2017 Music Catch Up

Time to look back on all the nonsense I didn't talk about on this here blog; discussed in as little as one sentence.

Gruesome – Fragments of the Psyche EP

I was kind of looking forward to this EP and then I actually listened to it. I know everyone in the death metal scene thinks that Gruesome is the second coming of Christ, but with this new EP all they have shown is that they also like the Human/Symbolic era of Death just as much as they like the Spirtual Healing/Leprosy era. It's a fine EP, yes, but Gruesome cement once and for all that they have nothing more to offer me other than just piggy backing off Death.

Ahmi – S/T

I loved Ahmi's previous EP “The Friggin” and was really looking forward to this full LP, but unfortunately it falls into that awkward category of “not for me”. Ahmi does good work and there is some fantastic compositions here, but the tone is just wrong. I assume they wanted something more psychedelic and dream-like but it just ends up feeling overly long and dull. I would still keep an eye on Ahmi, as something more in line with “The Friggin” could mean one of the best math rock albums in a long while.

Mastodon – Cold Dark Place EP

Boring. Next.

The Crawling – Anatomy of Loss

Intense, heavy, and ultimately, incredibly depressing. The Crawling have put together one of the most lonely and bitter albums in recent memory, all dripping in the crunchy death/doom metal sound they have been slowly putting together over the last few years. The only things that keep this album from being perfect are the vocals which sometimes come across like “edgelord's first metal band” and the oppressively dreary nature of the album. As much as I like it, sometimes I don't want to come out of an album hopelessly depressed... you know, my default state.

Dying Fetus – Wrong One To Fuck With

I know everyone seems to really dig this record, but I just can't get into it. It's not that it's inaccessible or anything, I just feel I might have hit that point where Dying Fetus doing the same thing on every record has finally bored me and I'm ready for a change. How about a more grindy record next time? Remember when Dying Fetus was pure grind? That was cool.

Goatwhore – Vengeful Ascension

Hey guyz! Know what's really metal!!??? Taking out all of our mids to make our sound as bland and washed out as possiblE!!! yea that is too br0Tal! (This is actually a decent record otherwise).

Power Trip – Nightmare Logic

I really like this album but again, I'm going to throw it in the “not for me” category. It's got the crossover thrash sound down, but I just prefer my crossover thrash to be a bit more cheesy and light-hearted. Honestly though, if you enjoy Toxic Holocaust you'd probably love this record.

Dead Cross – S/T

look guyz we can be HARDCOREEEEE!!!!111!!!

Accept – The Rise of Chaos

Accept has been making good records for the last 5 years or so, go listen to this.

Tankard – One Foot In The Grave

Much like Accept, Tankard's strength has always been in their reliability to put out good material, and One Foot In The Grave is no different. It's got a little bit of a humorous side, poking fun at the band's age, but overall this another solid, if underwhelming, record to add in their discography.

Pigeons Playing Ping Pong – Pizazz

I listened to a few tracks off these guys' last record “Pleasure” and was happy enough to give this a listen, and just couldn't find myself loving it. I think it's because these guys play pretty hard to the style of funk rather than doing something a bit more experimental. I keep thinking of the funk and Ska genres, so content to use the same predictable guitar patterns for every verse, then look at this record and think... yeah sure, but what else do you got? Love that name though.

Scale The Summit – In A World of Fear

This isn't my favorite Scale The Summit record (that still probably goes to The Migration) but there is something remarkably different about this album. It's songs are more dry and lonely rather than the sweeping, uplifting melodies and rhythms of past records. It's certainly a different approach to their music and it's a style I quite enjoy. Honestly, if they do something similar on their next record I might get tired of it, but for now it's a nice change of pace.

Black Dahlia Murder – Nightbringers

Oh boy I certainly wanted to listen to the same album for the 500^th time.

F.K.U. - 1981

I was expecting average and I got slightly above average. Not bad for a thrash band on its 5^th album I guess.

King Gizzard & The Lizard Wizard – Flying Microtonal Banana

This isn't bad but I thought King Gizzard was supposed to be experimental?

King Gizzard & The Lizard Wizard – Murder of The Universe

I said experimental not boring.

King Gizzard & The Lizard Wizard – Sketches of Brunswick East

BOOOOO!

King Gizzard & The Lizard Wizard - Polygondwanaland

Ok so the reason I've been so down on King Gizzard's output this year is because despite my respect for the band trying something new on each new LP, they don't experiment enough with a concept, then end up looking like pretentious hipsters. Polygondwanaland goes back to basics with a simple, jammy, catchy psych rock style and it works wonders. It's not King Gizzard at their most complex, but it's easily the best out of their 2017 output.

King Gizzard & The Lizard Wizard – Gumboot Soup

Dear god am I glad I wait until early January to finish these things. Anyways this is... Ok. It's nowhere near my favorite King Gizzard record, but overall it just felt kinda lacking. The Great Chain of Being, meanwhile dips into stoner/doom metal, which is something the band has never really attempted. Surrounding this and one or two other decent tracks (“All is Known” comes to mind) are more spacey filler tracks that just don't have the weight of similar tracks in their discography. Maybe I'll like it if I listen to it a little bit more, but for now it's kind of a letdown.

Chon – Homey

As I've been writing over the last few years, I found my greatest flaw is trying to describe/recommend an album even though it's just the same record as last time, and I often condemn artists for not taking more risks. Homey is the album that brought this thought to the forefront of my mind. All the good things about Chon still remain, and the few times where the group does step outside of their comfort zone (see: Nayhoo) it scares people like me off. So go listen to Chon even though I really can't tell you why.

Cannibal Corpse – Red Before Black

More like Bad Before Suck. *airhorns playing All Star by Smash Mouth*

Info Wars – The Answer to 1984 is 1776

This one gets a recommendation more for the context around it rather than the actual quality of the music. Info Wars (not to be confused with the hate speech radio show run by Alex Jones) is the politically charged grindcore side project from Texas Toast Chainsaw Massacre. It's grindcore at its most raw and unwelcoming. Lots of screaming, unintelligible lyrics, and harsh noisy guitars. Yet, what makes it work is the very obvious and not least bit subtle parody of Info Wars (that's the show not the band, man this is getting confusing) is the political talk show version of grindcore. It's the most smart joke, from the worlds dumbest band and I can't get enough of it.

Direct Hit & Pears – Human Movement (Split)

Probably the only good punk album I heard all year. Pears is a group I've been waiting for more material from for a while, so I'm more than pleased with this record.

No Use For A Name – Rarities: The Covers Vol. 1

Normally I don't put cover albums on here, but I wanted an excuse to talk about Tony Sly. No Use For A Name was a band I got into just after Tony Sly's passing and it was unfortunate that I had no chance to talk about his work. If you want some solid punk rock with some of the best songwriting in the genre, go listen to No Use For A Name. This cover album is also some of the bands best work, with their “Dream Police” cover being one of the best covers I've heard in a while.

Kamero – Absence Paradox

I also like Tool... not as much as you guys apparently...

Green Day – Back In The USA (Single)

It's bland, it's uninspired, it's basic... it's better than all of Revolution Radio at least. Neat music video though.

Weezer – Pacific Daydream

I'll be 100% honest and say I didn't actually listen to this album at all... but Weezer's recent discography has been nothing but disappointing, so I'm just going to take a risk and say it's bad. Feel free to fill my inbox with poorly worded messages about how I'm wrong.

Texas Toast Chainsaw Massacre – ReLoadED (EP)

Texas Toast do what they do best and take stuff that isn't crossover and make it crossover, this time, a handful of tracks from Metallica's ReLoad. I hesitate to call this EP “good”, but what makes it work is Texas Toast's ongoing commitment to doing something new and interesting, as well as goofy. I will say that “The Memory Remains” is easily a standout for being so easily converted into a punky jam.

Iron Reagan – Crossover Ministry

You know, I don't like Tony Foresta as a vocalist (I've made this clear in the past) but I've had a lot of respect for Iron Reagan. Compared to Municipal Waste, which always had this squeaky clean, SFW crossover thrash vibe, Iron Reagan always seemed like a more genuine and exciting alternative. Think Pop Punk vs. Hardcore Punk. It's been a while since I've heard the rest of Iron Reagan's discography, so I don't have a strong point of reference for how this compares to their catalog, but I really enjoyed Crossover Ministry. The raw production is great, the riffs are still stupid fast and angry giving the whole thing a S.O.D. meets Morbid Angel vibe, it's just a ton of fun.

The Foo Fighters – Concrete and Gold

A little less concrete and a little more gold next time! (rekt)

Queens of The Stone Age – Villains

I'm not exactly up to date on QOTSA's discography, so I don't know if this is what they've been doing lately, but this is more of a pop rock album than an alt rock one. Like Queen without the blues and Iggy Pop without the all the weird. It's just kind of bland and soft. Where's the anger and cynicism that made Rated R and Songs For The Deaf so brutal?

DMX – Rudolph The Red Nosed Reindeer

HA HA AHA HAHA! *inhale* HAHAHAHAH! This is real. Dog Master Xtreme made a fucking Rudolph cover. I'm not even shitting on it, I just find it hilarious.

Shadow of Intent – Reclaimer

Props to these guys for putting out a whole LP of new material so quickly but it has the exact same problems as their last record which is that the band has so much talent but wants to show off every bit of their talent in every song, and as a result end up making their songs more bloated and exhausting then they should be. If everything was a little bit tighter and more compact I think these guys could really do something great, because there are so many moments in this album (fantastic solos, great instrumentation) where I'm just blown away by the sheer talent on display, but can't enjoy it as a whole because the entire album is just too much.

Harlott – Extinction

That's some damn good thrash we got here. It's not exactly trend setting but boy is it a skull cracker.

Game Over – Rise To Supremacy

Game Over? Thank God.

The Bombpops – Fear of Missing Out

I'd say the 2000's called but you obviously grabbed your valuer shirt and bedazzled jeans and got in your car before the phone even finished ringing.

Electric Wizard – Wizard Bloody Wizard

Ehhh... a little too slow for my taste.

xSPONGEXCOREx - Stop Laughing You Fools!

Uhhhhhhhhh...

Uhhhhhhhhh...

UHHHHHH...

Yeah I fucks wit dis.

Goolagoon & Antichrist Demoncore – Split

So I actually enjoy both of these bands (though their power violence is still a bit too noisy for my taste) but Goolagoon uses the Spongebob label as nothing more than a gimmick. It's a shame they felt the need to stand out with a gimmick because their music is surprisingly gripping.

Rob Scallon – The Scene is Dead

If you don't know who Rob Scallon is, he's that guy your wimp friend sent you who plays Slayer on banjos and what not. In addition to putting out some fantastic YouTube videos, Scallon also makes some pretty fantastic music. The Scene is Dead is his first (to my knowledge) true metal album, filled with all his talent as a guitarist thrown headfirst into the metal genre. It's rough, it's nasty, it's heavy, it's something I can't get enough of. Go listen to it, if you're a fan of instrumental death/djent that is.

Arcadea – S/T

Ehhhh... I don't know... for a band touting themselves as metal/electronica, I was expecting something a little more... I dunno... dynamic? This just seems a little bland and basic for what they seem to be shooting for.

Motorpsycho – The Tower

This is... beautiful. Maybe it's a little too long for my taste, but yeah this is some pretty good prog rock here.

The Atomic Bitchwax – Force Field

Love that name, BTW. Really fun, fast stoner rock. It's got a Queen of The Stone Age meets Sound Garden vibe. I dig it.

Shining (Nor) – Everything Dies

So this song is fine. It's got a strong beat, good vocals, solid production, what's missing is all the weird avant-gard black metal/jazz music this band has been doing for the bast several years. Again, it's not a bad track, but why give up on all the weird technical stuff you've been doing for so long? I just don't go to a hooker for a back rub, you know?

Morbid Angel – Kingdoms Disdained

Wow... this may just be more bland and uninspired than Cannibal Corpse's recent album... and that's a fucking feat.

Archspire – Relentless Mutation

I'll be honest, I was pretty excited when I first listened to this, but with each subsequent listen, I started caring less and less for it. It's a fantastic tech death album, but it's so exhausting. Some songs on the later half of the album break up the pace, but the album as a whole is just too much too fast for me. Shout-out to the title track for being a real standout, however.

Toothgrinder – Phantom Amour

I was kinda into this but I don't know... I was expecting something with a little bit more... teeth? I kinda just went in one ear and out the other with this one.

The I.L.Y.'s – Bodyguard

Wow this blows. Awful, muddy production while also lacking in all the progressive rock/noise rock elements that made “Scum With Boundries” one of my favorites from last year. That opening track is real catchy, but the production on this album is so gross and muddy, it makes every other track so boring and shitty. Listen to the first track then move on.