Morning Again were formed back in the nineties and their vision of metallic hardcore helped shape what we nowadays call metalcore, playing mixture of hardcore and metal with moshing parts, tempo changes and brutal guitar riffs mixed with hardcore energy. They even released full length record for legendary Revelation Records. Now, this new EP contains five songs, one being intro. ‘Serpiente’ is uptempo aggressive song with fast start, evolving into moshing mid tempo parts with screaming apocalyptic vocals and brutality prevailing all over, I can even hear some Slayer in the guitar work during faster riffing in this song. I love how this band combined socially and politically engaged lyrics into their music, kinda being personal but read between the lines lyrics and these hardcore heavyweights have their hearts in right places. ‘Insolvent’ starts with great sample and it is a modern hardcore bomb with Earth Crisis vibe in there, vocals at times reminded me of that band. This one is noisy, brutal and in your face song. ‘Resignation’ features guest vocals by none other than late legendary Trevor Strnad of Black Dahlia Murder fame and this one is my personal favorite on this EP. ‘Nigh’ finishes the record as short but heavy miniature. Good one!
We remain in exciting and excellent Italian underground scene with WILD STEEL. This band is solo project of Andrea De Stefanis a.k.a. Wild Steel. This is third full length opus since the inception of this entity in 2005. The third opus contains eleven songs, one being kind of instrumental epic intro ‘Dragonfly’ reminding me of Italian westerns and giallo horror soundtracks in some segments, maybe it is only me. The music of Wild Steel is power/true metal with lots of speed, up tempo and epic melodies sounding not at all as one man band, but like full orchestrated epic true metal band with symphonic keyboard passages, double bass fast drumming, guitar main melodies switching places with synth keyboard solos and main themes and decent vocals that fit great into music as a whole. Some of the choruses are just made for singing along to, pumping your fist in the air and being glad your metal heart still beats in this world of madness and music sometimes really saves I can safely say. My personal favorites are ‘Age Of Steel’, power ballad ‘Live Again’ and ‘Final Battle’, you find yours by listening to this great opus.
ANGUANA is another band from the mighty Italian underground scene. This is their new EP containing 6 songs, two of them being atmospheric instrumentals which serve as kind of intermezzo between the songs. Anguana play mixture of raw old school black metal, melodic atmospheric black with touch of folk influences which can be heard in the song structures, like in the title song for example, which starts with folk metal guitar work, evolving into fast, aggressive, yet melancholic melodic black metal song, like Italian bands do. I love the use of choir clean vocals, reminding me of Bathory behind the black metal vocals which at times reminded me of Satyr from Satyricon with similarity of voice. Lyrics are in Italian and local dialect and deal with witchery, folk tales and tradition, this band being from Venetian region, meaning north of Italy. The usage of synth is sounding more dungeon synth and fits perfectly to the whole atmosphere of this opus, making it even more versatile and interesting for listening. This is good band and I am looking forward to the full length one day.
KRAYKULLA-WEBZINE 