Skeletal remains - Condemned to misery (2015)

Condemned to Misery is the second album from Skeletal remains. They are from California but their old school death metal has clearly a floridian taste. On the more melodic and technical side of floridian old school death metal. Yes that means they sound closer to Death than to the other floridian death metal great beasts. And they're paying a good homage to the forefathers, they sure knows how to craft a good death metal song and play it with the musicianship the style asks for. Condemned to misery is really an enjoyable death metal album.

Their Bandcamp page.

Rotten sound - Abuse to suffer (2016)

The new Rotten sound album, Abuse to suffer is in direct continuation of the previous one, somewhere between Napalm death and Entombed. And this time the old school swedish death metal elements is maybe even more present. So the album is related to grind but I'd say Rotten sound is more a death metal band that is often accelerating to grind speed than a grind / death band. If you're just looking for grind and don't like old school death metal, Rotten sound is not for you (or go to their album "Murderworks"). Otherwise this is an enjoyable album, like Rotten sound knows doing. Nothing groundbreaking but solid stuff.

Their Bandcamp 

Chestburster - Slime and guilt (2016)

Chestburster is a new Svart records finding from Finland. Their first album Slime and guilt sounds like a nice and dirty mix of bands like Turbonegro, Danzig and Unsane, somewhere between hard rock, punk rock and noise rock. And they'll also surprise you with some blast beats and sax parts thrown here and there. Definitely cool and surprising stuff. The ballad in the middle of the album is a bit too long, but otherwise everything is really good, the album managing to create a special atmosphere of raw, dark and sleazy rock'nroll, not afraid to venture into noisier and more radical territory.  Recommended!

The Svart page for the album

Blown out - Jet black hallucinations & Planetary engineering (2015)

Blown out is one of the band with the guitarist Mike Vest from Newcastle upon Tyne (UK) who also plays in 11Paranoias, Bong , Lobster priest, Haikai no ku, etc. In Blown out you'll find the heavy and trippy elements that you find in every Mike Vest bands, taking the form of an instrumental space rock power trio. They released two excellent records in 2015 Jet black hallucinations and Planetary engineering, and I'll do one review for both because basically it's the same stuff. Heavy rock with a lot of psychedelic lead guitar with fuzz working with the drums & bass grooving rhythmic section. On these records Mike Vest shows once again that he's a major player in the heavy psychedelic scene with a strong distinctive style. If you're into heavy psychedelia you needs to listen to this. Stoner space rock at its finest. Strong stuff.

The Blown out Bandcamp page.

Howls of Ebb - Cursus Impasse : The Pendlomic Vows (2016)

Howls of Ebb, from San Francisco (or is it from some Lucifer's psychotropic dreams?) plays a kind a death metal you don't know existed. A kind of "free and psychedelic" death metal. Death metal use to be very predictable but Howls of Ebb brilliantly shows that it can be completely otherwise. Cursus Impasse : The Pendlomic Vows is their second album, also on I, Voidhanger records. It's a bit different from their preious release The Marrow veil EP (read HERE my review), the songs are less atmospheric, faster and more concise. But still they're far from following traditionnal structures and the drumming and guitar playing is far from traditionnal death metal (. They maintain your attention through the album, surprising you at every turn, displaying a level of creativity hard to match. And it's far from experimenting for the sake of it, no, it's free from standard songwriting structures, but manages to be "catchy" and memorable. It makes other albums sounds flat and one-dimensionnal. If you listen to just one death metal album these days, try this one. Highly recommened!

The Bandcamp page.

Skullfuck - Day of the black sun (2016)

Skullfuck is an awesome free jazz spanish duo (drum & tenor sax). Their new album Day of the black sun is released on Norwegianismrecords, which has nothing to do with Norway but is linked with the band Dead neanderthals from the Netherlands. And if you like Dead neanderthals you'll like Skullfuck. But they are not clones, in fact they often sound closer to afro-american free-jazz than to european free jazz. I mean the drumming has something more primal / tribal (there's even a bit of didgeridoo playing), less abstract, and the sax playing has a more melodic side, and I'd say it has a jazz feel that european free jazz has lost. The trippy / ritualistic feel the album have reminds also a bit John Zorn's Painkiller (but the Zorn influence is less present than on their previous album Catalogue of horrors).There's even some noise / drone parts in the long closing track. Day of the black sun is a very stong album that easily put Skullfuck among the best wild free jazz bands. So far my favourite free jazz album for 2016 and it will be hard to beat.

The Bandcamp page

Ghold / Dead existence split (2015)

This is a really good split with two bands related to the english sludge / doom scene, Ghold and Dead existence. Each band plays an original and a cover. It starts with the Ghold original. On this track the bass & drum duo formula of Ghold works really well, with some tribal rhythmic patterns that reminds a bit Sepultura, but better. Then it is Dead existence doing an excellent cover of Autopsy ("Ridden with disease"), can't argue with that... the third track is the Dead existence original, sounding a bit like a rawer Crowbar. Good stuff. The split ends with Ghold cover of Man is the Bastard ("sutee") which is not very memorable. This last track is the weaker one, but overall this is a really good split between two really good bands.

The BC page.