Blastbeat Reviews: Conan, Aborted, Cynic

I've been super bad about updating this blog, and now that summer is in full swing I'm working two jobs and trying to balance making music with the blog while catching up on Game of Thrones. Hooray! For today's reviews we have three polar opposites: Conan and Aborted!

CONAN - BLOOD EAGLE

For those of you who don't know, Conan is a disgustingly heavy British doom band whose sole purpose is to sound like molten tar pouring out of your speakers. Blood Eagle is the trio's second full-length album, despite their relatively expansive number of other releases.

Blood Eagle comes across as much more well produced than there previous album Horseback Battlehammer, the first Conan release I've heard. Blood Eagle starts off with some standard slow as all hell riffage accompanied by vocals that sound like a barbarian standing atop a mighty mountain, screaming out to the frosty air, praying to Crom for revenge upon his enemies.

Conan actually mixes it up on this album a bit. The first song released, Foehammer is pretty fast, even for a normal band. But don't let that fool you, because Conan still manage to make it sound like the heaviest thing this side of ununseptium. For those of you who like chest-crushing doom, Blood Eagleis a must listen. Overall Score: 4/5

ABORTED - THE NECROTIC MANIFESTO

I reviewed Aborted's last record Global Flatline and while I enjoyed it and wasn't blown away by it, I was expecting much more from the Belgian deathgrinders on this release. The album was hyped as all fuck by all the mainstream metal media outlets, and unfortunately, I find it didn't quite deliver. It's Aborted. They play deathgrind. There's nothing but blast beats, mile-a-minute buzzsaw riffs, and de Caluwé's iconic vocals. The problem with The Necrotic Manifesto to me is that it runs for nearly an hour, without shifting gears. It's all gore all the time, and that shit gets tiring after about 25 minutes.

I do have to commend Aborted for their single "Coffin Upon Coffin" which sounds exactly like a B-side of Heartwork (you all know how much I love that album), and their bitchin' covers of Suffocation's "Funeral Inception", and Converge's "Concubine". Overall Score: 2.5/5

CYNIC - KINDLY BENT TO FREE US

Ah, Cynic. I love this band. I've fawned over everything they've released from Focus to Carbon-Based Anatomy, loved every change in sound they've made since the beginning, and after hearing the first single off of KBtFU, "The Lion's Roar", I was super pumped for this album. Kindly Bent to Free Us delivers. Cynic have fully evolved into a progressive rock band, banishing any and all growling or guttural vocals, and ditching (for the most part) Paul Masvidal's iconic vocoder. I for one love Paul's unedited voice, and it's great to hear it alongside plenty of proggy clean guitar riffs and some fuzzed out psychedelic sections. The musicianship is still top notch, as Masvidal and drummer Sean Reinert team up with their old friend, bassist Sean Malone.

I definitely dig KBtFU almost as much as I dig Traced in Air. Kindly Bent to Free Us sounds much less spacey and airy than Traced did, but brings in more psychedelic and Eastern influences into the music, as well as incorporates samples now, which I think is cool. I haven't heard many (if any) prog rock albums that use sampling like grindcore or death metal albums do.

If you are one who disliked the changes Cynic made from Focus to Traced in Air, you're going to hate this album. If you've been liking the band's venture into progressive rock, then this album will be the progressive rock album of the year. Overall Score: 4.5/5

Also, as a PSA for the public: Fuck Vik Guitars. Don't use them. The founder and luthier of the company showed his true, ugly colours recently after Paul Masvidal and Sean Reinert came out as gay to the public. Fuck homophobia. Fuck you Vik Kuletski.

That's all for now, folks!

-DG

Album Review: One Direction - "Up All Night"

After looking at and listening to some underground Hip-Hop, Dream Pop, and whatever genre Diablo Swing Orchestra are, I think it's time to turn around and head straight into the mainstream. Today we're going to check out who are probably my new favorite band from England: One Direction! These five best friends have put out their debut album Up All Night and it's been blaring from my speakers ever since I bought it.

One Direction (<3) just excel, in every way. Musically and lyrically, these guys stand head and shoulders above almost any group I've had the pleasure of listening to. It's hard to make jokes here when the music and messages they stand behind are so fucking good.

Everything above this image was probably the most painful thing I've ever had to write.

Don't worry, everyone. I wouldn't even touch that One Direction shit with a 50-foot pole, let alone buy it. Today I'm going to look at a band who would rape One Direction to death, eat their flesh and sew those little bitches' skins into their clothing. And if they're very, very lucky, it'll happen in that order.

Aborted (<3) are a Deathgrind band from Belgium who've been around for what's starting to close in on 20 years. They go for the classic Carcass-style gore-splattering, innards-disemboweling themes and lyrics, and with song titles like "Coronary Reconstruction", "Expurgation Euphoria", and  "Our Father, Who Art of Feces", how could you not get excited? For those of you who don't know what Deathgrind is, it's (as the name suggests) a crossover between Death Metal and Grindcore. It mixes the furious speed and aggression of Grindcore and the musicality and songwriting of Death Metal into the equivalent of being mauled by a grizzly bear with a +5 thundering warhammer.

Yeah. Terrifying, I know.

The album is pretty straight forward. The band pulls of flying at a million kilometers an hour without giving the look-at-how-good-I-am-at-playing-my-instrument wankery. The riffs stay pounding and brutal, and the drums sound absolutely massive. The real attraction on here is vocalist Sven de Caluwé's impressive range. Everything from throat shredding Grind screams to brutal as fuck Death Metal growls to even the occasional pig squeal shows up on here. His ability to cycle between a bunch of different extreme Metal vocal styles really keeps things interesting throughout this album.

Something else that adds a fun touch (but is in no way anything new in either the Death Metal or Grindcore genres) are the audio samples. The intro track is a a bunch of snippets of old movies strung together to give this eerie zombie-apocalypse-is-actually-upon us feeling, and most other tracks feature audio clips from some horror movie or another. The final track ends with the somewhat cliché "Now I have become death, the destroyer of worlds" quote, but it still fits nicely for closing the album. The one sample that I really love the most is on the title track where just as the song is about to hit full-on Grind mode, you hear "I'M GOING TO FUCKING RAPE YOUR SOUL!". Classic.

I have to say, although Global Flatline keeps it fresh throughout, it's not fresh enough for my tastes. With music like Deathgrind or Technical Death Metal, I feel there are always a few songs on thew album that really stand out, but most other songs seem to sound similar, with not enough character put into each one.

Bomb-Ass Tracks

Global Flatline: What can I say, this song fucking raped my soul.

Our Father, Who Art of Feces: This song's chorus is gargantuan. I really love the guitar work as well. There are a bunch of memorable riffs all the way throughout, and the solo is wicked sweet too.

Enstille: The closing track (excluding the bonus tracks) starts off with similar sampling as the intro track and then shifts into a driving, mid-paced monster. It's got some incredibly well phrased guitar work shredding over top of the first half. The second half picks up with Sven doing a mix of spoken word and growling like a motherfucker. I know that a lot of people really disliked this track because it didn't fit with the rest of the album, but I personally love this song.

On a Playlist With: Decrepit Birth, Origin, Cattle Decapitation

Overall Score

3.5

If you like Death Metal, Grindcore, or Tech-Death, you'll probably like this. If you don't like any of those genres, this probably won't change your stance on them. I think this is a pretty solid album. I mean, what can I say, they had me at "rape your soul". <3

That's all for now, folks. Keep being Awesome.