Life Soundtrack Vol. 2

I have grown weary of entrapping unsuspecting telemarketers and CVS cashiers in one-sided conversations about the Mountain Goats’ Alpha series and how Cryptopsy’s None So Vile is a benchmark in technical death metal; thus I shall turn to my online outlet and imagine there is someone reading this that actually cares which artists and albums get me as excited as Robert De Niro flipping his sticky fingers through the latest issue of Black Beauties. Here is a smidgen of what blares out of my car’s one remaining functional speaker and prevents me from driving head-on into a telephone pole on the way to work:

Blood Ceremony: Blood Ceremony


Folk-infused doom psych occult rock self-described as the following:
We're anti-war, but pro-horror. Standing before the crimson altar, our minds melted as we gazed into the cosmic eye. Now we slay the stages of the universe with heavy riffs, paranoia-inducing trills and '70s fills.
Honestly, why even try to expand on that? I am really at a loss when trying to describe this band. ‘70s style dark prog with staccato rock flute, heavy blues-rock riffs, and psychedelic organ work, tempered with brooding melodies and runic, funereal lyrics resurrecting the vibe of Pentagram and Black Widow. How’s that? Fuck the world; I love it with all my heart.

Agoraphobic Nosebleed: Frozen Corpse Stuffed with Dope


What’s a band to do when they can’t find a drummer who can emulate a gas-operated rapid-fire machine gun with a revolving ten-chamber drum infinitely fed by a metal disintegrating link belt of armor-piercing, incendiary ammunition? Enlist the help of a drum machine on steroids blasting out a blizzard of 100,000 beats per minute. Regardless of the absence of a human drummer, ANb is a relentless grind force. Track titles including “Bitch’s Handbag Full of Money,” “Kill Theme for American Apeshit,” “Unwashed Cock,” and “Grandmother with AIDS” pale in comparison to dissonant lyrics which revolve around drugs, violence, and whores.

Pig Destroyer: Phantom Limb


Grindcore gets its point across and does it fast. It is a subgenre that contains elements of hardcore, punk, death, black, and thrash metal resulting in a raucous sound that is driven by vocals consisting of guttural growls and high-pitched screams, blast beats, and down-tuned, heavily distorted guitars capable of making a paraplegic rise from his chair and flail his body about wildly. For many, it is difficult to differentiate between minute-long songs that bleed together and adhere to the same brutal formula. Phantom Limb, however, combines the traditional short grind songs that clock in at about one minute with longer, more intricate songs that are three or four minutes in length. There is also a surprising amount of melody with killer riffs and—dare I say—groovy breaks and tempo changes. Pig Destroyer’s discordant mixture of egregious noise can be therapeutic in the grand scheme of things and if you take the time to read the lyric sheet, you can trail a yarn of a man who exhumes the corpse of his dead girlfriend, cuts off her hand, and attempts to have a relationship with the severed limb. Sadly, his plan is not fruitful and he ultimately commits hara-kiri. I am in love with this album.

Mogwai: Young Team


Sometimes I feel like listening to Possessed’s Seven Churches. Other times, I crave something more ambient. This is the musical equivalent of the aurora borealis. While most categorize Young Team under the umbrella of post-rock, I am more apt to proclaim it this generation’s Birth of the Cool. Eleven years after its release, Mogwai’s debut remains one of the most perfect albums to hit my eardrums and “Mogwai Fear Satan” remains the only 16+ minute song that never grows monotonous. Hence, I consider Mogwai a jam band for intelligent people who shower at least every other day. If you have been dwelling in an underground bunker in the Kondoa region of Tanzania for the past decade, I also recommend checking out Mr. Beast, an equally mesmerizing album which may not receive as many critical accolades, but may very well be my personal favorite.

Sarcofago: I.N.R.I.


When many hear black metal, they conjure thoughts of misanthropic, luciferian music recorded in a cave in Belarus or some grim ice fjord in northern Norway. Brazil’s Sarcofago, on the other hand, are one of South America’s greatest exports, which is saying a lot as the continent has produced cocaine and Adriana Lima. Regardless of their origin, Sarcofago’s death metal fury, punk attitude, polemic ideology, and corpsepaint aesthetics were extremely influential to the second wave of black metal in the early ‘90s. Whereas I am far from a cornerstone in the black metal “scene,” I surely can appreciate bludgeoning metal when I hear it. “Nightmare”, for example, is black metal-fused thrash with vomiting judgment day vocals. This is not for the weak of heart. I’m not even sure if it’s for me. But, yeah, I dig it.
Upon completion of this level, one can graduate to Burzum’s Det Som Engang Var. Fare thee well on your journey.

16 Horsepower: Low Estate


Classify it however you’d like, 16 Horsepower are alt-country messiahs with everything modern music lacks—conviction, passion, banjos, accordions, layered vocals, and the fear of God. Plus, sometimes it makes for a strong spiritual balance when combined with Sarcofago’s growling about sodomizing biblical figures. Honestly, I’m not sure whether the lyrics are religious or sexual, both or neither; 16 Horsepower produces brooding backwoods rockabilly neo-goth with a dash of Jim Morrison that sets them apart from their contemporaries. I can listen to the opening track alone on repeat for my entire work day and the rest of the album is just as formidable. I swear to god.

On a side note, I went to the used CD store last weekend, an establishment that instantly earned cool points as soon as I opened the door and heard the soundtrack to Lucio Fulci’s Zombie playing, which was followed by the Body Count classic, “Cop Killer.” I’ll return soon enough with another unnecessary update in the near future. Patience is a virtue, my friends.