TOP 50 ALBUMS OF 2022: Part II (#40-#31)
List madness continues.
40.
Executioner’s Mask
’Winterlong’
[Profound Lore]
Jay Gambit already has a long and prolific musical trajectory with several projects, most notably the shapeshifting horror that is Crowhurst, but his best move might really have been to form a band based on the stuff he consumes the most as a listener, as he told us when he guested on the podcast a couple of months ago. Executioner’s Mask’s second album sees them dive even deeper into the 80s UK post-punk and goth scenes, and while the homage is real, they also manage nevertheless to sound current, never coming across as a nostalgia act at all. As far as recent updates/bastardisations of genres go, this is it for everyone who’s ever owned a Sisters Of Mercy record.
39.
God Alone.
’Etc’
[Prosthetic Records]
“Dance infused math/noise rock” made by actual music students who look like this? I get it if you haven’t given them a chance even if God Alone. have come across your musical travels somehow, but for fuck’s sake please do right now. I was kinda forced to listen to them because I was assigned a review for a magazine, but I quickly realised that instead of the hipster-friendly pretentious mess I was dreading, the cacophony that blared out of the speakers made me instantly sit up and take notice, and when it was all over, press play again. These delightfully nerdy students of the MTU Cork School of Music (and guys, please confirm your name comes from that one Altar Of Plagues - Cork natives themselves - song) seem to have thrown black metal, prog, electronics, jazz, doom and indie rock in a blender, poured the resulting gloop all over the mixing desk while smoking a blunt, and it fucking worked. Unpredictable, exciting, gloriously fresh madness that demands to be listened by more people. Open up your mind and go!
38.
Serpentent
’Ancient Tomes, Volume I: Mother Of Light’
[Svart Records]
A stroll through a haunted wood, or something like that. There really is no justice to be done to this record without resorting to tired analogies that have long since lost the impact they should have. The work of multi-instrumentalist and visual artist Anne K. O'Neill, ‘…Mother Of Light’ is a record that will instantly draw you into its thick atmosphere, not only musically but for the depth of its meaning as well, a collection of reflections on life and death brought to life by a rich yet subtle tapestry of dark folk with sombre industrial undertones. If you really need a comparison, take for instance Steve Von Till’s more recent solo work, where his Harvestman ghosts became more embedded in his work, as a mere reference point. A similar haunting, pastoral vibe takes place here, but instead of Steve’s hoarse mutterings, it’s Anne’s commanding vocal presence that takes it to another different place entirely.
37.
Mamaleek
’Diner Coffee’
[The Flenser]
Fucking hell, that album cover alone really tells you everything you need to know about this sick puppy, doesn’t it? Following KEN mode’s ‘Loved’ as another perfect example of “artwork you can listen”, ‘Diner Coffee’ delivers exactly what you’d expect. Deranged, unhinged, terrifyingly hilarious (or hilariously terrifying, or both) broken bits of music, samples and field recordings, all of it an attempt to, as the press release mentioned at the time, “reflect the camaraderie found at the heart of global calamities and changing personal situations,” whatever you might make of that. I won’t even throw genre names or comparisons at this one, you just go and have a listen if you’re feeling brave, and then maybe have a shower, or a coffee, or just try to laugh it off. Or all of those at once.
36.
War//Plague
’Manifest Ruination’
[Phobia Records / Organize And Arise]
One of the best crust punk bands still going. Taking on all of the world’s many social and political problems and injustices and spitting them back at you with sneering disgust, War//Plague are awesome by themselves, yes, but also by what they represent - the kind of band that we always need to exist, the ones who don’t shy away from reality, from the issues that torment us, and try to do something about it with their art and their activism. The best part is that even if you’re a dead-inside robot who wants “politics off my music” or some such nonsense, you’ll still be moved by the crushing power of these songs. Oh, and guitarist Andy Lefton is a lovely dude too, as you can hear for yourself on the podcast episode where we had him as a guest.
35.
Ratos de Porão
’Necropolítica’
[F.O.A.D. Records]
The Troops Of Doom
’Antichrist Reborn’
[Alma Mater Records]
Vulcano
’Stone Orange’
[Emanzipation Productions]
A three-piece, but one that is, I hope, easy to understand, as all these three bands represent some of the best heavy music that is being made in Brazil, while also maintaining their connections to the golden 80s period of the Brazilian underground. My esteemed colleague Nick Moberly, with whom I was honoured to share the pages of Terrorizer as a writer for a few years, runs these frequent quizzes on his Twitter account, questions like “best death metal album of 2003”, stuff like that, and they’re awesome to get opinions going and great nerdy discussions flowing. A few days ago, he had a deceptively simple one, “Which country has made the more impressive contribution to heavy metal?”, and the options were Brazil and Switzerland (he’s been basing these on World Cup clashes). Much to my initial surprise, and despite my profound love of Tom G. Warrior’s entire career, Coroner, Samael and a few others, I really had to pick Brazil, and to be honest there aren’t many other countries that could have taken this one from them. Sure, most people know and recognise Sepultura’s early input as crucial, but bubbling beneath that surface, there’s dozens of absolutely fantastic names, many of which never really made much of an international splash, but retain their brilliance - and influence, whether the bands they influence know it or not! - to this day. From Sarcófago to Overdose, Holocausto, Dorsal Atlântica, Executer, Mutilator or Lobotomia, it’s an, erm, overdose of riches that is to be found in the 80s Brazilian underground, and despite the passage of time, some of them still remain today.
Two of the best examples are Ratos de Porão and Vulcano. The former are true crossover pioneers, formed in 1981 and with early masterpieces in their catalogue like ‘Crucificados Pelo Sistema’ or ‘Brasil’, they should totally be mentioned in the same breath as bands like Void, C.O.C., Suicidal Tendencies or D.R.I., and their entire career has actually been more solid and consistent than even most of those. And you know what, they’re still pissed off (or even more now, considering what the political situation in Brazil was under Bolsonaro), and eight years after their last album ‘Século Sinistro’, they pulled off what just might be one of the best albums of their career, totally worthy of their hefty classics of the 80s and early 90s. ‘Necropolítica’ is, as always, raw and harsh, constantly on the edge of a knife that slices clean through thrash and hardcore punk. The band themselves have said this could be called ‘Brasil Part 2’, and that really tells you all you need to know.
Vulcano, on the other hand, have always been bubbling on the searing hot cauldron where death, thrash and black metal are all boiling together, and they roared off the gates in 1986 with an all-time classic metal album, ‘Bloody Vengeance’. Despite a short hiatus in the 90s, they’ve always been consistently productive, and ‘Stone Orange’ is their 12th full-length effort already. ‘Eye In Hell’, from 2020, also heavily recommended, was already a strong hint that they are going through a particularly inspired period, and this new album is a kind of more ambitious follow up to that one - always tearing it up ferociously, recalling those earlier days of bestial devastations (hah), but with a degree of musicianship and songwriting excellence that is far above the norm. Oh, and if you speak/understand Portuguese, do check out the long chat with their legendary main man Zhema Rodero on the Portuguese edition of the podcast, it was really awesome.
The final piece of this unholy triptych is the only one that is not an old band from back in the day, but it kinda is at the same time. You see, The Troops Of Doom, whose name you might recognise as a nod to a certain song by a certain band, are led by guitarist Jairo Guedes, aka Jairo "Tormentor" Guedz, a member of Sepultura from 1985 to 1987, having played on ‘Morbid Visions’ and ‘Bestial Devastation’. And you know what, even if you didn’t have that info, that much would have been clear from ‘Antichrist Reborn’ - a no-frills blast through old-school death/thrash, full of wonderful Celtic Frost-isms and evoking that very particular spirit of old Sepultura that still gets the spine tingling.
34.
Cauchemar
’Rosa Mystica’
[Temple Of Mystery Records]
Annick Giroux is one of the most amazing people in the international metal scene, right? She put out the best cookbook ever, she wrote for metal magazines, she’s part of the amazing Wings Of Metal festival, she has a record label, and yeah, there’s also Cauchemar, with whom she has been putting out true heavy doom metal for over fifteen years. ‘Rosa Mystica’ is the quartet’s best album so far, and that is really saying something - Annick’s unique voice gives these songs a kind of distant, esoteric feel, while the power of the riffs and the irresistible hooks bring you crashing right back to solid ground. It was an immense honour to have Annick on the podcast, and to premiere one of the songs on ‘Rosa Mystica’ at the time. Now how about an European tour, eh?
33.
-(16)-
’Into Dust’
[Relapse Records]
A last-minute addition to the list, as ‘Into Dust’ only came out recently on November 18th, and while lack of immediacy has never been an issue with the mighty -(16)-, this new album feels curiously like much more of a slow grower than ever before. Maybe the slight shift in the vocal approach helps - it’s guitarist Bobby Ferry doing all vocals now after kinda splitting them with departed Cris Jerue on the previous ‘Dream Squasher’ -, but there’s also a bit of a slow-burn feeling to the songwriting that is more prevalent than before, it’s more like being chased through several back alleys by someone with a knife rather than running into sixteen drug-fueled thugs with baseball bats that will beat you down right now. Of course, there’s still instant ragers like ‘Lane Splitter’, and the general outlook is still one of disgust, aggression and mismanaged anger, but on ‘Into Dust’, these perennial favourites show us, on their 31st year of existence and their ninth album mind you, that there’s still some shades of dark grey left to explore in their sound. And there’s no bigger compliment than that.
32.
CANDY
’Heaven Is Here’
[Relapse Records]
Yeah, you can probably find tattered remains of metal, hardcore and punk somewhere beneath those guys piled up on the album cover, soiled by whatever other bodily fluids might be oozing from them, which makes for a very apt image of what Candy sounds like. You can tell why Relapse picked these guys up - a confrontational, harsh beast of a record, ‘Heaven Is Here’ plunges straight down the gutter opened by their ‘Good To Feel’ debut of a few years ago, while offering surprising musical riches and songwriting depth underneath all the grime and violence. Also, be forewarned, I plan to play ‘World Of Shit’ every time I spin records from now on.
31.
Bastard Noise & Merzbow
’RETRIBUTION BY ALL OTHER CREATURES’
[Relapse Records]
Cavernancia
’no chão’
[Regulator Records]
If you think noise is a limited or one-dimensional genre, here’s two releases that can be filed under that genre that are quite different in aim, scope and feel.
’RETRIBUTION BY ALL OTHER CREATURES’ (it’s like that, all in caps, because apparently they don’t shout at you enough, figuratively speaking, during the album) is described by Bastard Noise themselves as “a lashing out against man-made institutions that perpetuate animal cruelty,” which just for that will hopefully make you want to check it out, but make no mistake, this isn’t a flower power kind of activist album. In true Cattle Decapitation form, it’s a scathing revenge attack on humankind, and by the song titles alone you can probably guess the kind of vitriol that takes place in these long pieces. It’s one hour and eleven minutes of harsh sonic violence, where even the slower, moodier ambient parts are deeply unsettling. If you were ever to take the place of an animal inside a human abattoir, this is what would go on inside your head all the time. Oh, and Stupidfy: there’s no “The” on their band name.
‘no chão’, on the other hand, as I explained when I featured Cavernancia as band of the month on these very pages, is a whole different beast. The one man noise machine Pedro Roque leads has been getting noisier and more up in your face with each release, yes, but it’s still mostly a question of atmosphere and long build ups, even if they’re building up to throw you into “a bottomless lake of fucking fire,” as I sort of eloquently put it in that band of the week feature. It’s also much vaguer and left to your own interpretation in terms of meaning, so you can just stare off into the distance as the rumble accumulates around you rather than dreaming of chopping human beings into strogonoff-sized pieces. It’s a mood thing.