Car bomb might be one of the most underrated of all of the tech/math/jazzcore bands out there, they have released some absolutely mind bogglingly mental music throughout their career so far and deserve to be absolutely massive but never seem to have broken through and conquered the world, so clearly I am a fan and I hope this new EP Tiles Whispers Dreams keep the good run going.
Blindsides has a blistering and jagged beginning that then drops down into a droney and sludgy but still intricate and technically beautiful with plenty of twists and turns and always manages to keep you engaged and intrigued all the way through and they even manage to throw in some off kilter yet still hauntingly beautiful melodic section midway to really mix everything up, Paroxysm is a bit more straightforward thinking and focuses on pure blunt force attack, the mid bending rhythms and techniques are obviously still there but there it feels a lot more streamlined and intentional.
There aren’t as many tangents or time changes thrown in and the song is fairly short so doesn’t need to be overcomplicated and just like the Tiles Whisper Dreams is the last track and it has a more epic feel to it then the previous tracks, it feels like the production has been beefed up as there is just a whole new level of thickness to every guitar and the drums sound punishingly violent, the song has a new different rhythm to it and around every corner there is something new to be heard, not repeating much is a definite strong point for Car Bomb and an appeal for someone who doesn’t like to be bored when listening to music and it all blends in to create a worthy ending.
I probably knew going into this exactly what score this was going to get as in my humble opinion over all the years I have been listening to Car Bomb they have never had a bad release and Tiles Whispers Dreams is a worthy addition to an already immense back catalogue. If you like Car Bomb you will undoubtedly love this and if you are hearing them for the first time then this will easily make you want to delve into their other releases and that has got to be worth listening to it for! 10/10
The New Jersey band was different when Further was released, most notable was Jason Limpantsis on lead vocals, who sadly passed away this year. Further is owned by Jason, as his vocals really doubled down on the heaviness of the songs and partnered perfectly with all of the riffs and Sabbath-y heavy blues vibe of the record.
We all owe Magnetic Eye a debt of gratitude for bringing back this classic, influential, and monumental album. It deserves to be heard by everyone who loves what is going on in the scene today, because without records like Further and what Solace was doing in 2000 this thing we love would look and sound a lot different. RIP Jason, and long live Solace. 9/10
Retching - Charming The Decomposed (Transcending Obscurity Records) [GC]
I’ve been away for a while, busy with life stuff and so on, so to ease my way back into reviewing I have something from one of my go to labels for death metal, Transcending Obscurity, from most previous reviews it may seem like I am on their payroll, I can assure you I am not, they are just a great, consistent label who generally release great music on a regular basis. This week it’s the new release from Retching, Charming The Decomposed.
It takes Moonlight Perversions- Gorging On Ecstasy a while to get going as it has an unnecessarily long sample as its intro but thankfully when it does get going there is no messing about its just feral, pounding death metal, nothing fancy and no subtleness in any part of the track, it has a bit of an old school Carcass feel to the sound which helps things massively and gets us off to a good start. Premature Decapitation absolutely flies out of the blocks and gets a bit messy in places as its just full steam ahead but this also adds to the charm, its not polished or pristine, its rough and dirty and sometimes death metal needs to be taken back to that place to remind everyone where it came from.
I probably knew going into this exactly what score this was going to get as in my humble opinion over all the years I have been listening to Car Bomb they have never had a bad release and Tiles Whispers Dreams is a worthy addition to an already immense back catalogue. If you like Car Bomb you will undoubtedly love this and if you are hearing them for the first time then this will easily make you want to delve into their other releases and that has got to be worth listening to it for! 10/10
Solace - Further: 2025 Remaster (Magnetic Eye Records) [Rich Piva]
Solace is one of the first bands that got me back into the heavy stuff and got me really paying attention again to the stoner/metal genre with their release of the amazing album The Brink in 2019. But Solace had been around for over two decades before that record dropped, with multiple different lineups but the same killer heavy stoner/metal goodness.
Their debut record, Further, out of print for a long time and originally released in 2000, has been resurrected by Magnetic Eye Records for a new vinyl pressing that includes some great extras that have new been released before, until now, and allows this underrated classic to be heard by the masses for the first time in a long time. Great timing to re-introduce this record as the band is prepping new material, which everyone should be very excited about, but this is where it all began.
The New Jersey band was different when Further was released, most notable was Jason Limpantsis on lead vocals, who sadly passed away this year. Further is owned by Jason, as his vocals really doubled down on the heaviness of the songs and partnered perfectly with all of the riffs and Sabbath-y heavy blues vibe of the record.
Just check out Black Unholy Ground for the proof of this. Solace was really ahead of their time and were (are) experts of incorporating all sorts of different styles in their songs, from the aforementioned Sabbath worship, some serious metal licks, the driving stoner grooves before the masses were doing it (Whistle Pig), some sludgy parts, and punk and hardcore ethos picked up while coming up in the NJ scene (see: Followed).
All of this makes Further pretty much a perfect record. The repress/remaster sounds excellent (got my vinyl yesterday!) and Magnetic Eye did us all an even further (pun intended) solid by giving us some bonus tracks to this already amazing record. This included some cool covers, like their version of the killer Skynyrd track On The Hunt that shows off another one of their broad influences and styles, right next to a Misfits cover, We Bite, which is a perfect microcosm of what Solace was all about on Further.
There is also a killer version of one of the best tracks on Further in the form of Heavy Birth/2-Fisted (Distanced From Reality Version), some slow burn heavy psych until the sludge kicks in with Dirt, as well as a glimpse into what the band sounded like live during that time, with their cover of the James Gang classic, Funk 49.
We all owe Magnetic Eye a debt of gratitude for bringing back this classic, influential, and monumental album. It deserves to be heard by everyone who loves what is going on in the scene today, because without records like Further and what Solace was doing in 2000 this thing we love would look and sound a lot different. RIP Jason, and long live Solace. 9/10
I’ve been away for a while, busy with life stuff and so on, so to ease my way back into reviewing I have something from one of my go to labels for death metal, Transcending Obscurity, from most previous reviews it may seem like I am on their payroll, I can assure you I am not, they are just a great, consistent label who generally release great music on a regular basis. This week it’s the new release from Retching, Charming The Decomposed.
It takes Moonlight Perversions- Gorging On Ecstasy a while to get going as it has an unnecessarily long sample as its intro but thankfully when it does get going there is no messing about its just feral, pounding death metal, nothing fancy and no subtleness in any part of the track, it has a bit of an old school Carcass feel to the sound which helps things massively and gets us off to a good start. Premature Decapitation absolutely flies out of the blocks and gets a bit messy in places as its just full steam ahead but this also adds to the charm, its not polished or pristine, its rough and dirty and sometimes death metal needs to be taken back to that place to remind everyone where it came from.
The same sludge like production drips all over Shower Curtain Silhouette and the same grimy and downright filthy sound permeates the track as a whole and the main riff in the song is infectiously catchy, it has rhythm and groove mixed with equal parts brutality and it’s an absolute blast to listen to. Foaming is another rough and ready sounding song, that once again does sound a bit messy and all over the place time and syncing wise but none of this really takes any of the enjoyment away, it just sort of adds to the charm of the whole thing!
The beginning bars of Vulgar Celluloid Trophy goes for the slower and more swampy Florida style of death metal and wile I’m not saying it sounds exactly like Obituary, I’m not saying it doesn’t either, it doesn’t take long for the thrashy death metal to take back over again and it’s a nice way to shake things up and show what they can do. It takes until Septic Entombment for some parts of the sound to get a little grating, as before the charm was there it now starts to get a bit annoying in places as the chaotic bits are sounding that little bit too messy and you just want them to concentrate more, but then they manage to pull it out of the bag towards the end when they show a little more composure and reign it in they show that can create some hulking groove laden death metal that you just want them to concentrate on as this is what they undoubtedly do best!
I’m not really sure what purpose Fetid Abattoir serves as it’s an instrumental and its not even a very good one its slow, laborious and ultimately very boring and its just not really needed at all, thankfully they end on a more positive note on Mortuary Of Desire which has all the high points of previous songs and even manages to not get messy in any parts, it’s just one last solid blast of gory old school death metal nastiness.
Most of Charmig The Decomposed was a highly enjoyable listen and you can forgive some of the rough around the edges-ness as it’s got some genuinely disgusting grooves in there and provides you a with a glorious reminder that all death metal doesn’t need to be glossily produced and razor sharp. It can be dirty, it can be lo-fi, it can be whatever you want as long as it sounds good and for the most part is does here, of course there were bits I didn’t love and some that got slightly annoying but for the most part these are easily overlooked and shouldn’t take away from what is a very good album. 8/10
Most of Charmig The Decomposed was a highly enjoyable listen and you can forgive some of the rough around the edges-ness as it’s got some genuinely disgusting grooves in there and provides you a with a glorious reminder that all death metal doesn’t need to be glossily produced and razor sharp. It can be dirty, it can be lo-fi, it can be whatever you want as long as it sounds good and for the most part is does here, of course there were bits I didn’t love and some that got slightly annoying but for the most part these are easily overlooked and shouldn’t take away from what is a very good album. 8/10
Afghan Haze - Sermons Of Filth And Disgust (Self Released) [Rich Piva]
In the official group chat of Musipedia Of Metal, it was questioned as to why I had let an album that was not yet claimed to be reviewed simply labelled “Booze Weed Satan” as the genre description slip by me. This is a valid point, given the albums I usually grab as my own to review with the fervour of the most loyal member of a Tik Tok dance cult. Anyway, here we are, we me reviewing the new Afghan Haze record, Sermons Of Filth And Disgust. Indeed.
The first think we need to talk about are the vocals. These are the opposite of clean, so you need to be okay and ready for that right off the bat. It’s not subtle with the opener, Copperheads, which is slow, crawling death doom. Same with the track Hogs Breath. This record sure is heavy, with case in point being You're Marked which exists to kill you. You can hear it in your voice.
In the official group chat of Musipedia Of Metal, it was questioned as to why I had let an album that was not yet claimed to be reviewed simply labelled “Booze Weed Satan” as the genre description slip by me. This is a valid point, given the albums I usually grab as my own to review with the fervour of the most loyal member of a Tik Tok dance cult. Anyway, here we are, we me reviewing the new Afghan Haze record, Sermons Of Filth And Disgust. Indeed.
The first think we need to talk about are the vocals. These are the opposite of clean, so you need to be okay and ready for that right off the bat. It’s not subtle with the opener, Copperheads, which is slow, crawling death doom. Same with the track Hogs Breath. This record sure is heavy, with case in point being You're Marked which exists to kill you. You can hear it in your voice.
The evil sounding The Butcher is very sludgy, as New Orleans as you can get for a band from Connecticut. I think the band excels when they go the death and roll route, like they do on Phoebe, the most up-tempo track on the record. I am sure the guys in the band have the Acid Bath records, considering the track Coffin Burners, which is also great. Hammers and Wolves is more death and roll than death doom, and continues the effort to destroy you.
The biggest challenge for most on this record will be the dirty, dirty death vocals. If you dig that though, and you like some heavy, sludgy, New Orleans sludge via Connecticut, you will probably dig Sermons Of Filth And Disgust. If clean vocals are you thing, then you may want to skip this one. 7/10
The biggest challenge for most on this record will be the dirty, dirty death vocals. If you dig that though, and you like some heavy, sludgy, New Orleans sludge via Connecticut, you will probably dig Sermons Of Filth And Disgust. If clean vocals are you thing, then you may want to skip this one. 7/10
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