Keymaster - The Lords of Everything (2005)

Cost: $2.00

The album name and several of the songtitles here are clearly meant to be facetious (the band name is kind of corny too, although I could totally see a band using it unironically).  I picked this up not quite knowing if this was a case of a band not taking themselves too seriously, or whether it was just complete parody stuff.  I was kind of expecting super-technical or avant-garde stuff that just played on metal cliches.

The music is straight up, mostly fast-paced power/heavy metal, but the opening song uses goofy high vocals, peppered with even more ridiculously exaggerated falsettos that are obviously a send-up of high-pitched metal singers. The vocals seem to be less irritating in general after that first track and the vocalist is actually decent when he chooses to be, although unnecessarily silly high parts are never that far away.

Due to the generally faster tempos, shredding/soloing styles, and general feel of the music, I wonder if some of the material was less influenced directly from power and heavy metal, and more from deconstructing those influences in melodic death metal.  There are definitely times where the music has a strong melodic death metal vibe...But, well...Without the death.

Even with better/serious vocals, I doubt this would rate anything beyond "just OK" for me.  But hey, it's way better than KeyDragon at least...

Grandexit - The Dead Justifies the Means (2013)

Cost: 99¢

I wish bands/labels would realize that yes, aesthetics mean nothing if your music is crap, but they can mean everything if I've never heard of your band.  Initially I was going to skip over this because it was on Lifeforce and just looked like generic metalcore/HC.  I looked up the band on metal-archives at the store and they were listed as death/thrash, so I went ahead and bought it.  Further online info was very conflicted and made me pessimistic.  I saw it described as both deathcore and death metal in various reviews, with The Black Dahlia Murder mentioned a lot.  The label itself touted it as a blend of progressive rock and death metal, unfortunately mentioning System of a Down and Mastodon--way to make me enthusiastic about this, eh?  The emphasis on the progressiveness had me somewhat expecting something Disillusion-like.

Of course, all of that turned out to be typical exaggerated advertising hype nonsense.  There's nothing remotely progressive about the music.  The only real odd/weird elements are the beginning of the album, where there are a couple more bouncy/spastic riffs (which I think is where the SOAD comparison comes in), and a few scattered sections with clean backing vocals.  As nitpicky as I am about such things (as evidenced by this blog), I considered it no big deal.  I don't even know if I would have taken any notice of it had I not been pre-conditioned by the promotional descriptions and reviews.

The Black Dahlia Murder comparison fits decently for some faster parts, but overall there's a far stronger The Haunted-style modern melodic death/thrash vibe.  The vocals are a tad on the forced side at times, but thankfully they're still not typical HC vox.  This isn't a type of metal that I particularly need to hear more of, but since they lean more towards the DM side of things and there are no super aggro vox, it's done well enough for what it is. As this blog attests to, I've done far worse in the bargain bin.

And Harmony Dies - Flames Everywhere (2007)

Cost: $2.00

Bands are often laughably overzealous in marketing themselves, and as a result I've seen plenty of ridiculously exaggerated sound comparisons and descriptions.  So I was quite surprised this actually does sound a lot like Arcturus mixed with some Devil Doll (in a more metallic context) influences, who the band cite as primary inspirations.  Most of the music is very much in an avant-garde post-debut Arcturus vein, particularly La Masquerade Infernale.  They tend to dip into extreme influences more, and early on there are a lot of full-on black metal passages (though far, far less than I expected before listening).  Much of the direct BM influence dies down as the album goes on, replaced by more Cradle of Filth-like extreme sections with rasped/growled vox.  On the subject of vocals, while I'm not a huge Arcturus/Garm fan, the clean vocals here are not that strong--they're not terrible, but I could see the accent and lack of polish turning off Arcturus fans looking for something somewhat similar. I also found nothing particularly special about the guest vocalists.  

They also go farther than the Norwegians in terms of musical weirdness.   There are lots of carnival type melodies that create quite a playfully sinister atmosphere, occasional electronic effects, and the track "Psichic Waltz"--the intent is clearly some kind of incantation with background tribal drumming, but it sounds equally like demented world music.  It's these types of things which evoke the Devil Doll influences.

Now, all of that's well and fine, but the original music on here isn't particularly up my musical alley. No, what really interested me is the unlisted cover of "At War with Satan."  It's 20:37 long.  Yep!  They do the whole thing.  I'm unaware of anyone else ever having covered it in its entirety (and the only cover I'd previously heard was the truncated version by Cronos' solo band).  It's a more gothic/symphonic-oriented take on the song, and unfortunately a lot of the progressiveness and atmosphere of the middle section are lost.  I was impressed by the spot-on cadence of the vocals at times, and the dreamy acoustic guitar section is wonderfully executed, despite not having the female vocals and pulsing effects behind it.  While no match for the original, it's commendable that they kept a comfortable quality level and avoided a total trainwreck--it's not too minimalist (and thus cheap sounding), but they also avoid overdoing it with too many effects and flourishes.

Near Death Experience - Journey Into Darkness (1996)

Cost: $1.00

I distinctly remember seeing an ad and/or review for this CD back when it was released in a magazine--almost certainly Pit, since they ran that None of the Above Rec. ad with "Alien" ("Don't let that autopsy video fool you, I'm still alive!").  Couldn't find anything after a very brief search through my old issues, but that's probably for the best, since I don't want a review or ad blurb to subconsciously influence this post.

This is a vocalless, guitarless synth-and-programmed-drums project by Brett Clarin of Sorrow/Sorrow band photo/Apparition fame.  Considering when this was released, I suspect some attempt here to capitalize on the trend of black metal musicians doing ambient/darkwave side-projects, and while I suppose it is some type of ambient music in a general sense, for the most part it's quite different from those other projects.

There are some gothic sounding parts which are similar to the synthwork in BM intros/outros/interludes, but a lot of the music is far more riff based (just performed on synth), sounding closer to MIDI/8-bit versions of metal tracks.  While I get the feeling these recordings had their influences in more underground stuff, the MIDI-ness of the sound is far less nuanced than a traditional band with guitars, and this imparts a certain genericness to the music.  The faster stuff could very well be inspired by black and death metal, but it's equally as Slayerish.  Same thing with the slower parts--it's hard to tell whether they were inspired by doom metal or by South of Heaven.  Speaking of Slayer, their influences on the Doom soundtrack are a pretty good reference point for some of the music here, which does sound quite a bit like an old PC game soundtrack.  However, more than anything else, the darker tracks feel like music that should be playing in the background of a gore video or snuff film--many tracks would easily make a superior replacement to the original Traces of Death soundtrack.

Being all synth based, there's a definite artificial/inorganic feeling to Journey Into Darkness, which I can easily see being off-putting.  I tried to approach this more as a soundtrack or background music when listening, and in that context, it's quite enjoyable and was well worth my $1.

Seventh Rize - Visceral Rock (2000)

Cost: $1.00

This CD is available for trade.

Given the album title, I didn't realistically expect this to be metal, and it's not.  At just $1, I didn't want to pass it up in case there was heavier material on here. Unfortunately, there isn't--it's 80s hard rock through and through.  Very L.A. hair band styled stuff, although they don't descend to the level of making a sappy power ballad. That said, there's nothing very metallic on here either. The band aren't misrepresenting themselves in any way so I have no reason to trash it, but it's just a music type that doesn't particularly interest me.

Should also point out this is the original independent version.  While the reissue has tits to look at on the cover and a less homemade looking layout, it also makes the CD look more sleazy/glammy than it really is.

Thought Industry - Songs for Insects (1992)

Cost: $1.00

Previously I had only heard some of  band's mid/late '90s output, which was not metal, and I didn't care for it at all.  While this debut isn't particularly to my taste, it does hold my interest far more than the later stuff.

"Weird progressive thrash" is a decent overall descriptor, as it covers the three main components of the band's sound.  There are straightforward Rush/Genesis progressive rock influences, progressive/technical thrash parts, and weirder musical influences and funky bass sections which are comparable to a more metallic Primus.  Some of the quirkier musical ideas are vaguely reminiscent of Scatterbrain, but without the blatant humor--just a general oddball/eclectic atmosphere.  Still, that doesn't quite describe everything at play here--there's a percussion-led industrialish track ("Corner Stone") and an acoustic ballad ("Alexander Vs. the Puzzle").

The big problem I have with this (and the majority of avant-garde and kitchen sink metal), is that while it makes a pretty coherent album out of quite disparate influences, it falls a bit short of being crazy and weird enough where I appreciate the listening experience itself.   I think the straightforward thrashing parts are the best part of the CD (just check out the beginning to "The Chalice Vermillion"), so all the other stuff going on kind of detracts from that, even though I realize it's for the sake of creativity.

Self Torture - Mislead (2002)

Cost: 1€

The internet had me expecting some sort of -core when I looked up the band prior to getting this.  I ultimately bought it because it was cheap and I was hopeful for some DM influences since several of the members had been involved in death metal bands.

Instead, this is groovy stuff of the Chaos A.D. variety.  So while my hopes for anything death metal related were dashed, this a slight step up from the metalcore/deathcore crap I was kind of anticipating.