Vektor

Monumental metal 5 playlist

Once again some insanely good varied epic metal tracks packed into a one hour album-like entity.

1. Keep of Kalessin – Armada. One of my long time favourites from 2006. A perfect fusion of thrash metal, death metal and black metal really. The composer Arnt Obsidian shared a really interesting story about the creation of the track in his blog (https://arntobsidian.wordpress.com/2016/04/08/10-things-you-might-not-know-about-armada/):

The ARMADA title was decided on very early in the process and I had a vision of how the title track should sound. But when I was writing songs I always felt that “this is a cool song, but it’s not ARMADA!”. I remember thinking this for Crown of the kings, The Wealth of Darkness and The Black Uncharted. Until one special night at around 11pm, I took one chord and I felt goosebumps all over my body…..because in that moment, I knew that THIS was it. It was happening now! The best song I’ve ever written was about to manifest itself on my guitar! I then spent 8 hours writing the song. Without recording any of it. I just made the entire song in one go, with all the passes and details right there and then. And I remember calling my brother at 7am after I was finished, saying “I’ve done it! ARMADA is written!! And it’s fucking insane!!!”. Haha. I have never been more excited about a song and I remember this as something special because I’ve never written an entire song with all passes and details like that in one long session before or after. It was truly something unique and I also think that this song is something truly unique!

2.-3. Mountains Above the Sun by Vektor serves as an intro to Ultimate Artificer in their 2016 album Terminal Redux. I saw no reason not to do the same here. A monster of a theme, Progressive sci-fi thrash metal, lead to the biggest metal breakthrough album of 2016. What a headbanger Ultimate Artificer is. As the saying goes: Sci-fi or die!

4. When Anaal Nathrakh go doom, they go massive. When their usual chaotic tempos and vocals are matched with epic and heavy undertones, like in Drug-Fucking Abomination it creates a new kind of diversity. Just listen how epic as shit intro first transforms into screams of pain with a melancholic melody, and then into fierce ripping tempo. It’s almost funny how damn intense Anaal Nathrakh can get.

5. Murder, by Katatonia is part of their Brave Murder Day album (the track name is not Murder Day as is falsely tagged in Spotify). It’s almost comical how fitting it is for an album with that name to have three first tracks with the names, Brave, Murder and Day. Day is the most somber one and Murder a link between their old and new days. The first 13 seconds of repetive guitar chord are at first almost annoying, but after it becomes familiar, for me it is a promise that one of all time best melodic doom riffs is to follow.

Brave Murder Day (1996) is a great mixture of the rawness and doom of Dance of December Souls (1993) and their later clearer melancholic rock/metal sound. The main focus is still with the doom but the great lead melodies do not hurt at all. Also Mikael Åkerfeldt’s inspired vocal performance has to be taken into account. He was actually alerted to sing in the album in a really quick notice after Jonas Renkse lost his voice just before the recordings. And Åkerfeldt delivers!

6. One of the most underrated albums of 2016 Downfall of Gaia‘s Atrophy has a title track that deserves to go to metal history as a supreme accomplishment of melodic black metal. It is not often that a band from the backwoods of German black metal/sludge/hardcore scene comes to the fore with this much damn style. I mean this neverheard band has the guts to start with brilliant melody that leads to a fucking drum solo and to-die-for tremolo riff. And no, they aren’t progressive metal, just casually throwing a drum solo there. Blows my mind. If Downfall of Gaia manage to keep this strong base level up, they are bound to get a lot more notice in the next years.

And damn, that is not the only backwoods atmospheric German melodic black metal album in the masterclass of 2016. Ultha’s Converging Sings is also there.

7.-8. Downfall of Gaia shares some post-hardcore traits. Converge is a band that for many defines the mixture of hardcore punk, post-hardcore and metal. Precipe is an intro to All We Love We Leave Behind in their 2012 album. It sets the mood very well being a very  atmospheric composition by nature.

All We Love We Leave Behind striked me first as a bit whiny even though the riffs and especially the rhythmics are really inspired. Later on I heard that the track is actually about the vocalist Jacob Bannon’s dogs. Sheesh, it transformed into heartbreaking at that very instant. The lines that I thought were such a fucking cliche actually started to work really well. Converge seems to keeps inventing the wheel again and again, their mixture of different genres is ever so fresh.

9. A bit before Hardcore punk band Converge mixed metal in, a hardcore band Neurosis abandoned hardcore punk and started playing slow weird music with hardcore elements. It could have been called post-hardcore (emo, anyone?) but instead it turned out post-metal. The second album of Neurosis from 1992, Souls At Zero is one of the first, if not the first post-metal albums of all time. Surprisingly it is arguably the best.

Souls at Zero is not as widely regarded a classic as most genre defining albums. It should be, post-metal has grown quite big in the 25 years since the making of Souls at Zero. I had heard a huge number of post-metal albums before I stumbled across Souls at Zero, but still Souls came on top of the whole pile. This very rarely happens to me, usually I find the genre defining albums to have been made better later (not a popular opinion I know). Souls at Zero is not a clinically clean album and has the hardcore rawness and energy being heavy and oppressive as shit at the same time. Sounding so damn inspired.

To Crawl Under One’s Skin starts with humming voice clips and obscure stuff turning into really memorable melodies and riffs. They may lack the later post-metal loudness war heaviness but have dynamics to die for. Bass booms in the front and a weird quite high-pitched but heavy riff chugs and meanders about. All the sudden at 2.47 the guitarist Scott Kelly or Steve van Till makes the guitars damn near cry with long bends. Followed by a drum-break and build up, I feel there is a term to it too. This kind of structural freeness defines a lot of post-metal. Free-flowing meandering compositions that wonder through different climaxes naturally, sometimes avoiding the peak and turning to different direction half-way.

Still, Souls at Zero is pretty damn different from any later post-metal albums. That might actually explain why it is not valued as high as I’d want, cause it’s still a part of a process but not the actual defining album. Why has no one else done post-metal like this? Damn. If someone has, feel obliged to send me that album’s name immediately.

10. Cult of Luna turned out to be arguably the biggest second wave post metal band (first album in 2001). Mainly because their discography is full of class. Though it also helps that they did not break up like Isis did. First albums of Cult of Luna are quite hardcore influenced as with so many of the biggest post-metal bands. Neurosis, Callisto, The Ocean and Isis for example.

Mariner from 2016 is listed as a collaboration in Metal-archives but it is actually a new album. 54 minutes and 5 tracks with a female singer Julie Christmas. A friend justly commented that he cannot imagine why Cult of Luna wouldn’t make this permanent. I agree, the female vocals complement the bit stale Cult of Luna signature male grunts so perfectly it adds A LOT to the music. The album Vertikal (2012) already grew a bit stale but this new element keeps the kettle boiling.

Julie Christmas is also not a pop singer. The hardcorish attitude vocals add a lot of scale especially when sometimes she sounds angelic, others like a 41 year old woman she is, but at times like a 14 year old teen. Boys, that is vocal talent.

The Wreck of S.S. Needle does not have play between female and male vocals that I feel they could try more in the future. It is a basic real quality, real atmospheric intro that leads into heavy riffing, electronic throbbing elements in the back, and later on a climax. Usually with post-metal the pinnacle of the track is a heavy as shit riff but here it’s the vocal performance of Julie Christmas. Cult of Luna hasn’t sounded so fresh since 2006.

Best albums and tracks of 2016

Also known as what new releases I happened to listen in a limited timespan of one year.

Last year I realized I’m not too old yet as many an album caused childlike enthusiasm. In the early 2016 it was mostly blasts from 2015 (Wilderun!) but as the year went on, 2016 unveiled a good amount of solid material. 2015 had higher peaks but 2016 did have its share of killers with a strong base level. As proven by 2015 reprise list that you can find on the bottom of this text, many of the best albums are going to be unveiled only later.

Best albums of 2016

Vektor — Terminal Redux – progressive sci-fi thrash metal – Vektor’s hyped 2016 release is astronomically progressive metal. Vektor was the best modern thrash metal band for years, it is about time for them to get recognition. For an album that sates and mildly bores the listener while delivering killer tracks (Pteropticon, Psychotrophia, Pillars of Sand) a bit over midway, it is astonishingly good but would be more enjoyable shorter. The last two tracks, Collapse and Recharging the Void manage to uplift the album to great heights again with surprising twists. It’s really not a better or worse album than their previous efforts but ridiculously good and full of everything tasty. 

Katatonia — The Fall of Hearts – progressive melancholic rock/metal – Some outerworldly charm with heartbreaking atmosphere. Drags time to time yet still wrenches heartstrings every minute. Passer‘s descending scale should be obnoxious yet it is genuinely alluring. How on earth did they make it work. I did not expect this at all, what a comeback.

Ivar Bjørnson & Einar Selvik’s Skuggsjá: A Piece for Mind & Mirror – folk / folk metal – A project by Enslaved and Wardruna veterans, which may run below radar cause of it’s eccentric name that sounds like artsy folk music. In a lot of ways Skuggsja sounds more like folk with metal elements than the other way around. Though even the folkier tracks often have a heavy backbone that owes to metal and makes these two elements come together naturally. Stunning.

Excellent (9-)

jumalten_aika

Moonsorrow — Jumalten Aika – folk metal / black metal

Very good (8½)

Panssarijuna — Nyt Sattuu – trauma blues / rock

Omnium Gatherum — Grey Heavens – When rather basic melodeath manages to excite me like Grey Heavens does, it’s worth a lot of points.

The Wounded Kings — Visions In Bone – doom metal

Good+ (8+)

King Gizzard & the Lizard Wizard — Nonagon Infinity – psychedelic rock / garage rock

Fleshgod Apocalypse — King – symphonic metal / neoclassical death metal

Oneohtrix Point Never — Garden of Delete – electronic / experimental / IDM – Probably an album I was most excited about cause it’s such a fresh kick in the eardrums (I just found out it’s a November 2015 release but what the hell, it was an important album for me last year).

Haken — Affinity – progressive rock – Some of the best moments of 2016 but also completely lackluster tracks. Their 2013 record The Mountain which I also found this year would be up there among the best albums of the year.

Whispered — Metsutan – Songs Of The Void – Japan influenced melodic death metal 

Behexen — The Poisonous Path – black metal

Good (8ish)

Paradox — Pangea – oldschool thrash metal

Blaakyum — Line of Fear – thrash metal

King Goat — Conduit – doom metal / heavy metal

Myrath — Legacy – progressive rock / metal

Anaal Nathrakh — The Whole of the Law – grindcore, black metal

Hebosagil — Lohtu – noise rock / post-metal / sludge

Tähtiportti — Eetterimessu – EBM

If These Trees Could Talk — The Bones of a Dying World – post-rock

Dark Lunacy — The Rain After The Snow – melancholic melodic death metal

Trees of Eternity — The Hour of The Nightingale – atmospheric doom metal

Oranssi Pazuzu — Värähtelijä – psychedelic black metal – I wanted this to be the best album of the year but unfortunately it’s the worst in Pazuzu’s discography. Another of my personal hype albums with Vektor. Vektor delivered, Pazuzu sort of. It does have about 50 mins of solid material but there’s an extra 20 mins  on top.

We’re still good (7½)

Alcest — Kodama – blackgaze

Vola — Inmazes – djent / progressive rock

Mogwai — Atomic – post-rock

The Dillinger Escape Plan — Dissociation – progressive metal / mathcore / metalcore

Riutta — Sinun Täytyy Elää Vielä Kerran – progressive rock / indie rock

Sulphur — Omens of Doom – black metal

Okay (7ish)

Hanging Garden — Hereafter – melancholic rock / doom metal

Obscura — Akróasis – progressive metal

Glanko — Isometrik – downtempo / ambient / IDM

Wöljager — Van’t Liëwen un Stiäwen – neofolk

Insomnium — Winter’s Gate – melancholic melodic death metal – It was supposed to finally be a great album after all the pretty good melodeath they’ve done of late, repeating the same formula that drew so much blood in their early albums. In the end it’s just pretty good melodeath again with some quite stunning moments.

Be’lakor — Vessels – melancholic progressive melodic death metal – Alike Insomnium, in theory Vessels is a really good album but there’s something bothering me. Maybe it’s the production that lacks danger, or the sounds that remind of Insomnium too much.

Okay- (6½)

Most 6ish albums I didnt listen enough and/or simply forgot about but these ones got a chance. None of them are bad but I’ve already heard similar stuff done way better or they elude my musical preferences.

KYPCK — 3epo – Doom metal

Reptilian — Perennial Void Traverse – Death metal

Oh well… (6ish)

Devin Townsend Project — Transcendence – progressive metal – I wanted to like Transcendence cause I dig Devin’s creative lunacy. However, Transcendence has an unbearable scent of virtues and purity. In a way it’s the opposite album to the chaotic nature of Deconstruction. Clean production, clean prog metal, fun for everyone. Not for me, I crave for some evil.

Spigu — Viimeinen papukaija – indie pop / country – Spigu’s first album from 2013 was one of the biggest surprises this year, if it was a 2016 release it would be on the very good category. Unfortunately Viimeinen Papukaija fell short. I don’t get the lyrics and the sprained bluegrass feel is replaced with compositions and themes so major key it doesn’t strike my positive nerve at all. At least the title track is a nice piece. I still haven’t lost hope on him.

Venetian Snares — Traditional Synthesizer Music – breakcore / improvisational – My face when he finally… (makes an album that does not hold my interest).

Deathspell Omega — The Synarchy of Molten Bones – progressive black metal – Evil [x], atmospheric [x], virtuoso [x], good riffs [x], bad riffs [x], songwriting [-], thanks for coming see you next time. Even the dark lord must be thinking: “Man, these guys sure make worship hard for themselves, how about you just switch to a frigging goat sacrifice every now and then?”.

Best tracks of 2016

Haken – The Architect
Haken – Initiate
Oranssi Pazuzu – Hypnotisoitu Viharukous
Riutta – Valkoinen Kohina
Riutta – Lorenz
Hebosagil – Pian tämä kaikki on ohi
Oneohtrix Point Never – Animals
Katatonia – Residual
Katatonia – Passer
Trees of Eternity – Gallows Bird
Tähtiportti – Abraxas
Tähtiportti – Ihmeiden aika ei ole ohi
Vektor  – Mountains Above The Sun & Ultimate Artificer

Bubbling under

Brilliant tracks just below the first category. Except on a good day…

The Wounded Kings – Beast
Riutta – Pyhäjoki
Hebosagil – Peltirumpu
Oneohtrix Point Never – Sticky Drama
Alcest – Oiseaux De Proie
Moonsorrow – Mimisbrunn
If These Trees Could Talk – Swallowing Teeth
King Gizzard & the Lizard Wizard – People-Vultures
King Gizzard & the Lizard Wizard – Road Train
King Gizzard & the Lizard Wizard – Evil Death Roll
Omnium Gatherum – Storm Front
Vola – The Same War
Mogwai – U235
Sulphur – The Force of Our Fall
Sulphur – Gathering Storms
Trees of Eternity – The Eye of The Night
Vektor – Collapse
Ivar Bjørnson & Einar Selvik’s Skuggsjá – Tore Hund
Ivar Bjørnson & Einar Selvik’s Skuggsjá  – Rop frå røynda / mælt frå minne
Whispered – Tsukiakari

2015 reprise

a bunch of really interesting 2015 releases found too late


10
Wilderun — Sleep at the Edge of the Earth – progressive symphonic folk metal – The best album since 2014, or perhaps even further

9ish
Lost Soul — Atlantis: The New Beginning – technical death metal
Lik — Mass Funeral Evocation – oldschool death metal
Hanging Garden — Blackout Whiteout – doom metal / melancholic rock

8½
Genocide Shrines — Manipura Imperial Deathevokovil: Scriptures Of Reversed Puraana Dharmurder – death metal
Akrabu — Ziggurat Ascension – acoustic folk / ritual

8
Barren Earth — On Lonely Towers – progressive death metal / melodic death metal
Satan — Atom By Atom – heavy metal
Janne Westerlund — Marshland – folk / country
Batushka — Litourgiya – melodic black metal
Slægt — Beautiful and Damned – heavy metal / black metal
Ghost — Meliora – heavy metal / hard rock
Venetian Snares — Your Face (When I Finally) – breakcore

7½
Downfall of Nur — Umbras de Barbagia – atmospheric black metal
Zuriaake — 孤雁 Gu Yan – atmospheric black metal

Music quickies – Vektor, Current 93, Katatonia, Devin Townsend Project, Behemoth

vektor-terminal_redux Vektor – Terminal Redux (2016)
Vektor’s hyped 2016 release is astronomically progressive metal. Vektor was the best modern thrash metal band for years, it is about time for them to get recognition. For an album that sates me midway, it is astoningly good but it would be more enjoyable shorter. It’s really not a better album than their previous efforts but still ridiculously good and full of everything tasty.
9/10
Listen: Mountains Above The Sun + Ultimate Artificer

0Current 93 Calling For Vanished Faces Calling for Vanished Faces (I: Funeral Music for
Us All) and (II: Love, Sleep And Dreams) (1999)
David Tibet’s overtheateritical aesthetics drove this Sol Invictus fanboy mad for half a decade. “Maybe, I might finally appreciate something of theirs?” I thought. I: Funeral Music for Us All starts as an oddities collection I cannot recommend less but picks up on Coal Black Smith, staggers to its most annoying pieces and picks up decently at Hourglass (For Diana) soon to turn into 1 hour 30 minutes of pure neofolk bliss. Probably my favourite release on which I completely skip 1/3 of it.
I 7/10
II 10-/10
Listen: The whole second side, except the 4 ending tracks, is blissful.

570160Katatonia – The Fall of Hearts (2016)
Some outerworldly charm with heartbreaking atmosphere. Drags time to time yet still wrenches heartstrings every minute. Passer‘s descending scale should be obnoxious yet it is genuinely alluring. How on earth did they make it work.
Listen: Decima & Residual for angsting in a dark room, Passer for prog.
Grade upcoming

 

devintownsendprojecttranscendencecdDevin Townsend Project – Transcendence (2016)
Middle aged Devin is zen and re uses his components but those lures still amount some catch. Not bad, but I may have heard too much “c-grade progressive metal” (quoting their own making of documentary) to fully appreciate this kind of polished sound anymore. Danger lurks somewhere else. Here’s hoping the next album goes permanently Higher.

The second album is simply too much as can be noticed from the lack of recognition it has gotten. The (demo) titles are a very Devin Townsendish joke, the stuff is nearly as polised as the first. Love the commercial suicide though, it could have well been released it as a lone piece.
Listen: Higher
7ish/10

395440Behemoth – The Satanist (2014)
If you can think of a more epic way to start a track than in the title track of The Satanist please let me know. The track does not carry the weight of its beginning but the album does. The wall-of-sound production, mildly reminiscent of Emperor, gives it weight unlike many releases.

Incorporating a massive and satisfying finale that only runs through the last minute of Blow Your Trumpets Gabriel requires so much finesse. O Father O Satan O Sun! towers above the rest of the release with another finale, this time based on a monster riff and oration like an esoteric sermon. Here’s hoping The Satanist won’t be the last of Behemoth like Nergal hinted in the past.
Listen: Blow Your Trumpets Gabriel & O Father O Satan O Sun!
Grade upcoming

MonuMental Metal Collection II

Another collection focusing on epic metal masterpieces. This collection goes from symphonic death metal (Septicflesh) to progressive thrash (Vektor) to black metal roots leading into different directions (Tribulation, A Forest of Stars, Oranssi Pazuzu) and melodic metal (Atoma, Enshine).

Septicflesh’s Mad Architect is a brilliant unison of death metal and majestic, mentally symphonic orchestration with a chorus to die for. Truly an original kind of a death metal track fit such a fitting title.

Accelerating Universe is the finest piece of the world’s finest thrash metal band Vektor‘s first album. My statement may seem preposterous but Vektor. Is. The. Shit. I don’t say stuff like this lightly. Metal simply does not get much better. This is how you make modern thrash metal. Both of their albums are absolutely killer and 3rd one is coming up in May. My most anticipated release of 2016.

Apparitions is a true grower-type of a track. The ending track of Tribulations The Formulas of Death from 2013. Tribulation is yet another original band combining both black and death metal with progressive compositions. I admit it, I’m a sucker for original bands that compose brilliant music.

Drawing Down the Rain is the masterwork of A Forest of Stars. They embarked from black metal background but nowadays add psychedelia, melancholia and progressive elements with otherwordly lyrics. I wasn’t supposed to use the same band twice in collections this soon but Beware the Sword You Cannot See was one of the very best releases of 2015.

Hole in the Sky by Atoma somehow manages to be even more epicly tuned and majestic than its predecessors while being less metal.

Ympyrä on Viiva Tomussa, like Apparitions took me a while to grow. A brilliant way to sum up Oranssi Pazuzu is their first promo letter where they stated that (roughly translated from Finnish): “Oranssi Pazuzu makes churchburners and bluntburners hold each others hands”. They combine psychedelic elements with black metal; Ympyrä on Viiva Tomussa nears a shamanistic ritual.

It was supposed to be the closing track as it leaves me utterly empty, but I realized that the beautiful melodics of Constellation by Enshine actually light up the feelings instantly. After Slumber broke up in 2011, the members formed Atoma. However Jari Lindholm left and formed Enshine. It’s only natural to have them on same collection.

Did I say Epic Metal Collection I was my favourite. I feel that this one is even stronger, 100 % killer tracks.

f922429ebfaf9bebaa664c8149d10261You can also find all playlists from playlists.net:
http://playlists.net/epic-metal-collection-ii