Scott Williams of RTRFM’s Critical Mass breaks down the best 10 albums of the year.
Honourable mentions:
Entombed A.D. — Back to the Front
Exodus — Blood In, Blood Out
Opeth — Pale Communion
Abysmal Dawn – Obsolescence
Anaal Nathrakh — Desideratum
10. REVOCATION – Deathless Deathless is another fine example of Revocation’s impressive talents, blending tech death, thrash and the occasional progressive interlude. Doesn’t quite top previous releases, but still a stupidly good album.
9. BEHEMOTH — The Satanist After kind of losing their way since Demigod, the band has found a new focus and hit the nail on the head with this release. Crushing.
8. TOMBS — Savage Gold Post-metal with more than a dash of black, Savage Gold is dissonant, haunting, extreme – and one of the surprise releases of the year. See also their excellent cover of Bowie’s ‘Heroes’.
7. VADER — Tibi Et Igni Polish death metal veterans continue on the winning path with their brand of extreme thrash – consistently brutal with bangover-inducing riffs and beats.
6. INSOMNIUM — Shadows of the Dying Sun Greater than or equal to 2011’s One For Sorrow, Shadows blends the melo-doom-death formula for a perfect result. The best band of this genre on the planet right now.
5. WOLF — Devil Seed Heavy metal from Sweden in the vein of Iced Earth/Judas Priest/King Diamond etc. Razor sharp riffs, bombastic drums and one of the best vocalists of the genre. If they could drop a couple of the filler tracks, they could easily knock Iced Earth off their perch. Repeat after me: “SHAAAARK… ATTAAAAAAAAAACK!!”
4. ALCEST – Shelter Taking listeners further into melodic, dreamy, atmospheric territory and leaving the black/post-metal to the past, this album is still on high rotation despite being one of the first releases of 2014. Neige has created yet another album full of beautiful sounds to add to his already impressive back catalogue.
3. TRAP THEM – Blissfucker Holy SHIT. This album knocks you to the ground right from the get-go, leaving you breathless from start to finish. Skull-crushing riffs over pounding D-beats reminiscent of Converge/Napalm Death, yet mixing it up enough to stand on their own and deliver an album with enough variety for repeat listens.
2. THE DEVIN TOWNSEND PROJECT — Z2 Townsend has to be admired, not just for the great music on this album but for the projects he takes on in general, the majority of which are born from his bizarre and brilliant mind. Z2 is a double album (condensed down from 50 songs originally), the first part being a typical DTP “pop metal” album taking elements from Epicloud and Addicted, though it feels more mature. The second half is a War Of the Worlds-style rock opera featuring the return of Ziltoid (Devin’s alter ego, a coffee-loving alien hellbent on world domination) similar in musical style to the first Ziltoid album but with a bigger scope/budget. The Ziltoid tale will also be taken to the musical theatre stage next year at the Royal Albert Hall for a show that sold out within weeks.
1. NE OBLIVISCARIS – Citadel Extreme progressive metal at its finest, Ne Obliviscaris have been impressing metal audiences for a few years now, and have delivered another fine feather in their cap with Citadel. Epic in terms of song length and musicianship, and a perfect blend of the light and dark sides of metal.
Scott Williams joins fellow Life is Noise contributors Scott Bishop and Deryk Thomas in hosting RTRFM’s Critical Mass on Wednesdays at 9PM Perth time (+8 GMT.)
Check back next week as we continue to count down our top records of the year.
10. HAIL SPIRIT NOIR – Oi Magoi Oi Magoi is a strange and clever creature. The melding of black metal with early ‘70s psychedelia, prog rock, and touches of Hammer horror kitsch has a more natural and less forced quality than the debut. The result is something slippery that’s quite difficult to nail down, yet quite fun to try. The band has produced something distinctive from the bulk of heavy music around today, and certainly from the more typical sound of Greek heavy metal. With ironing out the odd kink, Hail Spirit Noir could go on to be a special cult favourite amongst heavy music fans. Not quite sure it’s worth the 666 Euros as listed on Bandcamp, but good on them for trying!
9. KAYO DOT – Coffins On Io A tortured and thoughtful sci-fi noir hybrid of suave neuromanticism, 80s darkwave, and frenetic prog rock, Coffins on Io is an outstanding work by a daring and divisive musical treasure. It demands being listened to in its entirety, continuously revealing details and emotions within the densely packed compositions with each play. Even with their best record yet, it is simply too much to expect near unanimous love. Thankfully for those who are exhilarated by music that keeps the listener on their toes, it’s not in Kayo Dot’s nature to seek out those types of dreams. The ones they share with us are far, far superior.
8. OCCULTATION – Silence In the Ancestral House The New York trio mixes apparent influences from Mercyful Fate, Black Sabbath, NWOBHM, and just an edge of goth on this theatrical gem released through Profound Lore. Nameless Void from Negative Plane supplies riffs that tick all the boxes for any heavy metallurgist, driven on by the solid drumming of Viveca Butler. Annu Lilja puts in an amazing vocal performance alongside her wonderful bass grooves, elevating the band’s sound into an epic haunting occult rock gem. Produced by Converge’s Kurt Ballou, Silence In the Ancestral House is is chock full of great moments for fans of old school metal with a few twists.
7. FVNERALS – The Light Swoon at the brilliant production and elegant compositions of gloomy yet multi-faceted post-rock on this debut LP from Brighton’s Fvnerals. The expansive sound created by hypnotic synths, guitars that drift between deliberate dirge-like mantras and shimmering jangly strums, and down-tempo drumming is crowned spectacularly by the haunting, sensuous surrender to despair of vocalist Tiffany. Together, the three musicians have swept well beyond the suggested potential of their EP. Their capacity for deep, meditative mood of such moreish grimness is impressive. A bright future beckons for these souls calling from the shadows.
6. INTER ARMA – The Cavern Is this the most metal thing that has ever happened? Just under 46 minutes of riffs, all from the top shelf and surpassing pretty much anything else Inter Arma have tried their hand at before (which is really saying something)… The Cavern is a masterpiece that never once feels tired and overdrawn at any point across its epic journey. Engaging from start to finish, the moment you start to make a sarcastic Spinal Tap dig you are slapped hard in the face mid-sentence by another mind-blowing progression, with the opus continuously evolving into something better as it blazes away. The musicianship is breathtaking, full of surprises and soaring melodies amidst the whirring savagery. If you’ve yet to explore this, plan to set the required time aside and be thoroughly rewarded.
5. PALLBEARER – Foundations of Burden Wearing their hearts on their riffs, there is smoothness to Pallbearer’s doom that avoids the sense of pastiche that is so pervasive in metal. Whilst their debut was certainly a great effort,Foundations… sends Pallbearer hurtling into the echelon of heavy divinity. Pallbearer’s gift for crafting layers of melody to achieve their intensity on Foundations of Burden will leave you speechless. The songs are free from the staple production values of a heavy record. It’s not that it hasn’t been done before, just so rarely this well. “The Ghost I Used To Be” and ‘The Watcher In the Dark’ are magnificent highlights, showcasing the immensely pleasing irony of just how elevating doom metal can be for the spirit.
4. BEHEMOTH – The Satanist It seems Behemoth are a love/hate proposition. For those who decry an independent music reviewer praising such polished, slick production and a record that took Satanic death metal into the upper regions of the American charts for the first time ever, I say nick off and have a pow-wow with the Poles who want to jail the band, the Russians who deported them, and all the other gatekeepers. The Satanist is pure excellence, driven by shameless ambition, total lack of self-consciousness, and intense tribulation Nergal has experienced over recent years. The pride taken in the band’s work shows clearly in its outstanding, bar-setting production for death metal. A landmark work in the genre, and one that will create even more expectation at their next step… which Behemoth will gladly meet head on.
3. YOB – Clearing the Path to Ascend
And now, reaching the point where virtually nothing separates the albums on this list going forward, YOB’s Clearing the Path to Ascend was virtually undisputed amongst aficionados of independent heavy music as one of the best albums of the year. Crowned by a song bound for a timeless regard in the world of heavy music, “Marrow”, the rest of the album gradually emerges from the blinding supernova of the closer across multiple listens to burn slowly into the mind as one of the most outstanding albums made in heavy metal history. Scheidt can make it seem as though drawing upon an utterly deadly riff is as easy as breathing for him, and is quite happy to let you have it methodically and relentlessly over a period of time where other bands would have played twenty different ones. This is doom deep in a trance. YOB is meditative. YOB is introspective, and deeply moving in its sincerity. On this record, YOB is godlike.
2. MERKABAH – Moloch Somewhere in the Abyss, there’s a room packed with the souls who lost their way searching for a volatile sound blended from the extremities and sanity-proofed experiments on the fringes of jazz, hardcore, post-rock, and psychedelia. They stand transfixed by a sense of imminent disintegration, engulfed by volatile transmissions of psychosis, spread outwards upon a incendiary command of sound and vision by the five demonic vectors that make up the perfection through chaos that is Merkabah. The band’s Moloch is a pitiless and unforgiving pleasure, provocative and asphyxiating in its brilliance. Within the tremendous invention and intensity of the songs, there is the deep sense that, at their peak performance, Merkabah must be an incredible live band. I have half the mind to travel all the way to the bristling cauldron of exceptional music these days that is Poland simply to find out. Without question, this release from way back in March was one of the most unique and captivating albums of 2014.
1. RAISON D’ETRE – Mise en Abyme For those who know the man’s work, it’s pretty much a given that anything Peter Andersson releases under his project Raison d’Etreis going to be bloody brilliant. After a 5 year break between releases, Andersson produced not only the best album of 2014, but the best of Raison d’Etre’s catalogue across the 22 years of its recorded existence. Mise en Abyme is the singularity, effortlessly sucking you into the deepest recesses of your psyche. Four tracks, adding up to just a skerrick under an hour, provide the ideal soundtrack for witnessing the abandonment of reason that characterizes our times, the anthem for the stench of humanity as it wantonly destroys itself and everything it comes into contact with through ingrained hagiographic values of greed and self-importance. The drones and ambient frameworks are filled with incredible detail, transporting the listener inwards with the purpose of introspection and self-discovery. Whether it is peace or panic,Mise en Abyme will show you things about yourself you may never have known were inside you. This is a supreme soundtrack for being placed within the abyss (the translation of the album’s title), befitting a year when elements within humanity too often showed their bottomless capacity for sinking into decrepitude.
Check back later in the week as the rest of our writers’ count down the best releases of the year.
We check in with all things heavy on RTRFM’s Critical Mass show.
Nothing can stop Behemoth, the Polish extreme metal icons are seemingly unbreakable. Main man Nergal’s highly publicized battle with leukemia and an ongoing battle with the law (and church) over Nergal’s vehement anti-Christian lyrics along with tearing up a bible making them public enemy number one in their home country. So what better way to say “screw you” to all these setbacks and hassles then to release the best album of their career, title it The Satanist AND have it crack the US top 40 chart?
Behemoth’s transition from obscure black metal band to well oiled “blackened death metal” started in 1999 with the Satanica release. Most of the proceeding albums, up til 2009’s Evangelion, while having some great songs tended to blend in a bit together. “Blackened” death metal (or extreme metal for a blanket term) is a hard genre to master for many bands and as a result a percentage of the bands individual sound is sacrificed a bit. Amon Amarth have similar issues (solid but interchangeable albums for a stretch) and for a few albums Behemoth seemed to be content to “out Nile” Nile.
The Satanist reigns these issues in with a powerful, forceful production. All the instruments shine and the drums and guitar in particular sound amazing, Nergal’s feral roar is vital and full of venom. The band apply the breaks a bit and add some dissonant riffage, a nod to a slightly more black metal sound of their early days here and there (showing they are influenced by Mayhem as much as they are Nile and Morbid Angel). These slower moments make the more breakneck pace tracks (such as Messe Noire and Amen) sound that much better. The album closer “O Father O Satan O Sun!” is pretty much an extreme metal re-write of Led Zeppelins “Kashmir”.
Opening track “Blow Your Trumpets Gabriel” starts off as a slow burner before exploding into action, sure to be a live favourite.
The Satanist is an early contender for album of the year already.
Critical Mass is 9pm every Wednesday on RTR FM 92.1