Controversies and passion for freedom expression have always been the root of this masters of music in general! DEP have shown patiently, how a band comes to surface, without making a single compromise to anything nor anyone.

After years of digesting everything Faith No More and Mike Patton have taught us, about freedom and musical expression, they’ve made it to their fourth full length release.

“Option Paralysis” cannot be described in a text, as the shocking truth should be faced in a sincere and closer listening. These ten brilliant new songs sound amazing. This band has developed their super unique and extraterrestrial style through hard work and they’ve already made it clear they’re here to stay. Monumental!.

I’m afraid that anything I might want to try to express or write, will not be enough to convince you. This is the ultimate release for year 2010!

First fact is that Warrior is angry. Very angry. Full of rage inside him, furious from the pain that surrounds him. He has the urge to make us all understand what he’s coming through. He wants us to stand by his side, as this is a big bet for him. He is not a person who would care about press reviews or fan opinions, as he has been demonstrative in his whole lifetime. Each release he ever did was different and in very hard times back then. Don’t forget what happened when Celtic Frost released either ”Into The Pandemonium” or ”Cold Lake”. Not to mention his Apollyon Sun days where none understood what he was doing back then.

This time, Triptykon sounds ready to stay among us and conquer the world. This album is the definition of negativity in all matters. It’s blacker than a thousand nights without stars. It’s heavier than a valley of anvils falling straight to your head. It’s so hateful and bitter that you’re going to feel that walls surround you, even if you’re outside on the road and listen to it through headphones. Finally, it’s so threatening that you get the feeling that the creatures of the morbid and phenomenal cover of the album are going to attack you, leaving you soulless and unaware of everything, without need to kill you. Just make you stun and obey to them.

From the first moments of ”Goetia”, the 11 minute opener of this atrocity, what you knew of your past is going to end. Then a dividing line will enter your mind and your whole being will pass the other side and never look back. Warrior sounds so confident and aggressive here, no argues he has come to set new boundaries in our whole scene, especially with the next track ”Abyss Within My Soul”, which could become the trademark of this release, doomy and swampy as hell. Pure trademark of Warrior’s songwriting for about three decades. Only this time it is evolving into something even more monstrous.

I can write so much about this release that has sent me to hell and back, with Limbo, Abyss and many outer planes as inbetween destinations. I see monsters surrounding me, staring at me threatening, just to make me shit my pants. They don’t look hostile, just certain I’m going to be a slave to them. How can eight songs (plus the sickening ”Shrine” interlude) and 72 minutes make someone look lesser than everything and everyone? Unaware of what’s around me I declare myself as defeated by Triptykon’s uniqueness. Some would say this is ”Monotheist” part 2. I just say it is an album that leaves ”Monotheist” behind, as it is totally different in all ways.

Though the songs were written for what was to be Celtic Frost’s new album, Warrior managed to give them another identity. Just a living of nearly 20 minute opus ”The Prolonging” will convince you for sure. Enough and also so little said about this. Hats off once again. What fears me most is that they may surpass this in the future. Lord have mercy on my soul…

In these 45 minutes of their last effort and first for the colossus called Nuclear Blast Records, Immolation manage to leave us speachless. How can somebody describe this morbid and grim atmosphere in their music? How can your soul not feel in the grasp of something that will soon tear it apart? How can’t the sense of fear and inferiority overcome your whole existence while listening to the first notes of ”The Purge” and ”A Token Of Malice”? How can’t the title track convince you that this is real and you are profoundly helpless?

The dynamic duo of ”Divine Code” and ”In Human Form” maims your soon to be corpse in much pieces, until ”A Glorious Epoch” brings darkness to earth, with its whistling riff getting inside your vains like a drug you don’t want to get rid off. ”A Thunderous Consequence” and ”The Rapture Of Ghosts” mangle your mind with no hesitation, and when you think it is finally over, ”Power And Shame” and ”The Comfort Of Cowards” kill you and resurrect you from the beginning and what you knew of your former life is long gone and never to return again.

I haven’t listened to such a complete release for about two years. It’s amazing how a death metal album can create such a suffocating atmosphere. It’s amazing how the level of compositions has been raised to their last three albums. ”Harnessing Ruin” and ”Shadows In The Light” had set the stage that something big was following but even if we know how great Immolation is, this is beyond imagination. Robert Vigna kept his best for this album and Ross Dolan sounds in his best shape ever in the two decades of the band’s existence.

What we call blackness, finds its definition in this album. This awe is what somebody would feel in the old years when Celtic Frost released records back in the day. I don’t know how else to state this. A great lesson that music doesn’t get in genres and if you want something that is atmospheric, pitch black like a starless night, doomy as hell in parts and thrashing its way to absolute greatness. This album has it all. Except one last thing: There is absolutely no decay in Immolation’s music. Only pure majesty. Blessed be the ones to feel its uniqueness and live with it through the years to come…

Need is exactly built to fit to my personal likings of pure metal sound. First of all they are god damn heavy. Combining the heaviness of Metallica, Pantera and Nevermore, the progression of Dream Theater and Tool, the poetry inside the music of Savatage and Fates Warning and in terms, the diversity of bands like Meshuggah or Fear Factory, the result is simply amazing. The guys are making a pure statement of what soul and open mind is on this album. Songs that either make you bang your head towards all directions or even paralyze your senses and make you just sit and observe the sounds coming out of the speakers.

Ravaya causes constant orgasms to his six string guitar, pulling its guts out with his gigantic riffs and the bizarre changes in rhythms where needed, followed by the exceptional rhythm section of K.K. (not Downing) on bass and Peter on drums, which is a strong card to the band’s whole effort to create something different and special. Jon V. is a singer who won’t overreact by reaching high-pitched sequences, he’s always to the point, making his voice sound like velvet in tracks such as ”Inbetween”, the most emotional moment of the album and generally being the driving force to the Need vehicle.

From the first notes of ”Rainy Pieces Of Hell”, your neck is going to do the left-right and up-down trip many times. ”Soon” is one of the cleverest songs ever to be written the last years, while Fates Warning would be dying to write a song like ”Lie Before You Sleep”, simply because they can’t. ”Flesh Machines” is a pure Nevermore worship, which doesn’t mind me (and I hope everyone else) at all, the title track is one of the most experimental ones, ”Warning” shines for its progressive feeling, proving that aggression and melody can fit when there is potential, maybe that’s why a video clip was shot for this.

In general the album is a masterpiece, the last two tracks ”C.M.R.” and ”The Lesson” close this journey to a great new discovery with the most convincing way. I can state in pure sense that it is the best Greek album I have heard since Septic Flesh did ”Sumerian Daemons” and many people should try their best and may not be enough, to reach such level of creativity and point in music. Praised be the ideas of each individual member, they listen to excellent groups and they produce excellent music. The next one will get a 10 from me if they go like this. For the time being, this is half a step before perfection. Listen and you’ll understand what I’m talking about.

Indukti are perfect musicians and this shows from the first sounds of ”Sansara”. They could expose themselves as great players by showing off or playing a million notes but they concentrate on the point of their compositions. This album is much heavier than their debut and while Mariusz Duda from Riverside did the vocals back then, this time they have three different individuals on the three songs with lyrics, as the others are instrumentals.

A great combination of Tool, Meshuggah in the most heavy parts, Porcupine Tree and even Sepultura of the ”Roots” era will be found in this album. Added to this is the band’s personal identity which makes the overall feeling filling you with need to stay focused while listening to it. The songs are long enough and you shouln’t treat them naively, as they have a lot to offer to your untrained ears.

”…And Who’s The God Now?” is easily the most different and remarkable piece on this album, changing rhythms constantly and in its ten minutes it will drive you to spaces of music not commonly heard and not easily adapted to minds. ”Nemesis Voices” also is another great one, also being the shortest in duration with a little more than six minutes surrounding it and offering some really heavy moments.

In conclusion, rating this one is difficult. It really makes the difference, one of the best and most unique albums I’ve heard the last years. It needs some more attention than usually, once you do it, you may discover one of your new favorite bands. My interest on them was at a good level with the debut, but this one blew me off. Congratulations gentlemen, alongside Riverside, Poland’s progressive scene stays strong. More are yet to come, promising I hope.

From the very beginning, you’ll notice that this album smells ancient Greece all over it. Rotting Christ continue their efforts into a more aggressive direction with folk elements, blending them with catchy riffs and melodies that will easily penetrate your mind. However, there is a little shift towards their older albums, getting some of the familiar yet great stuff they had. I would like to say that their sound feels more “complete” this way, everything fits perfectly into its place and gives a remarkable result. Another feature on the release is guest appearances, like Primordial’s Alan Nemtheanga, Magus from Necromantia, Diamanda Galas, Daemonia Nymphe and Dirty Granny Tales. Last but not least, “Pliades”, a traditional choir from Epirus. As far as the production is concerned, it’s flawless.

What makes “Aealo” great though is not in the music itself, but in the feeling it provokes. The title, meaning “conquest, devastation, catastrophe” in Greek, is definitely well supported by the album. It one of those few albums that have “the ability to make you wander in time and place”, as I like to call it. It gives a taste of war in ancient Greece and the feeling is very real. Songs like “Noctis Era” or “Pir Threontai” will make you wish you were there, having your place in a phalanx, kicking ass without mercy.

I have to admit that personally I’m not the biggest fan of Rotting Christ. “Aealo” though has really left me speechless, it’s epic, aggressive, amazing. I truly recommend to any metalhead out there to get this great album. It deserves a place in your collection and your hearts.

The title track opens the new identity of FF convincingly, and what we get to understand from the beginning is that the chemistry between Bell and Cazares is still active and working perfect. The rhythm section causes no surprise, since Stroud and Hoglan have been yearly bandmates in Strapping Young Lad, a band which definitely had influences from FF. Combining the individuality and skills of these gentlemen, the album is a well worked clock that lacks no seconds or minutes and hours. Everything is in place and for the 45 minutes it lasts, landscapes of the past meet the vision of the future.

Soundwise, it is the album with the most ‘death metal’ vibe the band has released since ”Demanufacture”. It took them 15 years to produce something like that but it fits them for sure, while it is as mature as ”Obsolete” sounded when it was released. It is heavier than the past three releases of the band, meaning ”Digimortal”, ”Archetype” and ”Transgression” and mostly we have to deal with a two sided album. On the first seven songs, the band smashes everything in its wake, while the last two songs ”Designing The Enemy” and ”Final Exit” close the album in a more emotional and epic way.

While the attack lasts, the double intrusion of ”Fear Campaign” (for which a videoclip has been shot) and ”Powershifter” (which was the first sample of the album for everyone to hear) decapitates heads that don’t feel comfortable between shoulders. ”Christplotation” which is about religion is an enraged statement of antiproselytism and ”Oxidizer” alongside ”Controlled Demolition” (strange sense of control, this makes ears bleed) complete the nihilistic first scenery, before things ease with the last two songs. In overall, this is a complete release, producing some new elements which you’ll find loveable, but without big changes in the sound we all have loved the past 18 years.

To be honest, the first times i listened to the album, I was very strict to it. With each new listening, it grows inside me and I have to admit that my great love for them, made me unarguably strict and bitter at first. This is a good album, but the sense that they will do better rolls around my mind. If we consider that five years of absence were enough, it feeds our hunger for sure. It may sound as if they released a safe card, but that doesn’t mean that this is not good. And I am glad to say that it is better than I initially thought it was. More are yet to come, let’s see if and how much alive the machine is in the year of 2010. I hope they’ll stand the test of time like most times did.

So, as HE knows everything, HE takes form of four selective human beings that have been more than heroes to generations that lived the last two or three decades. God comes in forms of Scott ‘Wino’ Weinrich (Saint Vitus, The Obsessed, The Hidden Hand, Spirit Caravan etc) and Scott Kelly (Neurosis) on the guitars, Al Cisneros of OM on bass and the mighty Dale Crover of The Melvins on drums. This is Apocalypse itself, imagine the divinity of these individual bands on their own, then compare the result of this combination. Luckily, the nightmare last only 39 minutes, divided into five units of pure heaviness, honesty, non-commerciality and will to show that less is always more.

The album begins with ”Solar Benediction” and Wino’s voice comes straight after the first riff to bring smiles on our faces. You just can’t help but diving deep into this album from the start, great changes in vocals between Wino, Kelly and Cisneros throughout the whole duration of the album. Next comes one of the best tracks for 2009: ”Pyramid To The Moon”, you just have to listen to this. An amazing opus that grips you from below to a sea of sounds, colors, visions and multiple erections. Only for this, they will be named gods to the future. ”Blind For All To See” contains excellent bass play from Cisneros and is the crawling piece of this puzzle, everything seems to go slower but you dyon’t mind at all.

It seems as if you know a wild card is going to come out next. And it is ”The Architect” that comes to prove you right, the most straightforward of the five pieces, also the shortest, less than six minutes. Again Wino and Kelly do excellent job, building mountainsides of riffs and fill the journey to oblivion with their voices. The ground is prepared and the last stop is called ”Science Of Anger”, the epic of the album, the long one lasting nine and a half minutes. The perfect closure in a perfect album. The cornerstone to a greatly built shrine, where we shall worship these four gentlemen in the near future.

I don’t know if all this is going to last, does it really matter anyway? All I know is that Shrinebuilder is something fresh, something that came to show us that there is no need for blastbeats or growls in the year of 2009. The ’00s end triumphantly with such releases and i have no fear for the next decade. Did I tell you I have found God recently? HE came and told me a story about some guys in a shrine. And we all know that God is always perfect, right?

Following their reputation and their professionalism the kings of raw thrash metal return with another monumental release.

“World Painted Blood” opens the album, with mid tempo “Seasons-like” character. Tom barely breathes, as he spits the words of fury, Dave bombs the drum kit with his familiar brutality, as for the killer guitar duet of Kerry and Jeff, they already seem unstoppable.

“Unit 731” is a classical moshpit anthem and just before it ends, Slayer go on with “Snuff” in a river of unleashed aggression, probably the best track from this record, keeping your mind to their past releases, but mostly on the South/Seasons era.

“Beauty Through Order” follows in a quite slow tempo, until you get one minute before its end, where a thrash chaos blows your mind shamelessly.

“Hate Worldwide” that comes next is another unstoppable Slayer classical that goes really nice with “Public Display Of Dismemberment” and as you listen so far, you might just want to re-adjust your thoughts about bands from the past, that are not loyal even to themselves. These songs give the answer to all out there, why Slayer are a big chapter in thrash metal history, if not the only one from the “big four” that is so close to their roots.

“Human Strain” and “Americon” are attached to the style of their previous release “Christ Illusion” both having a lot to say lyrically, as most songs of Slayer do, when they refer to politics.

“Psychopathy Red” was the first single that came out of from this release. I should say there’s a big resemblance with “Sex, Murder, Art” from “Divine Intervention ”. Full speed tempos and Tom’s screams warn you that none is joking. Perfect!

“Playing With Dolls” is probably the only filler song in this strong album.

Reminding me the song “Jihad” from “Christ Illusion” this tune just doesn’t fit to the anger and the mood of the album.

After only 35 minutes and ten songs Slayer draw the curtain with “Not Of This God”. Another live Slayer classical perfect for album closer and surely promising for the future of these monsters…

I was happy when “Christ Illusion” was out back in 2006. “World Painted Blood” though, shows that Slayer will go on their own great path and as every king does, they’ll always claim their throne with every release, that no doubt belongs to them and will belong to them, for years to come.

Observe and headbang ‘till you bleed! This is pure SLAYER!

This year’s effort, their eleventh full-length album, is called “Wormwood”, and boy, it is a worthy successor to their albums “Plague Angel” and “Rom 5:12”! While servile followers of merciless musical warfare still get what they are looking for, Marduk again managed to implement melodic elements and add more atmosphere to their artistic onslaught.

“Wormwood” stands for perfect tunes to listen to while watching creepy still movies of old. Sinister, rather groovy songs take turns with familiar mercilessness. The vocals on “Funeral Dawn”, a piece straight from the graveyard, can be called epic without even coming close to an overstatement. Agreed, there’s not a lot of riffing variety, but the song compensates that with a shitload of eeriness. Listen to “Wormwood” from start to finish and regard it as a unit of pure evil that will surely push your mood down one notch if you’re already under the weather.

So better keep those razors away! Don’t get me wrong: this album definitely gives those who claim Marduk is not true underground Black Metal plenty of ammo. And they aren’t wrong with that complaint either, because Marduk is just Marduk. But judging by all those interviews with them out there, they pretty much don’t give a damn whether we like them or not anyway.