Undead – Blood Enemy

undead_-_blood_enemy

This one arrived in the mail some time ago. Apparently, it got held up in US Customs because our address is on the terrorist watch list. Looking beneath the skin, which is tasty gore-dripping old school death metal, this 7″ EP in fact owes its origins to the speed/death crossover bands of the late 1980s, sounding like a cross between Merciless and Sadistic Intent with Swedish death metal style elegant riffs concluding each song.

(more…)

10 Comments

Tags: , , ,

Full Sail Brewing Company – Session Premium Lager

session premium lager

When I ran to the liquor store hoping to pick up a reasonable beer to wash the taste of the horrible Sam Adam Foreskin Spiced Latte out of my mouth, this called out to me as something that probably would taste akin at least to a Michelob, Budweiser’s less diabetic brother. Session Premium Lager is your typical American lager but done well. I smell lemony hops and Ritz crackers. Strong malts almost overpower the taste but it finishes semi-dry. This is a dangerously drinkable beer. A man with a twelve-pack is akin to a seven year old fat kid with a bag of Pepperidge Farm cookies; they’re going to be mostly gone by the end of the night. There’s nothing truly unique to make Session Premium Lager worth seeking out though. There are better American and European lagers, there are more flavorful beers, there is nothing actually memorable in these grenade bottles but it doesn’t do anything wrong and it isn’t watered down for 22 year olds in cargo shorts.

Quality: 3/5
Purchase: 3/5

3 Comments

Tags: , , ,

Boston Beer Company – Samuel Adams Octoberfest

samuel adams octoberfest

The Boston Beer Company generally makes solid but unexceptional beers for a wide audience which isn’t surprising given that it is a brewery founded by a former corporate financier who was the son of a brewer to fill a hole in the market in the 1980s: domestic beers that could compete with mediocre European imports. Craft beer was just getting started and most of the big adjunct lager brewers had already diluted down the their product to the point where many wouldn’t even drink it. Jim Koch employed the same chemist and brewer who formulated Miller Lite to fine tune a beer an old family recipe he had been homebrewing for mass production. Samuel Adams Boston Lager is a genuinely good beer but what their Octoberfest eventually became in the 21st century is not. The first whiff and sip is dark fruits and toasted bread like a darker Marzen beer should be but then the unpleasantness hits you like an off-scented dashboard air freshener. The beer tastes like brown sugar and smells of artificial cinnamon and ginger. Sam Adams is hiding pumpkin spice bullshit in their Octoberfest seasonal for the Starbucks yuppies! Samuel Adams Octoberfest is one of those beers. The radlers, shandies, Zimas, pumpkin spice lattes, and mango IPAs for ex-sorority girls and effeminate homosexuals – wine cooler “beer”! The only positive attribute is that if you get this for free and drink the entire six pack, you will get drunk. Unfortunately, your excretate will smell like that of an unwashed obese man the day after Thanksgiving.

Quality: */*****
Purchase: */*****

3 Comments

Tags: , , , ,

Nothing Left – Demo 1999 (2016)

tnothing_left_-_demo_1999

Some compare this to Mortician but to these ears, it sounds more like a Cathedral, Cianide and Asphyx crossover. Where Mortician adopted slowed-down grindcore stylings to death metal, Nothing Left bring a pure grindcore approach to the type of pummeling, rhythm-driven riffing that powers Cianide or Asphyx, and adds the droning doomy feel of later doom bands like Cathedral.

(more…)

12 Comments

Tags: , , , ,

Kaeck Release Live Version of “De heerser wederkeert” from Under the Black Sun 2016

kaeck under the black sun 2016 1

Kaeck have posted a live video of “De heerser wederkeert” off of Death Metal Underground’s 2015 Album of the Year Stormkult from their performance at the Under the Black Sun 2016 festival in Germany. Regrettably, Oovenmeester (also in Noordelingen) was unable to provide his unhinged vocals so Ygethmor from Standvast provided more somewhat more conventional and staid black metal vocals somewhat too high in the mix for a ringer. The live version is still worth checking out in order to hear Chaos from Sammath‘s haunting guitar work in a less distorted live setting.

8 Comments

Tags: , , , , , ,

Classic reviews:
A B C D E F G H I J K L M N O P Q R S T U V W X Y Z