Author Archives: Old Disgruntled Bastard

Prelude to Apocalypse via Onward to Golgotha

Posted on May 1, 2020

This isn’t so much a contest as a bunch of observations on two obviously related death metal albums. Onward to Golgotha is Incantation‘s magnum opus and rightly resides at the very peak of the genre. The proliferation of the internet … Continue reading →

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Quarantine sci-fi: Iain Banks’ The Player Of Games

Posted on April 23, 2020

  The Player of Games is the second book in Iain Banks’ Culture series, notable for its mix of hard science fiction, world building, and socio-political commentary. In the distant future, humankind has left its home planet to become an … Continue reading →

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Cóndor – El Valle del Cóndor (2018)

Posted on April 22, 2020

As in language, so in music, the possibility of meaning becoming lost in translation is immense; especially so when the music is more parochial than the norm and the interpreter comes from a milieu altogether different from the creator. Such … Continue reading →

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Human Agony – Putrescence Of Calvary (2019)

Posted on April 20, 2020

Putrescence of Calvary is unabashed Blasphemy worship channeled through the likes of Pseudogod, but eclipses both by virtue of tighter songs than the first and less knuckle-dragging than the latter. As the video below of the band’s life performance illustrates, … Continue reading →

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Iron Maiden at 40

Posted on April 17, 2020

Iron Maiden‘s self-titled debut turned forty this April 14. Forty years is but a decade shy of half a century, a long passage of time by any measure, one that has seen the world change beyond recognition, and yet this … Continue reading →

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Sammath – Across The Rhine Is Only Death (2019)

Posted on April 16, 2020

I read somewhere that metal as opposed to rock n roll is thought over feeling, meaning that the metal musician feels first and then reasons upon that initial feeling to come up with an expression of his intellect. It is … Continue reading →

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Regarde Les Hommes Tomber discography review

Posted on April 15, 2020

Regarde les Hommes Tomber are the kind of band for which the parking-lot drinking session before going in to watch the headliner was invented: post-hardcore screamo with a djent tone on their self-titled debut, then incorporating more drone on the … Continue reading →

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Death metal interludes playlist

Posted on March 28, 2020

The classically-tinged interlude is a proud death metal tradition, giving lie to the popular assumption that this is a brute’s music. It is that, without question, and unabashedly so, but as can be sensed from these pieces on an instinctual … Continue reading →

Posted in Ambient, Death Metal | Tagged | 7 Comments

Retrospective: Dissection – Reinkaos (2006)

Posted on March 27, 2020

Over the last fifteen years, Dissection‘s returning, and final, album Reinkaos has acquitted itself honorably alongside other neither-fish-nor-fowl albums like Megadeth‘s Youthanasia, Metal Church‘s Hanging In The Balance, Savatage‘s Edge Of Thorns, and Armored Saint’s Symbol Of Salvation. Symbol Of … Continue reading →

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Death by melody: Denial of God – The Hallow Mass (2019) & The Spirit – Cosmic Terror (2020)

Posted on March 24, 2020

Depending on who you ask, The Hallow Mass can be considered a heavy metal album with black metal trimmings, or a black metal album in the original sense of the term, where extra-musical theme and imagery override actual musical technique. … Continue reading →

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