Category Archives: Reviews

(review) Cursebinder – ‘Drifting’ (Avantgarde Music)

Cursebinder are hailing from Krakow, Poland and they are another testament of Polish extreme underground music scene vastness and greatness with so many excellent bands coming from that mighty country. The band was formed in 2019 and this is their debut opus and it contains eight songs. Music of Cursebinder can be simply described as black metal but it is so much more. Coldness is definitely there with black metal guitar riffs and blast beats being delivered here and there to crush your meat from the bones. Vocals are bordering somewhere between black metal and death metal growls. Opener ‘Affected by Panic’ is example how this band easily shifts from aggressive total all out war black metal parts to more psychedelic and spacy cold post metal ambient guitar parts and tempo changes from blast beat war to a bit of groove and post rock. My personal favorites on this album are ‘Drifting’ the mighty title track with slower start and almost sludge parts and doom metal influenced parts, and also ‘Becoming’ with eerie and almost horror like atmosphere. So, if you like technical abilities, brutality and prowess of Behemoth and Mgla, combined with occasional melody, melancholy, post metal, atmospheric coldness of space and void, go try this band’s opus. I assure you that you will not regret it.

8,5/10

(review) Godiva – ‘Hubris’

Portugal has interesting and varied metal and extreme music underground scene and I am glad I discovered one more band from that nice country. Godiva are hailing from Porto and this is their brand new opus. This one contains ten songs. The music of Godiva is a mixture between black death metal and some gothic metal influences mostly the darkened atmosphere of the opus as a whole. Vocals are a mixture of black metal screams and death metal growls but you can understand what is being sung about, so that is another plus for this band in my opinion. Music varies from aggression of blast beats black metal to more atmospheric keyboard led melodies and symphonic black death metal passages not unlike later Dimmu Borgir era, at least I heard it that way, that does not mean this band is a clone of mentioned band or anything. Godiva lean more into guitar metal oriented side of things and less on symphonic metal, although there is enough of both to satisfy fans of both genres. Songs like ‘Death of Icarus’, ‘Black Mirror’ and ‘Faceless’ are my personal favorites. You will have to find ones for yourselves.

8/10.

Bandcamp

(review) Gužva u 16-ercu – ‘Smrtonosni zadah’

Osijek je od devedesetih na hrvatskoj underground sceni slovio kao grad melodičnog panka iznjedrivši bendove poput mojeg omiljenog Debelog Precjednika, Grupe tvog života, Bud Spencera, a i ovih veterana koji su na sceni jednako kao i Debeljaci iako su im se putevi razlikovali. Gužva u 16-ercu su se vratili novim albumom koji je označio i promjenu u line-upu, ostali su samo vokal i jedan gitarist od stare postave. Isto tako, bend se ponovo vratio na Croatia Records, svojevrstan major label u hrvatskim okvirima. Novi album sadrži trinaest stvari u prepoznatljivom Gužva stilu s nekim hitovima, a i nekim promašajima, barem po mom mišljenju. Stvar koja je odabrana kao single i spot ‘Znak STOP’ je catchy i poslušao sam je milijun puta koliko je refren glupavo simpatičan i ulazi u uho i ostaje tamo dugo nakon slušanja i tjera opet na slušanje te stvari. Jedino mi nije jasna truba na početku, pa nije Gužva Krešo i kisele kiše da im je potrebna truba. No, na albumu ima i pjesama koji su mi nekako više filleri nego hitovi na koje smo navikli od ovog benda, kao ‘Far far’ ili ‘Hund’ koje mi nikako nisu sjele. Mislim, tekstualno su dobri u većini stvari, ali muzikalno nekako šepa to sve skupa. Muto pjeva na svoj prepoznatljiv način i njegov glas je uvijek moguće prepoznati u moru drugih punk vokala s naše scene zato kapa dolje, nije neki virtuoz s rasponom glasa, ali pošteno se trudi hehe. ‘Bez oružja’, stvar koja je također objavljena kao single i spot je dobre strofe, ali fali mi nešto na refrenu da bude himničnija. Ali, ima i dobrih stvari, kao što je na primjer ‘Ko vodu me popije’, brza melodic punk stvar s dobrim zajebantskim tekstom i dobrim bridgeom i refrenom, kao i tercama na back vokalima. Također, meni jedna od dražih je laganija stvar s baladnim početkom i koja se razvije u dramatičnu punk pjesmu ‘Čekaj i Zaboravi’, koja me podsjetila na neke laganije stvari od Šanka kao i Hladnog piva, sve u svemu dobra stvar. Još jedan novitet je usna harmonika u stvari ‘Pivske Mušice’ odu Osijeku i svim proteklim desetljećima, jedna s najljepšim tekstom na albumu. Tu je i pomalo atipično ritmična, skoro ritualna ‘Jedno Tijelo’ koja ima prilično mračnu atmosferu, ali najbolje dolazi na kraju, stvar ‘Arene’ koja je već poprilično stara, ali je hit sam takav. Dakle, miješani su mi osjećaji, kao da album ima više prosječnih ili samo dobrih pjesama, a očekivao sam više od ovog benda. Ali, to sam samo ja. Poslušaj i odluči.