Destroyer 666 "Wildfire" Album Review

The leading dominators in Blackened Thrash Metal are back with their new album on Season of Mist, Destroyer 666 and their new album “Wildfire” have been spreading like... well, a wildfire. Being the bands first full release since 2009 it’s a breath of fresh air to get something like this in the genre, taking over what Sodom stopped going for and doing it just as well if not better! 9 songs and 40 minutes of headbanging brutality, an incredible onslaught of destructive riffs and a consistent shock in vocal prowess the band brings their all on this album, but is their all enough?

                Destroyer 666 are back and in case you were unsure of that, right off the bat in “Traitor” you get introduced by an insanely high scream that could almost put modern Rob Halford to shame, mixed with the riffing harmony being Warslut and Felipe Kutzbach. If the speeds of these riffs weren’t enough and you have a problem headbanging to solos then just wait till the last 60 seconds, the song enters a riff that you have to headbang to that leads into a solo. “Live and Burn” follows up “Traitor” sounding like a cross between Destruction and Toxic Holocaust between having Destruction style tempo in the introduction blended with Black Metal-era Joel Grind (I know he never ACTUALLY did Black Metal, calm down there I see you typing to tell me how I’m wrong about Toxic Holocaust being Black Metal). The speed of this song is off the charts, between that and it being heavy this song would be excellent live as a pit song. With the next song “Artiglio Del Diavolo” being an instrumental how about we skip ahead a couple to “Wildfire” the title track of the album and see how it stands up being a bit later in the album. Warslut‘s vocals are less harsh on this song, taking more of a Speed Metal turn, which makes sense with the galloping style of riffing, featuring one of my favourite solos on this entire album which is followed by a heavy bridge into a straight speed solo before getting back to vocals. The song is sheer speed, the album is fast as fuck and unrelenting, and the contrast in the vocals between sounding like a Black Metal lunatic and Tom Araya at the beginning of “Angel of Death” makes a lot of these songs unpredictable which a lot of bands fail to do. The only real break you get in this album is right before the album resets with “Tamam Shud” being an incredible album closer and the song I see being played in the background as the band walks out on stage an bows goodbye to the crowd, it’s slower, mostly, it’s intriguing and the guitar patters are really cool even to someone who couldn’t play “Smoke on the Water” to save their life.

                7 years later Destroyer 666 release “Wildfire,” an album that will, more than likely, stand tall to every other album released this year. With this album it’s becoming apparent that this year will be the year of Mist, releasing plenty of excellent albums already this year Destroyer 666 are just another notch up for the global domination Season of Mist must be planning at this point.

95/100

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Rhine "An Outsider" Album Review

                Progressive Extreme Metal is nothing new anymore now that Opeth did it, made it famous and moved on and Enslaved are doing it a lot more instead of being straight Norwegian Black Metal. Now Rhine want to do it too and with their new album “An Outsider” coming we can discuss whether they take a step in the right direction or not.

                This is a 10 song, 72 minute long album. So needless to say, most the songs are longer than average length just like the aforementioned bands. In the style if their instrumentals I hear a lot of Opeth, specifically from “Ghost Reveries” with the fact that they’re fairly complex and pretty catchy. Vocally, this band is a mix of Enslaved and Opeth with their clean singing, generally used in slower sections much like Opeth do with their music. Take this with a sprinkle of Cradle of Filth in the Extreme vocal style,  Vocalist, Gabe Tachell, has a better way of pronunciation in his voice making his words easy to understand.

                “Dreaming of Death” opens the album entangling you with everything you could need to learn about this band. Both vocal styles, catchy and slightly complex tapping riffs and a mix of Extreme Metal and Prog Rock, but it’s more in the second track “The Spell of Dark Water” that catches my attention. The song starts off soft and clean before jumping into an Opeth style of Death Metal, after a minute or so the song enters an elevator type music portion to throw you off and jump back into the extreme. The final segments are a mix between Opeth with keyboards in the background and almost upbeat riffs and Enslaved in extremity and galloping riff styling before closing out.

                Every song has its own personality, emotion and destructive power. Every song mixes and most the time you don’t know when one song end and the next song starts. Portions of this album don’t exactly hold my attention as I am personally more of an Extreme Metal fan than I am a Progressive Metal fan, but in the end even not having the interest in Progressive Metal this is still an album I would recommend to any fan of Opeth specifically mixing their new Alt-Prog Rock sound with their old “Blackwater Park” and “Ghost Reveries” extremity, I believe if you’re anything like me and only really a fan of the Extreme Metal portions of this album, there is only a couple songs you would skip.

70/100

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BLEED - "The Hatred Inside" - Review

               What do we have here, Horror Metal? Well this sounds familiar being a fan of Death Metal, what’s the difference? Well for starters, this isn’t Death Metal, it’s more of a Melodic Thrash style with Cannibal Corpse style lyrics except a bit more frightening and real. See from the beginning, where Cannibal Corpse display the act of killing and kind of try way to hard and make it funny, Bleed put you in the conscience of the killer. Almost make you feel bad, you can picture it all happening, but you can’t do anything about it.

                Queue our bass intro to Canadian band Bleed’s album “The Hatred Inside,” the build up of the title song instrumental can almost make you feel the build of the hatred of a killer. The real opening track “Deceiver” gets us started off kindly, pushing you right off the cliff into the mind of a man who knows he should be locked away. The real pleasure of this album is it demonstrates every instrument, all instruments are audible at all times without making the sound overwhelming and on top of that you have the narrative of vocalist Robert Kreed to take you on a story through this man’s mind and pain. This song is also the home off a sweet bass solo, the kind of bass solo that will make every bassist.... in their pants.

                “Murder Baby” a few song down from where we started takes a different idea, the instrumentals are more of a Slayer style, speedy Thrash Metal but with a more Gwar mixed with Rob Zombie style of lyrics and vocals. The chorus is literally just “fuck and kill and hate and rape and plant the seeds of Murder Baby.” The idea of listing exactly what horrors this thing breeds is more of a Gwar thing, but come on it’s called “Murder Baby” tell me that doesn’t sound like a Rob Zombie kind of song. Honorable mention, the next song “Xombimind” sounds a lot like Slipknot’s “Before I Forget” instrumentally.

                From Canada, we have Bleed and their album “The Hatred Inside,” this is an album of horror, and slight hilarity if you have a fucked up mind in songs like “Murder Baby.” They don’t stray away from showing off their influences and they write some awesome in depth and intriguing lyrics, it’s definitely an album and Thrash fan should have in their collection.

4/5

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Interview with Psychostick

The outstanding, oulandish and overall over the top hilarious guys in Psychostick are in between albums right now, IV: Revenge of the Vengeance came out last year and the next one is sure to come sometime in the future but for now, they sat down and took time out of their busy and supposedly creamy life to talk with me. Enjoy what happens.

Hey there, how are you?

Creamy. Very, very creamy.

How is life on the road, you’re currently touring across the USA correct?

Life on the road is exhausting, chaotic, and very very slippery due to all the cream. Did I mention that I was feeling creamy?

You also just came back from good ol’ Harry Potter land, any stories you can share from the great United Kingdom?

Well, it was our first time over in the UK. It was AMAZING. Every show was a huge success, and we are already tinkerin' with agencies and venues to head on back.

I also joined house Hufflepuff. We're HARDCORE.

Your last album “IV: Revenge of the Vengeance” is already coming up on a year old. Any news in sight for album number 5?

We are always writing, brainstorming, and barfing up horrible song ideas for more albums. So yes, expect more from us for SURE.

You guys are at the forefront of Humorcore alongside the likes of early Dethklok (not humourcore, but still comedic) and Tenacious D, what happens in your everyday life to make you write about what you write about?

Mostly the typical stuff;  cars breaking down, going to the dentist, the insatiable craving for tacos, and the occasional demonic possession.

Pretty much all of our material is based on normal boring stuff that either makes us laugh or pisses us off.

What’s your process to writing a song? Whether it is lyrics, riffs or just simple ideas like the skits between songs.

The general rule is that is has to make us laugh genuinely. None of that fake, processed laughter.

From there it's a matter of swishling around things until a song forms. (Note: There is a lot of CREAM involved)

Extensive touring is part of being a band, how do you keep yourself entertained, and from killing each other, while on tour?

We try to enjoy the little things, like eating the local food and drinkin' the local brews. 

It's very important to actually LIKE your bandmates before you tour with them. Many bands neglect that simple thing before they "live the dream."

How do you, in your day to day life, obey the beard?

Lots of Bluebeard beard products, clam chowder, and allowing nature to extend itself from our faces. Hence, BEARD.

Who would you say are your biggest influences in what you do and how you write?

Real life (as mentioned before), the Simpsons, food, and them old slapstick movies (Airplane, Spaceballs, etc)

You’ve covered all sorts of classics, including more recently “Danger Zone” and even more specifically “Bill Nye The Science Guy Theme” what compelled you to cover such strange songs? 

in the case of Danger Zone, that song is REALLY corny. Just read the lyrics. We have no idea what they actually mean.

The others kinda go like, "Wouldn't it be GREAT if we metaled up this thing that SHOULDN'T be metaled?"

Also, how do you follow up covering the Bill Nye Theme Song?

You'll just have to see. :)

So a fan on twitter would like to know, why are you guys so damn attractive?

Genetics and crunches, bro. The rest is a waste of time.

Last but not least, are there any secrets you can share with your fans who survived the stampede of President Rhino?

The only secret that I know of is that it's tough to eat pizza when you're in a coma.

Thank you very much for your time!