cassette craze chronicles XXX feat. ASAGRAUM, CH'AHOM, MIZMOR, ORDER OF DECAY, THE KEENING and YOB

I know, as if compiling all thoses end of the year lists wasn't enough, there's still the regular business of tape reviewing going on. Spoiler: It's very likely that you'll see at least one these releases again in a ranking soon.

THE KEENING - Little Bird (2023)

Last heard together with her former SubRosa bandmates, but already split up into The Otolith and her solo project The Keening on the brilliant 2020 "Women of Doom" compilation - but there only with an instrumental piano piece -, Rebecca Vernon is now finally back in full band mode! Which still means that she performed a huge chunk of "Little Bird" herself: drums, piano, organ, hammered dulcimer guitar and obviously vocals, leaving bass the only "standard" Rock instrument not in her hands.
But then there are also harp and many strings, winds and guest vocals, all in vital roles, which helped her to create an amazing album far beyond what was appropriate to expect.

I can't believe how much I missed her voice! That is her actual singing voice as well as her whole artitistic voice as a composer, player and - not to be underestimated - lyricist. Even the most epic song "The Truth", in which she's telling such vivid stories and raising existential questions with so few words, is significatly elevated by its profound poetry.

Musically The Keening continues where SubRosa left off both with their last studio release as well as with their more atmospheric "subdued" Roadburn performance. Vernon also doesn't shy away from possibly becoming more accessible for a wider audience beyond Metal circles without sacrificing her integrity. No, it's not as crushingly heavy as her former band, but it's still definitely categorizable as Doom, in an equally wide sense like you can call it Contemporary Gothic, Alternative, American Dark Folk or simply gorgeous and meaningful music. There's so much to love in these six tracks... but we have five more cassettes to listen to, right?

Speaking of the media, I actually also bought this album on CD, because my tape copy somehow doesn't play as clean as I would like it to - and I also just wanted a version with readable credits and lyrics. So even though I prefer the upright format for the cover artwork, I wouldn't necessarily buy this stunning work on cassette again.

MIZMOR - Prosaic (2023)

Mizmor mastermind A.L.N. wanted to make "less self-indulgent" and concept-heavy music on his new album. Well, I was completely fine with that, but you do you. So for once we're not getting the huge hammer of atheism. And that's ok, since it ultimately doesn't have a crucial influence on the sound anyway. "Prosaic" still gives us four long and devastating tracks of bleak and sludgy Blackened Doom with pained brutal vocals, which will wring the soul out of your body.

I don't have the desire to rank Mizmor's discography here and now, but if you think this is the best album so far I won't object. I'd still take "Wit's End" from the same-named EP over the individual songs here though. Which naturally doesn't mean too much. All of this is peak Doom. Especially the awesome fourteen minute closer "Acceptance" is exemplary for everything great about this band.  

YOB - Elaborations of Carbon (2002/2023)

From Mizmor to a band whose guitar sound and Doom heaviness is quite similar, even though Yob's style of course includes a whole array of different influences plus Mike Scheidt's unconventional, sometimes surprisingly high vocals. Even though on their 2002 debut their style wasn't fully evolved yet, a lot of trademarks like the very dry guitar chugging before opening the sound up wider and wider are already recognizable. And the song length already goes up to seventeen minutes on this album too.

Now remastered and thankfully graced by a new cover artwork "Elaborations of Carbons" still proves to be a worthwhile edition to the inspired quality Doom Metal section of any music collection.

ORDER OF DECAY - Mortification Rites (2023)

More metal, please! How about some nasty Blackened and Doom-infested Death Metal straight from a namless Scottish crypt? The first time I listened to Order Of Decay was by accident, because Sentient Ruin Laboratories had uninentionally put one track from them into the digital promo package for Disimperium's "Grand Insurgence Upon Despotic Altars". It took me a while to even notice that, because both bands for sure have some similarities, and I just thought "Blood Libation" was the odd  somehow less chaotic, more melodic (in the way of Autopsy) and abyssal track.

But luckily there's this whole album, so eventually when I saw it being available in Europe I got this nice and foul tape. These "Mortification Rites" don't re-invent the wheel, but they roll deadly and with malicious conviction. Interesting for anyone who likes their Death Metal as atmospheric as dangerous. 

CH'AHOM - Camazotz Cult (2016/2018/2021/2023)

Moving at least one escalation level up from Order Of Decay we enter the ridiculously extreme low-fi hell of the German-Aztec blood cult Ch'ahom. I'm not even fully up to speed with their infernally grinding Blackened Death emissions, since "Camazotz Cult" isn't the newest actual release, but a compilation of their first four demos, originally released between 2016 and 2021 on one sixty minutes long tape. Most tracks - of whom a couple appear several times in different recordings - bear titles like "Tlacaxipehualiztli", "Path to Ixtab" or "The Breath of Miclantecutli", but on the "Lustfully Sinning For Death Metal" EP they also play covers of the band Sadogoat (later Sadomator), featuring the attempt on most offensive Metal song title "Sexual Metalcoholocaust".

Some of these recordings really sound like most people with prejudices against the medium would imagine a demo cassette to sound, but it's always powerful - and you shouldn't let yourself be fooled by the production or the band not taking themselves too serious all the time to think that this is just utter primitive garbage. Sometimes it kind of is, because it wants to be, but then there are also moments of Slayer soloing, complex contemporary Dissonant Death Metal or Ch'ahom sounding like Morbid Angel on "Covenant". But it's all embedded into very South American underground aesthetics, so at first glance you can think you're listening to some extremely old school Sepultura / Sarcófago stuff, while in truth the band is rather paying tribute to a sound which fits their specific concept. Which also includes long atmospheric drums and flutes intros / interludes for probably ritualistic purposes. 

And if you're a regular reader and think that some parts of this review sound familiar - yes, there are indeed parallels to Grave Desecrator. This rips good.

ASAGRAUM - Veil of Death, Ruptured (2023)

I've seen the two "satanic witches" Obscura (vocals, guitars, bass) and drummer A. Morthaemer twice with additional live members now and I liked both shows. I still didn't expect the new Asagraum studio album to blow me away as much as it acually does.

Most Black Metal releases I love have at least some special gimmick which helps me to explain my affection. "Veil of Death, Ruptured" not so much. The lyrics being partly English and partly Dutch certainly isn't it. Asagraum simply celebrate stylistically pure Black Metal with a great sense for riffs and melodies and the right amount of ferocity in both instrumental performances and vocals. The classic spirit of the genre presented with a flawless recent production, which allows every detail to be detectable, but doesn't  soften up the music while doing so.

With around thirty-six minutes playing time this isn't a very long work, but it has enough to say and does it with a great dramatic curve, where each of the seven tracks (plus one interlude) somehow feels like a rise. The only thing I'm missing are maybe one or two more minutes of the closer "De Waanzin Roept Mijn Naam". It's already the longest song, but it ends a bit too abrupt for my taste. Yeah, that's my whole mighty hammer of critique. Devastating, I know.

STONEHENGE FESTIVAL • Steenwijk, July 29th 2023 • feat. AUTOPSY, HYPOCRISY, POSSESSED, VOMITORY, ASAGRAUM, FLESHLESS, SERIAL BUTCHER, STILLBIRTH and many more

To absolutely noone's surprise the Dutch word Steen means stone. So that's probably the sole reason why the Netherlands' self-proclaimed oldest Metal festival is called Stonehenge. I doubt that there's an alternative foundation myth which includes a small town appearance of Spinal Tap. But let's check their "Stonehenge" lyrics and see if anything applies for the actual event:

"Stonehenge! Where the demons dwell

Where the banshees live and they do live well

Stonehenge! Where a man's a man

And the children dance to the Pipes of Pan"

Ok, I guess that works. Let the demons symbolize Death Metal and the banshees Black Metal! The children are dancing in the mosh pit. And the man being a man? Well, there was exactly one band with female members - also the only banshees on the very demon-centric festival line-up.

I'm not going to lie, this report is going to be a challenge. I never take notes outside my head and there were so many short shows on just one day. Which usually isn't a huge problem. But usually the festivals of my choice aren't as stylistically homogenous as this one.

And that's not me saying that the artists all sounded alike or that even one of the bands I've seen was bad. But it was not only almost exclusively Death Metal, but in most cases also specifically Death Metal from the early Ninetees or even Eighties. Which means that there was just a lot of half-bald dads grunting and squealing about gore and annihilation. Being unfamiliar with most of them a lot of it naturally became kind of a blur. So please forgive me that not every show can receive a proper "real" review here!

the evening before at a body of water nearby

The reason why I drove to the Netherlands again and spent two nights there for a relatively small (yet sold-out) festival on a parking lot? One word: Autopsy.

One of my favorite Metal bands of all time and I had never seen them live. Since they never tour through clubs in Europe me getting to know a new festival in order to see them was bound to occur for years. Them at Roadburn would be a dream, but it's really just a pipe dream, because there's alway the Netherlands Death Fest taking place in the same location in spring, too. And I cannot afford to travel there twice in such a short span of time.

Waiting for Autopsy to come to a nearer festival isn't an option either. In Hamburg or home further north there are just very few fitting events in the shadow of Wacken with a realistic chance of the Death Metal legends stopping by. Of course there may be a chance for Wacken, but I rather wanted to see them now on as headliners than bet on a mega festival, where it would always be a risky lottery, if they would get the appropriate stage, time and sound or not anyway...

But enough explanation! Fast forward to me commuting fifteen minutes from a very nice holiday home in a former garage and arriving just in time for the first band to start already at 10:00 AM:

Hey, it's middle-aged dudes playing Death Metal! KLONT are obviously fans of Macabre, which didn't only show in their murderer outfits, but also in the fun grindcore flavour of their music. Those twenty-five minutes flew by fast.

As soon as the first band had stopped, the announcer could be heard on the other stage of the festival site. No breaks with canned music coming from the speakers at Stonehenge! For the sound of CORRUPT from California Death Metal was an equal ingredient to raging Thrash Metal. They slayed, had Ira Black (Metal Church, Vicious Rumors) joining them as third guitar player for the last two songs and teased to cover Slayer. But of course there was no time for those shenanigans.

NEPHYLIM got the memo: If you have bramble decoration on stage you have to play Scandinavianish Melodic Death Metal. It's a thing I heard. Or was it the other way around? Anyway, not my preferred variant, but these five Dutch dudes knew how to do it right. So yeah, cool.

With the Frisians STOFLIK OMSKOT things got bumpier and dirtier again. I didn't follow their show very close, but their straight-forward Death with some baby Obituary Punk attitude  was a fun throwback for sure. A lot of it actually reminded me of the earlier stuff from a certain local band called Imbecile I saw and shared stages with back in the day quite often. 

Come on! Seriously? Guys, it's the year 2023 and we're still doing this misanthropic shit? That is disgusting! I'm talking about the hamburger I foolishly got from the food truck before SERIAL BUTCHER started their show. That was the worst grossness in a bun I've ever had - at least as far as I can remember.
The band's murderously precise double-bass heavy Death Metal thankfully was of a way better quality. Fitting to the name the vocal performance was the closest to animals being slaughtered so far. I just hope the victims of this butrcher get processed better than the poor beast in my burger.

Before MOUFLON could begin their show a drying commando had to enter the stage, because it was absolutely flooded. A couple of days prior I had even considered buying a rain poncho or something, but that would have been so unnecessary. Luckily I could flee from the only serious cloudburst of the day into a merchandise tent, so when I would get wet, it wasn't because of the rain, but because there are always those guys who cannot make clear choices between drinking their expensive beer or participating in a circle pit (and crashing into the idiots stupid enough to stand in the front row before them).
I can't remember if and how bad they got me at this show though, but the rabid dog bark energy Death Metal of the group certainly provided the fitting soundtrack.

So much Death Metal and all bands at least good... But like I said earlier, some unfortunately got lost in my fractured memory, among them FRACTURED INSANITY, who I couldn't remember much of, probably because I had a tired phase in the early afternoon. Luckily with the internet helping me their mighty ultra-fast double-bass Morbid Angel tradition style came back to me. Also the party pit seriously gathered pace now.

Ouch! If you were standing too close to SKULLHOG's bass player you were in serious danger of being hit by his widely wobbling lowest string. His sound was the filthiest and sludgiest so far, in perfect conjunction with everything else about this trio. Ever been stuck in a swamp while a piglet rubbed its belly on your face? That's SKULLHOG in a nutshell for you.

It almost sounds made up by an AI for the festival  program guide, but the Dutch GUTWRENCH actually were that band who had released only two demo cassettes in the 1990's and now after decades played their one and only live show in the original line-up. Well, they have certainly kept themselves in shape with other projects since then, because if you didn't know that, there would have been no chance to tell how rare this performace was. Solid oldschool quality Death Metal.

There were only two bands on the billing who I had seen live before. One of them was FLESHLESS. That was way back in 2004 at the Kuhle Festival in Northern Germany. What I remember from then is that they deservingly had the wildest crowd of the day. And lo and behold they were also the best of the bands at Stonehenge for me thus far. Brutal Death with slayerish aroma and pinches of Grind. What's not to like?

I took a little break from the festival at my car now, so I missed the shows of Tortharry and Doomas. And while we're waiting for me to return to the ground, here are some digital toy camera pictures from the action up to this point:

Back at the festival area PURGATORY already played. And they played some good Death Metal. Hmm... Sorry, that's really all I got. I'm not even sure if the program guide can help me, because a handful of bands just had completely wrong info texts in the little hand-out, maybe from last year? These dudes certainly didn't look like Indonesians to me. More like a German band founded - of course - in 1993.

And now some weird fun fuckery! Next level naked flayed guy in a tutu and his skinned zombie friends having a blast. And a lot of blast beats. Meet the crazy Frisians CÔTE D'AVER and their bonkers Deathgrind nonsense! Finally a group taking their craft seriously here! High culture.

Ok, so we're all playing dress-up now? It is the easiest way to convey a specific image, I get it. Not sure if the music of the Italians ADE alone would have led me to the Roman Empire though. It certainly combined oppressing power and intimidating chops in a quite mighty way, even with one guitar only joining after several songs due to technical problems.
Yes, somehow it was musically fitting, I guess. But still visually... Maybe it's my personal socialization with Death Metal being the music, where regular dudes just get on stage and play, but the look just felt a bit campy for me.

Ok, you got me there! Of course many people would say the same about the typical Black Metal look, including myself some years ago, so get over it, Stephan! The only Black Metal band - and also the only band with female members on this Dad Metal festival - had to play facing the summer sun, which burned hotter than my unprotected skin had expected.
ASAGRAUM however did exactly what I expected, which didn't come as a surprise, because I had already seen them on their headlining show in Oss last October. Even the fluctuating live line-up was almost the same, only with a different bass player. Their mostly traditional Black Metal sound, including those one or two too cheesy lyrics or melodies underlining the oldschool cvlt approach, provided a very welcome fierce change of pace.
While singer/guitarist Obscura definitely presented herself easy on the eyes, I think that using that fact as an opportunity to ask her for marriage from the crowd goes at least one embarrassing step too far. On the other hand her quick "no" before croaking the next song title was a pretty funny moment, which reminded me of that time when someone yelled "Play some Black Metal!" during an Ulver show.

From ladies in facepaint to dudes in surfing bermudas, Stonehenge appearantly had it all. STILLBIRTH not only mastered the craft of ultra brutal Death Metal, but they also had a lot of fun with it and didn't shy away from a funky "Another One Bites The Dust" interlude, while the singer went down into the audience to personally oversee the Wall of Death proceedings, A killer show with everything you need for a proper excess.


The early evening was only beginning, so there was still a lot of Death to come, but I had to take a break again, since I felt a gastric situation slowly coming up which I didn't want to face on a festival lavatory. A connection to the beforementioned burger can't (and shouldn't) be ruled out. Since it was time to grab something to eat anyway, I decided to look for a place in town to take care of both the ins and outs. Until I find it, missing the shows of Lik and Ingested, here's another bunch of photos:

So as the urgency of my situation grew, I entered the first restaurant I came across and realized a couple of things in the moment I crossed the door: This was a place where you had to reserve a seat and people put on their nice summer clothes. I was not only in full black Metal gear, but I was also sweating on my bald head as soon as I took off my Voivod hat, and I obviously had the unmistakable smell of spilled beer on me, even though I'm not even drinking it ever myself. So yeah, they surely didn't really want me there. But they had one small table free and still wanted my money.

I chose the tortellini menu, because it was the only one on the Dutch card where I was sure there wasn't anything unwanted in it - and damn, it was good! They also had real towels to dry your hands and then throw into a basket instead of paper ones. Kingly.

And before you dare asking what all those details about my metabolism are doing in this festival write-up, look at half of the bands' names and think again!

Speaking of: The cluster of the the four bands you would most likely call headliners was opened by Sweden's VOMITORY. Once again great seasoned Death Metal, because what else, but the main vocalist's mic shtick still remains an enigma to me. Most of the time not quite loud enough, because he was consequently growling above his microphone, I still cannot tell if it was intentional for some acoustic effect or if he was just trolling everybody. The stage sound engineer even adjusted his stand and he pulled it right back below his mouth. Such a weird thing to overshadow any other detail in my memory of this show.

Now we were getting to the legends, the founders. Possessed even gave the whole genre its name in the Eighties. Unfortunately I soon realized that I couldn't immerse myself into their show, because given the towering importance of Autopsy for me and the festical ground being packed now, reserving a spot in the first row just was more important. So I only really followed a couple of songs, while the sound still had some issues to be figured out. To see the respect and admiration for the partly paralysed Jeff Becerra, - being a champion in the wheelchair - was sincerely heart-warming.

Fuuuuuucking AUTOPSY! Fuck yeah! Where do I even start? I'm repeating myself when I say that everything on this day had at least been good. But then the masters and Godfathers of sickness took everything to another level!

Noone else has this balance in the riffs and leads, which are both raw and disgsusting, but also so incredible memorable. And regarding the guitar solos I've always said that Eric Cutler and Danny Coralles are the King / Hannemann of Death Metal. To finally be see it proven live was a blast.
The sludgy note of new bassist Greg Wilkinson was an absolute win, too. And then there's of course the one and only Chris Reifert, whose drumming is filled with individual character like you seldom get to hear in the genre. And his vocal delivery while drumming? Boy, give that man all rancid stinking medals you can find! And yes, even AUTOPSY's stage banter was the best of the day!

This show was a triumph from beginning to end. Not even the very odd occurence of a guy in the festival crew shirt intending to run from the back of the stage and than dive into the audience, but embarrasingly pushing over a whole guitar stack instead, could change anything about that. The band handled the break with humour and all was fine. I was so perplexed by this moment that I didn't think of taking a picture of the accident, even though it happened right in front of me.

The setlist was very heavy on the debut album "Severed Survival" from 1989, and even though I'm more a "Mental Funeral" guy myself, I didn't mind at all. At least I got "Twisted Mass Of Burnt Decay" and the ultimate AUTOPSY cult classic "In The Grip Of Winter" from that one!
A little bit more new stuff ("Maggots In The Mirror" ruled!) would have been welcome, but you only squeeze that much into a seventy minutes festival show I guess. On the other hand they played the first song they had ever written, "Mauled To Death", with Eric on vocals, which was also cool.

Honestly, the band could probably have played anything from their discography and I would have eaten that reeking shit up. After the - completely different! - Roadburn appearance of Ad Nauseam this was already the second Death Metal show this year, which goes straight into my eternal Hall of Fame. Along with classic Morbid Angel Reifert & Co. have always been the definitive Death Metal band for me. Now, after finally seeing them in the rotting flesh and in this phenomenal shape, I know that AUTOPSY are the sole kings on a hill of human remains.

The show ended with the Bloodbath cover "Fuck You" and I just thought Fuck Yeah, I could have another hour of this!

Of course whatever would come afterwards wasn't going to rival Autopsy for me, especially since Peter Tägtren's HYPOCRISY in particular have never stirred my interest before. I don't know, it's just not for me. Additionally their bassist had his flight cancelled and couldn't make it, so the band had been busy recording bass backing tracks before the show. Respect for the effort, but this kind of too clinic Melodic midtempo Death Metal just leaves me cold.

So with the temperature getting colder towards midnight as well I called it a day and was rewarded with getting up before six AM in the morning, crossing the German border before eight and getting home shortly after noon. A much smoother and faster ride than what I'm used to coming from the Netherlands. 

"And where are they now?

The little people of Stonehenge

And what would they say to us?

If we were here, tonight"