Crater - Degenerate (2023)

Chinese doom/sludge heavy enough to make your eyeballs burst and your teeth rattle out of your skull. All the warmth and moisture you normally get from standard doom riffs have been sucked out and the fuzz sandblasted away to leave an arid musical wasteland of slow, hateful tempos. Salvation does lie within Degenerate  as there is a slight stoner element that resonates within the tide of toxic sludge dissonance that gives the album a remarkably accessible feel to it, but generally, the Eyehategod influenced doom leaves a debilitating sense of hopelesness and nausea for which there is no known antidote.

VISION DEPRIVED ~ Self Elevating, Deep Inside The Void (2023)

 

Unsettling Italian death metal that spits and snarls in your face in an unrelenting, frenzied attack. The riffs just keep coming, charged with adrenaline, like a serial killer stalking his next kill. Self Elevating, Deep Inside The Void, hurtles from one toxic tempo to another with crust armoured grind vying with mid paced crunch in a withering dance of ferocious extremity.

WHORE OF BETHLEHEM - Ritual of Homicide (2023)

Tumultuous Texan death metal, bathed in a hue of snarling black anger and macerated with bludgeoning brutality. With skin flaying ferocity mixed with a pummelling rhythm section, Whore Of Bethlehem drags you into a tortured world of hurt.

VOLCANA ~ Goddess of Flame (2017)

Originally released in 2017, Goddess Of The Flame, by U.S band Volcana has been given the vinyl treatment by Glory Or Death Records. Red blooded, gritty riffs and twin guitar leads entwined into vicious barbs, career from one genre to the next, often within the same track. The main ingredient resonates with a Thin Lizzy'ish metal/rock sound but Goddess Of The Flame also leaves an aftertaste of doom and stoner as well as the occasional thrash crunch. 

DEATHRATTLE PODCAST ~ Dirty Dozen February 2023

The twelve albums  I contributed to the Doom Charts as my 'best of' list. As usual the 'Dirtry Dozen was mainly dominated by doom and death metal but this month had more of an influx of stoner albums and even a couple of hard/heavy rock releases. The Filth Pit also provided me with one of my albums of the month 'Repulsie Post Mortem by Putrid

BONE WEAPON - Thrive Or Starve

"Death/doom that never deviates from its sole purpose of asphyxiation by claustrophobic filth"~ Deathrattle Podcast

https://transylvaniantapes.bandcamp.com/album/bone-weapon-thrive-or-starve

WARP - Bound By Gravity (#11 Feb Doom Charts)

"Colossal  stoner/doom aided by a fantastic mix that swells the sound like a dying sun. Deep, sonorous riffs are lacerated by crystalline licks." ~ Deathrattle Podcast

https://warptlv.bandcamp.com/album/bound-by-gravity

TRAMALIZER - Fumes Of Funeral Pyres

"There's no room to breathe with this rabid slice of Finnish death metal. Devastating death metal filled with churning riffs and wailing leadwork thats sounds like a spoiled brat clinging to its mothers skirt tails."~ Deathrattle Podcast

https://tramalizer.bandcamp.com/album/fumes-of-funeral-pyres

PÉ ROTO - Tormento

"Destructive Portuguese doom/sludge with added dissonance to the riffs for maximum aural distress. Tormento is an album swollen with bloat, (very) slowly decomposing as you listen to a heaving groove struggling under its own obese weight. The sludge laden depth of these songs are boundless in their extremity, remorseless in their depravity, colossal shambling structures of doom."~ Deathrattle Podcast

https://pe-roto.bandcamp.com/album/tormento

DRUG MOTHER - Rise Witch (#32 Feb Doom Charts)

"We're a down tempo'd stoner rock band from Newcastle Australia."

https://drugmotherband.bandcamp.com/album/rise-witch

STREET TOMBS - Reclusive Decay

"Reclusive Decay" features six tracks of thrashing Death Metal / Punk freshly ripped from the grave

https://carbonizedrecords.bandcamp.com/album/reclusive-decay

OLD MINE UNIVERSE - This Vast Array (#22 Feb Doom Charts)

"This is a fantastic album from a band with hard rock in its heart and stoner blues in its soul." ~ Deathrattle Podcast

https://oldmineuniverse.bandcamp.com/album/this-vast-array

JUST BEFORE DAWN - Battle Sight Zeroing

"Mid Tempo destruction is our middle name!"

https://justbeforedawn1.bandcamp.com/album/battle-sight-zeroing

PUTRED - Repulsie Post - Mortem

"Death Metal band from Transylvania, Romania."

https://putred.bandcamp.com/album/repulsie-post-mortem

ATOMWINTER - Sakrilege

"It's the same crusty doom/death grisliness as previous releases but this time it's all about the death metal riff. Brutality and filth still prevails but Sakrileg is the fastest album the band has yet written despite being weighed down with pustules and scabs.

This album will make even the leprous headbang. " ~ Deathrattle Podcast

https://atomwinter.bandcamp.com/album/sakrileg-2

ETA LUX - High And Low (#7 Feb Doom Charts)

"High And Low, the third full-length album from these four-piece, North German sandstorm riders, is an absolute treat for longing craving stoner-rock souls from back then as well as today!" ~ Sunday's Heavy Tunes

https://eta-lux.bandcamp.com/album/high-and-low

BLACKWULF - Thieves And Liars (#9 Feb Doom Charts)

"I don’t always need crazy experimentation or mold breaking on all my records; sometimes I just want straight ahead heaviness with riffs for days, killer guitar work, and just a kick ass rock swagger that oozes with its pores, like what we get from Thieves and Liars. You get all of that plus their greatest song yet, Psychonaut Edge Of Light, making this the band’s best album till date." ~ Musipedia Of Metal

https://ripplemusic.bandcamp.com/album/thieves-and-liars

ISOLE ~ Anesidora (2023)

The dual harsh and clean (mainly clean) vocals sets the tone for Isole's new album Anesidora an album that spans the full range of emotions dragging the listener from the depths of despair one moment to a rapturous sense of elation the next. It's like attending a wake yet leaving with a smile on your face. Isole doesn't need fuzz or effects to conjure an epic, aural funeral. Instead, this doom ceremony is sanctified by heavy, metallic crunchy guitars punctuated with solo's that sound like the anguished crying of a grieving widow.

Bereavement has never been this glorious.

https://hammerheartstore.com/collections/vendors?q=Isole

DIVINIST ~ Divinist (2023)

Ominous, sludgy doom seething with evil intent. Bleak, black and sullen, the surprisingly sumptuous sound adds multitudes of layers, pitted with pained, acidic guitar leads, to the numbing, hypnotic dissonance taking root into your skull. Painfully slow, not even the added death metal element breaks Divinist from its lumbering stride of behemothic proportions. Dark, necromantic spells are cast from the first track and the feeling of oppressive malevolence leaves goosebumps on the nape of your neck long after the final track 'Curse' has ended.

DEATHRATTLE PODCAST DIRTY 30 ~ A Stoner Playlist

Volume 1 of the Deathrattle Podcast Stoner Playlist to download and enjoy. Expect extensive use of the wah pedal, fuzz occasionally laced with doom and psych and overly long jams!!

AATHMA - Mah (Avesta 2017)

BAARDVADER - Walking On The Moon ( Baardvader 2020)

CABESAURIO - Gerli Valley ( Gerli Valley 2017)

DAEVAR - Leviathan (Delirious Rites 2023)

EARTH WITCH - Green Torch ( Out Of The Shallow2017)

FABRICANTES - El Mago Del Desierto/Hormigon Armado ( La Selva Incrustada 2016)

GAIA - Desolution (Reality Field 2014)

HAAZE - Acid Queen (HAAZE 2017)

I, CAPTAIN - Stugon Pt II (Mantras For Mindlessness 2016)

JACK HARLON & THE DEAD CROWS - The Tale Of ( The Magnetic Ridge 2021)

K2 - Nuevo Mutro ( At Mini P's 2014 )

LA IGLESIA ATOMICA - Hijo Del Sol ( Gran Muro de Sol 2018)

THE MACHINE - First Unique Prime ( Drie 2010)

THE NAKED HIGH - Moon Turns Red (Tap Into The Evil 2020)

OAK - Smoke (Oak II 2016)

PALACE IN THUNDERLAND - The Word Unspoken ( The King Of The Empty Aeon 2019)

RAIKINAS - Rokka - ( Arcadia 2016)

SAADE - Coming Home (You Are Coming Home 2010)

T.H.U.M.B - Wasted Worlds ( Lunar Flight 2004)

US CHRISTMAS - In The Night ( Run Thick In The Night 2010)

V-8 COMPRESSOR - Don't Break My Fuzz (Don't Break My Fuzz 2017)

WAINGRO - Mercury Six ( Mt Hood 2015)

YAJAIRA - Atormentándonos (Post Tenebras Lux 2017)

Z28 - Race With The Devil ( Mach II 2022)

10000 YEARS - Dark Side Of The Earth (II 2021)

1000 MODS - Into The Spell ( Repeated Exposure to. 2016)

1782 - Priestess Of Death ( From The Graveyard 2021)

18 SPEED TRANNY - Stoner Rock Chick ( Fluid 2003)

1968 - War Dogs (Fortune Havana 2017)

2 HEADED DOGS - Fly With Me ( 2 HEADED DOGS 2016)

BLACK MOON CIRCLE ~ Leave The Ghost Behind (2023)

Thoroughly engrossing Norwegian stoner jams from an alternative dimension. This is one of those rare albums that absorbs time and space into a minute nucleus of existence. I became totally lost in it, just closed my eyes and let it cast me adrift far into the stratosphere. This isn't chill out music, far from it, the liberal waves of psychedelic acid guitar and licks that scratch and bite make sure of that as does the pulsating, stoner rhythm. The tracks are long, divergent and compelling, boundless in complexity, this is an album that begs to be listened to in it's entirety rather than in sections to get the full brain frying, psychedelic experience.

SPECTRAL SOULS ~ Towards Extinction (2022)

Pummelling Peruvian punishment from death metal riffs engorged with brutality and wrath. Thrashing speed hasn't sacrificed the dense juggernaut of sound these guys have somehow harnessed into a murderous album, enbellished with shredding lead guitar. Anyone seen the 'Last Of Us' series'? Well this album is the bands very own 'Bloater' an indestructable, unstoppable force. 

With Towards Extinction, Spectral Souls has rendered Hell's Choir with its unholy trumpets redundant because once you hear the opening bars to the track 'No More God For Me' you know Hell is coming!

PÉ ROTO ~ Tormento (2023)

Destructive Portugese doom/sludge with added dissonance to the riffs for maximum aural distress. Tormento is an album swollen with bloat, (very) slowly decomposing as you listen to heaving groove struggling under its own obese weight. The sludge laden depth of these songs are boundless in their extremity, remorseless in their depravity, colossal shambling structures of doom.

ŠMIERCIESLAŬ (Death Worshipper) ~ Black Metal Tornado (2021)

Beyond necro, scathing black thrash mixing the speed of Bathory with the brutality of Slayer. Don't expect any Celtic Frost style breakdowns, this album is a remorseless onslaught from the netherworld, whipping the spirits of the damned into a headbanging frenzy. The production is enough for the riffs to cause wounds of flagellation upon the listener but don't expect pity from this band.

DEATHRATTLE PODCAST - Dirty Dozen (Jan 2023)

 

** AVAILABLE TO DOWNLOAD**

https://www.podomatic.com/.../2023-02-03T14_43_54-08_00

The first Doom Charts of the year is now available to peruse https://doomcharts.com/ and five of my personal picks made the list. Here is my 'Dirty Dozen for January '23

TRIBUNAL - The Weight Of Remembrance ( Doom Charts#22)

"... beguiling in its beauty, hypnotic with sinful perversion. This is pure blood funeral doom leaving most other bands of this type in its thrall." ~ Deathrattle Podcast 

TIDAL WAVE - Lord Knows ( Doom Charts #1 )

"...riffs so lush that you’ll not only want to headbang to but also give a great big hug." ~ Deathrattle Podcast

ANZILLU - Ex Nihilo

" whose sound is punctuated by buzz-saw guitar riffs delivered with equal amounts of dexterous shredding and pummeling anthemic brute force"

NEGATIVE VORTEX - Tomb Absolute

"Tomb Absolute" is a colossal slab of grim and hopeless death metal evoking bleak and pessimistic visions of a doomed future to come, and stirring with bitter reflections about mental illnesses," 

CONJURETH - The Parasitic Chambers

"Death Metal in the ways of old."

DAEVAR - Delirious Rites ( Doom Charts#16 )

"...the worshipper follows the ghostly-enticing female hand molded from magical-esoteric, sphinx-voice-breath into a pleasurable-tormenting doom scenario of lead-heavy, punchy guitar riffs, deep thudding bass and elementally punching drums.~ SUNDAY‘s HEAVY TUNES

IDLEGOD - Nightmare

" Italian sludge/doom"

RE - BURIED - Repulsive Nature

"Death Metal USA"

DREAD WITCH - Tower Of The Severed Serpent ( Doom Charts #25 )

"Six tracks of skin crawling doom sludge aural abuse, crushing the megalith with riffs of gravitational force and neutronium density." ~Deathrattle Podcast

FAITHXTRACTOR - Contempt For A Failed Dimension

"Faithxtractor was spawned by Ash Thomas in 2005 with the sole intention of playing savage Death Metal as an assault on the pathetic meat puppet human race"

TURBID NORTH - The Decline

"Written during some of the bleaker periods in the band's lifespan, the album sees a darker and more aggressive sound added to the formula. "

DESTRONOMER - The Two Horns ( Doom Charts #39 )

"Eight tracks of fuzz laden heavy riffs and manic melodicism from this driven 3 piece from Sydney."

DEVISER ~ Evil Summons Evil (2023)

I normally shy away from reviewing albums by black metal bands because I'm extremely picky about the genre and don't get excited unless the album is full of speed driven thrash fuelled riffs, steps into death metal influenced brutality, or wanders into the face of  doom laden sorrow. So why am I reviewing 'Evil Summons Evil' by long standing Greek metallers Deviser when it's none of those things? 

It's because Deviser has harkened back to the old ways of pure black metal but instead of weak production and tinny rasping guitars which put me off the scene in the first place, the band has re-emerged after some time away with an album of modern sounding, mid tempo, black metal darkness enhanced by a robust mix. I'm fascinated how the band can create a collection of metal tracks that sound melodic yet still pays homage to Satan, spiteful and giving evidence of their occult roots with a gothic twist to the sound. Evil Summons Evil is an album layered with symphonic drama and Lovcraftian hatred.

For fans of: Rotting Christ, Septicflesh, Dissection, Melechesh, Moonspell

TRIBUNAL ~ The Weight Of Remembrance (2023)

Deathrattle Podcast album of the month for January 2023 

Arising from undead slumber come forth Canada's Tribunal, a new force of the gothic/doom scene with their debut album The Weight Of Rememberance, an album draped in a black lace veil, cloaked in vampiric malevolence, beguiling in its beauty, hypnotic with sinful perversion. This is pure blood funeral doom leaving most other bands of this type in its thrall. 

SARIN ~ Sarin (2022)

This is the Midwestern US version of Sarin and their first, self titled, full length album has turned cruelty into an art form. It's a full blown assault of  feedback laced deathcore, all rampant rhythm and devastating hardcore style crunchy breakdowns, some of which trample into sludge territory and topped off with a thick layer of crust.

NOTHINGNESS ~ Supraliminal (2023)

Chamelionic death metal from Minneapolis. This is the bands second album following on from the excellent The Hollow Gaze Of Death and is even more gloriously chaotic. Riffs assault the eardrums with frenzied abandon, sometimes black, sometimes doom, always devastating, connected by warped, deformed, progressive death metal influences.

This is one of those rare death metal albums that somehow manages to weave complex, nightmarish structures without losing an ounce of brutality

DREAD WITCH ~ Tower Of The Severed Serpent (2023)

Dread Witch was formed in 2022 in Aarhus, Denmark by Andreas Cadaver of stoner metal act Stone Cadaver on guitars, bass, and keys, Mikael Rise of tech metal outfit Scamp on vocals, and Dennis Larsen, formerly of Olm, on drums.

Six tracks of skin crawling doom sludge aural abuse, crushing the megalith with riffs of  gravitational force and neutronium density.

I detect a leaning towards and beyond Triptycon at their heaviest especially in the opening track 'The Tower' but what makes Tower Of The Severed Serpent extra special is when the band occasionally transcends the oppressive gloom and launches a passage of stoner doom groove before once again succumbing to tyrannical sludge doom dissonance.

HORRID SIGHT ~ Evil Made Flesh (2022)

The last track 'Somber Dust' has just finished and I feel like I've been mauled by a pack of wolves then fed through an industrial cheese grater! This is an album of relentless fury and death/thrash savagery. Most of the tracks are between four and six minutes long which is perfect for allowing wailing, screeching solos to waltz with excoriating riffs in various merciless tempos.

I wish I had persevered with a 'best of' list for 2022 as 'Evil Made Flesh' by Mexican band Horrid Sight would most certainly have occupied a place within it.