ALBUM REVIEW: Mono – Oath


A sensuous, rapturous and thought-provoking collection of superior, post-rock instrumental music, Oath (Pelagic Records), from Japanese four-piece Mono, was recorded and mixed by late, great and already much-missed engineer Steve Albini, who passed away last month, aged 61.Continue reading


Emigrate – A Million Degrees


With fiery Germans Rammstein readying their seventh studio album for early 2019, guitarist Richard Kruspe has chosen the optimum time to release A Million Degrees (Universal/Spinefarm), his third “solo” record under the Emigrate banner.Continue reading


BlackLab – Under the Strawberry Moon 2.0


 

What is it about Japan that means they can produce such good doom bands? Hailing from Osaka, BlackLab is made up of duo Yuko Morino (guitars, vocals) and Chia Shiraishi (drums).  Though technically the pair’s debut, the ‘2.0’ is to highlight the fact this is the band’s original demo give a polish and a re-release on a proper label. The core sound is still intact though; rough around the edges doom with plenty of creepy atmospherics.Continue reading


Napalm Death’s Barney Greenway Performs “My Life” With Sick Of It All In Tokyo


Sick Of It All wrapped up their headlining tour of Japan last night in Tokyo, and had a special surprise in store for the sold out audience at ACB Club. Continue reading


Metallica Release A Previously Unseen Live Video Of “Battery” From 1986


Metallica recently announced that their highly anticipated reissue of Master of Puppets will be hitting stores on November 10th, and we have another preview of what to expect today. Continue reading


Foo Fighters And Rick Astley Rickroll The Summer Sonic Festival In Tokyo


Do you remember when Foo Fighters “Rickrolled” the Westboro Baptist Church back in 2015? At that time, it was one of the best “Rickrolls” ever, but the band took the prank to a whole new level over the weekend. Continue reading


DVD Round Up – The Rolling Stones, The Jam, Black Stone Cherry, Ritchie Blackmore


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If the surfeit of Christmas tinsel, chocolate and nostalgia is enough to drive you to immerse yourself in a VAT of Jaegermeister, or if you have already had enough of Christmas “specials” of television programmes that weren’t actually that special to begin with then, during this holiday season you could while away some hours with some of the really rather excellent music DVDs that are available from your local emporium of choice.

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Here at Ghost Cult Towers we have literally toiled hard from our sofas to check out the ones that are worth parting you from your hard earned cash. Top of our proverbial pile is, perhaps somewhat surprisingly, The Rolling Stones. Those lovely folk at Eagle Rock Entertainment have been slowly but surely releasing some terrific footage of Jagger and co at various points in their historic pomp. Live from The Tokyo Dome 1990 and Live at Roundhay Park 1982 are two cases in point. Filmed in 4:3 ratio (and considerably pre internet) the first is a spruced up version of a TV special that celebrated the band’s arrival in Japan and the culmination of their Steel Wheels Tour. ….Roundhay Park, filmed eight years earlier when the band were battling to retain relevance in a world dominated by post disco and New Romantics, is equally compelling. What could have been exercises in simple nostalgia actually turn out, thanks to the wonders of remastering, upscaling and a new audio track (thanks to sound wizard Bob Clearmountain) to be performances of considerable panache and verve, mainly thanks to Jagger and Richards being on particularly good form and yet more evidence, should it be needed, as to why this band are regularly regarded as the best live experience on the planet. These are the sort of DVDs that PR companies will say are “a must for any fan”. In this case, they might actually be right for once.

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About The Young Idea is a quite brilliant documentary about UK mods The Jam and, in particular, frontman Paul Weller. This is very much a warts and all documentary, ultimately sympathetic to the threesome, placing them appropriately in the canon of great British bands of the late 20th century. What resonates in this film is how diverse the band were in terms of influence and inspiration before what now seems like an inevitable breakup in 1982. Packed with brand new interviews with the band’s principal protagonists, About The Young Idea reveals itself as part insightful documentary, part labour of love, all fabulous music. If you remain sceptical after watching the film, then have a look at the accompanying live concert footage from 1980 where the band’s energy, anger at injustice and clarion calls to the youth to change the world around them can be seen in full effect. Indispensable.

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Shifting decades and gear somewhat, Black Stone Cherry are the hard rock underdogs made good and this energetic live concert film, Thank You shows just why. Their early career saw them somewhat unloved in their home country (USA) but they were soundly adopted by the UK and Europe and have subsequently built a fairly decent career, including notable performances at Download festival and their own sell-out arena tour, which this film documents. Black Stone Cherry are one of those bands that tend to divide audiences but, for the uninitiated, this is a standard concert film where, if nothing else the band are ridiculously hardworking, highly energised and pretty much adored by their fanbase. As souvenirs of their well received 2014 tour go, this is the one to own – it’s miles better than their over-priced t-shirts anyway…

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And so we come to The Ritchie Blackmore Story, which is a well-produced, insightful and fascinating talking heads style documentary about one of hard rock and heavy metal’s most revered and talked about characters. This is a DVD worth owning, not just for the vintage footage but thanks to brand new and exclusive interviews with the main man himself. You get a rounded picture of what drives and inspires one of rock’s most feted players. Pretty much everyone and anyone turns up to pay their respects- there’s Queen’s Brian May, Jethro Tull’s Ian Anderson and Gene Simmons all saying very nice things and Joe Satriani and Toto’s Steve Lukather revelling in being true fan boys but it’s Ritchie himself, entirely appropriately, who is the star of this. It’s the kind of DVD that you’ll watch time and again and the kind of DVD that will make you want to rediscover or (in my case) discover the man’s music.

Job done, then. Merry Christmas.

 

MAT DAVIES

 

 

 

 

 


Coffins – Craving To Eternal Slumber


Coffins - Craving To Eternal Slumber

Going on 20 years as the colossus of Japan’s extreme metal underground, Tokyo’s Coffins has shown no signs of slowing down. Boasting 4 weighty full lengths and no dearth of EPs and splits, this latest offering from Tartarus, entitled Craving To Eternal Slumber (Hammerheart America), is what we kindly refer to in the biz as “more of the same”. This is no fault however, as their œuvre has suffered from no shortage of death/doom cannonading that borrows from the crush of DM veterans Incantation, sludge impresarios Buzzov*en, and the rolling punk inflected gallop of Ilsa. I could go on, but to over-complicate Coffins’ mephitic, yet basic stew is to ovsrstuff the cauldron.

Being a short and sweet handful of songs, and the second major release featuring the new line-up, opening track ‘Hatred Storm’ charging in like a loose, and rather ticked off pachyderm. Alternating between Swedeath romps and grooving headbang sections, complete with a sweet solo by axe-cutioner and former frontman Bungo, the dynamics are set in place for the rest of the effort. The production, in following with previous LP The Fleshland, is considerably less thick and wet than it was in times past, but their sound is no less suffocating, as evidenced by the title track’s menacing, swampy lurch.

While the EP does hold up to multiple listens (I may be on my 10th now), its strengths lie primarily in the tracks that sound a bit more, for lack of better word, ” written “. The title track, despite its initial plod, picks up your attention with a sample of a man being tortured, adding a whole new dimension to this exploration of misery. Opener ‘Hatred Storm’, with its initial kick to the teeth, and the grand neckbreaker that is closer ‘Decapitated Crawl’ also hold the primary meat of interest, not to say the other tracks are at all gristle. A delectably rotten teaser, as Coffins is nothing if not infinitely industrious with their (a)musical output, and will continue sculpting new visions of horror for what I hope is another 20 years. At least.

7.5/10

SEAN PIERRE-ANTOINE