CD

Whaààt...this fine New York based SynthPunk quartet has been around for over 15 years, and this is the first time I heard of 'em? Well now, high time we got acquainted!

Based in Maastricht (near Belgian border) in the South-East of Holland, Lesoir is a Dutch quartet consisting of singer/ pianist/ acoustic guitar player Maartje Meesen, (electric) guitarist Ingo Daasen, bassist Dachuan Lu and drummer Rubel Israel whom, on stage, are usually fortified by multi-instrumentalist (she plays guitar, keyboards and percussion) and backing singer Eleen Bartholomeus.

Norway’s progressive metal band Leprous were founded back in 2001 but they still manage to surprise with new ideas on every new album. Not satisfied by just sticking to a single musical style, Leprous from Norway decide to use ingredients from such different genres like black metal, screamo, jazz, industrial and progressive rock, and put it all together into their very own sonic universe.

The cover artwork hints at postblack metal, but you can expect much more. Many tracks use a black metal frame but generally allow for many other genres. Already the ingenious opener “Stillborn motivation” where you can find next to some post rock also a few shoegaze sounds, makes you hungry for more. This high quality level is maintained throughout the album, and the songs are splendidly filled with breaks. Symphonic arrangements, dramatic passages, ambient influences and some evil metal outbursts guarantee a multi-layered listening experience.

For over twenty years of evil existence, Shyaithan’s Impiety have always been (one of) the most influential bands from the South-East of Asia. I’d like to refer to one of the reviews on any former record posted in the archives-page of Concreteweb to check out this project’s history / biography (for example Advent Of… on 11/04/2011 or Worshippers Of The Seventh Tyranny on 02/02/2011).

Grime started its mission in Italy somewhere during summer 2010. Their goal was bringing destruction to a town near yours with their doom like metal music. They themselves describe their sound as rooted into rotten burial grounds and their songs are the sound of a decaying swamp filled with trash. Now that is a statement they actually live up to. Their slow and heavy groove is filthy and vicious, guitar riffs are sharp but somehow maintain that muddy feeling that doom metal has.

The name should already point into the right direction. Normally I'm not responsible for writing black metal reviews because I'm not the biggest fan of this music and that’s an understatement. But From The Vastland from Iran certainly can claim to be very different from other bands in that genre.

Earthling are a young act from Richmond, Virginia, U.S.Aha, formed by guitarist / singer Alan Fary and drummer Brently Hilliard. Together with guitar player Praveen Chhetri and bassist Jordan Brunk, the quartet recorded some demonstrational material as well as a split-7”EP (with Valkyrie, another band Alan is involved with as guitar player).

Coming close to their twentieth anniversary, Italian Goth Wavers Camerata Mediolanense return with full length album number four, which is the main part of their Petrarca Project concept, based on the life (and his poetry more specifically) of Francesco Petrarca. This personality lived in the 14^th century and is known as poet, writer, humanist and philosopher.

As a matter of fact, this second Ash Borer-album was released on CD in 2012 through Profound Lore, and now Pesanta Urfolk are to re-release the material on vinyl. The double-long player will be available in two versions: 323 copies on 200 mg slipcase-edition, and as ‘normal’ 160 mg black vinyl (unlimited).