Tom Valcanis

2 April 2024

Blog

The Six Stacker - Marching In

Tom Valcanis

2 April 2024

Blog

I have so many albums. Why do I want more? There’s a paradox in record collecting. The more you find, the more you need to keep up with. That means for every new band you find there’s an exponential expectation in keeping up with their next releases, and so on. I don’t want to give it up. Spotify is the insta-cure nicotine patch to my addiction - but no. Tidal? Fuck that. I have convinced myself that my $10,000+ hi-fi deserves better than bitcrushed - or even slightly bit-squeezed - filth. Is my hi-fi really that expensive? It felt that way at the time, let me tell you. It’ll outlast me or my children, if I end up having any.

So what’s in my car stacker THIS month? Well, it’s a bit of a mixed bag…

Soen - Memorial

The brainchild of former Opeth drummer Martin Lopez, Soen has blossommed into a force unto its own. Their sixth album in a decade, this is the one that’ll go down in history as a balance of violence and melody; guitar heroism and hard reflection. Baritone Joel Ekelöf’s passionate performances compliment tight and fretbending songwriting. Acousti-ballad Hollowed feat. Eliza, tinged with howling country rock sadness and sprawling strings may go down as their God Only Knows moment. A five-out-of-five banger from front to back.

Green Lung - This Heathen Land

Green Lung’s rise like green smoke to the upstairs apartment have them under the aegis of Nuclear Blast Records, which must mean they’re going places. This Heathen Land hears them switching from indica to sativa; the big bombastic fuck you neighbours riffs of their first two are kinda replaced by utter and complete 70s heavy rock worship: Queen-ish twin leads, groovy Deep Purple riffs, and Uriah Heep style hammonds buzzing up and down the octaves. All that’s missing is Lee Dorrian writhing against cosplay witches being paid way too little to put up with his shit.

40 Watt Sun - Wider Than the Sky

Radiance Records/re-issue Svart Records (2016/2023)

Patrick Walker (ex-Warning) and his 12-bar blues is pitch dark. His music feels like rounding tempestuous seas and after all seems lost, sailing into the calm of day. Wider than the Sky isn’t exactly metal (which is why his previous label tried to dump him) but his meandering, passionate lamentations hit way harder than doomsters peddling the devil and eternal damnation. His warbly, strident baritone delivers his poetry like roman candles lighting up a midnight sky - like afterimages in your eyes, this will stay with you long after the disc is done. It’s sombre, tender, and laid-back. But by God is Walker bleeding for us in that recording booth. Incredible stuff.

Warcrab - The Howling Silence

It’s true - once I cotton on to something I absolutely adore, I kinda sorta can’t let go of it. The latest sludge-crust-headfuck disc from these British despair dispensers is equal parts stoner nihilism and buzz-saw bloodthirst. Imagine oneself riding into armoured battle stoned as an absolute loon, and you get standout throbber Titan of War. Like the Eau de Parfum of your favourite fragrance, The Howling Silence more intense, refined, and intricate than what they’ve done before. Yowza.

Werewolves - All My Enemies Look and Sound Like Me

I was joking to myself, by the time I write this up, they’ll have released another record. I wasn’t wrong. Identical to their other records, it’s balls out old school death metal; double kick at ludicrous speeds, wrist-breaking riffage, swirly headbanging, and liberal use of the word fuck, nutsack, and shit-cunt. Remember: a parody of death metal will end up looking like itself. Even if it isn’t completely self-serious, it sure is fucking fun.

Windir - 1184

Just like the Snuff Box quote “without the guitar there’d be no pop music, dancing, or magazines,” I think without Windir there’d be no Korpiklaani, Finntroll, or Eluveitie, though you will probably disagree with me (don’t all metalheads?) Frostbitten fuzzy-tremolo and classical folky music meld together in a far less OTT way than say, Dimmu Borgir or Emperor did it at the time. That’s not to say they couldn’t pound out some real hard-hitters like Dance of the Mortal Lust, a glacial wall of distorted sound and gang choruses. I don’t know why I slept on this for so long - but hey, better late than never.

Tom Valcanis

27 February 2024

Blog

The Six Stacker - No Hugging, No Learning

Tom Valcanis

27 February 2024

Blog

Ha! You thought I was going to write a Top 10 list! No, I cannot be fucked with that shit.

At least, not any more.

We live in a non-linear present. If you listen to Spotify in playlists, what are the odds most of the tracks you are dished up are even from this year? Does it even matter any more if we’re trudging on a constant treadmill of Retromania and re-re-re-revivals of genres? How many times has thrash metal “been back” since the mid-1980s? More times than Backstreet’s been back, alright.

Also - who gives a shit?

MERCENARY - SOUNDTRACK FOR THE END TIMES

Denmark’s Mercenary, around the time of their now TWENTY FUCKING YEAR OLD Century Media debut 11 Dreams, were showered in affection from the press and the new fangled internet as the torchbearers of melodic death metal for the new millennium. Two good albums followed (The Hours That Remain and Architect of Lies) and the band lost half of its songwriting team overnight with the departure of the Sandager brothers. Now kept in line by vocalist and bass player Rene Pedersen, Metamorphosis divided fans by embracing elements of ‘core, which was a Thing You Could Not Do™ back in 2011. (I really liked it, so what do they know.)

Ten years have passed since a rather forgettable Through Our Darkest Days. Thanks to inflation and their relegation to a micro-label and e-begging via Indiegogo, this disc cost me about $70AUD, most of it lining the pockets of various postal services.

Worth the money, though? Yes.

Burning in Reverse feels like that burst of energy we once felt in World Hate Centre, which opened 11 Dreams. All rage and noise yet tempered by processed cleans, it sticks to the brain…until the Matt Heafy (Trivium) helmed thrasher comes into view and again is displaced by Where Darkened Souls Belong, their most complete and ear-worming song since The Hours That Remain, an accomplished attempt at making non-sadboi melodeath as epic and cinematic as your average Insomnium track. Using both guitars to build intricate rhythms, an all-enveloping chorus teases what’s to come; summoning POWER through clenched fists ala Blind Guardian. Ten years of noodling around on one’s guitar makes for some real heroic shit - and this is where Soundtrack does not disappoint.

Sure, there are some stock-standard (as far as the band is concerned) songs like the Dark Tranquillity ripoff Anthem for the Anxious, cribbing the glass-drop piano sound, and the staccato hard knocks of Soilwork on banger Become the Flame, but it shits all over most melodeath being produced these days. Every track features guitar wizardry of some variation, something that seems so quaint these days. Of course, closer Beyond the Waves is nothing short of incredible. If you don’t have $70 to spare, check this release out on Spotify and leave it on loop until they hopefully break even.

Stormruler - Under The Burning Eclipse

The Shine of Ivory Horns? Reign of the Winged Duke? What is this, some kind of metal fuckin’ album? Well, duh. Apocalypse rider on the cover art kinda gives it away. Though definitely a black metal band, it’s a masala album. A masala Bollywood film is bits of everything - romance, action, comedy - blended together into a rich creamy gravy; these Missourians (what?) are so adept at frostbitten Norse mimicry you’ll be hard pressed believing this platter came straight outta St. Louis.

Windmills and tremelo picking at the speed of hummingbird wings reigns supreme here, cribbing the ye olde sounde of Mayhem and Immortal. Other tracks like the title track and Blood of the Old Wolf infusing ambient keys and galloping cinematic sounds pioneered by Emperor and perhaps Dimmu Borgir. For self-serious black metal it’s a relatively easy listen, even with pensive instrumental intro padding. Die hards might scoff; but everyone else will find something rather beefy and complete. Kinda hard not to recommend.

Godthrymm - Reflections

Death/doom? In my 21st century? Who woulda thunk it? Sure, My Dying Bride is still a thing and to a certain extent so is Paradise Lost, but tar-thick, black-veiled, glacially paced death/doom o’ the early-90s seemed to be a distant memory. Save for Yorkshireman Hamish Glencross (ex-MDB, ex-Vallenfyre, et. al.) who staved off the death rattle of the genre. He (and possibly Enchantment) has rejuvenated brittle guitar leads and mournful congregations of doleful riffs. His Bleakness treats us to a pallbearing march par excellence in first track Monsters Lurk Herein. It really is a continuation of pre-Host/34.788% Complete death/doom from gloomy Blighty, peals of lonely guitar chiming above Chasmic Sorrows about as warm and cozy as the hopeless thousand-yard stares seen in the equally cheery film Threads.

As haunting and funereal as Hamish and company’s compositions are, we find a minimalist take on The Grand Reclamation. The first two-thirds feature crashes of cymbals, a few scant bass notes, and Hamish screaming into the void. If that ain’t death/doom enough for ya, then I don’t know what is.

Saturnus - The Storm Within

I’m on a death/doom train and I don’t want to get off, EVER. Saturnus’ Danish take on the genre is bleak yet fresh, despite an 11 year wait between drinks. Like contemporaries October Tide and Novembers Doom (oh we’ll get to YOU in a minute) they prefer their riffs to breathe and twist in the wind, accompanied by pensive piano or licks that herald skinny-armed triumph, kind of like Insomnium on ketamine - the title track bearing all of those hallmarks and then some, including a (looooooong) pared back middle-8, the kind Edge of Sanity pioneered almost…checks paper - thirty fucking years ago?

Saturnus’ spoken word is more compelling than most bands’ gruff vocals, and in Chasing Ghosts, their early weapons-grade Anathema throwback is a curious exploration of “what if” the brothers Cavanagh ditched the paisley and peyote for black t-shirts and beer after the Judgement album. Just when you thought the spirits of Novembers Doom and Saturnus couldn’t be more kindred, a solemn piano n’ strings weepie Even Tide comes into focus with none other than ND’s haunting vocalist Paul Kuhr crooning behind the mic. Culminating in a seven minute epic Truth where all their songwriting powers combine, The Storm Within is a mighty comeback from another talented band destined to resurrect this dearly departed genre.

I already did Wytch Hazel, so…

Warcrab - Scars of Aeons

Transcending Obscurity/Black Box Records (2017)

First cut Conquest thunders in on marching armies of drums and a seven-note scale, fuzzed up beyond belief. It sounds more evil than Hades himself reading Mein Kampf while using kittens as logs for his fireplace. Riding a groove that’ll rip the Bayou a new one, Warcrab’s debut is the absolute opposite of fucking around. It’s so simple yet so addictive, especially when they begin a spine-crushing churn of three (three!) guitarists in tandem, vocalist Martyn Grant cremating everything within earshot.

You’ll be floored by just how raw this union of old school death metal and sludge metal can get. On bass-dominant Destroyer of Worlds their triple-attack will rend everything you love into ash. Well, it feels that way. Scars of Aeons feels like the Eyehategod/My Dying Bride/Obituary collab we could never dream of but are sure glad exists. It will bulldoze your soul and leave nothing good behind. Just how we metalheads love it.

Tom Valcanis

21 July 2023

Blog

The Six Stacker - No Quarter Given

Tom Valcanis

21 July 2023

Blog

Once upon a time, album sales were the main source of income for a band so they could make even more on merch: now the merch is where money is made with album sales (or plays) coming a distant second. In fact, album sales has become merch - if you want physical media you have to pay 20x the going price for renting it on Spotify (per month, on average). Represses and reprints are the reserve of the boomer-beloved; Rod Stewart, Steely Dan, Dire Straits. If a band issues 100 copies of a digipak on Bandcamp and you find out through a mate’s blog a year after the fact, those copies are resting inside homes from Mumbai to Melbourne and all places in between and not yours. You missed out, son.

In fact, some people buy the LP or CD just to have - not as a useful conveyance for music playback. A friend I worked with on a project said he only “buys the CD to have in his collection” and never even plays it. CDs and LPs have become a curio more than a necessity. A piece of bragging rights to climb higher atop their peers on the mountain of cool. Me? Well, I’m just stubborn. That, and I just love holding something that’s intangible. It makes more sense in my head.

Dav Dralleon - Kthullu

Is there any wonder metalheads love synthwave? In the mid-2000s when extreme power metal band DragonForce burst on to the scene, it wasn’t uncommon to see their albums on ravers and EDM-heads (is that a thing?) iPods. If both camps gathered together protest style, we’d both be chanting: What do we want? Processed sounds! When do we want it? All the time!

Though metalheads and ravers seem like natural enemies, they’ve got way more in common than not. During that brief mid-2000s crossover, metalheads wouldn’t be out of place at a Venetian Snares or Infected Mushroom gig. Fast beats, twisted melodies, and large looming riffs - it’s what’s for dinner at both households.

The rise of the New Retro Wave of 80s synthpop has also led to a mini-revival of darker, metal-inspired EDM and psytrance referred to as “darksynth” or “metalsynth.” One of the original purveyors, Klayton of Celldweller fame is still producing great albums in this vein under new moniker Scandroid as well as releasing music by fellow travellers under his FiXT label.

Now comes French solo artist Dav Dralleon on second album Kthullu which is cybernetically augmented metal; as if people with robotic arms and legs were playing this hard and fast in a studio on the moon, to get even more hits in thanks to relaxed gravity. That’s exactly what we get: planet-sized riffs, glitched out robot synth lines, and blast beats big enough to wipe out the sun. Don’t say you weren’t warned.

Wachenfeldt - The Interpreter

Dr. Thomas von Wachenfeldt, Ph.D is an associate professor of musiciology at Umea University and part-time registered metal badass. Lucky for Tommy, his last name is more metal that mine could ever hope to be. Every riff and lick has a sense of polish; nothing out of place, everything balanced in perfect measure. Opener Spirits of the Dead is flailing drums and double-time riffs carved up by tasty, flowing leads as if Thor himself was loosing his blonde locks to the winds of Midgard.

Dr. Wachenfeldt is a master of deception - everything feels straightforward enough but like a serene duck atop a pond, the legs underneath are paddling like fury. As for his “interpretation” of black metal, it sits somewhere between Behemoth before Nergal did it for the ‘gram and Dimmu Borgir just went…well, weird. It’s creative, too Ut opens with a skull-crushing bass solo (gasp!) and drips in antipathy like blood does from ceilings. After someone has EXPLODED. Probably. It’s kind of like the prelude to Megadeth’s Rust in Peace…Polaris except the foreboding never really stops. If you like the extreme end of metal, give this one a spin. You won’t be disappointed. If only every music snob made music this good…

Insomnium - Anno 1696

Insomnium may not have invented Scandinavian sadboi melodeath, but they sure perfected it. Some ungenerous folk might say it hit a peak on 2005’s Above the Weeping World. Sloughing off their In Flames meets Children of Bodom by way of Sentenced tag around that time, their sombre, introspective brand of melodic death survived the 2010s wilderness and beyond with some solid yet middling albums. I mean, shit, I still bought them. Don’t listen to them much, though.

Anno 1696 is a concept about the black death, Christianity, and paganism and they play it like an epic musical, to a point. Opening with twinkling folk guitars, they segue into their trademark low-to-high note before blasting us in the face with blastbeats and fiery vocal attack. They’re trying to capture moods here, and they pretty much nail it. Bringing in throat-shredder Sakis Tolis (Rotting Christ, Thou Art Lord) for centrepiece death march White Christ is sort of like letting the devil off his leash to menace the track. Then heavenly voices decend from on high through a guitar hero-led Godforsaken; it’s all rather dramatic and engrossing.

Tracks like Lilian and Starless Paths are classic Insomnium fare; hard riffing led along by melancholy leads, lamenting loss and what could have been. Since In Flames have long vacated the acoustic crown, Insomnium more than fill out the rump on the beginning of Witch Hunter and “ballad” (of sorts) The Unrest which treads that Opeth line without going over into full 70s paisley and shag hair carpet territory (there’s a mellotron, though!) Nine albums down, they’re still making compelling melodeath. Only a handful of bands can lay claim to that.

LEIÞA - Reue

Avantgarde Music/Noisebringer Records (2023)

Yes friends - that’s not a “P” (or an R, in cyrillic…this is getting confusing) that’s a Þ - the long-forgotten Old English by way of Norse “thorn” pronounced “th”. So it’s not LEE-pah, it’s more like LEE-tha. You know, like the mythic river of forgetfulness. The sweet balm of blessing. Wait, that’s the wrong band. Anyway…

Leiþa makes vocal noises that occasionally resemble German, which automatically makes everything sound 1000% more evil. Sitting in the pocket of the PR-invented genre “atmo-black” (atmospheric black metal) which is supposed to signal more Agalloch than Anaal Nathrakh, so what the fuck would I know. It has its fair share of blast beats and guitars filling the fringes of the soundscape in a sweeping, epic vein, though it sounds way more “traditional” than ambient or whatever. Songs like Abgang and a waltz-like 3/4 time catch the ear way more often. Though it doesn’t pick up bear skins and torches like your average Saor or Primordial yet they don’t slip into neon-trimmed techno-suits ala Shade Empire or …And Oceans. It’s a constant tension between organic and technological elements, which makes the listen all the more intriguing.

Warcrab - Damned In Endless Night

India’s fastest growing extreme metal label has one secret of success: they don’t sign shit bands. Nearly every TO band on their roster have been one of quality; and the generous free downloads they give out with every physical release just means you get even more music to fall in love with. Oh, and their crazy UV gloss digipacks look fucking incredible. Their vinyl even more so. Also, label owner Kanal Choksi runs a stray animal shelter out of the TO offices. What a guy!

Back to UK’s Warcrab. A band that has a badass/dumbass name depending on how you look at it. Though on flrst blush these UK gloomsters are pure Sabbath worshippers, especially with languid Iommi-like leads scuzzing through monster tracks like In The Arms of Armageddon; but there’s more than meets your sacred ears. First proper track Halo of Flies looms large with a sturdy death n’ roll sound not too far removed from Edge of Sanity or Entombed, then they’ll slow it right down like we’re sloshing through a bayou on Abyssal Mausoleum, which fits into that cross-eyed, pickle-brained Eyehategod or Crowbar mould. Freewheeling jams are even thrown in (Unfurling Wings of Damnation) and it doesn’t take much to imagine thick reeds of green smoke curling around fretboards. With three guitarists in the mix, there’s new sonic nuggets to be unearthed on every listen. A monumental effort - can’t wait for their new album to drop within the month.

Sermon - Of Golden Verse

“Cinematic” - I suppose that word is overused in the same way “epic” is - but what is it about cinematic that people actually mean? Adam Sandler movies are released in a cinema. There they are, all flat lighting and boring locations. What I think people are trying to convey is the overwhelming force a cinematic experience can bring - expansive views, the translation of a titanic vision into moving pictures three times the size of our bodies. We are engulfed, immersed, mesmerised. Of Golden Verse is possessed of those qualities, even as drums march through Royal, dervish like as it pulses and speeds towards a near-carnal explosion of rage and melody. That’s hard to do in heavy metal; make it erotic insofar it touches at the core of our subliminal urges instead of our conscious desires. There are cues from all over prog and metaldom here, songs like Senescence’s minimal synths and yearning vocals recalling Agent Fresco, jazz-like riffs abounding like Soen by way of Katatonia. It hangs on with claws in your skin and refuses to let go, like any masterful album should. If you’re sleeping on these guys, wake the fuck up.