Pipes and Cigars sent out its tobacco-drink pairing guide:
7 CommentsTags: hermeticism, pipe smoking
Kaeck – Het Zwarte Dictaat (2021)
Easily a candidate for album of the year, Het Zwarte Dictaat from Kaeck makes a form of war metal that incorporates the subtle melodies of black metal and the longer atmospheric riffs of later death metal, melding a primitive assault along the lines of Zyklon-B and Blasphemy with the type of elaborate construction we might expect from Emperor or Demigod.
With use of precise riffs, this album creates atmosphere in the classic underground metal style that contrasts loping hypnotic riffs with bursts of fury, allowing the song to emerge from a smoldering inner conflict like a car shooting out of a darkened tunnel into the light, looking for clarity within a shifting landscape of ambiguity and violence.
In its blend of war metal, doom-death, and black metal, Kaeck runs the gamut of tempi and rhythms over the course of this album, transitioning from the primitive to the almost reverentially mood-driven. By blending current methods with the most ancient of metal traditions, Het Zwarte Dictaat keeps a foot in the past while stepping into the future.
2 CommentsInterview with Spinoza Ray Prozak on Necropolis Podcast
Jason Kiss of Goatcraft has reinvented himself again with a podcast called Necropolis, and he graciously invited me on to talk about ANUS, Dark Legions Archive, the classic underground, and the nowadays internet and corporate/hipster metal.
13 CommentsTags: dark legions archive, jason kiss, necropolis, spinoza ray prozak
How They Attempt To Assimilate You
We warned years ago that assimilation by the ancestor is a common fate of breakaway genres; rock, consumerism, and popular culture have been trying since the early days to turn metal into a variation on their basic formula.
15 CommentsTags: assimilation, normies, propaganda
Pazuzu – Oath of Unholy Sacrilege (2021)
For most listeners, the core of Pazuzu can be expressed as an Autopsy-inspired take on grindcore, with the slower doomy riffs like the tug of a scalpel through flesh alternating with bounding hardcore riffs much as the Bay Area band applied, but with elements of black metal and doom metal filtered in.
2 CommentsKaeck Releases New Video “Tegen een scharlaken horizon” from Het Zwarte Dictaat
Melodic war metal band Kaeck has issued forth a mysterious new video from its new album Het Zwarte Dictaat due out on Folter Records on October 15, designed to shock and awe the metal community with fierceness from the old school:
Tags: folter records, kaeck, melodic war metal
Condemner Posts Rehearsal Track of “Male Patratis Sunt Atra Theatra Parata”
Texas post-death metal band Condemner — which seems to combine Celtic Frost, Incantation, and Blasphemy in its sound — posted its latest rehearsal track yesterday, showcasing its desire to stack primitive chromatic riffs against rumbling discursion in order to make wandering, melancholic tracks with an undertone of violent Nietzschean-Galtonian “might is right” conflict.
5 CommentsMac Baren – Royal Twist (2021)
As more people flee the world of vapes and cigarettes, pipes and cigars — but mostly cigars — show the signs of experiencing a renaissance. If you can work from home, why not enjoy a leisurely two-hour relaxing smoke instead of hurriedly wolfing down a nicotine jolt in the parking lot?
42 CommentsTags: dark fired kentucky burley, mac baren, pipe smoking, pipe tobacco, royal twist, tobacco
Into Darkness – “Into Darkness” (2012)
Billed as a doom metal band, Into Darkness spends less than half of its time at that range of tempo on its first demo. Instead, what you get is a band taking the Metallica approach of finding a unique vocal, rhythmic, and technique hook per song, and then writing riffs to fit around one big showboat riff.
1 CommentTags: Doom Metal, Into Darkness
Existential Dread – Full Moon Bliss (2021)
Somewhere in the middle ground between Winter and Maudlin of the Well, this attempt at an avantgarde+progressive version of drone metal succeeds in part and adds several interesting riffs and a handful of song approaches to the metal canon.
No CommentsTags: existential dread, experimental
