SHORT REVIEWS Our twenty-fifth edition of Short Reviews for 2023 finds us picking through the last two weeks of June’s new releases, most of these will release June 23rd. I’ve done my best to showcase the most interesting works that I come across while still presenting some decent variety here but choices boil down to what sticks, what inspires or what is worth writing about. These are more easygoing than longform reviews, so relax and think for yourself — If you find something you dig go tell the band on social media and support them with a purchase! If you’d like your music reviewed, read the FAQ and send promos to: grizzlybutts@hotmail.com

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Part of my mind naturally deflates when I approach a black/death metal band named after a Generation I Normal-type Pokémon but then I realize I’ve named my website “Grizzly Butts” and once again manage to shake it off. Snorlax is a thing that should not be, or, a project that simply happened by hand of Brisbane, Australia-based musician Brendan Auld (Descent, Daedric Armor, et al.) as the result of toying around with black metal tonality, eventually expanding it with death metallic influences and generally making a solo project of it. This second full-length album feels all the more serious beyond delivering a semi-dissonant voicing to mid-paced blackened death metal as Auld‘s knack for the ever-wandering phrasing of the modern “underground” is well con display here in clean yet edged-up render. Side A introduces the album solely guided by the musician but around the fifth song he soon hands off the microphone to a different vocalist (feat. Hadal Maw, Infested Entrails, Descent, Feculent) for each of the next four tracks and seems to tailor the style to that of each vocalist to some degree, even pulling in a guest drummer for the pieces he might not be best suited for. While I admire the curation of Side B, it seems like a bit of fun to flesh out the record, it didn’t amount to a wholly coherent, or, ambitious full listen on my part.

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Infernal Curse is a cavernous bestial black/death metal trio out of Buenos Aires, Argentina who concern themselves with a sound most would consider along the lines of groups like Proclamation and Abysmal Lord where a heavily echoing vocal casts dispersions atop a grinding, harried yet somehow meandering blast-forced set of rhythms. The riff-and-rhythm of their gig is simple enough, readable yet appreciably violent pieces which manage to bring an energetic fury to ‘Revelations Beyond Insanity‘, often spreading into impressive death metal arcs which are fast and loose but not inherently sloppy. If you’re prone to the longer form, substantive side of bestial death metal (read: war metal adjacent death metal) this band tend to err on the side of the riff while still breaking away from any too-contained movement. Much as I’d wanted to do a longform review of this album the appeal is very straightforward on my part, I’d really enjoyed the rhythmic sensibilities of the band and how they keep it moving in interesting ways throughout the half hour listen.

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At some point I’d lived nearby a train, one which would shake the second story of the house whenever it’d pass by and lend a random dizziness or nausea to whatever I was doing, often leaving me unsure if it was the ground shaking beneath me, or, if I was experiencing some manner of disoriented malaise. This is how I would describe the emergent, rash and exaggerative avant-garde metal of German musician Rainer Landfermann nowadays, since he’d began pouring himself into this container beyond ~2018 or so. Most folks know this fellowe from his one-off vocals on a certain Bethlehem record, one of those unforgettable pieces of extreme metal history which only becomes more enlarged as folks age into the details. I am probably a bit different in the sense that I have long been a huge fan of his technical/progressive death metal band Pavor and only knew him as a brilliant, underrated bassist until the mid-2000’s.

The style that has thus far emerged from Landfermann‘s solo efforts could potentially be summed as a macabre, horrified operetta which lends a dark romanticist terror to virtuosic and often angularly juxtaposed instrumentation which merely girds the direction of his hundred layered vocal performances, showcasing an erratic yet exhilarating range. It is nothing short of thousand eyed art-noir music pulled from the dark into the burning light, revealed as intentionally vexing études for the playful derangement of a non-scalar mind; Even if you might find a 12″ LP a bit over the top for eight minutes of wildly dense material this is entirely appropriate for the ambitions of the art music within, consider it a medley that could be stretched into a very indulgent hourlong event if prompted. Otherwise if you are already familiar with ‘Mein Wort in deiner Dunkelheit‘ (2019) expect some elevated abstraction here, a bit more of a hand to hold through the cyclonic emotive gusting of each piece in succession. Though I’d have loved for the bass guitar indulgence to double itself the focus on vocals here is exactly what folks want from the artist and the showing here is undeniably bold and unique.

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About ten years ago we found Québecois atmospheric, depressif and moderne acts Gris and Sombre Forêts among the most promising, or, noted in said style of the era. This status had certainly been given some push by their popular collaboration in Miserere Luminis circa 2009, perhaps at a time where post-black metal hadn’t yet reached its early crest where folks were still seeking surreal, devastating works rather than normative saccharine post-rock dilution. The dramatism of the group’s self-titled debut has certainly evolved here on ‘Ordalie‘ fourteen years later but perhaps more of note up front is that we’ve heard nothing from the trio, at all, since 2013 between their three projects respectively so there is some extra weight upon what this will be, and what would be within reason to expect. Well, atmospheric black metal with some wilting and wonderment beneath its folds is the end result, a style probably best described as post-black adjacent for its cinematic and lushly rendered focus. The use of strings for dramatic introspection, piano for redemptive strains of movement, and saxophone to extend the reach of their most surreal diversions comes with a strong feeling of sophistication which I’d felt outclassed the debut within just a few pieces but especially landed its impact within the two final pieces on the full listen.

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Intentionally depressive music is a tough thing to approach in the sense that folks tend to apply functionality to its existence in terms of both artist and consumer perspectives. We ask what it does for the listener and what it does for the artist just as often and this isn’t a common expectation within the milieu of extreme metal sub-genre specificity. Artists might be looking for catharsis in process, some even admit to attention-seeking behavior, others simply want to generate a sentimental or hopeless feeling to combat the numbness of repetitive existence, and many have simply inherited a fatalistic approach to depression which they wear as a key nodule of personage. I guess this not-so deep observation arises for the sake of having felt something for Portland, Oregon-based depressive atmospheric black metal duo None‘s second LP ‘Damp Chill of Life‘ back in 2019 and now parsing why I feel absolutely nothing for their follow-up. Not only has their presentation changed a bit, taking its time within longer pieces which meander with far less of a glowing peak to each song, but I’ve changed in the interim and feel hardened to the peaceful glow of ‘Inevitable‘. The combined ~16 minutes of “My Gift” and “Locked, Empty Room” are essentially ambient beyond the end of the latter wherein a women appears to say “I miss you” before convulsing, choking or similar noises of death end the moment. For my own taste this is a completely silly waste of a good fourth of the album’s hourlong run and ultimately what’d kept me from taking it in any further.

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Many folks would retroactively discover London-based ex-doom metal band The River by way of the guitarist’s association with 40 Watt Sun who’d similarly wielded atmospheric and downtempo rock music to shape their heavier-set take on doom and gloom-gazing metal. Their early works developed slowly beyond conception in the late 90’s, rough around the edges in an appreciable way per their first two full-lengths in 2006 and 2009. They’d eventually found a new singer in Jenny Newton circa 2018 and her voice seems to have served as a catalyst for some profound change in terms of their sound, now leaning towards folkish, at times rumbling post-metallic style on their standout third record ‘Vessels Into While Tides‘ (2019). While that’d been a drastic change it was a beautifully complete thought, a memorable record which had more-or-less escaped the feeling of doom metal in most respects. A more-or-less direct follow up in some respects ‘A Hollow Full of Hope‘ recreates the sentimental drift of the prior release yet avoids the heavier “metal” side of their sound entirely, making for a somewhat sweet, sleepy and frankly a bit plain pastoral “folk”. Once I’d stopped expecting a doom or post-metal related release it was a pleasant enough listen with some immersive, sentimental value. I’ve not real notes beyond style here as I’d not found any particular connection to the songcraft which I’d found overstated and samey overall.

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