Rebel Extravaganza

Heavy Metal And Other Occasional Musics And Cultures

2024

Album Reviews

Album Review: Heavy Temple – Garden Of Heathens

Philly’s HEAVY TEMPLE are listed as “heavy psychedelic doom” and there is truth in that. But on Garden Of Heathens, it’s also true to say that they are an ass-kicking heavy metal band. This record has the ability to reach beyond its simple description and venture into other realms of heaviness. This is a revelation all the way around. Opening salvo ‘Extreme Indifference To Life’ is thick and sludgy doom all around, kind of like WINDHAND but not quite as fuzzed out. That even extends to the mournful vocals of High Priestess Nighthawk. But she’s no mere Dorthea Cottrell knockoff, […]

Short Sharp Shocks

Wolves Don’t Sleep – Fears & Fractures [EP]

A Nottingham Hot Topic has exploded! ‘House Of Glass’ ticks all the boxes of whatever happened in the early ‘00s that was trying to be metalcore, but without the metal. More breakdowns than the side of the M1, melody, obscenely down-tuned guitars and clean/screamed vox is what we find through ‘Oblivion’ and ‘Shame’, and it seems the sextet has a handful of go-tos that they pull out in every song. That these fellas aren’t trying to add anything of their own to the mix is the real failure here. WOLVES DON’T SLEEP and Fears & Fractures have the look/sound of […]

Album Reviews

Album Review: Six Feet Under – Killing For Revenge

Aside from a wheezing, heart attack inducing “Is this Geritol in my bongwater” run partway up Half-Ass Mountain with Undead (2012) and Unborn (2013), Ol’ Chrissy’s been faltering at best, flatlining at worst since 1995’s Haunted. Chris Barnes had no choice but to get Jack Owen on board, as roping/duping another member of the O.G. CANNIBAL CORPSE lineup was the only way SIX FEET UNDER could retain any level of credibility in death metal. And so, the hopeful did hope. And lo, did Nightmares Of The Decomposed flop harder than Nicolas Cage with T__ W_____ M__. We shouldn’t have been […]

Album Reviews

Album Review: Deliria – Phantasm

Birthed in 2017, DELIRIA had the misfortune of coming into being shortly after the “post-black metal” (I will never understand that term) dam had burst, unleashing a saddened, craft beer-sipping, beard-grooming, horde of L.L. Bean-wearing DEAFHEAVEN fans masquerading as shoegaze devotees into the gene pool. Thankfully, Nausea had enough going for it to pass as more than Muzak made for immersing yourself in during your time at the local Whole Foods Market, and thus…Phantasm. ‘Smoke & Mirrors’ wants to shimmer its way into your consciousness, but there’s just something about the tone of this guitar that’s annoying from jump. Blessedly, […]

Album Reviews

Album Review: Vulture – Sentinels

Holding the flag high for German thrash we have VULTURE, who have emerged as solid journeymen in their chosen field. The ’80s thrash revival hasn’t quite hit the same level of success as the recent comeback of old school death metal…can VULTURE turn the tide? I don’t know if Sentinels will be the record to do it. It’s a fun record combining straight EXODUS worship with heaping helpings of yelping Kraut-thrash, but it’s no threat to join the company of thrash immortals. The yippy vocals (like Zetro Sousa trying to do early Schmier from DESTRUCTION) are overdone and sometimes cringeable. […]

Album Reviews

Album Review: KÓLGA – Black Tides

“Blackened surf rock/nautical horror”. Well, now I’ve heard it all. Although, to be fair, any band with a glockenspiel and waterphone isn’t to be denied for adventuresomeness alone. ‘Space Beach Massacre’ begins, already substantially more creeped-out and terrifying than 99.9% of death metal intro tracks, quickly slipping into the churning foam, flecks of black metal howl and DICK DALE guitar stranglings a’ flying and, believe it or not, ending too quickly for my taste. It’s alright, though, as the brilliantly titled ‘Squall Of Cthulhu’ rises, not as inherently frenetic as its predecessor, more lurking as its namesake befits. Imagine, if […]

Album Reviews

Album Review: The Rottening – Seeds Of Death [EP]

In which ex-members of Swedish death metal band INTESTINAL take shape under the moniker of that band’s last album, new vocalist in tow, to create, you guessed it…Swedish death metal. Carrying over three songs from last year’s Ode To Rot demo and adding a couple new ones, THE ROTTENING breathes, eats and shits the Stockholm sound on initial EP, Seeds Of Death. So, you know what you’re getting, and can stop now or move forward into demise. The Swedish Chainsaw is revved up with ‘Ode To Rot’, the tone a bit less coarse than I’d anticipated, but still raw, hard-charging, […]

Album Reviews

Album Review: Necrot – Lifeless Birth

I remember really digging on NECROT’s sophomore full-length, Mortal, maybe partly because it was released in the throes of the pandemic, when the world was in literal spastic convulsions. Songs like ‘Stench Of Decay’ and ‘Malevolent Intentions’ were cut to the chase, no frills death demons that gave (at least these ears) an escape from the political haranguing and media talking heads. Lifeless Birth’s opener, ‘Cut The Cord’ slices and dices with exactly none of the precision of, say, CARCASS, but more a rusty cleaver hacking away, chunks of gore a’ flying into the speed-driven title track. Less chord-driven, just […]

Album Reviews

Album Review: Sons Of Ra – Tropic Of Cancer [EP]

Instrumental. Avant-Jazz. Fusion. Well, there are three words that sound to these Luddite ears like a recipe for disaster. While I’ve become very intrigued of late with the idea that what most would term “background music” can actually make for a worthwhile listen and fill a space, most times it’s just sonic clutter, and I’m going to hard pass on that alone. Add “Avant-Jazz” and “Fusion”, and I’m truly already wondering why I bothered. Maybe it’s that Jazz has (until very recently) always come across as some inside joke played by the performers to stroke their own already-inflated sense of […]

Album Reviews

Album Review: Mastiff – Deprecipice

I can’t help it. I think it all started when “We’ll never make a fuckin’ video!” METALLICA began its not so long, not so slow slide down the greased colon that is mainstream acceptance and fortune/fame over quality. So when Yorkshire lads MASTIFF signed to multi-media conglomerate eOne for 2021’s Leave Me The Ashes Of The Earth, I was a bit trepidatious, let’s say. Thankfully, nothing changed but the name on the spine of the CD/record, as that album included some of the best work the band had put to tape yet. Still on eOne (now rebranded as MNRK Music […]

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