It’s getting colder and the leaves are turning brown (at least in my neck of the woods) which means Fall is here. And since this is the October edition, that means Halloween, the most metal of holidays, is on the way. Unfortunately, I don’t really have all that much to talk about right now as I haven’t done anything all that metal-ly. I don’t have anything new to spotlight since Dir en grey’s Dum Spiro Spero was the last album I bought. I’ve been trying to get my hands on the new Mastodon album but money’s been short recently. Although I did find out that Mastodon and the Dillinger Escape Plan are going to tour the US soon and there’s a small chance I might be able to catch a date. But other than that, nothing. So in case I don’t have anything else to report the next time I do one of these (which is a good possibility), I may begin a new feature for This Month In Metal. Nothing groundbreaking or anything but hopefully a cool feature nonetheless. It may be a one-time deal or a regular thing, depending on how I work it out. But I just came up with this idea so it won’t begin until next month at the earliest. Until then, here’s what’s on tap for Rocktober.
Metal Releases For October
Credit: About.com and Wikipedia
October 4
Blotted Science – The Animation of Entomology (EclecticElectric)
The Browning – Burn This World (Earache)
Danava – Hemisphere Of Shadows (Kemado)
Girlschool – Hit And Run Revisited (Wacken)
Midnight Odyssey – Funerals From The Astral Sphere (I Voidhanger)
Misfits – The Devil’s Rain (Misfits Records)
Nachblut – Antik (Napalm)
Rue – Thorns (Shifty)
Serpent Ascending – The Enigma Unsettled (I Voidhanger)
Thulcandra – Under A Frozen Sun (Napalm)
Wayne Static – Pighammer (Dirthouse)
October 11
3 – The Ghost You Gave To Me (Metal Blade)
Absu – Abzu (Candlelight)
As You Drown – Rat King (Metal Blade)
Black Cobra – Invernal (Southern Lord)
Casino Madrid – Robots (Artery)
Charred Walls Of The Damned – Cold Winds on Timeless Days (Metal Blade)
Cipher System – Communicate The Storms (Nuclear Blast)
Cyco Miko – The Mad Mad Muir Musical Tour (Suicidal)
Divine Ascension – As The Truth Appears (Nightmare)
Eldritch – Gaia’s Legacy (Scarlet)
Evanescence – Evanescence (Wind Up)
Five Finger Death Punch – American Capitalist (Prospect Park)
F–k The Facts – Die Miserable (Relapse)
Halford – Live At Saitama Super Arena DVD (Metal God)
I Declare War – I Declare War (Artery)
Hull – Beyond The Lightless Sky (The End)
Jeffrey Nothing – The New Psychodalia (Suburban Noize)
Judas Priest – The Chosen Few (Sony)
Myrath – Tales Of The Sands (Nightmare)
Nile – Worship The Animal: The Lost Recordings (Goomba)
Ordo Obsidium – Orbis Tertius (Eisenwald)
Pain Of Salvation – Road Salt 2 (Inside Out)
Redemption – This Mortal Coil (InsideOut)
Renaissance Of Fools – Fear, Hope and Frustration (Metalville)
Rise To Remain – City Of Vultures (Century Media)
Skeletonwitch – Forever Abomination (Prosthetic)
This Is Hell – Black Mass (Rise)
Threat Signal – Threat Signal (Nuclear Blast)
Trapped Under Ice – Big Kiss Goodnight (Good Fight)
VanGough – Kingdom Of Ruin (Nightmare)
Volbeat – Live From Beyond Hell / Above Heaven DVD (Universal)
Voyager – The Meaning Of I (Sensory)
October 18
Alarum – Natural Causes (Willowtip)
Cradle Of Filth – Evermore Darkly CD/DVD (Nuclear Blast)
Electro Quarterstaff – Akyroyd (Willowtip)
Evile – Five Serpent’s Teeth (Earache)
Hypocrisy – Hell Over Sofia – 20 Years of Chaos and Confusion DVD (Nuclear Blast)
Insomnium – One For Sorrow (Century Media)
Solstafir – Svartir Sandar (Season Of Mist)
Tsjuder – Legion Helvete (Season Of Mist)
October 25
Bahimiron – Rebel Hymns of Left Handed Terror (Moribund)
Black Tusk – Set The Dial (Relapse)
Carnifex – Until I Feel Nothing (Victory)
Danzig – The Essential Danzig (Sony)
East Of The Wall – The Apologist (Translation Loss)
Elder – Dead Roots Stirring (Meteor City)
Haken – Visions (Sensory)
Halcyon Way – IndoctriNation (Nightmare)
Hammers Of Misfortune – 17th Street (Metal Blade)
Isole – Born From Shadows (Napalm)
Knight Area – Nine Paths (Lasers Edge)
Lonely Kamel – Dust Devil (Napalm)
Molotov Solution – Insurrection (BLK Heart)
Morkobot – Morbo (Supernatural Cat)
Mpire Of Evil – Creatures Of The Black (Scarlet)
Necrodeath – Idiosyncracy (Scarlet)
Russian Circles – Empros (Sargent House)
Sincerea – Cursed And Proud (Abyss)
Svarttjern – Towards The Ultimate (Agonia)
Thrall – Vermin To The Earth (Moribund)
Visions Of Atlantis – Maria Magdalena EP (Napalm)
Wolvhammer – The Obsidian Plains (Profound Lore)
October 31 (Yeah, it’s a Monday. But, Halloween…)
Metallica and Lou Reed – Lulu (Universal/Warner Bros.)
The Rotted – Ad Nauseam (Candlelight)
Uneven Structure – Februus (Basick)
Ryno’s Pick: Justice – Audio, Video, Disco (October 25)
At least the album cover looks kinda metal, what with the cross and eveyrthing, right? OK, OK, I’m kidding…well, a little bit. Despite it being a dance album and nowhere near metal, I’ve been looking forward to the new Justice album for like a year now. But after last month, I can’t help but be disappointed in this month’s line-up. Sure, there’s a ton of releases and a few big names in metal but let’s look underneath the surface. I was a bit excited to see Cradle of Filth on the list only to find out that Evermore Darkly is an EP, made up of demos and remixes of songs from last year’s Darkly, Darkly Venus Aversa. I shouldn’t be surprised, they do this all the time. But even though Darkly… had a bonus disc, I can’t see why half of these songs couldn’t have been on that as well. Oh yeah, money, that’s why. Judas Priest’s The Chosen Few isn’t a new album but a Best Of compilation of songs chosen by other big names in the metal world, which should go well with Halford’s new live DVD. And that’s not to mention yet another Best Of comp from Danzig. And finally Nile’s Worship The Animal is not a new album but instead their original demo from back in 1994. But hey, at least Evanescence has a new album! Wait, how’d that get in here?
However, if you keep looking, I’m sure you’ll find some gems. I don’t know if it got pushed back or it was an error but 3’s new album comes out in October instead of September. I haven’t listened to them since Wake Pig but I’d still give them a recommendation. Same goes out to The Rotted, who I haven’t listened to since they were named Gorerotted. The new album from The Misfits also comes out in October but I didn’t even see that listed in most metal release lists so I had to add it myself. I also have to give some props to my fellow Ohio thrashers Skeletonwitch. And I’m sure I’m overlooking good stuff from the likes of Absu, Black Tusk and This Is Hell. But in the end, if I had to choose one album, it would probably be Fuck The Facts – Die Miserable. Originally, I was just going to pick them on the basis that I like their name and I like grindcore but then I actually listened to some of their new songs recently and was pretty impressed. I’m sure some extreme music purists would balk at the idea of adding melodic elements to grindcore but Fuck The Facts make it work quite well.
Oh, and on the matter of the upcoming Metallica/Lou Reed album: I don’t care. Like, at all. I’ve never listened to a Lou Reed song in my life and I haven’t been into Metallica since the Load era. Death Magnetic was alright but I don’t see it as a full comeback for Metallica yet. I was interested until I heard a preview of The View and it’s just not my thing. So that’s all I have to say on that.
Ryno’s Recommendation: Trap Them – Darker Handcraft
I try to cover a wide range across the various genres and sub-genres in metal music and Hardcore is one that I haven’t quite touched upon yet. I do have a secret to share though. While I do respect a lot of the original Hardcore bands in the ’80s for laying the ground work, I also believe that some of what Hardcore has become today almost comes off as being Metal’s mentally retarded cousin. And I’m not even talking about Metalcore, which some people accuse of diluting Hardcore. Instead I see Metalcore as an evolution of the genre, even though I will admit a good chunk of these bands today are doing nothing but following a trend and will someday fall off the map. Hell, I went to a Cradle of Filth and Arch Enemy show mainly to see Himsa and Bleeding Through open up for them. Anyway, Hardcore seems to have gone from the voice of the uprising oppressed to nothing more than chest-thumping bravado and background noise to see who can score more headshots in Call of Duty. Case in point: Hatebreed. They used to be great years ago and now Jamey Jasta has a solo album for some reason. Really? If you’re in the Hardcore scene and have a solo album, that’s obviously nothing more than a vanity project…unless you’re Henry Rollins, then you can do whatever the hell you want.
Anyway, all is not lost in the world of Hardcore and it seems like today’s flagbearers seem to come out of the Converge/Deathwish Inc. camp. I’m sure it’s easy to lump all the bands into one convenient category. That’s what happens when one of the most influential Hardcore bands of the modern era starts his own record label and a bunch of other bands try to get onto said label, whether it’s from aping their sound, their album artwork or even getting members of said influential Hardcore band to do guest spots or even produce their album. It might sound like a bit of an asshole in saying that but I’m really not; if you’re going to sound like anyone else, at least try to sound like the best. And of all those bands to come out of the Deathwish label, Trap Them did the smartest thing in using that sound as only a basis for their sound and making it grow to the point where the original source material becomes just an influence and not something they’re stuck with. On Darker Handcraft, the overall anger and animosity sometimes outshines that of Converge, which is very hard to do. Though there are more pure rock and punk elements than your average Hardcore release, that’s causing some people to complain rather than rejoice as a few critics have written off Darker Handcraft as nothing more than an Entombed rip-off. Shut up, metal hipsters. Trap Them is a Converge rip-off, get it right! Just kidding, Trap Them have become their own entity and should be treated as such. Although their chorus for “The Facts” could be accused of borrowing off of The Misfits’ “Where Eagles Dare”…