hopes that the writer’s impression of the work will suffice.
It will have to.** 

6 – Rarely bestowed. An honor reserved for undeniable classics (or those that should be). The Apex Predator.
5 – Impressive.
4 – Worthy of special recognition.
3 – A solid effort.
2 – The participation trophy.
1 – These are the albums that the 2s beat up on the way home from school.
0 – A waste of both our time and yours.

Album Reviews

Album Review: Midnight – Let There Be Witchery

There aren’t many good things to come out of the Buckeye State. As a Michigander there are the obvious “sportsball” rivalries, but mainly Ohio’s just something to avoid driving through on your way to get anywhere else. Don’t wanna “get any on ya” or anything. And yet, this is where the nasty blackthrashspeed of founder and sole member Athenar has thriven for nearly two decades now. Thus, I’ve promised myself this review will only take as long to write as a listen through his fifth under the black banner of MIDNIGHT. Thoughts of some piss-poor “intro” get flushed septic-ward once […]

Album Reviews

Album Review: Dark Meditation – Polluted Temples

With a PR sheet name-dropping everyone from VENOM to PRIEST to DANZIG and mentioning the members’ previous “punk ethos” Polluted Temples could’ve gone either way. Shiver-inducing images of early ‘00s CRADLE OF FILTH or any DANZIG after III: How The Gods Kill plagued my mind, but on a ridiculous bright and sunny Monday morning in February, 2022, I gathered my courage and… After the mercifully short ‘Prelude’, ‘Babalon.Money.Magick’ is…oh, yes, now I see where the DANZIG influence comes from, but it’s not even good DANZIG, instead sloughing forward with all the energy of a greasy devilock and half the passion. […]

Album Reviews

Album Review: HEBOSAGIL – Yössä

When a band morphs from a pretty much by-the-numbers speed/thrash act into a strange hydra of noise rock, abusive sludge and identifiably Scandinavian punk, it’s a chance taken; but when the change happens over the course of nearly two decades – and seems natural – it’s downright impressive. Think about it. Do any of our precious 2nd wave black metal bands sound the same as they did in the late ‘80s/early ‘90s? Well, there you have it. So, though the core ethics/beliefs may not have changed, through age and experience they have developed, much like the sound of HEBOSAGIL on […]

Album Reviews

Album Review: Lost Tribes Of The Moon – Chapter II: Tales Of Strife, Destiny, And Despair

The title is quite a mouthful, isn’t it? Well, that sets the table pretty well for the second album by this Milwaukee band, because the whole damn thing just drags on and on and on… I thought the first effort from these guys was pretty promising. Pick that up if you can find it. Skip this one. If it was a book, it would desperately need an editor. It’s the musical equivalent of a 900 page book about the romance of a mailman. LOST TRIBES OF THE MOON certainly have talent…there are several passages scattered throughout that prove it. But […]

Album Reviews

Album Review: Firebreather – Dwell In The Fog

In which Gothenburg stoner/doom merchants FIREBREATHER return with their all-important third album, Dwell In The Fog, hopefully ready to kick ass and take names. Given their previous album titles of Firebreather and Under A Blood Moon, and that both were solid efforts in their own right (rite?), methinks there may be something of the elemental in the band, what with fog now making an appearance. Opener ‘Kiss Of Your Blade’ flicks open the album, rusty, nicked and dry-blood-covered, no trendy desert or dune-buggy surfboard rawk ala FU MANCHU here, the rumble more akin to METH DRINKER and KRUGER. Flowing ‘n’ […]

Album Reviews

Album Review: Immolation – Acts Of God

Where does IMMOLATION rank in the list of American death metal bands? Right up at the top, I would say. They passed the likes of MORBID ANGEL and DEICIDE a long time ago…way more consistent. Compared to CANNIBAL CORPSE? Hmmm, that’s a tough one, because the CANNIBALS are masters of consistency themselves. But I give the nod to IMMOLATION because the music seems to have a bit more depth to it, and a special kind of darkness that IMMOLATION alone has mastered. Acts Of God continues in the style of the most recent albums, Atonement and Kingdom Of Conspiracy. The […]

Album Reviews

Album Review: Pyreship – Light Is A Barrier

Finding a quality band that falls under the post-whatever (in this case -metal) tag is almost – if not more – rare than a current thrash band actually doing something interesting with the genre. Houston, Texas’ awfully-named PYRESHIP has a full-length and split with Louisiana sludge/prog crew FORMING THE VOID under its belt from a few years back, and now returns with Light Is A Barrier. An overlong spoken piece takes up the first minute of ‘Broken Spire’, but I guess the band figured they could spare it, what with 8+ minutes to fill on the opener. Once the vocals […]

Album Reviews

Album Review: Darkness Everywhere – The Seventh Circle [EP]

Admittedly I’ve always dug both key variants of the Swedish death metal sound, those being Stockholm and Gothenburg. While the Stockholm sound was ripping, cavernous, gutted by the HM-2 pedal (Swedish Chainsaw, y’all!), the Gothenburg sound was inherently more melodic, generally faster, a distant cousin of the US thrash of its time. Oakland, California is nowhere near Gothenburg, though, so when DARKNESS EVERYWHERE’s debut EP landed on my desk, I had to investigate. As much as I despise intro tracks, ‘Apocalyptic Nightmares’ gets a pass due to its nod to my beloved doom, a simple pattern delivered over dual guitars […]

Album Reviews

Album Review: Mystic Circle – Mystic Circle

MYSTIC CIRCLE has been plying their trade in the black/death market since the mid-‘90s, releasing a half-dozen albums in the decade between ’96-’06, but has as yet failed to make a noticeable impression of any sort, just always being “there”, one could say. Others have their thoughts, I’m sure, but I believe releasing three albums in as many years burnt whatever creativity the band had to cinders, resulting in the lackluster Bloody Path Of God in 2006, followed by the 15-year recording hiatus that ended with last year’s Letters From The Devil EP. And now, a mere four months later, […]

Album Reviews

Album Review: Black Altar / Vulture Lord – Deathiah Manifesto

Given my current renaissance of affection for split releases over the past few months or so, Deathiah Manifesto looked interesting at the start, being a melding of Polish (now UK) blackguards BLACK ALTAR and Norway’s equally profane VULTURE LORD. The styles of blackness from both countries are identifiable almost at first listen, yet I’ve found them often in at least aesthetic camaraderie, giving me hope that the few moments to come won’t be wasted. With its last full-length arriving in 2008 and only three other splits and an EP to show for the past decade, BLACK ALTAR has more to […]

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