Hey there, loyal and devoted Valley of Steel Readers! For the past four months I’ve been doing these little profiles every Monday about bands that I’ve discovered on the “Sign Me to Roadrunner Records” website. Mostly they’ve been bands that have sent me messages seeking reviews of their music, but occasionally I’ll just randomly stumble across something good and then I end up writing about that. Either way, I’ve found some really cool stuff that I might not have known about otherwise! I hope the same has been true for you, readers — have you seen any bands profiled here that really resonated with you? Let me know in the comments section below; hearing that I’ve introduced a reader to some awesome new music (and also that I’ve given a band some much-deserved exposure to new fans) validates my existence and gives me a reason to get out of bed each morning.
Over the course of the past several weeks, I’ve tried to keep up with some of these exciting new discoveries — either by following their Facebook pages, or signing up for an email list, or possibly by watching for smoke signals. In any case, I’ve been hearing some things lately about some of these bands — in terms of new songs, new videos, or upcoming new releases — and so I decided to use this week’s post to reflect back on some of those previous posts and see what the bands have been up to since I wrote about them…
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Golah
On 16 January, I wrote about this Italian death metal band. They were one of my earliest finds on the SMT website — long before I even started writing this blog. I was a big fan then, and I still dig them now.
In that post, I mentioned that they had a four-song demo from 2010. I haven’t seen any word of recordings from the band since that time, but back in February, they did upload the whole thing to Soundcloud, so you can conveniently check it out here:
Also, just a couple weeks ago, vocalist Gabriele “Growl” Mazzola shared the following Youtube video where he covers “Conquered by Sodom” by Deicide (apparently just because he was bored):
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Necro
Dominican thrashers Necro were profiled on 23 January. At that time, I was happy to report that after an extended hiatus, the band planned to get back together in 2012 to record some new material.
Earlier this month I was contacted by guitarist/vocalist Junior Rosario with a brand new song! It’s called “Kill 2 Kill” and if this represents the new stuff they’ve been working on, I’m very excited to hear it when they’re finished! The intro really hooks you in, and it continues to accelerate until the song really kicks in — besides the great thrash riffs and death-growl vocals, the structure here incorporates a bit of a progressive element as well. And check out that guitar solo towards the end! The song has been added to the Necro Signmeto Roadrunner Records page, but you can also hear it here on Soundcloud:
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Victorian
On 30 January, we took a look at the symphonic/gothic metal band Victorian, from Indonesia. I really liked the incorporation of orchestral elements, and an operatic-sounding female voice, in with their death metal songs.
Recently, I discovered that soon after I wrote that review, the band had added a note on my Signmeto Scout profile. I get an e-mail each time someone sends me a private message on that website, but it appears there is no notification when someone comments on my profile. Fortunately, I just happened to look at it one day and I saw that there was a comment there. They said that the two songs from their SMT page had been added to Soundcloud with new mixes. I don’t recall having an issue with the old mixes, but I’ve listened to the new versions of the songs, and they are just as beautiful and haunting as I remember. Celebrate Victoria Day (to all the Canadian readers!) and listen to some Victorian!
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Amorphead
I wrote about another Italian band on 6 February — Amorphead, who had posted two songs from their 2011 EP Chaos Expression, including a video for one of those songs, “Holes”:
Anyway, just this morning the band put a note on their Facebook page, saying that the video had hit over 20,000 views! They also included a link for you to download the song for free: right here.
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Dirty Shirt
These Romanians were my band of the week on 27 February.
In April, the band had a big announcement concerning an international music competition:
DIRTY SHIRT is proud to announce that the band won several prizes at “Bite My Music Global Awards 2011” (an international independent music competition with more than 1000 artists participating from 50 countries).
– DIRTY SHIRT feat. Candice(ETHS), Klee & Daniel (TRIPOD), Mat (BABYLON PRESSION) & Kallaghan (SIKH, RAS): “East West” – Best Collaboration: 1st place
– DIRTY SHIRT – Best Rock Act: 2nd place
– DIRTY SHIRT: “Manifest” – Best Rock Song: 4th place
– DIRTY SHIRT: “Manifest” – Best Music Video: 5th place
The list of winners: http://bitemymusic.com/bmmg-awards-winners/East West Video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=97opvRvDKnQ
Manifest Video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0zaIqV7f3xkThank you for your continued support !!!
www.dirty-shirt.com
Congratulations on these achievements!
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The Jack Antonio Project
This quirky Canadian outfit was featured on 5 March. Since that time, the JAP have had their first-ever live performance, which was reportedly a resounding success.
Furthermore, the mastermind behind this collection of musical nonsense — Jack Antonio himself — is extremely active in promoting all sorts of music (Canadian or otherwise) on his radio program. Currently broadcasting on at least five different stations throughout the internet, The “Do You Know Jack?” Radio Show has a Facebook page here.
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Ex Inferis
On 12 March, I once again turned my sights toward Indonesia for some melodic blackened death metal.
A few weeks ago, I got another message from this band, saying that they had added a third song to their SMT page. This new song “Angra Mainyu” (or “Aŋra Mainiuu” as it is written in the Avestan alphabet) takes its name from a Zoroastrian malignant spirit. This is a lot closer to straight black metal than their previous offerings were — almost no melodic qualities here, and the vocals come across as very venomous and sinister. For a song named after a demon, it seems fitting.
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Barbarian Prophecies
On 19 March, I wrote about this Galician death metal band. Recently, they posted a message on Facebook saying that they had added a new song — which actually isn’t new, but it wasn’t on Signmeto before. The title track “Remember the Fallen” from their 2011 album is now available for listening at that website. Furthermore, the band’s own website has been more-or-less put back online. The icons for English or Galician (Galego) translations don’t lead anywhere, but the main Spanish (Castellano) version works. Just a rudimentary knowledge of Spanish is all that’s necessary to be able to navigate the site, and if you’re patient, Google Translate can do the rest for you. In any case, the page for merchandise indicates that the album is available to for 10 euros, but directs the visitor to e-mail the band in order to make the purchase.
Additionally, there are two new videos you may enjoy, which show the process behind making Remember the Fallen in two parts:
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Information Harvest
Finally (for this particular update, anyhow), on 26 March we took a look at some demo recordings for Andrew James Liles‘ Information Harvest project. At that time, he had some basic rough sketches of tunes, but said that the full band would be getting together soon to record “real” versions of the songs.
The latest news is that they are currently rehearsing and preparing for those recording sessions. In the meantime, the demo songs have been removed from the Signmeto Roadrunner Records page, and temporarily replaced by some tracks from Andrew’s old (mid-90’s) metal band Darkened Souls. Apparently, these songs have nothing at all to do with the new Information Harvest material, and they’re just here as a place-holder. But fans of grunge/stoner/doom metal from the 90’s (shades of Corrosion of Conformity, Temple of the Dog, Type O Negative, and Danzig, just to name a few) might want to go give them a listen anyhow!
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Anyway, I hope you enjoyed this post, and this little trip down the “Signmeto Roadrunner Records Unsigned Band of the Week” memory lane. Next week I’ll be back with another new artist to share with you, but until then, if you happen to stumble across something you’d like to share (or if you are in a band and are trying to get your own music heard), just write to me at my Signmeto “scout” page. Thanks for reading!
Valley of Steel 
Thanks for shining the light on so many unsigned bands who are marketing their butts of on SignMeTo. I own about 12 different Artist’s albums specifically because I fell in love with their music on SignMeTo.
There is a treasure trove of undiscovered talent there that can be experienced best by joining the site. It is as simple as creating a Scout profile and then listening and reviewing as many bands as you want. You can even create a listening queue with your favorite songs you find there.
The more music lovers and fans who become Scouts, the more these hard wroking Artists can emerge from the underground and perhaps establish their sound as the future mainstream!
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Thanks for your comments, Andrew.
I agree with you about the amount of awesome stuff that can be found at the website — I appreciate the sense of community that has developed there among the artists and scouts, but I’m trying to do my part to help get just a little bit more exposure to the rest of the world…
As I said when I first started writing these posts, I don’t know if the stated intention of the website (i.e., to get signed by Roadrunner Records) is a likely outcome, or even a realistic one, but that doesn’t matter to me — I love to hear all sorts of new music, and I know lots of other people do too, so I am using it as a source for discovery and sharing. And, I’m always glad when I hear from musicians who say how much they appreciate the recognition, too.
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