Category Archives: Shows

Amon Amarth – Jomsviking (2016)

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Amon Amarth - Jomsviking

Amon Amarth – Jomsviking (Metal Blade, 25 March 2016)

 

Well, it seems like this really turned into a week filled with black metal (or some form or variant of blackened-whatever), didn’t it? That wasn’t on purpose or anything, there just happened to be a few interesting things within that realm that I had wanted to share with you. But today we’ll be turning in a completely different direction: Viking metal!

(That was a little joke to piss off the Internet Metal Nerds, because the subject of whether Viking metal is really a thing, and if it is, how it should be classified, has been discussed endlessly, without ever really reaching a conclusion except for the fact that, as typified by bands like Enslaved and Bathory, it’s [somewhat] widely accepted as a subset of the black metal genre.)

But that’s not what we’re here to talk about at all — today’s topic is more along the lines of melodic/epic/anthemic metal. But I mean, look at that album cover (above)! Listen to the music (there will be previews near the end of the article)! Look at that photo of this band’s incredible stage setup from when I saw them a few years ago (below)! Despite their name (which means “Mount Doom,” a reference to the volcano from the Lord of the Rings books and movies), everything about Amon Amarth just screams “Viking metal”! What else would you call them?

In any case, this bunch of Swedes have a brand new album (their tenth) coming out tomorrow, so we’re going to take a look at that. Also, they’re coming back to the U.S. and Canada in about two weeks, marauding their way across the continent throughout April and May, so be sure to take a peek down at the comment section below where I’ll include the full list of those tour dates…

 

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Thy Art Is Murder Coming to Pittsburgh — Win FREE Tickets!!

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Opus One Productions Presents:

The Coffin Dragger Tour – Featuring:

Thy Art Is Murder, Rings of Saturn, Fit for an Autopsy, Dark Sermon

Saturday 07 May 2016

at Mr. Smalls Theatre, 400 Lincoln Ave. Pittsburgh (Millvale) PA 15209

ALL AGES, 6:30 show / 6:00 doors, $16 in advance / $19 day of show

 

Tickets are on sale NOW at Ticketweb… OR you can WIN a pair of tickets FREE, courtesy of Opus One Productions and Valley of Steel! Keep on reading to find out how…

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Acid Mothers Temple Coming to Pittsburgh — Win FREE Tickets!!

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Opus One Productions Presents:

Acid Mothers Temple with special guest Mounds

Thursday 31 March 2016

at Club Cafe, 56-58 12th St. Pittsburgh (South Side) PA 15203

21+ only, 8pm show / 7pm doors, $12

 

Tickets are on sale NOW at Ticketweb, Dave’s Music Mine, or the Club Cafe box office… OR you can WIN a pair of tickets FREE, courtesy of Opus One Productions and Valley of Steel! Keep on reading to find out how…

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Bardus – Solus (2014), Stella Porta (2016); Grizzlor / Barren Womb – Split (2015)

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Bardus – Solus (Wolf Beach Tapes, 21 October 2014)

 

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Bardus – Stella Porta (Solar Flare Records, 01 April 2016)

 

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Grizzlor / Barren Womb – Split (Riotous Outburst Records, 17 March 2015)

 

Hello, and Happy Friday to everyone out there! I hope you’ve had an okay week — and if not, then I hope you have a great weekend to make up for it. Before then, though, I’d like to throw something at you real quick.

At this very moment, there’s somewhat of a mini-tour going on — a handful of regional dates featuring a couple of bands, Philadelphia’s Bardus and New Haven’s Grizzlor, and it just happens that each of them have released something over the past year and a half that I’ve got in my to-do list for sharing with you readers. So it seems like a pretty convenient time to share both of those with you now, and even more so considering the fact that one of them also will have a brand-new album coming out next month — I’ll talk a little about that one, too.

I’ll try to keep this one kind of short (I know I say that a lot and it doesn’t always work out that way, but I promise I’ll try!) because I’m sure all of you are as anxious as I am to get started on those weekend plans. But scroll down to the comments section because I’ll also throw in the remaining tour dates for these two bands — which happens to include a stop in Pittsburgh this Saturday!

 

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Wrekmeister Harmonies – Night of Your Ascension (2015)

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Wrekmeister Harmonies – Night of Your Ascension (Thrill Jockey, 13 November 2015)

 

Well… here we are at the end of a dull, dreary Monday — looks like we’ve survived another one. And it’s a good thing, too, because I’ve got something pretty extraordinary to share with you this afternoon. It’s not often that you come across something that seems immediately transcendent — so otherworldly that it fully envelops the listener and transports you away from the surface level of consciousness — but that’s the case with Night of Your Ascension, the third album released by the American “pastoral doom” conglomerate known as Wrekmeister Harmonies. A late-year discovery for me (it just came out at the end of November), this LP nevertheless had such an instantaneous impact that I just had to include it among my list of 2015’s top releases.

This isn’t necessarily the type of material that really benefits from being written about, being described in words, so I’ll keep that part as brief as possible. Further down, you’ll have the opportunity to listen for yourself and get the full experience, and then you’ll understand. And even further down (in the comments section), I’ll be including the details of the group’s current North American tour with Bell Witch, so stay tuned for that!

 

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Season of Arrows – Season of Arrows (2014)

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Season of Arrows – Season of Arrows (The Path Less Traveled Records, 15 April 2014)

 

Hey there, folks — happy Friday! For a while it seemed like an end to these days of drudgery would never arrive, but finally it’s here! Hopefully you all have something exciting planned for the weekend — myself, not so much. If it ever stops raining, my yard needs cut badly, and then for an extra special treat, I get to head out to my Grandma’s house and do even more yard work there!

But before we all head out to do whatever it is we’ll be doing for the next couple of days, I wanted to leave you with a little something you might like to listen to: the self-titled album by Nashville’s Season of Arrows that came out a little over a year ago. If you like it — and I think you might — AND if you don’t have any weekend plans yet, AND if you happen to be within driving distance of Frederick, Maryland, you can go check out this band in person at the Maryland Doom Fest! More on that later, but first…

 

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Attalla – Attalla (2014)

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Attalla – Attalla (self released, 12 July 2014)

 

Hey folks! I’d like to share a quick little anecdote with you, then it’s time to talk about some more music. Deal?

Ok. So several months ago, this band called Attalla from Wisconsin wrote to me to let me know they’d released an album last year, and to see if I’d be interested in reviewing it. I then downloaded it and added it to my library of stuff to check out — but it just kind of sat there for a little while. I can’t exactly say what it was that kept me from listening to the album right away, but I feel like something about the band’s name brought up some sort of negative imagery on some subconscious level. (And frankly, that’s really a shame, because — at least from what I learned by watching Bill and Ted’s Excellent Adventure — the storied emperor seems to have been quite the bad-ass, and his name should certainly evoke similarly awe-inspiring thoughts.

In any case, I ultimately overcame whatever mental roadblock had been there (the word “attalla”, I would later discover, actually derives from the Cherokee word for “mountain”) and hit PLAY on the band’s self-titled LP. And I’m really glad that I did. I wasn’t just ‘pleasantly surprised’ at what I heard; rather, the album turned out to be pretty great. I guess the lesson to be learned here was, not only should you not judge a book by its cover, but you also shouldn’t judge a book by its title being vaguely similar to another book’s title. Particularly if you’ve already pre-judged that other book to be terrible based on ITS cover. Okay, moving on.

 

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Forest of Tygers – Bruises (2014)

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Forest of Tygers – Bruises (29 April 2014, Primitive Violence [cassette] / Acteon [CD/digital])

 

Hey there, ladies and gentlemen (and whomever else might be lurking out there reading this). Welcome to a new month! It’s strange: this week is almost over already, and I still feel like I’m trying to recover from last weekend. It was packed full of running around — for example, to the hospital to visit our cousin’s newborn triplets, and to a friend’s wedding — and a few late nights, between the wedding and my band playing our first show in over seven months(!) which was pretty cool. But yeah, just trying to get back into the swing of things — not to mention now we’ll need to be preparing for our next show, which as I mentioned last week would be on October 10th when Black Tar Prophet, the sludgy, noisy duo from Nashville, come to town.

Well. Today I’ve got a treat for you, because we’re going to talk about another great two-piece band: Forest of Tygers, which consists of guitarist Jim Valosik and drummer Rachel Valosik. Just like their fellow Nashvillains BTP, FOT have also put out a new release back in the spring of this year, the Bruises EP. Although just four tracks long, this debut is crushing, and just the right amount of nasty, and serves as an excellent introduction to this husband-and-wife team.

 

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Black Tar Prophet – Deafen (2014)

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Black Tar Prophet – Deafen (Domestic Genocide Records, 22 April 2014)

 

Hey, folks. How’s it going? I’ve got some more music here I’d like to share with you. I think you’re going to like it.

A lot of times when I write about a band, you may have noticed I will include some kind of anecdote about how I first heard about them — whether I’d seen them perform live at some point, or sometimes it’s someone I get introduced to through another website or another band. But the vast majority of the stuff I have here to write about came to me as the result of being contacted by either the band themselves, or their record label, or the PR person who represents the band or label. I get a TON of stuff emailed to me — seriously — and it can sometimes be a bit taxing to sort through it all. But in the end it’s completely worth it, because I’ve discovered some amazing stuff this way that might not have come to my attention otherwise. In fact, some of the bands I would consider to be among my favorites to listen to (not even exaggerating) were ones I had never heard of until I’d been contacted by their label or PR company.

For this reason, I make it a point to listen to absolutely everything that anyone sends me. Because there’s no way of knowing whether something might end up surprising me and being awesome. In fact, I go into every new album with as little knowledge as possible, and with the hopes that it’ll be something that completely blows me away. Of course, this leaves me feeling pretty disappointed much of the time, but occasionally I come across some real gems. When I do, that’s when I generally will go back to the original email (and then Facebook or Bandcamp or the band’s own website, wherever they have some sort of online presence) to learn more about the band — such as where they’re from and a whatever history I can learn about them.

This is sort of what happened when I first heard Black Tar Prophet‘s new album Deafen, which came out earlier this year. When I started listening, I knew nothing about the band other than their name, but before I reached the end of the first song, I was already rushing back to find that email, to see where these guys were located — and not just from curiosity. This time, I needed to know how close to here (Pittsburgh) they lived, so I could gauge the chances of them ever playing in this area. Once I found out they were from relatively nearby (Tennessee, which is just three states away, or about 8-9 hours driving), I immediately started considering the possibility that they could someday be on tour somewhere in this direction, and furthermore I decided that if this happened, I needed to get them a show here in town, and that my own band Last should open for them.

Well… I’m very excited to tell you that in just a couple of weeks, both of those things will be coming true! This instrumental heavy sludge/noise duo will be hitting the road in October, and I’ll include all the details about that right after I’ve told you some more about this album that had piqued my interest so much when I first heard it…

 

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Recreant – Still Burn (2014)

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Recreant – Still Burn (Halo of Flies, 02 September 2014)

 

Until sometime last summer, there used to be a house out in the Lawrenceville neighborhood of Pittsburgh. Well, actually I suppose the house is still there. But previously it had been the home of a couple friends, who (at the time) had been members of a few local bands including Cerebral Apophysis and Old Man of the Mountain. This little urban bungalow was referred to as the Gopher Hole, and it was here (specifically, in one small room which adjoined the kitchen) that a great many DIY shows were held, which featured a huge assortment of local and nationally touring bands.

At one such event, back in April 2013, my wife and I had dropped by to see local hardcore sensation Meth Quarry, and we also got to check out the grindy-screamy bass/drums duo Shiff. Later that evening a band from Florida, whom I’d never heard before, called Recreant was supposed to play, but unfortunately we had a prior engagement and had to leave the show early. While we were there, though, we briefly met some of the members of the touring band, who seemed like really nice people. Half based on that, half based the fact that it had some really sweet artwork, we decided to buy a copy of the record they had for sale. The idea was, it’s nice to help out bands on tour — especially when they’re playing a free DIY show — and if it wasn’t very good, well, we know enough people who collect vinyl and surely we could find a good home for it.

Well. The next day I took that LP with its Crass-inspired logo out of the sleeve (it turns out, it was housed in a recycled old album cover which had been turned outside-in, re-glued, and with the band’s artwork screenprinted on the new blank front), and decided to give it a spin. As I recall, it took less than twenty seconds to realize there would be no need to worry about finding someone else to adopt the record: this was some pretty incredible stuff. (You can check it out right here.)

So anyway, fast forward a bit, and now earlier this month, the band has just put out another record — this one through the Halo of Flies label. It’s awesome, too. They’re on the road again, in the middle of a huge cross-country tour. For months I’ve been looking forward to their return to Pittsburgh (which will be tomorrow night!), but I’ve got the full list of remaining dates here. I’ll share them with you after I talk a little bit more about the new album Still Burn.

 

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