Written by: The Voiceless Apparition

This goes without saying, but I'd imagine that you, the reader, love extreme music. But extremity is a subjective topic, it could be born of a vocal style, a style of instrumentation--perhaps lyrics as well. But there are many other ways to explore and express extremity. That leads us to the review in hand.

Feed Them Death is an extreme metal project blurring the lines of audial savagery: grindcore, death metal, black metal, doom, noise, and ambient. This project has been releasing a substantial amount of material in such a short amount of time with there being only a one year gap in between the debut album and previous album Panopticism: Belong/Be Lost. In 2021 the musician known as Void returns with his latest album Negative.

Written by: Izzy

Cut from the same cloth as many similar Obscura-worshipping avant-garde technical death metal outfits, Ad Nauseam got a fair bit of attention for their debut release, Nihil Quam Vacuitas Ordinatum Est, an album I personally enjoyed. It was filled with complex, angular and abrasive melodies mixed with a subtle sense for melody, but I felt it wasn’t as good as it could’ve been and was more indicative of where the band could go. Its not a new or original idea to make dissonant skronky tech metal inspired by classical compositions, and I felt Nihil Quam was held back by falling into many of the microgenres cliches, thereby not doing enough to really make themselves stand out amongst the crowd.
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Written by: The Administrator 

In lieu of the typical rambling introduction, I'll spare you all and jump straight to my conclusions regarding Nostophobia, the debut full length from Portland's Sea Sleeper. In sum, then: this is a wonderfully chaotic album filled to the brim with the kind of untethered energy that practically demands listener engagement. However, it is also a confusingly chaotic album that would benefit significantly from some spit and polish. 

Sea Sleeper bill themselves as a bit of a genre-jumping anomaly, frequently folding in elements of post-metal, deathcore, sludge, avant-garde, metallic hardcore, and even a lil' angsty grunge  into their bubbling cauldron o' progressive death. Needless to say, this is a complex conglomerate of sights 'n' sounds, and makes for an experience that is borderline confounding across the breadth. As a fan of boundary-pushing and rule-breaking in music as a general rule, that quality is a clarion call of sorts--provided the intrinsic weirdness sticks the landing. 

Written by: Izzy

​Have you ever wondered what John Zorn sodomizing a saxophone at a Godflesh concert would sound like? Well, if so, firstly let me say you have excellent taste, and secondly, I think it would sound a hell of a lot like God’s 1992 cult classic Possession.

For the shamefully uninitiated, God are a strange and short lived band formed in 1987 with an expansive list of semi-notable underground musicians that have occupied its roster. They employed a rather bizarre and grotesque blend of industrial metal, avant-garde jazz, and noise rock, resulting in an aberrant creation I truly feel no reservations in calling one of a kind. A frenzied and insane concoction of influences, Possession is an album that, if released today into the musical landscape of streaming and accessibility, would no doubt in my mind be hailed as a masterpiece. 
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Written by: Loveloth

Gather 'round, everyone. Let me tell you a short story. Abdul Alhazred, like any foolish mortal, thought he could evade the cosmos' grasp. Many years ago, around 700 A.D., Abdul spent a decade studying ruins of ancient cities before disappearing into the desert. After his return, he spent his final days in Damascus, and it was there that he unveiled the cursed book--The Necronomicon. There laid information which should've remained hidden.

In 738, his punishment finally came; The Mad Arab disappeared without a trace and many wondered what was the reason behind, for they knew he dabbled with black magick and worshipped otherworldly beings. No one knows what exactly happened to him, but the book prevailed and got translated into Greek, Latin, German and eventually English. The whereabouts of the book and its copies are unknown and trust me, it's for the better. Whoever read its pages faced madness, death, or worse. That book is pure evil and I would advise you, dear reader, to not chase that knowledge so many before you have. But what do I know for I am just a mere mortal, just like you. Or am I?

Whatever the case, it seems the spirit of The Mad Arab lives on, and in this particular case, lives through Esoctrilihum.

“…people will do anything, no matter how absurd, in order to avoid facing their own souls. One does not become enlightened by imagining figures of light, but by making the darkness conscious…”

Written by: Cantina

A possibly controversial (?) statement: music is mostly made of repressed and/or unspeakable emotions. Long lost are the times when I somehow believed black metal musicians’ real life persona coincided with the fictitious one, that wherever they went, gloom and misery accompanied them. In fact, it’s quite the opposite: black metal would be a metaphysical gold mine for Jungian scholars. This genre is the Shadow Self of metal music (of any music type, for that matter). I would go as far as saying that a proper understanding of Carl Gustav Jung’s philosophy will give you the knowledge to understand what is going on in the seemingly “twisted” mind of any musician.

Black metal is of course a prime example of that. ​​

Ghat, I implore, hasn't already been said about this utterly Godlike album? If you're still unaware as to the depths of insanity one inevitably plumbs in the course of understanding Remmirath and their epic Shambhala Vril Saucers, I highly recommend you read the previous accounts littered in the annals by our brave scribes.

Now then. Do you feel the comforting embrace of clarity? No? Apologies. Such is the scope and impact of Remmirath. Shambhala Vril Saucers is an odd album, to say the absolute least, and in many ways it feels genuinely uncategorizable. It defies genre convention with the kind of smug confidence that indicates a complete disinterest in following the rules, whatever they may be. For this alone, it's a very special album.

Our shadowy cabal of scribes has happened upon one of the most wondrous and/or perplexing albums in existence. The following reviews, released over the course of several days, is our humble attempt to decipher that which lays before us. Prepare thyself. - Ed. ​

Written by: ​Lichtmensch

After a long SVR hiatus, yours truly, the Soliloquist, has awakened and unearthed an album that had been buried and forgotten in the deepest depths of the musical underground for far too long. The album in question is Shambhala Vril Saucers by Remmirath.

I decided to approach this idiosyncratic piece of music from the absolute surface level. The first impression one gets is the painting that emblazons the album cover. I want to draw your attention to the figure it exhibits. Look at his face. His pose. He is thinking. Meditating. Contemplating the big questions of life. In fact, I think it is safe to say that this is the face, the pose, the demeanor of a man who is thinking about the question itself.

Our shadowy cabal of scribes has happened upon one of the most wondrous and/or perplexing albums in existence. The following reviews, released over the course of several days, is our humble attempt to decipher that which lays before us. Prepare thyself. - Ed. ​

As I smoke my cigarette, I feel better than I have in hours. The only thing that's changed? That album isn't playing. Remmirath reminds me of a bunch of angry dads: "Clean your room!" "Where's my screwdriver?"

American Football-style leads really make us cringe. A couple surf rock and disco breaks make me want to hate them even more. This is the kind of music I want to like, but hate with every last bit of my being. If you put video game sounds inside of a shit black metal band, this is what you get. Never will we listen to this album again. I think I broke my ears giving them an ounce of my time. The guy rooting around in his garage really spoke to my hate. Some weird soundtrack to a horrible acid trip, and then I just lost control.​

​Remmirath - Shambhala Vril Saucers was released March 2015 from Todestrieb Records

​Remmirath can be found laying absolute waste to expectations at:
Bandcamp