Coupla notables & runner-ups: 2022
Here it is, list season begins. Four releases from a stacked year that got more attention than most, and were just barely edged out of my own Top Ten. Worthy in their own right, now put under the microscope.
Dead Void, Volatile Forms (Me Saco Un Ojo)
Been a big fan of the death metal scene in Copenhagen, which is still among the world's best. But like the trajectory of the Icelandic black metal surge a few years ago, a lot of the bands are getting too melodic and/or predictable for my taste. Impressive musicianship, no doubt, but how many times are they gonna re-write the same Death songs over and over? Enter Dead Void, who returned this year to follow-up their crushing The Looming Spectre demo from 2018. Where their peers are polished and seamless, Dead Void lurch forward with an inebriated stomp and sway; sometimes transitions are clunky, guitars groan and wail under their own weight, and the vocals are feral reverberations from below. The imperfections work to their advantage somehow, not only to differentiate them from the monolith of modern OSDM acts, but also to highlight their ferocity. Dead Void tear and claw their way through these five tracks; there is a palpable hunger on Volatile Forms. Songs like "Atrophy" and "Sadistic Mind" have the feel of the first two Eyehategod albums, filthy and desperate, and it also highlights the rough slow-fast transitions the band employs. The band runs closer to death-doom hybrids like diSEMBOWELMENT or Winter than pure death metal, bursting out of mantle-cracking riffs to barrage the listener with an assault of full-on thrash, and ultimately returning to the grimy depths. "The Reptilian Drive" is probably the weakest track, the two chord riffs overstaying their welcome, but it's still hard to deny the powerful drumming and squalls of guitar noise that pass as solos. If you like your metal slower, very dank and cavernous, and don't mind a little gristle here and there, Volatile Forms is your fix.
Gu-N, s/t (An'archives)
Might be a bit silly, but I've been buying the An'archives stuff almost purely for the presentation: Alan Siwa's beautifully silkscreened jackets and obis, thoughtful liners, and the postcards are a nice touch, too. The music is primarily focused on the sub-sub-underground of Japan, and ranges from the jaw-dropping to stuff that maybe should've stayed obscure, but all of it is head-scratching and deeply singular. File this Gu-N LP with the keepers. Featuring artists from groups like C.C.C.C., Hijokaidan, Incapacitants, Fushitsusha and LSD March, this is creeping noise reimagined in a guitar-bass-percussion lineup, with an unsurprisingly large helping of electronics and homemade instruments. I'd have guessed this would be either a caustic mess or a too-polite meeting of the minds (á la that Gagmen album), especially given that these four tracks are all improvisations, but it's wildly compelling. The tracks grow and throb, like a sped-up video of a fungus growing, and no one instrument or performer drowns out another. It reminds me a lot of the Dead C on their recent mostly-instrumental albums on Ba Da Bing, but there's a gnawing intensity burbling up behind these tracks, as if they're collaborating with Tom Darksmith or Joe Colley. The band never reaches all-out destruction like some of the members' other groups, and they don't have to, but the threat lingers throughout. Bowled me over, and continues to do so the more I lean into it. According to the writeup, this is a sampling of the band's improvisations; let's hope there's more releases in the works from the vaults of Gu-N.
Lilac, s/t (self-released)
Chicago, you're still ground zero for rough 'n burly rock accompanied by sneering spoken-yelled vocals. Shellac looms large over Lilac, as I'm sure the band loves to hear, but I also hear a good bit of those coasties Fight Amp on this record, too. Driving the album are big muscular riffs, boosted largely by the rhythm section, and even someone who's heard it all oughta be able to appreciate the energy injected into a oft-emulated, rarely this-well-executed genre. My personal favorite is the opening riff to "I'm Old" (check those lyrics, too), but the band hits on just about every song. The mixing and mastering by Seth Manchester probably plays an outsized role here; everything sounds clear, the bass and drums extra punchy, and the guitars are precise and noisy as a buzzsaw cutting metal. Some of the music I used to listen to in this vein makes me cringe now, but Lilac skewers topics like the casual misogyny commonly employed among "edgy" rock bands. Anya Davidson leads the attack on songs like "I.U.Dea" and "Woman In Power," the lyrical efficiency putting out backwards conservative talking points like a cigarette butt under a heel. That's not to say that this record isn't without its less than inspired moments, like "Burn Down the White House," a comparatively juvenile, unambiguous sentiment on an otherwise brutal yet cleverly indirect lyrical record. It's a more than forgivable offense - I mean, who hasn't thought that same thing in the last few years? - and it's especially easy when the rest of the record holds treasure like the seasick riff of "Sewage Alphabet" that hits at 0:18 in. Good lord. Seems the biggest problem with this record is that not enough people are talking about it or buying it, so go help Lilac cruise through the rest of these LPs they painstakingly put together and released themselves.
Reeking Aura, Blood & Bonemeal (Profound Lore)
Reeking Aura's three-song demo dropped in the midst of 2020 on Parasitic Records, and was quickly purchased and lost in the deluge of my Bandcamp Friday purchases. I thought it was good, but I didn't think it was good enough to land them on Profound Lore, one of metal's preeminent labels. It makes more sense now that I know the vocalist in Reeking Aura was, until recently, also the voice of Artificial Brain, who have a couple of LPs on Profound Lore. The vocalist in question, "Big Will" Smith, is an outsized, affable personality with arguably the best guttural metal vocals in the game. Set him up in a death metal band featuring three guitarists, and you've got my attention. Reeking Aura is a bit of a concept band, something poorly summed up as a band focused on the smells emanating from the life-death-rebirth cycle of nature, and on their debut LP, the concept grows to include a "caretaker" of a farm slowly succumbing to "morbid psychosis." The lyrics, for the curious, are available with the LP and on the Reeking Aura Bandcamp page. I'm not sure any of that adds to my enjoyment of the record (though the Reeking Aura shirts that say "Agricultural Death Metal" certainly do), nor am I sure that it could: Blood & Bonemeal is flat-out one of the most fun death metal records I've heard in ages. The ante is upped from the demo musically, too, even if it's a bit cleaner than I normally like my death metal. The vocal performance shines, and the triple-guitar attack is as potent as you'd imagine. There are big chunky riffs, leads that twist and spiral skyward, and peppered in are a few well-placed and well-executed Mournful Congregation-worthy breathers, specifically the last couple minutes of "Pyramid Shaped Plow / The Caretaker." I especially like the opening track and how it grabs you by the shirt, but it's always the ascent-and-decay of "Harvesting the Hatchet" and the rumbling doom of "Grublust" that end up my favorites. Those Death ripoffs I mentioned in the Dead Void review? Reeking Aura is basically one musically, but with a distinctive personality, one unafraid to put down washes of pastel watercolors on the cover and immediately start a circle pit. Blood & Bonemeal has been a perfect workout soundtrack for me, just over thirty minutes with built-in breaks, punishing enough and engaging enough to make repeat listens worth my while. Reeking Aura's flying a bit under the radar, and the lack of touring probably didn't help, but this is a damn fine slab of death metal. Purchase, and channel your own inner vegetative mush.