Clouds Taste Satanic/To Sleep Beyond The Earth/Kinda Like Music/2014 CD Review

  Clouds  Taste  Satanic  are  a  band  from  New  York  that  plays  an  instrumental  mixture  of  post  rock  and  doom  metal  and  this  is  a  review  of  their  2014  album  "To  Sleep  Beyond  The  Earth"  which  was  released  by  Kinda  Like  Music  and  is  a  single  song  that  is  close  to  50  minutes  in  length  and  divided  into  4  different  chapters.

  A  very  slow,  dark  and  heavy  doom  metal  guitar  riff  starts  off  the  album  and  after  a  couple  of  minutes  bell  sounds  and  melody  find  their  way  into  the  music  as  well  as  adding  in  elements  of  post  rock  into  the  bands  musical  style  and  after  10  minutes  they  change  the  riffing  around  a  bit  as  well  as  bringing  in  a  mixture  of  both  clean  and  heavy  parts.
 
  Halfway  through  the  album  a  small  amount  of  drones  and  heavy  reverb  is  added  into  the  music  before  the  band  brings  in  a  melodic  post  rock/doom  metal  guitar  riff  that  also  starts  to  get  heavier  and  also  add  in  elements  of  stoner  doom  and  the  band  uses  a  lot  of  the  same  riffs  over  and  over  again  to  make  the  music  sound  more  dark  and  desolate.

  Clouds  Taste  Satanic  create  a  very  interesting  a  repetitive  sound  with  their  mixture  of  post  rock,  stoner  and  doom  metal  and  also  stay  away  from  vocals  to  create  a  more  instrumental  atmosphere  and  the  production  sounds  very  dark,  heavy  and  powerful  with  all  of  the  music  remaining  in  a  slow  direction  from beginning  to  end  of  the  album.

  In  my  opinion  Clouds  Taste  Satanic  are  a  very  great  sounding  instrumental  mixture  of  post  rock,  stoner  and  doom  metal  and  if  you  a  fan  of  those  musical  genres,  you  should  check  out  this  band.  8  out  of  10.  

Missiles Of October Interview

1.For those that have never heard of you before, can you tell us a little bit about the band?

Missiles of October are Salas Mathias (guitar / scream), Seytor Bob (drums) and Beyet Lionel (bass / scream).

Band is born in beginning of 2012 at Brussels, Belgium. Mathias Salas who just stopped is previous band: Galvanize, ask me if i want to create a new band with him, i've hesitate a bit because with my other band, [P.U.T], we were in a intense activity at this period (new LP and a tour) but like we've got already share many common stage and appreciate to do shows together, i've accepted. Quiclky Bob have join adventure, interested too, to create a new band (he play with Mathias in Rotyes). 

first rehersal was very funny and constructive so we decided to continue, and 2 years later, we done +/-50 gigs in Belgium, France, Germany and Netherlands and done 2 EP and 1 LP, and have many fun together.

2.So far you have released 2 ep's and 1 full length, how would you describe your musical sound?

we describe us like angry sludge stoner! we love distortion! For Missiles we are influencate by 90's noise rock sound.

3.What are some of the lyrical topics and subjects the band explores with the music?

we talk about our life and all things that angry us, touch us, disturbe us... and few more ""light" songs. We are not a "political" band but few songs are in this spirit. 

4.What is the meaning and  inspiration behind the name 'Missiles Of October'?

When we were looking to a band name, i was reading forthe umpteenth timecomic book "LOCAS" from Jaime Hernandez (Love & Rocket) and one of character "Maggie" was looking about her girlfriend "Hopey" who left in tour with his band. Maggie want to find Hopey and in each club she visit, she asked to people if "Hopey" band have play here, and she give many possibilties of band names, and one is "Missiles of October".

Sure there's an historical reference, a movie, etc... we think it's a good name, aggressive like a part of our music, and when we see what's happen in world it's an actual name, nothing change in this world....it's a bit ironic too

5.What are some of the best shows that the band has played so far and also how would you describe your stage performance?

Best gig? hard to said.... many crazy gigs, can't said. The first show at Magasin4 was very crazy, german shows were always good moment, stage share with our friends of Frau Blucher are always fun... many good remembrances.
And for stage performance .... we are or try to short of storm in stage, it's noise, speed, loud, dark, crazy, etc... and we have fun, people see this. Sincerely we give all our energy in a 40 min gig, all our madness and fury, we try to transmit it.

6.Do you have any touring or show plans for the new album?

since march, we have done shows in belgium/germany and do a complete week in germany.
In near future we have few others gigs plan for coming months. Actually only CD & Digital (free on bandcamp) are out, LP version will be over in July and a new free ep in september, so for next months, we will play everywhere we can to promote "don't panic".

7.With your releases you have worked with Pogo Records, Dingleberry, Bonobo Stomp and At War With False Noise Records, can you tell us a little bit more about those labels?

Bonobo prod is a new french label, Bertrand who do it is a good friend. Dingleberry is our german label, we have meet Tim who do it there's few days, it's nice guy too! At war False noise is our English label, never meet him  but we hope a day to tour in UK, why not? POGO is my own DIY label, i do it since 1993.
They have all co produce LP version, so we've got chance to have 4 labels to help us in 4 countries for our 1st album. Now we try to find other labels for countries like outside Europe.

8.On a worldwide level how has the feedback been to your recordings by fans of underground music?

we've got some many great reviews, radio diffusion, downloads or many good reaction during gigs. it's a pleasure to have all these good react, it's a good motivation to continue and doing our best for fans. On a worldwilde level i do not know we are a little little band so, it's beginning.... things can just grow.

9.What is going on with the other musical projects or bands that some of the band members are involved with?

Bob is singing in punk band Contingent (1978-1983 / reform since 2007), he play drums & singing in Rotyes (with Mathias), he have done few others bands before like Valpurgis.

Mathias play in Rotyes like i said with Bob, he also play in punk band Frau Blucher & drunken horses, before he was playing in Galvanize.

And me, Lionel is playing in sludge indus band [P.U.T] since 1998, i have done others band like Monsters Eaters.

10.Where do you see this band heading into musically during the future?

we are curious to know too ahahah, we have many ideas, want to explore many things, we want each time to create great songs and have fun, songs is often create when we jam and experiment, nothing is planified. we will try to put ahead our noise rock madness.

11.What are some of the bands or musical styles that have had an influence on your music and also what are you listening to nowadays?

90's noise rock bands have influence us for missiles, american bands like Unsane, Girls against Boys, Shellac, Jesus Lizard, Unwound, Fugazi, Deadguy and french bands like Sleeppers, Portobello Bones, les Thugs .... these are few example. At three, we have already listen tons of records since 20 years (and more for bob) so we like many things in many different sytles.

12.What are some of your non musical interests?

I will talk only for me (lionel). I'm interest by cinema (a good influence for bands too), art, and specialy comic book/manga/etc... i'm drawing too. illustration or comic book, I prepare a new one and collaborate regulary with few comic fanzines.

13.Before we wrap up this interview, do you have any final words or thoughts?  

thanks a lot for support and give us chance to talk about our music! hope people will be curious and will listen our music.Be sure that we will done many gigs and records in next years so support us and follow us, Thanks !

Steel Prophet Interview

1.Can you give us an update on what has been going on with the band since the recording of the new album?

We've been planning our record release party on July 19th in Ventura CA with Night Demon and Venomous Maximus.  Other than that not much just doing press and waiting for the album to debut!

2.You have a new album coming out in July, how would you describe the musical direction of the newer material and also how does it differ from the stuff you have released in the past?

I'd say it explores new territory, but owes a lot to our past as well.  Ithink I’ve grown a lot as a writer and performer, so I think there are things that are done better on this new album, than we’ve ever done.  But we still owe a lot to our past, and this album reflects a lot of that.  I see it as being a mixture of the “Goddess Principle”, “Dark Hallucinations” and “Messiah”, but with more developed ideas.

3.This is going to be the bands first album in 10 years, can you tell us a little bit more about the gap?

We didn’t mean for it to be such a long gap, but when we started to work on writing new songs it was a slow process.  It took us a lot of time.  Then the recording took a long time.  I estimated I spent 2800 hours of my time alone, without counting other people's time like the mix and all the other musicians performances!  Like a lot of artists these days we are doing a lot of the recording and editing at home with computers, and I've found this really slows the process down.  On our older albums we would write for a month, rehearse the songs for a month and record for a month then be done with the whole album in 3 months.  With this album we spent almost a year writing it, about a year and a half recording it, and 7-8 months mixing it (R.D. Liapakis from Mystic Prophecy was the mix engineer).  Then when it was completely finished it took us a few months to find a label, then the artwork was created, and it is finally ready.  It took about three years from the time we stopped writing to finishing.

4.Your lyrics over the years have covered some political, esoteric and conspiracy theme topics, can you tell us a little bit more about your interest in these subjects?

I'm a curious type of guy, interested in most everything.  How the human mind and condition works is always fascinating to me.  Rick is the conspiracy guy though.  I'm a bit more skeptical, but we marry the two ideologies together pretty well I think.

5.The band has been around since 1983 and while there where some demo's in the mid 80's and early 90's the first full length was not released till 1995, what was the cause of that?

No Labels were interested.  We tried to get a record out for years, be it Metal Blade, Capitol, etc.  No one would take a chance on us until Brainstorm in 1995.

6.When you first formed the band 30 years ago, did you ever think you would of still been around in 2014?

No, I was looking that far into the future!  It's kind of surprising in a way, but I love to create and I was pretty sure I would always love music and have a need to create it.  I never considered such longevity for the band though, because rock and metal was pretty 'new' at the time.  Black Sabbath was barely 10 years old around then.  The book wasn't written yet.

7.What is the meaning and inspiration behind the name 'Steel Prophet'?

Just the classic mixing of hard with soft along the lines of Led Zeppelin, Iron Maiden, etc.  The prophet part was kind of important though because we really wanted to be mystical and foretell things to our listeners...

8.What are some of the best shows that the band has played over the years and also how would you describe your stage performance?

I think our Wacken performance in 2000 was pretty special for our fans.  Also, the KIT 2013 was a milestone.  Opening for Fates Warning, Candlemass and Armored Saint back in the old days was always pretty awesome too.  Opening for Edguy and Gamma Ray on our 1999 tour was a lot of fun.  I especially will remember opening for my walking buddy Ronnie James Dio at the Heavy Oder Was festival in 1999.

Our performance is very energetic, almost punk in a way.  Lots of jumping, moshing, thrashing, laughing and smiling!

9.The new album is coming out of Cruz Del Sur Music, how would you compare working with this label to the other ones that you have been a part of in the past?

I love Enrico from the label.  He treats me like a partner in our enterprise.  We brainstorm ideas and decide on them together.  With other labels they tell you what you're going to do and how you will do it.  If you have new ideas to try out they are usually rejected.

10.On a worldwide level how has the feedback been to your music by fans of power metal?

Great.  Lots of fans in Germany, Netherlands and Greece more than any other place I'd say, but we have some fans in just about every country.  Our US brand of power metal is a bit different than the European version as you probably know though...

11.Where do you see the band heading into musically during the future?

Getting better.  Honing our ideas more skillfully.The musical future is bright but unknown.  I have some song ideas for the next album, and I'd say the prog elements will be in the instrumentation and harmonies more than the song arrangements.  It's gonna have a lot of the same elements as this new one, but only time will tell where the ideas lead to with Jon and JT back in the fold to add their take on things...  I know there's going to be lots of melody and harmony, and the guitar orchestra concept will always be there in my works.

12.What are some of the bands or musical styles that have had an influence on your music and also what are you listening to nowadays?

I always fall back on Queen, Zep, Pink Floyd, Nugent, BoC, Mountain, Randy Rhoads, Van Halen, Schenker, Scorps, Kiss, Aerosmith, Starz, Priest, Riot, etc. They were my primary influences in the beginning and I still hear new stuff in their stuff every time I put it on.  Just basic music and harmony theory have had a huge impact on what I do.  Truthfully, I am listening to a lot of Beethoven lately.  He's been like a revelation to me recently.  I don't know how I missed him for so long. 

13.What are some of your non musical interests?

I'm an avid back packer.  I've done month long solo hikes in the Maine wilderness, New Hampshire, etc.  I also love to garden.  Tomatoes are my specialty.  I've been in a flag football league for many years now and have been on a couple championship teams.  I'm in electrical engineering and love being involved in the design of new electronic gadgets.  I also just love staying connected to my friends and family and appreciate good beers and tequila…  Truthfully, it's harder to find something I'm not interested in than to list all my interests.  One thing i'm not into is drama and gutless people… But who is?  Not even wimps like other wimps, right?

14.Before we wrap up this interview, do you have any final words or thoughts?

Thanks for the chance to connect with your readers and talk about our new album!www.cruzdelsurmusic.com 

Hard Tension Interview

1.For those that have never heard of you before, can you tell us a little bit about the band?

We are a band of four friends who found their musical inspiration when listening to old school heavy metal bands from the 80's.
One day we just started combining the sounds we enjoyed hearing with elements of classical music and fast electric guitar riffs and decided that we should play live. And so we did.


2.So far you have released 2 ep's, can you tell us a little bit more about the musical direction the band has taken on both recordings and also how do they differ from each other?

Yes, we have released two very different EPs. In the first one, entitled "Perception", the majority of the tracks were instrumental and the guitar played a big role on the Ep's overall sound.
On the second EP, "Fear and Guilt" we experimented with a more current type of sound, but always keeping in mind the old school 80´s style.
The second EP is very different from the first one because we are now trying to explore themes that are important to us. The vocals in this EP are stronger and play a bigger part in our overall sound.
This way, the sound we experienced in "Fear and Guilt" turned out to be a good mixture of heavy aggressive sounds and rhythmic clean elements.


3.What are some of the lyrical topics and subjects the band explores with the music?

We take inspiration for the lyrics in the world around us, from every day events to situations that spiral out of our control.
We aim to inspire the people who listen to us to reflect about their life journey and tell them to always try to be better.



4.What is the meaning and inspiration behind the name 'Hard Tension'?

Hard Tension are a type of classical guitar strings which are very resistant and are used for maximum sound projection.
We very much liked the name and adapted it for ourselves. And also because we like it hard :).



5.What are some of the best shows that the band has played over the years and also how would you describe your stage performance?

We enjoy playing everywhere. What we value the most is providing the people who come to listen to us with worth wile entertainment.
Most of all we like to have fun on stage and engage our audience. Although we tend to have the most fun when the sound is too loud and we have our faithful jack daniels bottle by our side.


6.Do you have any touring or show plans for the future?

Yes, we do. We have just finished the first part of our tour in Portugals's Santa Maria Metal Fest. We will be back on tour on late september, because right now we are working on our first full length album.


7.Currently the band is unsigned, are you looking for a label or do you feel that they are out of date in the modern world?

We were not signed with any label before because we wanted to experiment with sound in our own way. But we still think that a record label still plays a big part in todays musical industry and we still consider that a possible option for the future.


8.On a worldwide level how has the feedback been to your music by fans of power metal?

The feedback has been quite good actually, we got a lot of support from many radios worldwide that want to play our music.
Also, we have received many invitations to play at heavy metal festivals, so we are pleased with how everything turned out so far.


9.When can we expect a full length album and also where do you see the band heading into musically during the future?

You can expect a full length album by 2015! We are now experimenting with a more heavy sound, with elements of hard rock, speed metal.
Overall the sound is more progressive and experimental, with longer riffs.


10.What are some of the bands or musical styles that have had an influence on your music and also what are you listening to nowadays?

We listen to all types of music. We take inspiration from the most diverse musical backgrounds, from the old classics such as Bach and Paganini, to the first Stratovarius albums, as well as Helloween, Gamma Ray, Deep Purple, Thin Lizzy or Jimmy Hendrix.


11.What are some of your non musical interests?

We very much enjoy the long sunny days we have here in Portugal, our beaches are exquisite :)


12.Before we wrap up this interview, do you have any final words or thoughts?

We want to say thank you to all of those who follow us and we hope to continue to have your support!

Cardinals Folly/Our Cult Continues!/Shadow Kingdom Records/2014 CD Review

  Cardinals  Folly  are  a  band  from  Finland  that  has  been  featured  before  in  this  zine  and  plays  a  mixture  of  heavy  and  doom  metal  and  this  is  a  review  of  their  2014  album  "Our  Cult  Continues!"  which  will  be  released  in  August  by  Shadow Kingdom  Records.

  Demonic  spoken  word  samples  start  off  the  album  along  with  some  bass  guitars  and  clean  playing  in  the background  and  the  feeling  of  a  1960's  horror  movie  and  after  a  couple  of  minutes  the  music  starts  to  get  heavier  along  with  some  ritualistic  spoken  word  parts  which  start  evolving  into  clean  and  melodic  singing.

  After  the  intro  a  melodic  guitar  lead  starts  to  kick  in  along  wit h some  vocals  and  the  music  starts  going  for  a  more  traditional  and  old  school  doom  metal  sound  and  the  music  sticks  to  mostly  a  slow  to  mid  paced  direction  along  with  most  of  the  songs  being  very  long  and  epic  in  length  as  well  as  evoking  a  very  dark  and  depressive  feeling  at  times.

  A  great  amount  of  dark  sounding  melodies  can  be  found  on  every  song  that  is  present  on  this  recording  and  a  great  amount  of  NWOBHM  influences  are  added  into  the  bands  epic  and  traditional  approach  to  doom  metal  and  while  the  music  is  in  an  early  80's  musical  direction  the  production  makes  the  band  sound  very  modern.  and  they  also  bring  back  a  small  amount  of  spoken  word  parts  on  some  of  the  later  tracks  along  with  a  small  amount  of  acoustic  guitars  which  alos  are  used  on  the  last  song  as  well  before  returning  back  to  a  heavier  and  doomier  direction  on  the  following  songs  as  well  as  having  the  bass  guitars  make  a  very  powerful  presence  on  this  recording.

  Cardinals  Folly  remain  true  to  their  NWOBHM  influenced  style  of  doom    metal  on  this  album  and  they  keep  it  slow,  melodic  and  heavy  all  the  way  throughout  the  recording.  the  production  sounds  very  professional  while  the  lyrics  cover  Occultism  and  the  writings  of  R.E  Howard,  H.P  Lovecraft  and  Dennis  Wheatley.

  In  my  opinion  this  is  another  great  sounding  recording  from  Cardinals  Folly  and  if  you  are  a  fan  of  occult  and  traditional  doom  metal,  you  should  check  out  this  album.  RECOMMENDED  TRACKS  INCLUDE  "Morbid  Glory"  "Sighisoaran"  and  "Fallout  Ritualist".  8  out  of  10.

  

Great White/Saturday Night Special/Collectors Dream Records/2014 CD Review

  Great  White  are  a  band  from  Los  Angeles,  California  that  have  been  around  for  a  long  time  and  where  also  very  popular  in  the  80's  and  there  music  is  a  mixture  of  pop  metal,  blues  and  hard  rock  and  this  is  a  review  of  their  2014  album  "Saturday  Night  Special"  which  was  released  by  Collector's  Dream  Records  and  consists  mostly  of  cover  tunes  and  a  few  of  their  own  songs.

  A  very  hard  blues  rock  sound  starts  off  the  album  before  adding  in  some  vocals  and  after  awhile  solos  are  added  into  the  music  and  the  first  2  songs  are  a  couple  of  their  tracks  which  receive  a  great  amount  of  airplay  on  the  classic  rock  stations   along  with  the following  track  being  one  of  their  power  ballads  which  also  uses  a  good  amount  of  acoustic  guitars.

  The  rest  of  the  album  are  cover  tunes  and  they  do  a  couple  of  blues  rock  songs  during  the  first  part  which  are  also  mixed  with  hard rock  before  going  into  a  cover  of  "Eye  Of  the  Tiger"  which  shows  the  band  going  for  a  more  traditional  hard  rock  sound  and  th e rest  of  the  album  has  a  decent  amount  of  variety  with  blues  rock,  classic  hard  rock  and  hair  metal  covers  and  some  of  the  bands  they  covet  are  Black  Crowes,  Lynyrd  Skynyrd,  Aerosmith,  "Motley  Crue,  Fleetwood  Mac,  "Journey,  Led  Zeppelin  and  Van  Halen  plus  a  few  other  ones

  Great  White  stay  away  from  doing  most  of  their  original  songs  and  do  covers  of  bands  that  where  a  huge  influence  on  the  band  and  this  album  is  a  lot  more  closer  to  classic  rock  than  it  is  to  metal  but  Great  White  have  always  been  on  the  more  commercialized  80's  side  of  that  genre  to  begin  with  and  the  production  sounds  very  professional.

  In  my  opinion  this  is  a  decent  sounding  recording  from  Great  White  and  if  you  are  a  fan  of  this  band  or  classic  rock,  you  should  enjoy  this  album.  RECOMMENDED  TRACKS  INCLUDE  "Save  Your  Love"  Any  Way  You  Want  it"Diamonds  And  Rust"  and  "Sarah".  7/2  out  of 10.

Black Sachbak/No Pay No Gain/2014 CD Review

 
  Black  Sachbak  are  a  band  from  Israel  that  plays  an  old  school  and  crossover  from  of  thrash  metal  and  this  is  a  review  of  their  self  released  2014  album  "No  Pay  No  Gain".

  A  heavy  and  old  school  thrash  metal  sound  starts  off  the  album  along  with  some  aggressive  vocals  that  combine  elements  of  hardcore  with  melodic  sounding  as  well  as  adding  in  back  up  shouts  and  the  music  starts  turning  into  a  mixture  of  thrash  and  hardcore  punk  along  with  some  blast  beats  being  utilized  at  times.

  Spoken  word  parts  can  be  heard  in  the  music  at  times  and  the  band  also  adds  in  a  great  amount  of  melody  with  the  more  aggressive  side  of  their  musical  sound  and  the  also  bring  in  some  old  school  thrash  metal  guitar  leads  in  certain  sections  of  the  recording  along  with  some  powerful  bass  guitars  and  a  great  dose  of  humor as  well  as  a  brief  use  of  power  metal  style  screams  and  on  of  the  alter  track  also  uses  a  small  amount  of  spoken  word  samples  before  making  a  return  back  to  a  more  heavier  direction.

  Black  Sachbak  go  back  to  the  punk  and  thrash  crossover  sound  of  the  80's  and  bring  in  a  more  melodic  take  on  this  genre  with  their  musical  sound  while  still  having  a  great  amount  of  heaviness  and  aggression  to  them,  the  production  sounds  very  old  school  yet  professional  all  at  the  same  time  while  the  lyrics  cover  political,  real  life  and  humorous  themes.

  In  my  opinion  Black  Sachbak  are  a  very  great  sounding  crossover  mixture  of  punk  and  thrash  metal  and  if  you  are  a  fan  of  those  musical  genres,  you  should  check  out  this  band.  RECOMMENDED  TRACKS  INCLUDE  "Haircut  I  Never  Got"  "Marx  Was  Right"  "Fuck  Your  Law"  and  "Smoke  Hash".  8  out  of  10.