Jesus the Snake - Black Acid, Pink Rain (2019)

Country: Portugal
Style: Psychedelic Rock
Rating: 7/10
Release Date: 11 Jul 2019
Sites: Bandcamp | Facebook | Youtube

As if to emphasise the impression that nobody in Portugal seems interested in making any sort of music except instrumental psychedelic rock, here's a nice example (another nice example!) of that genre, this time from Braga, not too far from the northern border with Galicia. While it does heat up at appropriate points, much of it is laid back and the obvious comparison has to be Pink Floyd, even if the second and third tracks weren't called Floyds I and Floyds II as a giveaway.

This isn't the nine parts of Shine On You Crazy Diamond, extended to almost fifty minutes and with no vocals at all, but you wouldn't be too far wrong if you imagine that. Certainly the eighteen minutes of Floyds I and II tend to explore that sort of tone, but the style doesn't stay there and the fine keyboard work of Gonçalo Palmas doesn't fit that sort of song. This is both rockier and jazzier, those keyboards often being in that heavy organ style of the early seventies.

For a while in Floyds I, though, I was waiting for the moment when I could start singing, "Remember when you were young". It kept almost arriving but it never quite did, before the song started to explore other destinations. About four minutes in, it livens up and Crazy Diamond could never have had that, given its subject. As much as I like everyone here, I really enjoyed those keyboards, which add an extra dimension to the song.

Floyds II is my favourite here, though it's also the most familiar. It finds a groove almost immediately that emulates that of the cover of Bob Dylan's Going Going Gone which Bill Frisell, Robin Holcomb and Wayne Horvitz played on the Rubáiyát album to celebrate the 40th anniversary of Elektra Records. Find it. Trust me.

Beyond being reminiscent of one of the most exquisitely beautiful songs ever recorded, it's somehow deliciously laid back and subtly progressive at the same time. There are points that remind of King Crimson: chords and changes, as well as the windchimes that are such a tasty touch four minutes in. This one livens up too, an important thing here because each of the five songs on this album last around ten minutes and they need that breathing room.

Duna follows on well. Again, there's that laid back jazz influence but this one has a dalliance with lounge music, as filtered through progressive rock. It's like Focus landed a residence in Las Vegas. Black Acid, Pink Rain gets a lot heavier but it never sheds that mindset. The delightful drums of João Costa kick it off like that Focus residency in Vegas turned out to be in a tiki room and they had to add exotica into the mix. Those keyboards are an emphatic driving force here, but I often got caught up in the roaming bass of Rui Silva.

For those of you paying close attention, I haven't mentioned the guitar yet. Most psychedelic rock albums nowadays are driven by their guitar, often an overtly fuzzy lead. Jorge Lopes does a great job here, but that's not what he's playing. While he's happy to solo away whenever needed, he's a subtle and unselfish guitarist and this album benefits as much from what he doesn't play as what he does.

If that sounds oddly contrary, that's this album through and through. It's a beautiful record worthy of solid exploration, but it's also an album that is easily lost. It can drift away from us, not because it's unworthy background music but because it's worthy background music for a weird trip, especially once those keyboards really start pushing on the title track. I think it's best heard in the wee hours of the morning on a pair of good headphones. I'm planning to try that tonight.

Cabrakaän - Cem Anahuac My Home (2019)

Country: Canada
Style: Folk Metal
Rating: 7/10
Release Date: 27 Aug 2019
Sites: Bandcamp | Facebook | Instagram | Metal Archives | Twitter | YouTube

My previous pair of reviews were of melodic death metal and symphonic metal. In some ways, this Mexican album from Canada is a surprising combination of the two. The band were founded in Toluca, just west of Mexico City, back in 2012 but they're based nowadays in Calgary, Alberta, an odd choice given how overtly Mexican they are. Apparently, they played the Metalocalypstick Festival in Lone Butte, BC in 2017 and loved the place so much they moved north. By the way, I love that festival name!

Cabrakaän sing about Mesoamerican myth and folklore, include instrumentation from pre-Hispanic times and use imagery from that era as well. Just look at the hummingbird on the album cover. The Mayans saw the hummingbird as the animal that transported wishes and thoughts, the Aztecs saw it as immortal and the Zapotecs put it in charge of drinking sacrificial blood. I believe the band are referencing it as the Aztec god of war and protector of all warriors. A song on the album, Huitzilin, is the Náhuatl name of this god.

I've seen the band described in a number of ways, but folk metal is the one that rings truest, because there are a lot of sounds here and some songs are quite clearly based on folk melodies. I don't know if the melody on La Bruja is a traditional one or a new one written by the band, but it sounds like it could be hundreds of years old. There are a few languages used here, English and Spanish being but two. Cem Anahuac in the album's title is Náhuatl for "land surrounded by water" and it's what the Aztecs named their land in pre-Hispanic times.

Songs like the title track start out folk metal, but they evolve. The vocals are generally clean, courtesy of versatile lead singer Pat Cuikäni, but they are often accompanied by harsh vocals from drummer Marko Cipäktli, often but not always in sections where the guitars ramp up to a death metal level. It has to be said that, even when they do, they're lower in the mix than either the keyboards or a variety of instruments that wouldn't be usually expected to sit above the guitars, like maracas.

The symphonic side comes from Cuikäni being so versatile. She's generally in a pretty standard rock mode, but she shifts whenever the song needs it. On a song like Burning Flame, her vocal is the traditional part, sounding like an early eighties heavy metal singer, at least until the end. On La Bruja, she moves to folk mode, as if she's a travelling minstrel. On Huitzilin, she's a symphonic metal singer and, on the title track, a few sections see her shift into outright operatic style.

Cuikäni is the most obvious reason to pick this up, but it's worth listening to for other reasons, especially the variety, which is often on display even within individual songs. I'm not sure what instruments I'm listening to as The Eagle and the Snake begins, but it's very western. It's very cinematic too and I could almost follow the journey south, as if it started in desert territory and ended up in the mountains. A lot of this is cinematic and it's fair to say that I saw almost as much of this album as I heard.

I'm fascinated to discover just what the Canadians way up there in the frozen wastes of the north are making of their local Mexican transplants. As far as I can tell, they're having a blast up there and finding new fans at each new gig. I'd call myself a fan too, though more of the folkier material than the more traditional songs. Calm in My Storm is done as well as La Bruja, but it would be the latter for me every time.

Astralium - Land of Eternal Dreams (2019)

Country: Italy
Style: Symphonic Metal
Rating: 7/10
Release Date: 23 Aug 2019
Sites: Facebook | Instagram | Metal Archives | Twitter

I've listened to Astralium's debut album a couple of times now and it hasn't thrilled me, even though it sounds like it ought to.

For a start, it's clearly capable stuff made by a set of musicians who just as clearly know exactly what they're doing and that's insanely important for a symphonic metal album. It's ambitious stuff, with each song trying to do a lot of different things. It's never boring, even at a touch over an hour, an especially long time for a debut. The songs are admirably varied, within the boundaries of the band's chosen style.

And lead vocalist Roberta Pappalardo has a truly glorious voice. She stood out for me even in a genre that's frankly full of truly glorious voices. Is she another Floor Jansen? Maybe not, but it's not unfair to ask the question and that's a serious compliment all on its own.

But... I don't love this. I love a few tracks on it, three of them in a row in fact, but overall it falls short and it took that second listen to figure out quite why: it's so close to textbook that it becomes generic. I wouldn't call anything here filler, but a bunch of songs that initially sound wildly impressive, start to falter as we pay closer attention.

For instance, there isn't a single component part of Hope is Gone that I can call out as wrong. There's nothing wrong with it at all. However, if someone took the entire combined outputs of Nightwish, Epica and After Forever, then poured it all into a clever database and had an accomplished AI generate an original song in that style, this is exactly what it would create. I enjoyed it while it was playing, but I forgot it the moment it ended.

Fortunately, not everything falls into that bucket and I should explore the three in a row I mentioned earlier.

Rising Waves from the Ocean is a gem of a song. It's catchy from moment one and gets catchier. This is how to write a symphonic metal chorus! The vocal performance is spectacular; Roberta has that rare ability to be powerful one moment and teasing the next. She challenges and soars and whispers and does whatever else the song needs, depending on the moment. She's on grand form here, but the band don't lag behind her. This isn't merely a singer's song, because it's also about the riffs and the drums and the orchestration.

My Life is My Eternity starts out the same way, teasing with guitar, soaring with orchestration and then finding power and emphasis. Roberta shifts from sultry to powerful on the turn of a dime. There's a great guitar part in the middle and the choral section is strong. It's not Rising Waves but it's good nonetheless. Whisper in the Silence is the one song that might match it here with its fast begining and memorable drumming. Salvo Grasso is fine playing slowly, but he seems to relish the up tempo stuff. And Roberta reaches some fantastic notes, while Emanuele Alessandro gets a strong solo.

So, three great tracks. The problem is that rest of the album consistently fails to match them, even though it tries for longer than most albums run. I think the male singer epitomises their problem in a microcosm. He's capable and he does exactly what he should, but that's his biggest problem. He has no individuality, so he becomes just like every other capable male voice in a symphonic metal band. And Astralium sadly follow suit.

If the whole album, all sixty plus minutes of it, was up to Whisper in the Silence and Rising Waves from the Ocean, this would be a gimme at 9/10. I'm almost disappointed that I have to only give it a 7/10. It's decent but I'm unable to get past the feeling that it should be much more.

Cyanide Paradise - Reach for the Stars (2019)

Country: The Netherlands
Style: Melodic Death Metal
Rating: 6/10
Release Date: 8 Jul 2019
Sites: Facebook | Instagram | Metal Archives | Official Website | YouTube

Ironically, while I was listening to the female led melodic death metal band Frantic Amber at the end of last week, Linn Liv from the female led melodic death metal band Cyanide Paradise reached out with their debut EP, which I'm very happy to review too.

Linn is the singer for the band and, like Elizabeth Andrews of Frantic Amber (and insert your female melodic death metal singer of choice here), she has that recognisable something that I'm still trying to figure out is common to all female death growlers. Maybe it's a slightly higher pitch, even though it's still guttural. Anyway, she sounds good. The whole band sound good and its not difficult to like this EP.

Everyone does a solid job. The vocals contain a lot of energy and attitude. The guitar finds that balance between melody and power. The bass backs them up well. And the drums do everything they need to, even though there isn't a drummer. Since this EP was recorded, the band have added a second guitarist but I believe that they're still looking for someone to fill the seat behind the drumkit.

It should be too surprising that everyone does a solid job, because this is far from your average new band. Sure, they were formed this year, by Martin Vos and Jeff Wennekes, who play guitar and bass respectively, but they both previously did the same job for symphonic metal band Desolace Divine with the very same Linn Liv on vocals. They continued on after a rename to Veil of Delusions, with a different singer, and put out a full length album in 2016. Liv wasn't in the latter band but she does also sing for symphonic death metal band Pictura Poesis, alongside Wennekes on bass. They have two albums out, though I don't believe that Wennekes was with them at that time.

So, while Cyanide Paradise may be new, its band members know each other well and it's no surprise that they sound like they've been playing together for years. In many ways, they have and I'm sure that the point of this EP is to introduce the world to these old colleagues in a new project. If that wasn't the point, then this runs short at under twenty minutes, even if it is an EP.

Being short, I've been able to listen to this in entirety a lot of times and I've done that because I wanted to see if each of the songs would find their individuality over repeated listens. It's a very consistent album, which can be both a good and a bad thing. Here it's both. The consistency tells me how reliable the band are, but also that there's not as much variety as I'd like to hear.

There is some, but it's mostly variety that we have to find for ourselves. I think of Subatomic as the opening baseline for the band: a solid, dependable slab of melodeath. Enlightenment does more of the same, but it adds a worthy spoken section, still done by Liv in her harsh voice, but showing that she's able to show nuance with her voice better when she speaks guttural than when she sings it. Pestilence has a guitar that's more dynamic, almost cinematic; there's also a cool section with what sound like synth bells.

Best of all is the title track, because what I can only call a keyboard aura behind the regular instruments elevates what is already the best song on the album even further. I wonder if this was the last track written, because it feels deeper and more memorable. If this is the direction forward, I'd like to hear the band's debut album, especially if it's recorded as a solid five piece. Thanks for sharing, Linn, and best of luck to Cyanide Paradise!

Sacred Reich - Awakening (2019)

Country: USA
Style: Thrash Metal
Rating: 7/10
Release Date: 23 Aug 2019
Sites: Bandcamp | Facebook | Metal Archives | Wikipedia

I wasn't living in Phoenix three decades ago when it was the next big thrash scene about to explode. I was six thousand miles away but I was listening to a lot of the bands that were tearing it up in what I probably thought at the time was just an endless desert. The name that most people remember today is probably Flotsam and Jetsam, especially after Jason Newsted elevated their name when he left to join Metallica, but they were far from alone. I bought Sacred Reich albums too and those of Atrophy, who were just down the road in Tucson.

If Flotsam and Jetsam were the most famous Arizona thrash band, I hear that Sacred Reich had the biggest and wildest mosh pits. I hope that's still the case 23 years after their previous album. And yeah, only 23 years. I bought Ignorance and the Surf Nicaragua EP back in the day but I don't think that I knew that they had knocked out a few albums in the nineties, before taking a break. I guess I wasn't paying attention, though I also see that they weren't entirely well received. It was a tough time.

They only went away for a little while, from 2000 to 2006, but they've only got round to a new album now, one that feels strong and punchy, as if they were just itching to make it. They've had a pretty consistent line-up over the years, though I do see one key recent change, namely that Jason Rainey, the only founding member to last until their debut album in 1987, has been on rhythm all the way through, but he left this year, to be replaced by Joey Radziwill. That seems like an important break. I wonder if it had anything to do with this album.

All the others who took part in the band's heyday in the late eighties were the second people in place. Phil Rind, the songwriter, vocalist and bassist, joined in 1985, replacing both Dan Kelly and Mike Andre. The lead guitarist, Wiley Arnett, showed up a year later to replace Jeff Martinek. After a year of Ray Nay on drums, Greg Hall took over and stayed for most of the band's life thus far. It's Dave McClain here, though, who took over from Hall for half of the nineties and did so again last year.

But what about the music? Well, the title track, which kicks things off, is a heavy, mid-paced song with a real punch. I don't remember Rind's voice as being this clear or this strong. He's quite obviously on top form here and the production aids him, as it does McClain's drumkit, which is relentless. Divide & Conquer is faster. It doesn't care about doing anything fancy; it just drops its head and blisters.

If Rind deserved the first overt compliment, the back end gets there too. It continues to deliver, song after song, so amazingly tight. That chugging at the outset of Manifest Reality is dream material for me. Then it kicks into high gear with Arnett's buzzsaw of a lead and I'm in heaven. Revolution's close as well. This is quintessential old school thrash, textbook stuff. Killing Machine also features the socially aware material we expect from Rind, anti-war material telling the stories of a succession of bright new soldiers, all of them inevitably "bodies for the killing machine". This album is far too long a time in coming but it delivers.

And there's variety here too. Death Valley is wildly different: alternative and even southern. Something to Believe starts out like a Judas Priest song but gets alternative in a very different way, almost like Priest covering a Creed song, if that remotely makes sense, with a notably heartfelt delivery from Rind and strong work on the bass too.

The flaw isn't in the music but in the fact that this is just a breath over half an hour in length and it feels short at only eight songs. Sure, this is authentic for the era it ably resurrects but I can't but feel greedy for the first album Sacred Reich have done in 23 years. I want more! Please, folks, let's see another album in 2020 or maybe 2021. We're glad you're back, even if you never really went away.

Eighteenth Hour - Eighteenth Hour (2019)

Country: USA
Style: Hard Rock
Rating: 8/10
Release Date: 23 Aug 2019
Sites: Facebook | Official Website

I have a very deliberate focus here on rock and metal from around the world, but that doesn't mean that there aren't great bands coming out of the US as well. Eighteenth Hour are an energetic hard rock band from Bethlehem, PA who have been winning all sorts of local band awards. This is their debut album after a decade supporting bands like Bon Jovi, Skid Row, Greate White, even blues singer Shemeika Copeland.

There are certainly classic rock influences here. You don't need to wait for the slide on Unnoticed to realise that a lot of it comes from southern rock. I kept hearing moments of Rory Gallagher too but his vocals rather than his far more famous guitar. It's in the phrasing of singer Geoff Houser, who has a rock voice but one clearly sourced from the blues. Of course, there are a few songs where he sounds a lot more like Jon Bon Jovi, like Unnoticed.

However, this sounds a lot more contemporary to me, even if I'm not up on a lot of the new bands to tell you who they might sound like, if anybody. I'm hearing an alternative edge but not so strong as to push this away from the hard rock core of their sound. There's even a little prog at points, like a neat riff on Should've Been Gone, after a few bars of an intro that sounds a lot like the Scorpions.

I don't know quite how long it's been since Eighteenth Hour was founded but it's been a while and I'm sure they've racked up a lot of songs in that time from which to compile this debut album. It doesn't feel rushed. They clearly have enough material to populate this with strong songs and probably have a bunch left over for the follow-up.

And I'd suggest that the songs are what they're all about. There are a few solid solos here, courtesy of Houser and David Zullo, not least on Takes Me Back, perhaps my favourite song (though the consistency is strong enough to mean I have a new favourite each time through). They're backed up by a solid rhythm section of Jim Touchton and Tom Chaffier who keep things tight. Just listen to Should've Been Gone to hear them do that even though Jim's bass is doing something completely different to Tom's drums. At the end of the day, though, none of them are showing off here. They're each just playing their parts to make the songs work.

And they all do. Few of these scream to be, well, singled out for a single release, but every one of them could be a viable single. They're all catchy without being flashy, which means that they grow. Hear one on the radio and you might let it pass unacknowledged but it might also take root inside your head and, next time it comes on, you'll be paying attention to it. The more you listen, the better it gets. And that goes for all ten tracks, none of which are clones of any of the others.

Maybe the most accessible are the ones that pause the music at key points so that the vocals can get a little emphasis. They do this on the first couple of tracks and they do it very well. The album gets deeper from there. I wish I could give you an elevator pitch for this band, but I can still recommend them highly. I dug this a lot. It sounded good on a first listen and then it dug into my skin.

Frantic Amber - Bellatrix (2019)

Country: Sweden
Style: Melodic Death Metal
Rating: 8/10
Release Date: 23 Aug 2019
Sites: Facebook | Metal Archives | Official Website | Twitter | VK | YouTube

As I've mentioned here before, melodeath is the easiest genre to get lost in the crowd because it's easy to sound like everyone else. I treasure melodic death that stands out and that leads me to Frantic Amber, a Swedish band on their second album. I've enjoyed the pair of singles that preceded it and I was eager to check out the album once released.

They're another female led melodic death band, which I tend to enjoy. I've found that, once I got used to the idea of harsh female vocals almost two decades ago now, I started to recognise them when I heard them. There's an interesting component that I'm not sure I can describe. I wouldn't call it softness, but it's something that adds a melodic nature to the vocals to go above the melodic nature of the band behind them. Frankly, I prefer it now. Elizabeth Andrews is very good at what she does which makes her a welcome addition to the ranks of female led melodic death bands.

In fact, this band is eighty per cent female, I believe, but you can't tell that by listening to it! I like the sound too, because the vocals and drums don't overpower everything else and I can actually hear Madeleine Gullberg Husberg's bass. It's especially obvious in the midsection of Lagertha, but it's there throughout.

This is a concept album, very much like something Sabaton might do if they were women. Each of the eight tracks proper here are about warriors of note who just happened to be women. As Frantic Amber are very good at flavouring their songs with appropriate samples and ethnic instrumentation, we realise that these warriors are from all over the globe. This means that there are flutes on Lagertha; woodblocks on Joshitai; Jews harps, eastern strings and Mongol chants on Khutulun; and a host of other varied flavours that elevate the album.

As with the Sabaton album about the First World War, I highly recommend that you treat these songs as rabbit holes to discover some amazing stories. Just start with Lyudmila Pavlichenko, the Soviet sniper focus of The Ghost That Kills, and you won't be able to stop. She was known as Lady Death or simply "the Russian bitch from Hell", because she finished the Second World War at 309 confirmed kills of Nazi soldiers, which is insanely high, even before a pondering on how many more were unconfirmed.

This is melodic death rather than power metal, so it can't hold a candle to Sabaton on catchy choruses and earworm hooks, but this is a deeper, far more varied and more interesting album that outstrips Sabaton on textures. And I have to add that it's certainly not without solid riffs and hooks, whatever instrument they happen to be played on.

It's another of those albums that I was going to rate 7/10 until I realised just how many tracks I'd noted down as highlights. I enjoyed Lagertha a lot, Joshitai even more. The Ghost That Kills was my favourite until the pirate yarn Crimson Seas took over. That has everything: strong riffs, solid hooks and some great vocal phrasing, not to forget swords clashing in time behind the music. And The Black Knight wraps things up in style at a longer length, almost seven and a half minutes.

Given that there are only eight tracks proper (there's a short instrumental intro too), four of them are real highlights and the other four are hardly slackers, this clearly deserves an 8/10. Word on the street is that this is a step up from its predecessor, 2015's Burning Insight, but I'm now eager to check that out to see for myself.

Изморозь - Культ (2019)

Country: Russia
Style: Pagan Folk Metal
Rating: 7/10
Release Date: 19 Apr 2019
Sites: Facebook | Instagram | Metal Archives | Official Website | VK

Here's one I missed earlier in the year. I've finally got round to finding a phone so I can sign up for the Russian social media network called VK. In a community dedicated to the Russian folk metal outfit Стожар, whose album, Холодом Битв В Объятья Зимы, I enjoyed back in June, I saw a Best of 2019 poll. Ten bands had albums listed and Стожар made it to second with 13% of the vote. Way out in front, though, with a whopping 62% of the vote were a band named Изморозь with this album.

I don't read Cyrillic, so I'm relying on Google Translate to help me out. I believe the band's name is Hoarfrost, they hail from Moscow where they began life as a side project of folk metal band Ashen Light and this, their ninth album, is called Cult. I just had to track it down and see whether Изморозь have a heck of a lot of friends willing to vote in the social media polls or whether this is really that great an album.

Well, I have to say that I enjoyed Стожар more, but I enjoyed this too and it's continuing to grow on me. In many ways Изморозь could be seen as a dark side to Стожар. Instead of light and lively keyboards and clean and melodic female vocals, they play their folk metal with a black metal influence and a subversive nature.

It's often catchy stuff that's hardly serious in nature, as we discover on the two minute blitz of an opening song. I don't read Cyrillic so Медведь, балалайка, водка! means nothing to me, but the chorus makes it clear that the final two words are "balalaika" and "vodka", which need no translation; the first turns out to be "bear". Listening to this song alone, I knew that I had to share it with my son, who's a Trollfest fan.

Even when the songs aren't that wild, they're short and punchy. The longest falls short of the five minute mark and a couple are under three. What sells the dark side for me are the vocals, which are delivered if by a lascivious bearded dwarf with plenty of mead in him, even though I see from photos that precisely none of those attributes are the case. I'd like Trollfest if they had different vocals; I like Изморозь in large part because of them.

I don't know if these memorable lead vocals are provided by Belf or Kiv, as there are two vocalists here; the former also handles the bass and keyboards while the latter plays the guitars. Behind them on drums is Gumanoid. All three are highly experienced, having played in long lists of bands and on many albums and that experience shows here.

While much of this is a heady mix of fast drums and folk melodies delivered by prominent keyboards presumably masquerading as a variety of instruments, with those lascivious vocals emphasising them, there's actually quite a lot going on here. Злой князь (The Evil Princ) begins like Rammstein as a folk metal band. Берега храбрых (The Shores of the Brave) has a Celtic mediaeval feel to it. Лавка смерти (Death Bench) features a lot of variation in speed and plenty of what sound like flutes and other ethnic instruments. It kicks off like speed metal with bagpipes and I'm all for that!

And there are bizarre moments that I can't imagine are deliberate but, hey, may just be. Most come courtesy of the keyboards. I couldn't help but hear the Inspector Gadget theme on Злой князь, even if it isn't a likely source. I also my favourite game soundtrack on the opener and I'd be truly shocked if this bunch of Muscovite black/ folk metalheads grew up playing Fuzzy's World of Miniature Space Golf too.

I liked this on a first listen and I like it more with each further time through It's Изморозь's ninth album and there are EPs in their discography too. I'll be exploring those for sure.