Now, for something from this our regional scene. Eva Ras were already in this zine, it is a one man hardcore punk/screamo band/project. This time, Eva Ras released split with similar one man entity from Novi Sad, called give.me.the.gun. Eva Ras side features five songs, one being Kobra Khan cover and delivers what we are used to from this band, being short and raw, noisy hardcore punk screamo songs with clever use of noise parts and some samples. My favorites are ‘Ja Sam Eks Ju Mesec’ and ‘Da Se Podsetimo’. This is dark hardcore screamo par excellence, especially the dark story featured in ‘Voala/Se Moa’. Vocals are tortured screams mixed with sampled parts, whispering and talking, like horror movie soundtrack. Give.me.the.gun. side contains four songs in English, one also being IWHACIYY cover. This is also one man band/project from Novi Sad, which I never listened to before. This side sounds more like a rehearsal record, being very raw, but also very atmospheric and having some great melancholic melodies, like in ‘Burning Bridges’ instrumental. There is also a sample of two of noise atmosphere cleverly thrown in. But, there is also sheer hardcore screamo brutality and rawness in ‘Hello, I Hate Myself’. For my taste, Eva Ras side suits me a bit better but this is a nice release, so go support your local scene.
Colorsfade from Canada are no strangers to the pages of this webzine, because we reviewed their previous record here, also featured their videos and singles prior to this new album out with People of Punk Rock Records. This new one contains ten songs of beautiful and fast melodic hardcore punk, skate punk, leaning more on modern side of this genre, with lots of technically well executed song parts, changes in tempo but, basically, yes, it is that old school nineties melodic punk hidden here in between and warms your heart. Music is fast and reminds me with all this speed of Spanish Adrenalized or UK’s The Human Project in some songs. Although Colorsfade have less metallic influences than mentioned band. Vocals are great, not whiny or snotty, just right with all harmonies and sometimes screamed backing vocals like in awesome ‘Roll Of The Dice’ and having listened to that great melancholic guitar solo melody of ‘Your Remedy’ almost brought tears of joy to my eyes and warmed up my old punk heart. Lyrics are personal, but also relate to state of the world and political situation this planet is right now like in ‘Rise To The Challenge’, another favorite of mine, so that is another plus. This is great fast punk rock and I recommend this one.
Finland’s …And Oceans have a new full length opus out with Season of Mist. I was so glad when they released their new come back opus called ‘Cosmic World Mother’ back in 2020. Although there were some line-up changes through the years, this didn’t stop …And Oceans. They were very interesting band to me back in the day because they mixed industrial with symphonic black metal and it worked excellently. Then they changed name, line-up but they returned and new vocalist Mathias Lillmåns, known also as singer for Finntroll delivered new power with his strong voice capable of black metal screaming, angry growling to some spoken word and clean singing. This new batch of songs are concentrated more on melodic and symphonic black metal, not unlike Old Man’s Child in some segments of the songwriting or maybe even Dimmu back in their early and best days. Lyrics deal with more deep introspective and philosophical side of darkness in man and universe. This also means strong synth melodies and symphonic arrangements, guitar work which connects old school aggressive black metal riffing with melodies and melancholic hooks only Finnish bands are capable of making. Add to this phenomenal drumming from blasts to changes of tempo to emphasize the strength of material. This is sympho black melodic par excellence. My personal favorites on this record are: ‘As in Gardens, So in Tombs’, ‘Within Fire and Crystal’ and epic ‘Ambivalent God’.
KRAYKULLA-WEBZINE 