Math Metal/Mathcore: The Most Impressive Genre?

Now I know thats a bit of an overreaching statement, and one that will receive some dismissal as mere opinion, but if you're a math metal fan you'd find it hard to deny. I first got into math metal when I heard 43% Burnt by the Dillinger Escape Plan. It blew my head off, I had never heard such a mind bending blast of technicality before and I'll be honest, I didn't get it to start off with. It seemed to be a literally representation of noise for noise sake. But a close friend of mine got me into DEP with their Miss Machine album, and I've not looked back, and I thank her sincerely for that! DEP had pretty much defined mathcore with Calculating Infinity, their 1999 album, and at the same time took it to its most extreme conclusion. Miss Machine was a more sideways move than progression, incorporating more melody and singalong ability without losing any of their roots and skill. But of course DEP are not the only purveyors of such mind altering metal. Meshuggah are the kings of odd time signatures, polyrhythmic riffs and head caving groove. Behold...the Arctopus, a personal favourite, are the instrumental equivalent, again a wonderful cocktail of technicality and brutality. Other bands like Psyopus, British underground heroes Sikth, Daughters, Fear Before the March of Flames, Norma Jean and of course, the bands that laid the foundations for such a discordant, spazzed out genre, Botch and Converge, have managed to keep this genre flourishing which is always so surprising considering its obtuse style and severe lack of mainstream ideas. Well, except for the infectious choruses of some DEP songs from their latest, Ire Works. So if you're a metalhead who finds even some of the more technical thrash, death or black metal just not quite enough, or if you're just looking for something a bit mental, keep an eye out for mathcore.

Essential Releases:
Botch - American Nervoso - buy here
Dillinger Escape Plan - Calculating Infinity - buy here
Psyopus - Our Puzzling Encounters Considered - buy here
Behold..the Arctopus - Skullgrid - buy here
Daughters - Hell Songs - buy here
Meshuggah - Catch 33 - buy here
Sikth - Death of a Dead Day - buy here

Dillinger Escape Plan - myspace page
Psyopus - official website
Sikth - offical website
Behold...the Arctopus - myspace profile
Daughters - myspace profile
Botch - myspace profile
Mesuggah - offical website

Immolation - Close to a World Below

Immolation are veterans of the death metal industry, releasing solid and generally magnificent death metals since their ferocious debut Dawn of Possession in 1991. They've refined their brutal technical and unwavering blasphemy spewing music into something we can rely on. Unfortunately I feel they can be regarded as rather underrated, even though they rarely put a foot wrong musically. When you think of death metal, they're not in the top 5 that instantly pop to mind, but in terms of consistent quality, they probably should be. After reading a review and hearing a promo version of their newest release, Shadows in the Light, I decided to invest in their back catalogue. The first record I decided to pick up was 2000's Close to a World Below, an excellent slab of death metal with appropriate Christ baiting cover with a crucifixion scene in the fires of hell and a crowd of damned souls. Musically Immolation were firing on all cylinders here, the twisted riffing of Robert Vigna is instantly recognisable, a thunderous chugging section that winds Lost Passion to a close is perfect for a bang of your head, and the blasting starts to both Furthest from the Truth and Put My Hand in the Fire show that Immolation can still blow most death metal bands out of the water. Overall Close to a World Below is a great record, one that kept Immolation at the top of their game and solidified their position as one of the flagbearers of extreme metal to this day. Lets hope their newest can finally get them the worldwide recognition their individuality and style warrant. If this is the soundtrack to the world below, count me in...

Links: www.everlastingfire.com (Official Website)

Power Metal: Yes Please or Too Much Cheese? (This One's For Neil)

Confusing title you may think, but it will become clear. My friend Neil is not a metal fan, in fact he's much more Belle and Sebastian than Cannibal Corpse. But he and I found a strange connection in our love for uber cheese power metal. You know the kind: Rhapsody, Lost Horizon, Dragonforce and the like. He became a fan when I listened to Rhapsody's Symphony of Enchanted Lands II: The Dark Secret album in his presence. With Christopher Lee providing the narrative to tales of ancient kings, wizards and dragons, its a perfect example of what I want to talk about; is the super cheesy, dragons and wizards style power metal really to be looked upon as ridiculous, or is it actually a flag bearer for 'true' metal? I believe that it definitely incorporates parts of both arguments. Yeah it can be ridiculous, just one look at the cover of Lost Horizon's Awakening the World, above, will show that there is much to deride. The chains, the facepaint, the swords and shields, dragons, magic, mystical times and places, its all very Warcraft/Dungeons and Dragons and of course bears little or no resemblance to problems that the real world face. And surely, as grown men or women, why wouldn't you have grown out of such things? The other side of the coin answers this entirely. Power metal is there to be the lighter side of metal, it's normally a guilty pleasure for most metal fans, they like to hide their Blind Guardian or Rhapsody albums from their more kvlt friends. But we all love a bit of fantasy now and then, we can't all go through our lives dealing with real issues without some form of escape. Why do you think Lord of the Rings and Pirates of the Caribbean were so hugely popular? Because its escapism. Plus probably Johnny Depp and Orlando Bloom as well. But mainly escapism.
The point is that power metal albums are normally brilliantly over the top, and reminds you that metal is still allowed to be fun. Many of them are classic additions to metal, such as Blind Guardian's Nightfall in Middle Earth. So me and Neil will keep listening to our Rhapsody, our Luca Turilli, our Dragonforce, and we will be proud of it. And all other power metal fans should be proud of it too, because lets be honest, its THE most metal genre of them all!

Today's Purchases

Now I'm an avid cd collector. As much as I have downloaded in the past, I am much more of a fan of the actual CD, the overall package you get with it, and of course, I understand that extreme metal needs the sales to thrive. I remember when I saw Dead Man in Reno support Sikth in 06 in Glasgow, I bought their album and got the guys to sign it after a great discussion at the merch table. Now I'd never heard them before, but I was impressed by their energy and their music, and I felt they deserved their modest £8 for their album, which turned out to be rather good. But I'm getting away from my point. Today I went to my local and favourite record store, Avalanche, to make some cd purchases. They've got an excellent selection of new metal, and their second hand collection is second to none. That was where I managed to find three of my four purchases today. Tool's magnificent 10,000 Days was only £5.99, and for a progressive metal album of such unbelievable quality, thats amazing. I was an instant fan of Vicarious when I heard it for the first time last year, and the rest match the quality of this. Essential. I also managed to find Napalm Death's Smear Campaign for the same price, and the self titled debut from Melencolia Estatica. The former, everyone reading this should know, are the legendary death/grindcore band from Birmingham who are as essential on their latest as they were when they first tore the metal genre a new arsehole all the way back. ND are always reliable, I find, at just hammering the fuck out of you, and yet leaving you totally satisfied. The latter is a black metal band from Italy, an interesting prospect of being a one woman project dealing in sadness and depression (as if you couldn't get that from the title). It's great undergound black metal, laced with icy, melancholy atmospheres that surround the riffs and drag you down with them. Finally I got Suffocation's Despise the Sun EP. Suffocation are veterans of death metal, with their Effigy of the Forgotten album a bona fide classic of the genre, and this EP doesn't disappoint. It is their trademark mix of brutality and head spinning technicality, along with seriously deep growling. It'd be a perfect starter to their sound, short and sharp but head cavingly heavy.