Seven Daily Sins - Say Yes to Discomfort

Seven Daily Sins - Say Yes to Discomfort

Seven Daily Sins is a newish technical death metal band who have released their debut album Say Yes to Discomfort from the backwoods of Europe in Belarus. The way that I see it, there are two common types for technical death metal in the 21st century. You have the bands who try to be super fast and extremely extreme all the time such as Fleshgod Apocalypse and Obscura and you have the other who try to make their music as technical and complex as possible such as Brain Drill. Both of these seem to cover the 99% of bands who are in the technical death metal or even technical deathcore scene. But, there is that 1% of bands who say “no, I do what I want!” and don’t follow either of those two paths. Seven Daily Sins is in that 1%, they take technical death metal and give listeners a completely different outlook on the genre of technical death and what other elements can be mixed in with it to make it sound more unique.

First of all, if you don’t have an open mind, there is a 99.999% chance that you will not enjoy Say Yes to Discomfort, because these guys are very unique and innovative with their styles. I wouldn’t go as far as calling them “avant-garde” though. They aren’t weird enough to claim that title but if I were to summarise their sound in a single phrase, I’d say that they are somewhere in the middle of a technical death/hardcore/progressive/jazz Venn Diagram. They combine a lot of different styles in their music without making you say “wtf” every three seconds in the song. They really capture the audience with their guitar work in this album. The rapidly alternate from extremely abrasive/technical guitar work, to soothing jazz. The transitions are quite nice as well, they aren’t too rough to affect the flow of the music, but they aren’t too smooth to not fit the technical death metal criteria.
   
I really think that Seven Daily Sins is another great example of how young bands who choose to break off from their trendy roots and move their music into the modern era. There is just something about the vibe given of in the music that makes the music sound contemporary. One trait that I have noticed with bands who sound ultra modern or futuristic is that they aren’t one dimensional, which means that they don’t just choose a sound they are trying to achieve and stick with it the whole way and like I’ve mentioned earlier they have taken quite a few elements and mashed them into one sound. There are times where you get; the intense chugging from deathcore, the technicality and complexity of technical death, the atmosphere of jazz rock and the smoothness of progressive death metal. The best thing about this is that all of it is presented to you on a silver platter also known as Say Yes to Discomfort.

Overall, this is a plus 1 for Seven Daily Sins. I think that they have successfully displayed how well they can put songs together and how they execute them. This album is one hell of an adventure to listen to, there are a number of things that Seven Daily Sins have put into each song to make sure it is never boring. There are awesome guitar solos, super intense deathcore style breakdowns, technicality that might kill you and a little bit of a psychedelic atmosphere thrown in there. I recommend this Say Yes to Discomfort to those who have a very open mind and who like jazzy/technical/deathcore style of music. Pretty much all of the tracks here have a similar style to them as they all contain traces of the elements that I mentioned before. I think that Seven Daily Sins are one of those bands that need to have someone keeping an eye on them in future, because they might have something exciting in the future. I give Seven Daily Sins’s Say Yes to Discomfort a 15/20.

Rose Funeral - Gates of Punishment

Rose Funeral - Gates of Punishment

Rose Funeral is a world renowned deathcore band from the USA, but before I go on any further, strap yourself in because Gates of Punishment could easily be their most impressive release yet. I might sound a little bit like an underground metal elitist but many would agree that it’s very hard to find bands mainstream nowadays pushing the limits of their respective genres because it seems like all the activity in happening underground. But we must ask ourselves, how did these bands become mainstream in the first place? There are the bands that became popular in the deathcore scene by accident and there are those who actually worked to get to where they are now. Rose Funeral might have started out a little rough in Crucify.Kill.Rot. but I think that Gates of Punishment makes up for their blunder in so many ways. This is an unbelievable good album and I don’t think words can fully describe how excellent this album is.

First of all, Rose Funeral have come a long way since their debut release Crucify.Kill.Rot. They were stale, slow, generic deathcore but geez have they turned that around since then. The music now has so much power and torque behind it, it almost seems impossible to dislike this album.

The first thing that is noticed about this album is the drumming, the high paced, high energy, flawless drumming. There is just something about the drumming that makes it sound so seductive than many other bands. It’s probably because pitch and tone of the drumming is absolutely perfect and its clean and crisp. I don’t know what makes some deathcore bands think that having a poor quality recording of drumming is good way to make the atmosphere sound dark and heavy. This is just dumb as far as I’m concerned because there are bands out there who achieve this with high quality recording and If I were to talk to those bands who think this, I’d show them this album and tell them to learn from their superiors (like Rose Funeral). The drumming here in this album literally blasts everything other known band out of the water and while on the topic of blasting stuff, the blast beats here are amazing. You know when people say “speed isn’t everything” when it comes to blast beats, well these guys have both now. The blast beats and double kicks are super fast and super organised, there are times where I could swear that I was listening to Fleshgod Apocalypse.

The guitars work in this album are top notch as well, there aren’t many guitarists that can play as fast as the drumming at times. I mean there are a few bands that come mind when people talking about speedy guitar work and they all come from the technical death metal genre. Well, Rose Funeral isn’t a technical death metal band but they are the few deathcore bands that can keep up with that type of pace without creating an unco-ordinated wad of sound. The guitar riffs here sound a lot like Fleshgod Apocalypse in many ways but I would no way say that they are cheap rip-offs of them. The way Rose Funeral have applied these riffs are completely different that Fleshgod Apocalypse giving them a different character. Also you’d expect there to be many high pitch tabs to be played, if I said that there is none, I’d be lying, but there aren’t as many as what is found elsewhere. I don’t know how people react to this, but I find that there is less confusion within the music without or less which is never a bad thing. There is just one more thing to point out about the guitars and that’s the solos. Deathcore isn’t exactly known for the best guitar solos and although Rose Funeral hasn’t created the fastest most insane guitar solos, they have sparked emotion through their progressive approach. Which I think is much more important than anything else.

Although the progressive elements aren’t the main attraction in Gates of Punishment they do have a major impact on their sound and the emotions of their music in particular. Occasionally there are some progressive style riffs that come along throughout this album which is easily distinguishable from the more technical ones but when they some you’ll know about them. For some reason, there is just some kind of overwhelming power behind the progressive style riffs and guitar solos. It seems so uplifting that it’s the very thing that could make someone’s day and those kinds of guitar riffs seem like a dying breed so you might as well listen to it while it’s still around.

There aren’t many bands out there anymore especially in the mainstream scene that write half decent breakdowns. They probably think, “Hey, my band already had 500,000 likes on facebook, I can just write shit music from now on.” Well, Rose Funeral are one of the most infamous bands out there on the scene as of yet and their breakdowns are still going strong. Back in their first album, their breakdowns weren’t very good; they were dry, stale and unheavy. But once again, Gates of Punishment has pulled another surprise out of the bag. The breakdowns are absolutely amazing, they are slow but heavy and they are well written and perfectly executed. This is something that is rare to find in mainstream bands nowadays, it’s good to have a change sometimes and it’s even better to have a change for the better.

Even the vocals in this album are something different and unlike the vocals in their older music, these vocals are nowhere near as generic. The best thing that I like about the vocals here is that they are just perfect. I don’t mean to bash any other bands out there but it’s just that Rose Funeral does it better than everyone else because they don’t just try to scream has much distorted and incoherent sounds as possible. Rose Funeral has done the smart thing, the vocals here are still distorted but the words are still very clear. You could make out every single word that is in this album, but at the same time, they match the speed pace and heaviness of the music which is just awesome.

I don’t think that Gates of Punishment has any flaws in it whatsoever, the music is; fast, brutal, heavy, emotional, organised/melodic and emotional. They have really outdone themselves tenfold this time and not only that, they have blitzed the competition as well. Although there are a few signs that they are slowly drifting away from the deathcore genre and into more of a death metal sound, I still consider them a deathcore band. Mainly because they still sound more core than death and the roots are still very evident. I recommend Gates of Punishment to anyone remotely into deathcore and death metal and especially to anyone who enjoys listening to Fleshgod Apocalypse. When it comes to recommending tracks from this album, I say try them all but if you don’t have the time check out the track The Desolate Form, it’s just awesome. Many people have thought and still think that there is no such thing as a perfect deathcore album, this might have proven these critics wrong and puts other mainstream bands in their place. Everyone should be ready because Rose Funeral is on the rise. I definitely think that Rose Funeral’s Gates of Punishment is worth a 20/20, it’s just amazing. 

Fleshgod Apocalypse - Mafia

Fleshgod Apocalypse - Mafia

Mafia is Fleshgod Apocalypse’s 2010 EP which was signed under the label Willow Tip Records. For all who don’t know, Fleshgod Apocalypse is a progressive brutal technical death metal band from Italy. These guys are renowned worldwide for their creativity and the leaders in this particular genre. Since their split back in 2008 and their album (Oracles) in 2009, these guys have catapulted themselves to the top of the metal ladder. Bands like this are only one in a million so what is the catch here? There must be something about these guys that make them so appealing. Well the first thing to point out about this band is obviously the technicality, and these guys go further than most bands have the ability to and even then they still have to write good music. So automatically, Fleshgod Apocalypse shouldn’t be insanely discredited for anything they have done.

The first thing that hits you about this album is of course the ferocity of the music. It hits you like a tonne of bricks falling from a ten story building. The band is definitely more technical than anything that has come before it and they have set the bar extremely high for themselves with the release of their debut album Oracles. Oracles was the ground breaking album that absolutely no one has seemed to have cloned to this date. And I’m not sure if people were expecting a new direction with this album, because people who didn’t want them to had their prayers answered. This album has the extreme technicality of Brain Drill with the melody and progressiveness of say… wait, nothing is like these guys. In fact, I don’t even think their old band Hour Of Penance will be seen as even good since Fleshgod Apocalypse has out done them.

Like I’ve mentioned before, these guys have a progressive side to them. So no they aren’t all out br00tality and mindless and incoherent insanity. They do have a sense of song structure and direction within their music. This is another thing that makes them quite special because there aren’t many bands who can write this kind of music, even other progressive technical death metal bands such as Obscura, Fleshgod Apocalypse is easily superior in the song writing department compared to Obscura.

The next thing that Fleshgod Apocalypse is known for is the symphonic and Orchestral elements in their music. Yep, they still have it from their original album Oracles but I think they might have eased back a little from Oracles. Instead of littering the ep with piano solos they chose to do it with guitars. I don’t think this is a bad problem though because piano or guitar the music is still excellent in most aspects. I think that the classical elements in their music go well with the title of the EP, “Mafia”. When people think of Mafia what do people think of? Tuxedos? Tommy Guns? The Godfather? I think that Fleshgod Apocalypse’s sound may reflect the intended themes in their music. Thompsons firing and the majestic, sophisticated Mafia society. Although I have no clue why there is just a random octopus on the front cover, could that be the drummer?

Although this is still an excellent album which is one of the best things to ever hit the technical death metal scene, this isn’t exactly the perfect release, sorry to rain on the parade. After listening to this a few times you cannot help the feeling of repetitiveness throughout the EP. The song structure and pace of music can get boring sometimes, but that rarely happens. I think the biggest problem with this EP is that it can and does get bland at times and even then the music is still going extremely fast, so speed isn’t everything. Another thing they have done here which I think was a mistake is how much space they have wasted on this EP. I have no problems with instrumentals and covers in an album, none at all. But when you have five tracks on an EP and one is an instrumental and another is a cover, that only gives us three complete songs. This EP is way too short.

Overall, this is still an impressive EP which will continue to bring some of the most impressive progressive technical death metal the world has ever seen. I think that Fleshgod Apocalypse has put Italy on the map for technical death metal and we sure won’t forget this. Fleshgod Apocalyse has unmatched capabilities in their music, no one is more technical and melodic at the same time as these guys. Not to mention their amazing song writing capabilities either, their song writing is second to none. It’s no wonder why these guys managed to become so popular in such a short time. I recommend this to all metal fans… everyone, this will definitely open fans to a whole new frontier of technical death. Furthermore I recommend the opening track Thru Our Scars because of the sheer awesomeness that is contained in this single song. I give Fleshgod Apocalypse’s Mafia a 16/20. 

Behold Oblivion - The Infinite Being

Behold Oblivion - The Infinite Being

Band : Behold Oblivion

Album: The Infinite Being

Genre: Technical Death/Deathcore

Year: 2011

Country : USA

Websites: Facebook 

Tracks:

1. Astral Imprisonment

2. Legion Atrophic

3. Hallucinogenic Universe

4. Empyrean

5. Ascendance

6. No One Left

7. Warden

16/20

Myopic - Disconnected Bonds

Myopic - Disconnected Bonds  

 

Artist : Myopic

Album : Disconnected Bonds

Genre : techincal death / progressive

Year : 2011

Country : USA

Website : facebook , bandcamp

Tracks:
1. Hypocrisy
2. Myopic
3. Rodney, II: The Encompassed
4. Impoverished Abstractions

Size : 44.6mb

 
9/20