Tag Archives: Portal

Vastum – Hole Below

Posted on by

a1307917939_10

Vastum’s second album Patricidal Lust (20 Buck Spin) made quite an impact when it was released in 2013, offering Death Metal fans who weren’t convinced by the Portal-inspired trend towards abstract dissonance a more conventional but equally engaging alternative. It also made waves due to Vastum’s unorthodox use of sex and relationships as lyrical content, though it has to be said that they address those topics in a straight-forwardly Death Metal way – when their new album opens with a track called ‘Sodomitic Malevolence’, you know we’re talking World’s Greatest Love Songs.

After two years of waiting, Hole Below (20 Buck Spin) continues both the band’s fascination with the dark side of human relationships (‘In Sickness And In Death’, ‘Empty Breast’) and their mastery of cavernous but melodic morbid Death Metal. Vastum’s sound is much more rooted in DM orthodoxy than Portal and their imitators, but this is no crude exercise in “Old School” revivalism, either. A thick, powerful production enhances song-writing that forges Autopsy’s murky melodies to solid, punishing grooves and even a touch of the abyssal atmospheres explored by many modern Death Metal bands.

Hole Below sees Vastum explore their Doom and atmospheric elements more deeply than they did on Patricidal Lust, and the result is an album that perhaps lacks a little of its predecessors instant appeal, but which rewards perseverance. Big, decayed riffs drown in treacly feedback are still the core of their sound, but songs are structured less for violence and more for a slow-building of atmosphere.

Along with Cruciamentum, Vastum have produced some of the best straight-up Death Metal of the year. Not as brutal, as abstract or as alienating as some, but firmly treading a path which embraces Death Metal’s past as well as its future.

 

8.0/10

 

RICHIE HR


Ramon Ortiz – Portal

Posted on by

Ramon Ortiz PORTAL CD cover 2015

Being stuck between three cultures is interesting, although also difficult at times. The metal and rock worlds always draw me back in but so do my Boricua roots so it really shouldn’t have been any surprise that I became emotional over a recording of Coquis singing. Like the saying goes; la sangre llama.

Today’s review is brought to you by the letter R, as in, Ramon Ortiz and his second album, Portal (Self-Released). Taking a look at the title track, ‘Portal’, has some groovy moments with a lot of weedly, weedly, woo. The chorus sounds like something that could have been featured in an action cartoon from the 80’s. I believe that it would be one that I would look back on with fondness.

At twelve and a half minutes long, closing track ‘Yukiyu II’ is a beautiful mix progressive metal elements with Spanish guitar and touches of Latin percussion. This is also one of the songs where you can actually make out the bass in the background every once in a while. The downside is that this eventually turns into your standard progressive metal track around the eight minute mark. It makes a slight recovery once you get to ten minutes before dropping off again soon after.

It may not be salsa or merengue but then again, Puerto Rico has always been a melting pot of cultures and music and Ramon is a great example of what can come out of it. I would have liked to have heard more Latin influences but maybe we get enough of that when Ramon’s running around with Puya. Personally, the albums highlights for me were the use of Spanish guitars. I may be biased, but I prefer Ortiz’s fusion style and this record has a bit too much of a general progressive metal record vibe to it. I was hoping for some more experimentation and expansion.

7.0/10

ALEIDA LA LLAVE


Albert Mudrian – Choosing Death: The Improbable History of Death Metal & Grindcore (Reissue)

Posted on by

choosing-death-revised-and-expanded

Released twelve years ago, Albert Mudrian’s anthology of Death Metal has stood the test of time; an engaging read taking you on a loose zig-zag through the birth and, um, death of Death Metal. Unveiled through the eyes of its’ progenitors, there is method to the tale that begins in England, moves to Tampa, takes in Entombed and Scandinavia and reserves a special mention for the oft overlooked Dutch input of Gorefest and Pestilence.

Undertaking a task as complicated as trying to find the true source of the Nile (Karl Sanders – badoom tish!), Mudrian begins his tale by trying to uncover the birth of what became known as Death Metal, settling on Napalm Death and their 1985 era hybrid (Siege meets Discharge meets Celtic Frost) of hardcore punk, thrash and a desire to be harder, faster, sicker than everyone else. The book then focuses on the influence of their Scum release (Earache) on other vital artists, like Morbid Angel (via Pete Sandoval, then in Terrorizer) and the incestuous, small nature of the scene where, due to tape trading and pen palling, most of Death Metal’s predominant protagonists all knew and inspired each other.

As the tales unfurl, you find yourself swept up and wanting to revisiting all the classic albums that are mentioned – Possessed ‘s Seven Churches (Combat), Pestilence Consvming Impvlse (Roadrunner), Massacre From Beyond (the story of Massacre’s signing to Earache being another fun aside revealed in the book) and Master Master (Displeased) forming part of my own soundtrack while reading.

The re-issue picks things up as the roots of recovery were just sprouting through the top soil at the tail end of the 90’s, highlighting the rise of a new DM general in Nile. After touching on the diversification of Death Metal of this millennium, including the mind-sucking brilliance of Portal and their focus on eldritch, dark atmospheres, Mudrian covers the popularity of technical Death Metal (a section that introduced me to Necrophagist and Obscura as you can’t help but be enthused to check all the recommends as you go) over the last decade. The tome now concludes by covering the return to the scene of the apex predators with Carcass, At The Gates, Death (DTA) and others reforming to reap the benefits of their respective legacies and the rewards of the now lucrative and high profile festival market, and to satisfy an urge that, in the case of Bill Steer, they didn’t even know they had. If you read the original, the added content is an agreeable appendix.

Peppered with short anecdotes, but above all an informative and enjoyable potted history of Death Metal, all imparted with the enthusiastic love that a doting parent has for a child, Choosing Death is an affectionate, if whistlestop, walk through of the story of Death Metal to date. In the authors’ own words, he is “Just  a fan. Just like you.” He just happens to be a damn good writer who has written The Improbable History of Death Metal & Grindcore. And updated it.

Buy the book here:

 

8.5/10 

STEVE TOVEY