Grotesque

Here's some spooooky classic Swedish death metal for Halloween. In the Embrace of Evil compiles Grotesque's Incantation EP from 1990 and some earlier demo tracks. There's elements of early black and thrash metal present rather than the straight-up chunky riffing of their countrymen (there's some of that too). Tomas Lindburg went on to front At the Gates, but this is more primal, potent stuff.

bleeargh

Slice of Doom

Dig that tribute to Blue Cheer in the cover art. One of my favs, Finland's Reverend Bizarre played (they split a year or two ago) Doom Metal in the style of the slow n' low heavyweights of the 80's without sounding like an insincere "retro" cash-in. Fantastic vocals, solos, and RIFFS goddammit. This is the re-release of their demo with bonus tracks from the couple of different versions of the original release, and it starts out with a killer cover of the theme song from Doctor Who. I mean, c'mon.
And if anyone out there is thinking of starting a Rev Biz collection, Svart Records has just started to release super-sexy vinyl editions of their main releases starting with Harbinger of Metal. Mine should be here within the week.

click

A Fallen Unicorn

Fuck yeah, unicorns! Here's a cool little EP from Greece's Nocternity with tracks that were recorded at the same time as 2003's Onyx. I cant help be reminded of Graveland with their medieval armour and the way they use synthesizers to add atmosphere rather than over-the-top pomposity. The riffs, overall, sound more like the nordic black metal bands rather than the typical "Greek black metal sound". There's a fantastically successful cover of Bjork's "Pagan Poetry" to close out the EP proper. This is the 05' reissue with the tracks from the splits with Akitsa and Kawir as bonus tracks.

clicky