Ripple Music’s Bone Church have been bringing us some killer bluesy stoner doom for almost ten years now, but never has the Connecticut band more sound like they were from Texas, or maybe North Florida, then they do on their new record, Deliverance.
While the first records leaned way more into the doom side of things, especially vibe wise, the seven songs on Deliverance are as party album as Bone Church can possibly get; more ZZ Top than Sabbath, with other Southern Rock and rocking blues bands thrown into their already killer mix of heavy.
There is always a gallop to Bone Church and this record is no different, but there is some next level ripping it up on Deliverance. Electric Execution sounds like if Grand Funk and Diamond Head collaborated on a song, and boy does it work. Lucifer Rising keeps up the proto/NWOBHM vibes and is the most Sabbath song on the record, but still with this kind of Texas groove to it. The Sin Of 1000 Heathens is the most Bone Church song on Deliverance, so this one should be right in a BC fan’s wheelhouse.
There is always a gallop to Bone Church and this record is no different, but there is some next level ripping it up on Deliverance. Electric Execution sounds like if Grand Funk and Diamond Head collaborated on a song, and boy does it work. Lucifer Rising keeps up the proto/NWOBHM vibes and is the most Sabbath song on the record, but still with this kind of Texas groove to it. The Sin Of 1000 Heathens is the most Bone Church song on Deliverance, so this one should be right in a BC fan’s wheelhouse.
The very on the nose title Goin’ To Texas is pure doomy ZZ Top, and it is killer. Love the organ work on it too. There is a kind of Alice Cooper thing going on as well, and it all works great. You know how ZZ Top lyrically can leave out the subtly of things? How the lyrics can be the right level of cringe and cheese but also wonderful?
Bone Church nails the vibe perfectly on Muchachos Muchachin, with not just the words but the ZZ Top worship musically as well. The gallop returns on Bone Boys Ride Out, doubling down on Deliverance being your outlaw biker friend’s new favourite record. The closing title track is a grandiose (for Bone Church) 70’s stadium rock anthem that channels all of the heavier radio friendly great bands of that era. It is very different for the band, but it is also the perfect way to end the record for what Deliverance is.
I don’t think that Deliverance is a massive shift in sound for Bone Church, but I think it is just enough of a change to take the Connecticut boys to the next level, even if they are thousands of miles from Texas. Great stuff for new and old BC fans, and fans of filthy ZZ Top covered heavy ass blues metal. 8/10
Brainwave - Ill Intent (Elimination Records) [Mark Young]
Unexpected treat of the week goes to the Wellington crossover outfit Brainwave, whose name initially gave me alt-rock/shoegaze vibes until pressing play and album opener No Mercy came out stomping. You can safely say that within 5 seconds of the drums coming in, followed by what the young kids would describe as a guitar line from the stone age suddenly dropping in, you know that you are nowhere near shoegaze territory.
I don’t think that Deliverance is a massive shift in sound for Bone Church, but I think it is just enough of a change to take the Connecticut boys to the next level, even if they are thousands of miles from Texas. Great stuff for new and old BC fans, and fans of filthy ZZ Top covered heavy ass blues metal. 8/10
Brainwave - Ill Intent (Elimination Records) [Mark Young]
Unexpected treat of the week goes to the Wellington crossover outfit Brainwave, whose name initially gave me alt-rock/shoegaze vibes until pressing play and album opener No Mercy came out stomping. You can safely say that within 5 seconds of the drums coming in, followed by what the young kids would describe as a guitar line from the stone age suddenly dropping in, you know that you are nowhere near shoegaze territory.
Ill Intent is a 10-song repeated mantra, where the ability to throw out triplets, down pick and carry out whammy bar abuse are the order of the day. So, where it could be dull for some, used to technical wizardry, then this will heaven for others.
Imagine an album that channels the vibe and approach from the mid to late 80’s thrash, then bolts an extreme vocal style to it. This is what Brainwave have done here, and if its not for you, never mind. You should go and pick something from the technical section and then bore the pants off someone about it.
Before we go too far, Ill Intent is their debut release and is a confident, well-built one at that. Each of the tracks ploughs its way through that thrash heavy field, always keeping one eye on where they can bring a touch of hardcore into it but always ensuring that they keep the riffs rolling and that old school vibe is maintained but in doing so it paints them into a corner in how each track is built.
For them to try and keep each song fresh is a tall order but for the most part they achieve a measure of success. Ill Intent is built with those who love aggressive, to the point metal. That is their core audience, and your enjoyment of this will depend on how you feel about thrash metal. Love it then this is right up your street. Hate it, then go elsewhere.
I make no apologies about this being a relatively short review because it would be largely redundant in me trying to give you an in-depth precis of each song, which would miss the point. Rather than zero in on one stand-out track, instead give all ten a go because each one does its job in striking hard and then moving onto the next one.
I make no apologies about this being a relatively short review because it would be largely redundant in me trying to give you an in-depth precis of each song, which would miss the point. Rather than zero in on one stand-out track, instead give all ten a go because each one does its job in striking hard and then moving onto the next one.
So, to recap: Love thrash? Buy this. Hate thrash? Don’t bother. 7/10
Remina - The Silver Sea (Avantgarde Music) [Matt Bladen]
Mike Lamb and Heike Langhans, both of international atmospheric black metal act Sojourner return with a second album of brooding, introspective gothic doom. Featuring the musical craftsmanship of Lamb and the haunting vocals of Langhans.
The Silver Sea also features some brilliant guest vocals from the dulcet tones of Mick Moss of Antimatter on Algol while Vanta Rey features Tony Dunn of Sgàile. It's an album that deals with turmoil, the theme of isolation runs through the album as during the recording of the album Lamb and Langhans had to move away from their life in Italy and move across the world to New Zealand for family reasons.
It's this sense of the unknown and the fear that brings which comes through on the claustrophobic tracks of this record, the guitars and bass riffs, helped immeasurably by the drum tracking of Shayne Roos. While the undercurrent of electronics means that synthwave pulses on Io while it also adds some beauty to final track Silence and The Silver Sea.
Album two reflects big personal change for Remina but musically they stay on track with some gorgeous gothic doom. 8/10
Deteriorot - Awakening (Xtreem Music) [GC]
Having been around since 1988, you may expect Deteriorot to have a hefty back catalogue but after a quick check, it looks like Awakening is ‘only’ their seventh album, they came from a time when death metal was fresh and new and have persevered and carried the torch for nearly 4 decades, time to find out if they still have what it takes after all these years.
We get title track Awakening to start off and it’s just an unnecessary intro which seems like a weird choice for the title track? It actually begins properly with The Flame which is full of the scuzzy sounding riffs that one minute are all guns blazing but then it’s a slow, brooding vibe but do we get enough blasty, chaotic bits to appease anyone who has a short attention span, no not really and it’s a bit of an underwhelming start in all honesty.
Remina - The Silver Sea (Avantgarde Music) [Matt Bladen]
Mike Lamb and Heike Langhans, both of international atmospheric black metal act Sojourner return with a second album of brooding, introspective gothic doom. Featuring the musical craftsmanship of Lamb and the haunting vocals of Langhans.
The Silver Sea also features some brilliant guest vocals from the dulcet tones of Mick Moss of Antimatter on Algol while Vanta Rey features Tony Dunn of Sgàile. It's an album that deals with turmoil, the theme of isolation runs through the album as during the recording of the album Lamb and Langhans had to move away from their life in Italy and move across the world to New Zealand for family reasons.
It's this sense of the unknown and the fear that brings which comes through on the claustrophobic tracks of this record, the guitars and bass riffs, helped immeasurably by the drum tracking of Shayne Roos. While the undercurrent of electronics means that synthwave pulses on Io while it also adds some beauty to final track Silence and The Silver Sea.
Album two reflects big personal change for Remina but musically they stay on track with some gorgeous gothic doom. 8/10
Deteriorot - Awakening (Xtreem Music) [GC]
Having been around since 1988, you may expect Deteriorot to have a hefty back catalogue but after a quick check, it looks like Awakening is ‘only’ their seventh album, they came from a time when death metal was fresh and new and have persevered and carried the torch for nearly 4 decades, time to find out if they still have what it takes after all these years.
We get title track Awakening to start off and it’s just an unnecessary intro which seems like a weird choice for the title track? It actually begins properly with The Flame which is full of the scuzzy sounding riffs that one minute are all guns blazing but then it’s a slow, brooding vibe but do we get enough blasty, chaotic bits to appease anyone who has a short attention span, no not really and it’s a bit of an underwhelming start in all honesty.
In Battle To Survive carries on with the low and slow pace and it’s a bit of a struggle to make much out over the vocals here as they have been mixed as the main part and just drown everything out for the most part Horrors In An Everlasting Nightmare doesn’t do anything to change the dynamic or sound, which would be fine if the sound was interesting or did something to really reel you in but it doesn’t do that at all, its all so slow and tedious and so far the songs all just feel so long and drawn out, I can’t imagine watching this live would be very entertaining!
I’m already struggling to be positive and I’m only halfway through and unfortunately A Ghost In The Mirror does nothing to change my view on how things are going, there is just nothing interesting happening it’s all just slow, crawling and very dull, cut, paste, repeat and there are 12 tracks on this album, with only one having anything half decent happening so far!
Deliver Us From Fiction then does sort of shut me up and has that something that has been missing so far, it has pace and energy with a riff that will burrow into your brain and stay there for a while (because it’s the first one you have heard on the album so far probably) the main verses have an unpredictability about them and sound rough and ready which is a welcome change but they never stray too far from what they have done all album and about midway just totally stop any momentum and its back to the slow, tedious pace and I just roll my eyes and wait for the song to finally finish.
I was expecting Haunting Images From A Past Life to be a blasty, short number at 2:32 but of course it’s nothing of the sort it is, just a drawn-out boring dirge of a track and I honestly don’t know how much more I can be bothered with on this album before I just completely lose that will to live! Programmed By Fear is where I do actually tune out as its just more of the same, we then get Winter Moon and In Silence which are you guessed it, carbon copies of any other track you may care to mention on the record.
The Spirit veers off track and does finally have some energy and, well spirit, it just annoying that its in there but they use it so rarely because more of this would have made this album a lot more listenable, To Sleep isn’t what I have finally done, its an instrumental outro and just sums everything up in one last shot of boringness.
It’s been 37 years Deteriort has been around for and on this showing, I am not really sure how? There may be different sounds to their previous albums, but Awakening does not make me want to find out! Death Metal can polarize opinions as there are so many different forms of it, I’m not sure how to pinpoint this because boring death metal doesn’t really have decent ring to it but, I am sorry this is exactly what this album was, boring. 3/10
It’s been 37 years Deteriort has been around for and on this showing, I am not really sure how? There may be different sounds to their previous albums, but Awakening does not make me want to find out! Death Metal can polarize opinions as there are so many different forms of it, I’m not sure how to pinpoint this because boring death metal doesn’t really have decent ring to it but, I am sorry this is exactly what this album was, boring. 3/10
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