Black Boned Angel – Verdun
[Riot Season, 2009]
genre: drone, doom, metal, experimental, noise, dark ambient
Album Review by Sovereign
As the press release info says: “Sharing a similarly bleak ground to Corrupted, Sunn 0))) and Earth, New Zealand’s Black Boned Angel return with their fourth full length album ‘Verdun’, and perhaps their most sombre and fully-realised work to date.” This is Campbell Kneale’s drone metal project. I am a fan of Birchville cat motel -the other solo project of him-and I was really expecting this one. The result is fantastic, an awesome dark ambient masterpiece and a drone doom metal fuss. This man is creating really progressive music, his noise is unreachable, his mind is genius and this album is again one of the best ever drone metal releases and maybe one of the most inspirational ever dark ambient(under huge noise passages) albums…. It is like a battle!
The album:
Black Boned Angel Verdun 2009 rapidshare
http://www.riotseason.com/REPOSECD020.htm
http://www.myspace.com/blackbonedangelnz
http://www.myspace.com/itsriotseason
Track:
Black Boned Angel – Verdun
a. Prayer Sodden Holes
b. Tears Strike the Mile High Gong
c. Creeping Barrage
51:55
Sovereign
“Last Day of Summer is a split album from dark Britain’s Swale, Kent, instrumentalists Sons of Alpha Centauri and West Virginia Riff Rock outfit Treasure Cat (featuring members of Karma to Burn). The eleven-track split album includes 3 exclusive tracks from Alpha Cat – the lethal collaboration of both bands rocking together plus all new material from both acts”. Personally, I prefer the tracks from Treasure Cat, maybe because of my music taste and my sympathy and preference to stoner rock. Treasure Cat create a full of energy instrumental stoner rock and I think their riffs are the best I’ve heard the last months. I get excited with ‘Valhalla’. Sons of Alpha Centauri produce a more virtuoso instrumental rock and a quite atmospheric and melodic dark and psychedelic rock. Their attitude is quite experimental and there is an ambient and a post-rock influence deep inside their music. I thins SOAC can reach the edges of experimental rock till the limit of post-metal and avant-garde metal. Both bands are really alternative and their collaboration is the most interesting part of their split release. Great inspirational guitar riffs! Huge riffs get stacked in my mind…
Greymachine is a projet of Justin Broadrick (Jesu, Final, Godflesh) in collaboration with Dave Cochrane (Head Of David, God, Ice), Diarmuid Dalton (Jesu, Godflesh) and Aaron Turner (Isis). Again and again Justin reviewed in this blog. I can’t understand where this guy find time for all these superbands and all the projects and collaborations he is a part of. Anyway this record is a super wow record. Broadrick is back to his lovely experimental but noisy shit. This sound is brilliant; this is what he can do. This band could be awesome. The album is the origin of ambient metal, this is the definition of noisy sludge, this is experimental shoegaze, no one can play this kind of noisy drone metal. This is a mix of rock, electronica, noise and metal. My head is exploded. Fantastic drone noise, excellent FX, awesome soundscapes, interesting hardcore drums, dirty guitars, never ending distortions, fantastic minds, great harsh vocals (Aaron). I can’t say anything else, if you like ambient metal, if you miss the Angelic Process and Overmars, if you like Earth, Grouper, Nadja, Tribes of Neurot and Tim Hecker, if you appreciate old Godflessh and original Jesu and if you try to remember and put in your mind bands like Fear Falls Burning, Troum, Black Boned Angel, Burning Star Core and Birchville Cat Motel under a Khanate or an Isis prism then you have this super album. This project is Einstürzende Neubauten of sludge, it is Yellow Swans and Noxagt of metal, This is a scream, this is truly loud. This is post, this is modern, this is meta music under no illusions, behind hallucinations and in front of its time, this sound is progressive. I think this album could be the spot of the year! It’s an industrial noisy atmospheric doomy music. FANTASTIC
Fall of Efrafa 
Aaron Turner and Justin Broadrick (these guys never stop) working together, that’s awesome!!! 2 tracks of noise-ambient industrial music and a promising album coming out this summer (2009). Fantastic tracks, awesome noise, great work, compositions full of ideas, ambient and noises. This EP and I think the forthcoming album; will be perfect for fans of the Angelic Process, Godflesh, Alec Empire, Einsturzende Neubauten, Ministry, Swans, Genghis Tron, Khanate and other extreme experimental but always atmospheric acts. This music is progressive, these sounds are avant-garde, you may gain a lot of things after the listening of these tracks. This is post music and maybe one of the most original compositions of the last years. Drums, synths, noise, brutal and harsh vocals, electronics, dark, ambient, dust, stoned and fly away with this 12”. Don’t miss it. I really expect the album in some days…
The story behind the recording of this album is really interesting. From 1999-2001, maudlin of the Well released three albums. These albums seamlessly blend metal, jazz, and prog in a fusion that is breathtaking. However, maudlin of the Well’s avant-garde nature also kept them from being more widely known. They disbanded in 2001, some members of the group going on to form Kayo Dot, a well known avant garde metal band. Yet over the years, through music message boards, forums, and blogs, maudlin of the Well slowly began to pick up a devoted following. In a MySpace blog post in 2008, maudlin of the Well front man Toby Driver mentioned he wanted to record some older songs that were never recorded, but was restricted by financial issues. Response and enthusiasm from fans was massive and a fan donated enough money to record a new album On May 2009 is online and free to download from the internet (there is a donate choice, like in rainbows style).
Progressive metal with female vocals. A modern heavy metal, a great performance and a really interesting music. I was stacked with Madder Mortem back on 2001 when they release ‘All flesh is grass’, a huge album, a masterpiece for the genre, a really aggressive release, a hard and rough metal. I met them back then with that album and I realize that their music is unique and quite complicated or maybe sophisticated. The band from Oslo can approach music and sounds like Tool and Ayreon produce and at the same time can instruct bands like Lacuna Coil, Epica and After Forever. I‘ll dare to compare them with Opeth, I think they are quite similar to them, despite the female vocals. The cover of the album is excellent, and you can find it as a poster in the digipack edition of the album. Extreme music, fantastic guitars, modern and meta-metal inspiration, inspired lyrics, hard sounds, and classic string routes. It is progressive metal, it is not easy to understand it, it is complicated and quite flush. They change the rythms every 1-2 minutes and they produce the most colorfulness metal of the last days. Different kind of moods and atmospheres and a great distorted tone around. “See, it flows so easily, a ruthless piece of art”
Πρόκειται για μια από τις καλύτερες κυκλοφορίες της χρονιάς. Οι ιρλανδοί post-blackαδες εδώ ζωγράφισαν. Η μελαγχολική διάθεση της μουσικής τους είναι εμφανής και διαχυτη σε ολο το δισκο. Black metal εναλλασσόμενο τέλεια με ambient, post, και doom μελωδίες, καθωτι ο drummer χρησιμοποιει synths αλλα και διαφορα samples. Οι συνθέσεις είναι καθηλωτικές και σε ταξιδεύουν. Στα φωνητικά κυριαρχούν τα black-death. Δε λείπουν βέβαια τα σημεία που αλλοτε θα σε κάνουν να χτυπιέσαι και άλλοτε να τρομάζεις μέσα από αργόσυρτες και σκοτεινες doom εκτελέσεις.
Antique Brothers are Connecticut-bred brothers Cy and Ged Gengras who instead of the ordinary sibling squabbling have focused on producing music.
The first one (Camouflage) is a limited edition album of 800 copies released in 2009 but recorded live on September
The second one (Somei) was produced by a Greek label and is not as difficult to find as the first one. This is a heavier noise record with faster songs and so fucking good percussions. Here, the sound is more interesting and I think it’s easier to listen to it than
The Greek Atmospheric Death Machine is Back after Several Years of Silence with a New Killer Production! Great songs, great atmosphere, really heavy music. Among the best Death albums of this year. 10 January live in Athens, Gagarin205. 
Conifer combine a space rock music background with metal, hardcore and modern alternative music. They are heavy and really hard. This album is really interesting and is a post rock wannabe with a heavy metal smell. Their sound is coming from the early 70s and ends up 2 or 3 years later from now. They remind me the Grails. 
The band comes from France, I hope they will be like Overmars. French metal scene is really big and proud. Caldera points out an excellent profile and offers us interesting works. They are a metal band, as simple as this. This album is similar with doom metal releases, or sludge instrumental works, but I can’t define it. It is heavy, it is metal, it is well produced and well played. 
Again this mystical metal sense. Jarboe tries to impress with her voice. The album definitely has a good mix of styles on it – random bits of metal, droning, avant-garde, noise, melody, experimental, rock and electronica stuff. A great job, a soundtrack of voices and modern sounds.
As I said (in Greek) for the previous release “unconquered” , Eric, research the interminable spectrum of ambient sounds and repeated drone guitars. He tries to search the use of guitar as unique generator of tone. Using real-time looper he manufactures soundscapes and basic musical structures. If you like Unconquered you ll love this one. Hurry up this is the best ambient album of the year…
