The metal band Bloodlit, hailing from Borås, was formed in 2009. A couple of years later they released the EP “Take What’s Mine” and earlier this year the full length album “Dead On”. Well, I should I also mention that I got a press release today announcing that the band has made the official song for their hometown’s hockey team Borås Hockey: “Lions (Fight Under Pressure)“. Think about that, to see the home audience headbanging to heavy metal just have to give some extra fuel to the team.
“Dead On” is a great metal album, full of heavy, raw metal, in which they blend smooth melodies and some influences from classic hard rock from the seventies and the eighties, but without compromising with the weight and the roughness in their rock sound. Add to that a good singer in Mladen Milojkovic and a great drive in the music and you get a band on their way of carving out their own sound in the metalrock stream. Here are two songs, where “God of Clay” may be my favourite from the album.
The hard rock/metal band Sideburn took their first steps in 1997 and I’ve been sitting here today listening to their fourth album “IV Monument”. Often their music is put in the stoner metal and doom metal genres, but as I’m quite lost in those areas, I find my references elsewhere. And there are plenty of them to find.
In the first place I feel the strong influence from Black Sabbath, not only for the heavy riffs but also for the wonderful retro sound with warm crunchy guitars, a real pleasure for the ears. This is far away from modern overloaded loudness-optimised productions with dynamics that give them plenty of room to show their brilliance in. There’s quite a span between the songs, ranging from the doom-sounding funeral procession in “The Last Day” to the Led Zeppelin-vibing ballad “Silverwing” to pure classic melodic metal. Jani Kataja’s vocals are brilliant and introduce a bluesy feeling which sometimes reminds me of Ian Gillan and sometimes of Glenn Hughes. I love the guitar playing as well and it’s not often I hear such a varied and creative playing on hard rock albums, sometimes with an improvised feeling which makes it feel even more alive. To sum it up: a fantastic hard rock album.
Accustomed readers of this blog may be a little surprised how I start this week, i.e. with some heavy thrash metal from Crowdburn, a band hailing from Umeå. Most often I’ve kept away from these domains of rock, but after having exposed myself to this metal energy during The Roskilde Festival this summer, it got to me, and my music menu is now even wider.
Crowdburn’s debut album “Ignition” is an excellent opportunity to express this new passion. It’s a splendidly raw rock album, but which also offers just the right dose of sweetness in the form of melodic smooth choruses. Add to that a fine variation and genre mixes and you’ll have an album that will keep you interested through all ten songs. Here’s a couple of songs from this raw beauty.
Some long jumps between genres today, and next up is har rock/metal band Lifer. They seem to have something interesting going on, with a raw and dirty sound I like. A first taste is out with the two-track debut single “Rise”. Check out the video to the title track here below.
Last year the rock and metal trio Stone Carpet started their project about releasing four EP:s during a year. Each EP contains three tracks and has it’s own character and theme. I told you about the first two parts in August, and now all parts have been published, which all together form the album”Dispositio”, downloadable from their site. Listen here below to the song “Suburban Circus” from the EP “Peroratio”.
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