Tuesday, January 8, 2013

Eight Bells/The Captain's Daughter/Seventh Rule/2013 CD Review


  Eight  Bells  are  a  band  from  Texas  that  mixes  post  black  metal,  progressive  rock  and  experimental  music  together  and  this  is  a  review  of  their  2013  album  "The  Captain's  Daughter"  which  was  released  by   Seventh  Rule.

  Drums  range  from  slow  to  mid  paced  drumming  with  no  fast  playing  or  blast  beats  being  present on  this  recording,  while  the  bass  playing  has  a  very  strong  and  powerful  sound  with  heavy  riffing  that  dominates  throughout  the  recording.

  Rhythm  guitars  range  from  slow  to  mid  paced  playing  that  combines  post  black  metal,  progressive  rock,  psychedelic  and  experimental  together  to  create  a  sound  of  their  own  as  well  as  some  soft  and  clean  playing,  while  the  lead  guitars  are  psychedelic  sounding  guitar  leads.

  Vocals  are  mostly  clean  singing  female  vocals  with  some  black  metal  screams  being  utilized  at  times,  while  the  lyrics  cover  dark  themes,  as  for  the  production  it  has  a  very  strong,  powerful,  heavy  and  professional  sound  where  you  can  hear  all  of the  musical  instruments  that  are  present  on t his  recording  with  the  songs  being  long  and  epic  in  length.

  In  my  opinion  Eight  Bells  are  a  very  great  sounding  hybrid  of  post  black  metal,  psychedelic,  progressive  rock and  experimental  music  and  if  you  are  a  fan  of  this  musical  genre,  you should  check  out  this  band.  RECOMMENDED  TRACKS  INCLUDE  "Fate  And  Technology"  and  "Yellowed  Daughter".  RECOMMENDED  BUY.

EIGHT BELLS on Facebook
http://www.eightbellsband.com

The Magik Way Interview


1. Can you tell us a little bit about the project for those that have never heard of you before?




Well, The Magik Way was born in the 1996 as the result of an idea: to create a form of music totally linked to esoterism and magik, where sounds are influenced by our studies and our personal vision of music, as a mix between theatrical moods, applied music and experimental music.

Even if we started the project playing an obscure kind of black metal, after a couple of years we began to consider the music with new parameters, abandoning every kind of cliché.

The Magik Way is not a simple musical band, is even an order. Members of The Magik Way order are involved in the practise of Magik and principally spiritism and necromancy. As an esoterical order lot of members are not involved in music; inside the order operate philosophers, photographers, painters, psycologists, mediums, mathematics.



2. How would you describe your musical sound?



A mix between dark sounds and theatrical attitude. A sort of expressionist music, inspired by composers like Nino Rota, John Cage, Nicola Piovani, Bernard Hermann and a vocal attitude near to some conceptions of artists like Demetrio Stratos, Marina Abramovic, Diamanda Galas, Ettore Petrolini.



3. What are some of the lyrical topics and subjects the band explores with the music?



With our lyrics we want to explore the Man and the Nature, two macro-subjects. The Alchemy is the instrument we use to observe it, as a propagation of necromancy and spiritism.

Our effort is to find questions and not answers, is our conviction that “questions” generates knowledge.



4. What is the meaning and inspiration behind the bands name?



La Via Magica Mistica (The Magik Way) is a term coined by Fulvio Rendhell, a great Italian spiritist, about a path divided in 4 phases (The Doubt, The Dizziness, The Sacrifice, The Knowledge).

The adept, is committed to overcoming and understanding of his condition, false before, wise after, through great suffering that will lead him to live different levels of emotion, annihilated first, then elated, until they reach a state of "Sacrifice" as renunciation of the Ego, to conquer a wider and dual vision of reality, dualism guaranteed by the presence, in the fourth phase, of the sign of Mercury which, as is known, is bipolar (Aurum et Argentum).



5. The music was recorded in the 90's why did you wait until 2013 to release the music?



The reason we came out with a retrospective CD is about the passion that Marco Cavallini of Sad Sun Music put on the project as a dream come true: to present to people what The Magik Way played in the ’90.

Marco told me he still remember when The Magik Way demo tape was considered a “top demo” in the ’96 and after 13 years he purpose me to realize a work as a testimony of those years.

What Marco did not know is that The Magik Way created some other materials, and after heard it, he decided to publish the CD and start a collaboration.



6. On a worldwide level how has the feedback been to your music by fans of metal and occult music?



This is the first time we have the opportunity to communicate to the World our music, with the exception of some fans we have since the ’90 years. Even if we are involved in this project since the 1996 and we played in a great and famous band like Mortuary Drape, we always prefered to stay in a limited scene, in our country, working inside the theatre scene or the video-installation world, so far from the so called “market” of the music.

Simply we concentrated our energies to create something good for us.



7. What is going on with Mortuary Drape these days?



I really don’t know, unfortunately I’m not in contact with the band.



8. Can we expect future material from this music or is this only a one time thing?



As I explained, we are surprised that people deserve so much attention to our project. What can I say is that for the future we continue to work with Marco Cavallini (Sad Sun Music) and Francesco Palumbo (My Kingdom Music) in order to think about the publication of other material of the past (there are several works we have made in these last 10 years) or suddenly to focus our attention to new music we have composed in the 2012.



9. What are some of the bands and musical styles that have influenced your music and also what are you listening to nowadays?



We listen to all music with an open minded attitude, it is impossible to know which kind of music influenced us. Considering the fact we started every project by the lyrics we could say that probably is the Magik our favorite starting point.

Personally I’m dedicating lot of time listening Claudio Monteverdi and the Serbian-Byzantine choral.



10. What are some of the forms of Occultism and Satanism that have the most interest to you?



We are totally unreleated to all forms of religions, or pseudo-religious cults, especially the Christian cults or anti-Christian cults. We consider the atheism as a primacy to defend, a fact of freedom.

We practise the contemporary Magik, we observe the Nature and his duality, the Man and his role in the aureal space.

Recently the order of The Magik Way is doing study around the Water.



11. Outside of music what are some of your interests?



There are a couple of great passion in my life: contemporary art and the good red wine of my country.



12. Any final words or thoughts before we wrap up this interview?



Well, I just want to thank you. We hope you’ll enjoy the CD.

Please follow us on FB in order to know all the news about The Magik Way.

We need your inspiration.



Nequam.





Sunday, January 6, 2013

The Magik Way/Materia Occulta (1997-1999)/Sad Sun Music/2013 CD Review


  The  Magik  Way  are  a  band  from  Italy  that  is  a  side  project  of  Mortuary  Drape  with  a  musical  style  I  would  describe  as  being  avant  garde  black  metal mixed  with  ritualistic  occult  music  and  this  is  a  review  of  their  2013  album  "Materia  Occulta  (1997-1999)  which  will  be  released  by  Sad  Sun  Music.

  Drums  range  from  slow  to  mid  paced  drumming  with  not  much  in  the  way  of  fast  playing  or  blast  beats  being  present  on  this  recording  as  well  as  a  brief  use  of  tribal  sounding  percussion,  while  the  synths  bring  a  very  dark and  avant  garde  ritualistic  sound  to  the  music  with  some  touches  of  classical  and  they  are  the  only  musical  instrument  that  are  present  from  songs  5-17,  as  for  the  bass  playing  it  has  a  very  dark  tone  with  riffs  that  follow  the  riffing  that  is  coming  out  of  the  guitars.

  Rhythm  guitars  range  from  slow  to  mid  paced  riffing  that  combines  black  metal  with  avant  garde  music  with  some  dark  sounding  melodies  being  thrown  into  the  music  at  times  as  well  as  a  brief  use  of  clean  playing  and  they  are  mostly  present  on  the  first  4  songs  but  make  an  appearance  later  on,  while  the  lead  guitars which  are  only  utilized  briefly  are  very  dark  sounding  guitar  solos  and  leads.

Vocals  which  are  only  utilized  on  the  first  part  of  the  album  range from  high  pitched  black  metal  screams  to  ritualistic  spoken  word  parts  as  well  as  a  brief  use  of  clean  playing  male  and  female  vocals  which  are  used  on  the  non  metal  side  of  the  recording,  while  the  lyrics  cover  Necromantic,  Occultism  and  Left  Hand  Path  themes  with  the  songs  being  written  in  a  mixture  of  English  and Latin,  as  for  the  production  it  has  a  very  dark,  powerful  and  heavy  sound  to  it.

  In  my  opinion  The  Magik  Way  are  a  very  great  sounding  hybrid  of  avant  garde  black  metal  and  ritualistic  occult  music  and  if  you  are  a  fan  of  this  musical  genre,  you  should  check  out  this  band.  RECOMMENDED  TRACKS  INCLUDE  "The  Dizziness  (La  Folgorazione)"  "The  Knowledge  (La  Conoscenza)"  "Gloria"  and  "La  Quiete".  RECOMMENDED  BUY.  

 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6v7qvAiXc_Y 

Tuesday, December 25, 2012

Okkultokrati/Snakereigns/Fysisk Format 2012 CD Review


 Okkultokrati  are  a  band  from  Norway  that  mixes  black'n'roll  with  doom  metal  and  punk  and  this  is  a  review  of  their  2012  album  "Snakereigns"  which  was  released  by  Fysisk  Format.

  Drums  range  from  slow,  mid  paced  to  fast  drumming  with  some  blast  beats  being  utilized  at  times,  while  the  bass  playing  has  a  very  strong  and  powerful  sound  with  heavy  riffing  that  dominates  throughout  the  recording.

  Rhythm  guitars  range  from  slow,  mid  paced  to  fast  riffs  that  combine  black  metal,  doom,  sludge,  rock  and  punk  together  to  create  a  sound  of  their  own  along  with  some  primitive  riffing  as  well  as  a  brief  use  of  clean  playing,  while  the  lead  guitars  when t hey  are  utilized  are  rock'n'roll  style  guitar solos  and  leads.

  Vocals range  from  high  pitched  black  metal  screams  to  early  80's  style  black  metal  growls,  while the  lyrics  cover  darkness  and  occult  themes,  as  for  the  production  it h as  a  very  dark,  heavy,  raw  and  primitive  sound  to  it  while  you  can still  hear  all  of  the  musical  instruments  that  are  present  on  this  recording  in  addition  some  of  the  songs  are  long  and  epic  in  length.

  In  my  opinion  Okkultokrati  are  a  very  great  sounding  hybrid  of  black  metal,  doom,  sludge,  rock  and  rock  and  if  you  are  a  fan  of  this  musical style,  you  should  check  out  this  band.  RECOMMENDED  TRACKS  INCLUDE  "No  Ouroboros"  "I  Thought  Of  Demons"  "We're  So  Heavy"  and  "Nothing  Awaits". RECOMMENDED  BUY.

Friday, December 14, 2012

Vex/Memorius/Horror Pain Gore Death Productions/2013 CD Review


  Vex  are  a  band  from  Texas  that  has  been  featured  before  in  this  zine  with  a  musical  style  that  mixes  melodic  black metal  with  progressive  death  metal  and  thrash  and  this  is  a  review  of  their  2013  album  "Memorious"  which  will  be  released  by  Horror  Pain  Gore  Death  Productions.

  Drums  range  from  slow,  mid  paced  to  fast  drumming  with  some  blast  beats  being  utilized  at  times,  while  the  bass  playing  has  a  very  strong  and  powerful  sound  with  heavy  riffing  that  dominates  throughout  the  recording.

  Rhythm  guitars  range  from  slow,  mid  paced  to  fast  riffs  that  combine  melodic  death  metal  with  progressive  death  metal  and  thrash  to  create  a  sound  of  their  own,  while  the  lead  guitars  are  very  melodic  and  progressive  sounding  black/death  metal guitar  solos  and  leads,  as  for  the  acoustic  guitars  when  they  are  utilized  they  use  finger  picking  and  full  chords  to  add  more  progressive  touches  to  the  music.

  Vocals  range  from  high  pitched  black  metal  screams  to  deep  death  metal  growls  along  with  a  brief  use  of  clean  singing  and  spoken  word  samples,  while  the  lyrics  cover  dark  and  depressing  themes,  as  for  the  production  it  has  a  very  strong,  powerful,  heavy  and  professional  sound  where  you  can  hear  all  of  the  musical  instruments  that  are  present  on  this  recording  with  some  of  the  songs  being  long  and  epic  in  length..

  In  my  opinion  this  is  another  great  sounding  recording  from  Vex  and  if  you  are  a f an  of  this  band,  you  should  check  out  this  album.  RECOMMENDED  TRACKS  INCLUDE  "Carve  My  Eyes"  "Spectral  Nation"  "Away  From  The  Sun"  and  "A  Drinking  Song".  RECOMMENDED  BUY.


www.facebook.com/vexhomepage 

Thursday, December 13, 2012

The Advent Equation Interview


1. Can you tell us a little bit about the band for those that have never heard of you before?

A: We are a 5 member Progressive metal band from Monterrey, Mexico. That has been working on this project since 2008. Recently we released our debut album independently.


THE ADVENT EQUATION is composed by:


Daniel Cordoba: Guitar and growling vocals.

Margil H. Vallejo: Bass and clean vocals.

Luis Gómez: Guitar

Roberto Charles: Drums

Esaú García: Keyboards.


2. How would you describe your musical sound?

A: it’s a mixture of heavy guitar influences, along with atmospheric leads and rhythm complexity, which can go from warm and calm melodic passages, to aggressive and dynamic grooves.


3. What are some of the lyrical topics and subjects the band explores with the music?

A: it goes around an existential theme throughout the songs, exploring the mind’s journey through loss, pain and death.


4. What is the meaning and inspiration behind the bands name?

A: We can describe its meaning by looking at the words individually, with ADVENT we have something big, a change that will occur, that being one side of it, and on the other one we have the word EQUATION which speaks of balance, equality that each member brings .


5. What are some of the best shows that the band has played so far and how would you describe your stage performance?

A: We’ve had some memorable performances throughout the years, joining stage with bands such as Haggard, and Opeth, which have been rewarding, each on their own. And definitely a remarkable moment on our history was when we presented this album with a full venue on our hometown.

As for our performance, it has always been as energetic as it is atmospheric, trying to share the way we feel the music.


6. Do you have any touring plans for the future?

A: we look forward to promote our music in 2013, across our country and wherever our music can be heard.


7. Currently you are unsigned, are you looking for a label and if so what kind of label do you feel that would be a perfect fit for your music?

A: We decided to go ahead and release the album independently, to get our music out there, and of course we would be open to professionally work with a label, with intention to make an important contribution to the modern metal scene.


8. On a worldwide level how has the feedback been to your music by fans of metal?

A: It has been received in a very positive light, and we would like to take this moment to thank anyone who has supported us by looking us up on social media, and given the album a listen.


9. What direction do you see your music heading into on future releases?

A: Thanks to the genre’s versatility, our future releases will stay within progressive metal. We strongly believe in not limiting yourself. This has been our main drive to make things as professional as possible, to take every detail into consideration, and ensure our productions have the best of each of us.


10. What are some band or musical styles that have influenced your music and also what are you listening to nowadays?

A: As each member comes from a different background musically speaking, we have a multitude of influences, just to mention a few, Porcupine Tree, Tool, Cynic, Camel, Pink Floyd and melodic metal in general.


11. Outside of music what are some of your interests?

A: Photography, art, whiskey, sports, videogames, and what living in an industrial city entails.


12. Any final words or thoughts before we wrap up this interview?

A: We would like to thank anyone that took the time to read this interview, and invite you to listen to our music, visit our Facebook and Twitter accounts, and please be more than welcome to contact us.


Facebook
ReverbNation
Twitter
YouTube

Sunday, December 9, 2012

The Advent Equation/Limitless Life Reflection/2012 CD Review


  The  Advent  Equation  are  a  band  from  Monterrey,  Mexico  that  plays  a  very  progressive  form  of  melodic  black/death  metal  and  this  is  a  review  of  their  self  released  2012  album  "Limitless Life  Reflection".

  Drums  range  from  slow  to  mid  paced  drumming  with  no  fast  playing  a  blast  beats  being  present  on  this  recording,  while  the  keyboards  bring  a  very  dark, atmospheric  and  progressive  sound  to  the  music,  as  for  the  bass  playing  it  has  a  very  dark  tone  with  riffs  that  follow  the  riffing t hat  is coming  out  of  the  guitars  and  at  times  they  have  a  very  powerful  sound  to t hem.

  Rhythm  guitars  range  from  slow  to  mid  paced  riffs  that  combine  melodic  black  metal,  doom  and  death  metal  with  progressive  rock  to  create  a  sound  of  their  own,  while  the  lead  guitars  are  very  melodic sounding  guitar  solos  and  leads,  as  for the acoustic  guitars  when  they  are  utilized  they  use  full  chords  and  finger  picking  to  enhance  the  progressive  sound  of  the  music.

  Vocals  range  from  clean  singing  to  deep  blackened  death  metal  growls  as  well  as  a  brief  use  of  female  vocals,  while  the  lyrics  cover  dark  and  depressing themes,  as  for  the  production  it  has  a  very  strong,  powerful,  and  heavy  sound  for  being  a  self  released  recording  where  you  can  hear  all  of  the  musical  instruments  that  are  present  on  this  recording  along  with  a  good  amount  of  the  songs  being  long  and  epic  in  length.

  In  my  opinion  The  Advent  Equation  are  a  very  great  sounding  melodic,  progressive  black/death  metal  and  if  you  are  a  fan  of  this  musical  style,  you  should  check  out  this  recording.  RECOMMENDED  TRACKS  INCLUDE  "On  Darkness"  "Visions  Of  Pain"  and  "Hopeless".  RECOMMENDED  BUY.

www.Facebook.com/theadventequation
www.Twitter.com/adventequation
www.Youtube.com/theadventequation