Crystal Viper - The Silver Key (Listenable Records) [Matt Bladen]
After Marta Gabriel released her debut solo album the same year as the last Crystal Viper album (2021), and dabbling with melodic stuff with Moon Chamber, she now returns to heavy metal with the ninth album from the Polish power/classic metal band.
So it's Marta behind the mic and on bass, rhythm guitar (in the studio) and piano used on ballads such as Wayfaring Dreamer. Flanked by Andy Wave and Eric Juris on twin axe attack as Kuba Galwas sits behind the kit, this album deals with the works of H.P Lovecraft so it continues the vein tapped on The Cult in 2021, well and before that as well as the band have always dealt with horror and fantasy so this ninth release, keeps their style of metal more towards the occult and evil than the dragons and battles of many bands in their genre.
Despite this look towards darker subject matter, Crystal Viper play classic metal and play it well, influenced by Priest, Maiden, Mercyful Fate and Angel Witch, the galloping rhythms on bass and guitar from Marta injecting the pace on tracks such as Book Of The Dead and Old House In The Mist. Those dual guitars adding to Heading Kadath and Fever Of The God as they get a it more progressive with the title track and those brooding horror themes inspire Cosmic Forces Overtake as more drama and piano playing comes on the closing Gods Of Thunder, Wind And Rain which screams of Manowar.
Classic heavy metal with horror at it's heart, Crystal Viper still wear their influences proudly. 7/10
Stillborn - Netherworlds (Black Lodge Records) [Rich Piva]
Generally, bands that try to sound too much like Type O Negative fail miserably. Either they are way too close to the Type O sound (see; October Noir, it is scary and almost wrong how much they sound like the band) or they just don’t really get the vibe. The closest record to me that got it was Woods Of Ypres - Woods IV: The Green Album. It had the Type O doom and despair but also that sense of humour that was a bit more hidden but ever-present on that record (RIP David Gold).
I wrote the above as I was putting together my review for the new Stillborn album, Netherworlds. I went into the record with zero knowledge about the band and only that they had a Type O thing going on. Well, I am a journalist, so I did some research and it turns out these Swedes started all the way back with their first demo in 1985, when Peter was still hanging off the back of a garbage truck and in Carnivore, so that all went out the window.
Early Stillborn has the deep vocals but they sound more like a proto metal version of Sisters Of Mercy than they do Type O. The band took a really long break after 1992, releasing a random single in 2003 and finally another new record in 2017 which was very Candlemass meets Type O, which brings us to Netherworlds that stays firmly in the roots of their 2017 record but feels more minimalist than its predecessor, with mostly strong results.
I hated this record for like the first 7 minutes. Then I restarted it with a different frame of mind and it quickly grew on me. Neophyte has a weird little riff and is a slower doom chug with vocals so low at times it sounds like he is belching. When the chorus kicks in you hear where the Type O comparisons come from as Mr. Steele seems to emanate from my speakers at one point. Musically there is something sparse to the production, and it really works well. The prominence of the keys and synths makes this record lean more towards the gothic metal side, with the closer, When The End Begins as a good case in point as well as the very spooky children Of Darkness. You get evil amusement park/haunted house vibes from Dead Black Woods in the best possible way of course, as well as the Candlemass worship I mentioned from tracks like Katharsis.
Albino Flogged In Blue is up there for the song title of the year and is one of my favourites tracks on Netherworlds, probably because it sounds the most like Type O out of all of them. The chunkiest riff comes from Lusus Naturae and is the heaviest track on the record while the addition of female vocals on Motherland adds an extra depth to the album. Is the album a track or two too long? Probably, but the strengths definitely outweigh the weaknesses on Netherworlds.
Stillborn works on their own timetables, so let’s just be grateful that we have Netherworlds in 2024. The shift towards more gothic metal is a good one, keeping this small but mighty discography diverse enough to give us something different every time out, even if it is decades apart from releases. Check out this and the old Stillborn stuff if you are not familiar like me, you are in for a treat. 8/10
Cages For Preachers - The Sleep That Knows No Waking (Self Released) [Rich Piva]
I am pretty sure that none of the four members of Manchester UK’s Cages For Preachers were alive when the bands that they are influenced by were in their heyday, but if Greta Van Fleet can shamelessly play Led Zeppelin dress up then why not can these guys sound like they come out of the US Pacific Northwest circa 1993? Yeah, you get some tuned down, very grungy guitars ala Soundgarden and Alice In Chains, some radio friendly alt rock like, I don’t know, let’s say Dishwalla, and even some vibes from the band that the GVF boys worship at the altar of.
Here is the difference though, and I will make some people mad here, but I feel so much more soul from CFP on their debut record, The Sleep That Knows No Waking, then I have on anything that I ever heard from GVF. I‘m sorry, but while the latter sound like they cooked up their stuff in a lab with lots of dudes in suits, Cages bring us something that feels real and somehow fresh and new even borrowing from all of those legendary bands.
The chunky down tuned riff on the opener, The Blind Leading The Blind, is a nice heavy grunge type thing with a very cool riff and great vocals. I mean it is way more Superunknown then it is Fopp, but it is some nice quality grungy metal and you can tell these kids are up for it. You get something similar with tracks like Soon Your Day Will Come that includes nice and heavy wall of sound guitars and sweet echoed vocals and the slower burn but equally heavy So Young. Jeff Buckley is used as a reference point in their bio, and I guess this is what they were going for with the ballad type track Slipping Away.
This is where the 90s radio rock stuff comes to the forefront, but it almost feels like a cross between that and an 80s metal ballad. It’s a good song, but I prefer when the boys are more flannel and less hairspray, like on Let Me In, that once again musically channels late period Soundgarden and even includes a Cantrell inspired riff. This one rips and is one of my favourites on here.
The Sleep That Knows No Waking is filled with serious 90s love, including Heaven Has Fallen and False Idols that include more great vocals and additional cool Seattle style riffs. I am usually not disappointed when a band has a song named after the band, and this is no exception, as Cages For Preachers is my favourite track on the record and really brings the metal side out of the band. Great stuff. The record closes with two more rippers, Bury The Hatchet and Adrenaline, which I particularly dig.
I mean what is not borrowed from these days? To me it is all about where it’s coming from, and the eleven songs on Cages For Preachers seems nothing but real. Nothing built in a lab here, just four kids leveraging the best music from the past to create an excellent debut record with The Sleep That Knows No Waking. 8/10
Ethos - An Eye For An Eye (Self Released) [Matt Bladen]
Ethos have drawn comparisons to Muse, Circa Survive, Porcupine Tree, The Dear Hunter and Between The Buried And Me, so you get modern prog rock with some post-hardcore screams, pianos and bags of emotion. Inspired by classical music as much as they are metal and rock it makes for a level of musicianship that is right up in the higher reaches but never skimps on the melody or the accessibility. This EP from the Atlanta based band is based around the Archetype Suite, it makes up the majority of this EP, following the Muse-like Holy Water and opener Begin With An End.
The Archetype Suite is a long running concept that has had it's beginnings on their last releases but Parts IV to VI are part of this album and continue the storyline established in Part I on their last album Shade & Soil with a cinematic sound that features stings and pianos, spread across three new sections and a promise of more to come. It's with this suite that Ethos display their progressive chops and as such their talent. Their non concept tracks are good but maybe are little too close to the likes of BTBAM, but The Archetype Suite they lean more towards the likes of Coheed & Cambria.
An Eye For An Eye gives you two new stand alone tracks and the next chapters in Ethos' magnum opus', If you've not heard the band before, this is an easy access point to what they do well. /710
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