Aria- As If Forever Really Exists Aria is a metalcore band from Charlotte, North Carolina. This album was released in 2002 on Tribunal Records. Paul Genet who was the former vocalist for Azazel is now the current vocalist for Aria. This record is also very original sounding and that is really hard to find these days. Paul Genet's vocals are just sickening and could peel the paint right off any wall. The melodic death metal guitar leads fit perfectly if you could marry good to evil on a metalcore album. The shrill vocals next to the beautiful buzzing guitars fit perfectly. Hardcore breakdowns are present very frequently and really keep this album moving. Paul Genet uses death metal growls to perfection and the drums are just all over the place and they are simply brutal. This album has a real and complete flow to it and the melodies are gorgeous. This music is epic and filled with surprises at every corner. The vocals are just demonic sounding and they are here to frighten you like a horror movie. The drumming doesn't let up for a second like it's firing on all cylinders. This album is done so well. It must not have been easy to combine elements from hardcore, metalcore, death metal. Aria sound like they are having so much fun making this record. The vocals are just maniacal and he sounds like a crazed madman. I love these off kilter rhythms that the band uses that I can't get enough of. They are so strange sounding and they totally go with the rest of the music. This band is so confident sounding in the way they play their music. It is like they are seasoned veterans when playing this style of metalcore. I think this is because Paul Genet used to sing for Azazel and now he sings for Aria. I believe this has given them real veteran leadership from one of the best singers in metalcore. The wailing vocals meeting the heavy breakdowns was just a perfectly placed section of music. These fast paced sections fit really well with the overall feel of the music. The guitar leads are done to perfection and sound like they could come from Sweden. Aria are from the hardcore scene and they play metalcore so there is no doubt that they are from North Carolina. I have reviewed Azazel for my webzine and talked about how amazing and how essential they are. Now I have reviewed Aria for my webzine and I want to tell how amazing and how essential they are as well. I would say you need to have both bands because they both have the same singer. The truth is right now I want you to listen to Aria. This is a classic album like no other because it's a very original sounding metalcore album and that is hard to find these days. I think fans of hardcore, metalcore, death metal would all be fans of this album because it borrows from all of these genres of music. If you like my review of Aria please check out my review of Azazel. Thanks. Kevin
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Prayer For Cleansing- The Rain In Endless Fall Prayer For Cleansing is a metalcore band from Raleigh, North Carolina. The band plays hardcore, metalcore, death metal, black metal. This album was released in 1999 on Tribunal Records. This is my favorite metalcore record of all time and this is also my favorite extreme metal album of all time. When I first heard this band the North Carolina hardcore scene was starting to produce some amazing new metalcore bands. They had bands like Bloodjinn, Undying, Azazel, Prayer For Cleansing. These bands are so metal sounding and I liked Prayer For Cleansing the most because they sounded the most metal of all the bands. All of these bands are metalcore bands but when Prayer For Cleansing infused hardcore music with black metal that just wasn't being done at this time. They just mixed so many different styles of extreme metal together that they were simply groundbreaking. They have these melodies that are simply sublime and unforgettable. The vocals are very raspy and very serpentine in their delivery and they cast a long shadow all the way out to the lands of fire and ice. The singing is a nice touch and sounds very pretty. I love the creepy whispers and that you can sometimes hear the lyrics clearly. The growling vocals are incredible and make me think of the best death metal bands ever. The guitars are done so well that they make beautiful music together and they are the backbone of this album. The guitars can go from such a fast pace to such a melodic pace at the drop of a hat. The drumming is outstanding and just brutally fast but it also slows down when melody is present. Prayer For Cleansing are such amazing musicians that it seems like this album was a breeze for them to make and play the music that they recorded. I really love their vocalist David Anthem because he can sing so many different vocal styles and it just seems easy to him. His vocal range is so impressive because he is screaming all the time and he never lets up for a second on this record. The mood of this album is very triumphant but also very sorrowful. The mood of this album is also very victorious but also very gothic. The hardcore breakdowns on this album could turn any moshpit into a feeding frenzy of hardcore kids trying out their best mortal kombat moves. The black metal parts on this record will take you to a far away place where black metal is magical and infamous. It will take you to Norway to the cities of Oslo, Norway and Bergen, Norway. This record is so breathtaking and so strangely otherworldly that it can transport you to North Carolina the home state of Prayer For Cleansing or all the way to a far away galaxy. If you have read my reviews you will notice that I didn't use funny metaphors in this article. This is because Prayer For Cleansing means so much to me as a metalcore band. Since I first discovered The Rain In Endless Fall in 1999 I have never heard a record like it and I have never heard an album this good since. I wanted to start a band in the same style as Prayer For Cleansing. When Prayer For Cleansing went on tour and I saw that they weren't playing in Chicago I had to convince them to play here and what an amazing show that was. Prayer For Cleansing makes you think, they make you feel, they make you happy, they make you sad, they make you hold your head up high, they make you feel down in the dumps. A band that can make you feel such a wide range of emotions is an important band. I'm not a big lyric guy but I really love their lyrics because they speak to me. The music of Prayer For Cleansing is very original sounding and the lyrics are also done in a very original way. I implore you to listen to this album because it is so special and done with so much reverence and honor to the metalcore genre. If you like Prayer For Cleansing you might want to check out my review of Azazel because you may like them also. This was a pleasure for me to write and thanks for reading this. Thanks again. Kevin Deformity- Murder Within Sin Deformity is a death metal and metalcore band from Belgium. This album came out in 1999 on Blasphemour Records. The album cover is sick and disgusting just like a classic death metal release should be. Deformity is so death metal sounding that it's not even funny. They are absolutely vile and brutal in the truest sense. But they do have some metalcore mixed into all the death metal chaos as well. This is what makes them truly awesome in my book. The singer lurches forward and releases growls and bellows from his mouth in a reptilian style. The vocalist is amazing because he uses so many vocal techniques including different styles of screaming and wailing. The drumming sounds so tight and it just sounds incredible. Here we have some classic metalcore sections that sound amazing. The guitars sound blazing fast and really hold all the chaos together. I really love how fast these guitars are because it brings this album to the next level of greatness. The singer is like a salt water crocodile growling and biting the hands and feet off of poachers. These poachers should have never messed with a death metal crocodile. I really love how raw the recording sounds yet it still sounds very professional at the same time. It has just the right amount of rawness for a record like this. The drummer is like a maniac with two machine guns in each hand who is going to murder all the death metal haters around. Oh he has found a crop of death metal haters at the local mall and with all guns blazing he kills them all. We have more incredible metalcore right here. The whole song "Stained Red" turned out to be a metalcore song. What a great song and I did promise you more of that here. The death metal is back again in full effect and you better brace yourself for the brutality. So why is this album so amazing? I don't believe this to be a deathcore record but rather two clearly defined genres of music. I believe this to be a death metal and a metalcore album. This is a clear distinction and it would sound very different if it was done any other way. Many deathcore releases can sound boring and formulaic but records like this can sound lively and refreshing. Even though this album is extremely heavy it's still entertaining to listen to. This album is deliberate and purposeful with it's sound so it has been all planned out. I have listened to death metal even longer than I have metalcore but I love both genres. This is a really special release to me because of how strong of a record this really is. I think that this album is classic and essential for fans of death metal and metalcore. Thanks. Kevin Shortsight- Cold Wounds Waking Shortsight is a melodic metalcore band from Belgium. This album came out in 1996 on Good Life Recordings. The melodic vocals of singer Saskia Verbeke are simply breathtaking. The music on this album is so unique sounding and the guitar solos are amazing. I have been listening to this album since 1997 and it never gets boring. Cold Wounds Waking is as vital to me as the first time I ever heard it. In the days of run of the mill records that is really saying something. Shortsight was an awesome band. Saskia is a female singer and her vocal cadence is just perfect. Shouted male vocals are also present and fit well when they are used to enhance the mood of the album. Her vocals are haunting like a banshee in the dark making you scream your guts out until you have made a mess of the floor with your blood. The guitar playing is simply fantastic with riffs galore. To me the guitar riffs can resemble Iron Maiden and Helloween in technical ability. This band is so talented yet they come from the hardcore scene. The solemn vocals remind me of a lynx in the forest who controls the hunt with razor sharp teeth and the primal wit that lands the animal a huge kill in just minutes. The drums are powerful and are the backbone of this record. The guitar solos take you to another place and another land from a time before that was regal and majestic. Some very frantic and hushed vocals at the same time here make me think of a masked silent killer that has killed many with his cerated knife tonight. This is a metalcore album that is very unique sounding and with this style could only come from Belgium. That is because Belgium is the homeland of Shortsight. This band has tons of melody in almost every song. The dynamics on this record are just downright impressive. This is such a classic release and to me this an ultimate classic. The beautiful vocals of female singer Saskia make this album even more impressive. The guitar work is almost as important to this release because it sounds otherworldly. You should for sure check out Cold Wounds Waking. This is a one of a kind experience. Please enjoy this album. Thanks. Kevin This Day Forward-The Transient Effects Of Light On Water This Day Forward is a metalcore band from Philadelphia. This album came out in 2000 and was released by Eulogy Recordings. I just heard this album very recently so I am late to the party. The early 2000's was a great time for metalcore so it was easy to miss some albums. The album artwork is strange and abstract like the Snapcase Lookinglasself album cover. This Day Forward is known as one of the best metalcore bands of the early 2000's. So what do I think? I think they are a really amazing band. This album has everything you could want in a metalcore album. It has sick brutal screaming and some great beautiful singing. These guys play music so well that they make it sound easy. The band members could play in a modern classical band that is how good they are. The screaming and growling vocals are so powerful that they sound like someone stole a locomotive and proceeded to run down everybody in a five mile radius. The guitar playing is astounding. The guitars sound like planes crashing into each other at maximum speed. They have beautiful interludes that go straight into brutal mosh parts. This should make for some awesome hardcore dancing. The drummer is just destroying his drum set and he sounds like a master killer that is ready to take out hundreds with his deadly sword. His growling is so vicious that it can attack you like a hyena with a horrible case of rabies. What makes this band so special is that they have the dynamics to go from such heaviness in the vocals and the music to such beauty in the music and the singing at the drop of a hat. It is really very impressive. I would have to go as far as to say that if you like metalcore you are going to absolutely love this album. My final take is that this album has something for everyone. I do believe this could be one of the best metalcore albums of the early 2000's. During that time they had so many amazing hardcore albums come out and this was one of them. Thanks. Kevin For The Love Of-Feasting On The Will Of Humanity For The Love Of is a metalcore band from Colonia, New Jersey. This album came out in 1998 and was released by Ferret Music. I never heard this album when it originally came out. I actually only heard this album a couple of years ago. I had always heard about the scary looking album covers and the infamous live shows. People always talked about how legendary For The Love Of and this album were. So a couple of years a go after hearing this album what I can say is all of the hype was justified. This is an amazing album and a legendary band. This is a crazed frenzy of an album that takes you for a wild ride. It has these beatdown style hardcore breakdowns that must have made a For The Love Of mosh pit totally ballistic. We have crunchy guitar work here and epic high pitched vocals that set the standard for many metalcore bands. For The Love Of has become a very influential band in the hardcore scene. This album still sounds current today. But it creates this feeling that it is lurching out to get you and pick you off one by one. We have fast blasting drums that are ready to lay down the gauntlet. Also some nice technical guitar riffing appears on this album. The singers screaming and growling vocals just feel like he wants to shake you and squeeze you until you can understand what he is saying. But his vocals are impossible to understand so he will probably end up choking you. This album is like a game of cat and mouse but both the cat and the mouse are strapped with guns. We have a definite hardcore feel to this album. But it is still a metalcore album with this being a very evil sounding album. It is like you are being stalked by a deranged killer but the only thing you have to hide behind is just your own computer. This album feels like a real life horror movie filled will psycho killers and ghastly ghouls from beyond. This album is intense from start to finish. It is really heavy and has a ton of speed to it also. This is a classic album and For The Love Of is a classic band. I highly recommend this album. So check it out. Thanks Kevin Azazel- Ashes To Ashes Azazel is a metalcore band from Winston Salem, North Carolina. This album originally came out on Tribunal Records in the year 2000 and was reissued in 2008. I first heard about Azazel because of their record label Tribunal Records. At the time Tribunal was a new label and had just put out the Sever The Fallen album and the Prayer For Cleansing album. I was crazy about these albums and I had to have every album that Tribunal was releasing. So of course I bought the Azazel album and it was amazing. The singer of Azazel has a very powerful voice. His voice is almost demonic sounding. We have great technical guitar work here and even guitar solos. I love The Exorcist sample and other horror movie samples. This album is metalcore but it is almost just an outright extreme metal album. The drumming feels like an all out attack on the senses. I am just a sucker for these hardcore breakdowns. This album has a suffocating feeling like it is going to try to strangle you and make you pass right out from the sheer brutality of it all. This is a monumentally brutal release and I can't get enough of it. This album has an overall feeling of death that makes it sinister and evil sounding. If you had a soundtrack to claustrophobia this would be it. The singer has these hoarse guttural vocals that just put this album over the top. He is just sick and insane sounding. I really love the hell out of this album by Azazel. This album is simply awesome. So please check it out and thanks for reading. Kevin |
AuthorFor the past thirty years I have been listening to heavy music. I wanted to take my knowledge and my love for music and share it with my viewers. Archives
May 2022
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