June 3, 2016 finds

All of the day's discs were a buck each.

First stop was a book and music sale.  I wouldn't classify any finds there as spectacular, although some of the eclectic finds meant I did better than usual at these kinds of sales.

Apocalyptica - Wagner Reloaded - Live in Leipzig
More compelling than a lot of their later studio material, but that said, I'd just as soon listen to a real Wagner piece than this.

Despair - Pattern Life
Hardcore.  Trade fodder.

The Silverhounds - Nevermore
I bought this solely because a) it was brand new and b) the drummer had on an Adicts shirt, and I thought it might be tradeable punk.  Mix of punk, metal, and psychobilly.  The vocals are a semi-clean crooning (not as Danzig-like as that might imply) closer to something from a horror punk or gothic band.  

I wasn't very optimistic since the album starts out with a heavy chugga chugga riff and upon closer examination the guitarist sports Machine Head and Black Dahlia Murder patches.  On the one hand, I was surprised how much metal influence this showed off at times, although most of it is in the form of modern thrash style riffing which I don't think would be terribly interesting taken out of this context. The one exception is the title track, which has a cool speed metal main riff and some nice soloing.  Not up my alley enough to keep, though.  I can't help but think this is what SuicideGirls/Burning Angel type chicks consider to be metal.

Scythe - The Seventh Day CD-R
Normally I don't bother with CD-Rs, but the price was right.   Wasn't expecting much based on the cheap-looking, silly cover.  In theory, the Grim Reaper giving a sermon could be a cool concept (not as cool as the Grim Reaper crashing through a stained glass window on a motorcycle, though), but it looks like he only attracts the crudely drawn dregs of society to church.  The band logo also looks a little odd, as if they cobbled together letters from various logos including a very plain H.  The S looks suspiciously similar to Sadus'.

The first song starts off deceptively with a slow-paced intro/buildup reminiscent of something off Morbid Angel's "Covenant," so I had no idea what I was in for, but thankfully they settle into orthodox thrashing.  The middle two tracks are the best--the title track reminds me of some of the more underground late '80s crossover-tinged west coast thrash that was prominent after the initial Bay Area explosion had fizzled out.  "The Virus" has more of a Germanic thrash feel--reminds me a bit of the second Vendetta album, maybe?  Their strongest material feels genuinely old and doesn't really have the telltale modern missteps that plague a lot of retrothrash.  I think I would be hard-pressed to identify those middle tracks as being from 2009 if I didn't know beforehand.

Seekers Pass - The Sands of Time
Just looking at the disc, nothing conclusively metal about this, but I went ahead and bought it, realistically expecting it to be prog. rock.  But this turned out to be prog. metal and can be counted as one of my rare successes on a blind purchase.  The main influence here is early '90s Fates Warning, although the mellower sections are definitely more Queensrÿche-ish, and the vocals lean towards being more Tate-like than Alder-like. One disappointment about it, though--the song "Denying Reality" opens with a cool galloping riff (my favorite part of the entire disc) and I excitedly thought it was going to be some Arch-era Fates Warning worship, but it segues into stuff more like the rest of the disc.  Oh well.

Shred Bettie - Born Again
One of the few obvious indie releases at the sale, so I bought it for trade fodder.  Wasn't expecting metal, but the band name made me think it might be retro-hairband type stuff.  Female-fronted rock.

Whitecross - In the Kingdom
Trade fodder.  Just a Christian version of hair band music with the obligatory ballads, even less heavy than their earlier Ratt-ish stuff.  Oddly some of the vocal phrasings give off a Lizzy Borden vibe.

Then went to hit up one of my usual bargain bins, and came away with quite a varied stack of collection filler:

Alcoholics Unanimous - 20 Years of Tanked Up Tunes 
Had never heard of AU before and figured it was punk.  While it is a project of the core duo from Rancid Vat, the gimmick here is drinking songs, both originals and covers, so very little of the music is actual punk.  I found the entire CD of this stuff very tedious, and it's probably material that is best left for novelty EPs or as joke tracks on punk/hc recordings.  Jeff Clayton of ANTiSEEN does vocals for the last couple of tracks (the Dixie Fried EP).

Astra - The Black Chord
70s-style progressive rock.  Knowing nothing about the band, the Metal Blade and Rise Above logos geared me up to expect psychedelic doom or stoner rock.  So even while not metal, I suppose I came out ahead.

Diapsiquir - Virus S.T.N.
Industrial-laden black metal with all sorts of disparate elements added.  I have the 2CD with their demos but I couldn't remember the music, so I had to go back and check if they started out being so experimental.  Their early stuff flirts with some ideas, but this disc just goes overboard.  Certain things I don't mind, like the sampling or their rendition of The Godfather theme, but the vocals (usually shouted-in-French main vocals and several sorts of lame "hysterical" additional vox) and histrionic tangents they go off on feel like failed attempts to seem crazy and schizophrenic.  It just comes off as silly and heavy-handedly avant-garde to me.  When more traditional BM elements show up they are generally appealing (the doomy riff at the beginning of "Organisation Contamination" is probably the best part of the disc), but they're way too sparse.  Glad I didn't have to pay more than a buck for this.

Michael Fath - Suspended Animation
I bought this in case it was (and hoping for) shred, but it's instrumental rock guitar stuff.  There's nothing remotely heavy on the disc until the end (I'll get to that in a minute), but I enjoyed the mellower material on the disc--the classically styled "JoLaurel : Dantz" and the dreamy "In Memory of Little Danny"--more.  Still wouldn't have been a keeper.  However, the store's price tag/UPC label covered up the bottom of the tracklisting, so unbeknownst to me when buying it, the last track turns out to be a cover of "Highway Star."   It's quite a good one at that, so I may hold on to this for now.

Humangled - Odd Ethics
Death metal, just a short mCD.  They play around with a lot of different tempos, even within single songs, but they're not at all technical or progressive like that might imply.  At times they have a groovy, somewhat death'n'roll feel.

In This Moment - Sick Like Me CD-single
Trade fodder.  I was aware of them but had never actually heard their music, and based on their fanbase alone knew this certainly wasn't going to be metal, even if misrepresented as such.  I was actually expecting female-fronted -core stuff, but this is nu-rock (the title track also has some clean-vocalled Evanescence-like sections). 

Lecherous Nocturne - The Age of Miracles Has Passed
For some reason--obviously the initials, duh--whenever I see the band name I initially immediately think of Lestregus Nosferatus, the Hallow's Eve related band that put out a couple of demos.  Generic death metal.  No memorability for me at all.

Ozzy Osbourne - Blizzard of Ozz
Old Jet Records press.  I was surprised to see it for just a buck since initially it looked to be in pretty good condition, although when I got home I realized someone initialed the cover.  Oh well, probably would have bought it anyway.  Hadn't listened to the original album in a while (much less an unremastered version) and I honestly forgot a lot of the nuances on it.  I like certain aspects of all of the first 4 Ozzy albums but this is probably the strongest overall.

Ozzy Osbourne - Ozzmosis (2002 remaster)
"Perry Mason" is great of course, and is the last thing Ozzy's done that I've cared about.  Overall No More Tears presented better examples of commercially viable songs and ballads than the material here, and it wasn't even that good of an album.  One of the remaster bonus tracks, "Whole World's Fallin' Down," is marginally better than most of the other songs since it has more of an Ultimate Sin feel.

Pain of Salvation - Entropia
This isn't my preferred type of progressive metal (I prefer the '80s stuff that is basically traditional HM with some minor progressive tendencies--with a huge emphasis on the metal over the progressive), but I liked the album a little more than I expected.  While I appreciate the musicianship and quirkiness here, it's more of an interesting listen than an actively enjoyable one.   This is something I would put on as mellow background music.

Soilwork - The Early Chapters
5-track EP.  Earlier Soilwork is listenable but I never considered them to be one of the better Swedish melodic DM bands, so let's go straight to the 2 covers, which are the most interesting tracks anyway.  Deep Purple's "Burn" is enjoyable instrumentally but the extreme main vox and backing female vox just don't work.  I have the Mercyful Fate tribute disc the "Egypt" cover was originally on and I couldn't even remember their version at all even though I like the original.  It comes off as bland, as if they discarded everything interesting about the song when converting it to a melodic DM style.  They don't attempt to mimic King's vocals, which I'm not necessarily against since it can be treacherous ground to venture in, but obviously they are an integral part of the original song and they don't do anything to make up for that loss.

Stainless Steel - Red Heat Within
Power metal, the day's best find.

Hammer Down: The Tribute to Motörhead 
Crimson Mask Rec. re-release of the Dead Forever tribute originally on Dwell.  I was never able to pick up the original tribute, so I can't complain about finding this for a buck, although it's disappointing the packaging is even more generic now--especially the skull/iron cross artwork (which is a shame considering the Dead Forever cover was at least an attempt at a Snaggletooth homage).

1. Coffin Texts - Steal Your Face
Definitely the best of the extreme-styled covers on here.  While more DM styled vocals aren't the best fit for Motörhead, the rest of the cover compensates.

2. Deceased - Stay Clean
Quite good (of course), musically the closest cover to the original.  Only cover I had previously heard.

3. Hate Theory - Bad Religion
Not awful, but disappointing given the underrated song choice.  Starts out like it might be okay, but has very forced vocals in multiple styles, and adds some needless downtuned chug parts.

4. Acheron - (Don't Need) Religion
Kinda boring.  Not awful though, I was expecting much worse. 

5. Hostile Intent - Ace of Spades
What the hell is this?  Nearly unrecognizable except for the chorus.    It's not like it's bad in a sloppy, off the cuff way either--it sounds like a) the band only casually knew the song and took many liberties with it or b) they couldn't play it and overly simplified it.  Doesn't sound right to begin with, and has awful Anselmo aggro vocals on top of it.  Easily worst cover on here, and as far as I can remember, the worst recorded "Ace of Spades" cover I've heard.

6. Vile - Love Me Like a Reptile
I should point out that most people think the Vile here and on Dwell's Kiss tribute is the CA death metal band, but it's the NYC band.  Doomy/stoner rock version.  Interesting interpretation, but the vocals are a bit too weird and off-putting, particularly the moaned, drawn-out chorus.  Weirdest/most unconventional cover due to the vox.

7. Blood Coven - Deaf Forever
The synth intro made me fear that they were going to try to inject this with corny atmosphere, then the song started and it seemed okay; of course, they show up again for the chorus.  Would have been a decent extreme cover version without the invasive synths and black metal backing vox.

8. Tchort - The Chase Is Better Than the Catch
Straight-up cover.  Quite faithful to the original but the singer has much cleaner vox than Lemmy's, giving it a bit of a different feel.

9. Tyrant - Killed By Death
I had totally forgotten the California Tyrant did a bunch of Dwell tribute covers until I saw the Mays listed while I was looking at the liner notes!  Vocals are surprisingly rough and not up to usual Tyrant standards, even compared to King of Kings (to say nothing of the band's '80s LPs).  Aside from the vox, good cover.

10. Noctuary - Iron Fist
Not the best BM vocals I've heard, but energetic cover, way better than expected.

11. Engrave - (We Are) the Road Crew
Mixed bag.  There's a weird dual vocal style here, with gruff semi-DM main vocals and higher backing vocals in sync.  It sounds like they were using them in tandem for a more Lemmy-like delivery, but it just seems odd to me.  I probably would have enjoyed it more with standard extreme vox.  Musically it's fine, and I thought it was fun that they speed up for the solo section.

12. Decay of Salvation - Motorhead
Kinda hard to recognize, didn't translate well as death metal.

13. Black Witchery - Overkill
Good cover, and they wisely opted for a more faithful cover that sounds nothing like their own material.  Tempo seems a bit slower than the original.  I do appreciate they're the only band that even attempted to emulate Lemmy's vocals.

Ritual Carnage - I, Infidel (2005)

Cost: $1.99

Previously the only Ritual Carnage album I heard/owned was The Highest Law, so skipping right to this was quite a departure from that debut...especially with the vocals here. We'll get to that. Most of the death metal overtones and influences are gone, and the sound is slicker, cleaner, a bit more technical, and less overtly old school sounding.

I'm curious to know what the hell happened with the vocals. Let's not pretend otherwise--they're wimpy sounding. They're nasal and sound unnaturally high, like perhaps they were tinkered with/processed in some way, and then the delivery itself seems stilted. I suppose to a certain broad "weird vocals in thrash" degree they could be compared to Sean Killian's, but I don't mind the Vio-lence vocals that much. These are far more monotonous, distracting, and weird in a negative way.

The vocal style is so ridiculous I actually went to Youtube to listen to the 2nd and 3rd albums just to see if it was a gradual change or not. The vox on the 2nd album are like the debut. The Birth of Tragedy vocals shifted to a tough talk style, and while they don't have the highness, they do have that same somewhat artificial/overproduced feel.

The music itself pretty straightforward contemporary thrash, ie a modernized take on classic influences.  So it's not '80s emulation, but they haven't succumbed to groove or Panteraisms. A couple sections bring to mind newer/00s+ Sodom, with more intricate lead/solo work. It may be partially because of their shift to a cleaner production style, but in general this has a feeling similar to the better thrash reunion albums.  There's an obvious homage to "Hell Awaits" at 0:18 of the title track, and one of the riffs in "Twilight of the All Too Human" is a sped-up "War Ensemble" riff.

Divine Sin - Thirteen Souls (1997)

Cost: 99¢

Black Mark was responsible for some rather lame modern stuff in the '90s (Soulquake System probably being the biggest offender), but with two members in Mercyful Fate shirts here I wasn't terribly worried.  Don't recall if I had any particular musical expectations when buying this. 

Even though the core of the music is somewhat groovy thrash, I hear lots of death metal sensibilities in the guitarwork (not a big surprise considering the DM background of several members).  While I can easily see many of the riffs being used in death metal songs,  the band never actually crosses into being actual DM or even death/thrash.  The last few tracks are more straightforward thrash in a contemporary late '90s style--some grooviness, but nothing to an annoying degree.

The main vocals are gruff, but thankfully they're not aggro/toughtalk, nor are they full on DM-style vox.  The vocalist also often uses a deep, semi-operatic style which immediately brings to mind a less accomplished Messiah Marcolin.  It is interesting that when they're used, I get an immediate mournful Candlemass vibe, even though there's nothing particularly doomy about the guitar tone or music as a whole.