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#4. MUSIC REVIEWS 1: STUFF I'VE ENJOYED SINCE I MURDERED THE UNBULOVA RIPOFF
ETERNAL ELYSIUM SHARE METEORCITY, 2002 The only thing I hate about this album is its title. I mean, come on, the word "share" reminds me of the Care Bears, for chrissake. Incidentally, I don't know if Global is still showing episodes of Care Bears fourteen years after the last original episode went off the air. For some reason, they still fill early morning timeslots with crap like Care Bears and other Canadian cartoons like Ovide & The Gang, but I digress. (Great, I'm talking like Jeff Rappaport. Somebody shoot me.) The rest of the album, though, is fucking perfect. It seems like Yukito Okazaki decided to go more commercial with this album, since this album is a lot tighter than Eternal Elysium's previous album, Spiritualized D. There also hasn't been much of a progression from Spiritualized D in terms of the sound and the musicianship, but that's not a big deal, given that Eternal Elysium had a great sound to begin with on Spiritualized D. Yukito Okazaki is the only remaining member of the band from Spiritualized D, so it's amazing how similar the band sounds from two years ago. The two problems that plagued Spiritualized D, though, were the fact that the songs tended to take too long (due to the sometimes-repetitive riffs on that album), and Okazaki's weak vocals. Those two problems have been taken care of. No song on Share (goody-goody-gosh) is boring to hear, in my opinion, and none of the songs sound too long (though two of the songs, "Waiting for the Sun" and "No Answer," hover around the nine-minute mark). Okazaki's vocals are also much improved from Spiritualized D, partly due to the great production job on this album, which is clean, yet still more than adequate enough for this band. There's also the obligatory final "fuck around in the studio" track ("Fairies Never Sleep"), which is fast becoming an EE trademark, but they've kept it to four minutes instead of fifteen this time (which is great news for people, i.e., everyone except me and Residents fans, who hate this kind of stuff). If you're a stoner doom fan, then this is an album you must pick up. Hell, even if you aren't, pick it up, anyway. I can't give this album enough praise. Share is a fucking perfect album. Incidentally, I'm not being biased towards Eternal Elysium because my 'zine was thanked in the credits to Share. The band is just that good. ETERNAL ELYSIUM c/o Yukito Okazaki 1201-8-203 Fujisato-cho, Meitoh-ku Nagoya 465-0036 Japan http://www.soybean.co.jp/EE [email protected] ----- METEORCITY RECORDS PO Box 40322 Albuquerque, NM 87196 USA http://www.meteorcity.com [email protected] THE RIBEYE BROTHERS IF I HAD A HORSE... METEORCITY, 2002 Yay! Another Monster Magnet side project from MeteorCity! ROCK! Okay, I'm being a bit facetious, but former and/or current MM members have figured in three MeteorCity releases already (through albums from Scene Killer, The Atomic Bitchwax, and these guys). This is my favourite "MM side project" band thus far. If I Had A Horse... sounds like something that Bloodshot Records would release. It's very "insurgent country" mixed with rockabilly, with a Farfisa organ added in (especially on tracks like "Bootful of Piss"). It's a good enough album to get pissed to, and is a very un-Meteorcity release. While I don't want MeteorCity to start becoming the stoner-rock equivalent of labels like Relapse (admit it, that label started to go downhill when they started releasing stuff from bands like The Dillinger Escape Plan and Burnt By The Sun, and you know it) and Century Mediocre, I don't mind diversions like this from MeteorCity. In fact, I can see an audience for The Ribeye Brothers beyond fans of Monster Magnet (unlike, say, The Atomic Bitchwax, who are okay, but not that great). It's also better than most of the "insurgent country" I've heard on RadioSonic (which is this very trendy, annoying CBC Radio Two show that airs on Saturday nights here in Canada) in the last five years. This kind of music might better be served by an "insurgent country" label or a label like Crypt, but If I Had A Horse... is good enough that it can stand on its own as a MeteorCity release. By the way, I'm not sure if this is the full title of the album, but the title track on this album is called "If I Had A Horse, I'd Buy It Oats And Fuck It." Just thought I'd let you know. METEORCITY RECORDS PO Box 40322 Albuquerque, NM 87196 USA http://www.meteorcity.com [email protected] THE CHASM REACHING THE VEIL OF DEATH LUX INFRAMUNDIS PRODUCTIONS, 2001 Man, did Dwell ever give these guys the screw job. I don't know what's going on with that label. They dropped The Chasm, and yet they're STILL releasing "tributes?" I got the Destruction and Mayhem "tribute" albums from Dwell some time ago, and true to form, they're both shitty. Dwell seems to be dead as a label now. Sure, they release some of the stuff from AvantGarde domestically, and I think they still have Coffin Texts, but they've only signed two bands in the past two years? That's a "whatthefuck" moment if ever one existed. Incidentally, The Chasm covered "Deathtrap" for the Destruction "tribute" album. I don't get it. Well, onto the music at hand. Reaching the Veil of Death is a decent mid-to-fast-paced death metal (or, as Daniel Corchado likes to call it, "Metal of Death," which I find a "term of redundancy") album, and I find this better than The Chasm's previous album, 2000's Procession to the Infraworld, though this is an EP. The underlying problem I had with Procession to the Infraworld was that it seemed to be a little bit too poppy for a death metal album, and that it was a little too repetitive. On Reaching the Veil of Death there's more variation, and there is a marked increase in "mosh parts," which I felt was lacking on Procession to the Infraworld. Reaching the Veil of Death is a very "old-school"-sounding album, and though this isn't very "brutal," The Chasm manage to be effective at being melodic without degenerating into NWOSDM dross. I'm not going to lamp on this album long and hard like Terrorizer and Unrestrained! have, but Reaching the Veil of Death is still a very worthy death metal album, and it makes Dwell's dropping this band seem even more puzzling. The price of this MCD is $10 for those in the USA and Canada, and $12 for everybody else, payable by cash or money order to Daniel Corchado to the address below. Interview forthcoming... LUX INFRAMUNDIS PRODUCTIONS 5858 S. Kedzie Ave. PMB #6 Chicago, IL 60629 USA http://www.enterthedeathcult.com/ [email protected] [email protected] ACCLIMATE MISCREANT: OLD, NEW AND INBETWEEN SELF-RELEASED, 2000 Acclimate is one of the bands that I sent the "Save The UBR" e-mails that I did in February to. Well, The Unbulova Ripoff is dead, and Acclimate still stands as the only non-metal release that I got from that failure of a promo grab. Okay, I shouldn't be so crass as to use terms like "promo grab," but come on, that's what it was. Anyhow, Miscreant is a collection of ambient tracks assembled by "Artemis K" from 1996 to 2000, and I must say, what Artemis K is doing is pretty good. Artemis K comes up with some very good arrangements and effective use of samples, synths, etc. to create some very interesting tracks on this album. Some of the songs get a little too redundant for their own good, and the album is a little overlong at sixty-three minutes, but on the whole, Miscreant is a very interesting album, and is very good music for the ambient genre. I especially like the use of white noise alternating with more subdued silence and quiet synths that can be found throughout the album. A problem I have with a lot of ambient music is that it is quite boring, just minute-long notes and groaning. Give the project an "arty" name, and the project will end up being released on Cold Meat Industry and given 10/10 marks by clueless, ass-kissing goth 'zines. This is the real stuff. Fans of ambient would do well to check out Artemis K's two websites and listen to what he has to offer. I'm just glad that I finally got something from Michigan that wasn't shitty metal-influenced hardcore. That sort of stuff just gives me gas. ACCLIMATE PO Box 262 Flushing, MI 48433 USA http://www.mp3.com/Acclimate http://www.cdbaby.com/Acclimate [email protected] METAL RULES! MAGAZINE ISSUE #12 LATE 2001 I've been enjoying this 'zine ever since I bought it at a Belleville Chapters (a Canadian mega-bookstore, by the way, kinda like the Tim Hortons of books around here) in February. The price is kind of high at $4.95 US/$5.95 Canadian, but it's worth it for what you get. The 'zine is a full size one, 100 pages and without a lot of filler to boot. There are some good interviews with some very diverse bands, and while I am not personally fond of or couldn't care less about some of the bands Metal Rules! interviews (I mean, come on, who the hell wants to read an interview with a band called One4One, anyway?), the interviews are very personal, and for the most part very interesting to read. I actually learned some stuff from reading the interviews. For instance, I now have the perfect rebuttal to all those who think Tom Araya's a Nazi. I mean, would a sane man, much less a supposed Nazi, admit to liking SpongeBob SquarePants? There are also the usual piles upon piles of music reviews, and though the reviews are generally of more mainstream metal and hardcore albums, there is some underground coverage, and the reviews are very honest for the most part. There are also obligatory things like letters, a photo gallery from Thrash of the Titans, and the usual eighteen hundred photos of Jeff Rappaport. The only big problem with Rappaport that I have is the fact that there are so many pictures of him in every issue of Metal Rules! Some of his reviews (like the review of Lead's Meditation of Flesh where he talks about how he stabbed himself in the leg with a pencil when he was in the 5th grade) are a little dodgy, too. Still, Metal Rules! is very well-done, professional-looking and very clean in its design, and not afraid to be silly in the least. I know that pisses some of you brutal DM freaks off. Good!...You can fuck off! METAL RULES! MAGAZINE 2116 Sandra Road Voorhees, NJ 08043 USA http://www.metalrulesmagazine.com/ [email protected] [email protected]  UNRESTRAINED!ISSUES #17, #18 ISSUE 17: LATE 2001; ISSUE 18: FEBRUARY 2002 Well, it took a year and a half to actually get a copy of this to review for The Unbulova Ripoff, but it's being reviewed for Unbelievably Retarded instead. Heh. Anyhow, Unrestrained! is a high-quality glossy 'zine from Canada, and it's a lot better than what I expected, given that Unrestrained! is a glossy. There are a lot of interviews with well-known bands, and while I'd like to see some interviews with more obscure bands, the interviews here are very well-written and interesting, and generally very long. For issue #17, U! interviews bands like Emperor, Neurosis, Darkthrone, Akercocke, Six Feet Under and Krisiun, and for #18, the 'zine interviews Pungent Stench, Borknagar, The Crown, The Chasm, Sodom and Thought Industry, among others, so U! seems to have a good selection and variety of interviews. There are also a lot of reviews, and while there is some overlap between U! and Chronicles of Chaos (which Adrian Bromley, Paul Schwarz and Aaron McKay also write for), I've rarely seen the same review in U! that I've read in Chronicles of Chaos, which is commendable. There seems to be a slight bias against the more gore-based death metal/grindcore bands, and I could do without the entire Abrasive Outlets (read: hardcore/noisecore) section, but this is a good 'zine overall, and I do recommend it highly. Finally, I should point out that the best section of the 'zine is the Kevi-Metal section, just because Kevin Stewart-Panko writes it. Although he contributes to eighteen million other 'zines (including, uh, Terrorizer and Metal Maniacs, 'zines synonymous in the metal underground with the word "poseur"), his rants are always entertaining, and he makes fun of the entire metal scene, something that has made me what I am today (cue rimshot). By the way, for Qvadrivivm fans, Yury Arkadin and Mikko Kuronen (i.e., the heart and soul of Qvadrivivm) have joined the staff of Unrestrained! <in-joke>Now all they need is me on their staff and they'd be all set!</in-joke> Both issues are $4 US/Can for the USA and Canada, and $6 US for the rest of the world. UNRESTRAINED! c/o Adam Wasylyk 5625 Glen Erin Dr., Unit 57 Mississauga, ON L5M 6V2 Canada http://www.unrestrainedmag.com/ [email protected] TALES FROM URANUS ISSUES #2, #3, #4 ISSUE 2: OCTOBER 2000; ISSUE 3: JULY 2001; ISSUE 4: OCTOBER 2001 What can I say about Tales From Uranus, except the fact that IT RULES!!!!! Heh heh, sorry about the unprofessionalism, but I love this shit! Anyhow, Tales From Uranus is basically a half-size comic by "Jake" (last name not given, but who really cares), and I have to warn you PMRC types that these are horror/gore comics, with a hell of a lot of fucking swearing, so if you don't like this sort of shit, stop reading this review, you idiot! I'm not forcing you to read this!...okay, now that the poseurs are gone, I can continue. Anyway, these comics are very well done, very funny, and with a lot of boobs, gore and "metalhead humour" (I'm using Goden's term here; you'll know it when you see it). Personally, I think you should check out the link to witness the wonders within; this is great stuff. The writing is great, the artwork is great, the dialogue is great...in fact, almost everything about TFU is great. Of course, TFU is not for everybody. If you're one of those people who don't like frequent depictions of penises or male-on-male anal rape (and I understand you are many), then you'll probably think this is gayer than hell; it's all a matter of taste anyway. I personally like this stuff. Again, click on the link below, because all this review is, is my opinion, goddamn it! I believe issue #5 should be out by the time this update of Unbelievably Retarded is published. Regular issues and the "Fall Annual" issue of TFU are $3, and the "combo issue" of issues #1 and #2 (of which the original issues were given away, since TFU was free before issue #3) is $5, and that's payable in "hidden cash" ONLY. By the way, this comic is for "ADULTS ONLY DAMMIT," as it says on the back of my review copies of issues #3 and #4. Just in case you couldn't figure it out by now. TALES FROM URANUS c/o Jake 203 4th St. Charleston, IL 61920 USA http://www.talesfromuranus.com/ [email protected]  
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