Reviews: Tithe, The Chameleons, Crucible, Walls (Sasa, Rich Piva, Simon Black & GC)

Tithe - Communion In Anguish (Profound Lore Records) [Sasa]

A three-piece extreme grinding death metal band made up of Matt Eiseman (vocalist/guitarist), Alex Huddleston (vocalist/bassist) and Kevin Swartz (drummer), Tithe's new album Communion In Anguish is seven tracks of dissonant death metal.

I absolutely love this new album, it is extreme, dark, and contained political themes. Communion In Anguish has a blend of many genres and even that slight power violence element. The vocals are powerful, and the drums are fast paced heavy and loaded with rage. 

The track Shallow Grave Of Karmic Retribution is my favourite, Kevin Swartz drum skills are very impressive and nothing to laugh at, it is brutal and got that melodic touch to it when it combines with the guitar, bass, and vocals especially on this track, a definite headbanger. The lyrics hint towards calling out narcissism and users, the screams are just so satisfying and pleasing.

Moving onto another track I love is At The Altar Of Starving Children, it talks about being anti war and anti-greed, showing that the band does not shy away from being political at all. Across seven songs, they continue to give nothing but heavy brutal death metal with those powerful political themes. 

The only thing I wish is that there were more tracks and longer in length as I really do love what the band have made, with just 7 song it manages to blow you away with the aggressive bass and deadly speed of the drums.

If you love the dark gloomy vibes then this is definitely the best thing for you, it is diverse and distinctive and different to what is currently happening within the death metal scene. 10/10

The Chameleons - Arctic Moon (Metropolis Records) [Rich Piva]

The Chameleons are one of if not the most underrated post punk band of the 1980s. Them, along with The Wedding Present, at least from an American point of view, never got their due here in the States. Script Of The Bridge and What Does Anything Mean? 

Basically are pretty much perfect 80s post punk records. Bands like Oasis and Smashing Pumpkins site the band as major influences or as being big fans. The Chameleons have broken up and got back together a dozen or so times, but now, in 2025, they are back with album number five, Arctic Moon. 

Two main original members, Vox and Reg Smithies, are in this version of the band and you can certainly tell, as the trademarked The Chameleons post punk, early Brit pop sound is unmistakable on the seven tracks on Arctic Moon.

The opener, Where Are You? is perfect post punk circa 1985 or now, whichever you pick. The guys sound great and the band is super tight. Lady Strange is the same, and shows me that Teenage Fanclub must have been big fans too. 

Feels Like The End Of The World is a gigantic track, with an opening guitar line that sounds like it is from one of their contemporaries, Johnny Marr, and has 60s psych pop vibes combined with what the band does best. 

The piano-driven Free Me could have been stolen by Oasis and played on their stadium tour and no one would have known the difference. Magnolia sounds like it could have been one of their early b-sides. 

David Bowie Takes My Hand is a really interesting track. It is almost nine minutes of slow burn Bowie worship that you just have to hear because it is very, very cool. Saviours Are A Dangerous Thing goes down the more traditional Chameleons path to close the record out. Fans of the band will really appreciate this one.

Fans of The Chameleons getting their first new record from the band in 24 years will be very happy with Arctic Moon. The songs are all a bit too long, but hey, The Chameleons have a new record for the first time in 24 years. 

If you don’t know the band, start with the first two albums, but Arctic Moon is a great addition to a small but mighty discography. 7/10

Crucible – Hail To The Force (From The Vaults) [Simon Black]

I seem to be getting a lot of records like this. It all seemed to start most recently with Tailgunner’s Guns For Hire album, but the reality is that there’s been a glut of old sounding new and very young bands trying to create the era of the parents’ youth, not to mention a bunch of oldsters who never got anywhere at the time dusting off material lost to the intervening four decades, but this is a definite trend. 

Crucible hail from Denmark and this is a clear attempt to point out that this sort of NWOBHM / Speed Metal influenced stuff still sounds pretty good after all these years. If the cover doesn’t tell you where they are coming from, then let’s say that Judas Priest might be entitled to royalties on the basis of reasonable comparison…

One thing in their favour: Crucible have managed to capture the sense of speed and immediacy that old recordings done in limited studio windows very well, without losing all the advantages modern technology has afforded production values. 

Their approach quite originally is to make the full drum mix drums the complete click track for the whole recording, with the drum lines being recorded in real time as live, and everyone else slotting in around this. 

Fortunately, whoever miked this up knew what they were doing, because it absolutely works, and strikes the balance between capturing all the immediacy of the olden days, without compromising overall quality of the end product.

Then there are the tracks. These are all solid, fast-paced and anthemic riff-driven songs with some hugely solid instrumental work creating a highly impactful delivery, wrapped in some well thought out arrangements. The vocals are the one area that I’m struggling with though. 

Philip Butler has a good vocal range and can certainly hit those long high notes in the tradition of Dickinson and Halford, but his melodies and phrasing can come across as a bit repetitive, relying too much on his ability to hold and wail those high notes, which means we lose the impact of the words themselves. 

Don’t get me wrong, he’s naturally gifted with a great set of vocal apparatus, but a little technique is needed here to vary and balance the tone. It's fresh, raw, well-crafted but just needs a little more polish for maximum impact, but rather enjoyable nonetheless. 6/10

Walls - Endeavour Of Destruction (Self Released) [GC]

I always find reviewing new music a bit of a mine field as we usually get a PR kit with releases and sometimes I read them and just wish I hadn’t as some of the descriptions of the artists and their music sound very pretentious and way over the top.

Now I get its their job but it just seems unnecessary to me, today I read Belgian hardcore band Walls PR kit for their new EP Endeavour Of Destruction and it was really something!! There are lots of grand descriptions and promises of things you will only experience listening to this band?! Time to see if they deliver!

I am not instantly blow away by opener We All Suffer because one of the many differing influences they bang on about in their PR kit, nu-metal seems to be the main focus on this track with jilting time frames and squealing sounds covering everything and a bass heavy thud that drags and rumbles along, it never really picks up any pace and seems to form a track without any excitement, and it all just feels very meh to my ears.

White Ghoul attempts to offer more and while it does sound like a more formed song to begin with and has a half decent chug to it, we then get more of the angsty nu-metal woe is me stuff that sounded boring in 2003 so now it’s just not needed at all.

They switch between the heavier and mopey bits with limited success until Viper threatens to make me want to instantly give up and turn it off as it starts with some stupid electronic dance beat which does then actually make way for something with a bit of grit and energy but it doesn’t last for long and then we are back to the basic sounding nu-metal heavy core and its just not for me.

I don’t like the tone of the guitars and the mix feels horrible, I just don’t get this style of music at all and for people to call it hardcore actually really gets on my nerves. 

Gears Of The Cold Machine almost promises to save the day but ultimately fails, it starts out ok enough but, very quickly we are right back to a very basic sounding chugathon that lacks any emotional depth or anything that really makes your hairs stand up on end its all just so insipid and bland sounding.

Thankfully Quicksand Part 2 (Not sure where part one is, but I also don’t realty care as that would be another track I had to listen too!) is the last track and they don’t do anything different to what you would have expected, they chug and holler as loudly as they can but ultimately deliver nothing you can get any sort of feeling out of and honestly I am just glad its all over now.

Walls made a lot of big promises and raised expectations for this EP and they delivered precisely none of them! This felt completely devoid of any real emotion, it felt forced and empty, you can try to be as heavy as you want but if there is no feeling or emotion to back it up you will ultimately fall flat. 

This is exactly what Endeavour Of Destruction has done, I cannot emphasize enough that this is nowhere near a hardcore release this is a nu-metal core release if that’s even a thing? Whatever this EP is, unfortunately it’s not for me. 2/10