I am always glad to discover new bands in this vast and beautiful underground scene that I have been a part of for almost three decades now. Next Door To Heaven are hailing from Russia and this is their new e.p. The theme of the e.p. is battle between two sides of one medal, between artificial and natural within one person. There are five songs on this little record. Music of Next Door To Heaven can be described as mixture of metalcore, modern metal and being melodic above all. Catchy and nice guitar hooks are successfully mixing aggression of metalcore with calm of atmospheric metal creating one really fine soundscape for the listener. Vocals are superb with singer Daria Mazunova being able to reach emotion, melancholy and happiness varying of the song. Her voice reminds me a lot of Anneke from The Gathering. My personal favorite is Unleash The Beast being on of the hardest yet melodic song on this e.p. There is an interesting guest performance by none other than Lord Nelson (ex Stuck Mojo) on Flare Up being more of a rapcore song proving variety and creativity of this band. Really enjoyed this one.
Causam are hailing from Switzerland and this is their first full length album. This record contains eight songs, one being intro. Music of Causam can be described as fast yet melodic black metal. Their music creates atmosphere of aggression, sorrow, despair, yet at the same time melancholy with excellent melodies and guitar work. Drumming is mainly blast beats, yet turning at times into beautiful atmospheric passages just reminding me why I love black metal so much, being best music for expressing all of your emotions. My personal favorites are Beauty of Decay and Eternal, although all of the songs are just excellent. Vocals are black metal screeching but being perfect and fitting fantastic to the song structures. The lyrical themes are more deep and personal than in your face Satanic verses and the mixture of epic music and great lyrics make this one of the best black metal records that came out this year until now.
It is time for Croatian band to grace the pages of this zine again. Manntra just released their brand new record and it was time for me to listen and find out what are the new songs like.
There is an intro invocation plus ten songs on this opus. Although this band is firmly rooted in some folk metal song structures this new record is so much more. Songs are very melodic just made for singing along and humming long after you finish listening to the record. Besides this, there are also lots of industrial influenced song structures, also melodic gothic parts, even some classic rock and pop influences are clear in the song structures. But, most important, this is well written, well played and quality modern folk metal album, Vocals are fantastic, also backing vocal harmonies are superb. My personal favorites are Voices of the Sea and I Want To Eat You which is instant hit upon first listening makes me wanna listen to it again and again. This band always delivers great music! Go listen!
KRAYKULLA-WEBZINE 