Zero Credibility

Finally the weather calmed down: cold winds, low grey clouds and occasional rains happen here on a regular basis. I can think again, I have motivation. Northern hemisphere aligns for the cold times – the proper times. All this is being supported by the pack of relatively weird music I got during last 2 weeks.

Ruhr Hunter – “Torn of This”. I was recommended to check this one. Very nice mix of folk and ambient. It’s very much forest music. A lot of field recording and live instruments make it sound natural and submerge you to the night forest atmosphere. I checked their myspace and found that the new track from yet to be released album rocks my world – throat singing with ritual music always was my fave mix.

Derniere Volonte – “Immortel”. Derniere became so pop it’s scary. Still it has that attractive melodies and vocals of Geoffroy to it. Speaking of vocals it became lighter, like he’s singing half strength. Some tracks have proper vocals and they definitely sound better. Weird album in band’s evolution. Still cool and brings that DV mood. Need to get used to it though.

Deutsch Nepal – “Silent Container”. This is reissue of the old limited cassettes in one 3CD pack. The timespan of these disks is around 10 years, so the difference in music is quite noticeable. This release shows the evolution of Deutsch Nepal and should be in collection of every DN fan.

Ordo Rosarius Equilibrio – “Apocalips”. Another fine release of this scandinavian neofok band. Calm guitar/synth melodies with erotic hue over them makes it nice relaxing and dark music. The last 2 albums of the band are their greatest indeed.

Horologium – “Earthbound”. I was recommended to get this release. I’m usually not  a big fan of martial stuff, but this release contains some nice ideas. Not all tracks are of my fave but still, some melodies are quite aggressive and interesting in rhythm and lyrics. There are some ambient like inserts as well.

Nordvargr/Surachai – “A Wilderness of Cloades”. The weirdest release from all in this pack. Strangest mix of dark ambient of HNB and unkown to me before japanese artist Surachai. There’s everything: dark ambient, guitar noise, pure noise and other weird thing these two created and mixed together. This album requires several attempts to get grasp of it.

Der Blutharsch – “Live in Leiden”. Live recorded in Leiden features old but best tracks of the band. Their live performances are rich of proper fluid sound and energy. I wish they come here some time.

Finally managed to sit myself down and dig through 900+ pics I took in Morocco to select just 38 moderately good ones. It was very hard to concentrate and make proper pictures due to immense heat (+45C far from the ocean) and fast speed of our group. I wish I had more time to find proper angles and view but alas. Hope these pictures bring the atmosphere.

Also kudos to Sony for making such a great camera. It worked perfectly in complex conditions and it’s easy to operate it. Rather nice picture quality, impressive HD video, sweep panorama and of course small size and weight makes it my favourite camera at the moment. Though the lens that comes in the kit isn’t that great, but I’ll replace it with proper one later.

This is the most severe summer I’ve experienced during my entire life. Two full months of merciless heat is quite unbearable. Lucky me that I managed to flee for two weeks  to Morocco where the chill winds blow from the Atlantic ocean and there’s no smoke from the wood fires. I’ll post some selected pics taken in Morocco here later, when I’ll be able to think clearly again as it’s impossible at the moment due to lack of oxygen and high temperatures.

To bring some good stuff into the post here’s long awaited Land:Fire – “Shortwave Transmission” CD that I got before the vacation but was too fried to write about. Once again this is nice mix of industrial and ambient. Sometimes spacey, sometimes harsh and dark electronic sounds create trademark Land:Fire atmosphere if impending technological collapse.

This is 3rd week of severe heat here in the middle of Russia with constant +30-32C oven and little wind. I’m missing autumn already. To sustain ability to keep sane I need some fresh music injections (daily). This time it’s pack of Napalm Death and some other tasty things.

Napalm Death - “Inside the Torn Apart” and “Words From The Exit Wound”. These two albums are in vein of much needed by me “Diatribes”. It has that special atmosphere of metal of the middle of 90s. Listening to it drags me back in time when this music was considered pretty brutal. But if to compare these albums with the last two ND releases you’ll see the difference. Still, catchy rhythms and heaviness are there so it’s proper Napalm Death of their most mellow era.

Napalm Death – “Fear, Emptiness, Despair”. This album was released before those two above, the production quality is considerably lower, the sound is hollower and not so thick. Still, it’s awesome ND release and of course it helps too to survive this heat. Anything would help actually.

Graumahd – “Cheru”. Very atmospheric and nice neofolk. It’s mostly guitar and vocals with little injections of drums here and there. Still it brings nice german folk atmosphere.

Sleep – “Sleep’s Holy Mountain”. Stoner rock originators at their best. I was hunting for this CD for like an eternity. Was able to get this reissue only. This is quite stylish CD, it oozes with 70s, it’s heavy and indeed filled with smoke. Very nice early doom sound.

Apoptose – “Bannwald”. Top notch ambient with folk touches. Awesome artork of the sleeve adds more impression and tunes for proper wave when listening to it. The album dedicated to two girls lost in the forest. Cool mix of chilly ambient with field recordings of the woods and female voiced folkish songs. Very well done album.

So, here goes another picture update. These are two considerably ok pictures I took last weekend. I’m very happy with my camera, I always have an urge to make pics with it, yet I’m still learning it, so I hope with time the images will be a bit better and less Photoshop would be applied ;)

This panorama below was created with new feature implemented in the camera called Sweep Panorama. You just hold it and rotate your torso 90 degrees from left to right and camera makes nonstop shooting while you’re rotating. Here’s the result. I’m sure I can make it better by adjusting everything manually. But let’s start with auto mode ok? Click on it to see in a bit bigger size.

After 4 years of weak usage I finally sold my Nikon D80. I never really liked this camera due to alot of reasons: it’s big and heavy and I never really liked images it produces. Yes they were sharp and all, but there was no that finish which I so liked in my old Sony 717. So as you can see I stopped putting images here on my site just because I never was truly satisfied with them. Maybe I’m just too lame for that camera, and maybe I had to edit them in Photoshop for the release, but it turned that I’m too weak for it and not so dedicated. So, the decision came after the year of pondering and I finally sold it on auction for quite ok price. And I wasn’t even sure with what camera I’m gonna replace it.

During the week of selling process I started digging dpreview.com for the new camera. And to my surprise I found very new one from Sony – NEX-5. Whole idea if this camera repeats my old Sony 717: tilting screen (quite big and sharp now), live view, etc. But adds another new cool features like HDTV movie and replaceable lenses. So my soul was sold instantly and I started to wait for it to appear on sale, and bought it the week it started to be available. I hope I’ll return to my humble photo hobby with it because it’s small and comfy and produces great pictures. Here are two silly images I took today when going to work.

Today is a Big Number day. My collection just reached the number of 800 CDs. It all started back in 1993, and now, 17 years later (oh my), I have such a big pile of plastic and paper oozing with grim music. I have troubles storing them all as I ran out of rack space for quite some time now, and I was looking for proper giant rack, but it’s not an easy task as they’re usually limited for 200 CDs maximum. Looks like I’m gonna get drown in my own collection soon.

Today I’ve got another great album by the Naevus – “Silent Life”. I like this band quite a lot. Calm rock with nice catchy melodies and clear vocals that I don’t have troubles understanding words. Very well done music, it merges interesting lyrics and proper rock sound. Looks like I’m seriously hooked and gonna get more albums.

Second CD is Tho-So-Aa – “Identify”. This is further development of this interesting dark amient act. This time it went exploring interesting area of multilayered dark ambient, featuring drones and noises that add that special old movie hue to the music. Quite interesting and unusual ambient, always happy to see such projects develop with time.

After a year of hunt I finally got Moss – “Chtonic Rites” CD thanks to the vast mailorder catalogue of Relapse and possibility to order it from them. Now  I finally gathered all Moss full length albums and ready to submit my soul to Chtulu when the time comes. Looks like it’s impossible to get the rest of EPs and splits in my current situation, but to hell with that. Chtonic Rites is first album that hooked my attention to this uber grim act. Endless drones and immense heavyness of sound is what my soul needs on a regular basis.

Annotations of an Autopsy – “Before The Throne of Infection”. It took quite some time for me to track this first full length of this quite nice UK band. Then Relapse came and saved my day. This album is a bit better than the last one as it doesn’t afraid to be experimental. There’re better vocals (pig squealing prevails) and more heavy drums.

Negligent Collateral Collapse – “Reprocess Segment Database Extender”. This is my fave Chezh grind band for several years now, and I’ve abandoned the idea to get any of their albums due to underground nature of the band. But again, Relapse’s bottomless mailroder saved my day and it turned they have some of the NCC albums in stock. This is NASA grindcore, featuring lyrics about space, physics and pig squealing vocals. What alse one needs for his grind appetite?

Eardelete – “Zombieology”. This band is almost NCC as it was started after NCC ceased to exist, so it’s the same mad and fun grindcore. But with more common for grindcore theme: zombies, corpses and such. More piercing and heavy guitar sound and still the same nice humor filled atmosphere of NCC which I like a lot. They’ve released new album titled “Scalpeology” recently, gonna grab that one too.

This last chilly day of rather contrast spring brings package from Relapse Records containing the awesomeness I was waiting for quite some time. The latest creation of one of my fave bands is in my hands: Beherit – “Engram”. This one is an awesome example of grown up black metal band: staying quite primitive and evil, yet bringing something new. Like last track of this album is an awesome mix of black metal and some kind of dubstep. Very well done! The sound on the album is also of very nice power and purity. All in all, one of my fave albums during the last months.
Cannibal Corpse – “Evisceration Plague”. I’m still continuing to gather last albums of the veterans of the grindcore as they’re indeed of top quality. This one is the latest album from CC and of course it sounds like typical CC: quality meatgrinder for your everyday needs plus better sound quality that modern tech brings. Nothing special about this album, just another heavy brick of sound form USA :)
Whitechapel – “The Somatic Defilement”. Another new grindcore band I discovered recently. They sound very brutal and intense. Nice mix of fast and slow tracks and proper low growling. What else you need to whet your grind appetite?
Relapse was  kind enough to include the promo of Cancer Bats – “Bears, Mayors, Scraps & Stones” into the package. At first I thought wtf I’m gonna do with this, but after listening to a couple of tracks I actually liked this canadian band. It’s proper hardcore with some hints of deathmetal. Seems like I’ve inadvertently discovered another band I like.
All in all this May turned to be quite rich in terms of new music deliveries. I’d say this is the hottest month ever. 26 cds during one month! That is indeed extraordinary update to my collection. Well, blame Napalm Death show that started this grind madness. By the way, Fear Factory and Cannibal Corpse will be here soon with their shows, I’m pondering to go to at least to one of them. Yet I’m thinking about going to Brutal Assault fest this early august, but I’m not sure how things will turn out.

Finally I’ve received latest Burzum album “Belus”. I listened to mp3 the day it was released and liked it instantly. The delay in getting the CD was caused by the fact that the CD was released on some obscure russian label, hence first not so big pressing kinda disappeared instantly. So I had to wait 2 more months. Anyway, the music is pretty much in style of “Hvis Lyset Tar Oss” or “Filosofem” which makes Burzum sound special and interesting once again. The music is ascetic and atmosphereic, the lyrics add the big part to it. Exactly what I expected from the act for quite some time. I never liked his last pure electornic albums, they were kinda boring, but this one is what I love Burzum for.

Enslaved – “Vertebrae”. Decided to buy this one finally. Latest Ensalved album sounds pretty much like some hi end rock, nothing common with viking metal. Still the melodies are nice, the usage of normal vocals makes it sound interesting too. Overall very varied and interesting album, even not being in strict genre boundaries.

Brutal Truth – “Evolution Through Revolution”. Decided to get this barrel of pure chaos after seeing this video. Well, it turned that other 20 tracks are the same screaming chaos as well. Even more chaotic than Napalm Death. No wonder they use GW’s chaos star on the cover ;) This album requires proper mood to listen to it, i.e. this is not vor everyday relaxed listening for sure.

Deathbound – “Non Compos Mentis”. Not sure why did I bought this one. Probably cover design attracted me and I’m in desperate hunt for proper grindcore. Local stores don’t have it in proper amounts. All in all, it turned to be quite generic death metal from finland. Nothing interesting to get hooked. Just wall of typical metal without any fresh ideas or proper execution. Once again I have to remind myself that I have to listen to samples before byuing stuff.