Author Archives: Friar Johnsen

SKULL171

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HOURGLASS SANDS OF ETERNITY, Journey to Infinity (2002, Secret Port)

The skull:
If there’s one thing that we Friars love on our metal covers as much as as a skull, it’s an hourglass, and the ludicrously named Hourglass Sands of Eternity brings it all together with this excellent double whammy. I love that either the headband or the skull was painted without regard for where the other would go, I love that the weirdly shaped skull is actually weeping sandy tears, I love that the bony leg on the right is broken, I love it all. And while watching an hourglass empty is about as far from a “journey” as you can get, this cover nevertheless communicates exactly what you’re gonna get from the music.

The music:
I will admit to owning an awful lot of discs like this: a hamhanded mix of true metal and progressive metal played badly and produced worse, but for whatever reason I never acquired a copy of this particular release. HSOE (as I’ll abbreviate them) are a Greek band, and Greek prog metal is almost never good, but it’s probably just dumb luck that a vendor I patronized back in the early 00s didn’t foist this one on me. I would have taken it in a heartbeat, based on the cover alone. The songs are dull, in that ponderous would-be-proggy way, and the singing is fairly bad, although certainly no worse than any of the playing. All in all, this squarely inhabits that dread zone of mediocrity where abide all those bands just good enough to not merit special scorn. But even though it’s been over ten years since this, the band’s only release, HSOE are allegedly still active, so there’s still time (har har) for them to salvage their reputation. Hopefully they try that with a skull, too.
— Friar Johnsen

SKULL169

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EMERALD STEEL, Emerald Steel (1990, Woodstock Discos)

The skull:
First you’re like, “What’s the worst he can do? Bite me? I can handle one fucking skull in a fight,” and then he shows up armed to the (grinning) teeth, and you’re like, “Aw, shit!”

The music:
How on earth have I never heard this before? I knew the name, and based on the cover, I assumed they were crappy NWOBHM. Instead, they’re more like a crappy Crimson Glory knock-off, which is exactly my kind of crap. Singer Wagner Geronymo (obviously his real name), a Brazilian transplant to Florida, has a strong, piercing high voice, and he delivers his lines with exactly the overblown theatricality you want in an act like this. His pitch sometimes doesn’t quite hit the mark, especially when he harmonizes, but when he lands it, he sounds great. The songs are not classics for the ages (see: “Sex Metal”), but they’re certainly better than a lot of other US power metal bands from the late 80s, comparing favorably with early Heir Apparent, Oracle, Sacred Oath, or others in that vein. If, like me, you already own all the classics, and all the second-tier guilty pleasures, and then all of the third tier junk from the heyday of American melodic metal, then it’s time to open a new tab, bring up eBay, and find yourself a Hot Metal bootleg of Emerald Steel, yet another band that deservedly fell through the cracks but is still kind of okay.
— Friar Johnsen

SKULL167

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LEGACY OF HATE, Unmitigated Evil (2008, Maintain)

The skull:
There’s something off about the dimensions of this skull that makes me think it’s perhaps supposed to be a child’s. I guess plopping a kid’s skull in a pile of bones (or whatever) is pretty evil, although if that evil were totally unmitigated, I imagine there’d probably be a whole lot more skulls. And probably less foliage, which isn’t very evil at all.

The music:
Googling for information about this band, I turned up a lot of heavy metal references to “legacy of hate,” the phrase. It’s a Fight song. It’s a Celesty album. It’s a Hellfighter (aka: the singer from Xentrix’s band) single. And, of course, it’s this Austrian band. Usually when that sort of thing happens, it turns out the phrase is the title of a book or movie, or was part of some famous speech, but I can’t seem to find the source (unless all these groups were fans of the 60s TV western The Virginian), so I’m just going to assume that this is a phrase so utterly generic that it’s been coined dozens of times. Which is to say, it’s absolutely perfect for a band with a big dumb skull cover. Legacy of Hate are a melodic death metal band that are neither bad nor at all noteworthy. Just the same thing you’ve heard countless times before, done better and worse. They’re from Austria, but though I usually expect an off-kilter oddness from Austrian metal bands, Legacy of Hate don’t have a measure of quirk to spare. Straight up and down, these guys. If you love the first albums by In Flames and Dark Tranquillity, then you probably won’t dislike Legacy of Hate, but you’re almost certainly bored by the myriad bands who have tried to reinvent that wheel over the last 15 years or so, so while Legacy of Hate might pass the time inoffensively, that’s about as good as it’s gonna get.
— Friar Johnsen

SKULL165

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NEURASTHENIA, Possessed (2007, UKDivision)

The skull:
I was going to start with, “I’m no expert on skull horns…” but then I realized I probably am about as close as it comes to such a thing, so I can just flat-out say that I don’t think that’s where the horns go. The only justification I can imagine is that Neurasthenia is positing a very literal kind of possession, where a little demon actually sets up shop inside your head. This seems like an awful way to go, I must admit! But, these Italian thrashers must really love the idea, because basically this exact skull appears on their next album as well, albeit ringed by a necklace of smaller, evidently unpossessed skulls. I guess they’ve gone all in and decided to also steal the concept of recycling skulls from Nuclear Assault, which is odd, but I’ll allow it.

The music:
Thrash, but not your typical rethrash. I guess almost all thrash, at this point, is inherently retro, but Neurasthenia seem to be shooting for the weird not-sure-of-itself thrash of the early 90s, like the weird groovy miscalculation of Nuke Assault’s little-loved Something Wicked or the third Xentrix album. Those comparisons are sure to make Neurasthenia sound worse than they are, but I can’t think of a better frame of reference. At their hookiest and most melodic (as in “Filthy Lucre”) Neurasthenia are pretty good, actually, tempering their old thrash tendencies with a helping of melodic death metal, and they rarely plod in the unfortunate fashion of bad 90s thrash. Singer Neil Grotti makes the best of a limited range, eking out some fairly catchy melodies with less than an octave of Hetfieldian yarl, and while the riffing is short on stand-out exemplars, it also doesn’t offend with naked derivation. Overall, this is a moderately pleasing, if slight, late thrash entry that functions as something of a corrective to all the pizza mosh bullshit out there.
— Friar Johnsen

SKULL161

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NOCTURNAL DEPRESSION, The Cult of Negation (2010, Avantgarde Music)

The skull:
Very bummed, this skull: he’s so sad. You can tell because he’s pointed down in 3/4 view. He’s probably upset to find himself hovering in such a shitty part of town. Look at this dump! Rubble and weeds everywhere, and an obviously empty parking garage in the background. Even the logo, set in some font which must come standard with French versions of Windows, is weepy. I guess we can assume the setting is “nocturnal”, but it’s so hard to tell with this crappy black and white cover, and let’s face it, this neighborhood would be depressing in broad daylight.

The music:
Evidently there’s a branch of black metal called “Depressive Black Metal,” or at least so says Metal Archives. If Nocturnal Depression is a representative sample, then DBM is basically just doom metal with terrible production and raspy vocals, and I guess that’s as good a delineating feature set as any. Historically, black metal was defined by the three ‘S’es: speed, satan, and six/eight, but Nocturnal Depression mostly gets by without any of them, although they do occasionally dial up the tempo. The songs are dull, but what really rankles is the feeling that these guys are trying just SO hard to come off as the saddest sacks in the land, which always rubs me the wrong way. If you’re gonna be black as in evil and darkness, at least sound like you MIGHT shoot a motherfucker.
— Friar Johnsen

SKULL159

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PERSECUTOR, Wings of Death (2008, Rawblackult Productions)

The skull:
You’d be forgiven for thinking this demo was released in 1985, but no, it came out in 2008. There was a time when covers this bad were obviously the product of overeager teenagers doing their best to bring their evil visions to life, but in this late and derivative age, men probably in their late 20s or older are making covers like this to conjure a false nostalgia for an era they were born too late to know firsthand. You almost have to wonder if the job of drawing the skull went not to the guy in the band with the most artistic skill, but to the guy with the least, just for the sake of some misunderstood authenticity. You also have to wonder, “Where are the fucking wings?”

The music:
Unsurprisingly, it’s throwback thrash with a black metal twist, but it’s played with more verve than you might expect, and with no small amount of actual musical skill. I’m especially impressed by the rubber snake bass that burbles throughout with an almost spastic business. It’s excessively overplayed, in the best way. The riffing is also fairly clever at times, although this is one of those reverse synergy situations where putting everything together smooths over the most interesting elements to create an overall atmosphere of familiarity. I’ve been exposed to a lot of music like this since BigDumbSkulls.com came online, and this is one of the better examples, but I still probably wouldn’t listen to it unbidden by duty. But, if raw throwback German style thrash with nods to first wave black metal if your kind of thing, then you’d probably love Persecutor.
— Friar Johnsen

SKULL157

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SCUM, Voyage into Depth of Insanity / Macabre Moors of Morgoth (1993, Sickness)

The skull:
Lit from above and deeply shadowed, this stark skull drawing is a nearly perfect example of black and white BDSery. No jaw, no logo, no title. The essence of Big Dumb Skull.

The music:
Original entry:
Friar Wagner collected this skull, but he failed to adequately record its provenance, so its identity remains unknown even to The Council. For close to two years, Friar Johnsen has labored to uncover the identity of the band, scouring the obscurest of mp3 blogs and frequently entreating Tineye.com for assistance, but he has so far failed in his epic quest. Friar Wagner has all along insisted that the band is a metal band, and supposing that’s true, the likelihood of it being a black metal band is close to 100%. The Council welcomes any and all information about SKULL157, the only mystery skull in the entire Skullection.

Update 2013-08-10:
It was only a matter of time, but finally the mystery skull has been identified! Thanks to Sami at Bestial Burst Records we now know that SKULL157 is actually a 7″ by the Finnish death metal band Scum. Like early Sentenced, Scum takes the Stockholm formula and adds a weird twist, producing something that’s mostly familiar without sounding entirely derivative. Both songs are excellent (and both appear on the band’s full-length debut, Mother Nature), particularly the slinky plodding bits of “Voyage”. Honestly, I wasn’t expecting much from the mystery skull when it was identified, but I’m pleasantly surprised by this discovery. Thanks again to Sami!
— Friar Johnsen

SKULL156

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DIVINE HERESY, Bleed the Fifth (2007, Roadrunner)

The skull:
In a squalid restroom, a skull is jammed full of wires and gauges and shit, while he chomps down toothlessly on a grenade. There’s no bleeding going on, but presumably that grenade is ensuring the skull’s right to remain silent. Score another victory for the rights of the accused! This is not a very pretty cover, but it looks like someone went to the trouble of finding a good replica skull and going to town on it with rusty ric-a-brac and the hot glue gun, which is an artistic process The Council fully endorses. The arts-and-crafts method of cover creation is a sadly fading tradition, especially in the BDS realm, where handmade skulls once ruled the roost.

The music:
After he quit Fear Factory, Dino Cazares assembled Divine Heresy to play exactly the same kind of music he was making before. The differences are minor: Tim Yeung’s drumming is slightly less quantized than Raymond Herrera’s. Dino’s riffs are (very) occasionally a little noodlier. Tommy Vext’s (aka Cummings) death vocals are notably crappier than Burton Bell’s, while his clean vocals are at least a little more consistent. Other than that, if you’ve heard Fear Factory, you can easily imagine what Divine Heresy sounds like. I really enjoyed the first three Fear Factory albums (although they haven’t aged especially well) but the band lost me with the flaccid Digimortal, and while the post-Dino band put out some competent albums, the real Fear Factory magic (such as it is) is clearly in Dino’s hands, and this first Divine Heresy disc is probably the best of the post-Obsolote offerings from the FF camp. Hardly essential, but if you’re in the mood for Dino’s unique sound, this is a fine offering.
— Friar Johnsen

SKULL153

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PHONOMIK, Soul Creeper (2010, Nightmare)

The skull:
If I’m mistaken, this is a first for Big Dumb Skulls: an underwater skull. Yes, I joked that SKULL38 might be peering out of a submarine, but there’s no denying that this fella here is hanging out under the sea. Probably somewhere in the Caribbean, considering the clear turquoise water and white sands. Then again, I guess this might not even be a real skull, but one of those ceramic ones sold at pet shops to decorate your aquarium. It’s a niche accessory catering to the thin sliver of overlap in the Venn diagram of tropical fish and vampire enthusiasts.

The music:
I was really expecting shitty death metal when I started spinning Phonomik, so it was quite a surprise to find that they’re a quirky, kind of funky progressive metal band with a unique sound, good vocals, and catchy songs. Wonders never cease! Their sound is very modern, with downtuned guitar and a distinctly nu cadence to the vocals, inviting comparisons to both Evergrey and Fair to Midland. The singing is a bit nasal, but it still works for me, and with songs built around strong vocal hooks and an almost playful bouyancy from the keys, Phonomik have a winning formula on their hands. I would like a little more activity in the guitar riffing, but that risks looking the gift horse in the mouth, so I’ll just content myself with the unexpected small pleasures afforded me.
— Friar Johnsen

SKULL149

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KATAKLYSM, Serenity in Fire (2004, Nuclear Blast)

The skull:
It’s been a while since the last real Photoshop abomination here at Skull HQ, so this truly abysmal effort is almost a welcome reminder of just how fucking dumb a skull can be. Really, it’s hard to imagine how the snake here could look less like it was actually coiled in and around the skull, which is itself glowing, for some reason, and nearly transparent, for some other reason. The (serene?) fire is terrible, and the crosses (also mysteriously transluscent) look like stone and shouldn’t be burning at all. And of course, the background and general palette are best described as “warm shades of brown.” When all these shitty digital collage covers were coming out in the mid aughts, I guarantee every band that used them thought they were so fucking badass, but I thought, “In ten years, these will all look completely ridiculous.” I was totally right.

The music:
There are some albums on the great list of big dumb skulls that completely intimidate me as they heave into view on the spreadsheet. It’s not because the albums are sure to be terrible; terrible albums are the most fun to review. And it’s not because the albums are so good that adequately capturing their excellence in a 200 word review is paralyzingly daunting; that basically never happens with skull albums. It’s because these discs, which are usually released by one of the bigger metal labels, are so middle of the road, so predictable, so completely as-expected that it’s nearly impossible to muster the energy to even listen to them, let along write about them. Serenity in Fire, it won’t surprise you to read, is a perfect example of this phenomenon. Modern Kataklysm (defined as post-Victims of This Fallen World) are not a terrible band by any stretch, but there’s absolutely nothing about them that appeals to me. They sound like pretty much every other legacy death metal band, somewhere in the middle of Morbid Angel, Deicide, and Immolation, with an occasional nod to European melodic death. All these bands have terrible triggered drums and singers trying entirely too hard to sound like evil men. They all abuse the privilege of pinch harmonics and blast for no good reason. But, they all more or less write “songs” in a traditional sense, and for this reason alone I should at least sort of appreciate them, when so many of today’s death metal bands dispense with arrangement altogether in favor of a formless sequence of interchangeable riffs. I don’t, though; I just can’t bring myself to give a shit about Kataklysm and their ilk. They bore me to death, ever and anon. And so, even though I forced myself to listen to this entire fucking album, I just can’t muster the energy to say anything specific about it. It came and it went, leaving nothing in its wake.
— Friar Johnsen