Ygolonac - Strange Aeons

Apologies for the unexplained absence for the preceding fortnight, gentle ones, but rest assured that posting will resume with gusto upon the arrival of the new year.  In the meantime, share with me this horrid lump of coal that I found in my inbox.  Another mad one man metal band in the mode of Brown Jenkins or Aarni, this Ygolonac seems fixated on the fictional grimoires of the Mythos, from what can be deciphered from the song titles and the band name.  Ygolonac is the lord of the perverse and sadistic, the only Old One outside of insidious Nyarlathotep capable of taking human form, and notorious for the ravenous mouths screaming for blood from his palms and groin, traditionally cast in the role of curating the library of suppressed tomes which tend to drive mundane minds into madness.  Ramsey Campbell's brutal and bitterly funny "Cold Print" is perhaps the finest Lovecraftian story produced in the seventies, and while the retro vibe of this nasty debut is probably meant to transcend time and space, I can sense a little disco cokestache under all the noise, maybe just slowed down 800x.

Down at the Bookstore

Yob - Elaborations of Carbon

Well, Swamplings, I apologize for the brief lapse in posting once again, but I have squeezed out the end of another wild week and I should note that I might not have endured without the help of Yob's new album Atma.  Yob is one of the longest running and most potent doom acts in the world, and remains a group of genuinely nice people amid a vast ocean of douchebaggery.  I'm not going to post Atma - you should just go buy it - but instead have this first LP, another album that simultaneously encourages spiritual reflection while pelting the listener with anvils from space.  I've been waiting all day to say this:
Take this Yob and shove it

The Old Ones - Manfred

I've been sifting through the archives this week, spurred on by sickness and cabin fever,  eventually arriving at a pile of poorly tagged, low quality mp3's of The Old Ones. Downloaded years ago from the baffling 9 Productions website ( seemingly a relic from 1994 but sporadically updated with new information, despite being 90% perpetually "under construction"), The Old Ones are a classic example of a one-man project driven by sheer love and madness, content to languish in obscurity and bereft of shame or self-awareness.  Existing for years on the same fringes of doom populated by Aarni or Brown Jenkins, this anonymous Czech fellow continues to make music under this moniker - there is another album and multiple singles, and a sequel to this semi-full length is promised sometime this year.  This one is a bit of a mess - I corrected the incoherent tags as best I could, but the volume is wildly erratic, the guitars are tinny and muffled except for the occasional solo, the vocals are too loud, and the drum machine is laughable.  Still, crazy-eyed ambition and enthusiasm go a long way in bands like this, and The Old Ones have no shortage of either.  

I Remember

Shub-Niggurath Please

Vader - Out of the Deep
Morbus Chron - Red Hook Horror
Necromandus - Nightjar
Arkham Witch - Dagon's Bell
Briton Rites - A Meeting in the Woods
Orchid - Eyes Behind the Wall
Noctum - The Seance
The Wounded Kings - Return of the Sorcerer
Innsmouth - The She-Goat Quandary
Portal - Omnipotent Crawling Chaos
Abgott - Book 3-The Eye of Yog-Sothoth
Vasaeleth - Wrathful Deities
Necronomicon - Dreaming of the Old Ones
Thergothon - The Twilight Fade

Happy Halloween

Stoned

In keeping with the spirit of the season, let's all listen to Acid Witch's superior second LP, Stoned.  This album was easily one of my favorites last year, and still gets frequent rotation in the Swamp, especially this week.  Acid Witch explores the sort of death/doom purveyed by Coffins and Hooded Menace, but in contrast to the dark and cryptic vibe of those bands they explode with technicolor gore, like a Suspiria-inspired marker set by Lisa Frank found in the cheap costume aisle of your local grocery store, the kind that get you high as hell.  With festive seasonal gusto in the lyrics and a warm layer of horror-movie organ to fend off the foul weather, and several trippy digressions into cinematic abstraction belying the knuckle-dragging facade, Stoned glows like a pillar of green flame rising from a distant pile of corpses.

Thundering Hooves

Norrsken

Norrsken was the short-lived band primarily remembered today for the two groups who formed from their ashes: Witchcraft and Graveyard.  This ought to give you a good idea what to expect on this apparent bootleg - a heavy-lidded hybrid of Sabbath doom and thuggish psych rock in the Blue Cheer mode.  Contained herein are the "Armageddon/Little Lady" single and the Hokus Pokus demo, along with two comp tracks, covers of Blue Cheer and Trouble's "Psalm 9."  To make things more confusing, there's also another demo (not included here) called Norrsken with a whole different batch of songs than this.  "Little Lady," you'll note, contains an excellent passage of Joakim Nilsson's whistling skills, which were put to great use on Graveyard's killer Hisingen Blues from earlier this year.  There's a bristling, apocalyptic vibe palpable here, an ominous cloud of teenage hormones and pre-millenial dread.

Rest in Space

Arkham Witch - On Crom's Mountain

At last, a new release from Arkham Witch!  I'm breaking my own no-new-releases rule once again here due to my excitement over this album.  Straddling the line between the old-school Lovecraftian doom of Simon Iff's other project Lamp of Thoth and the NWOBHM-informed approach of like-minded bands such as Christian Mistress, On Crom's Mountain isn't deep or particularly dark heavy metal.   Instead, it's a fairly upbeat, joyous drunken celebration of crusty rock n' roll, ragged and righteous.  Of course, there's the requisite Lovecraft/Howard lyrical leanings, along with some witch and viking-related material, and some more cryptic sentiments.  It's still gestating in my ears, as I've only listened to it a scant handful of times, but even now I must go crack another beer and loosen up the old neck muscles - It's tough to headbang and type at the same time.

Through Arkham madness, and lunacy

In gibbous frenzy - we are free!

Eibon - Entering Darkness

Eibon, not to be confused with the Phil Anselmo/Fenriz band, is a French doom act named after Clark Ashton Smith's Book of Eibon, a tome of great and terrible power.  Fittingly, the music they play is hypnotic and repulsive, a black tar pit full of bones.  Sludgy vocals alternate with frenzied, barely audible sounds of panic and madness, as if the narrator was slowly losing his mind.  The occasional blast beat/tremolo part crops up from time to time, but only to heighten the weighty slowness of the rest of the album.   A must have, one of my favorite releases of last year.

Path to Oblivion

Briton Rites - For Mircala

 

Greetings, dearies!  I have once again returned to the Swamp, and am back among you.  Today I have for you one of the great unheard doom albums of the last year, the debut album from Georgia's hirsute Briton Rites. Effortlessly evoking the dark history of doom metal without sounding artificially retro or atavistic, For Mircala is a loose concept album centered around vampirism and Lovecraftian dimensional bleedthrough.  I have a particular weakness for metal bands with literate and diverse sources, and these chaps certainly deliver on that front: the title cut is based on a pre-Dracula vampire novel; "The Right Hand of Doom" is grounded in a Robert E. Howard short story starring his demon-hunting Puritan, Solomon Kane; several other are grounded in Hammer Horror flicks and pulpy supernatural melodrama.  Musically, it owes a heavy debt to the doomier side of NWOBHM, like Witchfinder General of Pagan Altar, with killer vocals from Phil Swanson (of such Swamp favorites as Hour of 13, Seamount, and Atlantean Kodex) and guitars by Howie Bentley of legendary Georgia metal band Cauldron Born.  More importantly, every song is memorable, catchy, and tough - no pretty stuff here, just doom and blood and haze.

The doom evoked by the words he spoke, as the hand began to crawl

Year of the Goat - Lucem Ferre

There's a ton of this occult doom rock floating around these days, so much so that's it difficult to parse out the primo stuff out of legions of clones.  I have discovered this EP by Year of the Goat (from Sweden, of course), and it's quickly one of my most-spun over the last few months.  Fans of Pentagram, Graveyard, Witchcraft, The Devil's Blood, and Noctum will find much to enjoy here: tales of hedonism and regret, crushing fuzz riffs, flaxen hair blowing in the northern winds, and even a cover of Sam Gopal's "Dark Lord."  Hopefully they will release a full length before the darkness swallows them.

She pours cataclysm from her golden cup.

The Slow Death

Abiding my love for obscure sub-genres and strange hybrids, let's all get dragged backwards through this haunting death-doom variation from Australia's The Slow Death. Beginning with sodden blankets of earthy guitar similar to Warning, and exchanging Patrick Walker's ghost-ridden anguished vocals for some spooky siren whisperings way up at the high end of the register, and some Skepticism-styled funeral growling on the low end, this self-titled LP is their only release. A widely varying pace and sinister internal logic, not to mention the occasional horror movie keyboard melody, give it the air of an ill omen. Interestingly, some of the members of this band are also in the wildly dissimilar Corpsickle and Murkrat.
Dark Days

Pentagram - Sub-Basement

Much like this imperfect but undervalued Pentagram album, I have spent many decades in the dank underground today, and I only just re-emerge under the deadline to slime out this gibberish upon my keyboard and hope that it reaches some vigilant ears somewhere out in the cosmos before I dissolve into an unrecognizable jelly and the tide goes too far out.
Sub-Intro

Orthodox - Amanecer En Puerta Oscura

Spain's Orthodox plays a curious hybrid of hypnotic drone-doom, bass-driven bop jazz, and liturgical chant informed by the folklore of their native land. For those skeptical of that description, know that they sound completely unlike any other metal band, and have been one of my personal favorites since their first release. This year's Baal is an instant cult classic, but this second album is perhaps the strongest and most coherent statement. Equally influenced by Mingus, Morricone, and the Melvins, this strange and slowly unfolding flower rewards careful and repeated listening. The vocals take a distinctive tack too, warbling and ululating like one of Edison's wax cylinders, a transmission from beyond
time and reason. Frankly, I'm surprised I haven't posted anything by them yet - this is the kind of thing that keeps the Swamp florid.
Templos

Pagan Altar - Lords of Hypocrisy

Skirting the doomier edges of the NWOBHM, Pagan Altar played a stoic, dead-serious brand of heavy metal drawing influence from the first Black Sabbath album's graveyard shuffle and Paranoid's war-pig politicism, while delving further into the realm of mystic lyricism. Right off the bat, the title track comes stomping out of Stonehenge decrying the evils of war and greed, immediately followed by the doomsaying "Satan's Henchmen," arguably another war parable. This relentless pace eases up a bit as the album progresses - the b-side is more expansive and subdued, but the closing number fulfills the promise of Armageddon. Terry Jones's instantly recognizable, haunted vocals are another huge draw here - full of fear and anger and sadness, they really elevate the album above the legions of bands playing in this style today. Alas, the man will probably never be spoken of in the same reverent tones as your Ozzys or your Dios (or Halfords, Dickinsons, etc.) but in my mind he really is in their league as a frontman.
Strangely, Pagan Altar never managed to release a proper album during their initial run as a band, but a late-nineties reunion managed to produce a stellar crop of albums, of which this is the second. The gods of doom may move slowly, but sometimes they reward the faithful.
Death will come to even the righteous
Only the good die young

H.C. Minds - The Beginning of the End

Like many of you, I have been basking in the dark radiation of the new Yob album repeatedly for the last several days. I'm not going to post it, but I will unleash this monstrosity from H.C. Minds, for which Mike Scheidt and Travis Foster of Yob once played. While HCM trades in a crusty doom style not dissimilar to Yob, it is nonetheless more filthy, nasty, and preoccupied with apocalyptic matters, making it right at home here in the Swamp. Elements of the nastiest Amebix-worship hardcore creep in around the edges too, lending a particular stink to the proceedings. Lots of ugliness, nihilism, and pessimism here, oh joy.
Land of the Wargoat

Fear No Pain

Lord Vicar is the group founded by former Reverend Bizarre guitarist Peter Inverted and vocalist Christian Lindersson, most notorious for replacing Wino in Saint Vitus on the under-appreciated "C.O.D." album. It's about what you would expect - molasses paced swaying doom riffs, eldritch lyrics, and crushing despair and hopelessness. Strangely it also sounds wonderful while I am sitting on a porch, sipping on a fruity girly drink, whiling away my first day of downtime in weeks. Ponder the futility of human existence and pass the pomegranite juice, you wanker!
Pillars Under Water

Eight Hands for Kali - Mount Meru

I had a dream last night that Sunn O))) released a documentary film about soup entitled, of course, Soupp O))). What does this mean? Hopefully nothing, aside from the fact that it's a bad idea to eat leftover enchiladas before bed, but it did remind me that I haven't posted anything by Eight Hands for Kali in over a year. Featuring Topo from El Natas and Tas from Electric Wizard, this Buddhist War Doom band creates smoky, sinister snake-charming metal as hypnotic and resinous as opium. Although this album is a scant half hour, criminally short for this kind of music, it nonetheless packs a serious wallop and may leave you drooling and soiling your drawers.
Apocalypse Love Hypnotized

Devil - Magister Mundi Xum

It's a bit difficult to properly convey the sense of foreboding and gloom on this doom demo from last year while this kitten writhes around on my lap and sheds upon my keyboard, but let's say it's a fair shot between Ghost's Blue Öyster Cult/Mercyful Fate hybrid and the swaggering bell-bottom blues-metal of your Pentagrams and your Witchcrafts. There's an album from this year you'll want to look into if this whets your appetite, but be sure to spit out all the cat hair first.
I Made A Pact

Black Land - Extreme Heavy Psych

Yet another self-explanatory doom album, but keep in mind that the Italians tend to do it weirder than anybody. So, how far out are you ready to go? Some minimal research reveals a mysterious history of typical opaque personal weedian occultism:
"....at the beginning the band started experimenting by fusing sounds of stoner and heavy psychedelic rock with the typical reflexive mysticism of doom, and it’s from those atmospheres and by the convergence of each own personal background that Black Land’s songs took their origin.
The first “confused” exibitions took place mostly in squats, and other underground locations in Rome and in the rest of Italy (without producing any record or demo)."
Gibberish or genius? Remember that Italian metal is famous for both.
Holy Weed of the Cosmos

Noctum - The Seance

There must be something in the water over in Sweden. Noctum, following in the footsteps of countrymen Graveyard and Witchcraft, present us with a rock-solid slab of groovy doom on this debut LP from last year. Not quite as eclectic or psychedelic as the former and not as Roky-influenced as the latter, Noctum instead relies on old-fashioned mystical mumbo jumbo and swaggering heaviness to make an impression. Come take my hand...
Den Onda Trollpackan