Posts Tagged ‘Album of the day’

Album of the day: Nails – Abandon All Life

Posted on Tuesday, March 19th, 2013

Lovingly pinched from The Sleeping Shaman: Nails. Not often has a band been better named, this full-bore sludgy grindcore three-piece monstrosity is simply HARD AS NAILS.

You may have come across them in 2010 as their Kurt Ballou-produced blunt force trauma of a debut album, Unsilent Death, got some pretty rave reviews, but for the uninitiated, they pretty much sound like Napalm Death, early Entombed and Eyehategod mixed together with some more hardcore punk righteous anger thrown in.

You have original Terror member Todd Jones on vocal and guitar, so you know there is going to be some finger-pointing potential moshpit action here. There’s also an undercurrent of noise rock a la Unsane in the sound, which is even more ‘Kurt Ballou’ than on Unsilent Death, further enhancing the punk / noise as opposed to metal aspects.

His style could be described as ‘integrated’, nothing particularly stands out or gets special treatment, it’s just one mass of sound coming at you. Judging by the amount of people that love Converge, his idiosyncratic way of producing ‘metalcore’ isn’t too esoteric. And it certainly works for Nails, conjuring a sense of the no-doubt full body pulverisation that would be the live experience.

The previous album was around 14 minutes, and this is positively an epic at 17 minutes. It comes blazing out of the blocks with ‘In Exodus’, which is pure coruscating, bile-filled excitement, swiftly running into the incoherent short blasts of fury that are ‘Tyrant’ and ‘Absolute Control’, you know there is some political rage going on, if the lyrics could be deciphered.

Continue reading: The Sleeping Shaman – Nails – Abandon All Life CD/LP

Tags: Abandon All Life, Album of the day, James Parker, Kurt Ballou, Nails, southern lord, The Sleeping Shaman
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Album of the day: Bolder Damn – Mourning

Posted on Monday, March 18th, 2013

Praise for Bolder Damn‘s Mourning from San Francisco’s aQuarius Records: Bolder Damn‘s only album, Mourning, came out originally on vinyl in 1972 in a scant pressing of only 200 copies. We actually reviewed a previous reissue of it (the band’s own self-released ’25th anniversary’ CD from 1996) way back when, ...read more

Monday Song: Road – Road

Posted on Monday, March 18th, 2013

Every Monday morning we’ll post a kick-ass song to get your week going.

Album of the day: Free Fall – Power & Volume

Posted on Sunday, March 17th, 2013

Lovingly pinched from Metal Assault: In their continual pursuit to support old school hard rock and heavy metal, Nuclear Blast Records have unearthed yet another potential gem. Swedish classic hard rock quartet Free Fall recently signed to the label and are now all set to release their debut full-length album ...read more

Album of the day: Ensemble Pearl – Ensemble Pearl

Posted on Saturday, March 16th, 2013

Praise for Ensemble Pearl‘s S/T from San Francisco’s aQuarius Records: Ensemble Pearl is a new psychedelic supergroup of sorts, featuring SUNNO))) guitarist Stephen O’Malley, Boris basher Atsuo, legendary Japanese psychedelic axeman Michio Kurihara, and William Herzog (guitarist for Jesse Sykes & the Sweet Hereafter) along with a handful of guests ...read more

Album of the day: Wo Fat – The Black Code

Posted on Friday, March 15th, 2013

Lovingly pinched from The Sleeping Shaman: The word “thick” in the English language has a few uses. It can mean stupid, it can mean something that has great physical depth yet in the case of this new album from Texan groove masters it is a suitable adjective to describe their ...read more

Album of the day: Inter Arma – Sky Burial

Posted on Thursday, March 14th, 2013

Lovingly pinched from ThisIsNotAScene: For those of you unacquainted with ancient Tibetan funerary practices, a sky burial is the process of flaying, dismembering and butchering a corpse on a mountaintop plateau before grinding the bones up, possibly burning some incense along the way. This gory tableau is then devoured by ...read more

Album of the day: Altaar – Altaar

Posted on Wednesday, March 13th, 2013

Lovingly pinched from Meatmeadmetal: Embracing something and paying homage to it is a respectable, worthwhile venture. But taking steps to stretch beyond the boundaries of the thing you love to make it more expansive, dramatic, and personal is the sign of understanding one’s surroundings and knowing how to make it ...read more

Album of the day: Orange Goblin – A Eulogy For The Fans – Orange Goblin Live 2012

Posted on Tuesday, March 12th, 2013

Lovingly pinched from About.com: Heavy Metal: Orange Goblin’s first ever live album, A Eulogy For The Fans: Orange Goblin Live 2012, opens up appropriately enough with vocalist Ben Ward barking into his microphone over the rumbling of rager ‘Red Tide Rising:’ “How are you doing Bloodstock? We’re Orange f—ing Goblin, ...read more

Album of The Day: Ash Borer – Bloodlands

Posted on Monday, March 11th, 2013

Lovingly pinched from No Clean Singing: With relatively few hammer blows, Ash Borer have already chiseled their name into the obsidian edifice of American black metal. They’re bringing the hammer down again with the the impending debut of their newest album Bloodlands, which will be co-released on vinyl by Gilead ...read more