Record Review: Čad - “Ťažký Kov” (My Sleeping Cat Records)

Genre: Progressive Crust/Metal

Country: Slovakia

Label: My Sleeping Cat website facebook

Band website: facebook bandzone

Metallic crustcore is not known to be the most innovative of genres. However, there is always the exception to the rule, like CAD, who are at least a few years ahead of their game. These Slovakian crust maniacs have been at it for a while, having released a number of eps with well known crust and grind/death bands like Unholy Grave, Entrails Massacre and Ripcord. However, Cad has the cleverness to avoid all crust cliches and go on to create heavy music that isn't necessarily blackened and can go down well with any fan of brutal sounds. The name of the game here is progressive crustcore, but don't ever think that it is not brutal enough cause you will be in for a surpirse. A big one. The band actually calls its style 'ripcore' which is fine by me, cause this hardcore hybrid does in fact truly rip!

You can understand what I mean by the above from looking at the record cover. Grim and mysterious though it may be, it doesn't stick to the black/white colors and skull/war imagery that is so fucking commonplace in crust. The same happens with the music and lyrics. This devastating mix of crust and extreme metal does destroy our ears, but it also packs a dose of white light; technical proficiency and a touch of upbeat rock and roll-ness do the trick. The lyrics (which come in a translated sheet of paper as Cad sing in their native language) are rooted in the hardcore tradition of looking at the world through eyes of contempt, but also with a positive mind.  More things that differentiate this not-so-ordinary crustcore outfit is the fact that they are straight edge (or at least drug-free) and that they have a female in their ranks. The more you learn about this band, the more interesting stuff you discover.

Now we should mention some things about the album title Heavy Metal in our Chestrs. It may sound funny to some, but I for one am totally down with it. Heavy metal here is the term which depicts differentiation, our culture, the underground, the flame in your heart -- whatever you want to call it. One lyric reads "we're the worms from the underground and we're eating everything, we have bloody jaws and bite the heavy metal". This is exactly what I'm talking about. This is what makes us alive... Metal, hardcore, punk, whatever it is you identify with is the thing that saved your life and Cad are here to represent this notion. The rest of the lyrics are expressions of hatred towards society, or slightly humorous poems about death on golf courses and zombie massacres.

OK, and of course I shall also provide some record info for us nerdy freaks. Ťažký Kov has been released as a 12" by My Sleeping Cat Records. It is printed on plain black vinyl and I have to say that the album art does indeed look rad on this edition, because you can see all the fine detail and try to figure out what the fuck it is you're watching exactly. As mentioned above the lyrics are included in the package with their english traslantion. Support this awesome DIY effort and own a record that will stand out in your tried n true vinyl collection!

- Fotis.TYS

INTEGRITY live in Athens, 11 Feb 2012

I've been waiting a long time for this... Being so that I was out of the country and missed the first time Integrity visited Athens (in a show that Chubby of One Life Crew fame allegedly broke down the snare drum!), I am eagerly waiting to witness this legendary hardcore band in action. This shit is going to be heavy.

I consider Integrity not only the best Clevo-core band (along with Ringworm, obviously) but actually more than that: Dwid Helion (Integrity's singer and main figure) is pretty much responsible for the whole Kvlt hardcore scene that has grown like a monster and is steadily getting bigger and stronger around the world. There are really no words to describe how important Integrity are for the way hardcore has evolved.

Long-running hardcore metal act Endsight will scorch our ears with the heavy role of the opening act.

Old School Classics - Disrupt / Sauna "People Killing People" (split)

Our contributor Rigas goes back in time to review some legendary crust from grind pioneers Disrupt!

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Given that Disrupt is one of my favourite bands, it was really a hard choice which release to present here:  The cult classic 7’’ split with Destroy! (1991) or their most influential and probably most complete work ‘Unrest’ (1994)? Although, Unrest is their only full-length that actually kept Disrupt alive in punk history I chose to write something about their split album with Sauna as representative of that era and their most crustcore output.

Disrupt was one of the best hardcore punk bands of their era playing unrelentless ferocious crust/grindcore, or more aptly termed in this case discore (Dis-bands). I particularly like their style because there are no metallic influences just pure punk energy and ethos, unlike most of the ‘grind’ or ‘polished’ punk bands of today. Disrupt, like most of their peers back then, were spreading anarchist values:  DIY, abolitionist, anti-corporate, anti-authoritarian etc. (Check the anti-vivisection blast ‘A life’s a life’ from Unrest album).

Disrupt, hailing from Lynn, MA, US, were formed in 1987. They managed to release various splits, 7’’ and EPs in their short-lived career, which lasted only six years. They were in the same wave of bands as Dropdead, Destroy! and the likes. Actually, the songs found in this album were recorded only few months before their European tour (October/November 1993), after which they disbanded. Sauna, were a Swedish band and this is their only recording.

Recorded and mixed during two days (13^th and 14^th June 1993) at The  Lanes studio in Boston, MA by Bill Miller ‘People Killing People’ contains some of the most consistent tracks of Disrupt. Between the necessary Discharge and Extreme Noise Terror influences, Disrupt’s skilful and outright intense delivery sets them apart from the early American crust/grindcore bands. The riffs are crashing, the drums are pummelling, the vocals are lacerated in urgency. From the d-beat holocaust of ‘Xenophobia’, ‘You’ve no one left to blame’, ‘Succumb to the pressure’ and ‘An end to white rule’ to the slightly faster tracks ‘Trapped’ and ‘Leave me be’, this split album is a manifesto of punk essence. They even included a cover of ‘Protest’ from the UK anarcho-punk legends Conflict.

Sauna’s side is a good example of Swedish crust, albeit a bit weaker in comparison with Disrupt. The production at Markstudio with Mats Andersson is more muddy and downtuned. Highlights are the desperate, shouted vocals and the typical d-beat cuts ‘Welfare’and ‘Love’.  

Bottom line is that Disrupt delivered uncompromised music throughout their course to raise awareness and break the system apart. Their version of punk is stripped down to its pure, original essence: strictly political, rebellious and raw creating feelings of defiance and urgency. I suggest everybody should check them out. Disrupt were not playing punk, they were real punks. Not to forget also that 4 members went on to form the sludge masters Grief.

- Rigas(freegankolektiva@gmail.com)

DUCKCORE: Not Quite Gone

Until last week, Duckcore.blogspot.com was one of the premier DIY sites for free br00tal downloads. Its owner Ducky had uploaded hundreds of quality albums with deathcore as the main focus, as well as various forms of death metal and metalcore (technical DM, blackened deathcore, progressive DM, djent etc). Unfortunately his blog has been taken down along with all the links to the albums he uploaded. Needless to say this is a major bummer. Even if we don't upload stuff on this blog and only review music, we too appreciate free stuff and have downloaded albums through Duckcore for sure. We will miss it for sure!

In any case, the site is back at a new adress and Ducky has started uploading stuff again. Check the new version of the sitr called The Duckore here: http://theduckcore.blogspot.com/. Spread the word!

Also, check what Ducky himself had to say about the whole shutting down of his blog, as well as for the new site.

So listen as I'm sure most of you are aware DuckCore.blogspot.com is no more unfortunately. We got completely shafted by blogger. Anyways this is going to be the new DuckCore and I know with all of your help we can restore this to it's former glory. So please I'm not begging but if you could share this new blog with your friends, post about it on facebook, show your mum, do whatever you can to get this out there it would be really appreciated. We were almost at two million page views and we were averaging almost 250,000 views a month. So yeah needless to say, I'm pretty bummed.

Things will get better though and with all of you guys supporting I'm sure that we can get back to where we were. Thank you so much for taking the time to read this and I'm going to be very busy with trying to get a new layout and get some sweet stuff done for the blog so yeah, thanks again guys. 

Love, Ducky

Record Review: Comrades – "Collection 2010 – 2011" (Blood & Ink Records)

Great music-great musicianship and songwriting. Comrades delve into (mostly) instrumental, progressive rock and post-hardcore to eliminate musical boundaries and achieve a coherent whole. Enchanting melodies and captivating song structures, compiled here in a stunning release for the music enthusiast.

Genre: Rock / Post-hardcore
Country: USA
Label: Blood & Ink Records (link)
Band Website: Reverbnation
 

This is a rather unusual review for TYS, since Comrades’ music is much ‘softer’ compared to most of the bands presented here. Their sound might surely turn off some hardcore kids, but on the other hand it can surely please music enthusiasts. You can simple describe this as ‘good music’ without any terms and definitions. That is to say that these guys and gals, Joe, Connor and Laura, wrote some really inspired, good-sounding songs.

Now, more in detail, Comrades play rock with some post-hardcore hints here and there. That sounds like Sweet Cobra but Comrades invest more on ethereal, heartfelt melodies than sheer heaviness. There are surely parallels to post rock acts like Explosions in the Sky but again Comrades are quite different: their songs are more ‘unsettling’, featuring more changes and complex structures than the usual ‘building up climax to the point of distorted catharsis’ pattern. You can find some similarities to bands like Keelhaul, Red Sparowes or Burst (less), but although they share the passion of building ‘progressive’ songs with manifold changes of rocking riffs and melodies, Comrades are much less loud, sweaty and dissonant.

This album consists of 10 compositions, gathered over a span of time of two years as the title conveys. This is actually a compilation of 3 self-released EPs, as an outcome of their recent signing with Blood & Ink Records to be followed by a new album later this year. Most of the songs are instrumental and whenever vocals appear they just complement the message of the songs. The production is very bright and every instrument has its own place delivering all those timbres that you can expect from an instrumental rock band. Apart from unerring songwriting, Comrades’ are skilful players.

Riffs, melodies and tempo changes are intermixed in a very eclectic and captivating way. What really stands out here is the omnipresent enchanting melodies. The songs are utterly memorable and interesting to the point of ‘forced’ repeat. It is hard to talk about particular favourites here - all songs have something to say. They have a very grounded, human nature which is appealing directly from the heart of the musician to the heart of the listener: ‘Weight’, ‘Giants’, ‘Where Moth and Rust Destroy’ (the most HC song), ‘Hammerhand’, ‘Lend Me Your Heart’, ‘We Are Halves’, ‘Encourage, Encourage’. You can actually listen to the whole record through the following link:

http://bloodandink.bandcamp.com/album/collection-2010-2011

Comrades are doing their part; they have built their own sound and have pushed some elements of rock, progressive rock and post hardcore further. It is like they distilled those music styles into a coherent whole in order to expand, or better abolish, their boundaries.

Comrades come from Richmond, Virginia, US and they have toured extensively playing in any imaginable place. They are also part of the ‘Motherland Collective’, which is dedicated to re-establishing respect, collaboration and mutual support in the scene. As Comrades put it in their own words:

“[We are] Three very different people trying our best to make honest music about things we believe to be important, such as (but not limited to) integrity, the remedying of social injustice, and our creator God.”

Review by Rigas