P E R P E T U A L S T R I F E

Please check out my new blog entitled Perpetual Strife. It promises to be better than anything that I've ever done here!

Furthermore, if you have any demo submissions, etc, e-mail them to Perpetualstrife@gmail.com

Thanks

Motherfuckin' Doombox

Official Site

Label: Vitrol

Release Type: 10" EP + CD w. EP and trilogy (Destination Time trilogy)

Released: Spring 2011

Genre: Grindcore

I wish I could stop my review here... y'know images speak louder than words... look how cool that thing is!

Everyone's favorite action movie aficionado grindcorists return with this nifty box that's both a new EP and a reprise of their totally awesome trilogy. The packaging isn't something that I can leave out as it folds out to a ghetto blaster with the EP+back catalog on a CD up top and a 10" of the EP tucked in the front. Remember, these are the guys who gave us a release in a backpack, another in packaging reminiscent of everyone's favorite scene of Alien and finally one with cross-hairs over the likes of JFK and Tupac. Of course the liner notes are included in the instructional pamphlet for the boombox.

Over the top and insanely cool packaging aside the EP is stands up on its own as a solid chunk of hardcore tinged grind with plenty of references and snippets of movies. Super slick production highlight the pummeling drumwork and the plethora of vocals used. Riffs standout and blur together, just seconds apart; many feel like sped up Integrity riffs. This isn't to discredit the band, far from it. The riffs just have that "positive" nature found in many hardcore acts (the opposite kinds being that of Weekend Nachos and black metal bands, etc).

Where Spazz were just spastic with their samples, the GO boys look to thematics (no matter how silly or light-hearted they might be) each track and sample plays a crucial role in their cinematic grind feature. Fans of their previous efforts will find little tweaks, but thankfully much of the same ( and better might I add than their previous release). Newcomers will find grindcore not without hardcore sentiments a'la gang choruses, breakdowns and rhythmic shifts that make the pit all the more satisfying with plenty of tremolo outbursts and blistering blast beats. What Frightmare are to horror movies, Graf Orlock are to action movies; nerdy, fun, and brilliant homages to the mediums that reflected the times of their conceptions.

To dip into the collection aspect of the package you get their first LP, Destination Time Yesterday, which is one of my favorite grindcore albums post 2001 and definitely their best work. Following is Destination Time Tomorrow, an 8 song EP much in the same vein, but better than the second LP and third part of the trilogy Destination Time Today, which I found to be a bit lackluster.

And I quote "No rights reserved, not licensed for distribution to everyone on Earth, reproduction and exhibition authorized, all rights reserved. Summary execution will result from looking at, touching, listening, selling, or buying said product."

Buy

-F

Not Even Europe's Safe

Words from Gilead Media mafioso/cult leader...

"My swamp-dwelling buddies in THOU will soon be making their way across the Mariana Trench to flatten the old-world on their 2011 European tour. Please do whatever you can to meet them at these locations on these days:

10.06 - Brighton, England at Cowley Club

11.06 - Groningen, Netherlands at Vera

12.06 - Eindhoven, Netherlands at Area 51

13.06 - Leiden, Netherlands at 071

14.06 - Bielefeld, Germany at AJZ

15.06 - Hamburg, Germany at Flora

16.06 - Copenhagen, Denmark at Stengade

17.06 - Berlin, Germany at Cassiopeia

18.06 - Leipzig, Germany at Zoro

19.06 - Praha, Czech Republic at 007 Club

20.06 - Wien, Austria at Arena

21.06 - Koper, Slovenia at Pandamonium

22.06 - Milano, Italy at Dauntaun / Leocavallo

23.06 - Bologna, Italy at XM24

24.06 - Stuttgart, Germany at JH West

25.06 - Versmold, Germany at Cry Me a River Fest

26.06 - Mülheim, Germany at AZ Mülheim

27.06 - Utrecht, Netherlands at dB's CAB-Rondom 100

28.06 - Kortrijk, Belgium at Cinepalace

29.06 - Portiers, France at Le Confort Moderne

30.06 - Paris, France at La Miroiterie

01.07 - London, England

02.07 - Nottingham, England at Stuck on a Name Studios

Bring Josh and Matthew greasy food, bring Andy an

d Bryan vegan food, and bring Mitch lots and lots of comics."

God Harvest - Demo 2011

Myspace
Label: Unsigned

So JGD at The Living Doorway just posted this up. Guy knows his shit for sure. God Harvest play pissed-off hardcore (what else could hardcore sound like, eh?) and they play it fucking well. "Hardcore" and "demo" put together usually spells bad production, but this release is anything but that. There's plenty of weight and punch in the guitars and bass, satisfyingly enough. Drums are not muffled at all as one would find in inferior releases and run a gamut of blastbeats and d-beats. Demo clocks in at a perfect 11 minutes.

Minimum time spent, maximum bludgeoning achieved.

And On and On...

Despise You

Agoraphobic Nosebleed

Label: Relapse

Released: April 2011

Release Type: Split 12" or CD

Genre: Power Violence/ Grindcore

West Coast power violence purveyors Despise You team up with East Coast grind freaks Agoraphobic Nosebleed for what seems to be the split of the year.

Thankfully, after all these years Despise You has stuck with what they do best, but as one would expect and hope, they've added here and there and really tried to trim the fat. "Roll Call" alone makes the split worth it as it shifts from blistering blast beats to d-beats until we get a slew of fuck yous, gang shouts, and the much loved female contributing vocals. It's not only the curb stomping vehemence of the vocals that propel this band, but also the band's dominance of rhythm and song structure that really make it enjoyable. Before there was melody, there was rhythm and Despise You have rooted themselves deep into that heritage. This isn't to say there aren't good riffs, quite the contrary, there's plenty, but those riffs duel it out with the uncompromising drums and vocals to merge each aspect into one pulsating body.

"Roll Call"

The production this time around is much cleaner, guitars cut off on the drop of a dime and the bass drum threatens to jump out of your speakers and throw a haymaker. Where they retain much of what's made them one of the best power violence bands out there, "Fear's Song" keeps in line with their attitude but plays out like an old school punk song with the simple punk chord progression and drum beat. The proof is in the punk pudding when "All the Regimes You Hold Most Dear" ties together every aspect of the band into one 34 second song. The only thing I could ask for more of would be break downs... but I'm happy where this one leaves it. I can only look forward to what's next. To quote the laconic machine-gunning genius "they drew first blood:" up the ante Agoraphobic Nosebleed.

I've never been much of a fan of Scott Hull's side project, but here I am listening, head-banging and looking for more. A nice aspect of the split is the similar production between the bands, this creates a nice listening experience (although it is a bit too clean for me, particularly the drums). "Half Dead" starts things off perfectly only to be followed by "As Bad As It Is" with its Slayereque dive-bombing and a slew of drums, riffs, and vocals flying around like shrapnel. Agoraphobic Nosebleed play a super thrashy style of schizophrenic grindcore that's familiar enough but at the same time jarring and bone shattering. The varied vocals, every shifting drums and riffs are overwhelming in the best kind of way. "Ungratful" and "Burlap Sack" stand out as the best tracks, the former being a knotty grind explosion where as "Burlap Sack"

crawls along fittingly featuring Kat's vocals front and center (as she sings for the sludge band Salome). A varied whirlwind of tracks from Scott Hull's mysterious bag of tricks.

So far one of the best things I've listened to this year. Well worth picking up.

-F

Hayaino Daisuki - Invincible Gate Mind of the Infernal Fire Hell EP

Myspace
Released: 2010
Label: Hydra Head Records

APs are coming up in a couple of weeks so I'll be hitting the books - hard. Don't expect to see me until the second week of May. In the meantime I leave you lovely gentlemen and scholars with this little baby.

Hayaino Daisuki is Jon Chang's other significant other, the first one being Gridlink. Latter sounds like an abstract art-grind soundtrack to some Japanese surrealim-inspired acid freakout. Invincible Gate Mind... sounds like a hardcore otaku zonked on energy drink playing through Ikaruga on hard mode for the 3rd time at 4 in the fucking morning. A wide-eyed, cramp-thumbed, foam-spewing, delirious, manic, kill-'em-fucking-all-high. Nothing else compares. The EP has been out for a good while, but I fear it hasn't gotten as much attention as it deserves.

Please prove me wrong.

Cut Your Teeth

3 hardcore kids from NYC playing thrash with a rock 'n roll swagger. Heavy shit that will put you flat on the floor in no time, like a good kick to the groin or several vodka shots too many. Music is pretty much a mix of those two. It's potent stuff.

Check it out.

And here's a music video for their new song "Stallion".

Gridlink - Orphan

Myspace
Released: 2011
Label: Hydra Head Records

So now that every member of Chainsaw Justice has been rendered inactive one way or another, I suppose it falls on me as a second-semester high school senior to resuscitate this blog. Let me warn you though, I have a penchant for long-winded, self-indulgent monologue but write terse, short reviews. Hopefully the next few posts will see me writing/ranting more about the music than my personal life. We can only hope.

As mentioned, the next couple of reviews will be short and concise. I prefer to let the music speak for itself and the readers to use his/her own ears. Perhaps I'll offer deeper criticism when I've got more time to spare and when people are reading this blog again. In the meantime, my job here is to simply expose the audience to music they hopefully aren't familiar with and regenerate interest in this blog. That'll be all for now. As promised, here's the review.

+-+-+-+

Grindcore deity Jon Chang and fellow noise-pollutors from other genre greats such as Hayaino Daisuki, Kill the Client, and Discordance Axis are back with the follow-up to 2008's Amber Gray. Chang-boy brings back the death growls employed during his DA days to compliment his typical throat-shredding sceams. The addition of bassist Teddy Patterson III (Burnt by the Sun, Human Remains, Hayaino Daisuki) supposely adds the low end that was missing on Amber Gray, though it's hard to tell it's there at all. The presence of two-guitarists (Takafumi Matsubara and Takafumi Matsubara) only ups the trebly piano-wire strangulation-madness that they somehow manage to convert into riffs.

Gridlink (and pretty much any of Chang's bands) are notorious for taking an extremely long time to put out new releases and having a perfectionist streak. And there is absolutely nothing wrong with that. Along the longest, most laborious distillation process can produce the the purest, strongest works that will stand the test of time. Those who can stomach the wait - the true believers - will be rewarded richly. Everyone else can go listen to Amon Amarth. Orphan is 12 minutes of the most skin-flaying, eardrum-rupturing, skull-piercing technical grindcore known to man and probably any other intelligent species in the multiverse. You will enjoy it...

...and then beg for more.

Weekend Nachos- Black Earth

Official Myspace
Label: A389 Records
Release Date: March 2011
Release Type: 7" EP
Genre: Power Violence


Striving for the balance they found on 2009's Unforgivable, Weekend Nachos bounce back from the lackluster Bleed e.p. and hit home with this one.

Black Earth is a short, jam packed e.p. totaling 4 songs just over 5 minutes.As mentioned earlier, I found Bleed to be a let down as it had the animosity and heaviness I loved of Unforgivable but lacked speed and variation, making it overall a bit boring. This time around they band keeps it's focus on unbelievably heavy guitars and beat down sections but thankfully intersperses plenty of faster and more typical power violence outbursts. Flurries of blast beats lead into intense mosh sections introduced with harsh feedback and cascades of cymbals. As far as song writing goes I'm sold with this one.

And while the band regains the form that they do best, the singer still seems to be struggling with his voice as it sounds artificially distorted and quite different from the last two releases. This is a sore point as the vocals hamper the release overall and are not up my ally. To go further, it's a sorer point if this is studio magic as the vocals dramatically shift throughout the band's whole discography; the tough guy barks from Unforgivable are gone (which was a huge part of my enjoyment). Seriously listen to the band's discography and the vocals will be recognizable but drastically different each time.

Worth a buy for sure, but I have my axe to grind with those vocals. Their next full length promises to showcase both "Black Earth" and "Friendship," while "Priorities" is a redo from This Comp Kills Fascists Vol. I and the last track, "No Saints" is an unrecorded oldie.

Pick it up from A389's site.


-F

Record Radar

Here's just a little update for all of you fan, collectors, enthusiasts, consumers, and what else have you. What we've got here is Gridlink's Orphan due out soon, Weekend Nachos's new Black Earth e.p., and Agoraphobic Nosebleed's split with Despise You.

Soon to be out is Gridlink's sophomore effort Orphan. Available for pre-order over at Hydra Head. There's a CD and a limited vinyl version in either blood red or black. In addition, both versions contain downloads and karaoke versions of the Orphan tracks. Furthermore, the vinyl is heavy weight 45rpm with the A side being Orphan and the B side being a remastered Amber Gray (I believe this means there's a bass and a second guitar on this recording). And to top it all off, there's a karaoke contest....

" Sugarbear (aka Andrew Cox) assembled this karaoke video for the title track so you can shred your vocal cords at home!

To enter the contest, make a video of yourself (or whoever) performing "Orphan" Karaoke, upload it to youtube, and post the link in the comments for the contest blog post (http://mrch.me/r). The deadline is March 22nd, 2011.

The winner(s) will be chosen by Jon Chang (Gridlink, Hayaino Daisuki, Discordance Axis), and will receive a test press of the Orphan / Amber Grey LP, plus whatever else we decide to throw in the package.

No purchase necessary."

This is all great news, as I've been excited for this since it was announced a year and change ago. I myself have only listened to the Myspace stuff and loved it, not to mention heard them play it live at MDF last year which was amazing. Definitely going to be a bright spot for the year. The Black vinyl seems to be all out, so get it while you can.


Weekend Nachos's Black Earth coming out on A389 records sometime soon. This 4 track e.p. features two tracks from their upcoming l.p. that'll be out on Relapse/Deep Six sometime this year. There's a much stronger power violence vibe this time around, which is a welcomed attribute as Bleed was a bit one dimensional in its lack of rhythmic diversity and song structure. This is what's on their Myspace...

"[T]his will feature 3 brand new songs, 2 off of our upcoming LP on Deep Six, and 1 exclusive B-side. in addition to those 3 new songs, the 4th song will be a re-recorded classic that we play at every single show but has still not been seen on an actual W.N. release until now. true Nacho enthusiasts can probably figure out which jam we're talking about. We really wanted to produce a heavier, updated version of the song and make it more recognizable for future live shows by putting it on an actual 7"....so there it shall be. Stoked."

Simple black vinyl with a download code, for the cost of 2 tacos and a coke I think it's worth the bread; buy it!


Probably what I'm most excited for is the Agoraphobic Nosebleed split with Despise You. Already set for pre-order at Relapse in a nice CD t-shirt package; expect it by the end of April. The shirt itself isn't my favorite, but it's worth getting amped about. Info on the vinyl is sparse, but on their Facebook the guys acknowledge that it will be done.

If the tracks from This Comp Kills Fascists 2 are any indicator, than this is gonna fucking kick dick. I've never been a fan of AxNxB, but I'm always open to new things, especially if it involves Despise You.

So there's an update, keep your eyes peeled for all this great stuff, as well as the stuff due out on Gilead. I'm sure there's things I've missed, but these are three things I'm looking forward to the most.

-F

Cassette Casualties Part I

So I've been torn between school work, personal matters, Trailer Park Boys and NHL '11, so it's been hard to get at this blog; but here I am. What I've got in store are two awesome casette's that I had the good fortune to hear.

First up on the chopping block is Spewtilator's Get Conjured ep
.


Official Myspace

If you're uncomfortable cutting your hockey mullet, replacing your Wehrmact and Morbid Angel tapes or unwilling to play anything but your SNES then Spewtilator's latest ep might alleviate your temporal anxiety.

Gloriously fun and frantic, Spewitlator are a brilliant homage to the sounds of the 80's. Quintessential thrash riffing tied together with mosh breaks and outburst blast beats offer something for everyone. Vocals shifting from nasaly shrieks to guttural belches keep up the dynamic and fast paced nature of the band. If you heard their excellent debut ep expect a bit more of a death metal influence with this one.4 songs that breeze by quick, Spewtilator find ample ways to make it attention grabbing and fun; not to mention nailing the perfect kind of production for this kind of music.

Ordering details here, support good dudes playing solid stuff. Keep a look out for the band as they prepare for a new 7" that promises to be good (I've got the inside scoop).

-F

Fell Voices - Untitled

Official Myspace
Label: Gilead Media, Howling Mine
Release Type: LP, Full Length
Release Date: March 2011
Genre: Black Metal

Fell Voices, containing ex members of Mohoram Atta and Centipede, are taking the proper route this time around with the reissue of their CD-R only release thanks to Gilead Media and Howling Mine.

Fell Voices play a long, winding, stream of black metal much in the vein of Wolves in the Throne Room, Leech, Skagos, and the like. The vast sprawling composure of their new LP spans two songs and over forty minutes, allowing for all kinds of twists and turns, winds and falls, and always with momentum. It's a hard thing to keep someone listening for twenty minutes straight, yet that's never an issue with Fell Voices as they deftly craft songs earning the quality of epic. Every snare hit, cymbal crash, note and piece of feedback has its place; it's a rare feeling of cohesion that allows the listener to blissfully zone out in a black metal daze.

The record itself promises to be a real treat as it's heavy black vinyl with awesome artwork, a huge poster, patch, and pin. It's dirt cheap and can be pre-ordered over at Gilead. Also check out the Ash Borer/Fell Voices split being reissued by Gilead Media and Eternal Warfare which is also available for pre-order at Gilead.

No egos, no bullshit, nothing about how evil they are, Fell Voices are a sleeper-cell in the black metal scene and this is their dirty bomb.

As is plainly obvious, the frequency of posting on CJ has slowed considerably in the past several months. Now that FleshMonolith, lately our only regular poster, has become occupied with some personal affairs, I think it's entirely safe to assume that there will not be any new posts for a reasonable amount of time (at the very least, until his return). As for the rest of the crew, engagements and activities in our offline lives have kept us from posting (some of us much, much longer than others), so I'd like to extend my thanks to our dedicated readers who continue to privilege us with their attention. I believe that FM's guarantee of an inevitable return applies to all of us, and I do hope you lot won't forget about us before then. I know that Axel and I most likely will not be back before June, however 206, and especially FM, could come back well before then and run this ship singlehandedly as they have done so exceptionally before. As for the bands sending us demos and EPs, do know that we have not forgotten you, and that we are planning to review much of the material you've sent us later down the line. All in all, I'd simply like to extend my thanks once more to all our readers, and assure you that this project will be much more active later this year.

Best regards,

Gravemarker

I've run into some personal issues that have kept me away from this site (as you can see). A return is inevitable, but for the time being I'm overwhelmed.

Thanks for sticking with me,

-F