Sometimes death is waiting just around the corner. Sometimes death is the best option.

Project .44 – The System Doesn’t Work

Fun party crossover that rides revolutionary riffs until midsection breaks, intimating stadium heavy metal that never arrives, only to go back to more of the same. Song after song, we hear a band that wants to settle itself into the battleground of ideas but not enough courage is mustered. The cliche is there, but, like Testament, it lacks any substance past a catchy riff, one generic track after another. The heavily filtered vocals sink it more into the mire of oblivion.

Karelian Warcry – Veripellot

Advertised as blackened death metal, this is screamo played over a variety of death metal-influenced alternative metal that came to be known as dark metal. The quality is sufficiently rewarding, with moments that could almost be called interesting, but, like post-1995 At the Gates, it is never able to leave the radio-friendly, festival-ready, disposable tracks. What you have is a great guitar tone and well-studied riffs that fall through the cracks because there is no vision of the transcendent.

Aurora Disease – Epitaph

Advertised as a one-man metal band, this comes through as avant-garde weirdo urban mélange reminiscent of Peste Noire without the strength of drive or enough alienation to make the cut. The result feels sincere enough, the effort is present, the production and musicianship are present. Combining streams of understated black metal to emphasize a journey through words embedded in melody lines, Aurora Disease will find a fanbase among those who value message and aura packaged in decent production and effortful artistry. For those holding art to a higher standard of unity, aesthetic, and necessity, this release is forgettable.

Kaleidobolt – Karakuchi

Funny Scooby-Doo chase music with solos reminiscent of 70s music without actually entirely imitating it. This is simultaneously old and new. The band has a grasp of pop music dynamics and will be adept at playing festivals, weddings, and band battles, entertaining the many with guitar effects, solos, grooves, and the charisma of the momentary. Tomorrow, you won’t remember this band or this release.

AIDS Wolf – Harsh Human Style

Random snare hits, filtered farts, and an indistinct bass-guitar wobble, the opening of the present release reflects the name of the project as well as the promo pictures of the band members. The intent is a sort of experimental avant-garde without compunction. The band gets points for going all out on this idea and being able to record it. In its attempt and presentation, it is more sincere and pure than pop nonsense out there; its aesthetic constant and the streams of improvisation yield new patterns with each passing moment. Nevertheless, and despite the artistic unity, because of origin and intent, this is ultimately artsy-fartsy gutter music, coming from and destined for the garbage bin of human consciousness.

Black Reuss – ‘ENDGAME’ (Song from the Album Death)

Unfiltered, less directed allusions to goth rock and metal, Black Reuss dance to the tune of old, already very old and tired tropes used to focused effect through pop goth metal with male vocals. It does with the most established and generic materials, something that can stand on its own feet despite not moving the dial. The name of the virtue here is circumspection.

Epigram – Obsolescent

An admixture of Arch Enemy, Behemoth, and Amon Amarth, Epigram builds songs with a tried and true formula that will land with fans of the style. The structure is pop heavy metal, and the aesthetic relies on pushing simple catchy melodies over rhythmic riffs, and racing triggered drums with overprocessed and indistinct growls.

Dark Phantom – The Redline

Rhythmic Pantera and At the Gates, with lots of solos, political and social commentary from the Middle East. Lots of ‘heart’, computer games influence, allowing good musicianship and production in greater quantities, has made it so that anyone can make what in the 90s was the purview of media soundtrack composers. Nothing here will surprise, but the guitarwork might interest young guitar enthusiasts.

Devil Empire – Inside Infernal Anthropy Thrones

Catchy, sometimes unwittingly funny, abrupt, and lacking a sense of flow, this music sounds like a random collection of passages from what could be considered “cool driving black metal music”. Sometimes the music even appears to get stuck. The vocals sound right out of the 2000s by bands with vocalists who didn’t quite make the cut. The release ticks the style boxes, and it has the heart of the villager who happened upon a Mayhem album here, a Burzum there, and decades later found out he could do a lot of this in his bedroom. Computer orchestrations are thrown willy-nilly, and nothing in here makes sense. The intent, it seems, would be maximizing (farming?) aura moment by moment without regard for what just passed and what comes next in the music. While other music reviewed is just uninspired and mediocre, Devil Empire sounds like the product of passion and familiarity with (though definitely not mastery of) the morass of an underground genre. Marginally endearing and ultimately comical, it remains a belated and disorganized artifact of subpar releases of the past.

Tags: AIDS Wolf, Aurora Disease, Black Reuss, Dark Phantom, Devil Empire, Epigram, Kaleidobolt, Karelian Warcry, Project .44, Sadistc Metal Reviews