Private Music in the Drunken Dragon

Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:26):
Hello everybody, and welcome to That's Not Metal, and welcome
to the big reviews Bag. For the end of the summer,
it has been maybe you know, not as dry as
summer maybe often have. There have been some pretty notable
releases that have come out over the last month or two,
and today we have a really strong selection of them.

(00:46):
We have. I feel like this is a really classic
kind of TNM balance and mix right Like, no matter
what sort of corner you would expect us or hope
us to be covering, we have got some servings from
every one of those corners, from them from the giants
down to the underground, from the highly highly credible to
the highly highly silly. We are gonna fix you up

(01:09):
with all of that this month. So let me tell
you what we are going to be talking about up
today in the reviews Gauntlet for August. We are of
course going to be talking about the new album from
Death Tones, the new album from Dinosaur Pile Up. The
world is a beautiful place and I'm no longer afraid
to die Fire Shwonds, Pool, kids, Malthusian and faced out.
What a tantalizing selection we have in front of us there.

(01:30):
My name is Perry and Haish joining me on that
Gauntlets of Terror, Sam Dignon and Elliott Paisley. Hello, how
are we doing this week?

Speaker 2 (01:39):
Yeah?

Speaker 3 (01:39):
Certainly some more terrifying than others on the reviews batch
this week.

Speaker 2 (01:44):
But I'm good.

Speaker 3 (01:44):
You know, I've had to listen to an album that's
made me feel less good. But you know we're here,
we're doing this.

Speaker 4 (01:51):
I mean, one of my favorite bands ever is in
this reviews batch and it's it's not even close to
the review I most looking forward to, massively overshadowed.

Speaker 1 (02:02):
Yeah, there is some exciting stuff and as I say,
I know again maybe some more unknown bands there. Again,
as we go in to the sort of latter end
of it, keep your ears peeled because, like I said, Matt,
with sort of corner you're coming from, hopefully we are
gonna have something here appealing to you. So we're gonna
get to that in a little bit. First, let's talk
about news, and we start off news this week with

(02:23):
two helpings of lineup and band drama. And what two
worlds love drama the most? Of course, it's black metal
and hardcore, so let's dip in the drama pools of
those two genres. This week, let's start with the bigger
of the two bands, which bizarrely this time is the
black metal band. But Cradle of Filth right now are

(02:45):
getting all sorts of headlines for it's fair to say
the wrong reasons. Cradle of Filth are currently, you know,
right now as we are doing this, in the middle
of a South American tour and they seem to just
be falling apart over there. I get to get the
full timeline of this. About a year or two ago,

(03:05):
their their keyboardist who they've had for a couple of
years now, Zoe. She married the guitarist Ashot, who has
been in the band for about ten years now. We's
fast forward to this week. First, Zoe very suddenly dropped
off the Cradle tour and immediately, you know, severed ties
with the band. When you're in the middle of South America.

(03:27):
That seems like a quite a surprising thing to do
just at any given moment. Then a couple of days later,
her husband, Ashock, again longtime guitarist in Kradler Filth, he
made his own statement basically collectively with with her, putting
out the their complaint essentially with Cradler Filth management and

(03:49):
they're you know, basically what they'd been paid to be
in Kradler Filth for however many years they've been doing
and to you know, offer their services. Ashock statement, He
said that he would be leaving the band and at
the end of the tour. He intended on finishing the tour,
but for these reasons, all these financial and business reasons
where he wants to you know, go and start a
family basically with with his wife. He would be finishing

(04:12):
the tour and then dropping off at the end of it.
Cradler Filth then immediately, like an hour later, made their
own statement saying, no, you're not finishing the tour, You're
fucking out. We are firing you immediately, and they have
gone on to do the show they were going to
do that night, as you know, a five piece band
with with one guitarist, and this is just continuing to

(04:33):
kind of roll out from here. There are all sorts
of screenshots flying around of you know, Cradler Filth management
and all the things that interesting detail that whatever might
be aware of his Cradler Filth's longtime manager is Dez
Fafara from Devil Driver and Coal Chamber, so he's mixed
up in this. There are contracts flying around that you know,
people in the band are saying should not have been

(04:54):
posted out there, all of this kind of stuff, and
I'm going to do a rare thing, which is speak
ill of Cradle of Filth. I'm literally wearing the Vessel
Masturbation shirt right now because I did not leave the
house today. But this just seems like a fucking rigmarole shambas,
doesn't it. It's just very sad.

Speaker 4 (05:12):
Yeah, it's weird because Cradle Filth I've had so many
lineup changes over the years, and if there's been drama,
we've not really been all that privy to it. There
might have been a couple where something spilled out, but
this feels like something my time of following the band
the first time where not a major lineup shift has happened.
That's happened a couple of times, but where we've been
privy to why and all the reasons for him, what's

(05:35):
been going on in the background. It's a little weird
to basically come out publicly in the middle of the
tour and go I'm not being paid enough. I think
some of the other stuff this band are doing are
It's just something like foolish circus antics like this whole
like collaboration with EDG. Shearing and stuff.

Speaker 1 (05:50):
Yeah, he does mention the ed Shearing collab, which apparently,
I mean we've been hearing about for years now. Apparently
that was kind of initially meant to come out and
then got pushed back and pushed back, and he's sort
of trying to wash his hands whole thing. And if
he's got I don't know if he wrote half of
that song, I don't know. You know, who knows it
will evers either like a day now.

Speaker 2 (06:06):
It's a weird.

Speaker 4 (06:07):
I don't know if it's kind of just a practical
thing of it's a weird thing to come out and
say all that stuff and then go. But I am
going to finish the tour. It's like, I don't know
if you get to have someone Chris Fenn was suing Slip.
I was like, we can't be in slipknot if you're
suing Slip.

Speaker 1 (06:21):
Yeah.

Speaker 4 (06:21):
I agree.

Speaker 1 (06:22):
I'm not at all surprised that, you know, Danny and
credit Forth manager what ever. Immediately follow that, we're like, no,
fuck you, you're out right now, like you you can't
do that. I'm not surprised to buy that. But the
initial complaints again, you know, this is all you know,
they're kind of alleged side of the story. They have
again posted stuff and screenshots and contracts and all sorts
out there. I am, I'm very sympathetic to this idea,

(06:46):
and I know that you said, you know, there's been
lots of creative lineup changes, but we haven't necessarily seen
the drama. I'm not surprised that eventually someone would come
out with some sort of you know, some sort of
you know, supposed evidence like this, because when you have
a high turnover of members, when we all know Kradle
of Felth, Danny is the kind of the you know,
the long time like owner of the name, and then

(07:08):
there is this kind of revolving over the years, you know,
group of people around him who kind of helped make
it what it is, but they're not you know, on
the kind of the the same pedestal that that Danny is.
I'm not surprised to see something like this come out,
which is a shame because Korelavov are one of my
favorite bands ever and I I think back to the

(07:28):
Hammer of the Witch's lineup that they brought together ten
years ago, right, which is when Ashok entered the band,
But that was when they had you know, the other guitarist,
Richard who left the band a couple of years ago
maybe you know, who knows what his reasons were. But
they had like Lindsay Schoolcraft on keyboard and stuff. And
it's I felt like that line up there was almost
to me like a classic Cradle lineup in terms of

(07:50):
my time be follow in the band. And it's like
such a great group of people they had at that
point in time, and it's a shame that so many
of them have fallen away, perhaps because of you know,
business bollocks like this, you know, because they had a
fucking good group there who had you know, a creative
chemistry and an on stage chemistry and all of this stuff.

(08:10):
And you know, Cradle creatively has still been going strong,
but it is it's just a real shame again that
kind of third or fourth or whatever, like you know,
potential classic lineup that they had at that point in
time has fallen, you know, down to to stuff like this.
So you know, I don't want to wade into too
like heavily or start pointing thingers too heavily on the

(08:32):
business stuff, but I am I'm sympathetic certainly to this
and it is very sad, but I do expect we
will have, you know, a new look Cradle lineup coming
in you know. However, long the near feature, let's flip
to the hardcore drama, which is maybe less mundane and
a bit more than this, which you know, I guess
goes with with recent hardcore drama in kind of keeping

(08:53):
with that Jesus piece who I guess you know, have
not done anything in a little while. They have been
out touring. The last album was what twenty two or
twenty three, you know, so it felt like, you know,
they were recent enough that we all know them, but
maybe off cycle is how we could have looked at
them as being turns out all of the members of

(09:15):
the band have come out and said that the band
has been dead in their words, for a while.

Speaker 3 (09:22):
So this is where that the misinformation, This is where
that the whole thing has been a bit conflicted, because
when they talk about like because yes, so they've said
one member quit abruptly for.

Speaker 2 (09:32):
Personal reasons, and a lot of people.

Speaker 3 (09:35):
Took that as Aaron heard Apparently it's not the member
that quit, wasn't Aaron, this is this is where this
one's got like complain did.

Speaker 2 (09:43):
I did some digging into this because.

Speaker 3 (09:44):
I was trying to work out what the hell was
gone on because the last producedments were active was the
end of last year supporting Sepulturla, so like that they've
kind of been So it's been twenty it's been this
year they've been inactive.

Speaker 2 (09:57):
And what happened as of yesterday is three.

Speaker 3 (10:00):
Of the members of the band have basically said one
member quit and we didn't want to continue.

Speaker 2 (10:06):
The band without them.

Speaker 3 (10:08):
And so from what I've garret, it's like, from what
I've seen people say, the basically decision was made that
they're like, let's just call time on Jesus Peace, that
good one. And now it seems like Aaron Herd vocalist
wasn't down to sort of right, so he's now done
the thing of continuing Jesus Piece under the name Jesus

(10:28):
Piece but with a dollar sign yes.

Speaker 1 (10:31):
Which is so you are in like that is the
most self implicating invitation of mockery of a like new
alternate band name I could imagine, right when you're taking
your new look band out on the road and the
only thing you've done is put a dollar sign in
its inviting it.

Speaker 4 (10:49):
It's the like this user name is taken response, I
just turn this into.

Speaker 1 (10:54):
A dollar sign. That's fine. Yeah, but yeah, just to
to finish off that that story, this means that there
is on various festival bills coming up, there is a
band called Jesus Peace with a dollar sign through which
is Aaron Heard, the vocalist of Jesus Peace and other people,
while the rest of the band, members of you know,
O G. Jesus Peace, are saying that Jesus Peace has
broken up, done and hardcore's got a history of this,

(11:17):
doesn't it. Fucking you know, they're they're romags. Look there
their generations chromags now, aren't they. But let's let that
sort itself out. If this is actually calling time for
you know, the official incarnation of Jesus Peace, that's another
moment of you know, sadness, isn't it. Because when I
think about, actually, you know, of the last ten years
of hardcore, what are the bands who I would say

(11:40):
are somewhat seminal for that scene, you know, and like
we're really at the forefront of it. Jesus Peace would
be if I were to list ten bands. I think
Jesus Peace will be on that list. They were really
really a kind of cornerstone for those ten years.

Speaker 2 (11:55):
Yeah, Like I mean we saw them at that outbreak
twenty twenty.

Speaker 1 (12:01):
Yeah, I think a couple of outbreaks, but the last
one was so brutal.

Speaker 3 (12:05):
That one where that was that Saturday where they were
part of that just like biblical run of bands, and
that like set was just like punishing, and like there's
like this is hardcore set from I feel like twenty nineteen,
which is one of those that like went viral into
hardcore circles. Like they were really a kind of like
beloved and like just highly regarded band in terms of
just being the sort of like punishing sort of like

(12:27):
crushing one. So I'm good about this, and again, like
I'm sympathetic to all parties who like if they if
they again feel that like it was something to call it,
and now that their legs has been carried on about them,
it's this is like is messing with that one? But
like I am just bummed out that like that unit
of Jesus piece that seemed to be creating like really cool,
interesting and just like brutally heavy hardcore is done.

Speaker 1 (12:49):
Yeah, can I just think thata to you know, from
a pressor in the early days, which again, when I
think of those sort of seminal hardcore tunes of that era,
that's one of them, and how people would respond to
it all the way through to that last album we
last reviewed, and again that was just fucking killer and
just like you know, massive iron, fucking bag of riffs
as well. Yeah, a real shame if they're gone there.

Speaker 4 (13:12):
Yeah, I feel I feel that the story, you know,
the story that's because it is so juicy, has to
me overshadowed it when the when the when the news
broke that this had happened, I kind of didn't digest
that Jesus Peace were no longer a band for like,
you know, half a day afterwards, and it was only
so much lace. I thought, like, fuck, like one of
the most they say, seminal, if not pivotal, then like

(13:32):
definitive bands of their generation has disappeared, and even that's
kind of been taken from them, even though they were
they went out quietly. Like the story that defines them
disappearing now is kind of a punchline.

Speaker 1 (13:45):
Yeah, well happened to Chromags And I guess every generation
has their chromag So yeah, shame about Jesus Peace. We'll
see what happens with Jesus Dollar piece. Better news people's lice, sir.
They've been I think, you know, ramping up and teas
and stuff for a while now, but they've announced that
their third album, flesh Work, is gonna be out on
November the seventh, So that's an exciting album to look

(14:07):
forward to towards the sort of latter end of the year.
Bruce Dickinson, at one of his solo shows recently dusted
off and played for the first time ever across you
know solo and I Am Made and the first time
this song has been played Flash of the Blade from
Power Slave, and I can't believe that that's the first
time that song has been played. That's a in my mind,
that's a classic Monkey's poor strikes again. Someone wasn't clear enough.

Speaker 4 (14:33):
I agree. I thought like this to me is one
of the things that we think surely in the eighties,
surely like the tour of the album, because like, outside
of the four big tunes on that record, this is
surely like number five of that rule and some of
the smaller ones.

Speaker 1 (14:48):
Have been played. If this headline was the Duellists or
back in the Village. Which are the other songs on
Power Slave that are at the sort of bottom end.
I wouldn't be now surprised, but flash that maybe Becauld
have been Sevenfold covered it, you know, but I'm like,
that's a that's a heavy here, what's that doing? Not
being played for forty one years? But there you go,
not even by actually Iron made them, but it has
been played some live announcements, quite a few actually here

(15:11):
in the UK. While She Sleeps have announced a twentieth
anniversary hometown show in their hometown, shockingly of Doncaster on
December the eleventh, with support from Guilt Trip, Unpeople and Oversize.
My shocking takeaway from this is I did not know
that While She Sleeps were formed as far back as

(15:32):
it could be twenty years, right, because you know their
first releases are like twenty you know, eleven, twenty ten
or whatever. But the idea of that been twenty years
of While She Sleeps is fucking bizarre.

Speaker 3 (15:41):
I think this obviously accounts for probably their years as
like a local like band.

Speaker 2 (15:46):
While She Sleeps. Yeah, I know, you know, kids playing
like metal in like little like rooms.

Speaker 3 (15:52):
In Doncaster, But yeah, I was like, fucking know, yeah,
that is phrase what I wonder what sort of like
they're gonna treat this as as something of like a
career spanning set and bringing back some old tunes that
would be nice. But yeah, twenty years while steep that
that feels weird considering like again they're breakful with you know,
like twenty eleven, twenty twelve.

Speaker 1 (16:12):
Yeah, I can imagine they'm waiting a few years and
doing a twentieth anniversary you know, nor stands for nothing
or even this is the six or something, But yeah,
twenty years from here does feel like fucking hell, you're
you're jumping ahead here right. Loathe have also announced a
UK headline tour, their first full UK headline in four years.
It's twenty twenty one. They're a UK band and amazingly

(16:36):
they're still on the same album.

Speaker 4 (16:40):
I have not seen Loath, but this doesn't seem possible
by the amount of people talk about seeing them.

Speaker 1 (16:45):
They play every fucking festival, is what's happened, But it's
it's and I guess they've done, you know, a one
off show here or there or something, but I can't
believe that again, four years in the headline tour of
the country and it's they haven't actually released an album
in between those what's going on with lose Man?

Speaker 3 (17:05):
I mean, we just we can assume there must be
an album coming because like they've got the new song.

Speaker 2 (17:09):
But yeah, this is just they seem to operate really
weirdly right now.

Speaker 4 (17:14):
Even that album isn't not to dismiss ambient music as
a whole, but like even that twenty twenty one album
is kind of treated as a bit of a half album,
so it's longer than that.

Speaker 1 (17:28):
Yeah, the Callous Darboys are also doing a full UK
and headline tour, which you know, off the back of
their very well liked album that's come out this year.
Support comes from Knives and in the UK only a
band called Love Rarely. Elliott you had a very very
good zinger about how there are a couple of dates
that say no knives and it's nice to see that

(17:49):
they're they're tackling violent crime. But I know a lot
of people are really into that newclus Baboys record, so
exciting to get them having a full UK tour. Let's
move on to Damnation for of all, who finished off
their twentieth anniversary lineup this week with final editions. Obviously,
by the nature of it being a full on, double
day event, it's the biggest looking the motor amount of

(18:11):
bookings a Damnation has ever had to have. But polishing
it off in the last week or so they have
announced Prime or Deal Devil sold Is Soul doing a
set of the first album and EP and also Psychonaut, Devastator,
zer Rule and Din of Celestial Bird, so a little
bit of post rock and stuff and Shoe Gays added

(18:32):
on as well there as well as a bit of
thrash from Devastator. So let's look at that overall lineup.
You know, I'm in terms of new excitements, I'm announcements,
I'm excited about Primordial, I'm be sat by Devils sold
of Soul, continually good stuff. When I look at this
full lineup now, like I said, I know it is
because it's two days and they've got more kind of
room to play with and more to fit on a poster.

(18:52):
But you have got to go fair play. That is
probably one of the best certainly, you know extreme line
up ups assembled in the UK. Maybe Ever, like if
you like your extreme metal, which you know I do,
it's an outrageous bounty top to bottom on that bill,
from the you know, the very top band on the bill,

(19:13):
right down to the lowest small logos.

Speaker 4 (19:16):
Yeah, looking at this, it's it gives me the same
feeling I used to get looking at roadburn bills, like
ten years ago. We're just like, oh, one day, one day,
I want to make my way over there. Because twenty
twenty two was that the years all the album sets
was like Converge, pig destroyer, Yeah, gone flesh out the gates.
That to me was like it seems to be like
almost common consensums, Like that's like the high watermark, like

(19:39):
it was. My friends, We've tried to discuss as over
and over and like, could you pick another four albums
to do that would be better than that? We were
yet to come up with one, and I kind of thought, well,
they're not going to top that. But to be honest,
even with the day splits, you look at the two
days and both days are nearly as good as that
because the stuff that's spread across them, there's so much

(20:00):
of it that on each day it's still a full day.
Like it's not like seventy percent more bands spread over
two hundred percent of the day. It's you're getting arguably
more bang for your buck this time.

Speaker 1 (20:13):
Yeah, I mean I think whichever day is that where
it's like an Alna Thrack and Primal Audio and Pick
Destroyer and stuff all playing on the same day is
fucking crazy. But yeah, spectacular lineup, fair play. I am
so scared of the clashes.

Speaker 4 (20:26):
I am so scared.

Speaker 1 (20:28):
I'm actually I'm quite happy that even though obviously is
a great lineup, a lot of it is bands I've
seen before, and there's only a couple of bands where
I'm like, I have to see that because I don't
know if I'll see it again, because that will will
cushion me a little bit from the inevitable, very bad
clashes that come. But it's an amazing lineup. Fortress Festival
also the great Black mil festival that happens in Scarborough.

(20:48):
They've added a couple more announcements onto their bill as well.
Aca Coca are going to be doing their corns on
show again that we saw actually at Damination a couple
of years ago. They're bringing that to Fortress and also
they've announced that one of their second star headliners is
the Norwegian band Fordham Rife, who have a very intense
name and are also a pretty solid black metal band,
so cool good stuff. They're right. Before we get into

(21:11):
the meal of today's episode, which is the reviews that
we were talking about earlier, we should do another little
shout out for what we most recently uploaded to the
that's Patreon, for all of the patrons out there who
helped keep this podcast alive all of these years in
and we've spoken about it before, but the trial episode

(21:33):
we did, which was sort of the riff on the
battle specials of sorts of hair metal versus new metal
versus metal core, has I think in the last kind
of week or two gone down amongst yee listeners out
there as a bit of a highlight for us in
terms of just the most fun things. And you know,
it inspired a lot of debates. The rules and stuff

(21:55):
we put in place to try and make things more
interesting did their job of making things more interesting. I
am so glad that some of the matchups that would
not have normally happened came out of that. But people
are really into it. Elliott spoke to Samblet about it
last week. Elliott, now that you're reflecting on that thing,
which I should say for the record, a lot of

(22:15):
this was Elliott's brainchild. You kind of pushed for us
to far astiicular idea, and I think you were like,
maybe i've everyone. I felt like you were prepping the
being like I have to fucking win this. No spoilers
about the outcome for anyone who you know has not
listened yet. But was it what you were kind of

(22:36):
envisioning when we will be using it together? Did you
have as much fun with.

Speaker 3 (22:39):
It in the end?

Speaker 2 (22:41):
It was?

Speaker 4 (22:41):
It was genuinely It was genuinely better because there were
rules that I hadn't foreseen, that I would not have
come up with myself that made it so much more fun.
Brilliant pulls that Samon Marke did with again, things that
I wouldn't have chosen. And then that was most of
the fun of it was because I pretty quickly, like
you said, I was preparing week and weeks in advance,

(23:02):
listening to all the classics and got like, what am
I going to pick for each spot, but not knowing
what you're gonna have to argue against and what you're
gonna have to talk down and the hot takes that
I kind of have to that you don't. You can't
believe you're saying it as you're saying it, and then
you don't even get points for it when it doesn't line.
Just God, I've just said something terrible about one of
my heroes for nothing. It was it was so much fun.

(23:27):
Like it's it's been so nice seeing all the you know,
warm reception. It's got people enjoying it, and I haven't
been able to think of anything but like, I would
love to do that format again. If you can find
anything equally stupid, I think that would.

Speaker 1 (23:42):
Be nice if we come up with the perfect one. Yeah,
but the one that is there right now is an
absolute hoot. And as I guess, we'll be tipping over
into September soon, we're gonna start putting together what the
next special and you know, next episodes we're gonna put
out over there will be as well, So to get
involved and hear all of that juicy, juicy stuff. We
patron dot com slash That's not mel is where you

(24:03):
will find the TNM, Patreon and all of those that
we have made over all of these years. So cheers
to everybody who checks that out. Reviews for today start
with We've got a lot of good bands in this episode,
but there is one megaband versus a lot of bands
who do not necessarily have the cultural spread to the

(24:25):
same degree as the band with that. We're obviously going
to start this conversation off with Deaftnes released private music
about a week ago, and we have been digesting it,
and now we're gonna talk about it. I have been
doing this podcast long enough where I have reviewed multiple
Deaftones albums on it now. In twenty twenty, obviously a
year that was fraught with much in the way of

(24:46):
cancellations and delays and all sorts due to the COVID pandemic,
Deaftones Ohms felt pretty firmly like the big album that
year from one of these giant bands from the world
of heavy Like the previous year had Slipknot and Tool
and Ramstein and Corn and all this stuff, but twenty
twenty they weren't as many of those. Ohmes really felt

(25:07):
like the big band record that people were talking about
that year. I lead with that to of course say
that five years later that somehow seems like a small
period for them by comparison, because in the years since Ohmes,
Deaftones have bloomed into a late riser kind of band
in terms of popularity and cultural ubiquity without even really

(25:29):
having to do anything for it. You know, you know
all this, We've said it many times. There was a
headline in MetalHammer the other day of them telling China
Marina what badicore is so he can laugh at it
and shrug his shoulders at another genre attack that they
have to escape and wriggle out of. There are more
eyes on this Deaftones album than any of those in
probably at least fifteen years, because of how they have

(25:50):
been kind of adopted by generations below them, basically as
the sort of inescapable specter of like the band to be.
That's the narrative going into this at I will also
point out, though, that it comes thirty years after their
debut album was released in two years around the thur
is going to be thirty. I'm sorry people from the nineties.

(26:10):
Be Quiet and Drive and My Own Summer those are
near enough thirty year old songs, and those are the
two sort of polls of discussing this album private music,
I think because Deaftones are both at historic high, enjoying
unprecedented cultural cachet, and yet also a band who have
already had such a long career and released so many albums.

(26:32):
That mean they have already explored so much. You wonder
what more they could actually do and where else they
could explore to capitalize on any of this, you know,
do Deaftones have the capacity to defy expectations in twenty
twenty five And as if just to compound that with
a nice neat little stamp, this is a number ten
from them. We're all Deaftones fans, but something I have

(26:54):
learned is there're no actual real agreement on them and
their catalog. They have more U universally acclaimed records than others,
they have more divisive albums, but no one is actually
going to see one hundred percent eye to eye on
which records they love most and which they loved less.
This album coming out right at this moment for them,
when I guess everyone is so primed to immediately get

(27:16):
in on the deaftone conversation has kind of illustrated that
point for me.

Speaker 4 (27:20):
Yeah, because it's strange because, like you're saying, early a
death Zones. You know, obviously in a way they have
done so much to earn the success that having your
thirty years of plugging away being one of the best
bands in the world that reaping its rewards. That is
effort that they've put into it. But in the last
five years, nothing really about them has changed other than

(27:41):
we see less of Steph Carpenter now. But it's not
like they've made a shift and now they're so much
more popular. It's just like it just seems to be
this almost like the stars have aligned and now they're
super famous. There's more eyes on them, and obviously, inevitably,
whenever they release a record, like most big bands, there's
a rush of people saying, now it's the best thing
they've done in twenty years, it's one of their best

(28:03):
alms ever, and also detractions immediately, kind of in the
immediate aftermath. And it feels like because they're so much
more popular and so much more famous and widely listen to,
that should somehow affect how good the record is. The
record should be substantially bigger, substantially better.

Speaker 1 (28:24):
To match it.

Speaker 4 (28:26):
Without going too far into like what I think of
this record compares to their other records, because I've only
been listening to it for four days, so I'm not
gonna be able to make any you know, hard and
fast claims. The idea that this is somehow like massively
worse or massively better than what we should expect from
the Death Tones seems kind of nuts to me.

Speaker 1 (28:46):
Yeah, I would echo what you just said, where they
themselves have not changed, right, And if you're going to go, oh,
how are you going to capitalize on being such a
kind of you know, culturally popular ubiquitous band right now?
They haven't on. Oh, let's do loads of its that
sound like bad Omens and sleep Token, right, which would
be a terrible thing to do. And we should all
be happy that they are just continuely gone, just being deaftones,

(29:09):
right as I've observed the reaction to this album in
the last week or so, which you know, as we're saying,
I think this is the album from a more veteran
band this year that joins the likes of the Turnstiles
or Ghosts in there being like this many ears and
eyes on it, lots of opinions going around out there.
We saw the reviews that, like you're kind of saying,
that came in and straight away hard proclaiming it to

(29:30):
be like this is their late career masterpiece that I
think it would almost it would conveniently fit right now
for it to be there, like correct master Peace. You
know what I'm saying. Then there's been the ones that
you know. I think most people, even again reviews, praise
the record, but in maybe more measured ways. I don't
think anyone shitting on it. We can dispel that, and
that's nice. We all know that this is good. It's

(29:52):
just a matter of how good. You know, Ohms, I
thought was a really great album whilst being maybe like
top of the lower third of their discography, just because
it wasn't bothering their like elite top five. I think
most people would probably agree roughly with that. I think
that album is very well liked and well loved without
coming necessarily on top. For too many people, this one,

(30:12):
for whatever reason, maybe it is again just kind of
their their standing right now, has inspired that larger reaction,
and I have my feelings as to why. I guess
that might be. Let's just establish that up top. I
can't imagine any of us are going to say we
don't like this album, but where do we all sit
with it in terms of what level of great Deaftones album?

Speaker 2 (30:32):
I mean, for me, I've had it for less than
a week.

Speaker 3 (30:36):
Death Zones albums aren't ams and you can immediately kind
of listen to once and kind of go, I get
everything of this album does like it's it's that I've
listened to it once and I can already tell you
it's their late career masterpiece or oh no, it's the
worst thing they've done ever.

Speaker 2 (30:50):
Form me are going to take a wilder sort of process.

Speaker 3 (30:53):
My immediate takeaway from this album is it does feel
like what they've done in their new fan position is
kind of go, well, let's be the most Deaftnes. Let's
do one of those albums that kind of like touches
on every sort of a we've been across over like
the previous thirty years and kind of like tie all
together in.

Speaker 2 (31:10):
This really like cohesive, immersive package. And for me like that.
So I'm kind of like, yeah, this is just give
me lots of Deaftnes things. I like.

Speaker 3 (31:19):
I don't see how like this has anything that kind
of makes it the late career classical or a step down.

Speaker 2 (31:25):
It's just kind of a.

Speaker 3 (31:26):
Serving of forty two minutes of all the things I
want from Deaftones and a nice kind of concise package.

Speaker 4 (31:34):
Yeah, I can't rush to say exactly what to think
about this record yet, because when Gore came out, I
loved it. I still do, like, I still think that
record's fucking great, but a couple years later, maybe that
dropped slightly. Omes When that came out, I really liked it,
but it was only sort of a year later I
really really fell in love with that record. So I

(31:56):
to be honest, we could be doing this in two
months time and it might still feel too early. I'n't
even listened to it for four or five days. Well,
I will say, is I kind of I do agree
with what Sam's saying in a sense of that thing
of just going, well, we're the Death Tones, this is
the DEATHTNES package. And I think I think my initial
listening experience to this record compared to those last two,

(32:17):
is better. And I think that's partly why it's it's got.
I can't I can never say his last name, Nick
Rascular Knits, rasculine.

Speaker 1 (32:26):
Yeah, yeah, you'll know the guy. He everyone, Yeah, but
like he.

Speaker 4 (32:29):
Did Diamond Eyes and Cornercan and Cornercan maybe my hot Seat. Hey,
take of the Show is my least favorite Death Tones record,
But naughty, Naughty, those records are like death Tones in
the Pocket absolutely nailing it, and after Gore, which was
kind of death Tones and Turmoil and Ohms where they

(32:51):
are working with every day.

Speaker 1 (32:52):
And it sounds great.

Speaker 4 (32:53):
It's a it's a noisier, more cerviic record. Shein has
doing some really weird stuff on it. This feels like
a more comfortable record for death Tones, which because I
love the death Tones, means I think this thing's fucking great.
Where ranks in the catalog, I don't know, but my
initial feeling is that this is a very a sort
of typically strong death Tones album.

Speaker 1 (33:15):
Yeah. I think this album is really very good, excellent even,
you know, excellency being a term I think I would
bestow upon certainly, at least in parts to every single
Deathtones album in terms of the you know, the ten
out of ten reviews and then the sevens or the eights,
I would say I sit close to the latter. On
release day, which again is always hard because you've got

(33:36):
everyone around you, you know, either on one listen or
the writers who have had the record for longer than
you shouting at you that is the instant masterpiece, and
you're not feeling that, you know, I was kind of underwhelmed. Thankfully,
you know, as measured people, and we know this to
be the case. I really enjoyed the week of letting
it flourish, having its best songs leap around my head.
But I've also have been trying to think, while I've

(33:57):
been really enjoying it, what is it about this that's
making you feel it's a merely very good deaf Tones
record rather than what other people seem to be hearing of.
It's the best since Diamond Dies, or the best since
White Pony or whatever people want to kind of throw
out there. I think I don't even want to call
it a problem, because it's not that so much as
it is maybe a herdle I've just had to hop

(34:17):
over is to be very reductive. I haven't been wholly
sure what type of Deaftnes record this is beyond just
the deaf Tones record, right, like, for all that is
made of that kind of you know, them swirling around
these different areas. If I say to you Gore or
Coiner Yokan or Saturday Night Wrist or Ohms whatever, you know,

(34:38):
the sort of personality, and like even if it's just
a color or something that comes into your head, you
know that record has a specific sort of feel. I've
been struggling a little bit to pinpoint that with this record,
as kind of immediately it sounds like the most sort
of general, you know, not too descript version of what
sounding like Deaftnes sounds like. And that sounds really harsh

(34:59):
when I word it like that, but I'm just trying
to explain again what I'm kind of what I've been
feeling with it. And you know, Elliott, you and I
have had about two or three times this year the
conversation disagreeing on Deafthtones album where you have just said
your horrible corneiocain take. Because I think that Corniocun is
a top two Deaftnes album, easily a contender for their best.

(35:20):
I like it more than White Pony. The idea of
anyone skipping over that in to proclaim their like best
since Diamond Eyes or best since White Pony proclamation is
like irking to me, because you've got a master piece
right there, and as you said, you think it's one
of their worst, but you've described it as being too
sort of perfect, And this album, I don't think sounds

(35:43):
anything like Corneilloca and it's not as clean as Cornillokaan,
so it's not say, the same thing, but in a
weird sort of way, I think this album is maybe
my equivalent where it all sort of sounds so generally
deaf tones e without carving like as much of a
niche for itself. But I haven't had as strong an
emotional reaction as had who maybe you know, really like
you know, just kind of globed onto that much more quickly.

Speaker 3 (36:05):
I mean we've drawn the exact same conclusion essentially. I
think we've just come at it as like I've been like, oh,
you know, it's just very general death times for me.
I guess where this maybe doesn't stand out as much,
even though I'm just kind of like so into the
whole vibe of the record is individual songs on this
maybe aren't leaping out to me as much as a

(36:25):
couple that do really jump out, and I think are
like some of the best songs they've done since.

Speaker 2 (36:29):
Like yeah, Swerve City on corne Oaken.

Speaker 3 (36:31):
But I do think as a whole, because it's so
again like just kind of all encompassing, there's maybe less
songs that have kind of immediately grabbed my attation like
this is you know, the vibe.

Speaker 2 (36:43):
The sound of this record.

Speaker 3 (36:43):
This is the banger from it, and it's kind of
just like just this really well sequenced, immersive, kind of
like Journey. I go on the album that I like
listening to the whole thing, but I haven't had as
maybe a months ago, like that's a song like there's
maybe only like two or three right now that I'm like,
that's got to go into the set list, as opposed
to you know, when other deftans ams have come out
and I've kind of got like, ah, I hope you know,
all of these songs make it into the live set.

Speaker 2 (37:05):
But I do still just have just such a great
time listening to this.

Speaker 4 (37:09):
Yeah, it's interesting because that thing you're saying about songs
not to say leaping out, I think there's almost two
ways of reading that, where like something like Ohms, like
for a while was like these songs are kind of
angular and strange, and there's a couple, there's a couple
on the record that are really catchy and big, but
the most of that record is is kind of difficult.

(37:29):
But at the end of your first listen, you can
look back and go, well, that's the song with that riff,
that's a song that does that, that's the one that
has this part, that's what you blah blah blahlah blah.
I will concede on this record. First couple of listens,
I wasn't really able to do that. Outside of the
singles that I heard, there are a couple of songs
with certain moments where I'd go, that's the one that's that,
and that's one has that. But it's not really so

(37:50):
much like a song's record, if that makes sense, in
the way like Diamond Eyes, it's like the song power
is just so huge. Yeah, Like, even though the sound
is kind of consistent throughout the whole thing, you can
just go, well, I know of these songs straight away.
This doesn't necessarily have that. But what it does have,
and maybe this is why it kind of inherently appeals
to me in spite of that, is I think there's
a lot of Saturday Night Wrist on this record. And

(38:12):
everyone said that about Gore, but Gores are much like prettier,
more tranquil, chilled out, like genuinely sort of relaxing Cocktau
Twins' jangle pop version of the deathtone sound. Saturday Night
Wrist does have that side to it. But it's kind
of jagged and weird and difficult. This feels like a
more streamlined version of that motif because it's melodically much

(38:37):
more straightforward than what they've been doing recently, but it's
still got that kind of dreamlike element to it.

Speaker 1 (38:44):
Yeah, I think the production, again, considering that you know,
Knicks comeback, who did Diamond Eyes and Corny Ocan, I
think are some of the most just kind of like
pristinely put together in the studio. You know, Defton's records.
This it's interesting that he's come back for this because
it sounds like much kind of fuzzier and more blown

(39:04):
out than either of those records. You know, it feels
like they've fucked with it sonically more sort of deliberately
than not then on those, And I think it's kind
of it's taken me longer to get to grip for
the songs because of that. But this is a lot
of mitigating for an album that I've really been enjoying. Right, So,
so what is great my mind is a mountain the
sub three minute you know, opening track lead single that

(39:26):
as a standalone, I thought, well, that's cool, But I
feel like I've not been like filled up by it.
Yet as an album starter, it's great. You know, it
manages to sort of tow that line between ethereal and
graceful and having that kind of weird, sort almost like
skate rock kind of stabby percussive quality that me and
Sam are discussing on the single and you know, Chino
yelping that negative space is the records like First Real Hook.

Speaker 3 (39:49):
As a sort of an intro to the album, I
think it works so much better than as a standalone
sort of.

Speaker 2 (39:54):
Single, where it kind of it just eases you into
the vibe.

Speaker 3 (39:57):
There's that like say, the hook is almost in the
kind of like the run beat and the riff Tuna
has like the little moments in it, but it just
it sort of pulls you into the bold and it
seems sort of seamlessly leads into lock club and that's
where again, like the album really sort of takes off.
And this I think that the sequencing of the album
it flows really nice, where each song kind of compliments

(40:18):
the song that comes after it.

Speaker 2 (40:20):
And it just creates for a really pleasant eperience.

Speaker 3 (40:22):
But as sort of a first taste, like he might
be a bit of an idiot, but Steph carpenter. You know,
he knows a riff, and he shows that time and
time again on this album, where every time he sort
of drops a riff, it does just punctuate that song
and make it that much more memorable.

Speaker 1 (40:36):
I was, I'll say about this about the riffing because
I was thinking about this as well. I think he
on this mostly stays in the kind of traditional pocket
of a deaf tones riff, right, and there's a there's
a couple that I've noted down of like really noteworthy,
you know, sort of departures from that. But I think
when Omes came out, there was a lot of discussion
that was going on about sort of Steph's like flexibility

(40:57):
in the riffing. And you know, Elie, you're talking about
the kind of the Jagged Nature record, and like there
are parts on that I alway thinking about where he
was doing like almost like thrashy eighties metal riffs, like
but through you know, his kind of death tones, you
know filter. And then you know, you think about the
title track and there's that weird, sort of woozy kind
of you know, stone refeel on that riff. I think
this record he's much more in like normal terrains for

(41:18):
what Deaf Tones is, and he consistently, you know, he
like compliments the songs and they it does well what
it is. But I do think there are less like,
oh my god, what a crazy riff on this.

Speaker 2 (41:29):
I think that's fair.

Speaker 3 (41:30):
But I'm also like, every time those riffs just hit,
they just give me again that that sort of fix
of what I want from from a Death Sens song.

Speaker 2 (41:36):
And I think they just they compliment the songs better way.

Speaker 3 (41:38):
I don't know if some of the more like kind
of weirder experiments on stuff on owns would work in
these songs as much.

Speaker 4 (41:45):
Yeah, And I think, you know, one of the reasons
why people can't agree on what the great death Tones
record like, the truly you know, the massively massively great
death Tones records are part of it is because people,
you know, they look for different things and different records.
It's as in their catalog have different men of the match,
if you know what I mean. So, yeah, like Diamondized, Yeah,
that's just a riff avalanche. So if you if you

(42:07):
like riffs, that's the one or around the fur or something.
The thing with this road is perhaps lesser than any
record previously there isn't a really obvious standout performance from
any of the one players. It's kind of like everyone's
locked in. It's more songs oriented, so like it's not
that a riff stands out, but the kind of the
groove that the band is playing. Whoever's responsible for that,

(42:29):
it's like they kind of share the credit.

Speaker 1 (42:31):
I agree, and I had a similar sort of stream
of thought that I'll maybe I'll come back to a
little bit later. But some bits that did leap out
for me where I went, oh is when you get
to tracks three and four and uh egdsis suddenly you
get that baseline which they have got a new bassist,
Fred Sablin, who you know, because the thing with surgery

(42:53):
didn't pan out. He makes his debut on this record,
and that kind of like bouncing off these almost like
eighties and t sort of goth electronic sounds in the
intro and then a really graindy, sort of palm mute
kind of riff from Steph really striking, mean kind of groove,
but then into Infinite Source, which is easily one of
the two best songs on the album for me, the

(43:14):
other being Milk and the Madonna, which we'll get too later.
Though they get this total like upswell of wind in
their sales, the rift.

Speaker 3 (43:21):
On Infinite Source is like one of the catchiest riffs
of the year for me, that that's the sort of
the thing that holds that song together, because I like,
this is the song that I was like, well, it
became clear to me just the gap between.

Speaker 2 (43:33):
Deftones and bands inspired by Deaftones and.

Speaker 3 (43:37):
Where I'm like, these bands can't be a sonically interesting
in the rhythms and textures they're playing with that then
definitely definitely like they are, so they're so capable of
like doing interesting catchy rifts, and like the drums are,
like the rhybons I play with are just so much
more of like free form and loose. Like I said,

(43:59):
this albums doing of things, but it never feels rigid.
It never feels kind of like stock. Even if we say,
like I say, Steph Garbage is playing the kind of
dees they're still just always feels kind of like a
loose interplay between the bands where they're all.

Speaker 2 (44:11):
Kind of like vibing off each other and just kind
of like common on each other.

Speaker 3 (44:15):
And I think Infinite Source is the one where that
really comes to fruition and I think it's like so impressive.

Speaker 4 (44:21):
Yeah, And I think people like to make a big
point about how there's this dynamic in Death Ternes of
Gino and Steph and they're pulling in opposite directions and
one wants to go even further into the the cocktail
twins my blod Avanti and stuff, and the other one
just wants to sound like Dark Angel. But it's like
that's a part of it. And hearing those two things,
those two extremes, is exciting. But it's when those two
things work together. And that's one thing I think you

(44:43):
get across the record is it doesn't feel like a
particularly tense Death Tones record, and that from what I've
seen and heard about, like the recording of this record,
it's like it came together fairly quickly once they got
the start of it and they were all in the
room together, and they're like kind of hammering these songs
out within a few days, and you can kind of
hear that doesn't sound that they sound kind of effortless,
even though these songs, some of them pull from quite

(45:05):
different places that like Infinite Source, which I agree is
one of the best songs on the record. Some of
the riffs on there, almost like post hardcore. But then
when it takes off and it lifts up into that
sort of skyscraper moment which many of the best Deaths
One songs have, it doesn't feel like a harsh departure.
It feels very natural, like it sounds like everyone in

(45:26):
the band's kind of moving moving as one.

Speaker 1 (45:30):
Yeah, I mean even you know the riff from Steph
on that has this again, it's almost like ninety sort
of skate parks, or it reminds me a little bit
of the stress riff from Turnstile on non stop feeling,
where it has that similar kind of pick you up feel,
that kind of you know, ascending alt rock good time
kind of tone, and in a weird like you know,
like Ohm's Steph Carpenter was chat like, you know, remembering

(45:51):
maybe again some of that thrash stuff that you used
to be into. This is almost like doing a similar thing,
but for a different realm. You know, more of the
olt rock, less of the thrash metal sounds great, and
then you know, hits the you know, the last time
I'm doing in the stage and every time I've been
like almost overthinking this record going, you know, is it
this or is it that that chorus like thaors me out,
you know, like it's it's beautiful. And then just as

(46:12):
I mentioned it, Milk of the Madonna, which is the
second single, wasn't it. I don't think I listened to
it after the first one, but like that's the that's
the banger on it, right, Like that's the one where
I think everyone's gone, that's what should imediately I have.

Speaker 2 (46:23):
That exactly in my nose. Is like this has to
have a permanent like place in the in the live set.

Speaker 4 (46:28):
Milk.

Speaker 3 (46:28):
I think it's placement in the record again for me,
because it comes off the back of like three good songs,
but the am kind.

Speaker 2 (46:34):
Of slows down a little bit in the middle when
you get like Souvenir X and.

Speaker 3 (46:39):
I Think About You All the Time, which is obviously
like that's like an half acoustic ballad.

Speaker 2 (46:43):
Like so it does kind of like settle in.

Speaker 3 (46:45):
And I remember the first when listening, I was kind
of like drifting off a little bit, and the Milk
of the Madonna hits and you get that rift, which
again it is kind of a little bit of like
a typical Deftones swerve City riff. But yeah, like it's
got hooks that I'm on Fire hook has kind of
been the one that's like stuck from on the album.
The riff like could quite literally flatten the earth when

(47:06):
it's like at four pout when it's like hammering you.
I mean, milk with the Dunomy is like just a
perfect death tone song in kind of what I want,
what I want from them in twenty twenty five.

Speaker 4 (47:16):
You've you've touched on it there, but this song sounds
so powerful and I'm not sure what it is about
it that has that quality. It just sounds like a hurricane.
It's not that it's you're super heady, you know, something
like Swerve City is really buoyant and you know it's bouncy,
but that is heavy. That is kind of like a
bludgeoning riff. The riff on this and like the texture

(47:37):
of it isn't particularly aggressive and Sheino's not screaming at
you no, but it just it sounds so forceful. And
that chorus with the Holy Ghost I'm on fire, Holy Spirit,
I'm on fire. That's it feels like a sort of
instant classic death tones moment, the way there's sometimes this

(47:58):
band just put songs out and you go in my
head forever, and you're saying that i'd actually be in
the live set. I actually went to check to see
if they've been playing this. They've been closing the main
set with it, and with a band with that catalog
for this song to be closing your main set and
just to go, oh yeah, yeah, that checks out.

Speaker 1 (48:14):
That makes sense.

Speaker 4 (48:15):
The I love the My Mind as a Mountain as
a single. I think it's one of the most attention grabbing,
attention grabbing, attention grabbing opening tracks they've had, certainly on
the last couple of records. This was when like the
any excimles I had for the record kind of trebled
because it was like, this band has still got it.

Speaker 1 (48:34):
Yeah, I mean it's it's just when Gina hits that
a display and like the second part of that word
feels like it ruptures out of its lips. You know,
it's just phenomenal, great deathtone single. As you're saying, you know,
we jump forward in the record there a little bit.
Souvenir is sort of an interesting track for the opening second.
I always think it's drowned by bringing the horizon, like

(48:54):
it has always the exact same opening chord and then
I go, oh, no, it's Deftones, but that is you know,
sort of sort of more you know, sloba and experimental
kind of song. I think again, Steph stays within the
comfort zone basically on that one, like he's just doing
a couple of sort of notes to carto hammering on them,
you know where he can. But you have the kind

(49:14):
of extra stuff that seeping around from what like Frank's
doing on that, you know, and it turns it into like,
you know what has a kind of bone headed metal riff.
It turns it into a sort of like space rock
song almost, which is a very deaftnes trick, isn't it.
And I guess that's compounded by then when you get
like over in a minute and a half of just
sort of pure synth at the back of it, which
is not new for them. You know, there are bits

(49:36):
on the previous record which you know, they sound different,
but they offer a similar kind of approach, which reminded
me of again what we've maybe said about the Turnstile
record this year, where you have like these like you know,
extended instrumental, dreamy endings of a song to kind of
ride out on that are like maybe a little separate
from what was actually going on before it. But that
sets up you know what I guess is probably meant

(49:56):
to be called sex, which I guess is like the
most sort of tre eased song on the record. Like
Gino was quite upsetting on that song. It was a
really kind of bug eyed sense of escalation on it.

Speaker 4 (50:08):
This is another one of my favorites on the record.
It sounds like the bridge between the Self Titled and
Diamond Eyes, despite sounding nothing like the record that actually
came between them. Yeah, it's so sort of bright and energizing,
and the way that the Self Tized record has this
kind of I don't know, that sort of emo e

(50:31):
quality to it, and then Diamondized just sounds like the
biggest band ever, this kind of marrying those two worlds
and like just injecting a real jolt of energy into
the record. I don't think the record has necessarily been
starved of it, but it does benefit from a song
like this and where it is in the track listing.
Abe Cunningham, like I said, this album doesn't really have
a stand up man of the match, but certainly man

(50:52):
of this song.

Speaker 1 (50:53):
He is.

Speaker 4 (50:55):
He's never less than the absolute man, but hearing Hi
when he's like really putting a sh and on this one,
it's just like the wolf is off the chain.

Speaker 1 (51:04):
He's he's so exciting to listen to. Yeah, I like
when he's like hitting a piece of corrugated iron in
a different room to everyone else on on Metal Dream,
That's good yeah for me. Again, like Gino on that song,
really letting that kind of like wild Man thing come
out an intensity. Yeah, a song that like is maybe
lacking from something the album that just sparks it a bit. Yeah,

(51:27):
cut hands later on almost brings back some of the
rap metal like it's a little bit engine Umber nine
or or back to School or something. Isn't it just
in kind of his his demeanor. Although I do like
that you know, eyelids garting heavy where he kind of
finds this like, you know, very different seductive, dark synth
pop kind of style hook to you know, offset that
crazy Gino or the mic shit that he was doing

(51:47):
for it.

Speaker 3 (51:48):
This could fit like around the fur like it's it's
kind of like a modern take. And again this way
I say, like the album kind of like just touching
on all of the sort of eras of Death Time.
This is the kind of like let's you know, tip
the hat to our kind of new metal roots and
just bring that in just a little bit. I again
love the riff on that song is again it's big
and meaty, and it just kind of fits the kind

(52:09):
of slightly more obnoxious like tone on that song of
the new metal flavor. I mean, that's a cool again.
That of the back of Milk and the Madonna is
like a nice or real like Larry part of the
album for me.

Speaker 2 (52:21):
That that that stands out, especially that riff.

Speaker 4 (52:24):
At the end with the Panic cords. That's that's tasty. Yeah,
I think like Cut Hands into Metal dream Like that
feels like a very deliberate one too. But they've both
got a fairly similar kind of laid back hip hop
groove to it. Cut Hands goes a bit more new
metal and then this goes a bit more shoegaze, and
they're kind of identical lengths. It feels like, you know,
sort of sister songs to me, and I really like

(52:47):
both of them. I think they're both great. But I
was surprised to see where we were in the track
list when I was listening because Death Soon's alms typically
they build to this crescendo over several songs, and once
she gets a track seven out of ten. You know,
it's just kind of kind of ramp up and ramp
up until the big cinematic ending, and it didn't feel
like we were necessarily arriving at that and because that's

(53:09):
sort of typically what I've come to expect, if it
felt slightly odd the first time, but again, I quite
like how that sort of chars with how casual the
record feels like. It doesn't feel sort of like we're
saying at the beginning this It doesn't feel like a
major statement from the band.

Speaker 1 (53:23):
It kind of feels like Deftones.

Speaker 4 (53:26):
In the best way, sort of sitting in their comfort zone,
like exploring the stuff that they've done before.

Speaker 1 (53:31):
Yeah, I mean even the way you know the closer,
the part in the body after that is quite minimalistic
but hypnotic. You know, it has a sort of like
oscillating telephone sort of effect, you know, scratchy weeverby effects
coming from Frank, but a very simple loop of what
Steph is doing. You know, it's not a particularly elaborate
or overegged closer at all. Really threw me for a
loop the very first time on the first listen when

(53:53):
I guess it is Chino. I haven't seen anything to
suggest it isn't Gino, but the very first lines of
the last song he sings in a way that he
never has before, with more of this like baritone, and
I was like, fucking out, they've summoned the ghost of
Mark Lanigan for ten seconds on the record, and then
he just sings like Gino again. It's so weird. But
it really like made me set up and go, who
the fucking if it's a guest feature and a Deaftones record.

Speaker 4 (54:15):
This is like a Solitude moment because I literally thought,
that's not and I've listened to it a bunch of times.
I'm waiting till it clicks in because obviously I've heard
you speaking interviews and it still doesn't. It doesn't even
sound like that guy. It's it's so weird and it's
it's to me like the first couple of listeners that
kind of overshadowed it, because for the next three minutes,

(54:37):
I was just coming is that who? I don't even
know who does sound like that? Like, who's who you
have as a guest as the Death Tones didn't really have.
Guess that's a weird thing to do. It's like you said,
it's not really a show stopper finale. But I kind
of like the way this album, as we were saying
about how powerful it can be and how they were
these great moments. I like that this album kind of

(54:58):
like bids you a jew rather than exploding.

Speaker 1 (55:03):
Yeah, I like that as well, and I do want
I want to go back to I Think About You
All the Time as well, which in terms of like
the obvious kind of slow songs on Death Turns Records,
I don't think that's as good as I would say.
The number one for me is Entombed, and then you've
also got sex Tape. We were recently debating whether Changing
in the House of Flies could be considered a ballad.
You know, but it's a really nice, good song, and

(55:26):
I think for the first half you could almost to
be lulled into a sense of like, you know, I'm
just sort of in a drifting about lazily. But then
when it hits and when Chino hits the you know,
riding your wave bit particularly, they do that, you know,
better than basically anyone who has tried to do that
since then. Just to compare it to where they were
at immediately before. Again, this is you know, the challenge
of you know, doing the thing that we do. We

(55:47):
have to come in here and talk about the record
when it is timely. We can't just go, let's review
that in two years, you know. But where I'm at
right now, just to compare it to where they were
at immediately before, I prefer Oms, and I think think
it is Ohmes had maybe more of a sense of
discovery about it and with it that sense of particular
identity as a record where like I said, it's like, oh,
here's some you know, songs with striking, deaftnes interpretations of

(56:12):
like classic metal or hard rock riffs. Here's like some
really like vangelousy eerie, alien kind of synthparts. Here's the
bit with all the sea gulls on that record and
all that stuff. And this album it doesn't quite have
like the Link is Dead, where suddenly your guards really
up because they're ramping up the kind of psychotic intensity levels.
I think Sex is the closest on this, but it's
not quite the same thing. My overwhelming first impression of

(56:34):
this was, like I said, mainly the deaf tones of
it all, which seems like a poor criticism, But this
is what I was saying about them being, you know,
thirty years into their career. And to go back to
what you were saying earlier, Elliott, I think some of
the best Deaftones records, whether it be Around the Fur
or White Pony, Yok, the Self Titled even are ones

(56:55):
where you could maybe pick out any member and kind
of argue that they are being the man of the
match performance. Right this one, I think Chino is the
star player on this one. I think he's fantastic on it.
The other ones feel a little bit more an autopilot.
Their auto pilot is very fucking good, right, But I
don't think you're gonna argue that this is Steph Carpenter

(57:16):
or Abe Cunningham or whoever you want to say, is
like career defining performance in the way that you can
go to Diamond Eyes or the Self Titled or Corner
Yoka or whatever it may be and make the kind
of arguments what they are doing is very admirably, you know, uh,
filling in each other's kind of spaces and complementing everyone
else as part of this whole you know, I mean

(57:37):
like even like you know, weirdly, for all the shit
that people kicked up about Gore having no heavy riffs
or anything. I think Doomed User on that record or
even at the title track, have much more Oh my god,
Steph Carpenter's going balls out crazy than anything in particular
on this. But this record is maybe just generally like
the sum of its parts come together very well, you know,

(57:58):
even if it's not anything out of the ordinary film,
every song essentially works. Yeah.

Speaker 4 (58:04):
I sort of like I said earlier, but Owens was
a record which the first time I heard it, there
were things about it I absolutely loved, and things about
it which, to be honest, still to this day, even
though I might like them, I do go that is
a weird is it POMPEII where he has a really
weird cause want Jesus Christ, and You're like, what, Yah,
what kind of vocal melody is that?

Speaker 3 (58:23):
Like?

Speaker 4 (58:23):
There's there's there's loads of stuff on that record which
is like that, and the stuff I'm not completely enamored by,
I'm at least curious about it. I find that I
like that record more and more over time. This it
sounds weird, but like the fact it was so effortless
to enjoy it the first time does give me reason
to think that maybe in a couple of years this
might sit lower in the ranking. But I can only

(58:46):
talk about how I feel three or four days in
and I just I just love the sound of this band.
So even if, like you say, it is mainly death
Tones on auto pilot, it's not a particularly striking record
in their kind of where, like you say, it's not
go oh, this is the alm where they do this
thing and this is the am with that insane song
that they do this. It's just Deathtones kind of doing

(59:08):
their thing. And you'd think in a world where there
are so many people doing the death Tones thing and
doing it badly, that that just wouldn't be good enough.
You just got like death Tones, there's enough of this
you really need to stand out more than that. But
I've not heard a Deathtnes esque record since omes that
is five percent as enjoyable.

Speaker 1 (59:29):
As this for me.

Speaker 4 (59:30):
So even if this is a weaker death Tones record,
even if it is that, and I still don't know
the fact that they are lapping yeah, some of the
quote unquote most exciting bands of their like the generation
below them, that that kind of tells you everything.

Speaker 3 (59:46):
I mean, that's the thing for me is I think
of some like the Deaftones core bands like the Ams.
Like again, that last LOAVEAMM I fucking loved it was
probably in my top twenty of that year. I think
I'd still probably actually take this over that last Love record,
just because the just the pure quality of Deaftones operating
even at a safe standard.

Speaker 1 (01:00:03):
Like this.

Speaker 3 (01:00:05):
Is just like it's just kind of irresistible to me.
And again, like, I don't know why I put this
competitive Homes. I think my Omes has more kind of
striking standard sort of moment of course, the whole thing.
But this has Milk of the m'donald, which again might
be my favorite Deathtones song since Swerft City. Like I
think that song is just so fucking incredible that I'm like, yeah,

(01:00:27):
you know, that might be the only one this sum
that is of that standard. But I'm still just having
a wonderful time listening to it. Even if this is
not again going to be the most remarkable Deathtones abum
that again in six months time, I kind of go,
it is kind of just sort of standard Deathtones, But
right now I'm very happy of what we've got.

Speaker 1 (01:00:44):
Yeah, I'm thinking, you know, does this album have those
songs that will be remembered in ten twenty years from
now as Deathtones classics. Diamond I certainly has lots of them,
Coiner Yokan has lots of them, even Gore as like
Phantom Bride. Right this, you know, it's it's yet to
be seen. I'm not sure right now, but essentially it's
another very strong Deathtones record. As someone who doesn't think

(01:01:04):
any of them have been underpar really in terms of
their you know, kind of current day popularity or you know,
their kind of status as being still a creatively fulfilling
band thirty years on from their debut. This doesn't buck that,
you know. I don't know if this will make my
top twenty of the year when we're about to get
into kind of the avalanche of you know, September and October,

(01:01:25):
but right now, basically two thirds through the year, if
I have to do it right now, it probably would do.
And that's excellent, you know, so Deaftones Private Music. Let's
move on to the rest of these albums, and first up,
we've got another quite long awaited record, Dinosaur Pile Up
with I felt better if we cast our minds back
to six years ago, maybe a more optimistic time, it

(01:01:45):
wasn't Great Society lead, but we didn't yet have Covid
and Jack chat GPT. UK rock band Dinosaur Pile Up
released an album called Celebrity Mansions and basically everyone loved
it at that point. It was kind of an interesting
turn up for them anyway, because they've kind of been
around the block a fair bit without call in a
huge stir, and then suddenly, about ten years into their
career or something, they knocked out this album that like
nobody seems to not like it, you know, And I

(01:02:08):
actually think that album might be bigger than I'd even
thought it was, because I was thinking it as being
a sort of like TNM audience cult favorite, which may
be true to a degree. But Backfoot has over twenty
four million streams on Spotify, Like there's actually clearly some
breakout potential that happened from that, and then Covid happened,
and Dinosaur Pile Up as those years ticked by, just
never seemed to come back the way that all the

(01:02:28):
other bands would come back. And we have learned since
that frontman Matt Bigland was seriously ill in that time.
He's been very open in the press going to this
album about why Dinosaur Piled Up were inactive for so long,
and it's because he was going through the kind of
brutal Ringer for health problems that you wouldn't wish on anyone,
which the new album sardonically addresses in its new title,

(01:02:48):
I felt better Now. What questions there are about sort
of Dinosaur Pilot's momentum, they're you know, creative art across
these albums six years apart any of that, the first
thing that can be said up top is it's great
to have them back and considering all that, we are
very lucky to do.

Speaker 3 (01:03:02):
So that's that's my kind of like over thing because
I was wondering. I remember I was like, what happened
to danceall pulp? You know something mentioned was such a
moment and then it felt like when everyone came back,
there was nothing. And then eventually we kind of discovered
the healths when I was like, fuck, like the fact
that you know we're getting I think it was around
the time when they first parut the first single of this,
I was like, Jesus, this band like he has been

(01:03:23):
through the Ringer like health issues compiled with like going
through that during COVID and the complications that then kind
of like pile up horrible time. So I was like, ultimately,
I'm like, let's just let's go, like if they want to,
you know, just pick right back up and pretend the
last six years kind of sonically nothing's changed. I'm cool
with that, you know, I just want to see this

(01:03:43):
band get back at it and get another shot.

Speaker 2 (01:03:45):
Yeah.

Speaker 1 (01:03:45):
And the thing with Dinosaur Piloup is there was such
a sort of breezy band, right Like Celebrity Mansions were
so popular because it was just a set of no nonsense,
big riff summer rock tunes, and I wasn't really sure
how to imagine, you know, the follow up to that
record that's also presumably reflecting on the kind of serious
life or death ordeals. But Sam, after you know, several

(01:04:06):
years of going, man, where are Dinosaur Pileup, has this
you know, kind of delivered the follow up to Celebrity
Mansions that you'd wanted for those years.

Speaker 3 (01:04:13):
I think, to be honest, like this this is like
obviously lyrically it kind of touches on some darker themes,
but sonically, you know, this is as close to like
a Celebrity Mansions part who We're going to get you know,
it's just big, kind of nineties influenced all rock songs.

Speaker 2 (01:04:28):
Some of them are you know, can like big hard rockers.

Speaker 3 (01:04:30):
Some of them are like a bit more playful, you know,
they have they've got you know, the backfoot kind of
like wrap moment on here as well, stuff like that.
But it just it feels like Dinosaur Pilup kind of going,
let's you know, let's just let's just get back to
what we were doing. Everyone loved it, Let's just offer
more of that. And I think it's it's just a
really fun, nice again, just very playful, easy listen that

(01:04:53):
again lyrically is a bit more kind of like hardgoing,
but just the pure sound this record. I hate plown
it and you know, about to lose it as an opener,
big meaty riff, clattering drums, that that big scream like
it's go time for me.

Speaker 2 (01:05:09):
Yeah.

Speaker 1 (01:05:09):
I sometimes think alongside Dinosaur Pile Up as being alongside
the Dirty Nil because they're both bands who have kind
of got that like nineties you know, kind of grunge
punk rock kind of basis, but they both have this
sort of energy of like youthful adolescent music you could
imagine being played by a cool dog with sunglasses on,
you know, like very pure, very single minded. And we

(01:05:30):
obviously reviewed a new Dirty Nil record like about a
month ago, this one. Bizarrely, of those two albums, considering
the context of this is the one that sounds more like, Hey,
we're just gonna have as much fun as we've ever had.

Speaker 2 (01:05:41):
You know.

Speaker 1 (01:05:41):
Again, as we've said that, it does go into some
more you know, sardonic and you know, more introspected territory
at times, but it's pretty pretty much just let's go yeah.

Speaker 4 (01:05:52):
And I think, you know, as someone who's maybe of
the three of us the least familiar with Dinosaur Pilot,
I've heard celebrity manages a few times with special came out,
I haven't found myself going back to what loads is,
but I do like that record. I think it helps
that they're quite a snotty band, in that snottiness can
lend itself to a number of things, and two of
the main ones are either let's have fun and let's

(01:06:16):
sneer at something. And there's a kind of as much
as this is maybe more of a downer record than
the previous one, and there's you know, lyrics on here
which are kind of emotionally tough. It is kind of like,
you know, despite everything, like that sort of joys an
act of resistance mantris, like let's just kick out the jams.

Speaker 1 (01:06:35):
Yeah, I mean about to lose. It still sounds like
a car with flame decals on it. Yeah, And then
a chorus that just goes so purely into like brit
rock sort of modern day feeder kind of you know,
territory of that sort of radio feel. And again it's
not really you know, I don't necessarily go back to
celebrity imagines a great deal. It's not really my sound,

(01:06:56):
but I don't think anyone has done that specific thing
quite that way in these six years since that record
came out, you know, And my first four putting this
song was like, man, I remember what this feels like
from six years ago.

Speaker 4 (01:07:08):
You know.

Speaker 1 (01:07:09):
The title track obviously directly addresses those you know, like
hellish few years he had, but it still tells it
through basically a kind of slacker, kicking down the curb
kind of rock song that's really enjoyable to listen to,
and capturing the bewilderment of like waking up in twenty
twenty with Yaser fucking nazy energy, klor punk and the
confused bitterness with which he delivers it is so good,

(01:07:31):
like right on.

Speaker 2 (01:07:32):
That was the lyric that on Fursis and like stood
out to me.

Speaker 3 (01:07:34):
But yeah, I fore about it, you know, just SLINKs
on of these kind of like jangly guitar lines that
sort of really sarcastic vocal delivery. It is, you know,
just hitting that kind of like slacker rock like ninety
sort of thing that.

Speaker 2 (01:07:46):
Just goes and again the chorus.

Speaker 3 (01:07:48):
A lot of choruses on this album are again it's
kind of like that one line repeated over.

Speaker 1 (01:07:52):
Just draw that in.

Speaker 3 (01:07:53):
But they do all just pop off in a way
that just is really pleasant for me to listen to.
And I'm just like, yeah, you know, like I could
image two thousand trees next year. Like these songs just
like getting that main stage, everyone with a beer in
their hand, just having a lovely time. It feels like
prime for that sort of setting. And across this whole album,
they just hit out of the park.

Speaker 4 (01:08:13):
You know.

Speaker 3 (01:08:14):
Punk Kiss is like good vibes, It's I want to
have fun. You know, listen to Basement, one of those
songs about like cutting loose and rocking out and.

Speaker 1 (01:08:22):
Being in love.

Speaker 3 (01:08:24):
There's the Wheezer solo of you know, just the chorus
melody played as a guitar solo, but it is really
sticky and catchy, so like, why the hell not?

Speaker 4 (01:08:32):
Yeah, I think the choruses are as much as like
this band back in the day. The first time I
heard it, I was like twenty eleven to twenty thirteen,
because they were in total guitar all the time, and
that magazine was great at serving guitar nerds, but some
of the bands that they would champion who we not
so great, So I don't even think I listened to

(01:08:52):
them back at the day, but like, and the guitars
definitely sound big on this record, but the choruses are
comfortably the best thing about this band, because there are
songs on here which in the verses or even in
those guitar moments and going like, yeah, this is pretty
good that just they go up like five or six
tiers as soon as the chorus comes in, like you say, punk,
Kiss My Way. The first two tracks, the choruses are

(01:09:16):
stuck in My Head Now and on My Way, which like,
I really like the fact they're channeling bands like Cake
and the butthole surfers, which you never hear bands taken from,
especially like they're kind of dumb MTV e at the
end of their career. In the initial span that has
like a rap on it that I don't know what
I think, but my good will has been stored up

(01:09:38):
from the chorus, so when the rap comes in, I
go like, yeah, fine, great crack on. Yeah, it's funny
that you say mention those bands when my reference point
for that similar kind of dynamic is the novelty offspring songs,
you know, where you have you know, you kind of
have to have a punch on for knowingly stupid rap parts. Yeah,
and it's it's got almost got those like eight wait

(01:10:00):
fucking like Castanette bits or whatever. And there they flirted
with the rap rock a bit on Celebrity Mansion. So
I'm not necessarily fact.

Speaker 3 (01:10:05):
Thirty is the one that was really similar to that
sort of thing, but there's kind of like a playful
wink to it on like my way that I'm willing
to sort of let the the dorky white boy rapping
kind of go. And again it is, you know, offrings,
like just that kind of emptv era. It feel was
pulled right from that, but it's a really fun track.

Speaker 1 (01:10:23):
Yeah, you know, and they do the kind of again
I don't know exactly the term for it, but that's
sort of like weird. The solo sound in smells like
teen Spirit. That kind of weird, sort of wary kind
of melody thing is like on a bunch of the
leads on these songs, because we like that and will
put that in there as well, and it fits the vibe.
So while not and you know, the choruses, they do

(01:10:43):
have that balance of being again, his voice is obviously
kind of scratchy and imperfect, but they're being recorded a
sort of slick pop ear candy sort of way again,
like a band like like Feeder or someone from the
nineties crossed with a bit of I guess some forty
one as well. And you know, it's not my favorite style,
but they work it really really well, you know, and
the melodies as you go through the track list do

(01:11:04):
generally pretty much keep hitting. I think my favorite song
on this maybe, or at least one that jumps out
with me, is Big Dogs Eat for Free, which is massive,
you know, just like big, obnoxious, thundering guitar cards swinging
at you. It's got the bits that make me laugh.
With the dog barking, that's all I need.

Speaker 3 (01:11:18):
Tune yep again yeah that big dog starting with a
dog bark and I was like, hell, yeah, this rocks.

Speaker 2 (01:11:24):
And then again the guitar part is just big and booming.

Speaker 3 (01:11:28):
Like thing is that it feels like every time they
hear chorus they can like stamp on the pedal that
just you know, crank, They're like crank evering up to
eleven for.

Speaker 2 (01:11:34):
The chorus, just to make it all that bit bigger.
And they do it every on every song here.

Speaker 3 (01:11:39):
Basically like even though you know those songs that I'm
meant to be the ballads, it's like ballad ballad ballads.
Oh it's coorus time. Let's crank everything to overdrive and
it's a trick that like overdone maybe, but every time
it just makes me smile.

Speaker 1 (01:11:51):
Yeah. I think the second half of the track list
I don't think is as strong as the first. I
think when you get Loves the Worst, which goes into
sort of like more heart broken place, but it still
kind of sounds like that's sort of you know, streamlined
radio rock that we just describing. I don't really like
that very much. It's, you know, a sound that's trying
to kind of be you know, a motive like that,

(01:12:12):
but is that slick? It's just not really engaging to me.
Takes a bit of a dip around there. I think
the closer basically just makes you want to put where
is My Mind? On instead, But by and large it
stays pretty you know, boisterous, testoster own fueled, slacker alt rock.
They're generally good at. You know, It's not the kind
of record again that I usually go back to all

(01:12:32):
that much that has any particular dynamism to it, but
they have the same thing that bans like the Dirty
Nail or like Pup whoever have of just being kind
of so inherently likable and cheering you up as you
put the record on, you know, which for the record
called I Felt Better about what He's been through is
not bad going. And if someone was to go, you know,
summer just like fun rock record of the Year, just

(01:12:55):
like it was for Celebrity Matches of twenty nineteen, you
go yeah, tracks, Yeah.

Speaker 4 (01:12:59):
I think, you know, I guess I'm in the same
boat as you parent and that this isn't necessarily my
sort of thing, but I do like this record. I
think I can appreciate that given everything, you know, the
band wanting to put as much as they can on
every record because if these things are going to delay them,
you want to strike while the irons hot, like take
every chance you can. Thinking really critically and being a

(01:13:21):
bit brutal about it, I think this is a pretty
killer twenty eight to thirty minute record that's close to
forty minutes long. There's a few songs in the second
half the facts I can't really bring them to mind
tells you everything which feel to be a bit harsh,
a bit like filler. But when this album's great, it
scratches that itch that, like you said, because there wasn't

(01:13:41):
anyone else that quite sounds like them. It does a
thing that I haven't heard another man do in that
six years, and that alone is I think immensely valuable. Yeah.

Speaker 3 (01:13:52):
I mean for me again, like I assuming with like
the sort of the back off the I'm being a
bit weaker. I you know, just the entire time it
was on, was just enjoying the vibe of this record.
This is going to be no probably won't break my
top twenty of the year, but just in terms of
a pure sound that I'm going to have a nice
time listening to. And I'm like, again, what I want
to see is that a festival next summer. I want
to hear a bunch of these songs for the dimesall

(01:14:13):
pub come back like six years on, and that's kind
of like hitting the sweet spot for them, of like
just getting back on track, kind of delivering enough that
fans can kind of get on board with and hopefully
rEFInd their momentum and carry this forward.

Speaker 1 (01:14:28):
Yeah, next record, we're going to talk about the world
is a beautiful place and I'm no longer afraid to die.
With an album called Dreams of Being Dust. This is
I think the first time we've reviewed an album from
this band, even though it's not, of course, you know,
not the first time they've ever been mentioned, or that
you've likely heard of them, because they are one of
the I would say, from what I've observed, the most
central bands of the so called emo revival wave of

(01:14:50):
the twenty tens, the era that brought us all of
those bands. The world is a beautiful place where right
there with them, we haven't quite got to them yet.
Ongoing tour and carousel of the Emo bands of that
time one album Club, But if you follow that music
in the last fifteen years, you've likely cross path with them. Sam.
We have discussed them and your history with them in
you know, recent years in ways that kind of lead

(01:15:11):
them into where they are right now with this record.
But Elliott as a as a twenty tens emo enjoyer,
do you have much kind of a history with this
band's output.

Speaker 4 (01:15:21):
Yeah, the one I'm completely blanking on both the names now,
the one where he's jumping in the water and the
one when they're running from the animal. Yes, yeah, those
two are great. I remember I heard those at the time.
I listened to quite a lot since the one of
the twenty fifteen one, which I think is the one
with the animal that I really like that year that
was hype in my ranking. The one that came after that,

(01:15:42):
which I think is a field this is the best
I can do. I heard that at the time, and
I remember thinking this is good, but not as good,
So I kind of fell off there, and I don't
even know if I heard the one or two that
came out afterwards. So this is the first time I've
listened to an album in full for certain since the

(01:16:03):
twenty seventeen.

Speaker 1 (01:16:04):
One.

Speaker 4 (01:16:04):
The stuff they've done that's great that I like is great.

Speaker 1 (01:16:07):
Yeah. I remember again when I was getting into the
bands I like from that scene, like Turnover or whoever.
The World is Beautiful Place seemed almost more like a
post rock band in comparison, Like they had a very flowery, long,
you know, Godspeed You, Black Emperor esque name. They had
like again quite esoteric, mysterious album art which I think
the album is called Harmlessness with the which is the

(01:16:29):
one that looks a bit like someone's going for sort
of like home video style nostalgia photography, but of like
some children from the wicker Man, like it's just like
chasing each other. And I'd see that, and you know,
and I would definitely see more about them in you know,
Pitchfork than I would Rock Mags, And they often had
like ten members or something like that, so they were
almost like the sort of post rock orchchestra version of,

(01:16:50):
you know, an emo revival band. Our timeline with them
is going to really kick back in in the last
couple of years when by start comparison, they've been playing
Outbreak Festival, their book to play Damnation Festival this year,
and through those sets and the kind of material they've
been leading with. This like once very delicate, measured band
seemed to have just like gotten pissed the fuck off

(01:17:12):
and started channeling like the horrorle post hardcore side of
their influences. And we thought we should review this album.
That sounds interesting. What do we make of it?

Speaker 3 (01:17:20):
I never expected to lover the worlds of Buble Place,
and I'm no longer afraid to the album.

Speaker 2 (01:17:25):
As much as I fucking love this, this this one
is so usul so it's so unbelievably neat like thing.

Speaker 3 (01:17:31):
So there was they were playing a couple of songs
off of this at Outbreak, and I remember hearing there
was like I think it was like the opening whether
and when that sort of tappy guitarri if that tappy
post hardcore guitar riff comes in, I was like, oh,
I don't remember this band doing this. I was like, okay,
I need to pay attention to what you're doing now.
And then we heard on this album. I was like,
I'm soe in on this already that they are like

(01:17:52):
just hitting my spot. This is I mean, for me,
this is what a post hardcram should be, post harder
is one of those genres that like.

Speaker 2 (01:17:59):
Doesn't get talked about as much as metal.

Speaker 3 (01:18:01):
Corps does in terms of like, then the modern thing
of what post hardcore is is such a bastard eyes
watered down, like Sanitoz.

Speaker 1 (01:18:09):
I learned that Pierce the Veil have a TikTok challenge.
Currently I'm going fuck it.

Speaker 3 (01:18:14):
It's so bad, like you know, you know, you know,
at the driving and Glassjaw is now pierced the veil
and the light and it's just like, oh good and
hearing this is kind of like a band who clearly
fucking love at the drive in and love that kind
of like fu Ghazi and that vein of post hardcore,
we're still kind of keeping the kind of post rock

(01:18:36):
and emo touches and bringing it all together Like this
just hits the spot for me. I'm so in on
everything about this album, and I'm kind of like the
things that I kind of bounced off off with the
world to be placed before. Just adding in that kind
of scathing, spiky edge to it makes that so much
more palatable.

Speaker 4 (01:18:54):
I think I want the Handover as a sound because
I've given this one listen and it was I'd sat
down not so down I'd gone into I'd gone to
cook and I thought I watched I put on before
the show, and I remember I had this and I thought, oh,
the jumping in the lake chase by Lovely, that would

(01:19:15):
be nice, And I fucking I was. I was so bewildered.
I was when did this? It's it's it's it's a
weird thing for a band to kind of get naster
and heavier later, like the common trajectory you'd chill out.
Admitted I don't know if how they could possibly chill
out more than they had on those early records, But

(01:19:37):
what happened to the world as a beautiful place and
I'm no longer afraid to die where? They don't seem
to think that anymore. They they seem to have a
pretty negative take on that on the world nowadays.

Speaker 3 (01:19:49):
It's absolutely exact thing of twenty ten's millennial millennial optimism.

Speaker 2 (01:19:53):
Where's that gone? The world is just going to shit?

Speaker 3 (01:19:56):
And this does just feel like the products of like
the last few years and band just kind of going,
fuck all this shit, we need to get mad, because
I think like this album like lyrically, it kind of
strikes a balance between quite kind of like flowery metaphorical,
kind of like emo lyricism and kind of like occasionally
very pointed, and then it kind of collides those two together.
But it is like clearly now that is like pissed

(01:20:18):
off at like ongoing wars and class divides and like
just all of these sort of things, and they just
kind of like channel it through some of the most
scathing music I think an emo band could release.

Speaker 1 (01:20:33):
Yeah, you know, even when I had the warning of
like you know, when you've seen that outbreak and you
were like, they're really antagonistic, I wasn't prepared for the
opening of this album to be blast beats, you know.
And the production sounds a lot more like almost more
like recent metallic harcore right, Like it sounds more like
vain sonically than it does you know, kind of wishy,
washy post rock, you know. And I guess I was

(01:20:55):
impressed by how quickly they were to able to sort
of you know, slip into that. And the first track
has that again or like proggy tappy you know, lead
guitar part. That's really great. It's melodically quite involved. It
does have at times sort of deaf tonesy ault metally elements,
but not in like such a worshipy way as that

(01:21:17):
entire Deftones core thing that we were just talking about
has been going on for so long, and that first
song is like really coiled and full of tension because
it's it's a lot more kind of turbulent and winding
than you know those things, you know. It even it
goes into the sort of like you know, scream o
y grind kind of at the end of you know,
certain songs points in time.

Speaker 3 (01:21:39):
Yeah, it's it's like a really involved album for me,
this where where it's like there's that free vocalists at
all times, and then x amount of guest vocalists as well,
Like there's loads of volke wins play going on, whether
it's singing and screaming or just kind of harmonizing. The
guitar is kind of all between being quite like intercate
delicates and these like nasty, dird sort of riffs that
kind of like just you'll get songs that like are

(01:22:02):
quite vocally pleasant, and then the riff that's underpinning them all,
like the bass of groove that's kind of they're going on,
is like sludgy and horrible in it, and it's just
like really like stark contrast between the styles that that
makes it quite disarming to listen to at first, But
I'm just so in on this kind of like like
just bold swing and you right, there were like moments
I was like that that's a Deftones riff, but it's

(01:22:25):
just one piece of the kind of like sound they're
building on here, rather than just being like we're going
to do Deaftones with breakdowns.

Speaker 1 (01:22:32):
Yeah, you know the way they're kind of instrumental intricacies
work really tight drumming, those ear catching, the guitar parts,
you can tell, you know, their influence from those kind
of more oddball mathy ends of like classic post hark
or an Emao you know, whether it be your your
quicksands or your cursives or whatever. But you bring something
with the kind of real bite and intensity into that

(01:22:52):
as well, and it makes for something really cool. You know. Again,
a lot of tracks have these really frantic upbeat but
all so you know, kind of heart tugging lead guitar
parts and stuff like that. The second one is like
the second track is like immediately you're two stepping, but
also panically looking over your shoulder like an incoming train
is going to hit. You know, it's really cool, very

(01:23:13):
strong song. But Where the Centrist. I didn't know they
had pitsts like that in them. That's so sick.

Speaker 3 (01:23:19):
That song is like ceremony like earlier ceremony kind of
like scathing cloble punk.

Speaker 2 (01:23:25):
I like, I mean a but Where the Centrist maybe
song title of the year for me.

Speaker 3 (01:23:29):
But that song is just like the most like actual
like rowdy in your face, obnoxious pitsto a hardcore And
I was like, yeah, this is fucking like just meat
and like just smacks you. I think, such a great
moment to kind of just throw at you and again
under two minutes, so it doesn't outstairs welcome and they
don't really do that kind of hardcore again on the album,

(01:23:49):
but just as this like burst of violence, it stands outside.

Speaker 1 (01:23:53):
But I particularly like again they have have always had
that sort of multiple vocalist thing, and I think they
have a keyboardist who also does the female vocals, and
I think it's her on that where they're going back
and forth at each other in the middle of this
like you know, frantic hardcore song and she turned into
this like borderline k and Nashi thing for a couple
of lines that's just so like needling you and so

(01:24:14):
horrid and shrieky.

Speaker 4 (01:24:16):
There were so many moments on this record where even
though even once I adjusted to the new sound of
the World's a Beautiful place, I'm like, Okay, I guess
they're sort of you know, erratic, fast core, borderline power
violence band points even then they I think it's because
they have that history of you know, lots of members,

(01:24:37):
lots of different sounds. They pull from all this technical ability.
Even if once you get used to the father that's
what that's the sound they're going for. All the way
up to the end of the record, they're still throwing
in stuff which is so disarming.

Speaker 2 (01:24:51):
Like a full of hell guests spot yeah, exactly.

Speaker 1 (01:24:54):
Like that, which from the other side of like a mountain, like.

Speaker 3 (01:24:59):
Whatever are gonna get you gonna pull in Brendan from
Counterparts and then full of hell and like just gonna
have the most guess what's and they feel they feel
like they belong.

Speaker 2 (01:25:07):
It's such a weird with me, but it's it's so
called like the guess what's in this aumum? I really
well done.

Speaker 3 (01:25:12):
I think capticone Yeah, where again that's like it's again
it is close to probably what they were for. It's
a bit dirty, but then you get that church tongue
guess spot and fuck me? Is that again just disarmingly
heavy and how thick and just like nasty that gets.

Speaker 1 (01:25:29):
Yeah, I mean I do like that. Again, from what
we're describing this, they haven't actually abandoned their you know
kind of intricate instrumental builds and stuff like that. They
just explode into these more violently you know, post hardcore
passages every times as well. But like, I like how
those two things kind of you know come together, and
that earlier sort of weirdo jammy post rock DNA they

(01:25:52):
had kind of appears in these like big, you know,
violent rock song parts in interesting ways, you know, because
to go On has again that full on down burst
hardcore guest vocal at the end, but the riff does
remind me a little of like God's beeedy Black Emperor
in that kind of you know, sort of weird bending,
other worldly kind of guitar riff. Auguries of Guilt at

(01:26:15):
the end has those almost like you know, brutus Urcevalbardy
type you know, big ringing lead kind of post rock
guitar sounds, and then also because again they've got this keyboardist.
There are parts where it does this like bizarre sort
of neon synth, you know, dance kind of bass parts
underpinning stuff, and they take over like that song does,
which again really interesting kind of combinations. Then I guess,

(01:26:38):
as you're saying, how kind of lyrically direct stuff like
December the fourth twenty twenty four is, which does not
hide its intentions or its stance when it comes to
the news event that happened on that day, which was
the shooting of the United Healthcare CEO. That's come up
in a couple of hardcore songs we've review this year,
hasn't it. But the track that goes along with it
is this like really sludgy dirgy gross where even the

(01:27:02):
melody seems a bit kind of ill and diseased as
they're singing it. And like, I think it's a cool move,
you know, for one of that, again, one of those
emo revival bands from the twenty tens, who a lot
of them are either still beloved doing mostly the same
thing or have kind of fallen off. I think it's
cool for one of them to go, fuck it, We've
done that measured emo thing. For a long time. I'm

(01:27:22):
fucking angry right now, and I want to hit fucking
hard on this one and reinvent themselves like this.

Speaker 3 (01:27:28):
No, I think that like that reinvention is just it
s trys to sort of them saying true to themselves
where they clearly are like they could.

Speaker 2 (01:27:36):
You know, just carried on doing the premium thing.

Speaker 3 (01:27:37):
But I think because they clearly are pissed off and
have that BITTI theite if they've gone, well, let's like
actually just channel that and something that feels or painted
to us or paint it to us in this moment.

Speaker 2 (01:27:48):
And again this might you know, end up being a
kind of just a one off album in.

Speaker 3 (01:27:53):
Their calor where they just went and did a hardcorese
or record, post arcle record. But it's made the world
to be replaced just a much more interesting bad and
in my eyes, where I feel like they could just
kind of go offrom where they want, whether the mood
takes them. And I think it's just a very kind
of like uplifting things to your band, have that confidence
to just sort of swing out and decide. This might

(01:28:14):
piss off a lot of our fans. They might hate
this because they might think it's just noise, but we're
going to go with it anyway.

Speaker 4 (01:28:20):
I don't know if this is a rogue comparison or not,
but I reminded of the conversation we had when we
did the Ulster of Plagues club with Alistair.

Speaker 1 (01:28:29):
Right, yeah, yeah, I can see it.

Speaker 4 (01:28:32):
And the thing we were saying there was, you know,
what is post metal? What is post rock? Like? What
is the thing that defines it? There are so many
bands which we're going to shatter the boundaries of rock music,
and you're like, you just sound like Mogwi I did
thirty years ago. How was this shattering the boundaries of anything?
You're as limited as a lot of the bands you
want to push back against. And the thing we were
talking about with that also plays record is you know

(01:28:54):
it's post black metal. You think sort of atmospheric, slow patient,
which Otter Places had played with before, and in a way,
the more subversive thing was to just go stranger and
harder and nastier.

Speaker 1 (01:29:09):
I can kind of see that here.

Speaker 4 (01:29:10):
It kind of it's like the world is a beautful
place to kind of put their money where their mouth
is where it's not. It's not just a master of
Oh we'll just recycle seguts and explosions in the sky
riffs and that'll be fine. They're clear like a musically curious,
dexterous band. And even if this is only the album
they do in this star, and even if people don't
like it, they get huge credibility for demonstrating that if

(01:29:32):
nothing else.

Speaker 1 (01:29:33):
Yeah, you know, if you've never heard this band when
they were a more kind of delicate emo band. But
if you like anything from nothing to Thrice to Portrayal
of Guilt, you know, check in on this one. The
world is a beautiful place and I'm no longer afraid
to die Dreams of Dust. Okay, we've warmed Sam up
with some enthusiasm. The rest of this episode is very
deliberately paced, actually, to give a sort of on and

(01:29:54):
off leeway. We start surely so so on with firesh
funds and nightclub. If you are a listener who just
checks in for these review bags, you might not know
who this band are. If you listen to every episode,
you will because this is hot off the heels of
Elliot and I discussing this band at Bloodstock a couple
of weeks ago. I will give a recap for the
former group of how I became conscious of fires Fonds.

(01:30:17):
Last year, I was watching a Vakan live stream and
before the band I was going to watch started, I
just got a full blast of what I immediately described
as the most German looking thing I've ever seen. Our
folk kind of power metal band in full medieval armor
costumes and regalia. There's pipes, there's fiddle, there's fire everywhere,

(01:30:37):
blasting these like ultra daft pompous choruses at you. And
then a year later they got booked for their debut
UK show, Bloodstock. I did realize after we watched them
do it, I had actually heard their drager Stayed didn't
take cover a couple of years before, which does low
key bang. But now they've appeared in the UK and everything,
and with this album, immediately you know in the wings
they feel like they're established themselves over here a little bit.

(01:30:59):
Apparently they've been going for over twenty years. There's a
whole other worlds out there, you know. And I love
this descriptive where I read that apparently they formed because
they felt the folk power metal scene of Germany in
the early two thousands was taking itself too seriously and
needed an antidote, and as Elliott and I watched this

(01:31:20):
band at Bloodstock, we looked at each other. We instinctively understood,
this is an absolute bullseye of Sam's idea of a nightmare.
Like so many things about what we were witnessing, it
was just like this tick so many different individual boxes
of things that would drive Sam homicidal. So we had
to review the album. Obviously, the people demanded it. I
demanded it, but also so did the people.

Speaker 2 (01:31:44):
I suffer for you. I mean, I'm just gonna lead
of Io Electric corboyan apology. It can be so much worse.

Speaker 1 (01:31:56):
Yeah, So certainly what became clear as we watched their
set is far Biosh Frans are not a serious band
because you know, we'll talk about the incongruous themes I
guess at the moment, but all of what's in there,
the way they presented themselves, the characters they inhabit, how
they spoke to the crowd, they are, you know, daft
kind of cabaret entertainers more than they are a serious proposition.

(01:32:18):
The name translates as fire Taale, which does end up
somewhat lost in translation to English, but I understand to
a German speaking audience, there's some kind of dick joke
in there. They're stupid, and I am often at pains
to fight the fight for a genre like folk metal that,
particularly to an English audience, people turn their noses up
without knowing a thing about it. And there is a

(01:32:38):
world of difference between even some of the bands who
have been really tarred by those people as kind of
novelty bands like Rosas or Corporaclani or whatever by you know,
people who haven't heard their records, and then Fire Schrans.
I don't need to do that here, because, as I
just said, this is not credible, this is not serious music.
I think Fire Schrans are the kind of thing it's

(01:32:58):
quite amusing to have a f and watches me and
Elliott did and have them explain to an English crowd
what I'm bastard is and all of that. But the
music is the kind of thing that Napalm Records puts
out a ton of that has collectively turned that kind
of once and you know, exciting and diverse world of
folk metal from the kind of mid two thousands into
a very singular stream of kind of like party Viking

(01:33:19):
metal slop. But with that said, what do you guys
think of the nightclub, so you want to take this first, like,
let's look go to Elliott first for a more measured view,
and then we'll throw it to Sam Well. I mean.

Speaker 4 (01:33:36):
As you as you will have got if you've listened
to the Blood Story review. Is weird A very nice time?
I think watching we weren't sort of it wasn't quite
the same experience we had at Masterdon later in the
day when we were sort of going like, isn't this
just the greatest band on the form of their lives?
We were just kind of I just speak for myself.
I was course up in it. The German medieval comedy

(01:33:58):
folk edia metal style of Foyish Bonds was it was
speaking to me that day because and a bit like
the Trivium set a couple of days before, I was going,
I don't know what's gonna happen. I don't know where
we're going to go next, what they're going to pull from.
And so when when it was decided we were doing this,
I thought, well, maybe I should investigate. And then I

(01:34:18):
found out this is their twelfth album, and I thought,
never mind, I suspect it's not important. I I really
struggled to separate my experience listening to this album from
knowing that I was going to get to talk to
Sam about it. Yeah, because if I was just in

(01:34:42):
complete isolation in sort of white room torture with this record,
I probably wouldn't be as happy and joyous about listening
to it as I was knowing that this was coming.
Because the cheekiness and silly billy nature of this record
is the best and worst thing about it. I will say,

(01:35:05):
there's a couple songs which are pretty good, is there,
And there's one which I think if Visigoth did it
whoa now maybe would be nice about it.

Speaker 1 (01:35:22):
On the Bloodstot review, you know, I explained to Elliott
that it's nightclub with a K, and therefore the EDM
you know party song sung by medieval warriors makes complete
sense actually, and obviously, while I get the pun, that
being the theme here does basically tell you everything to
know about the record. It's kind of wearing the attire
of folk metal, which, as I've said, at its best,

(01:35:43):
is a genre I really love. But really it's much
closer to the sort of like rave metal boneheadedness of
electric call Boy. Like it's electric call Boy in touristas's clothing,
you know. And you know, if you love electric core
boy and you've never crossed the streams of the folk metal,
maybe this is your way. In I'd no Nightclub. The
song is really catchy, like I don't know if I'm

(01:36:05):
necessarily going to go on record saying I believe it
to be a good song. But the chorus is undeniably
pretty big, right, you know, raising your fist, drink and
other pipe up, and the way they've got the strings
folk metal riff, but it's actually just a scooter like
but but butt shann't you know, disguised as folk metal
is really amusing to me. And then there's a lot

(01:36:26):
of German rap on it, which I'm sorry to the
entire country of Germany. I'm sure some of your rappers
must be legitimate. To an English speaker, it always sounds
completely insane, like absolutely fucking nuts. But in its totality,
the song Nightclub is pretty big Sam Baby Shark for
people in battle jackets, I don't think I can refute that.

Speaker 3 (01:36:51):
Like so here, I'm the nice thing up, Valhalla is
the best this album has to offer. In an det
saboton with Doro giving them a charity case guests spot.

Speaker 1 (01:37:02):
I was going to say, someone Doro is here, because
of course she is. Get her out. Someone please rescue
Doro from the euro metal bits. And I resent the
quoting of man Or into glory Ride or something as
frivolous and lacking in true metal as this, but again
it is a catchy song nightclub.

Speaker 3 (01:37:18):
When I hit I was like, I hate this, just
tweet folk metal bollocks missed with naf eurometal bollocks, like
just a combination that is not going to work for me.

Speaker 2 (01:37:27):
How many vocalists are there in this band? Like I
don't know, or like I.

Speaker 1 (01:37:30):
Think that there's two guys at least maybe a woman
involved someone.

Speaker 2 (01:37:35):
They just seem to be competing to be the most
annoying vocalist ever. There's zero riffs. That chorus is grating.
When I heard Papa Party in the Nightclub, I was
like track one, fuck, they're.

Speaker 1 (01:37:48):
Leading with their strongest foot.

Speaker 2 (01:37:50):
That's the cell that song and the thing is like Valhalla.

Speaker 3 (01:37:54):
Like again, I was kind of like, well, this is
I guess the least offensive thing on this album, where
it's kind of just very stock folk metal, terrified of
actually going hard. Lest it's scare off the sort of
casual people who've stumbled on this through TikTok or at
a festival, but it's you know.

Speaker 2 (01:38:12):
Not abysmal. And then track three happens and I think
this is.

Speaker 3 (01:38:19):
The worst thing I've heard this year, Like like I
got the impression, I kind of did a bit digging
and this band are clearly, like you know, being a
euro metal folk band with a kind of point up
for being at a festival, that they're not afraid of
a novelty cover as we clearly are.

Speaker 2 (01:38:35):
Yeah, yeah, twenty twenty five, right, I don't know why
they've done this.

Speaker 3 (01:38:41):
Thirteen years ago there was a popular song called Gang
Damn Style, which you know, was kind of all the
rage at one.

Speaker 2 (01:38:48):
Point for a couple of months in twenty twelve. Why why, Peren,
tell me? Why why is this happening?

Speaker 1 (01:38:58):
As you said, you know, if you look back through
their their catalog, the record where they did Dragostade Inta,
the track list on that is insane because it's in
between covers of Square Hammer, Blinding Lights by the Weekend,
The Bad Touch by the Blood and Gang and Warriors
of the World United by My and you know, I

(01:39:18):
think the Dragon stayde Inte is weirdly perfect for a
kind of European folk metal band because the melody just
works for it, you know, going to Korean novelty rap
or whatever, you know, whatever style you want to say
that Sai is dragasteed in Tay. I think you can
kind of get away with turning into a folk metal
banger the way that like tourists are doing bony m did,

(01:39:39):
But there's no way of doing Gangnam Style without it
being one hundred percent just like a ridiculous face like
where the hook isn't a big belt along kind of
euro chorus, but you know Gangdum style and then the
hay Sexuy lady part and again like ten to fifteen
years late, Like am I going to be hearing this

(01:40:00):
in a YouTube rewind at the end of the year
as well? Like is that what we're doing? Will Shane
Dawson react to the Fire Schwan's gang Lam Style cover?

Speaker 2 (01:40:07):
Like what are we doing?

Speaker 1 (01:40:09):
Guys? Like this?

Speaker 2 (01:40:10):
That was my question, like is just what are we
doing when that cover here?

Speaker 4 (01:40:14):
You've got this all backwards? Okay, culture goes in cycles.
They're not late the early right, because right now you're
right in twenty twenty five. You don't hear Gangam style
at weddings or in clubs or anything, or pubs or
anything like that. It hasn't been long enough for it
to regain that cachet when I move on to another generation.

(01:40:36):
But it might, and when it does, they will be ready.
And do you know what, I had a thought while
listening to this song that was so stupid that I
decided I could no longer judge fire Schans for anything afterwards,
because this is how my brain works. I sincerely thought
to myself for the duration of this song, Oh well,
if I don't understand I already didn't understand the German,
I'm certainly not going to understand the German translated into Korean.

(01:41:00):
That is how poorly my brain is capable of working.
So after that, I just thought, like, I can't look
down on anyone. I am in no position to judge
the work of fires Funds. So I think, in a way,
even though the two best songs come before it, this
song kind of unlocked. It reframed the record to me.

(01:41:23):
I mean, it is appallingly bad. I should also say
that it is like hair whiteningly shit. But it made
me realize how dumb I was, so it gets points.

Speaker 1 (01:41:33):
It's always nice to learn things about ourselves. They didn't
even change. It's like, you know, a Hamburg style or
wherever they're from. Maybe the translation worked better. Like I said,
a couple of their covers, you know, if you've had
a beer or something, that they're fine, but that one
is terrible. But if there was any doubt as to
whether we would do this record, right when I was
pulling out the track list and I saw there was

(01:41:54):
a song called Sam the Brave.

Speaker 2 (01:41:57):
Come on, it writes we have to do it now.

Speaker 3 (01:42:00):
I mean, like like there's the Tale of Sam and
Sam the Brain, Like I mean, I plod them that.
They did an incredible job cramming.

Speaker 1 (01:42:10):
The saga in a minute of.

Speaker 3 (01:42:14):
Talking into a two minute like narration where it's like, well,
Sam was a hobbit, had a frame God. They went
to everyone, but Sam was strong. And then Sam went
home to plant his flowers and this is his story.

Speaker 1 (01:42:26):
And it's just I don't know why they've done that,
because they then do the song. It's like you've told
me the story.

Speaker 4 (01:42:34):
It's even better than that because the song is so
they've told the story and then they do the song,
and at least half the song is just them telling
us that they're going to tell the story. It's just
because the course is this is the sort of tale
of Sam the Brave, This is the tale of Sam over.
It's like that that South Park episode where's like it's
Christmas time, it's once a year, it's over. That's the

(01:42:55):
whole song, forever it again, you're right, this is again
very dumb, but I kind of admire. I mean, I've
I've not seen the Lord of the Rings films.

Speaker 1 (01:43:08):
I don't know if I have to now what the
fuck I mean for a s I need to tell
you that in Sam the Brave there is like had
just changed enough, sort of royalty free interpolation of like
the theme of the theme from the Shaya in Fellowship
of the Ring. It's like it is it but not quite.
And that made me laugh every time it came around
the pure folk metal songs, which oftenly there are often

(01:43:31):
songs that are just in German that are more I
would say serious. They're not again, they're not. There's nothing
remarkable about them. They're fine, but you know, they're okay,
and there's some nice melodies in them. But the transparency
between like what are the the kind of party songs
will push hard to the kind of festival market again
for maximumppeal. And then the album tracks is amazing. Elliott,

(01:43:53):
what's the one where you were like, that's the that's
the legit one, that's a hit.

Speaker 4 (01:43:56):
Well, I thought, well, the thing I said about vis
Go earlier was so like it was just the fact
that he goes, we are vikings, we have valkyries, and
together we were ride. I don't think that's so different
from the warriors. We are sorterers on magics will light
up the sky. That's just me that The one song
in the second half where I did think, I think
I am just enjoying this, so I don't I think

(01:44:17):
I've forgotten about talking about this with Sam is a
Drunken Dragon, which that's.

Speaker 1 (01:44:24):
Pretty deep of that song, one of the more just
sort of with poke metal songs.

Speaker 4 (01:44:27):
Sam No He No No, Sam.

Speaker 1 (01:44:30):
He does a blair.

Speaker 4 (01:44:31):
There is a beatdown and there's panic chords. So frankly,
you're just being you're being little Lord font Laury about this.
You've got them what you wanted.

Speaker 3 (01:44:40):
We wouldn't review that. I'm a dwarf digging a whole
stupid metal band. This is that. This is Alestorm for
fantasy losers. People who like this should be bullied this song.
I saw red on this album and I was like,
I can't do this. I didn't think that all were
so bad.

Speaker 2 (01:45:00):
I like dou La Lula at the Drunken I know
this is. I was like, this is where like metal
gets a bad name.

Speaker 3 (01:45:08):
People laugh at metal fans because of ship like this,
or they think, you know, people who don't.

Speaker 2 (01:45:13):
Know metal are like, oh, this is that metals about drinking.
How we like metal the same way.

Speaker 1 (01:45:16):
It sounds like the hobbits in the taverns in Lord
of the Rings when they're dancing on the tables like that,
are you?

Speaker 3 (01:45:25):
I do like that?

Speaker 2 (01:45:26):
But that works, you know, as like a part of
a film. This is genuinely I.

Speaker 1 (01:45:31):
Hear you half the way eyes and Faust when he's
like here he's the man with the iron hand. It
gave me the biggest case of like euro metal deja vu,
where I was like, I'm sure I've heard that before,
and then I realized I was thinking of a glory
Hammer song, which I try not to do much in
twenty twenty five. And then there's a Tanz de Taufel,
which goes for this kind of dark religious grandiosity that

(01:45:52):
is totally Power Wolf's territory. So they do sort of
hop about in you know, bands with maybe more of
their own sound, kind of taking bits from them, and
then at the end they hook up with Lord of
the Lost for a meeting of Germany's most inspired minds.
And you know what, when that guy's voice came at
the end, I went, oh, Fire Swans ain't too bad.
At least they've not covered Keen yet, give it time.

Speaker 4 (01:46:20):
This is the last song was where the good will
just evaporated. Lord of the Lost their sound is so awful.

Speaker 1 (01:46:29):
Are so bad. They gave me the snap to reality
of a fires record. It's amazing.

Speaker 2 (01:46:36):
Thing is I didn't even care. I was like, yeah,
of course all the Lost they hear. This is the
same thing. They're the same, no difference at least in tone.

Speaker 3 (01:46:48):
Sure did any of you listen to the epic versions
of these songs, by the way, because you know this
is the.

Speaker 1 (01:46:53):
Album curiosity they all do that ship it's streaming number.

Speaker 2 (01:46:59):
Isn't it awful?

Speaker 4 (01:47:01):
Nice? I think the I think, do you not think
that the Lord of the Lost entry does to me.
That is so markedly, it's so dour. It's just on
the record. Like even I'm not saying that you have
to think Fireshwan's are cool, because that would be quite
the ask, Lord of the Loss.

Speaker 1 (01:47:22):
Surely like they do?

Speaker 4 (01:47:25):
Does it not reveal the separation?

Speaker 1 (01:47:27):
Yeah? Send me to the Drunken Dragon any day. I
love their Instagram bio that says number one fantasy metal
band from Germany, Like excuse me, have we ever heard
of Blade Guardian? Like can you prove this? One day?
These guys are going to headline back and whilst never
moving past one pm in the UK and will go
so fire funds the night club sad reward for being

(01:47:52):
so brave is will throw a bone of a nice
twinkly emo indie rock type album. This is Pool Kids
and their album Easier Said than Done. This is their
third album. The first came out in twenty eighteen. This
is also I think their first on Epitaph Records, which is,
you know, maybe you have more sort of central prominence
in the rock world than I'd anticipated. Sam tell Us
about Pool Kids.

Speaker 3 (01:48:13):
I mean fair I got into on like very recently
so that they're kind of a sort of a newer
discovery for me.

Speaker 2 (01:48:18):
But I just really like this album. Like it's funny this.

Speaker 3 (01:48:22):
One's been the one on Epitaph because this is by
far their sort of biggest pivot to pop music, having
kind of like gone back and but you know, they
are a rock math rock wherever you sort of want
to do, whether you're sort of labeled as an emo band,
and this is again they're kind of like I guess
breakthrough pivot to kind of like bubblegum pop rock music

(01:48:43):
or you know, just like summary nice like pop rock.

Speaker 2 (01:48:48):
But I just you know, check this out.

Speaker 3 (01:48:50):
And I was like, I am, I like these vibes.
I'm here for catchy pop melodies and like twinkly guitars
and the sort of the rebird thing of that kind
of nineties alternative rock sort of touches on it.

Speaker 2 (01:49:02):
Yeah.

Speaker 3 (01:49:02):
I just found this to be a very kind of
just like nice summer evening. This has been sort of
my evening listened to recently, like sort of.

Speaker 2 (01:49:09):
Cool summer evenings. I don't know how it's going to
like try to that.

Speaker 3 (01:49:12):
I know some people who are into sort of the
sort of power pop like sort of a rock stuff
that's been going on have kind of been really in
on this, so I think it's doing well there, but
I just thought, you know, wanted to sort of shout
out about this.

Speaker 1 (01:49:24):
Yeah, there's something about this record that appeals to both
a kind of like old school nineties Midwest emo math
rock sort of mindset, very sort of delicate guitars primarily,
but then also very you know, twenty twenty five modernizations
and influence drawn from other things, where you know, the
title track has before it then kicks in has these
sort of like bedroom pop synth kind of vocoder effects

(01:49:48):
and stuff before slowly dovetailing it into a kind of
like indie emo song or like Sorry Not Sorry, also
starts off sounded like a kind of contemporary old pop song,
So it feels kind of both like an album for
nineties emo kids and also for zoomas somehow, which is
an interesting sort of you know, combination of things. But
I am interested to hear you say that this is
their pivot into like catchier, more summary pop rock music,

(01:50:11):
because I thought this was so like introspective and so
insular and so kind of timid, like I would not
use words like pop punk or anything like that that
you know, suggests any sort of urgency about it at all.
This is a real like put it on in the
quiet kind of album I thought.

Speaker 2 (01:50:29):
I mean, that's the thing that's it.

Speaker 3 (01:50:30):
It's still quite inspective, but you know, you get songs
like Leona Street, which is just like really sort of
breezy pop music. It's not like Pacey, which again was
why I find it's funny. It's on epitaph like all
things considered, but it is it's still just like a
prettier sort of popular album rather than kind of like
I don't think like I think that they're kind of

(01:50:51):
like to me, almost feels like they're kind of like
transitioning out of like the sort of shoegazy math rock
sort of thing they were doing into like kind of
a popular sound most all keeping enough foot in that territory.

Speaker 2 (01:51:02):
Like there's some moments that are like completely like.

Speaker 3 (01:51:05):
Reverbed up sort of shoe gaze sort of sound with
like the vocals there's so much effects on them. But
it's just again like to me, it's just a very
nice kind of like summer evening vibe.

Speaker 1 (01:51:15):
Yeah, that that sort of mixture of like you know,
very timid kind of indie emo and like old pop
left me completely unmoved, Like this is not of not
of interest to me at all, But for you, what
are kind of you know, sort of the standout moments
or characteristics of it.

Speaker 3 (01:51:31):
I think like the title track sort of start is
like it sounds that. I think the production is really nice.
There's kind of like a nice of inchricate canvas the
band sort of play on where it's got. There's kind
of like pop influence, but it's not basically you know,
there's like really pretty guitar melodies going on throughout it
that they're always kind of like twinkling away tinted windows

(01:51:52):
sort of again like flex that math fox sort of thing.

Speaker 2 (01:51:56):
More.

Speaker 3 (01:51:57):
I think there's songs like not too Late. It is
quite wistful, but it's just for me. Again, this is
very immersive, amay. I can just sort of sing into
the vibes, enjoy the melodies and just go along with it.
And it is like again, it's very minimalistic points, it's
very dainty. There's not much like attitude or kind of
any of that going on. But if you're if you're

(01:52:18):
down for that kind of like prettiness of it, I
think it just sort of really captures that spirit and
that like pleasantness which I've just had a very nice
time listening to.

Speaker 1 (01:52:28):
Yeah, you know, stuff like tinted Windows. It feels very
in that sort of like American football. Again, that's like
kind of nudely math rock emoy world little you know,
stick clacks and stuff going on, the sort of post
rock bits of Danny as well. Like I said, I
was surprised because I'd seen the term pop punk or
at least pop rock thrown around, and I like, I
don't think this is ever catchy, Like it's consistently lightweight

(01:52:52):
and it's content to be quiet and breathy. But I
never hear any point where it like Jams Fourth kind
of like pop punk hook at all. Leone Street is
the closest, which gets this sort of like fuzzy nineties
old rock league guitar, like a kind of more you know,
gossamer sort of counterpart to when dinaldsall pilop just like
waving their hands around, you know. But I just say
as a descriptive to people, so people know what they're

(01:53:14):
getting into, there is basically no rocking going on on
this album. Like it is one hundred hushed and slow
and sad and introspective. You're not coming to this album
for a good time, You're coming for a sad time, Elliott,
and they've been a busy boy. But did you get
a chance to slap this one on and kind of
drift around in its dreaminess?

Speaker 4 (01:53:32):
I didn't, but it sounds part of what you're saying
sounds very appealing and the other part sounds like completely alienating.
To see which one I come down on, because now
I'm really curious.

Speaker 3 (01:53:45):
That's interesting, Like I think also like Danny you might
like because that's one of the more kind of like
Hue Game's ones that does build a crescendo. It's one
of the sort of more longer form tracks on the
album that that is stands against them are kind of
like straightforward pop stuff. But for me, I just was
like like a nice pleasant, a little bit sad, a

(01:54:06):
little bit inspective, but like still has melodies that have
kind of stuck out to me.

Speaker 2 (01:54:11):
There's you know, which is worse has kind of like
some eighties synths.

Speaker 3 (01:54:14):
There's like kind of like little danceball bits on there
that there's always kind of like just little touches that
just catch my ear constantly on this lis when we
go like, yeah, I'm just having a very nice time,
and it's just maybe maybe this is you know, this
speaks to why I couldn't get on board with firest Ones,
because like I want to have like pretty nice like.

Speaker 1 (01:54:32):
I want to dive into the pool in the drunken Dragon.

Speaker 2 (01:54:34):
Is the problem, Like I don't you know, I want.

Speaker 3 (01:54:39):
Perfect View, you know, like nice little like maybe a
little bit too tweers an acoustic ballad perfect View. But
there's a nice warmp to that song for an album
that again like can be quite sad. I think there's
just a very warm coat. It's a very cozy album.
This seming, I mean that's almost the vibe is like yeah,
down for cozy.

Speaker 2 (01:54:56):
This album will will really hit spot for you.

Speaker 1 (01:54:59):
Yeah, it does something where off when a big burst
of rock guitar is about to come in in the chorus,
Like last Word is a song I've got Dan's example,
the kind of quiet loud dynamic. It actually seems to
get quieter when like the chorus comes in, like they
put a muffler on the guitar in the mix, and
that just seems like a massive inhibitor to me, Like

(01:55:19):
it's a really gentle, quiet album, and then they try
and you know, have that quiet loud chorus burst and
the mix completely like stops it going anywhere. So I
find it to be quite monotonous and very you know,
again just uninteresting to me. But it is very you know,
into the very reserved. But I have seen their name
you know, thrown around a little bit in the last

(01:55:41):
you know, week or two or however long as this
has been out from this kind of again kind of
indie pop emo sort of world. And so Sam, you're
saying that this is one of the sort of the
better things to have come out of that world of
this year.

Speaker 3 (01:55:53):
It's one of the ones that start that's caught my
attention and just sort of stuck around in the memory
because there's been quite a lot of that and some
of it sort of like and that's been somebody quite
pleasant but doesn't really stick around. This has sort of
made enough of an impact where I've kind of gone
back to it and just like, yeah, this is this
is this is this is sticking with me.

Speaker 1 (01:56:09):
Yeah, let's flip back over and where me complaining about
a lack of choruses will become really funny because a
very different experience Malthusian the Summoning Bell. This is a
pick firmly for the extreme death metal faithful. When I
was looking at the underground metal picks that will come
out in August, this is one that I was most
excited for. There was the Black Braid album as well,

(01:56:32):
which certainly has more eyes on it, but I thought
would be more interesting to maybe talk about a band
that is new for us that we haven't spoken about before,
even if more people would probably like the Black Braid one,
but I thought it was also an interesting moment for
this band as well. Because Malthusian are an Irish death
metal band, They're part of a small little scene of
bands there that has, like under the Radar, produced some
really cool stuff in the last fifteen years or so

(01:56:52):
on on labels like Invictus and so on. The drummer
of this band, Johnny King, was in one of the
best bands of all time who came up earlier, Alter
of Plagues, as well as being the drummer for Conan
and Dread Sovereign. One of the other ones is Engrave
me Asthma. So there are a kind of connected band
across the like Irish and UK underground metal scene without
ever becoming too well known globally. So I was quite

(01:57:14):
taken aback actually when they announced for this record that
they'd signed to Relapse. So that's a massive jump to
like one of the most legendary extreme metal labels in
the world. So I thought, interesting, what I am Malthusian
up to, Elliott. I know that you know some of
the bands I've mentioned that they exist in and around.
Have you ever heard Malthusium before.

Speaker 4 (01:57:31):
I've never heard the band. I've definitely heard the name.
I recognized the logo, and I think I saw them
when they signed to Relapse, and Relapse is one of
those record record labels where, to this day it still
is such a sign of quality when like an extreme
metal and graduates to that. So no, this was almost
entirely a new experience.

Speaker 1 (01:57:52):
Yeah, this is the band where I can actually go Oh,
I've been into them since the demo, you know, because
I have been following and going to see this band
for like over a decade. At this point, even if
this is own their second full length album, the Demo
and below the Hanger form EP in twenty fifteen, they've
got about four or five records, you know, along with
their studio albums that I think are really great, And
the thing that I think of first with Malthusian is

(01:58:12):
how they are one of the death metal bands in
the current era who most genuinely make me feel diseased
and upset. This is not death metal like Undeath or Sangwy,
super Bowl or Frozen Soul, you know, where it's very
fun and we try and get as many people on
board as possible. This is lightless suffocating. I pity you

(01:58:32):
who cannot fall into this fucking miasma of a record,
you know, tendrils wrapping around you, constricting you. Death metal.
The closest things that we've done that in the ballpark
of it is stuff like Spectral Voice that is just
so bleak and Malthusian, like make my guts inside me,
rot away and shrivel up with the queasy power of
oppressive death metal. They are so fucking evil, like their

(01:58:55):
first full length album from twenty eighteen, so I'd been
a while that I'd be waiting for this as well,
But that album is so sickly and so sonically upsetting.
I cannot recommend it enough. If you want to feel
awful and then you go, oh, you're on relapse now, Okay,
Like this is you know, it's heavy going death metal,
so I am sympathetic to anyone who dips their toe
and goes that's just just like so lightless and pitiless.

(01:59:18):
It's a bit much. How do we get on? I
really like most of this, I mean, save that thought,
I knew exactly what you're gonna say.

Speaker 2 (01:59:30):
Yeah, like red.

Speaker 3 (01:59:31):
Waiting sort of like because you have like that kind
of like sort of start spooky and then like when
this album, like the moment when it goes kind of mental,
goes fucking insane. This album like yeah, it's it's like
it's just push the pall between like these kind of
like totally lunatic moments that are so disorienting and disarming
mixed with them just like the most guttural filth of

(01:59:54):
like just like just sinking into the same there's a
bit of like.

Speaker 2 (01:59:58):
Black of like Blink the Misery. The riffs are like.

Speaker 3 (02:00:03):
Steamroll are kind of like bruted heavy, and it just
like again like when you get to you know, the
slow sections, it is unbelievably oppressive, and it's just that
pushing pall between the insane terms or make ms kind
of like, oh, you know, we sit like listening to
like like riff kind of like pummeling you for a
couple of minutes, and then it's going to go like
that no fuck it crazy section coming in here, and

(02:00:25):
then we're going to go into like a pure doom
sex and I was kind of like, yeah, this is
like way more engaging than I was kind of like
initially expecting, because I was kind of expecting like a slow, reary,
kind of like Doo.

Speaker 2 (02:00:37):
Me Definitel album. So I was having a really good
time for a lot of this.

Speaker 1 (02:00:41):
It's really rhythmically, particularly this bad It's really involved and
very intricate. It's just the space is so oppressive that
you have to kind of you know, you have to
work to get in there.

Speaker 4 (02:00:51):
Yeah, And every time we do one of these extreme
metal reviews where it's about that I kind of knew
that I'm not too familiar with I alway is pride
myself going it is. It's gonna be another one of
those reviews where Hearn brings in a black mel arm
that he absolutely loves and then I just go the
guitars sound like they've been using a recording equipment.

Speaker 1 (02:01:10):
I don't like it.

Speaker 4 (02:01:11):
It sounds that's that's a riff I've just heard. Please
turn it off. You have no idea how happy I
was when this thing just slumped into my ears. Like
the sound of this thing is, it's very adventurous music.
It can be occasionally hard to make out what's going
on because it's so murky. It's not necessarily sloppy in

(02:01:33):
the way that autopsy are or like they say, spectral voice,
but it has that same thing where it feels like
it's been recorded in like a smelly cave, where there's
it's it's it's technical and it's complex, but there's just
there's no sharp edges, there's no lying.

Speaker 1 (02:01:49):
Yeah, it's just rotten. I have the different perspective of
having followed them. I know I say this and sounds
like a dickhead. This album is genuinely the most cleaned
up and the clear sounded like the step up to
a larger label and everything there is a corresponding progress,
and sonically there is a preciseness to the hits here
when the twenty tens material is a fair bit murkier,
and he's really like a bomb bath of sound. You know,

(02:02:11):
the riffs are more legible on this, and so if
there's any entry into this band, it might as well
be this record. You know, but to retain how much
you know, pure unfiltered horror and evil is in their sound,
Like I still hear this and I go, yeah, just
because you're on relapse doesn't mean that you're now appealing
to like the four sided bolt throw a long sleep brigade,
like this is nightmarish. Yeah.

Speaker 4 (02:02:32):
One of the comments I saw in the band camp
for this record is just someone wrote pete as fuck,
and I think that's that's what it is. That's what
it sounds like. Again, don't I love that sort of
death metal? I say that the bolt Thrower four sided
sleeves thing like death mel that sounds like a war
machine or death mail. That sloans are fun, that's you know.

Speaker 1 (02:02:50):
Love it.

Speaker 4 (02:02:50):
I needs to tell you how great there's. Yeah, but
this album sounds like it has ibs and it's had
too much cheese. It's like it's it sounds like it's
got indigestion, and I fucking like it's unless you really
go looking for it. That's quite a rare thing. And

(02:03:11):
I got the fear that's what it's gonna be from
the off because the intro track isolation.

Speaker 1 (02:03:18):
I love stuff like that, even that like fucking hell,
what have I gotten in myself into. It's like being
in the waiting room for hostel or something.

Speaker 4 (02:03:25):
Yeah, because some people just skip into tracks like out
of you know, just habit, they just got I don't
need to get to get to the song. This being
like a three minute collage of half riffs, like random
drum rolls. It sounds like there's a swirling a storm
of ghosts around your head that should weed out some

(02:03:46):
people very nicely and normally that sort of thing like
builds and builds and builds and then it explodes. But
it just it drifts off, like you could feasibly have
this record without this track and it would still make sense.
It wouldn't be less, it wouldn't be any less cohesive,
but it's just such a great mood set of It's
like when you're at you know, the orchestra, so you

(02:04:08):
can hear them tuning up behind the Curse. You just
go like, this is going to be disgusting.

Speaker 2 (02:04:13):
That that isolation in charge kind of like that. I
was like, oh no, I I was like on edge
on that.

Speaker 1 (02:04:21):
I was like.

Speaker 2 (02:04:23):
Looking at the album cover. You know, all the sort
of all the war all the red Flags were.

Speaker 1 (02:04:28):
One of my favorite arts of this year. Just fu
it again. Just scary, that's it.

Speaker 2 (02:04:32):
It's like all the red Flags that I was.

Speaker 3 (02:04:34):
I was like, this could be you know, like a
special voice was the one we reviewed.

Speaker 1 (02:04:39):
Wasn't it a special voice of the Death Doom one?

Speaker 2 (02:04:41):
Yes?

Speaker 3 (02:04:42):
Yes, because again I kind of was like turing that
and then found myself kind of getting immersed out. I
was like itill I be that, or I'm going to
just you know, be immediately turned off and just kind
of like like can do it too much?

Speaker 2 (02:04:53):
Can do it? And I was so because I just
got that vibe from that spooky and I was like,
this is going to be horrible. Is going to be
good horrible or bad horrible, but it's not gonna be
a nice light thing.

Speaker 3 (02:05:02):
And I think it's like I just said, I think
it's a vital mood set for the album, because it
did kind of prime me for it.

Speaker 2 (02:05:08):
And it turns out it was like the good horrible.
It was kind of a horrible.

Speaker 3 (02:05:11):
It was kind of just like this is sickly and
like oppressively miserable and mean. But I'm in on the
world of the album for at least again like two
thirds to three.

Speaker 2 (02:05:22):
Quarters of it.

Speaker 1 (02:05:23):
Yeah, you know, but there's a lot of you know, immolation,
and they're kind of like highly twisted, kind of unconventional
sort of riffing mauthusing basically running with that and taking
it into these like ever dingier death doom sort of
territories where you have these like sharp, scrunky sort of riffs,
but in these like labyrinthine six to eight minute structures
that really put you through the ringer. When red Weighting

(02:05:45):
comes after the intro and the dive bombs at the
start start ramp up, it's so devilish. But then you
know the twists and turns of the low end riffing
and the way they like they'll lay on some really
fucking hellish like tappy lead parts here and then drop
the bass from out under you into like some really
pure death doom, particularly with a drummer like Johnny King,
who I say anytime I get the chance is one
of the kind of unsung players of like the last

(02:06:07):
twenty years of extreme music. There is such physical whiplash
to each groove, you know, like when he moves out
of a blast into a more caveman part. It feels
like getting your spine smacked. I love when between Dens
and Ruin starts literally just going like dumb dumb, dumb dumb,
like total caveman shit. Then is followed by about ten
to fifteen seconds of like almost like jazz falling apart dissonance. Yeah,

(02:06:29):
this only to then tighten the fifth for the blast.
It's like, what an incredible, like forty five seconds of
opening your song. That might be my favorite beyond the record.
We people talk about how much they love like fake endings,
fake starts, Yeah even better. I think there was one
of those on the Spectual Wound record where its Spectual Voice,

(02:06:50):
where it takes off for like forty five seconds and
then just dies.

Speaker 4 (02:06:54):
This is the same thing where the kind of panteric
if you feel like it's going to build into like
four to four slammer in the vein of someone like
on death or autopsy or something, and then it dies
as you're listening to it. It's it's an old autopsy trick.
But whenever it comes up, I just I fucking love it.
And then you said when it starts properly, it feels

(02:07:15):
like a lost Cryptopsy song, but even more shadowy and
even more twisted.

Speaker 1 (02:07:21):
And then the little moment of evil death met or
bass solo in there, which always just gets a hell
yeah out of me.

Speaker 4 (02:07:27):
Ah, Like whenever it's I don't know if it is fretless,
but it sounds thretless where it's like it just bleeds
into all the cracks in the song. That's just when
you're in the mood for that sort of thing. It's
the best sound in the world.

Speaker 3 (02:07:41):
I think for me, Like between Dens and Ruins, that
was when I was like for just sheer, like density
of rifts, the amount of like like different rifts and
just sort of things they'll pack into these songs like
and again they're not short songs, but there's still just
so many rifts and like different ideas and like weird,
horrible avant garde discordant touches they'll throw in and it's

(02:08:02):
kind of like just constantly hitting you with these things
so that he kind of never settles in. I think,
for me, my favorite part of the record, and again
just have no idea how to explain it, is the
start of Eroded into Superstition.

Speaker 2 (02:08:15):
Like that was what I was, like, what's What's what
what's actually going on?

Speaker 3 (02:08:19):
Because it goes on for like several minutes of like
completely unhinged manness.

Speaker 1 (02:08:25):
So I was like, sh it's crazy Emperor in it
that weirdly like it's still that really low end death metal,
but it has that kind of like the wayan sort
of tail end rifts have that weird snaking, like the
kind of weird worming around the ear.

Speaker 2 (02:08:36):
Things like that was what I was going to just
kind of like weird touch.

Speaker 3 (02:08:42):
I was like, I'm gonna be a little kind of blustered,
and it just kind of keeps going for and eva.
It does make you know, drop out into a kind
of like a slower death doing march. There's like barely
vocals on that tracking in when they other kind of
like buried under lesbies where they sound like just weird
demonic noises, and it's just kind of like there's like
that song is just.

Speaker 2 (02:09:00):
Like pure evil, and I'm like, that's that's really cool.

Speaker 1 (02:09:04):
Yeah, there's one part of the end of that when
the vocals just sound suddenly the fucking like uru Khai
are chanting and yelling at you from within their cauldro
and not that Elliot would understand that reference, but you know,
really just like surrounding you with decaying kind of energy.

Speaker 4 (02:09:17):
But then there's also there's a groove in that song
which wouldn't sound out of place on Butcher at Birth.
So as much as this record sounds otherworldly and like
it said, a damp, smelly cave and it's got ibs
and it puts up very deliberate barriers to the listener,
there's also a lot on here which if you are
that more I don't want to say passive, but like

(02:09:38):
more straightforward death metal fan, there's stuff you can grab onto.
It's just might the songs aren't short, and you might
have to wait five and a half minutes and it
might last eight seconds, but it's it's in there. You
just have to wade through it.

Speaker 3 (02:09:49):
That's what I was getting when I said, like that,
how dense here they just packing rists is that they are.
There are moments of that kind of like just kind
of slamming death metal grooveses. I'm just like, fuck yeah,
that that's a sick grip and it is only a
sort of short burst, but like it keeps these songs
from ever feeling too unintelligible and just can keep me
too far Away.

Speaker 1 (02:10:07):
Yeah, the title track was the song they released the
single when they announced they signed to Relapse, and that
does have an immediate first rift. That's it's like an
immolation riff that's been left in the ground for twenty
years and is rotting, but it does just like slowly
roll over your face in a really satisfying way. And
then at the back end we have amongst the swarms
of vermin, which is fifteen and a half minutes plus,

(02:10:30):
then basically a seven minute outro track after it, which
is a fucking ordeal on its own. Silly toot. We
were saying about the intro of combined pure sustained death
metal Torture, where immediately obviously I know who I'm talking
to here. I knew if Sam had, you know, managed
to get in the door in the first place, certainly
we would be out by here.

Speaker 4 (02:10:48):
I know.

Speaker 1 (02:10:49):
But Jesus, the amount of like pain and suffering dished
out there, almost like losing track of where I am
and if I'm even alive by the second half of
it is extreme.

Speaker 4 (02:11:02):
I well, I'm the opposite.

Speaker 1 (02:11:04):
Yeah, absolutely loving this.

Speaker 4 (02:11:06):
Like again, if you don't like the sort of thing
we're describing, I can't imagine anything worse. But if you do,
it's it's like an are you can eat buffet because
this doesn't and it suits this style of music. But
songs like amongst Us one was of Vermin. It's not
like the classic metal epic that's sixty minutes long, where
it goes from this moment to this that moment and
there's a big chorus here and then all this comes

(02:11:28):
back again later. It for the first few minutes, it's
like a pure funeral doom song. It wouldn't sound out
a place on an esoteric record or something like mournful
Mournful Congregation, which is something I do have an appetite for.
But I do like how it just over the tithing,
it just ramps up more and more and more, and
so it's just it's throwing everything at you. It's pretty

(02:11:49):
difficult to follow, but I kind of I enjoy the challenge.
I know, just about twenty minutes ago, I was saying
nice things about voyage funds, but since really this is
this song for sixty minutes long, and seeing a lot
of it is so doomy, I was hooked the whole time.
I found I found the whole thing exciting.

Speaker 2 (02:12:11):
This was just a bit much for me. I like,
this is one of these songs. I know, I don't
even want to, you know, talk down this song.

Speaker 3 (02:12:17):
So I'm like I admire the swing and doing it,
whether you know, the extended outtro I was like, oh, man, like,
but I respect the sort.

Speaker 2 (02:12:27):
Of twenty one sustained minutes of like.

Speaker 3 (02:12:31):
I was like the Great Old ones On movie that
Star Yeah, that had you know, some of those like
really long fulm epic songs that I did like go
with because that they were I think they to me
were more involving, and this is kind of just like, yeah,
we're gonna drag We're just going to drag out the
sort of like bleakness and kind of oppressive.

Speaker 2 (02:12:48):
Noise and like I get to it.

Speaker 3 (02:12:50):
I was kind of going with it for about ten
minutes and then I was kind of I was like
and then like not a knock on youw mauthusians, I've
got I've got to tap out at like there's a
ten minute mark.

Speaker 2 (02:13:01):
Yeah, good, good going. But I don't like because I.

Speaker 3 (02:13:06):
Was like enjoying a lot of this album, but this
was the sort of like I'm too much of a
week now, I've hit my limit fair Fox if you
like punish me enough.

Speaker 1 (02:13:14):
Yeah, I mean I feel like I've got like cartoon
stars floating around my head during most of that song.
It's just like I was in a daze. But there's
one riff in the second half of that song that
they keep bringing back when it goes fast and it's
then and and it's such a sick riff and every
time it comes in, my mind kind of snaps back
to reality and refocuses on it before they then absolutely

(02:13:35):
daze me out again for another like two minutes or something.
And it's this weird like flowing in and out of
consciousness over the course of this fifteen minute death metal song.
It's so heavy, so unforgiving. I love that we have
this in the same episode as Pool Kids and fire Swans.
That's that's beautiful to me. It's not for the fainthearted.
But if you want a death metal record this year
to really inflict some guttural sanity, fraying horror on you,

(02:13:58):
I reckond MAUTHEUSI and These and Masters of It, the
Summoning Bell final record, we get the relief out again,
fased out at Eternity's Edge is its name? Sam you
threw this one out there, and I looked at the
album cover and went, yep, that'll do the trick because
this is straight edge metallic hardcore. This band from Spain,
which cool. We don't review too many Spanish bands, but

(02:14:19):
this is out on the coming Strife Records, which I
can't remember we've reviewed one of their albums before, but
we've certainly mentioned them once or twice because they have
become the place of late for stuff that essentially sounds
like this, like stuff that sounds like metalcore from the
late nineties and early two thousands before it's commercial boom
that is bringing these like edge vibes are like evil

(02:14:40):
mosh riffs. This has got Gustav d'Or a you know,
biblical artwork lader tops and burning buildings or something to
give it that fiery apocalypse vibe, which is a particular
flavor that I favor in my metallic hardcore of this kind.
It makes me think of Archangel and their EP I
love Prayers upon Death Ears and then majorly I put
it on and it sounds like Oka too, So we're

(02:15:00):
good Sam faced out. Yeah.

Speaker 3 (02:15:02):
So I always say, like you said it there, I've
been on like a massive Archangel kick this year after
seeing him live and just kind of like bing and that,
like first EP and the early stuff, and I was
kind of like I've been missing this vibe metalcore, this
evil kind of like metallic riffing, and so when I
kind of just caught on this faced out album, I
was like, that's it because again, like these you know,

(02:15:23):
the Angel.

Speaker 2 (02:15:23):
Statue metalcore thing, it's all the wage and.

Speaker 3 (02:15:25):
A lot of bands are doing this kind of nights
throwback stuff, but a lot of mark and like leaning
more to you know, the poison the World sort of side.

Speaker 2 (02:15:31):
Of things and that sort of thing.

Speaker 3 (02:15:33):
We haven't been getting His Men Bad to World kind
of like downe that purely evil root of metallic hardcore.
And that's why this was when I was like, you
know what, I'm not going to bring all of these
bands onto the podcast because there's so many of them,
and we've kind of discussed it, like it's great to
have some some bands doing it, but are they're getting
a little bit derivative, which I think is a fair point.
But this album just kind of just like leapt out
to me of kind of like this is a nasty

(02:15:55):
metallic harker album that has like big evil dramatically and
actually kind of like a sense of them grandeur to it,
which I don't know, like given the sort of bands,
you know, in the wake of as of this intro track,
you're getting these big lead guitars, but it's super bruising
and it's just like purely kind of just nasty when

(02:16:16):
the beatdown drops and the double sort of kick drum kicks,
and I'm kind like this is just the hardest shit ever.
And then you go into it a fatal sacrilege and
I'm like, yeah, this is just what I want. I
want to swimmer fists around. I want to, you know,
just go along with this sort of vibe and again
for twenty eight minutes, which is down, move on.

Speaker 2 (02:16:33):
I don't think there's a single second I'm just not
enjoying myself.

Speaker 1 (02:16:37):
Yeah, it's got that the euro feel of that kind
of arismetallic hardcore, like the really nasty vegan edge stuff
from like nineteen ninety nine, two thousand, some of the
most like furious, like bloodthirsty hardcore ever made really from
that kind of point in time. And you know, down
to the fact that there's an intro track of like
just dastardly Slayer riffs just immediately split in the pit

(02:16:59):
before then too is the record. The vocalist turns up
and goes aha, and you know he's going to be
spitting blood at you for the remaining twenty five minutes
when you're saying about you know, you bring on these
bands and some of them are very derivative or whatever.
There is no trick on this record. I was surprised by,
like I think this, we could maybe be reviewing this
record as easily as we could really be reviewing any

(02:17:20):
number of bands who are doing this revival thing that's
come out in the last two three years. This one,
like I said, it has the feature of it likes
evil European vegan metalcore from nineteen ninety nine more than
it maybe likes you know, two thousand and one Angel Statue,
Early Avenge, whatever, that kind of thing. So it's cool
to have a flavor of that. But it is like basically,
it's a pile of riffs and breakdowns that do exactly

(02:17:42):
what you expect, but they make you pull a face.
For the duration that it's on the record is almost
as long as the last two tracks on the Malthusium
put together and I am pulling that face for that long.
So's mission accomplished, I suppose.

Speaker 3 (02:17:54):
I mean for me, it's like there's no pivots into
you know, clean vocals. Really it is just pure like
venom and anger the entire type. There are, like I
think he's like, there are like most like the riffs.
You know, they'll they'll look into like a bit more
of a groove at some point. Well, they'll be a
bit more of like I like a bouncy rift that
will come in. So and there's some you know, fun
guess spots. Sorcerer quite a cool hardcore band.

Speaker 1 (02:18:15):
And both like is the more that made me laugh
because there is a cult Swedish doom band from the
late eighties called Sorcerer, who are the one that I know,
And that's amazing. Actually if a band like this started
going all candle mass like twitching tongues too, but I
was like Sorcerer, obviously I knew it would not be,
but it's still pretty cool.

Speaker 3 (02:18:33):
I mean the Sorcer aum that the album has a
guy in chainmail, so you might still like it, Okay, Yeah.

Speaker 1 (02:18:39):
That Songe has some almost like sort of Stockholmie buzz
or yeah, bits as well in the rifts, and it's
really just it doesn't calm down.

Speaker 2 (02:18:45):
Yeah, that's the thing for this, just do it doesn't
calm down for me.

Speaker 3 (02:18:48):
It's just it is just twenty eight minutes of just
like pure metallic hardcore aggression like the some of the
Bone Flower guess Sport, which sound yeah like that's was
that that kind of like like more scream oh kind
of like moment comes into it which does differentiate, and
I'm like, that's a really cool And there's almost like
being like like some like nou metally bouncy grooves on

(02:19:11):
that one as well at times, so they do kind
of like play about with the guitar tones a bit.
But this is just like, like I say, twenty minutes
of just like rifts and rifts and rifts, and I
I'm just like I say, pulling a face kind of
like full body head banging and wanting to throw my
arms around the entire time this is on.

Speaker 1 (02:19:28):
Yeah, you know, Wretched Ascension has like a bit of
a thrash rift that I appreciated. That hit the spot.
As you're saying that Bone Flower feature. The guitars go
almos sort of post hard corey for a moment, so
like even though it is, you know, it's twenty seven minutes,
it certainly is derivative. It does have at the very
least most songs have like a slightly distinguishing feature of like, oh,
this is the song with that little bit in there.

(02:19:50):
I suppose we can use this kind of review as
a bit of a check in point this, you know,
sort of cumming strife sensation amongst the you know, the
current hardcore underground, this wave of bands doing this kind
of like edge that or core revival thing. What for
you is like really excited about that as a thing
to follow in twenty twenty five, And who are the
real standouts of that thing if there are any, Like,
who are the ones who actually really do you would say,

(02:20:12):
kind of rise above the crowd and what the rest
am are really doing?

Speaker 3 (02:20:15):
I mean of that sort of like coming strifing particular
on that label. There was an epy Bay band, crow Quill,
earlier this year. They they they're the one who had
really caught on killing me softly? Are the other like
kind of like real that they're they're the one. They're
They're they're they're very converge leaning, they're you know, purely
like kind of like frantic and like violently flailing like

(02:20:39):
I think they're they're really cool, killing me softly, big
fan of them, of this kind of like vein of
metal cores.

Speaker 2 (02:20:44):
There's you know, other bands outside of that.

Speaker 3 (02:20:47):
Coming strifing sort of globally a band I've kind of
mentioned a few times, but a view from the Sawyers.

Speaker 2 (02:20:51):
They're there again no one where.

Speaker 3 (02:20:52):
They've kind of got the archangel kind of like melody
and kind of evil guitar parts in them. I think
they're really cool, but this is just the sort of
vein of I'm just like I'm wae for these bands,
you know, come out of some to write some like
really great songs. I think it's kidding me softly, Like
on their late DP that came out a couple of
weeks ago, that that that felt like a sort of
step up moment for them in quality. I think obviously

(02:21:13):
again I come what sort label there attactually? But Bow
Moa are the real kind.

Speaker 1 (02:21:17):
Of like waiting for a more album, aren't we?

Speaker 3 (02:21:19):
Yeah, they're all I'm waiting for the album for now
and I'm annoyed they've canced their UK tour. But they're
just a lot of these bands are kind of like
just like showing a lot promises, kind of like right,
come out now with like the Goods. But this is
one where again like because this was not an EP,
so I was like, this is a full album. I
was like, I'm I'm gonna make a shout for this
one on the podcast because a lot of these bands
a just kind of put out EPs, and I just
thought it was like, this is just like it's it's

(02:21:41):
just the antidote to the octane core sort of slop
that we're being served up where if you if you
want male coll to just generally sound just nasty again,
there there is a wealth of it on off for
actually on the coming Strife and various sort of similar
underground labels and areas that you just kind of need
to sort of dig into and you might find the
one that jumps out to you for me. For me,

(02:22:03):
it's been faced out for you from the Sawyers Killing
Me Softly Balmorra, But you might find because there's so
many of these bands, it's a scene that like I
think a lot of people are just kind of like
enjoying as as the antidote to what's going on in
the mainstream yeah, so fased out and at Eternity Edge.

Speaker 1 (02:22:21):
That is seven albums this week for you to sink
your teeth into. I'm sure everybody probably is already sinking
their teeth into the Death Tones album, but that is
our take on it, as well as several more albums
are including some names that you maybe do not know.
So let us know what your favorites are from that
lovely Wee bunch, and let us know what you thought
of Sam's take on Foire Schwan's And are you a

(02:22:44):
patron now of the nightclub of the Drunken Dragon, et cetera.
So cheers everybody. We will be back next week for
a little bit of a birthday celebration. Actually send us
a present, come on, come on, we've given you enoughing. No,
we will see you back here next week for a
little bit of that. If you do fancy getting involved
with something, then you know. As always, the Patreon is

(02:23:06):
the place to be where we have our latest doozy
of a special in the trial. And yeah, we will
be back here in a little while for some really
fun stuff. So cheers everybody.

Speaker 2 (02:23:18):
Bye bye,

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