Last House on the Left - Among Flies (2008)

 

Cost: $1.00

Wasn't terribly optimistic seeing as this was a Ferret/Siege of Amida release, but hey, it was only a buck. Lots of Swedish melodeath-inspired riffage here along with more typical deathcore material. At times they even flirt with more straightforward death metal, which it seemed like "Liath Loinneach" was going for at the beginning. Even though they're quite metallic, there's always a breakdown or some overly bouncy rhythms lurking around the corner. On the plus side, the vocals--raspy BM-style main vox and guttural secondary vox--are aggro free.

While the ratio of metal to core influences here and the solid vocals make this tolerable, it's just not that special. Even if they eliminated all of the core influences, they'd just be making generic melodeath or generic groovy death metal. Competent, but nothing here leaves much of an impression amongst scores of other bands. Not that bad for a dollar, but not something I'll be likely to revisit.

Summer 2023 assorted finds

With COVID and inflation, I was worried that bargain bins wouldn't ever be back to full strength, but thankfully, over the past few months, they seem to yielding more goodies than ever (knock on wood!).  Although the more recent bigger label stuff is usually not much in line with my personal tastes, it's nice to find it cheap!

All CDs were $2:

Blind Guardian - At the Edge of Time

Not bad overall, and I actually found some individual parts to be quite impressive. I enjoyed a lot of the orchestral sections because they seemed like natural, seamless additions to the music, and not contrived garnishes. Some of the buildups in opener "Sacred Worlds" even made me think of the "Am I Evil?" intro a bit. I was also surprised by the beginning of "A Voice in the Dark," with thrashiness reminding me of the heavier material way back on Follow the Blind. Unfortunately, the overused choral vocals and some of the more stereotypical sing-songy power metal tropes prevented me from getting into this more. I know that expecting my ideal--a return to a purer Battalions of Fear speed metal sound--is foolish, but there's material here that indicates they still have the ability to make an album that sounds like a modernized version of Follow the Blind. I wish they would.

 

Byzantine - Oblivion Beckons

Lamb of God/God Forbid style groove metal with a strong dose of progressiveness and a lot of various modern influences. I largely bought this based off a mention of Nevermore I read in an online review, and while I can sort of see the progressiveness and occasional use of clean vocals justifying it in a broad sense, I personally would expect far different things if a band were compared to Nevermore. Any good points here (there's some slight thrashiness at times) just seem diluted and overwhelmed by everything else here. Seems like music that would be more for loyal consumers of Blabbermouth or Loudwire.

 

Dark Tranquillity - Haven

Dark Tranquillity - The Mind's I

Dark Tranquillity - Projector

Dark Tranquillity - Skydancer/Of Chaos and Eternal Night

The two earlier albums are very good. It's funny, while I was listening to Skydancer, I was thinking to myself that it's probably the best material of the big 3 of Gothenburg melodeath, and that prompted me to revisit early At the Gates. As it turns out, I definitely prefer Gardens of Grief and The Red in the Sky Is Ours (to be fair, it's been so long since I've listened to any early In Flames that I can't say how they'd rank. I recall the Maidenish guitar harmonies being a lot more prominent than in other melodeath). The other two albums had zero impact on me and I can't recall anything specific even right after listening to them. (I'm a little disappointed The Gallery wasn't part of the haul, as if it was the reissue like the 2 earlier albums, it would have had all the cover song bonuses, which I probably would have enjoyed most of all).

 

Also, oddly, while I was checking the discs more closely for wear at home, I noticed Haven had an extremely faint image of the Kiss logo and lettering from the Dynasty album. The disc played fine even though it looked like it had some sort of ghostly residue on the bottom. I've seen a few cases where the top-of-disc print covers up something underneath that you can still see from the top of the disc, but my first time ever seeing something like this on the underside. Since it's so faint, my best guess is that it was stacked against the Kiss disc at some point and heat or pressure transferred a little bit of the disc print. Weird. 

 

Elvenking - Wyrd

Power metal incorporating folk elements. Definitely skews towards the lighter and poppier side of power metal, although the folkiness makes them come across as more natural and coherent than the overly sweet and flowery sing-songy power metal bands. The folk side of things isn't as overblown as I thought it might be, so it's not as cheesy as I was honestly expecting. Still, it doesn't rise past the level of being just okayish power metal.

 

Gates of Winter - Lux Aeterna 

This is quite multi-faceted, and while it's not inaccurate to put it under the progressive metal umbrella, all of the components here make it adjacent to a couple of genres. There's always a song structure or keyboard run to keep it tethered to prog., although it's not always at the forefront. Ethereal keyboards and heavy symphonic elements are everywhere, along with more DM-like backing vocals as well as female vocals in The Gathering vein. There's lots of intermingling, even within single songs. Grouped very loosely, the first half of the album feels more like some sort of symphonic prog./power metal, and the later half feels more atmospheric, with many sections having similarities to gothic metal. I would be comfortable calling the end part of "A Dark Affliction" and parts of "Omega" symphonic doom.

Rwake - If You Walk Before You Crawl You Crawl Before You Die

All over the place sludgy stuff, with accoustic passages, chaotic sludge sections, more intricate Neurosis-inspired parts, and lots of stonerish riffs. The vocal style helps make this seem more extreme than it actually is. Especially after some parts of the opening track, I was expecting doominess that never really came. Okay as a background listen but pretty forgettable stuff.

 

Skyclad - Jonah's Ark

Pleasant enough. Even though the two preceding albums were hardly pure thrashing, this seems even less thrashy overall and in a mellower/folksier vein. The speedy riff in "Thinking Allowed" sticks out as being more mainstream metal-ish among Skyclad's songs, sounding like it could have been taken from a good Ozzy or Maiden track.

Voivod - Katorz

This is the first full Voivod album I've heard since Snake rejoined. I'm not a particular fan of Nothingface, Angel Rat, or The Outer Limits, but I also don't mind them. This did not impress me at all, though. There's a more rock-like feel, and in that sense it's slightly reminiscent of Angel Rat (though not as unheavy) and The Outer Limits, though perhaps with some more overt punkiness as well. The progressive Voivod weirdness here seems severely toned down, and what is here feels largely like diluted Nothingface-esque ideas.

Bathory - The Return...... (2018 reissue)

 

Cost: $2.00 

 

For whatever dumb reason, until 2003 all CD versions of the first 3 Bathory albums had very plain tracklistings on the back cover, with none of the rear artwork from the original albums. I was quite happy to get this one in particular--one of my favorite metal demo tapes of all time opens with an intro of The Return back cover text being recited in heavily-accented English (I'm sure the aficianados of evil speed metal among you know exactly who I'm talking about). Otherwise, this CD version is unfortunately very cheap looking, even taking into consideration the poor cover art quality of older pressings. I always found it kind of ironic that out of all the different Black Mark CDs I have, some of the cheapest looking in terms of layout were for the flagship band that started the label off in the first place! I'm confident that official CDs with better quality layouts and audio closer to the sound of the original LPs will eventually come, although probably from a licensee...

As for the actual album, this is probably my least favorite of the first 3 Bathorys (although to be honest, for me, Under the Sign... is more or less "Call from the Grave" plus some additional songs rather than a consistently great album). I've learned to appreciate it more than I did initially, but I still have to be in the right mood to want to listen to it. It's certainly a bestial and brutal release, but feels a bit lacking in songwriting strength and musical subtleties compared to the other two albums. "Born for Burning" has always been the one standout track for me. The debut is what almost always gets compared to Venom musically, but under the distortion, "Bestial Lust" is the most blatant Venom worship Bathory has ever done (which is by no means a bad thing). The re-recording of "The Return of the Darkness and Evil" is, sadly, nowhere near as good as the earlier compilation version.

Great White - Great White (1995 reissue)

 

Cost: $1.00 

Although I knew of the connections pre-Great White band Dante Fox had with the early L.A. metal scene, I never bothered to check out the earliest Great White stuff. I was vaguely aware they used to be less hair band-y, but as someone who really only knew "Once Bitten, Twice Shy," I was initially quite shocked. The faster tracks--opener "Out of the Night" (which easily bests all their other material combined) and closer "Dead End"--are straight up metal. The other songs are mostly mid-paced hard rocking stuff that I would compare favorably to the similar early material of Dokken or Ratt (Jack Russell really reminds me of a grittier Stephen Pearcy sometimes) even though it's not my kind of stuff. The cover of the The Who's "Substitute" is also pretty good. Even though Great White come off as consistently harder than either the Mötley Crüe or Kix debuts, this reminds me of cases like "Live Wire" or "Atomic Bombs," where a band's token heavy tracks completely overshadow everything else on their albums for me. Regardless of the direction they took later, cool to hear they had a couple of good heavy songs in them.

Halloween - E.vil P.ieces (2006)

 

Cost: $2.00

 

No, this post isn't the result of any lucky holiday-appropriate bargain bin find on my part. Found this several months ago, and no better day to finally post about it.

This is my first time hearing any post-No One Gets Out! material. I'm not sure why, but for some reason I had thought they descended into awful "scary music" trends (think Marilyn Manson/Slipknot) for their late '90s reformation, and while there are plenty of things to criticize the band about nowadays, that isn't one of them.

 

It's immediately evident their sound has succumbed to more modern sound and production sensibilities, as the guitars are very chuggy. Of the two new tracks, one is good and one is bad. The songwriting of "Angel of Evil" seems quite old school (I was actually surprised that it's apparently new and not a reworked demo track or something), and it's pretty decent even though it would have greatly benefited being played by the 1985 version of the band. "Hell," on the other hand, is rather bland groove metal.

Then there are three re-recordings of older tracks. Although these are the best material on the EP, the more modern sound condemns them to being inferior to the originals even though the actual songs haven't been significantly changed. "Don't Metal with Evil" and "Evil Nation" are pleasant enough, but the rumbly guitars on "To Fight the Beast" make it feel way over-modernized and thus the worst of the reworked tracks. Brian Thomas' voice has obviously aged a bit, especially in terms of hitting highs, but since he makes no attempts at more modern or extreme vocals anywhere on the EP (which I had somewhat feared, given the chuggy riffage), I find it perfectly acceptable.

The closing cover of Alice Cooper's "Go to Hell" is so-so. Musically it's alright for a stripped down and heavied up version, but the vocals don't feel right--too much sneer, not enough menace. I can see it translating well as a metal cover, but this isn't it. It's also another song that would have been better served by the band's '80s lineup.

This was fine for its short novelty spin, but there's nothing here worth listening to over their old material, and it doesn't inspire much confidence from me in their newer stuff. It actually reinforces the songwriting strength of their classic material--"Don't Metal with Evil" still shines as a shock metal anthem, even recorded nearly 20 years later with crappy modern sound. A nice find for 2 bucks, and not something I would have expected to find in the bargain bin here.

Metal Massacre XI (1991)

 

Cost: $2.00

This is part of my big Sept. 23 haul that'll hopefully be on the blog shortly, but in the meantime, I wanted to give it its own post.

Sadly, this represents the last classic volume of Metal Massacre. 12 came after a brief hiatus and tried to be more current with the inclusion of both more extreme and boundary-defying bands, but ended up being a mishmash comp. of mid-'90s trends and some bewildering non-metal inclusions. 13 was a ridiculous misuse of the series name by a Metal Blade sampler that should have been a Deathmeister or Metalmeister installment instead. 14 is musically okay, and while it's got a decent linup for a modern reset of the series, it feels more like a compilation of (then) hot NWOTHM acts than something in the spirit of the old Metal Massacres. 15 is in the same vein but with an uninspiring collection of bands, most of whom were already well past the demo stage. It was obviously meant more as a novelty vinyl release than a showcase of quality metal.

This happened to be the only volume of the original 12 which I had never seen in a store before--the very first time I saw the cover was when I purchased the CD boxset. Of course, pretty soon after, I started going to a store that had two used copies, but they were normal price so I never bothered to get them. It's nice to get an original pressing at a bargain bin price.

No fading here (this will make sense when I post about the entire haul), but someone marked up the booklet tracklist with pen. Ugh.

Have to hand it to Metal Blade--for a 1991 comp. (from the label that signed Cannibal Corpse, no less), it's a pretty gutsy move to completely ignore extreme metal. It's a pretty solid assortment, and while not as legendary as the older volumes, it's definitely a step up from 10 overall:

1. Mystic Force - Shipwrecked with the Wicked

Their prog.-tinged heavy/power may seem quaint compared to some of the thrash stuff on here, but it makes for a classy, fantastic opener.

2. Epidemic - Circle of Fools 

Punishing thrash with crossover/HC overtones--the vocals even remind me of a more HC Troy Dixler. It's good, but the version on the Decameron album is even more furious with all the added death metal influence, and it's not quite as great as some of the more violent songs from their debut album.

3. Forte - Dementia by Design

No-brakes speed metal riffage mixed with powerthrash aggression and soaring vocals. Although quite a few bands on here made albums, Forte were certainly the most prolific (and successful) of the bunch.

 

4. My Victim - Authority Lies

Not what I'd expect from several members of the San Francisco Assassin. Kind of mellow metal with vocals that give off a groovy Faith No More vibe. Quirky, but not as bad as it sounds, and the guitarwork towards the end of the song is cool.

 

5. Havoc Mass - Tormented Souls

Competent but unspectacular thrash. For some reason the vocals keep making me think of Attila (the Rolling Thunder band) even though they're not terribly similar.

6. Divine Right - The Dream Turns to Dread

Decent progressive metal, with riffage reminding me a bit of Perfect Symmetry-era Fates Warning.

 

7. Ministers of Anger - The Great Escape

Starts out like it's going to be prog. metal, but there are two sudden fast bursts of thrashy speed--I have no problem with these musically, but the vocalist seems ill-equipped and comes off kinda mushmouthed during these parts. The production makes the drums feel kind of flat. Maybe something of interest for progressive thrash fans.

 

8. Dominance - Resurrected

The Anvil Bitch guys with a different singer. Solid early '90s thrash (I don't mind the Planet of the Apes samples, but I could do without the two instances of vocal effects), but lacks the campy charm and reckless enthusiasm of the old Anvil Bitch stuff.

 

9. Mortal Reign - Sorcery of the Wicked

Not really bad, but the stop/start thrash riffage gives this a more modern vibe that rubs me the wrong way.

10. Nightcrawler - Eternal Call

The most traditional metal track here. Vocals might even be a little better than on the Soldier in Time LP material. Overall the song is fine; Nightcrawler has better songs but also worse.

 

11. Harum Scarum - Bad Habits

Nothing super exciting, but pleasant enough thrash that trundles along.  Not terribly aggressive or technical, the music--coupled with the anti-drug theme and gang vox at the end--brings to mind a lot of the Bay Area styled B- and C-leaguers that major labels were signing in the late '80s in hopes of making some Metallica$h.

 

12. Chemikill - Consumed by Hate

While this isn't going to be anyone's favorite thrash band (except the parents of the band members), they're good enough where you wish even a small label had given them a chance to release something. Vocals are like a mix of Steve Souza with a severe sore throat and Phil Rind.

 

13. Tynator - Excuses

Forgettable thrash, but they do enough right that it seems ok while listening. Like the material from the two earlier demos compiled on the Living in Pain CD, feels kind of disjointed, and although this comp. track feels less amateurish, I think they lost a bit of their campy ultra-generic charm too.

 

14. Spudmonsters - The Monkey Beat-Man

If they maintained the initial velocity throughout the song, this would be great crossover/speedcore. Unfortunately it's broken up by groovy riffs which are starting down the path to something like Pro-Pain, so the lost potential here is disappointing.

Pantera - Cowboys from Hell (1990)

 

Cost: $2.00

Had never heard the album in its entirety before, and since the stuff I was familiar with--the title track and "Cemetery Gates"--always seemed a bit silly to me, I wasn't very positively predisposed to it going in. But since unabused Pantera discs are a bargain bin rarity, thought I'd give it a chance.

It's easiest to think of this as a hybrid album with a lot of varying song types and blended influences, much like their previous material contained actual metal right alongside extremely glammy commercial hard rockin' stuff, or even something like The Black Album mixes rock and metal. The more aggro groove stuff like "Primal Concrete Sledge" is clearly in the vein of subsequent Pantera albums, there are residual elements from Power Metal in some of the guitarwork and in Phil's higher vocals, there's groovier more rocking stuff ("Psycho Holiday") with elements that remind me of early Alice in Chains or even the 2nd White Zombie album, and then there are the thrashy parts. Don't get me wrong, they're a welcome relief on an album like this, and while they represent the most interesting parts for me personally, they never rise above being rather generic Metallica homages. While there is certainly thrashiness here, this is definitely not a thrash album overall, no matter what deluded fans or whitewashers may say.

I'd often heard from non-fans that "Domination" was the best track on here, and I suppose it's alright. Personally I like "Heresy" more, as it's the thrashiest track on the CD. But again, I don't like it because of any distinct identity or particularly great songwriting, it's just because it sounds very Master of Puppets-era Metallica-ish (especially when coupled with Phil's gruffer vocals), which I can appreciate.

So yeah, this is about what I expected. Certainly as close to thrash as they ever got. Not as ridiculous as their later stuff, but nowhere near as good as Power Metal or the heavier songs from the first 3 albums. While I don't mind if someone likes this album, for anyone to insinuate that this was the heaviest, most aggressive, most brutal metal someone could easily access at the time (in the early '90s, any well-stocked major music retailer had plenty of releases from the bigger indie labels) is just laughable.