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Alright, back in the groove (Sorta, kinda) with more of those 2008 albums you like, love, and highly doubtfully you'll buy! But hey, I did buy them, so you can get an idea of what they are like. I got five reviews for you this time, so here we go.

BOREDOMS - SUPER ROOTS 9

Continuing the long-running Super Roots EP series, they get up to nine with this release (Apparently, when they put the 10th one out, they'll make a boxset showcasing all ten eps. FUN!). A live show on christmas eve in 2004, featuring eye, his three drummers, and a 24-piece CHOIR?

Really weird, but very harmonic, and bright in the sound. The first ten minutes is exactly the choir harmonizing throughout, before Eye's 2CDJ/huh? and the drummers burst forth with an improv for the next 30 minutes.

All-in-all it is a Boredoms release so early, late, now, or whatever, it's weirdness. Case-in-point? The case for the cd appears at first to be impossible to open, until youi open the digi to find two slits towards the spine. One has the cd. The other? Sheet music for the entire live set. I s**t you not!

You should go buy this.

5/7

UNEARTHLY TRANCE - ELECTROCUTION

Say, have you ever been skeptical about a band until you just pick up one of their releases and love it? Or better yet, you pick up one and it's jus okay, then you go to another one and LOVE IT!? The track listing is nice, with killer titles if you like killer song titles:

1. Chaos Star 04:48
2. God Is A Beast 07:06
3. The Dust Will Never Settle 05:00
4. Diseased 06:57
5. The Scum Is In Orbit 04:20
6. Religious Slaves 04:19
7. Burn You Insane 05:52
8. Distant Roads Overgrown 12:47

Yeah, this release (And the premise they was playing in Louisville (They didn't.)) sold me onto this band. Some of the harshest doom playing right now, grinding between relenting biker speed with the doomiest flow and molasses dragging DOOM. There's a lot of contrasting sounds revolving around the downbeat and bleak in this album.

Like Burn You Insane, a slow plodder with clean vox until it picks up the pace, and the vocalist gets ******** harsh and sadistic. It's almost catchy in the engaging torment and burns in your head until you've lost your mind with your hearing. HAH! Fitting!

Some songs are still painfully slow alike their previous works, namely God Is A Beast and Diseased. The rest of them seem to burst with speed, and just rip with low, crunching riffage and madness.

But hands-down the highlight of this album is the monolithic closer Distant Roads Overgrown, 12 minutes of DOOM. I think it's highly welcomed to see this band do long songs again, it's sorely missed. The longest track on The Trident was what, seven minutes. Christ.

But this song crunches forward with killer, unsettling riffs and screams. Making Sense. It eventually boards into almost a boogie sound with lots of guitar effects and a nasty bass tone, leading to a anic break-down, then settlign back to a slow-laden, clean sound going to a long, distancing instrumental going back to the DOOM before ending in an ambient closing. Would this s**t be called post-doom-metal or something silly if it didn't have vox? But that'd be irrelevant, this is epic. If epic was H.P. Lovecraft on PCP.

I'd talk more, but this is a must-own for doom fanatics, easily the best album of the year for that genre. Fans of doom as a whole should not question buying this over anything else. This band just seems to get more polished and unrelenting with each release. If this isn't the opus, then this is damn close.

7/7

COFFINS - BURIED DEATH

SICK! This band creates a ******** blend of two VERY ******** genres. Concoting the themes and grunts of death metal and the primitive sludge and bleakness of doom metal, their theme of "doom-death" is something horrific and incredibly unsettling. The music itself is very simplistic with occassional solos and drum beats but the sound itself sounds like something right out of a horror flick! Uchino's grunts gives off a sick, tortured feel to the music.

No wonder these guys fit so well on the increibly gimmicky Razorback Records early in their career. These guys probably invented doom crossed with death (Cathedral's first album is close, but it favors doom more) or at least fermented it. From the sound of the music, you can obviously tell it's a mix of both. Neither genre seems to dominate the other except on the slower tracks. Then again, becasue of the doom sound, the faster tracks all sound slow.

I gotta say the solos are the creepiest thing about this album. They're sludgy and trudging, but very horrifying in sound. They'd fit right well in a cheesy horror flick. Never mind the album cover with the zombies!

Honestly, I don't know why I like it, but I do. Death metal's barely been my cup o' tea, but the doom makes it a million times more unsettling than what's to be expected.

6.66/7

KIKURI - PULVERIZED PURPLE

Keiji Haino and Merzbow, playing together live. And people payed to see it. HOLY. s**t! I heard about them doing a couple shows together and now, for your (dis)pleasure, they put out a live cd of five viscerating improvs.

Needless to say, these two artists stand out strongly on collaborations and they only conduct even stronger together in this release.

The first track (entitled That Which Will Rise From Death Here Tonight Will Go Hand In Hand With A Glittering Echo Burdened With The Sin Of Joy...) is mainly ten minutes of noisy mass (from both artists) and a worn, yet subtle voice howling onwards not too laudly, but audible enough to catch. It easily sets the standard of what to expect but sure dosen't give you everything you'd want.....yet.

The second track is hands down my favorite of the five. First off, like most of the songs here, it has a Haino-styled track, By Mischance That Soul I Devoured Was A Transparent, Vertical Blues...

Next is the song itself, ten minutes of the most mangled acoustics you will ever hear. This thing sounds like a guitar tuned HORRIBLY wrong. It blarbles around while Masami rumbles a low bass and the occassional screech in there. It goes on for a bit.

And then it happens. The beginning of the end. You hear Haino. A howling, painstaking cry spanning the heavens reminiscent of an elderly person detoxing out of bed in desperate need of medication.

******** did I just write that!? But still, Haino screams on and the madness continues, almost concoting a mnightmarish rhythm and these "HOO-WAAAAAH"s that almost turn it into avant-hillbilly music. It's almost impossible to describe without listening. But it is insane genius.

The third song, the hilariously titled Give Me Back That Colour You Stole From My Guts..., is twelve minutes of the Merz wrecking eardrums and Haino.....drumming? Yes, the drums. An instrument so pounding, yet so elusive. Haino cannot drag out drum beats for 376 years no matter how hard he tries so he jsut does his best jazz impression and does a fairly decent improv.

The fourth track is less than ten minutes, and therefore is not acknowledged. But the title track, PULVERIZED PURPLE, is 30 minutes of insanity (And really good drumming by Merzbow!)

Best put it, if you want torture or something completely maniacal, you need to get this. Two avant-giants playing together in the most surreal form. And the best part is people paid money to see this. You can pay money just to hear it!

6/7

GRAND MAGUS - IRON WILL

Grand Magus is back. Nice to see one band that always delivers come back to bring the goods, especially if all had seem lost (Which it wasn't, but oh well.). I really missed hearing from this band and it's good to see they're still delivering killer doom (Or power. Or pagan. Or just heavy. It's hard to tell, especially with JB's amazing voice.)

But yeah, this album just smacks you in the face with the powerful, unrelenting "Like The Oar, Strikes The Water". One thing always to expect with this band is a killer opening track. And it keeps pushing forward with this high-set pace with the song "Fear Is The Key". The new drummer does sound fairly good, but comparing would be pointless, especially when the band has always been tight regardless with their music.

A short filler gives the ears a moment to breathe before the title track pounds with it's riffs. and pound hard it does. And it just keeps pushing forward with a fast-paced thrasher like "The Shadow Knows", pulse-pounding crushing "Self-DecieveR" and "Beyond Good And Evil" and the fantastic black-metal-titled "I Am The North". Their influences for bands like Bathory and Celtic Frost shows greatly here.

Too bad they did the whole "minutes of silence to feature some bullshit" to lead to the ending riff of the last song. Although they did it fairly well, let this be a lesson for any band doing this schtick.

KYUSS COULDN'T MAKE THIS s**t WORK. IT'S HIGHLY DOUBTFUL ANY BAND COULD MAKE THIS STUPID GIMMICK WORK.

Other than that, Grand Magus delivered another fine sonic attack of thrash....er, doom.....black.....huh? I just hope they keep playing kick-a** music and teasing everyone as to what genre they favor the most. No matter what the genre they may definitively follow may be, it equates to one thing in the end.

GOOD.

6/7

On the down side, this writer's block is giving me a head-ache. On the bright side, most bands aren't letting down this year. On the even brighter side, the next journal entry will be even more fun.