Autumn is almost upon us, and what better way than to greet it with some quality black metal. USBM scene is great, brimming with superb bands and projects all around. Blackbraid is one of them being a one man entity and this is the third full length opus containing 10 songs one being Lord Belial cover. Blackbraid describes its music like Native American black metal and in fact it is a quality mixture of pagan and melodic black metal with blastbeats, but also slower atmospheric parts and epic melodies reminding of their Scandinavian counterparts. This opus kind of functions like one atmospheric instrumental, then one song and so on. Vocals are screaming black metal voice, but you can understand some of what is being sung so this is another plus. If you love your black metal aggressive, melodic and epic, melancholic at the same time, go listen to this one, you will not regret it. My personal favorites: And He Became The Burning Stars, The Dying Breath Of A Sacred Stag. Excellent record.
I think that 6 years have passed since last Booze & Glory full length called Hurricane. It was such amazing album for me that I thought they will find it hard to make the same level album again or even better. Fortunately I was wrong. There were some line-up changes again like we are already used to from this band, singer Mark being only constant in the band although drummer Frank is also long time member of the band. For those who don’t know, these guys play melodic version of streetpunk/OI with anthemic choruses just made to sing along and lyrics to which you can identify with and they hit you right on the spot. There are 11 anthems on this album, my personal favorites being Family Isn’t Always Blood, Jimmy Fake, I’d Die For You and Legends. There is a kinda ballad at the end of the album, song called The One And Only, awesome song but different from the rest of material. This is another lesson in melodic streetpunk that this band delivered flawlessly.
Teenage Bottlerocket released their long awaited new full length album and it contains 14 songs of their recognizable pop punk mixed with Ramones like fast songs full of energy and melody, calling them purveyors of so called Ramonescore. Ray’s and Kody’s dual vocals are sounding better than ever creating superb melodies and awesome harmonies. Lyrics as usual deal with sci fi, horror, love and emotions plus humor. My personal favorites are faster songs like High Speed Yoga, also Friend Named Fly, Post Mortem Depression but there are also mid tempo more introspective emotional punk rock songs like True To You and She’s The Shit. Fans of this band will not be disappointed, this is way better album than the last one in my humble opinion, with more catchy and memorable songs. I really enjoyed listening to this excellent album.
KRAYKULLA-WEBZINE 