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Black Hell and At War With Shadows…

Black Hell - Deformers of the UniverseAmong the most recent releases from the almighty Hater of God label is the debut full-length from Black Hell. The band features former members of Unruh and Wellington, among others, but "Deformers of the Universe" may surprise you with its rather rocked out and sludgy direction—filtered through lengthy tracks that average somewhere in the neighborhood of seven minutes apiece. However, while thick and nasty southern fried riffs and the occasional fuzzed out lead may be present, the overall impact of this material is pretty damn down 'n' dirty—but I'd neither call it doom nor "stoner rock", though similarities to the two styles do exist, and it's definitely got a downtrodden air to it. So these aren't catchy, energetic rock songs at all; but at the same time, it's not a complete and total pummeling either. They're striking a balance, and the end result is interesting in that loose comparisons could be made to any number of bands from the last three decades, but despite familiarities I wouldn't necessarily see Black Hell being confused for any other group of individuals within this particular realm. I'm also digging the warmth of the recording and the way the forcefully yelled vocals are right in the thick of the mix with the instruments... oh, and of course the badass Mike Sutin cover art to boot!

Black Hell "Cowboy Cold"

Pick this shit up and prepare to bruise your knuckles in one way or another:

29 North Records
RevHQ
@ Very Distribution

At War With Shadows - The Truckstop TapesAlso new from Hater of God is At War With Shadows' "The Truckstop Tapes", and all I can say is holy fucking shit this is awesome and what the hell took so long!? I don't know what the deal is with this release, but it's dated 2004 in the booklet, and I thought At War With Shadows had broken up, so... since I can't really find any tangible details about this recording anywhere I'm assuming it's a couple of years old and for some reason didn't see the light of day until now. Whatever the case, this is some seriously scorching metalcore that's by far the band's best material ever. There are loads of tremolo picked death metal riffs and such on this thing that would probably send some listeners running in fear of this being a somewhat typical contemporary metalcore album. But no. That is so fucking far from the case it's not even funny, so do not get that impression. In large part the songwriting on this fucker is incredibly energetic and teeters on the brink of feeling somewhat chaotic strictly in terms of the mass quantities of riffs and tempo changes flying all over the place, but the picking patterns alone are right up my alley and accentuate some of the dissonantly melodic characteristics of the writing quite well, so I'm fucking loving the twisted and mangled vibe they've got going on here. Some of this shit is just totally sick, and at times it's very diverse as well.

Also excellent is the packaging, which is quite hilarious. Track titles such as "Norwegian Country Classics" and "Learn to Stop Reading Now!!" may sound a little silly, but they take things to a whole new level by having the song titles double as "cassette" titles—going so far as to use fake cassette inserts complete with mock cover art and liner notes for every single song on the album inside the booklet. Lyrics are also implemented into these facades, which is pretty damn priceless when all is said and done. Hater of God never fails on the packaging front, my friends. You can't lose. Now, on with the fucking jams:

At War With Shadows "Shedding Excess Baggage"
At War With Shadows "Amateur Facials"

I'm pretty floored by this one. Great, great work, and probably one of the best metalcore releases of the last six years. Very recommended, so make the grab and try not to savagely slit the throats of all who oppose you after experiencing the album for yourself:

Interpunk
Relapse Records

I'll also mention that Hater of God recently released the "Skate of Bulgaria" 5" from Japanese grinders Bathtub Shitter (complete with a toilet paper insert), but my record player won't play vinyl that damn small! Shit happens, eh?

Comments

  1. im glad someone finally got around to shedding some light on that ATWS disc. ive been curious for a while. looks like ill have to pick it uop now. what a great band those dudes are. great post.

    7.6.2006 | By chris

  2. At War With Shadows did indeed break up a couple of years ago, but this was all recorded (and some of the songs were written) posthumously.  They’ve done, I believe, two local shows since the break up (one to help out some touring bands in January 04 I believe, and one a few months ago as a release party).  Three of the members from this final lineup of AWWS are in this band now called Evixxion, which is honestly one of the best bands to come out of Albany in a long long time.  You’d probably dig the Evixxion stuff.

    7.7.2006 | By john torn

  3. good tunes all around. good stuff Andrew.

    7.7.2006 | By Adrianoso

  4. I gotta get that Black Hell stuff!!!

    7.9.2006 | By The Corpse Glide

  5. hey, been reading aversionline.com for a long time but this is my first comment. what can i say.. :)

    yeah, the vocals are really awful. this could have been the best metalcore album of the last six years.. i wouldnt even have considered these vocals adequate if it was a 1992 Sacrilege demo. i mean, c’mon.

    love the blog, keep it up! i miss the previous aversionline.com thing though. that was a good thing.

    cheers!

    7.18.2006 | By Erik

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