New Release Roundup 11/03/09

I listen to a lot of metal, obviously. But there are a relatively few bands whose entire discography are in my iPod, who it will take some kind of natural disaster to keep me from going to see when they're in my area. That list includes Amon Amarth, Iron Maiden, Judas Priest, Motörhead, Napalm Death, and it damn sure includes Slayer. That said, here's a brief rundown of what's in record stores this week.

Nile, Those Whom The Gods Detest (Nuclear Blast): Sure, the whole ancient-Egyptian schtick is a little goofy, but Nile come up with their share of decent riffs, and bandleader Karl Sanders is a hell of a guitarist; his solos are fleet and relatively non-masturbatory – that is, they seem to have something to do with the song that spawned them. Nile albums tend to have one or two totally non-metal tracks, and this time out, “Yezd Desert Ghul Ritual in the Abandoned Towers of Silence” features tribal percussion, creepy sound effects and voices, all intended to create an atmospheric lead in to the next round of blast beats and furious riffing. The title track and “4th Arra of Dagon” are probably the most successful at unifying the various elements of Nile’s style, as they combine traditional instrumentation (or specially tuned guitars, at any rate) with the band’s death metal roar. Overall, this is probably Nile’s best album. It's certainly the first one I've ever made it all the way through.

Slayer, World Painted Blood (Sony): I have already had a lot to say on the subject of this terrific album, including a track-by-track rundown when I heard it back in August. So I'll just reprint my conclusion from that review here: A lot of people say Slayer hasn't really been great since Seasons in the Abyss. Those people are wrong. The Paul Bostaph years had a lot to recommend them (Diabolus in Musica is a seriously underrated album), and Christ Illusion showed that Slayer could experiment with dissonance and melody, and kick their own playing and songwriting up a notch when they wanted to. The bandmembers have given a lot of interviews talking about how a lot of this album was written in the studio. Listening to it, you can't tell. That's really impressive. Much the way Metallica's Death Magnetic combined the thrash of their early years with the hard-rock grooves of their 1990s work, World Painted Blood builds on the success of every Slayer album before it. It's not a legacy-polishing effort; it's the next step in a still-ongoing journey. Highly recommended.

Various Artists, Swedish Death Metal (Prophecy Productions): A short while ago, a thick paperback book called Swedish Death Metal was published by New York-based Bazillion Points Books. It was an exhaustive look back at author Daniel Ekeroth's homeland scene of the '80s and early '90s, recounting the history of demo tapes, sparsely attended live gigs, binge drinking, intraband conflicts, the sudden underground success of groups like Entombed, Grave, and others...if you're a fan of the thick, distorted guitars and punky drumming of the Swedish sound, you need this book. And you definitely need this three-disc compilation, which includes an entire first disc of nothing but demo recordings, never before released commercially. For every relatively well-known act on here, there are two or three more obscure groups that never made it beyond the borders of their homeland. Just like the book, Swedish Death Metal the album is an important document of underground metal history. Get yourself one and crank it up loud.