2015 finds

Originally this was going to be a post about my Sept. 30, 2015 finds, but I mixed some CDs from subsequent trips in together with that stack.  So screw it, this will just be a general late 2015 finds post.  A buck each unless otherwise noted:

Apocalyptica - How Far CD-single
Single with 4 versions of "Quutamo" (the instrumental and 3 vocal versions in different languages).  Not a particularly heavy song even by Apocalyptica standards, but the music is catchy.  The vocal versions are superfluous, which is the case with all Apocalyptica material I've heard that has vocals.  The singing always tends to be a distraction from the whole concept of emulating guitar-based song structure with cellos.

Arena - Contagious 
Progressive rock EP.   It's been ages since I've heard them, but this seems a little heavier and less Marillion-y than their earlier material.  Still not my cup of tea, so to the trade pile it goes.

Bad Wizard - Free and Easy
Retro rock. The band name (and to a lesser extent, the look of the CD) scream stoner rock, but the major influence here is MC5 and the late '60s/early '70s Michigan rock scene in general.  Last track has a very AC/DCish feel.

D.C. Cooper - self-titled
Diverse album with power metal/melodic metal, hard rock, and progressive metal oriented material.  The guy is a great vocalist but I've never been overwhelmed by any of the bands he's been involved with.  This is more varied than his work with either Royal Hunt or Silent Force and doesn't seem as immediately engaging.  The cover of Uriah Heep's "Easy Livin'" is alright but I prefer the more faithful W.A.S.P. version. 

Devian - Ninewinged Serpent
Saw this in the $2.50 bin and waited for it to be marked down.  Black/death with Legion on vox.  I keep seeing this described as having a strong thrash component or being thrashy, which I think is a huge overexaggeration--there may be some thrashy parts here and there but I think the faster sections owe a lot more to older melodic death metal than to thrash.  Left no lasting impression on me, but worth the buck.

Die Happy - Volume II
I was hoping for some trace of the Vengeance Rising sound, but unfortunately this is groove-laden hard rock.  The style reminds me of the de-glammed early '90s output of a lot of the hair bands.

Embercrow - Blacklight Wanderers
Melancholic/gothic rock.  They wait until halfway through the album to bring out limited guttural vox--there's a death/doom part in track 5, and then they're used again on track 9 which feels more like typical gothic doom.  Ultimately this seems to fall in a genre-straddling grey area.  While the distorted guitars push this towards metal and away from typical gothic rock, I don't think it really has enough characteristics to be classified as metal overall.

Fear Factory - Live on the Sunset Strip
3-track live EP, all songs are from Archetype.  Never cared about the band, and this doesn't encourage me to start.

Genghis Tron - Dead Mountain Mouth
Like Opeth before they went full progressive rock or any number of modern bands, this band's gimmick is the juxtaposition of extreme and non-extreme musical styles that are typically considered incongruous.  In this case they mix heavier stuff (mostly blasting grindcore) with various types of minimalist electronica.

As the album goes on it really suffers from lowest common denominator syndrome where there are all sorts of various hardcore, metal, and post-rock influences thrown in without any coherence.  The track "White Walls" even has a brief intro riff that sounds very black metal (unfortunately it lasts all of 7 seconds).  So rather than being some sort of oddball electronica-infused grindcore, the band just cycles through a mishmash of stuff, which some morons will no doubt defend as "open-minded" and "progressive."

All of the vocals are hysterical grind screaming (I actually expected a band like this to foray into more varied/oddball vocals) which gets annoying.  Because of this I was able to give the instrumental track "Warm Woods" a more attentive listen.  It came off a little bit better than the other material, but
ultimately this comes off as a contrived effort to be weird and unique just to attract gawkers and musically spastic rubbernecks.

Golden Dawn - The Art of Dreaming
This is the Napalm rerelease from 2003.  At first, I didn't even realize this was a reissue of the first album due to the new cover, which is an interesting concept but looks like it should be on some gothic band's album (I should add that the original cover isn't really any better).

Fast-paced black metal with lots of atmospheric intros and interludes.  These vary in style, but the majority of them are epic or martial sounding symphonic pieces.  As a comparison to other Austrian Black Metal Syndicate bands, many of these passages would have fit well with Summoning's music (Dol Guldur/Nightshade Forests era) and they are somewhat similar to a few of the more epic Pazuzu tracks, minus the darkwave influences and spoken word stuff.  As I said though, these sections are varied--for example, the intro to "Sub Specie Aeternitatis" quickly turns into EDM.

Unlike the later Golden Dawn albums where there was more integration and mixing of metal/non-metal elements, I like that for the most part, the black metal sections and atmospheric sections are kept distinct and separate here, yet are both done well.

Guapo - Black Oni
No familiarity with the band whatsoever--bought this solely because it was on Ipecac and I figured I could trade it.  An extremely dark take on Mellotron-infused '70s prog rock, with some passages even bordering on dark ambient.   Interesting stuff.

(In certain ways this reminds me of what I envisioned Goblin to sound like before I actually heard them.  With their horror movie soundtrack pedigree, I expected something quite evil and haunting, maybe even a sort of embryonic Death SS/Black Hole style.  Instead, most of Goblin's material was rather upbeat and in the vein of comparatively "normal" prog).

Mattsson - Another Dimension
As with the D.C. Cooper album above (of course, I got them in the same trip), extremely varied album.  I guess it's easiest to classify it as progressive metal overall, although with a neoclassical/shred edge due to Mattsson's guitar playing, as well as more power metallish and hard rock influences.  Björn Lodin on vocals here, and I'm certainly not the first to compare the raspiness of his voice to Rod Stewart.

Meat Hook - Order of the Dragon
No clear indication of what this was.  Initially I was inclined to think industrial/ambient/gothic due to the band name, album title, and Vlad the Impaler bio on the booklet's back cover.  It looked like there was a chance of metal, as all three bandmembers are longhairs, but there's also a song called "Funky Butt Lovin."  I went ahead and gambled on it, but it turns out this is groovy hard rock from '95.  Some heavy guitar here and there, but no metal to be found.

Queens of the Stone Age - Go with the Flow CD-single 
Never really checked them out before, so this is the first time I've seriously listened to them.  I was expecting this to be very Kyuss-like due to the participation of a certain ex-member.  Unfortunately it's not, so this ends up being trade fodder.

Thought Industry - Black Umbrella
Have yet to hear the band's first album (fingers crossed it shows up in the bargain bins), but it sounds like it's thrashy enough to interest me.  This, on the other hand, is weird, multi-influenced, proggy alt. rock.  No thanks.

Tokyo Dragons - Give Me the Fear
The cool comic-style artwork enticed me to check this out.  Wasn't quite sure where on the rock spectrum this would fall.  It's retro style hard rock.  I think they miss out on a lot of opportunities to make the music interesting. They're not horrible, but there's no reason to choose this over the myriad of superior albums available.  '70s hard rock is the clear influence here, but they don't emulate the '70s sound to such an overt degree that it becomes a point of interest (except perhaps for "Let It Go"--I don't like the song, but it stands out as being extremely Kiss-like).  It's not dirty or heavy enough to be appealing in a metallic way, but it's not catchy or anthemic enough to be appealing in a commercial way.  The best song here is easily "Teenage Screamers" for its total Motörhead intro and cool solo section (this CD is in dire need of more Thin Lizzy style harmonized twin guitar attacks).  Following track "Ready or Not" is also pretty Motörheadish.  Still, not impressed enough to want to hang on to this.

Shock Rock Hellions - A Tribute to W.A.S.P. (2006)

Most of this makes Dwell's Show No Mercy tribute CD look great, with poor vocal peformances abound.  Rather surprised no one took a stab at "I Wanna Be Somebody."

1. Dracena - Animal (Fuck Like a Beast)
Fine musically--I think this song is actually well suited for a more extreme cover.  However, it's immediately obvious the vocals are female and they bring things down tremendously.

2. Denial of God - Hellion
First, let me say I have always wished this band's music was better.  Tornado was a consistently good 'zine, they made some interesting lyrical theme and cover song choices, and I agree with most of the viewpoints presented in their interviews.  Unfortunately, the majority of their music strikes me as mediocre black metal, and they show a disturbing lack of metal sense sometimes (ie pictures on the first mCD).

Anyway, this is a simplified version of my favorite W.A.S.P. song with unenthusiastic BM vocals.

3. Stos - L.O.V.E. Machine
Disappointing coming from such a veteran band.  The tempo is slightly slower and makes everything seem off, and the heavily accented vocals are very distracting.

4. Holy Death - Running Wild in the Streets
Seems to have good potential at first, but once those vocals start...I'm not big on the original's vocals, but the croaking/growling here just doesn't work.

5. Ceremonial Castings - Sleeping in the Fire
Starts out corny, with the vocals at the beginning sounding like someone trying to parody a male with a deep voice.  Becomes a black metal cover which isn't great but at least feels more enthusiastic than some of the other offerings.  It seems like the guitar solos were played on synth, which I was initially going to scoff at, but they're pretty faithfully played and I'll fully admit that it's a wiser choice than attempting a bad guitar version.

6. Blackies - Rock and Roll to Death
This is an Italian W.A.S.P. cover band, so musically the cover is very good even though it's later W.A.S.P. material I don't care about.  Unfortunately, this is also an Italian W.A.S.P. cover band with shrill female vocals.

7. Victimizer - Tormentor
Serviceable extreme metal version.   Nothing particularly special though, so it's very telling when this is still one of the best songs on the tribute.

8. This Tangled Web - The Headless Children
Fantastic interpretation musically.  I think they were going for a doom/death version but it definitely brings Tony Martin-era Sabbath to mind.  On the downside, the main vocals are a bit too croaky and hoarse, making me wish they had just used generic DM or BM vocals.

9. Impaler - On Your Knees
Rise of the Mutants had snotty, punkish vocals which were pretty tolerable there.  Here they've morphed into lameness with a silly hickish inflection to boot (this should have been listed as "On Yo' Knees").

10. Captain T & Ostronomy - The Real Me
Yeah, technically a cover of The Who (at least the liner notes correctly credit Pete Townshend).  The vocals have a definite Paul Stanley vibe to them, although the singer throws in some exaggerated over the top mannerisms which mimic what Blackie does even though he doesn't sound like him.  This has much more of a freewheeling rock'n'roll atmosphere than the W.A.S.P. version.  As a The Who cover it's pretty good.

11. Crystal Viper - Wild Child
Overall, pretty good, although it's sorely missing the rawness of Blackie's voice.

12. Exekrator - The Flame
Has those stupid shrill vocals a lot of their own material suffers from, which make this sound like a parody version.