Monthly Metal Mixtape: May 2022

Hath – All That Was Promised (2022, Willowtip)

Usually when people talk about depth when it comes to music releases, they mean intricacy, technical complexity, novel songwriting structures, and finding new things every time one comes back to an album. All That Was Promised from New Jersey’s Hath has that. It also has depth in another sense: like a well-worn recliner, this is an album to sink into. It’s comfy. A mystical, sinister quality inhabits the blasting, roaring waves of blackened death metal riffs that permeate the music. Fans of Behemoth’s opus The Satanist will find much to offer here. The sinister nature at play comes off in both dark melodic nuances of these tracks as well as in the rumbling low end of the rhythm section. This is an album to hold up and say here—this here is extreme metal. It’s an archetypical work executed with precision.

As comfy as this album will feel to anyone that has ever engaged with Behemoth or the more epic end of blackened death metal in general, there’s plenty of just goose bumping, heart pumping metal here. After an almost intro-track-like opener to dip you in with “The Million Violations,” track two “Kenosis” unleashes an onslaught in one of the most memorable and fun metal tracks of the year. The way the song builds tension in its early moments is unparalleled, setting you up for a more nuanced-than-you-would-think wall of ritualistic blackened death with a wonderful, infectious growl-a-long chorus any metalhead can get behind. I’ve been menacingly barking, “The call of the red star sets me aflame! It knows my true name!” more often than I’d like to admit. The song serves as a thesis statement for all the fun one can have here.

Later tracks “Decollation” and “Death Complex” show off the band’s ability to flirt with space, tempo, and progressive death metal overtones with the former featuring a quiet, clean departure before slamming headlong like a train into one of the best climaxes on the album. Moments of muted Opeth-ian reflection dot the latter half of the record allowing us time to breathe from all the metal as fuck moments. This album has a lot to offer to anyone with the time to take a listen. It’ll fit like a glove for any extreme metalhead into the more massive-sounding, higher concept side of the genre. – Mike Tri

Master Boot Record – Personal Computer (2022, Metal Blade)

Yeah, there were lots of great actual metal records that came out recently that we could talk about (Nechochwen, Misery Index, Aara to name just a few that I’ve been enjoying lately), but instead I’m gonna rave about something that’s decidedly kinda metal. And that is the electronic, synthwave, chiptune metal-adjacent compositions of Master Boot Record. It’s a name I’d seen floated about before and Personal Computer is Italian mastermind Victor Love’s tenth full-length since 2016. But I’d never looked in to see what it was all about. Honestly, I kinda brushed it off thinking something that electronica-influenced wasn’t really my thing. Well, damn, was I wrong because Personal Computer is stunning. There’s definitely a metal tinge to the synthesized sounds, starting with opener “8086” and the way it incorporates what would be traditional riffing and soloing, but done entirely programmed. The drum programming wouldn’t be out of place being actually pounded away on some mid-80s thrash record. What would be a virtuoso solo is instead here a dazzling, soaring, melodic synth shredding away. What would be some chugging death metal riffs is instead the chippy mechanizations of computer programming. What would be neoclassical power metal is instead a bombastic, furious composition of chiptune. It is all filtered through a lens of old-school video game soundtracks. The nearly nine-minute epic “80186” highlights all of these elements gorgeously. And as the derivations on an 8086 title proceed through these ten tracks, clocking over an hour long, the genius and musicality necessary to craft something like this becomes more and more impressive. The creativity certainly stands out. Granted, this was my initial foray to Master Boot Record, so I don’t know how it all compares to the back catalog. But I highly recommend shrugging off any dismissiveness you might have, because Personal Computer is a phenomenal musical journey. – SteveO

SASAMI – Squeeze (2022, Domino Recording Co.)

It was a surprise when I heard SASAMI’s second full-length would be a metal album. Her self-titled debut features the multi-instrumentalist/singer/songwriter kind of surfing on ice in front of a glacier and the album moves at about that pace or it certainly fits that vibe. I first came across Sasami Ashworth a couple years earlier when she was playing synths in indie rock dream pop band Cherry Glazerr. Again, a relatively chill set of songs. So why metal and why now? She explained in the New York Times that she “wanted to appropriate white, male music.” Metal absolutely needs more diversity in its ranks. So does punk. This is an effort worth celebrating. I encourage you to read that Times piece for more on Sasami’s background and life in music.

“Skin a Rat” opens the album with a bang. Heavy on nu metal and industrial rock, the song also hints at what else is to come in the album with an off kilter bridge of the line “there are many ways to skin a rat” over choppy drums. It’s a brief detour in the song that foretells some of the sonic wandering this album goes through. There are softer songs (“Not a Love Song”), there are mid-tempo hits (“The Greatest”) and of course more metal (“Sorry Entertainer”). The guitar solo on “Sorry Entertainer” rips, and hey, double kick drums too. Sasami has been touring extensively since Squeeze came out earlier this year - catch the band opening for Haim at Northerly Island on June 3. – Phil Collins