supposed to rot

I almost feel weird having to write any kind of essay about the following band and record. Along with early Morbid angel, this album is undoubtedly the most influential death metal album of all time. I speak of course about the debut Entombed LP from 1990, "Left Hand Path". Where would modern metal be without this album? I don't even want to think about it. In a single year this masterpiece defined an entire scene and style, and created a springboard for hundreds of imitators. This IS Swedish metal of death. Nothing comes close, nothing ever will. A recent acquisition via eBay, this is an original pressing on black wax. Earache Records #21.
Like I said in my post about the recent Nihilist reissue a couple of weeks back, I find it a little tricky actually saying that I am a fan of early Entombed when 90% of this album was written when the band were still producing and playing music under that first banner. Obviously this album brought the band to the masses, and of course this recording is the more widely regarded one, but you can't go past the charm of those Nihilist demos. Given enough proper thought though, I think that the clearer, more precise recording present on this release is vastly superior, and the very fact that this album represented the first time that all of these fantastic songs were available together in the one place really cemented Entombed as the rightful torch bearers in terms of the definition of the Swedish death metal sound. Nihilist is good when I am in the mood. "Left Hand Path" is fucking great every single time I spin it.
I wish there was more to really showcase with the packaging of this album, but as is the case with every early Earache release, there's not too much to it really. Simple, glossy sleeve (it's note worthy that this one I have is more or less in near mint condition), basic black and white insert with liner notes etc, and stock standard Earache badging on the actual vinyl centre label. Superior and iconic artwork by Dan Seagrave though, that I could look at forever.
You just simply cannot go past this album in terms of formative, classic death metal. The simple, hooky melodic structures, the iconic buzz saw guitar tone, LG's pure death metal growl. One thing that tuns me off of the majority of the popularised American approach is the overly technical proficiency in the guitar work, the use of triggered drums, and the general attitude of a lot of those early guys. Most notably in the case of Trey Azagthoth and Morbid Angel. It got to the point with that band where it was more or less just about being the best and nothing less. What I like about Entombed and the Swedish style is the more organic feel to the writing and recording. There's a much more punk feel to this album than the other big acts (more than likely why my favourite American band is Autopsy I might add too), and a much more humble, timeless feel in turn.

blood brew

Grind from Sydney is today's post subject. The band is Beer Corpse, and this is their debut 7", "Keg Nuts" thanks to Give Praise Records. Amber vinyl. Fitting.
What ou get here isn't typical at all of the American record label. This is extreme metal tinged grindcore, similar to a lot of those older 90's goregrind bands. Bands that I know nothing about really. Down tuned guitars recorded roughly, layered with a single tone, very guttural, low vocal belch that is occasionally broken up with some scummy sounding high ends. It's remarkably similar to very early Blood Duster for all of these reasons. If you haven't guessed already, lyrical content is humorously based around drinking beer and getting drunk etc, hence the fitting amber vinyl.

Amazing insert poster of a one Mr. Ivan Milat in his plyaground. Excellent.

Hardly comparable I know, but this is no Internal Rot, but it's cool none the less.

aggro

Here's a record that I have probably slept on for a bit too long, the "English Terror Boys" EP from Durham, England's Search And Destroy. Not to be confused with the current band out of Melbourne with the same name, this is nasty, gruff skinhead hardcore ala Negative Approach and the like. Shit's all over the Australian band. This was pressed five years ago by Marcus at The Endless Quest Records. If that name sounds familiar to you, then it should. Marcus is responsible for the long running record collecting blog of the same name. Certainly an influence on me as a blogger originally, his blog more or less gradually turned into what it is today after he kind of lost interest in the label in it's original form. The label is back now though, with the release of a 7" by a band that goes by the name of Hope Defeated. This new band is worlds apart from Search And Destroy though, I suspect fans of Bane (and similar 90's hardcore) will probably dig.
An English ex-pat mate of mine living here in Brisbane recently got his hands on a handful of these to sell, hence my acquisition of the EP. Kind of a lucky score I guess in the fact that I was planning to grab one directly off Marcus for full postage costs. Obviously with Kieren getting a small lot to sell cut down on postage for me.
Very clean, hand numbered package with expected nasty artwork for a release of this nature. Red dust sleeve, hand numbered. Having been reading Marcus' blog for years now, learning about his tastes and what he expects in record presentation, I wouldn't expect anything less than perfection from his work. Top notch.

product of environment

Sea Of Shit out of Chicago recently had their demo pressed to wax by none other than Mr. Jamie Grimes of Suburban Mayhem Records out of Ireland. I heard that he'd sold all of them already which surprised me a little. I have a few copies left if anyone wants one. Great, grimey powerviolence with a slight fastcore approach. Black vinyl, unsure of the numbers. Can't be too many though if they're already all gone.
What's to say? Nasty, downtuned hardcore comparable to the more crusty end of the spectrum. Fast to very fast structures injected with blast beats and punctuated by a double vocal approach of a combination of strewn out laboured styles and a second, more low end friendly grunt. It has it's moments.
They also did a split with a band called Socially Retarded which I think is a better release as a whole. SOS are noticeably more urgent with that recording, and SR aren't half bad either.

I think I read somewhere that these guys broke up, but I may be wrong. Too bad, cool band.

no paradise for the damned

A little while back I posted about my score in the Despise You "PCP Scapegoat" 7". That was made possibly after a fellow named Carlos emailed me with a list of stuff he was selling. In the same transaction I also grabbed the Nasum/Abstain split 7". Pressed by Yellow Dog Records back in 1997, this is "The Black Illusions" 7" on black wax. Not sure of alternate pressings.
I bought this based on the quality of the majority of the Nasum catalgue. Based around a dual vocal attack, you can't go wrong with the vast majority of the bands stuff. From the earlier material right through to the "Shift" LP, all of it is pretty shit hot. Over the course of the bands life they managed to obtain more 'cleaner' recordings gradually too which did nothing but make them more exciting. In my opinion there's a lot of their sound floating around in quite a few of today's modern grind bands. This EP marked something like their 7th or 8th recorded release and it's a perfect example of the earlier stuff. Noisy grind with a semi muffled recording. Such a recording manages to really exemplify their crust roots too. As their recordings progressed, the cleaner sounds started to lend to a much more metal feel. I do prefer the later stuff, but this is eight great songs regardless.
Abstain from California on a similar note also play a dense style of nifty grind/crust on this split. The recording qualities are arguably quite similar to that of the Nasum contribution and they also utilises a dual vocal front line. They certainly hit their stride when they opt for the full blast/grind attack, something which they manage to do a fair bit on this split. To be honest I'm struggling to decide which band I prefer with this release.

every day

The last record I need to post about from Youth Attack and their recent(ish) update, this is the latest Vile Gash single, "Deluded". Clear and black smudge vinyl, YA has black vinyl of 500 listed on the website as the pressing, and a photo to back, with no details about this one what so ever, so I have no idea what's going on.
Three songs of shit smeared, noisy hardcore, I actually really like this band and their brand of rough, fast punk. Their second 7", this one is notably shorter than the first their first foray into the disc realm, with only three brief bursts. Obviously rougher than that EP as well, this one has been touted as more or less a lead up to their upcoming LP which is due before the end of the year.
Of the three YA 7"s which arrived in my mail box this week, this one boasts the least tidy packaging, comprised of merely a glued sleeve, and inside the vinyl in a black dust sleeve. No insert as all relevant notes are printed on the back side. Even with this simplistic arrangement though, it still comes across as mega classy, with nice thick card, and a very clean looking piece of vinyl.

Very keen for the LP, this band hasn't done any wrong yet.

heads will roll

Here's the reissue of the first 7" from The Ropes. I posted about their first demo tape a few weeks back, but if you missed it, this is just The Repos playing a slightly newer style of rough hardcore. It's slower, it's dirtier. I'm not sure on the details of the original press, but this new Youth Attack version is of 500 copies. Once again, sold out. Red wax. Fantastic cover. They put it on a shirt too, cool.
So as I mentioned in Saturday's post about the Suburbanite EP, YA certainly have that knack for producing fantastic packages. This one is a custom, four fold envelope style thing, closed with a YA logo sticker. When I first opened it I worried that if I peeled the sticker it would either tear or take a bit of the sleeve with it, but the glue was light enough to just lift off the sleeve easily, and it closes back and sticks too.

Black inner dust sleeve.

45 hole.

Included is this 16 page, glossy paper booklet of various artwork by a fellow named Will Boone. Various notes and credits also included.
I dunno, I'm not too crazy about this band. Comes across as a very typical YA band. Noisy and boring. I'd never chase this on eBay, but I'm happy to pay stock price from it straight from the label. The packaging is worth the $10 alone.

twist and burn

Ringworm are in town as part of their national Australian tour and I managed to see them a couple of nights ago in a warehouse that fits only 150 people. It was quite an experience. They played "Numb/Blind To Faith" and it made my night. They're making their way around with Australia's premier exponents of metallic hardcore mayhem, Mindsnare. This is the second time the bands have made this tour and to help celebrate, each group has produced two songs each to contribute to this new split 7". From what I saw at the merch table, two alternate colours have been pressed, this clear/off green (coke bottle?) variant, and a purple version that I didn't bother grabbing. Probably should have bought that one too, but I'm trying to cut down on unessential wax purchases. Blame Dom and A389 Records and our own Graham at Resist Records for this one.
So this cover is a tour version with the official version to be released soon via each label. 160 copies only for tour, Dom said on the A389 website that the only reason it happened like this is because the proper covers weren't ready in time for these shows. I suspect that the real version will be launched in the coming fortnight with the new A389 update.

Each label has their logo on the sleeve, but up until this point I was totally unaware that Resist had anything to do with this record as Graham hasn't uttered a word anywhere of his involvement. Dom has been talking it up for more than six months on the other hand though, so I kind of thought it would just be an A389 deal. I little naive though I guess, Resist has fingers in every pie.
So as I mentioned, two songs from each band, all of which would be considered reasonably standard fare respectively. The Ringworm numbers are both fast metallic pieces with the obvious crunch and metal leads. The production is noticeably cleaner sounding than anything on the new album too, so I suspect this was recorded in a separate session. I remember reading somewhere that this record was due earlier in the year but was delayed so Ringworm could record the new LP, so it's more than likely that these songs were committed to analogue before the stuff on "Scars".

From what I can gather, Mindsnare originally recorded three songs during the sessions for this release, two of which have seen a release here, the third seeing the light of day via that annual digital compilation that A389 did earlier this year. With a sigh of relief, these songs see the band returning to that iconic metallic crunch typified on their 2004 LP "The Death". To be honest, I believe that the pick of the lot is the song on the compilation, "Final Call", as opposed to the two included on the wax, but all three are mainstay 'Snare numbers and manage to cast a massive shadow over the entire Australian hardcore scene.
I've never had a proper chance to post about Mindsnare vinyl on this blog, it's been that long since their last release, so I've never had the opportunity to test the waters on what non Australians think about these guys. As a result I am rather curious. In my opinion (and it's the opinion of just about every single other Australian hardcore fan, no matter what little sub scene they like to associate with), this is world class hardcore, and I've always been curious as to why these guys haven't managed to create more waves abroad. Everything about this band is totally on point, I can't see why people in America or anywhere else for that matter wouldn't love them. Perhaps I'm not seeing the bigger picture though, Human Furnace did manage to sing every word to just about every song for the entire set. Maybe everyone knows about them? For the uninitiated, get your hands on "Hanged, Chocked, Wrists Slit", "The Death", the s/t 7" (otherwise known as the Gasman 7"), and perhaps on a lesser note, their LP from 2007 "Disturb The Hive". The latter was good, but was botched by a less chunky mix and master, and in the long run it just hasn't translated to that 'classic' status of the other mentioned releases.

Here's a vid from their opening with "Bulldozed" from the other night. Iconic Australian song.

grateful nation

As much crap as Youth Attack Records and associated bands tend to cop from the more 'faithful' of the hardcore elite in today's current scene, the label does tend to put out the odd fantastic record every now and then. It's hard to argue with the quality in the packaging of just about everything the label has something to with as well, and the following post fodder is the perfect case to both points. Here's the new and debut s/t 7" from New York's Suburbanite. White wax of 500 copies, sold out.
As the label puts it, packaged with a custom tri-fold sleeve with a built in envelope for the record. Really nice thick, matte card. The record has a 45 hole with a 45 wedge, the first time I've bought an EP with a 45 wedge for a good four years or so. A-typical, bleak artwork that you'd expect from the Youth Attack alumni. Grey scale and grim, it's fitting, well thought out and it works the way it should.
I like to think that these guys take their name from the White Cross song, and really it's more than likely that that is the fact. Like that band, this is just great, fast, thrashy hardcore with an obvious, updated, modern recording. The snappiness in the drums and guitars is what makes this 7" so good, and the vocals from the guy that used to sing for The Aerosols is like the cherry on the cake. Though I'd never actually compare this music to anything like that, there's nothing sweet about Suburbanite.

Seven tracks, four faster numbers that never break the 40 second mark, and another three slightly slower songs that all exceed the minute mark, just barely. I can certainly see how some may interpret this as a bunch of noise that all kind of blends in together, everything here bares a similar structure and style, but with a little enthusiasm and some effort (not much, it's very simple hardcore), I think most believers could get something out of this. I'm getting a lot, such a good record.

year of skulls

Newish metal/hardcore band out of Arizona, this is the debut EP "Decade Of Dust" from Tuscon's Hellhorse. Red and black split 7", pressed by Twelve Gauge Records earlier in the year. I've had this for a good three months or so now, but just haven't had the time to post about it. If there's going to be any kind of award for coolest record title this year, then I'd have to nominate these guys.
Touted as part of some new wave of black metal/crust/d-beat coming about at the moment, I suppose such descriptions aren't entirely off the mark. If the opening track/intro is anything to go by though, I'd sooner describe these guys as some 80's thrash rehash before anything else. Heavy comparisons to a lot of that era's great in this one track alone. Sadly these 57 seconds would have to be the highlight of the entire release, as it's a gradual decline in quality for the remaining seven songs. Not to say that this 7" is a terrible presentation, but it's nothing overly inspired either. Just middle of the road metal influenced hardcore that dabbles lightly in melody and crust vibes, then throws some weak hardcore vocals over the top. I really think I'd be a great deal more into this if the vocals held a little more meat in the low end, but sadly they don't. Reminds me of Black Breath to an extent for the same reasons really.
Infant recording from a band in it's earlier stages, I plan to keep my eye on these guys if just in hope that the vocals morph into something a little more hectic and ballsy. Something that has happened with other bands in the past.