
WARPATH:
- When War Begins... (1992) Warpath
plays a more old school type of metal, the riffs are almost rocking at
some points, but they can still write a good song. Pretty good
production,
some inventive uses of clean and distorted guitars. Not really my cup
of
tea.
WHITECHAPEL:
- The
Somatic Defilement (2007)
- This Is Exile
(2008) Deathcore in the same general style as Job For A Cowboy, with a
touch of Meshuggah (see the beginning of 'Possession') and perhaps even
some Black Metal influences (check out the beginning of 'Daemon').
These guys aren't doing anything that others haven't done before, but
they do it so well. The sound is fantastic with a super pounding and
thick guitar tone (the band uses 3 guitarists). The music is really
tight. The drumming is fast and accurate (love the doublebass at the
end of 'To All That Are Dead'). The songs
do tend to suffer a bit from the sameness factor, which they try and
address with some spooky intros, and mild
industrial influences to break things up. But the core of the band (if
you forgive the pun) is the unending bludgeoning start-stop rhythms,
prepare to be punched in the face. The vocals are mostly low and growly
(with the occasional higher pitched raspy screams), imagine David
Vincent from Morbid Angel but with a deeper and thicker voice. They
certainly aren't gonna sway anybody who hates deathcore, but within the
confines of their genre, these guys are top notch. Hopefully they can
find ways on future releases to accentuate their unique aspects, and
break away from the pack a bit.
- A New
Era Of Corruption (2010) I was hoping this would be the album to
push them over the top, but in general, it falls a little flat. Nothing
really bad here, the sound is great, the songs are energetic, but
overall there isn't really any sort of "Hell Yeah!" moment on the
album. The riffs are a little bland, with nothing super memorable to be
found. The best song is probably the opener, 'Devolver', which has a
few decent hooks, but otherwise, this is all territory I have heard
before either with this band, or other similar bands in the genre. If
you're a huge fan of the band's last album, there's nothing wrong with
"Corruption", you'll probably like it just fine. But I don't see myself
replaying this a lot in the future, I'll probably stick to their second
album.
WHITE ZOMBIE:
- Gods on Voodoo Moon
(1986, EP)
- Slaughter The Grey/ Pig Heaven
(1986, EP)
- Soul-Crusher (1987)
- Psycho-Head Blowout (1987,
EP)
- Make Them Die Slowly
(1989)
- God of Thunder (1989,
EP)
- La Sexorcisto: Devil Music Volume 1
(1992) Sort of a combination of old style metal and new style metal
(Motorhead
meets Metallica). Very riff oriented, a more simplistic drum style,
with
decent although not mind blowing production. Nothing spectacularly new
here.
- Astro-Creep 2000 (1995)
White Zombie at the top of their game, a mixture of grooves and sound
bytes.
The production is powerful, with lots of bottom end and good EQing.
Pounding
drums that don't wander too far from techno / dance beats. Riffs are
mixed
with samples and strange noises to form a rather thick industrial sound
that still somehow retains the old-school groove that was present on
their
last album. The vocals are quite distorted, they obviously know how to
use their effects processors. In general good quality songs that are
well
written and commercially catchy without being boring, this is the
Zombie
album to own.
- Supersexy Swingin' Sounds
(1996) Dance remixes from Astro-Creep 2000. Some of the songs are just
way too dance oriented, with very minimal metal samples. But others
still
have that harder edge that you need in any form of intense music. In
general,
an excellent album to have playing in the background at a party, or
when
you're in a more mellower mood.
WOLFKAHN:
- Wolfkahn
(2010, EP) Short 5 songs EP (one song is an intro, and one is an outro,
so basically 3 songs), the band hits a number of styles, from more
thrashy stuff, to more straight forward death metal type material, to
neo-classical, to a touch of Deathcore. The 3 middle songs remind me of
some of Job For A Cowboy's material, I know some of you may not be a
fan of that band, but some of their songs are actually pretty good, and
Wolfkahn's music is as good if not better than Job's best material. The
real surprise is how professional this EP sounds, the production
quality is perfect, lots of big bass and crunchy highs, and the
performance is very tight, like the group has been together for awhile.
I appreciate the variety to the songs, but I think a little more focus
for their debut album will help, not so much focus as to become boring,
just enough to get a more even blend. Like for example, placing more of
the neoclassical elements as part of other songs, instead of only using
that style for the intro and outro. Overall, this EP shows a lot of
promise, and I very much look forward to watching the band mature, and
release their first full length.
WORMED:
- Floating
Cadaver In The Monochrome (1999, Demo)
- Voxel
Mitosis (2001, Promo)
- Planisphaerium
(2003) While I could draw a strong connection between this band and
Disgorge, there are a number of factors that set the bands apart.
First, Wormed has the super low vocals, but they're even more low,
gurgly and possibly processed. Songwise, Wormed's songs have a little
more variety to them. Not in the way that say Suffocation has distinct
and memorable songs, but compared to the ridiculously random Disgorge
formula they do a much larger variety of drum grooves, slow plodding
bits, squawks, 1 bar non sequiturs (like a bit that sounds like the
intro to Cryptopsy's 'Defenstration'). Imagine Disgorge mixed with say
Immolation, and a touch of Cryptopsy. Production is really nice, plenty
of bass and highend crackle, and a lot of layered guitars to make this
big, big sound. At just under 30min, it ends long before the formula
becomes stale. I don't know, is it bad for a reviewer to say it has
some indescribable quality that just persuades me to keep it in my
daily metal rotation? Because it does, some combination of groove,
brutal sound, the ridiculously low vocals keeps my attention, and so I
gotta recommend this one.