One of our staffers is on location and liveblogging this epic and exhausting metal festival which stretches an onslaught of bands over three days. Best to bring your comfy chair and maybe a Kindle so you can sit through the poseur bands.
23 CommentsTags: absu, adorior, ares kingdom, Arghoslent, communion, crucifier, death strike, demoncy, diocletian, graveland, infernal war, Inquisition, invocation spells, magnus, master, Necrovore, necrowretch, omegavortex, sadistic intent, usurper, weregoat
Many of us enjoy death metal and particularly Master, a crossover between garage rock and proto-death metal, but we might acknowledge the Late Stage Hardcore problem here: when a genre gets too solidified, it becomes formula, and the formula reduces its core to the same thing as everything else.
92 CommentsTags: death metal, late stage hardcore, master
Animate Records announced plans to re-release Master Let’s Start a War on a six-panel digipak. Attempting to mix the Master “sound” with a greater heavy metal and sludge sensibility, some of which appeared on Faith is In Season, Let’s start a War might best seen as a transition record for a band trying to find its voice but also portended what would become the later and tighter manifestation of Master.
5 CommentsTags: death metal, master
From roughly 1984 to 1992, Paul Speckmann recruited different lineups to express the same idea through different band names such as Master, Deathstrike, Abomination, Funeral Bitch, and Speckmann Project. With similar basic sounds and shared songs, these bands differed mostly in personnel.
1 CommentTags: abomination, death metal, deathstrike, funeral bitch, master, paul speckmann, speckmann project, vic records
Hammerheart Records opened pre-orders for the first Master album with several versions of the same songs, making this both a collector’s item and an impossible listen for the casual fan.
13 CommentsTags: abomination, death metal, deathstrike, funeral bitch, hammerheart records, master, speckmann project
Master on their seminal record On the Seventh Day God Created… Master operated on the principle of taking one idea and pounding it into the listener’s brain as much as possible without droning on and maintaining some form of forward movement. Paul Speckmann’s riffs are simple and straightforward but there was always something there that pushed them above the hordes of bands making minimalistic Hardcore influenced Death metal. The first actual riff of the first song “What Kind of God” is a perfect example of what made Master deceptively unique at the riff level.
Tags: analysis, classic, death metal, master, on the seventh day god created master, paul speckmann, what kind of god
The task before a reviewer varies widely. If you want to be a big shot, you need to write about what the labels want, since they are the only source of top-down money coming into the genre. They will then reward your publication with advertising, it will then reward you with a promotion, and eighteen months later, you can ditch it and move up to the big leagues.
25 CommentsTags: 2018, Angantyr, archgoat, best of, black funeral, Black Metal, condemner, death metal, deceased, Drawn and Quartered, Grindcore, Heavy Metal, internal bleeding, iskandr, judas priest, kever, master, monstrosity, nachtlieder, phosphore blanc, progressive metal, retortion terror, Satan, slam metal, sludge, Speed Metal, Summoning, Therion, trenchant, underground metal
Hammerheart Records is reissuing Master‘s second album, On the Seventh Day God Created… Master, on both CD and LP. Get the CD digipak as it contains the Speckmann Project as a bonus disc. Leave the vinyl with the same sound for the hipsters.
3 CommentsTags: compact disc, death metal, digipak, hammerheart, hammerheart records, master, paul speckmann, reissue, remaster, speckmann project, vinyl
Master are embarking upon an American tour to promote their recent Epiphany of Hate album. Hopefully the Portland show will have a bigger turnout as the last major metal show there, Profanatica, had a very poor turnout due to social justice warrior fanaticism.
5 CommentsTags: death metal, master, paul speckmann, upcoming tours, US tour
Master, Autopsy, Motörhead – what do they all have in common? They’re all long running bands that settled on a workable style relatively early and generally stuck with it for decades, gradually refining their craft while managing not to lose control of the forces that initially motivated them. Master is arguably the grandfather of this tradition within the realms of death metal, as they’re the approximate beginning of the constellation of Paul Speckmann projects (since War Cry is allegedly a far cry from most of his work). Given that Master sticks with tradition on An Epiphany of Hate, anyone who’s familiar with Master should know exactly what they’re going to get.
This album belongs to the more elaborate school of Mastercraft that’s come into being in the last few years; while Master has never written especially long or complicated songs, the level of musicianship and organization on display here is a definite improvement from the early days of the band. The production and mixing is also higher fidelity, but improving such is not nearly as difficult as becoming a better songwriter. I’d argue that Paul Masidval’s (protip: Cynic) contributions to Master during his brief mercenary period in the early 1990s must’ve resonated with Speckmann on some level and encouraged this elaboration. An Epiphany of Hate is still relatively sparse in its overall construction; the songs here are built out of comparatively few riffs; if not necessarily the three per song figure that comes up in older discussions. Monophony is still the band’s weapon of choice, but like many of the bands that have… mastered this sort of metal, Master’s musicians know when to keep it up and enjoy their freedom of melody and tonality and when they should instead use some sort of harmonic reinforcement. This expansion without overextension is something a lot of bands aren’t able to successfully pull off, so it does reflect pretty well on them.
I don’t know how much of an advance An Epiphany of Hate represents over 2013’s The Witchhunt, if any, but it’s still a good addition to Master’s legacy and a worthy addition to your 2016 collections.
2 CommentsTags: 2016, an epiphany of hate, death metal, master, paul speckmann
