Master with Hate Storm Annihilation, Summoning Hate, Ramius, and Abstruktor [Sammy's Patio, Revere, 4/19/2014]

So despite hiking myself into the ground in the morning running around getting the last stuff for China, I drove out to this (not confident in making three train and one bus connections coming back) and after a short period of "what the hell is wrong with highways not going anywhere in Revere, man" I got to the venue, stowed the car further away than I had to, and hiked down along the beach.  Sammy's is located right on the water, so during the offseason (i.e., when it is too cold for guidos to LIKE A CHAMP all over the beach) there's tons of easily-accessible free parking for those who don't come in by the immediately adjacent Blue Line stop, and inside, beer is cheap and you're right on top of the band.

I picked up some stuff from Master, including a physical copy, at long last, of the Fuckin' Death demo, and then browsed the Wicked Music distro table.  This was a good and a bad thing; my wallet ended the sequence a hell of a lot lighter than it started, but there was a copy of Cancer's To The Gory End involved, and if you walk away from a copy of that record at an old school death metal show, you will not generally come back and find it again.  Front pockets armored up with death metal old and new (including Decrepit Birth's Progeny and the new Cynic, which is the first metal record of any stripe I've seen with commentary from the New York Times on a sleeve sticker), I got a beer and watched Abstruktor finish setting up.

Abstruktor [4/7]
I had not seen this band before, but in a way I had: over the course of a long set, what they provided was a lot of league-average, poorly-differentiated thrash metal that did not go much beyond "we like early Metallica a lot".  For the most part, it was pretty well executed technically, and the several lapses in keeping in time might be down to the lack of monitors (which Paul from Master would complain about later) and/or breaking in a new guitarist (Brendan also of Black Mass), but other bands didn't have these issues, and they might easily have been forgiven if there was more there here.  Abstruktor are an ok band, but didn't really offer anything in this set that couldn't have been replaced, in the general "melodic thrash also-rans" sense, by staying in and listening to my Blessed Death record.  Actually, I should have done that anyway and still gone out on time; "listen to Blessed Death" is usually a good choice regardless of the circumstance.

Abstruktor doing their thing.

Ramius [5/7]
Ramius got back to the death metal that most of the audience came here to see, and offered in their five songs a solid, lyric, and for the most part well-finished performance, despite opening with "Omegaton" again, which still starts off with that riff cut directly out of "Crystal Mountain".  Monitor circumstances notwithstanding, this was still about as good as set as I've seen from this band, and while it's good that they're continuing to develop, it's not quite so good that they still, after all this time, sound the most focused, confident, and dominating when they're playing other people's stuff.  The scene's as demanding of originality as of quality, and it would be awesome to hear Ramius originals that they kill as hard as they did on "Pull The Plug" this time out.

Ramius detonate the Omegaton.

In here I got another beer and attempted to support the local bands who had merch out without adding needlessly to my shirt piles, and failed it.  I can understand, in the presence of the internet, the reluctance of local bands to charge for demo burns, but it would be really nice to drop some cash, every now and then, and get something tangible that isn't going to get worn twice and then go in the SVdP box in eight months.  And if you must loss-lead all your stickers/demos/printed patches, then ffs, have a tip jar.

Summoning Hate [5.5/7]
In the too-long intervening time since I last saw this band, Juan has come back on at least shared vocals, bringing one of Boston's longest-running old-school death metal bands back almost full circle.  Marco still has a lot of the vocals, and still executes them pretty well, but much of their old stuff was written for one vocalist without an axe over his shoulder; Juan's lack of instrumental responsibility makes the delivery that much more guaranteed, and the dude still has one of the best sets of death metal lungs east of the Hudson.  At times it was a little crowded with five dudes in the limited stage space, and the member shift and shorter set time meant that a bunch of good stuff they frequently have done in the past got cut from the setlist, but this was still a killer set from some killer dudes who have been killing it for quite a long time.  That Brutality shirt on Juan in the picture down there isn't a reissue.

Juan and the Avilas, back together for the first time (well, in my experience) in a long time.

Hate Storm Annihilation [5/7]
On tour out of Chi-town and sharing Master's kit, Hate Storm Annihilation put on a thoroughgoing brutal death metal tech demo that shook out maybe a little short in the composition department, but excellent in every particular of execution.  The songs as such did not hang together on much beyond brutality, or in large part separate themselves from each other, but in this style, that can become secondary to Craig's heroic seven-string evocation of several more musicians and Konstantin's flawless blasting battery all around the kit.  This band is not going to end up at the NEMAHF (running concurrently with this show) at any point, but technical mastery and a brutal attack is always going to be accessible and in-demand for underground death metal audiences.  Another axe might help them evolve in composition, along either the lines of Decrepit Birth or Gigan, but Hate Storm Annihilation clubbed us pretty well into submission and definitely justified the haul out from the Midwest, even as they are.

Hate Storm Annihilation fan the flames with a relentless barrage of notes.

Nervochaos was supposed to play in here, but weren't able to get the work visas needed for the tour.  This was a bummer, but with them off and one of the original four local openers dropping and not being replaced, a seven-band bill got cut back to a much more normal and hospitable five.  This is about the limit for normal shows; much more, and you're starting to trend back towards Mark's territory and people claiming that their overbooked, early-starting club show is a "festival".

Master [6.5/7]
We're all getting older, and the bloom is off the rose; this set didn't quite come up to Master's previous Boston-area gig, but it was pretty fucking good, and a hell of a lot better than most of the band getting turned back at the border.  They played more new stuff on this go-round than then, but also more old stuff, including "Cut Through The Filth", which I'd never run across before, DIJTB II being super out of print and one generation before even I started following that comp series, and despite the carping from Paul about not being able to hear the vocals due to the lack of monitors, the sound was pretty much dead fucking on.  This was the one band that the floor really filled in for, and when dudes weren't knocking the mic stands over thrashing out, it combined with the primitive PA setup and the older Death Strike tunes to really emphasize the down-and-dirty DIY feel.  Sammy's is pretty fuckin' DIY in any case, combining the exterior of a warehouse show and the interiors of Anchors Up with a Revere Beach boardwalk bar, but Master ripping up most of the old grimy parts of the Boston death metal scene in a floor filled with equal parts band and audience is about as close as you're going to get to a basement gig on any show you pay money to get into.

Paul Speckmann, the best beard in death metal, the rest of Master, and a bunch of Boston dudes.

Eventually, though, they closed up, despite the tired crowd getting a second wind after "Pay To Die" and demanding encores, including some weirdo who wanted to hear "America the Pitiful".  When it was clear that no more was in the offing, I wound my back in and headed out home, which ended up taking like twice as long as it ought to have, through random back streets in Medford, Somerville, and Winchester, because I am bad at not getting lost all the time.  Fortunately, I didn't have much to do on Easter, and was able to get this down and dusted.  Unless I by some miracle manage to go to Cloudkicker (volume of hipsters in Allston and being on call at the time suggest not), this is the last show, and thus the last writeup, before I try to go to east Asia and do a bunch of fundamentally very stupid things.  We'll see if that works, and if I come back in one piece...and not in a pine box.

Summoning Hate with Weregild, Forced Asphyxiation, Splatter Effect, and Soul Annihilation [O'Brien's, Allston, 6/22/2012]

I checked the weather before heading out in the morning, based on info from the gas station the night before, and despite the incoming rain, I loaded up only my lightweight rig.  This, again, was training; I'll have the full-weight rig in Germany, but unless absolutely necessary, I'm probably not going to wear it on the hike across the old inner-German border, and that goes off rain or shine.  It's too easy, in training for these things, to just decide to skip a session because it's raining, or too hot, or whatever, but actually in the field, I need to be able to make that hike in whatever conditions.

The conditions this time around, though, turned out to be pretty optimal.  It was only a light rain by the time I hit the ground, and it was a quick hike over to O'B's in still-melty heat.  This ended up dropping me on the stoop before even the door guy showed up, so I hung about outside for a while in the vain attempt to catch a breeze, and then went in to get my temporary license disrespected and pick up a beer.  This then showed that the prior heel-"cooling" was a mistake: O'Brien's, for the first time ever that I can recall, had functional air conditioning.  We've come a long way from the old days.

Soul Annihilation [5/7]
Though it had been barely two weeks since the last show, Soul Annihilation's shown some definite improvement on this outing, staying generally tighter and in some respects working the delivery of their black-death violence a little better.  The set started to run down about midway through, but this is largely due to the material: a lot of what Soul Annihilation has right now is pretty basic, and this will improve as they continue writing as a full band.  There is a good base of chops and talent here, and enough really good stuff at the start  to easily see their development to continue to improve.

Sean catches the light as Kunjan thrashes out.

Splatter Effect [5/7]
It had been a while longer since I last saw this band, who have also changed it up a little in the intervening, taking a more straightforward line on their mix of NWOSDM and hardcore, bringing it more into line with what the inventors of the alleged NWOAHM in this part of the world were doing in the mid-'90s -- and largely stopped after In Flames broke out stateside.  This was a good performance on the music as well as the history factor, and it's definitely cool that this sound, in whatever permutation, continues to be relevant.

Splatter Effect, focused delivery.

Forced Asphyxiation [5.5/7]
If there was one thing that this performance really emphasized, it is that this band is really getting to the level where they need an actual PA to present their sound: it's not enough to just play out of the cabs and hope everything's balanced.  There was a little bit of chaos at the start as everything got dialed in properly, but the band picked it up after that point, and smashed out a good, solid set that built steadily through to the finish -- and, for what may be the first time, was not mostly about weed.  Those moaning about the end of an era, though, can shut up and clock the band's kickass new "Robocrop" shirt, which I picked up here after running out of belt slots (and also cash) in Worcester.

Ryan lays it down, after recovering.  He fell into, but not over or through, the drumkit, during the second song or so, but recovered his balance and kept playing.  Elite.

Weregild [6/7]
I'm not sure if the band claimed this as their Boston debut, but it was definitely the first time I'd seen them in the city -- and more importantly, another solid push forward in the development of their rock-solid, heavily-Amon-Amarth-influenced evolution of viking death metal.  They've tweaked the lineup a little since last time, but continued in the same general vein without a break, and the result is steadily more impressive, both in the honing of the old material and the steps up in quality and (to a lesser degree) independence of the new stuff.  "Journey Through Musphelheim" remains the best song in Weregild's repetoire, but "Winterlands I Braved" is nearly as good, and if the stuff that the band is working on but not playing out yet continues in this fashion, their eventual demo is going to be must-get -- and it's not out of the question that it might not be complete Amon Amarth worship.  Absolutely immense.

If "We must kill / To Honor Our Dead", then Weregild definitely kills it enough to satisfy the condition.

In here, I went outside for a bit, mostly to unwind my back, as despite the strong turnout the AC was still keeping the temperature kind of in check.  It had cooled off a little outside, but not enough that I didn't get back in, and lined up for Summoning Hate's set, well before time.

Summoning Hate [6/7]
Weregild had set a really high mark, but Summoning Hate, as should really be expected by now, managed to pull out a relentlessly killer set, packed with craft and nuance as well as straight-ahead brutality, and definitely get up to that mark.  Show after show, year after year, Summoning Hate continues to both produce at a high level and continuously tweak and refine their take on largely-traditional brutal death metal, and at this point it is pretty unambiguous that they're just about the best Boston death metal band with no recordings available -- and unfortunately, there's no immediate sign of the second part of that changing.  In the meantime, though, as long as we continue to get killer sets like this, as frequently as the band does play out, we miss less from them not having a CD out.  The rest of the world, not so lucky.

Alex catches the sidelight as the band starts up.

After Summoning Hate closed up, I hung around a bit but still ended up not picking up anything else for export, then beat feet across the bridges.  Between the Euro knockout rounds and then Iron Maiden, not a lot got done in the intervening week, but here this pile of misapprehensions is, backlog cleared, one month away from the last wayfaring.

Summoning Hate with Untombed, Scalpel, Soul Remnants, and Forced Asphyxiation [O'Brien's, Allston, 5/18/2012]

Again I had the day off, and misread the start times on this Covan benefit, which led to me getting in about an hour ahead of the start, which I spent leaning against the outside wall, trying to shed heat.  It worked only intermediately well, and I was glad to be able to get in and at least get a beer waiting for the bands to start.  O'Brien's is seldom cool inside, but with most of the crowd not in yet, it wasn't in full sauna form.

Forced Asphyxiation [5.5/7]
For those keeping score, perhaps in anticipation of the CL final the next day, this one finished Weed 3:2 Other Stuff ("Weed" is still obviously the home team for this band, trolololol).  For those more interested in how the band was actually playing than on counting the prevalence of lyrical subjects, this was another strong, sharply-finished set in line with how they've been playing lately: strong, brutal, non-slamming death metal that on this exposure came off as highly reminiscent of 1992-vintage Hypocrisy.  This gig, both the bands that played and those that didn't (Parasitic were initially on, but had to cancel, and Malika despite organizing it didn't book her main band), shows that Forced aren't quite at the apex of NEDM yet, but the development and raw power manifested in this performance are carrying them in that direction.  Straight killer.

Forced inflicting some "Blunt Forced Trauma" on the audience.

Soul Remnants [5.5/7]
This set saw some progression from Soul Remnants as well, which was somewhat unexpected; their new stuff, from the record that they're currently working on, remains significantly inspired by At The Gates as per their older material, but weaves in a few new twists as well.  The band is still in the process of setting themselves apart both from their influences and from other bands drawing on those springs, but the separation is definitely coming, and that new record, when they finish it, is definitely going to be one to watch out for.  Here, they acquitted themselves well despite being both the most melodic of the five bands and the farthest, influence-composition-wise, from Decapitated on offer, getting the now-swollen crowd around and moving down front.

Mitch roaring away.

Scalplel [5/7]
This gig was intentionally booked to bring together as many strands of NEDM as possible, and if this is New England, there has to be a slam representative.  Scalpel filled the role admirably, and with a fair degree of originality, working slam content through more traditional death metal structures.  Their brand of slam isn't the most fully-developed yet, but this is a really young band, and if they can continue to develop this style further, they're going to be one to look out for.

Scalpel flat smashes it.

Untombed [6/7]
Two important lineup notes from this: first, Untombed has changed members again, and is now even closer to having all members having once played in Summoning Hate.  Second, it may look on first glance like they've gone away from that "goal" by changing vocalists, as Dave, in a job-related shock horror move, has cut off his famous dreads.  Take a moment of silence if you like, we're not going anywhere.

.....

The hair amputation fortunately didn't affect the music at all; Untombed have done better sets than this, but this one was cleanly balanced despite pulling in a variety of directions, slamming and grooving by turns, for a total effect probably as strong as I've seen from the band since they went to two full-time vocalists.  "Bloodstained World" was an especially violent standout here, but this whole set was damn impressive, even following on what had been a pretty damn impressive gig to this point.

The lighting is so bad that the only thing you can see in this alleged picture of Untombed is the reflection off Dave's cueball.

Summoning Hate [6/7]
Having traveled through most of the available styles of New England death metal, Summoning Hate brought things back around to where they started, closing out the night with a long, strong set of traditional brutality flavored with more and better-presented melodics than I can recall hearing from the band in a while.  As with Untombed, this wasn't quite an all-time high, but it was a killer set that put a fitting capstone on a killer gig, to what was still at that point a packed house.

Milo introduces "Infierno de Dante".

At the end, though, Summoning Hate finished up, and I picked up a shirt off Untombed -- if you see a design from this band that you like, get it bought, their production runs appear to be wicked small, and they will run out of your size -- as well as some stickers for export, and incidentally another copy of their demo, before heading back across the bridges.  As the night before, the extract from there was pretty simple, and despite the hole I'd ended up putting in my foot, I was in decent shape for the Morne show the next night.  Then the CL final went to extra time, and then to penalties, and I got back home too late and too blasted to drive in.  After that, work and family commitments delayed this writeup and caused me to miss Negura Bunget and then Sexcrement; there's some bookkeeping coming, and then hopefully I can get back out to some damned shows.

Necronomichrist with Summoning Hate, Excrecor, and Ramius [Ralph's, Worcester, 10/6/2011]

As is apparently becoming usual now that I've cleared a lot of backlog and reduced my load of busywork, I left too early due to a lack of stuff to stay occupied with in the office, flew over the highways due to a lack of traffic and roadworks (at least on the way out, coming back was another story), and got in well ahead of technical doors, nabbing an early beer downstairs and killing some time while staying out of the way of the bands setting up. Round about 9 I actually headed in, picking up another drink; due to the long drive, I tend to monitor consumption per unit time pretty strictly when I'm out here, which indicates how stupid-early I got in. Maybe I need to start playing KoL again to kill time.

Anyway, the bands loaded in and soon enough got started.

Ramius [5/7]
This was apparently their first show ever, and it kinda showed via the lack of material; four songs prepared, total, even if they were pretty good songs. Soundwise, the best description of Ramius is pretty much late-period Death, without the LIMIT BREAK and run through some more modern filters. Their approach to death metal is obviously rooted in said band -- "Omegaton" is substantially cribbed from "Crystal Mountain", which they went on to play immediately after it -- but like most bands just starting out, they don't quite have the chops to handle the whole thing. There's nothing wrong with this, of course -- there's no shame, as a guitarist, in not being Chuck Schuldiner, just as drummers should take no heat for not being Gene Hoglan or bassists for falling short of Steve DiGiorgio -- and it's good to see bands challenging material and styles like this, but they're not quite there yet. Still a good set, despite the limited material and the down tempos on some of "Crystal Mountain", and there's every indication that they'll get better as they gain more experience as a band.

For reference, the band pronounces their name as "RAY-mi-uss" rather than "RAH-mi-oos", probably because unlike their mascot, they're not themselves Lithuanian.

Excrecor [6/7]
Another set, another great performance from Excrecor. Some people may want a caveat here, that the author is a hardcore Hypocrisy fan and his experiences may not match the mean, but I assert that someone who does not dig Carcass, mid-90s Hypocrisy, and occasional 1997-vintage In Flames digressions hammered into a seamless and originally-developed whole is not someone who is even at death metal shows. They did a couple of new ones here, off the record that's still under development, and if the material they brought out here is a representative indication, that's also going to be a solid fucking record, in the vein of Synchronicity if not better. We may have occasional blank spots in our coverage of the full death metal spectrum in New England, but we've got some really good bands in the range that we cover.

In here I picked up my last beer, and a bottle opener from Necronomichrist. My Coctopus one is still holding up pretty well, but since I already had Excrecor's last record and wasn't up for a shirt, there weren't a whole lot of merch options at this show. Eventually, that opener will break unrepairably, and I'll have a backup on hand.

Summoning Hate [6.5/7]
Between the sound, the volume of material, and the total execution, this was one of the best if not the absolute best set that I've seen from Summoning Hate. This is a pretty significant mark given how many good sets I've seen from this band over the last five years, but this was a nice long set of killer material well-delivered, which also saw one of the few legitimate mosh pits (as distinct from "dudes stand in a circle while Dan thrashes around from wall to wall") I've seen at Metal Thursday lately, and some vicious hardcore dancing on the breakdown at the start of "Decimated". They brought out a new one amid some technical difficulties -- first Juan's guitar cables not working, then Juan and Alex keeping in synch with each other and Chris -- but these weren't enough to suppress the mass coolness of that song, let alone drag down the set as a whole. Simply killer.

Perhaps more significant than how good this set was is that Summoning Hate is apparently writing (more) new material, which suggests the possibility of new recordings sometime in the non-distant future. This band is and has been awesome, but they haven't recorded/released anything since they were going by Downfall, and even that's been out of print for years. This is one of the better death metal bands in Boston, but there's not really a lot of evidence that can be presented for that argument without seeing them live.

Necronomichrist [5.5/7]
The band's a little rebalanced since last time, which has had a definite effect on their sound. By going down to one guitar and bringing the keyboards more forward, they now sound less like Vital Remains b-sides and more like turn-of-the-millennium Hypocrisy covering Vital Remains b-sides. Dumb and snide jokes aside, this was a good solid performance, even if listening to that s/t the whole way out colored my impressions of what the band was working from. Necronomichrist is also working on a new record, and the newer stuff that they did here is a clear step both up and forward from the last CD: it's more developed, a little more technical and better-composed, and at least in this presentation significantly less Vital-influenced. As with, really, all of the bands on here, when they bring that one out eventually, it's definitely going to be one to look out for.

Necronomichrist closed up and/or ran out of material around one, and I beat feet for the exits. After waiting through most of "Until The End" for the windscreen to defrost, I headed out for the highway, and that would've been the end of it if I hadn't run into Milo randomly at the McDonald's at the Natick rest stop. I essentially communicated the above on SH's set, though without the frustrated whining about the lack of recorded material. We'll see what they have for that show on the 15th as regards any more new stuff, or fewer fillips on the on they rolled out tonight; I go on call next weekend, but that O'B's show is worth packing the phone and bending the rules.

Hessian with Summoning Hate, Iron Will, and Skull Hammer [Champions', Everett, 10/8/2010]

In retrospect, this was a terrible weekend to get sick, and if I knew that I'd be missing the next three shows because of it, I'd've leaned harder to get out to the first of the five in Worcester. Unfortunately, that didn't happen, but I did make it to this one, which turned out to be eminently worth it.

I went down right from work, having stayed late to finish some stuff off, but this turned out not to have been strictly necessary. Like most of the other shows I've been to at Champions, this one turned out to be on PRST, with the notional 8PM being set to about 9:15, but not much damage; one of the five bands that was supposed to be on the bill, at least as of the organizer's last understanding of it, didn't make it, and the bar had a 1AM curfew due to not being in Boston. DIY, how we love ye. At a minimum, there was a decent amount of time to spend hanging around inside and outside drinking cheap beer, which is also a strong attraction of this place, and the bands eventually did go on, with results as good as anticipated.

Skull Hammer [5/7]
I hadn't seen this band before, and the usual trepidation about seeing a thrash band you haven't heard of in this modern era was present going in. Fortunately, they overcame that barrier right away, and knocked out a solid set of grooving early-'90s-styled thrash metal. Song to song, their material isn't the most differentiated in the whole world, and they're pretty firmly in the second rank of thrash bands in this area, but this doesn't matter a whole lot, at the DIY level, as long as they're able to get up like this and knock out some thrashing tunes. It's not like this kind of sound is super common in the thrash ranks these days, either, which is a point in their favor as far as differentiation goes, and good any way you cut it; getting this style back from extinction is only a good thing.

While I was picking up their records, Ace was sharing some stories from the road, including getting hosted on their one off-day by a certain outlaw MC. They're not affiliated with that club in any direct way, of course, but people in said club's area of operations might want to think twice before screwing this band over. Screwing bands over, of course, is never a good idea, but sometimes the prospect of potential personal violence is more of a disincentive than having your name blackened in metalhead circles five states away.

Iron Will [5/7]
Though these guys have been around for a while, this is the first I've seen them on a bill, let alone one I've gone to, since I've been back in the Boston area. You can see why Ravage would be a higher priority for the Firicanos than this project, on hearing them, but that isn't necessarily a knock on this band, which as the arbitrary number next to the name above indicates, was still pretty decent. The music on offer was, as might be expected from the members' antecedents, was well-composed melodic thrash in a classic (or, depending on perspective, just "older") style; while Tony's vocals were a little rough at times, Al is a surprisingly good drummer -- not a second skillset that you generally expect from a guy who's made his name as a vocalist. All around, solid; maybe not much more, but if you go into a DIY gig expecting much more, you are in for a lifetime of disappointment. Stay rooted in reality, and you can enjoy good bands for what they are.

Iron Will closed up with a cover of Manowar's "Hail And Kill" which is a reminder for the geography-challenged that Everett is located outside the northern limits of Boston. On the North Shore, we don't fear no Manowar.

Summoning Hate [6/7]
Wow. And not just for the band; while this performance was probably the best I've seen from these guys since Dave left, maybe since Juan left, what really put it over the top wasn't the band's execution (of course, solid and kickass as always) but the sound balance, which was absolutely perfect -- not what you'd expect from a bar show, and definitely not for the only death metal band on an old-school-heavy bill. All the PA trickery in the world wouldn't help if the band hadn't absolutely killed it, but they did, and the sound probably helped in getting the audience into it. This is about where the floor started moving, partly from the usual Summoning Hate doods, but partly also from people who'd been in mostly to see other bands; result.

Seriously, Summoning Hate needs to put out some new material, or just re-release the old Downfall stuff under the new name; I'm tired of seeing these guys every so often and not being able to support by paying over the odds for a CD-R or some fabric with ink on it, and I'm pretty sure there are a lot of other metalheads in the Boston area that this applies to.

Hessian [6/7]
This writeup is ultimately going to be colored by personal impressions; it should be noted up front, though, that I've been looking for a band like this for a while, somewhat without knowing it. Hessian didn't get that much longer of a set than the other bands, despite coming down from Maine, but what this meant primarily was that they didn't overrun their material, pumping out a class set of melodic thrash that wouldn't feel out of place with a recording date of 1982 on the back. People were referencing Angel Witch afterwards -- which Angus didn't deny -- but ultimately Hessian is a thrash-revival band, if in a different style, and one that could only come from Maine, where no matter what your other influences are, rock radio consists almost solely of WBLM and some intermittent non-static. If you were looking to rebuild heavy metal from first principles, out of '70s melodics and pure aggression, you could not ask for (let alone find) a more perfectly preserved set of initial conditions. And that's what's on offer from this band: old-style American heavy metal with killer hooks as well as crushing riffs, put together in a way that hasn't been done much in a while, and not with any real prominence since Savatage decided they wanted to be Andrew Lloyd Webber.

I picked up Old, Wild, and Free off the band before hitting the road, which is an adaptive decision for anyone who likes metal; on the way back home, though, I passed up stopping in at one of the several still-open Chinese takeaways in Everett and Malden, which turned out to be maladaptive. When your brain says "no, we don't need Chinese food at one in the morning", and your gut says "no, seriously, we do", listen to your gut, it might save you missing a kickass basement show and then Thrones over the course of the rest of the weekend due to being sick. Next gig, due to on-call and provided I don't get fucking sick again, is likely Ipsissimus and Nachzehrer at O'B's, and then Black Pyramid in a venue I don't have to drive to come next Friday. Killer.

Summoning Hate with Martyrvore, Witch Tomb, and Deathgod Messiah [O'Brien's, Allston, 9/24/2009]

This was the best show I've gotten seriously injured at on this continent. Actually, the seriousness is debatable, because it was only a finger that got broken, and just the end of it, really, but the awesomeness of the performance was not.

I plugged along at work a little too late, at least as I thought, got stuck in traffic due to large portions of 93 being closed, and then managed to hike over to the venue with time to spare regardless. Once inside, I drank some beer, got shit from Raphael and others for cutting off the Sodom backpatch in favor of a DIYed Revocation badge (pics of assembly sequence maybe coming), and waited around a bit occasionally getting quizzed on Euro-festival stuff; pretty much the usual.

After some grousing about "punk rock standard time" (also pretty much the usual), the bands got rolling, and the result was a pretty epic time only a little dinged up by injury.

Deathgod Messiah [5.5/7]
I hadn't seen these guys together before (but, of course, all of the members separately in various local black/thrash bands such as CNV, Deathamphetamine, and Witch Tomb), and the first three bands were backlined with the Martyrvore/Panzerbastard kit, so I was a little confused that it wasn't Martyrvore opening. Once the band actually started, though, the confusion was gone, blown away by a roiling tide of primitive first-wave black metal. Best comparisons are probably to Sarcofago and Hellhammer, but angrier and more focused. Though this was a good set, it also felt kind of short, which is par for the course when a new band shows up (not much material written, and as discussed on Bone Ritual's debut a while back, a general disinclination to play covers), but still hurts. In truth, all the sets this night felt a little short, even Summoning Hate at the end when I was waiting for them to finish so I could go to the doctor; maybe it's just not enough shows lately. Good stuff, and if they had demos I missed them, but a band this good and aggressive is going to show up again on DIY shows, and I'll get another chance.

Witch Tomb [7/7]
You never know with Witch Tomb; some nights you just get a great show, and others you get something completely awesome. This was one of the latter; the band has an excellent history, but this was one of the real true highlights, at least as I've seen so far. They did a lot of stuff old and new, and all with that complete conquering presence that you really only get from a good black metal band at the top of their game. There are a lot of good black metal bands in this area, enough that it's realistic to talk about NEBM as largely or completely independent of USBM as it is today, but when they're putting up a performance like this, it's hard to think of Witch Tomb as anything but the top of that heap. The environment at that '07 outing supporting Watain was maybe a little more special, but the music here was definitely better.

Martyrvore [6/7]
Before these guys started, Seth (Anal Cunt, duh) Putnam had a couple words into the mic lauding the fact that the Boston underground is still going, still producing quality extreme metal and still putting up quality shows like this gig and these bands. Martyrvore basically took it from there, putting out an intense barrage of violent blackened death metal in their expected no-prisoners fashion. I was able to hear more of their set than the last time I caught them -- potentially one of the last times they've played out, but that's really neither here nor there -- due to generally better sound, and the result was a solidly better impression. If you're looking for a quick look into NEBM, you won't do much better than their split with Witch Tomb. As noted, there are a lot of bands from here, but this sort of raw, dirty violence is the dominant strain, and these two bands do it pretty goddamned well.

This show was the end of the line for the cowskull that Martyrvore has had for a while, and brought out corpsepainted. It got slammed into the stage rather hard on numerous occasions, and by the end of their set, Paul had carpeted the stage and front of the floor in bone shrapnel. OH SNAP FORESHADOWING. Another attendee took this Symbolfoto of it sometime before it became completely destroyed; that's no a half-bad desktop background for anyone into DIY metal. I managed to pick up a tooth from it that so far has not been successful as a ritual focus for the Merseburg Charm, but expecting effectiveness out of old Germanic magic is probably asking too much.

Summoning Hate [6/7]
Though I spent about half the set distracted by violent pains in the middle of my right hand, this was still an intense and awesome set from the least black metal band on the bill. Summoning Hate turned in, like usual lately, a nice thick set of pounding thrash-death that sounded a little crisper than the last few times I've seen them, maybe due to the good venue sound. They also got people moving with this music, which is the reason that this score ought to come with that infamous "includes adjustments for injury" tag.

About halfway through Summoning Hate's set, one of their guys got pitched backward in the pit. I stretched out a hand to try and keep him from busting his head open on the edge of one of Martyrvore's cabs, which they'd cleared off the stage after their set but not yet out to their van/truck. This was a partial success; the guy wasn't injured, but his head caught the last digit on my right middle finger right on the fucking edge of the cab, and as it turned out, neatly broke the bone. This hurt like a fucking bastard, but I've gotten banged up before, so with the help of a couple trips to the O'B's bathroom sink to ice it down, I got through the end of the show.

The finger was swelling up and looking bad, and I didn't do any favors on the long walk back to Cambridge by not elevating it and also jimmying the digit around to see if it would bend in a way that wasn't consistent with a single piece of bone between the nail and the first knuckle. I got one of those results, and by the time I got back to my town, the finger was large and purple and worth a trip to the ER rather than just going to the pharmacy next door to my apartment buying some athletic tape.

Since this was kind of a pussy injury as ER cases go -- even in a small town like this, there are issues, like the patient brought in euphemistically described by the EMTs as "significant lower GI bleed" and more candidly by the nursing staff as "gouts of blood pouring from the anus" -- I got to sit around with an icepack for three hours while the doctors took care of the people with real problems, and contemplate the staff, the sounds of other people under heavier treatment, and the bed in the waiting room, and with it the reality that I, like some of the heavier cases, would likely find myself on a similar contraption sometime in the next fifty years, at which point I would stop being an alive human being and turn into a corpse. Pussy injury or no pussy injury, medical gore and forced contemplation of your own mortality is pretty fucking death metal.

In the end, I got what I was after -- a splint and confirmation that the damn finger was broken and I hadn't wasted three hours -- then went home and went to sleep instead of going to work. An outbreak of egregious drunkenness kind of killed off the rest of the weekend, but I'm on the mend now, in fine condition apart from that one damn digit, and will be in prime shape for Revocation's CD release this week.

Summoning Hate with Goreality, Dysentery, Blessed Offal, and Axiom [Plaza Garibaldi, Revere, 7/23/2009]

Because I wanted to be sure that I found the place and could deliver correct directions back to some people who'd hit me up to potentially lug stuff over to Europe, I left right from work and picked my way carefully in through the rain and backroads traffic. The venue was exactly where the map said it was, and the tricks needed to get turned back around were pretty straightforward. I got in right about doors, and got my entry comped by Dave, which was unexpected. I had qualms about writing the show up afterwards; the experience you have as just someone who sees a flier and comes out is necessarily different from someone who just gets handed through by the promoter, if only because mine is missing that important arm of “value for money”. Ultimately, though, this massed out as pretty academic: this was a fucking awesome show in a hell of good venue, providing so much total value that the $5 entry charge effectively goes to zero in comparison.

The venue is a Colombian-operated (allegedly; doesn't matter, so I didn't check) Mexican restaurant with a good stage, a decent PA, TVs that follow the fitba, and a reputation online for bad margaritas and general gunginess. None of this was in evidence here; some people complained after about the price of drinks, but not the quality. One expects a certain amount of “yanqui go home” may have been poured out on the negative commenters, probably with reason; if the staff are cool with a bunch of death metallers thrashing out, spilling beer, and otherwise being death metal fans, you've probably got to be a real A-line jerk to get bad service out of them.

Though the music was slated to start sharply at 8:30, this was delayed a little; maybe part setup, maybe part Dave holding the start until the Gold Cup semifinal finished. Despite the US defense, as usual, doing their wet paper bag impression from about 55' on, Honduras proved themselves unable of punching through said wet paper bag, and the US stole a late reinforcement to make it 2-0, where the game ended. It was a crappy match, and I, a USA supporter, was nearly as mad as the Honduras fans in the bar at a generally incompetent display of football. And yeah, maybe not everyone knows everyone going in, but no matter who you are, if you stand next to Juan (Untombed) and rant about bad performances in the current game with him, you will, shortly, be in with all and sundry at this kind of show. (Well, as long as you don't run down Mexico too much.)

Beer, metal, fitba, and good company; I thought I wasn't getting over to Europe till Saturday?

Axiom [5.5/7]
These guys had a couple false starts, and took a song or two to get cranked up and dialed in, but when they did, they laid out a nice performance mixing a lot of elements of Dissection and Hypocrisy, melding melody and brutality in a way that you don't see much any more. It also needs to be said that they either explicitly or just by association pull some influences from Revocation as well; only Dave Davidson is Dave Davidson, but the guitar player in this bunch is cut from the same cloth, even if his style and skills aren't quite as developed. It could be mutual influence or parallel evolution, but regardless, it made for some cool-ass guitar work, and a killer set overall.

Blessed Offal [6/7]
I hadn't seen these guys since the Skybar was still open, and they've substantially revamped their lineup since, but if anything this hasn't affected their provision of high-quality, dirty, blackened death metal. This was about as black as the bands would get, but each of the bands represented a maximum outlier on some axis: melody, blackness, slam, brutality, thrash, and all of them tied back in with the provision of fundamentally worthy death metal in the bargain. Hopefully, this lineup will stick, and it'll be less than two years before I see Blessed Offal again.

Dysentery [6/7]
If you are lazy and just like to look at scores rather than reading about what the bands did to pull those marks, you will see an extremely limited range on this show. If you're also wicked anal, I'll cut to the chase and note that Dysentery's set was probably the top among equals. The band does what they do, and they did it extremely well here, locked in, mountain-thick, perfectly clicking for an avalanche of audio destruction that meshed well with their crew thrashing the fuck out in the pit. Only one person got injured (busted knuckle, self-inflicted), Paul (Proteus R.I.P.) didn't spin-kick the head off any of the normal patrons, a couple of whom were up front and into the band, and everyone had a good time or a piece of ballistic-rated cover to stand behind, which is as close to a success criterion as you're going to be able to encapsulate for a Dysentery performance.

Goreality [6/7]
This may be the lowest score I've given Goreality (still without bass, but no marks off); if they'd gone on, this might have gone up, as they started slow and cranked up through the course of the set, perhaps an adjustment process with their new/fill-in singer, who had a good command of the material, but, as any rational person should have expected, was no Dan Pevides. From the sample at the end of the set rather than the start, she's definitely good enough to stick full-time if needed; we'll see if she's still out front (and if they can recruit a capable bass player in time) on the NEDF.

Yes, “she”. It's perfectly possible for a woman to front a brutal death metal band and do brutal vocals, ande Scariel definitely filled her role capably. Not Arch Enemy style; think of the old Russian band Mary....or not, because nobody fucking knows them except absurdly underground 1%ers who didn't have a problem with the initial idea in the first place.

It should also be mentioned that this show was effectively backlined with Goreality's Vader cabs (Steve and Mark are Vader endorsees), and this may have played a part in the uniformly high scores. While crap still sounds like crap when played through good equipment, good music will only sound better when pumped through two to four Vader 4x12s.

There was a bit of a break here while the Mexico – Costa Rica game wrapped up. Mexico stole an absolutely brilliant winner in the 88th minute with an attack that resembled a hxc VFW show, half their strike force ending up in the back of the net before one of the midfielders volleyed the ball past the goalie at last. Go find this goal, it's awesome.

Summoning Hate [6/7]
They came off as a lot more together than their last outing, which will go to rehearsal more than anything. Even though Marco's bass died in the middle of their second song, they soldiered on and smashed out a badass set of thrash-death metal, closing up only after pleading with Dave and the ownership to give them a last song. Maybe not a whole set, and maybe not a full band for most of it, but Summoning Hate still makes some quality metal, and though the crowd thinned after Goreality, they had as much a claim to a legit headliner-quality set as any of the last three bands.

NB: Though the last two bands were effectively bassless, Drew's bass attack in Dysentery provided enough low-end awesomeness to compensate. Pure annihillation.

In the end, it was time to go, as I had to work and then fly the next day. I picked up some Parasitic Extirpation, Dysentery, and Goreality stuffs, both for personal use and general distro in the eastern territories, and made my way out into the downpour to wend my way home.


Written in the Logan terminal before boarding for Iceland; next is German fests, which will probably not be digitized and published till well after.

Ipsissimus with Summoning Hate, Bog of the Infidel, Vaettir, and Unholy Goatfucker [Midway Cafe, Jamaica Plain, 3/28/2009]

One of the signal reasons I like festivals is that I normally have to go to shows by car. Thus, at Wacken, and at NEMHF (except for this year because I dawdled and couldn't get a room at one of the five hotels within walking distance) where I can go to the show on foot, and at NEDF where I have a decent cooling-off period built in, I can drink to levels between "comfort" and "to excess" without endangering anyone but myself on the way back from the stagefront. Since Boston has public transit still running on Saturday nights after this matinee show got out, I could and did similarly go all out, only having to walk about three to five blocks on either side of the rail network. This, along with the fact that there were some seriously good bands on the bill, made this gig pretty awesome.

I got down a little after anticipated start due to some rail delays; I was coming from French class in Kenmore and had to backtrack to Park (because the Green car I picked up wasn't going all the way to GC), then across to Downtown to get the Orange line to JP. However, the Goatfuckers hadn't started yet, so I went to the burrito place next door to get some eats and missed about two songs because they apparently had to raise and slaughter the cow to make the meatballs out of or something.

Unholy Goatfucker [5/7]
As noted, I heard about the first third of their performance through the wall, but what I saw out of them for real was pretty damn good. This band keeps coming in at this score, but this outing here was probably the best I've seen from them, and the way they keep moving from strength to strength leaves you with the impression that they're going to make some major noise outside the area one of these days. There are still a few points of cliche to their sound, but on the whole it's done so well, and it's such a good style, even when it's being derivative, that you can't help but get into it. I should probably stop talking about Obtained Enslavement until I listen to the records from that band that I have again, but if you've discovered bands of that ilk, from the Norway of that time, that largely went undiscovered, you'll discover them again with Unholy Goatfucker and be damned glad of it.

Because I was missing their set, I went right in instead of eating the food I bought, so after finding that the place was still packed to capacity -- that's right, a matinee black metal show in Boston sold out, so keep crying, scene elitists in other places, your tears are a delicious part of our complete breakfasts -- and there wasn't going to be anywhere to unwrap it, I went outside and so missed explicitly getting one of UG's demos. I later found one off the floor, but I'm not sure what kind of condition it's in, so that's something to watch out for next time.

Vaettir [5/7]
I hadn't heard this band before, and was pleasantly surprised. While they didn't really separate themselves out from their influences, it's definitely not usual to hear a band that inherits half from Cold Northern Vengeance, half from Sigh, and on a song by song basis at that. The combined effect was really cool, and as they move forward, this should lay the groundwork for some really interesting music. As it was, we got a set of Arising Dungeon Cult following mixed with b-sides from Infidel Art, and at least I enjoyed the hell out of it; Vaettir did justice to their influences with good music and good execution, and as they mesh more, this is going to be another must-watch.

I moved around here a bit, partly because the bar area was overly packed, part in order to try and hear a little better; pretty much, it's only the vocals and maybe the drums going through the PA. Guitars and bass just come straight out of the cabs, which saves on micing, but also makes where you stand important depending on the angle that the band has their speakers pointed.

Bog of the Infidel [5/7]
I could sum this band up as "a less creative Bethlehem", but that would give the wrong impression; there's a lot of Bethlehem in Bog's instrumental sound and especially in the singer's screechiness, but if you're not familiar with Bethlehem and particularly with what they've done since S.U.I.Z.I.D., you may not be familiar with exactly how far you can go and still be less creative than Bethlehem. Bog of the Infidel hew more towards the doctrinaire sound from Dark Metal and Dictius Te Necare, but (or, accordingly) put forward some quality black metal. I did get one of their demos, and will be digging it in the next review block; this was a quality set, even if the sound did start a little overdriven for the PA, and it'll be interesting to get another sample from this band to see where they're going and how they develop.

Summoning Hate [6/7]
This band was on the third-from-last show I saw, but there's been some substantial change since; Dave's no longer behind the skins, and the Avilas have recruited Seth (ex-Ascendancy, Hekseri, Herugrim, etc) to pick up from here. Also, the second guitarist cut his hair, so you might forgive the casual observer for thinking that there's been more substantive change than there actually was. This only lasted until the band actually started playing; while this wasn't quite as strong as some of the SH sets I've seen recently, it was still a solid and well-finished outing. Seth's recently taken some heat for his playing allegedly coming apart when the tempos start to increase, but if such happened here, it didn't noticeably hold back the band. The thrash-death break was well received amid the surrounding black metal, and as noted the execution was quite good; we'll have to see, going forward, if they get up to further heights once Seth gets some more practice with the material.

Ipsissimus [7/7]
Wow. It's not absolutely certain how much of this is the band leveling up, and how much is ancilliary contribution from the fact that, as alluded to above, I was swilling five-dollar Guinness like water throughout this show, but you can't deny that this was a thoroughly dominating performance. At the start there were some problems with the bass, but these were quickly remedied, and black metal got promptly bent forward and backward all over the damn place. This wasn't a perfect set, but it was so freaking good that I can't really justify giving it a lower mark. We really have an embarrasment of riches in New England when it comes to black metal, and Ipsissimus' complex melodic attack is as much a part of that as Witch Tomb's raw violence and CNV's Thelemic drone. So damn good. If you live between Boston and NYC and haven't see this band, you're doing it wrong.

The Ipsissimus merch table set itself up on the section of bar-cum-divider that I was sitting at before and after Summoning Hate, so I got to talking with Ryan (guitar) about all kinds of stuff, from shows -- the Wolves In The Throne Room gig he's putting up that I may have to knuckle and drive three hours to, and the Walpurgisnacht one he's trying to put up, provided that he doesn't have to beat up the headliners for declining (bands not named here, to avoid shaming them and to maintain the surprise should things go right, because it's a pretty "wow" combo to be able to get for a one-off) -- to headstocks...and how with an older axe with the old super-pointy BC Rich Widow (he had a new seven-string with the short-horned Beast headstock for this gig) he'd once slashed open the singer of Capharnum's hand. This is DIY, and in the course of it, yes, you do learn the weirdest things.

Of course, even at at free-drinking matinee show, things have to close up, as there are "last trains" and such that one has to avoid missing to make this sort of thing work. And so it was that I hit the road, got mostly soberish by the time I got back to North Station, and got processed to head north without incident, either from general aggro or by accident from the hordes of Villanova fans on the way out of the Garden and into the Final Four and the history books. Next gig's out in Worcester for this week's Metal Thursday; on this note, said concert series is continuing to be successful, as Chris is now getting, it seems, every other Thursday rather than just the first and third of every month. More Metal Thursdays mean more guaranteed nights of 20-40 excess patrons drinking and tipping for four hours in Ralph's upstairs; it's a pretty simple calculation for them to continue to allow the ritual to expand until it starts drawing less per night than other uses of the space -- and with Chris continuing to book top-quality bands across a wide variety of metal genres, this isn't going to happen any time soon. Bands don't get overexposed, the series doesn't fall into a rut of just attracting only the same people every time, the potential audience stays large, and with enough ebb and flow that people never feel they have to show up just to support, and Metal Thursday continues to be an artistic and commercial success for everyone involved, which is hellishly rare in the underground, even if 'commercial success' occasionally just means 'not in the red this week'.

Summoning Hate with Boarcorpse, Unmen, and Untombed [Ralph's, Worcester, 2/19/2009]

The first Metal Thursday of the year (for me anyway), this one started off a little delayed for me as I took my leave from a work get-together a little later than planned (blame an excessive table delay and accordingly, one too many Pacificos, necessitating a longer dry-out time before hitting the Pike, for that one), but I did arrive in time to catch the end of the first set.

Untombed [5/7]
This is Juan (ex-Summoning Hate)'s new band, and it's great to see him back fronting a band regularly. Untombed came off as a little less developed than SH, but provided a solid performance of trad-brutal death metal, something that often gets lost in the shuffle of slam and technicality in this region. I wish that I'd seen more of them, but even this much was good stuff, and got a killer response.

In the break I picked up a beer and a couple Circque du Carne promos; they weren't playing, but they had a stack of CDs out, and since Boarcorpse is still in the process of putting out their demo, and SH appears to be boldly forging along the super-kvlt path of “be awesome, but have absolutely no merch available for purchase”, there weren't a lot of options here for take-out music.

Unmen [5.5/7]
This was a really cool and interesting band, on tour from Jersey, and doing a style of grind that I hadn't really heard before, one that relied as much on thrash circa 1984 as on the good old basics of Napalm Death. The fusion was compelling as well as brutal, in good contrast to the rest of the bill, and anyone who might have been grumbling about their inclusion either wasn't by the end of the set, or has their head screwed on wrong. A ton of energy and some killer music; if you can catch these guys on the road, do so, whether it's on a punk or metal bill.

From them I scored, afterwards, a CD and their last small patch. Bands, especially grind bands for some reason, are wild about huge patches, but they'd do better cash-wise with them if they could dial the ego back a bit and make more smaller ones and fewer larger. With a big patch, you ask yourself, “do I really like this band enough to make them the focal point of my jacket and take up all that real estate”, while with a small patch, it's more on the lines of “hell yes, DO WANT, I'll find somewhere to stick it, these guys rule”.

Boarcorpse [6/7]
This band has taken it up significantly since the last time I saw them; some of this is the addition of the irrepressible Elliot (The Body Farm, Composted, TYAG) Bayless on guitar, but some of it, certainly, is the development and maturation of the music to the point where someone like Elliot fits in with the ensemble and is pushed by the music as much as he pushes it. A lot of structured chaos and hellishly sick technicality, but still solidly within the song frameworks; this is definitely a band to watch going forward, and to pick up their demo when it comes out. Others have made Cephalic Carnage comparisons; I'm not enough into CC to confirm or deny, but it does certainly appear to be on the right track.

Summoning Hate [6/7]
Things had emptied out a little to this point; a consequence of having a very well-attended Metal Thursday, like this one, is that those non-core people are going to leave around midnight, before the headliners start. All this meant, though, was more room in the pit for Chris (the organizer), the Unmen dudes, and eventually Crazy Dan, to fly in and throw themselves around. This was a really good, maybe even peak, set from Summoning Hate, going full time with crushing thrashing death metal – maybe too crushing for the sound system, which didn't catch up to the band for most of the first song, but just right on pitch for Metal Thursday. Juan guested on a couple songs; the band and he are apparently fine with the lineup SH has going right now, and the conclusion seems to be that if he has the time to sing full-time again, why not have two awesome death metal bands instead of one? The logic convinces, not least because the musical results of this parting of the ways are pretty fucking convincing themselves.

Eventually, though, all good things have to come to an end, and the lights went up and I had to bail, having to work in the morning and such. Four awesome bands, a fairly easy drive back, and a great time thrashing; this is why Metal Thursday keeps going, and keeps drawing from even as far as I've got to go to it.

Mortal Decay with Goreality, Abnormality, and Summoning Hate [O'Brien's, Allston, 11/29/2008]

I'd skipped two shows due to work commitments (part of the reason that this review is so colossally late) -- and depression at Celtic crashing out of Europe -- earlier in this week, so this one was pretty much de riguer. It didn't hurt that it also packed a hell of a lineup, and allowed me to avoid going out locally and running into people back in town for Thanksgiving and/or reunions that I had little interest in seeing.

I left a little late due to working on some other junk, but managed to get in to Boston and stumped over to O'Brien's while the bands were still setting up. It was fairly crowded; Saturday show with a lot of good bands will do that, and there was a decent amount of time to hang out, stretch out, and drink chemicals.

Summoning Hate [6/7]
There are a lot of people who complain about NEDM being all slam these days, and far too many of them just sit on their asses and whine, instead of going out and supporting this band. Summoning Hate's old-school attack may not be as complicated as the other bands on this bill, but holy crap is it heavy, and you're not a fan of the likes of Obituary and Master, you really need to take a look at yourself and try to figure out exactly why you're in death metal, anyway. The songs that they pull Juan back in for may be borrowed finery, but they do a good job with them, and their original material is pretty killer as well. The night did only get better from here, but listening to this set, that wouldn't've been a rational expectation.

David later promised me that they'd have patches out sometime in the nebulous future, but we'll see if this materializes; there was a fair amount of Milwaukee's Purest Biotropic Reactant in play at that point, but doing patches would be in-character for the band, and their logo is pretty freakin badass.

Abnormality [6.5/7]
I thought they'd added a bass player recently, but I was wrong; fortunately, Abnormality proved that they still don't need one, with probably the best set that I've seen from them. Their low end sounded stronger, and the riffs were still ridiculously complex, for a killer total effect that set the stage for the bands to come. This would have been a killer headlining set in any other circumstance, but here it was just the second of four -- we have an embarrasment of riches as far as death metal goes in Boston, so go to local gigs and enjoy it.

Those not in the Boston area can check out Abnormality via their song "Visions" on Rock Band 2 -- and if you like torturing yourself, you can actually try to play it. The track is generally rated "impossible", which is the way technical death metal should be in a rhythm game, and cleverly positioned (Malika, the vocalist, works for Activision) to achieve maximum exposure from the band via YouTube videos of people killing themselves to beat it on Expert.

Goreality [7/7]
This must have been Leave Your Bassist Home Day; I swear that Abnormality announced that they'd got one, and then Goreality, who normally do have a four-stringer in the lineup, came out without theirs. I was initially concerned about this, as what really drives Goreality is the mixture of that absolutely punishing low end with the ridiculous technicality of the guitar lines, but Steve and Mark stepped it up here, and if the rhythm section wasn't as thick and overpowering, the sound wasn't any thinner for it. I'd rather see this band with a bassist than without, but they fully earned this mark even as a four-piece, and that they're able to do such a great set with an integral part of their sound removed is truly mind-blowing. They set a high bar for Mortal Decay to follow, and if they got the exposure that they deserve, they'd be setting that bar for the death metal scene as a whole.

Unfortunately, the number of people who stuck around for their set was a little diminished. Part of it may be people getting into Abnormality from the game, then not wanting to stick around late, but part of it was people leaving to catch the last train to wherever. Part of this is fail on the part of Boston, which needs to keep its public transit open later, but part of it is people needing to buck up and buckle down -- seriously, you go to a DIY bar show and miss Goreality and Mortal Decay? Sure, the first two bands are plenty of value for your seven bucks, but this was some of the best death metal of the year, and missing out on it would've sucked.

Mortal Decay [7/7]
From New Jersey, but frequent visitors to this region, Mortal Decay demonstrated why Boston loves them (and hence, why they love Boston). This was a ripping set of technical brutal death metal that united a lot of elements present in the three bands that had opened up, but also did take it to a higher level, as hard as that is to believe given how good the bands had been to this point. Shit also got brewed up in the crowd as well; Malika and Juan, along with a few others, finally managed to get people moving enough to start a classic O'Brien's pit (one with a pole in the middle), and only a few containers got broken, and nobody injured. Things were running a touch late, so the lights were on for curfew when they finally closed up, but I don't think there was a single metalhead left in the building who actually wanted them to pack up. Seriously, it wasn't even one in the morning! On a Saturday! Bogus is what it is.

Of course, the bar had to close, and threw everyone out, so it was time to beat feet back across the bridges, then get lost in Boston because I fucked up the Memorial Drive approach, but one way or another I got home, and one of the better local shows in recent memory went into the books. Next is a bunch of thrash bands at this same place on the 15th, then not too much until the turn of the year.

Master with Estuary, Sexcrement, and Summoning Hate [Church, Boston, 10/19/2008]

On this night, the choice was either this show or hang out back home and be social watching the Red Sox (ultmately lose the ALCS to the Rays). Naturally, I went with Master and a ridiculous walk in, despite feeling a little under the weather. I'd missed the Amon Amarth gig the night before resting up, which sucked, but those bands tour, generally, and Master pretty much does not.

Despite the aforementioned ridiculous walk -- I parked back in Cambridge again and hoofed it down to the Fenway -- I got in a little early, in time enough to drink a couple beers and do my merch (a bunch of Master swag, and CDs from Estuary and Sexcrement) before the bands started. This wasn't the most well-attended gig I've been to here, but there was a good feeling all around; an Ibex Moon tour is about as interior death metal as you're going to to get, and those who came out were there for mostly the same reasons, and mostly for all of the bands.

Summoning Hate [6/7]
Summoning Hate continues to blast out solid, high-class thrash-death metal; this set was no exception, though it took a song or two for them to get properly cranked up. This was a nice long, filled out set, including a couple of tunes with Juan back on vocals, and high-quality front to back. At this point, the band's main or perhaps sole problem is that they don't have anything recorded available, and it's only so often that they play live. They were a really good match for this show, their style fitting in well with Master's, and they did a hell of a job opening up.

Sexcrement [6/7]
There was a bit of lag going into this set, as Sexcrement had to get their new bass player in; Blue (of Dysentery, Parasitic Extirpation, Porphyria, and it seems like every other slam band in eastern New England) had played another show with PE up in New Hampshire and got down pretty much just in time to load in. Despite working out a new 1/4 of the band, Sexcrement came out hitting on all cylinders, and turned in a thoroughly awesome performance. This band always puts up a good show, but in this case they seemed maybe a little tighter than usual; maybe because they were working out a new member and hadn't rehearsed together enough to play off each other as usual, or maybe because of the brief reunion stint that Goratory recently did in Europe -- whatever it was, this was as good a Sexcrement gig as I've seen in a while, and another indication that this was building towards a truly classic gig.

Estuary [7/7]
This was the most significant surprise of the night; I hadn't heard literally anything from Estuary before, and had bought their CD basically solely on credit, on the idea that if the guys from Incantation had set them up to tour with Master, they had to at least know what they were doing. This hypothesis was vindicated, and then the expectation thoroughly exceeded. If it wasn't Master closing up, Estuary definitely would have stolen the show, blasting the audience with an appropriately old-school but still fresh-sounding blend of thrash and death metal. They got a hell of a reception as well, likely from people who similarly had their minimal expectations shattered; here's hoping that they come back, as the stage height may have been a limiting factor that wouldn't be present at O'Brien's, and, regardless, we'd get another Estuary set.

Master [7/7]
This was the reason that we turned out, and Master certainly didn't disappoint. Master is past their peak at this point, though some of this may be attributable to the fact that Paul built a new American band for this tour rather than trying to bring over the Czech guys that he's been playing with since going into self-imposed exile. There were a few minor flubs, and this obviously wasn't what we'd've gotten had this been 15 years ago, but what Master did then, they still do, and if Master today is Paul Speckmann dragging his sidemen to greatness by pure force of will, he's still certainly able to do so. Just crunching, thrashing, no-nonsense brutality that took back the audience after Estuary's crushing set, and if there was a little grousing about the crowd being run-down on a Sunday night, it didn't lead to an impeded performance. They closed with a Death Strike tune, but it's been so long since I listened to Fuckin' Death that I didn't pick out which -- and it's debatable as to how many others here had managed to reel in that demo out of the dark recesses of the internets to catch the reference.

Slowly, things broke up; it was still an atrociously long walk back to Cambridge when I could have parked closer and I may have picked up a tweak in my left ear from standing up close and unprotected again, but this was the kind of real true, interior death metal gig that only comes around once in a while, and there's no regrets to be associated with what's probably going to come out as one of the best gigs of the year.

Summoning Hate with Hirudinea, Parasitic Extirpation, and Boarcorpse [O'Brien's, Allston, 9/4/2008]

More than either a tuneup show for Carcass -- or a trap show, depending on your perspective -- this was an excellent reminder of why we like death metal so damn much, a vindication for the concept of living close to a metro area large enough to do diverse DIY shows, and a mighty fine time for a Thursday night that for once didn't involve driving to Worcester.

As usual, I mis-estimated how long it takes me to walk from Cambridge to Allston, even on a bum leg and with traffic, so I ended up getting in well before the bands started; this was a decent opportunity to sit around, drink beer -- well, PBR -- and get bored with the lack of action or entertainment value in the Giants-Redskins game. When you're not emotionally invested in an American football game, it's a little easier to see how little of the time spent watching it is spent watching live game action rather than slow-motion replays of players you don't care about. At least in a soccer game that you don't care about, there's something going on all the time, even if relatively little of it translates directly into scoring.

Also, a bunch of old white people were having some kind of party in Minnesota that they kept cutting away to. Seriously, what the hell is that.

Boarcorpse [5/7]
Fortunately, the bands started, and Boarcorpse provided a more than adequate opening. Their lineup for this gig, one of their first if I recall correctly, was the same as when the band was called Ouch, but it's definitely clear that this band is a different animal. They still don't quite have it together to the point that they'd probably like to, but the experimentation was more focused and brutal here, the material tighter, than on the demo that I'd gotten from them last year. This was a solid if short set of somewhat grindy death metal with a few modern-rock touches; good stuff, and as this band continues to develop and get a feel for their sound, they'll likely continue to improve.

Parasitic Extirpation [6.5/7]
Yes, this was total Suffocation-worship. However, when a band can pull off Suffocation's dense, technical brutality and really do it well, they're worth listening to, and seriously, the next time Suffocation plays a local bar show for seven bucks, I'll be there with bells on. Seriously. I will straight up sew those little Christmas jingle bells onto my rig in strategic locations in order to emphasize correctly how awesome such an occurance would be. On topic, this was not quite as slambolic as might be surmised from seeing current Dysentery and Proteus members in the lineup, but even those who may have come down solely for the slam couldn't've gone away unhappy with the output. It may have been by a narrow margin over the two to come, but PE did put on the best set of the night.

Hirudinea [6/7]
I hadn't seen Hirudinea in like forever -- actually, since 2007, probably in like June at the Skybar, which feels like it's been dead and gone for ages, but what the hell -- and initially wasn't sure if they'd changed their lineup around, until, of course, they kicked it up with some good old raw grindblack, and I stopped caring in preference to just enjoying the music. The phrase "locked up with a Burzum tape" is overused as a throwaway signifier for bands that use lo-fi droning and want to add some underground cachet, so there has to be another way to express how strongly the black metal portion of Hirudinea's sound is rooted in Burzum's and Darkthrone's demo phases, while still pointing up that they use this sound to create really cool music. I don't listen to enough grindcore to capture the other sources in the mix, but any time you have a band opening up with riffs that sound cribbed from Kreator's "Phobia" and "Bomb Threat", this should be sufficient. The sound seemed a little low for them throughout the set, but nothing was buried, and the mix allowed every instrument to come through....except the backing vocals, which kind of got lost in places, probably due to equipment issues with the mic.
This set also felt foreshortened; at a DIY show, especially one where load-in and load-out have to go through the crowd and through one door, there's not a lot of room for cracking the whip, and Boston apparently has a 12:15 curfew to keep these gigs from running longer, but the quality of all the bands on this one really makes you yearn for those slightly longer opening slots on national shows, and also for a venue outside the city where the bands can get to play a little longer.

Summoning Hate [6/7]
The crowd had dipped a little after Parasitic Extirpation, an unfortunate side effect of having a nice diverse show like this, where bands draw largely from different bases, on a Thursday night when most people have to work in the morning, but came back up as the Summoning Hate crew arrived in full force. The band rose to the occasion as well; this was the first time that I'd seen them since Juan left and they added the second guitar, but the sound was still thick and thrashy, and definitely up to prior standards. Their set seemed to run a little longer than the bands that preceded them, but still felt too short, despite the tons of thrash-death that they put out, including a couple tunes with Juan back on vocals at the end. Good music, a good bit of movement, and a great cap-off to a great night.

On my way out I hit the Parasitic merch table as Blue was packing it up, and picked up some pins and a Dysentery sticker; because I was more concentrating on the two miles I'd have to walk to pick my car back up, I didn't notice that one of the pins didn't have any actual pin in the back. This isn't much of a problem, though, as I still did get a couple complete ones, and better I take the un-assembled one than someone who only takes one and then finds they can't pin it anywhere. Next, tonight, is of course CARCASS! -- and Necrophagist and 1349 and Dying Fetus and Aborted and allegedly Rotten Sound as well, but the real draw is the scousers slinging the Tools of the Trade once again.