Archetype - New EP Streaming

In a world where metalcore gets increasingly more polished, it is very nice to hear bands still keeping it aggressive without compromising the most important elements of the metalcore genre: hardcore's intensity and passion combined with a metal character.

Archetype from Britain's Nottinghamshire manage to do the above. Sure they have some clean vocals, but for the most part they just plough on through with some chunky, brutal, downtuned metalcore. At times, the band gets so heavy and metallic that could even be termed deathcore (basically due to the excessive double bass drumming and the fat, discordant metal riffs). They have a chaotic and progressive dimension to their sound, which brings them close to bands like Time in Malta, Poison the Well, British contemporaries While She Sleeps and other metalcore bands with a progressive twist. However, Archetype - as their name suggests - have a unique stamp on what they do and they generally just nail it with this ep release.

Archetype are streaming their awesome new ep and you can check it out for free here. Make sure to give this groovy and extreme British metalcore powerhouse the time it deserves!

http://www.facebook.com/WeAreArchetype

Desolate by WeAreArchetype

Record Reviews: THE SOUTHERN ORACLE - "Hellwakening" (Let It Burn Records)

The Southern Oracle is a band which juggles brutal metalcore and deathcore with such precision and technicality, that will surely delight the needs of most modern metal (and some hardcore) fans.

Hellwakening is indeed a hell of an album. It's filled with heavy metallic riffs and stompy beatdowns that succeed one in other in a very relentless and warlike manner. There is enough speed, heaviness and ferocity spat out, which will have you going for the "repeat" many times over as a result. Maybe at first, this album is a bit of a handful and sounds a bit long for the inexperienced listener, because of all the complex riffs and constant changes in the songs (and the slight lack of catchiness). However, there is no letting up by these Hungarians; just merciless metalcore pounding! What this actually means is that you have to work on the record by giving it your time and attention. In other words, it's a solid, mature, real metal record.

A thing you shouldn't be looking for in this record is clean vocals. These Hungarian dudes keep it heavy all the way through and resist going out like the majority of metalcore bands, which can't resist the pop element (i.e. The Devil Wears Prada, We Came As Romans etc). Therefore albeit having their melodic riffs, this album often departs from metalcore territory and kind of dwelves more into technical deathcore stuff. In a way, it transcends both these genres. Some of the riffs are melodic and technical, while others are more proper death metal oriented. There is something for everyone (except the emo kid).

This album also has a nice production that takes it away from the usual beatdown and metalcore stuff, and roots it firmly in a more metallic tradition. Therfore, fans of The Haunted and Heaven Shall Burn will definitely enjoy this more than fans of whatever modern metalcore is the flavor of the day out there. Nevertheless, there is enough beatdown to keep all the beatdown junkies satisfied, for sure. Add some nice layers of horror atmosphere, guest vocals by Darkest Hour and Bridge To Solace members, great looking artwork by Dyer Baizley (or someone else?), and you get a very enticing package indeed.

http://hu-hu.facebook.com/thesouthernoraclehu

UPs: Awesome production, very high technical skills, good exchange of dual vocals (high and low pitched), decent amount of brutality.

DOWNs: Not enough innovation going on here, not very catchy or memorable enough songs.

LOWDOWN: Technical but mature metalcore/deathcore for the metal fan.

More SLAYER core!!!

If you, like me, are always up for some intense SLAYER-ic carnage, well how about "Angel of Death" (originally on the super classic Reign in Blood album) done justice by heavy as fuck death-core contemporaries, CARNIFEX? Enjoy the sheer brutality of a thrash classic pumped up with steroids and taken to the extreme!

AS HEAVENS COLLIDE- 'What They Fear the Most" Review (Full-Length,2011)

When I listen to stuff like AS HEAVENS COLLIDE, it makes me angry for the amount of whack musicians and bands out there with no technical proficiency and inability to put together good songs. AHC is the exact opposite of that. I had their new release sitting on my "To Review" list for quite a while, and now I am furiously asking myself WHY I didn't listen to this earlier so I could groove to it and mosh like a mad dog!

This may very well be the best brutal metal/hardcore I heard in 2011 so far. AHC go all out and manically destroy everything that stands in their way, moshing all the way through - breaking, ravaging and tearing apart. They only stop every now and then to throw you into some mysterious avant garde halts that give you the creeps and throw you in a meditative state of altered consciousness... of death!

It is so hard to pin down this band; they may base their shit on metallic downbeat hardcore, but have so much technical skill that they can go from tech-deathcore to epic symphonic metal to old school hardcore breaks like it ain't no thing. There are so many influences and mixed genres in What They Fear the Most that I cannot even begin to explain, I would just bore you. What YOU need to do is go and find this album and get ready for some really heavy stuff.

If you like listening to cool music with tons of layers and are not afraid of mixing melodic death metal with rabid, huge hardcore parts and a new age feel, then please do yourself a favor and listen to this band. It's totally TYS approved!

www.asheavenscollide.com

www.asheavenscollide.com

www.asheavenscollide.com

www.asheavenscollide.com

Better Left Buried - 'King of Kings' EP Review (2011)

Holy shit! These Dutch maniacs are back to deliver a crushing dose of downtuned deathcore with their aptly titled King of Kings ep!

I am quite selective when it comes to deathcore and beatdown/downtempo hardcore these days, but Better Left Buried definitely know what they're doing. I liked their pervious ep which came out last year, but this new 4 song ep is so much heavier and so much meaner than their previous stuff. They have gotten more techinical and more death metal for sure, and they have a huge production sound that crushes your head and destroys your happy feelings.

To be honest this ep is quite a surprise for me, cause BLB have erased all their old school dark heavy hardcore elements and have moved to more modern, downtuned metal territory. There is a sick range of death metal vocals, 7 string (?) heavy as fuck guitars and anxiety inducing, freaked out lead parts that accompany the dead-serious mosh. There are also a lot of manic blastbeats and some distinct industrial black metal influences. Hell if I know how BLB manage to fit all these influences in one ep, but they do it - and they do it WELL.

There are many bands doing the beatdown/death metal thing nowadays, but most of them sound like babies compared to BLB. These guys don't only fuck around with open chord riffs, they take this genre to the next level! Not head nodding fake gansta metal, but KILLER MOSH!

The Acacia Strain - The Hills Have Eyes (Video)

OK! So we had quite a bit of punk rock, pop punk, whatever the last few days; now it's time to get real and tune in to some crazy-ass, perfectly exectuted downtuned deathcore. Or actually it should be death CORE cause TAS are one of the few deathcore bands who actually draw from hardcore as an influence. There are not many bands who can do this style better than The Acacia Strain. This video has made the rounds quite a bit but it is pretty funny and it is full of mosh so there you have it (let alone these guys are pretty much unknown here in Greece - no shit!). And if this is too metal for you, go find Cockpunch 'Attack' (awesome straight edge hardcore with TAS members). Enjoy you fuckers!

Street of Possession - 'The Wolfman' EP (self-released) Review

Just how much ambient instrumental beatdown death metal have you heard lately? Probably not much... Nevertheless, this crazy 'prog meets mosh' band from Lyon, France is here to create a new niche and satisfy your insatiable need for new, crazy, and heavy as fuck music.

The thing with Street of Possession's amazing new EP The Wolfman is that it is actually has no vocals and consists only of heavy downtuned guitars, sick groovy rhythm patterns and beatiful ambient layers to accompany all the unsurmantouble heaviness. A one-man project on this one, SOP also work on stuff with death metal vocals on other recordings, but here Jeremie (guitars, bass, drum prog, samples) ventures on his own to create a masterpiece of avant garde post-deathcore. This is really like nothing else I've heard before, as this kid takes the ball from bands like White Chapel, Misery Index, For Today etc and keeps running, stripping it all down to the bare essentials.

SOP manages to combine the heaviness with some hair raising type of melodies, thus balancing between the extreme and the almost catchy, even mainstream sound if you like. The record is also based on something like a concept theme, about the cruel transformation of a man into a wolf. Sounds kind of crazy (or maybe typical if you're a metal fan), but as I am into all that anarcho primitive, back to wilderness feral type thinking, I can surely dig! Our feral edge is always calling, waiting to make a beast out of us again... Another interesting fact is that  since there are no lyrics, each song leaves you on your own to start making a plot in your head based only on the song title and the complexity of the music.

Awesome work from this French beatdown eccentric! I easily give it a [9.5/10]. I am just curious to see how the next stuff (with vocals) will sound like...

Heavy Sh*t: Trail of Lies, Abysmal Dawn, Doomsday Mourning, Without Remorse

Yeah so as the title shows, we have quite a few releases from some heavy as hell bands waiting to be reviewed. Light hearted punks and people with pop sensibilities might want to skip this one! This post only deals with death metal/deathcore/brutal hardcore etc.

Trail of Lies - Demo

I will start this off with Trail of Lies and their amazing new demo. This brand new band from Syracuse do one thing and do it well: they fuck shit up. Their brand of heavy hardcore is reminiscent of the good old 90s, when bands actually wanted to do some damage with their core. This is the type of hardcore that is coming back: no BS, pissed off and straight to the point. TOL mixes the heavy NY sound with some old school hip hop attitude (check the artwork) and just punishes the listener with heavy, phat guitars, distorted metallic bass, heavy hardcore vocals and some relentless - but not overused - double bass drumming. Fans of Neglect, One Life Crew and other 90s metallic hardcore need to get this [9/10].

Abysmal Dawn - 'Leveling the Plane of Existence'

Moving on to some clean death metal territory, we got Abysmal Dawn's killer new album amazingly titled 'Leveling the Plane of Existence'. Fans of Krisiun, Malevolent Creation and Suffocation gather round these new kings of brutal death metal. These perfectly technical metalloids also mix some dark, black metal elements to their sound as well as some black metal vocals, thus making the outcome all grim and disgusting. Hail! Everything is done with such perfect precision that you can really admire the music amidst the brutality. At some points, I can even make out what the singer is saying! If someone asked me what I am listening for metal these days, this is the album I would play them! All killer, no filler, seriously blackened technical death metal. You bet [8/10].

Doomsday Mourning - 'The Science of Exploitation'

I can't say I am overly excited with Doomsday Mourning's downtuned deathcore. It sounds a lot like Emmure and despite 4 out of 6 songs featuring well known personalities from today's metal scene, I'm afraid this doesn't cut the cake. It's all mid tempo with a lot of beatdowns and I guess it does have some head nodding quality to it, as well as some cool psycho, stress-inducing guitar work over the heavy riffs. But every song is kind of repetitive and there is really nothing innovative musically to keep things really interesting. In times with so much good stuff coming out from everywhere, another downtempo deathcore band with nihilistic rap stoner attitude giving it all on the open chords doesn't do it for me, I'm afraid. The kids out there do seem to like this for some reason (maybe cause it's all brutal with no melodies whatsoever), but what do the kids know, really [4/10]?

Without Remorse - 'The Truth Hurts'

Moving back to more familiar and more worth talking of territory, we have groovy hardcore kids gone death metal, Without Remorse. Here is a band that knows what it's doing, by delivering 8 songs of heavy ass, unforgiving death metal with strong hardcore elements. The vokills are not exactly death metal, but bounce back and forth between DM and hardcore (and some gore-metal), while the guitars create a huge wall of sound which is led by the ongoing double bass drum action. This is the new millenium's death metal sound: groovy, phat, jump up and down, let's fuck shit up music. Just utter craziness and grooviness for fans of death metal and brutal hardcore alike. No matter if you're a metalhead who's shaved his head or a hardcore kid that gets carried away listening to Job For A Cowboy and Dying Fetus, you will like this record. The only downer with this record are the tiring cannabis references, but that seems to be a tie-in with a lot of modern death metal for some reason I cannot understand [7/10].

Dead At The Scene's 'Sharktopus': FREE download!

A few months ago, we did a review for Dead At The Scene, the Scottish progressive deathcore pioneers. At TYS, we consider their debut EP Sharktopus to be one of the best records in 2010 for all of heavy music. This record really tears down the boundaries between genres and creates a worthwhile piece of music that you want to keep in your record collection and frequently revisit. Isn't that the purpose of all good music? To create feelings and thoughts that the listener wants to revisit and recreate over and over again? DATS managed just that with Sharktopus. They made an honest album that sticks with you like a good old friend, even though at times it is so heavy that it destroys your ears and unsettles your nervous system!

For all of the above, we are pleased to let you know that DATS has just released Sharktopus as a free download - a thank you to their fans and the support they've received so far. It is available through the band's website, www.sharktopus.co.uk. Now everyone can dig into that awesome, mystical death metal meets prog hardcore meets I don't know what! It is also a great move for independent bands to release their music free online. It shows that what DATS wants is to get their music around and don't fuss so much about the decreasing record sale rates and whatever. After all, experience shows that the bands who make it financially are the ones who tour like madmen and have merch to sell, not those that count solely on their sales of their CD!

So go download Dead At The Scene's awesome EP and have fun listening to it! Just remember to give it the time it needs to grow on you and you will be rewarded!

Psycorepaths - "Your Entropia Has Arrived" Promo CD (2010) Review

Hey everyone and welcome to the December 2010 edition of TYS webzine. This month is really important for us, because it is the month we will -finally- release our 4th print issue. It is done and all we have to do is send it to the printers and this bastard will be over and done with. Expect nothing but pure hardcore as usual!

OK so I will start this month's reviews with the notorious Greek deathcore band from Corfu, Psycorepaths, and their awesome 3 song promo entitled Your Entropia Has Arrived. 

We all know that many bands out there claim the label deathcore, but these dudes really deserve it. They play fucking heavy and base their sound around metallic riffs that are molded in such a way that the outcome is loyal to hardcore. The vocals are varied throughout the whole brutal (death metal and hardcore) spectrum, and the drumming in the background keeps on pummeling all the way throughout these 3 songs. There is a lot of beatdown and a lot of breakneck moshing, too. Very good!

It's been a long time since I heard a band with such a nice, solid groove to it. Most bands follow the 'thrash path' these days, but Psycorepaths really groove! If you mix 90s style metal with modern day beatdown hardcore and a meaty 00s production, you get Your Entropia Has Arrived. I hope it doesn't sound like an insult to say that these guys must have listened to a lot of Pantera when they were young. Song 3 has an closing riff that makes me wanna mosh and smash everything around here with no afterthought! I am talking about some proper phat Pantera gangsta grooves!

Psycorepaths: Earth Crisis meets Pantera!?

Another thing I want to mention is that Psycorepaths stand out lyrically. In Greece, we don't have many bands if any at all that play deathcore with straight edge themed lyrics. Yes, these guys leave aside the dark, intelligent themes (duh), and talk about the destruction of the environment and of our own bodies by modern society's marketing plans for monetary gain. This is exactly what we need: heavy bands with their minds in the right places, and not afraid to speak them!

So all respect to xThug15x and his crew of moshers, I hope they will do great in the future. I had heard a lot about this band, and now I am glad that I finally checked them out and realized how good they are. I will give them extra points for having the guts to be different lyrically and aesthetically.

[8/10]

RISE WITH HONOR - self titled demo EP

Truth is that I listened to this EP before I checked any info on the band online. As this is some kind of HEAVY-ASS downtempo hardcore, I was expecting a crew of thug gorillas with tattoos on their heads and stuff, but -to my surprise- these guys are a bunch of young Christian (!) fellas who simply play some of the heaviest hardcore/metal out there. Through the years, I have observed that the most passionate and intense bands in HXC are those with the clearest beliefs, like religious and straight edge. Don't believe me? Think Path of Resistance, 108, Facedown Records, Blood & Ink Records, or so many others.

In any case, these guys are pretty damn good. I've had this sitting in my playlist for quite a while, because I didn't know what to make of it. I mean, it is SO damn heavy and extreme, like nothing I've heard lately. OK I've heard heavier bands in brutal death metal styles etc, but these guys have really carved a different & heavy-as-fuck sound as far as hardcore is concerned. It is slow for the most part, with lots and lots of double bass drumming, death/black metal vocals and a down-tuned groove that will shake your stereo until it falls off the table. I guess I could describe this like a mix between Obituary, Suffocation and Hatebreed/Born From Pain type metal-core. 

Get this, cause this young band is on the rise and you don't wanna be the last person jumping on the bandwagon when everybody else likes them :P They got a nicely different, dare I say analogue but all the while extreme hardcore sound. I think it will suit all those who are pushing the boundaries a little bit more and want to hear something new and different without it necessarily being 'progressive' and 'post'.

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OK so here I will take this opportunity to say a personal view about Christianity in Hardcore (ouch) -- even religion in hardcore generally. I know that most people detest anything that is spiritual in hardcore but me as representer and main writer for Take Your Shot, I don't mind it. There are a lot of good bands and labels doing their thing and if they are Christians and they want to speak about it, they got the right. Of course I hate preaching and force-feeding as well! But why should all bands only sing  about Unity, fake friendships, corrupt governments, the scene etc? Hardcore is supposed to be (and truly is for the most part) an open-minded scene, we've allowed a lot of stuff in and freedom of speech, to reach the point of criticizing religious or whatever bands in 2010??? It doesn't really make sense. If you don't like the spiritual lesson, then just listen to these bands for the music if they are good. There is a high level of integrity and realness in this type hardcore, and some of the bands and label owners who are Christian, are some of the coolest people out there and proper hardcore dudes. So don't be so hard on 'em! (again, I say, this is a personal opinion--thanks & peace out! Fotis-TYS)

BLEED FROM WITHIN - "Empire" (2010)

Genre: Deathcore

Website: http://www.myspace.com/bleedfromwithin

Label: Rising Records

Yeahhhhhhhhh!

It's been a while since I listened to some REAL deathcore, but Bleed From Within is here to fill the gap! This Scottish band definitely elevates the game with this record that musically is almost death metal, but has a very good hardcore feel to it (maybe because of the real-life lyrics). This is the type of shit that can create a mad moshpit, rampaging through with 100% intensity, good breaks & beatdowns, fully extreme vocals and relentless double bass drumming!

Aside from the technical but in your face brutality, what really captures your attention on this album is Scott Kennedy's vocals, a very good heavy growl constantly exchanged with screamo insanity! He's good at both to the point you could think it is two different singers (but it's one-duh). Luckily, there is not one single clean vocal melody in this album. This is deathcore after all! To put it boldly, they would fit more on a tour with Suffocation than on a tour with Bleeding Through! Extreme comparison but whatever!

It looks like these guys could really bust anytime soon, they got it going on and judging from their touring schedule they're here to work hard. Let's see what the future will bring...

For fans of: The Black Dahlia Murder, Job For A Cowboy, American Me and all that modern heavy ass shit that's coming out these days!