Epitaph Romance are coming from El Paso, Texas and they are playing horrorpunk with metal and horrorrock influences and I had the privilege to listen and review their awesome new album for this webzine.
The album contains 13 songs of full-on energy and darkness with great melodies. The opening samples of “Army of bones” take the listener into triple vocal hell, combining hellish catchy guitar melodies with clean melodic vocals, almost death metal growls and screaming and the combination is awesome. I loved the faster songs like “Ghoul of my dreams” which is one of the best songs on the album in my opinion. The real winner and one of the absolute highlights of the album is “Last goodbye” a perfect hybrid mix of death metal and horrorpunk in one hell of a song with anthemic chorus. I listened to that one on repeat a couple of times! Keyboard parts surprised me in the middle of the song but that only added to the overall drama and gloominess. “The night he came home” is a beautiful ode to Michael Myers, one of the greatest horror legendary characters of all times. “London fog” is a classic horrorpunk anthem and it reminds me a lot of German The Other vocally and stylistically with somehow Iron Maiden guitar riffs. In all, this is a really great album and check it out and support the guys!
Defiant Brood were already featured on the pages of this webzine. They are hailing from Western MD, USA and playing horrorpunk/deathrock. This is their new full length studio album that I had fortune to listen and review for this zine.
The album contains intro and 13 songs of eerie melody and horror and macabre. After the said intro(“El Maldito”), the title song tells us a story about the withering and dying of nature and rebirth. Sarie´s vocals are more convincing and stronger than before and the song is a real hit. “Mina” is a slower ode to vampiric longing with beautiful chorus. “Mad mouth” is a horrorpunk anthem inspired by in my opinion one of the best horror movies of all time John Carpenter´s “In the mouth of madness” and I could almost hear the screams of Sutter Kane listening to the eerie chorus melody in this song. The punping bass intro to “Silver bullet” announces my favorite Stephen King movie and novel but the music and lyrics are talking to me from the werewolf´s point of view of anguish and despair of the man beast. The best song on the record for me is “Night air” with memorable guitar melody and anthemic chorus making it a horrorpunk song to remember and show it to the kids as an example. Elisabeth Bathory was a Hungarian countess that used to bathe in virgin´s blood to stay young and she is the theme of “Bloodbath”, another highlight of this album with ooo sing a long parts and super melodiy and energy in the song structure. “Natural born” as I understood it is in fact a love song about two killer ghouls against the world. What can I say, I am a real dark romantic indeed! “The urge” is the fastest song on the record and one of top three best songs on the record, I loved the evil energy crawling between the melody and cutting sharp guitar riffs. Excellent song! “Wildcat hollow” is a ghoulish ode to immortality and staying where you died not being able to move on. The song chorus about the house tormenting the soul made goosebumps on my hand with the melody. “Ode to aliens” is a fast anthem whose title speaks it all for the song. “Nightmare” is a song from the serial killer/psychopath point of view. “Drink you dry” and “The watcher” close this album in a perfect way. This is an awesome album, so go get it!
Finally! The new Grave Robber album is out via Rottweiler Records! I am a long time fan of this band, and I am really happy that I was able to review this one for my webzine.
This album is horrorpunk pure with some shock rock and a bit more hardcore punk influences. I love the energy and speed of the faster songs with hardcore vibe transforming into nice melodies and anthemic choruses just made for singing at the gigs from the top of your lungs. Vocalist Wretched sounds better than ever and the musicianship of the band as a whole is so tight that I weep the bloody tears listening to the album. Some of the album hightlights for me are “The Evil Dead”, the best “Lips of Blood” with beautiful melody and more aggressive “The Swarm”. The special anthem in my opinion and the absolute the best song of the album is mighty “The Night Evelyn Came Out Of The Grave”. This is an awesome album, a true horrorpunk lesson.
KRAYKULLA-WEBZINE 