Rebel Extravaganza

Heavy Metal And Other Occasional Musics And Cultures

lord randall

Album Reviews

Album Review: CONTRITION – Broken Mortal Coil

Sometimes I miss the days of buying albums blind because you had no choice, when often the only way you had of knowing who was in a new band was if there’d been a magazine article you stumbled across or the most reliable way, word of mouth. Looking at the lineup of Chicago’s CONTRITION, the now-familiar “current and former members of” tagline bearing such as NOVEMBERS DOOM, NACHTMYSTIUM, COBALT, YAKUZA and so forth, you almost feel set up for a fall. Can such a strange blend deliver? Haphazard, grotty and sordid in that basest, best of ways, ‘Diluted’ is unconcerned […]

Album Reviews

Album Review: HATE – Rugia

Poland’s HATE has been at it for over three decades now, in many incarnations, but always helmed by Adam “The First Sinner” Buszko, so, to put it bluntly, the praise or blame has always rested on his shoulders when it comes to the quality of the death/black outfit. For myself, HATE has sort of just been “there”, no great opinion one way or the other, in that I can see why someone may enjoy it, but I’ve also never been in the mood for the band specifically. Featuring a new rhythm section (again), and joined once more by Domin, who’s […]

Album Reviews

Album Review: Wormwitch – Wolf Hex

WORMWITCH has been at it awhile, and now returns for the all-important third album. Reviews have been kind to the Vancouver quartet thus far, so all that remains is the question “Did the band deliver?”. After the intro of ‘Lunar Maniac’ wanders about aimlessly for 1:00 (as most intros are wont to do), the laughably-titled ‘Canadian Denim Mountain Attack’, which manages in one clumsy, fell swoop to poorly appropriate both DARKTHRONE’s ‘Canadian Metal’ and ‘Hiking Metal Punks’, both of which leave a bag of reindeer shit on WORMWITCH’s suburbanite doorstep. And if you thought the song was any better, it’s […]

Album Reviews

Album Review: ROTHADÁS – Kopár hant… az alvilág felé

Hungarians ROTHADÁS arrive with their first long player, after 2019’s two-song self-titled release. Taking a page from the DARKTHRONE playbook, one might easily assume the duo to follow their ancestors’ now well-trodden paths to the past, but not so. Whereas the former relies these days on breaking down metal/punk/doom to its most stark, Messrs. Ledeczy and Hanyi don’t seem blind to taking ROTHADÁS death/doom down unexpected trails. In truth, what first drew me to Kopár hant…az alvilág felé was the cover art of four Victorian-era pallbearers transporting a coffin towards an inner-lit crypt amid a grey (I envision), rain-drizzled night. […]

Album Reviews

Album Review: Venefixion – A Sigh From Below

Simmering since 2013, with a demo, EP, and split release with Belgium’s POSSESSION to its name, the black magic Bretons VENEFIXION now prepare to turn up the heat with debut full-length, A Sigh From Below. After the Obligatory Intro Track ™, ‘Veneficial Upheaval’ gets things rolling, and roll they do. Heads, tanks, freaking boulders chasing Indiana Jones. If it can be rolled, it’s in motion. The one-sheet for ASFB mentioned “swagger”, and it wasn’t wrong, as the riff/rhythm at 2:01-2:24 is the stuff of which blood orgies are made. Bits of early DEATH pepper ‘Of Wolves And Ghosts’, albeit filtered […]

Album Reviews

Album Review: Thy Catafalque – Vadak

Reliability is a rare commodity these days, be it in personal relationships, professional commitments, or certainly in the arts. To find one of those bands – you know, the ones that worm under your skin and into your soul, to the point that you view each new release with hope instead of trepidation – is a true gift, indeed. Recorded in no less than 12 countries – aided by guest musicians and, indirectly, by the current isolation we all feel to some degree – ‘Szarvas’ ushers into Vadak with ULTRAVOX-worthy synthscapes, bolstered by bristling guitars that could as easily be […]

Album Reviews

Album Review: Hooded Menace – The Tritonus Bell

Well, Lasse Pyykko and his band of merry noose-knotters are at it again. Wisely removing themselves from the utter dreck that was 2020, HOODED MENACE return to ring The Tritonus Bell, and, in turn, our ears…we hope. For the first time since 2008 debut, Fulfill The Curse, the time between full-lengths hasn’t been stop-gapped by at least one EP or split, leading one to believe that ol’ HM really did pour everything it had into the cauldron, churned it up with a femur, added one eye of defrocked priest, one hymen of promiscuous nun, the blood of a somewhat perturbed […]

Album Reviews

Album Review: Lower 13 – Embrace The Unknown

LOWER 13 is a trio hailing from Cleveland, OH, an area I’ve always much more associated with the hardcore of RINGWORM, SIX FEET DEEP, or the doom of FRAYLE, the dirty-dirty sludge of FISTULA, RUE and their incestuous spawn. Which means I’m intrigued at what sort of traditional metal comes from the land of the burning river, so here goes. The band’s fourth, Embrace The Unknown, stumbles from the start, the title track a jumbled mish-mash of “alright, I guess, if you like that sort of thing” to outright bad ideas firing off in all directions, as if, lacking anything […]

Album Reviews

Album Review: VREID – Wild North West

Sogndal’s favorite sons, VRIED, return with album number nine, having kept to a reliable schedule of an album every 2-3 years throughout the entity’s nearly two-decade career. While never veering too far from the path originally embarked upon in Kraft, the outfit has managed to remain reliable in quality as well thus far. To be honest, Wild North West was one of those albums that, even before listening, I entered upon the assumption that it would rise to the same watermark as the formers had. At first look, there was that rare sight of a vibrant cover, bursting with Frank […]

Album Reviews

Album Review: Hellcrash – Krvcifix Invertör

Italy’s HELLCRASH cranked out two demos and a split between 2013-2015, then unceremoniously departed from sight. Apparently, the trio has spent the time since on a strict regimen of liver punishment, graveyard hijinks and a diet of pre-’87 thrash/speed metal, now returning with its first full-length, Krvcifix Invertör. HELLCRASH makes no secret of its allegiances right out the gate, four of the nine song titles invoking the name of Satan, so it’s clearly time to party, right? Hellraiser’s guitars and sneer could’ve literally been spawned from Killing Is My Business… – era Mustaine’s drunken sweat, while the title track is […]

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