Yesterday, a monster was born. And small-town melodic metalcore band Counterparts is the unit that gave birth to it during their record release show alongside surging prog/metalcore kids and labelmates I Am Committing A Sin. The monster in question is called “Prophets,” and it’s the kind of album that will spoil your senses in the most extreme of ways. Think back to the first time you heard bands like Shai Hulud, It Prevails, For The Fallen Dreams, Misery Signals, Bury Your Dead, and The Ghost Inside and the sheer surge of life that you felt coursing through your mortal coil. First impressions like these are just as rare as the artists and albums that trigger them. What you’re getting with “Prophets” is an expertly-crafted batch of multi-faceted, heartfelt anthems to accompany you on your life path, whatever it may be. This group of fine young men from Hamilton, Ontario burst out the gate with “Prophets” and make a compelling statement to be taken as serious as the styles forerunners. One of the ways that Counterparts in its current form may even outdo their idols is in upper-tier instrumentality across the board. Whether we’re talking about drum-wizard Ryan Juntilla making each song sound like it’s riding on a bed of marble, Alex and Jesse’s riffs, Eric’s metronomic basslines, or Brendan Murphy’s fervent delivery, Counterparts literally fire on all pistons at nearly all times. Technically, they bring to mind a less Swedish-influenced but equally complex Parkway Drive, thus overstepping the leaders of their genre in one mere album. Guess this must be the future then; an era in which a band can claim top-dog status from the outset. Granted though, it is by no means within the range of most bands’ capabilities and imagination to assemble such an album as “Prophets” in one, clean swipe as Counterparts have done. While surely the band must by default have practiced, written, and performed with scarily regimented regularity, there certainly is a certain advantage here, raw talent-wise.Brendan’s vocals, decidedly more traditional hardcore than death metal in nature, are arguably a cleaner fit for Counterparts’ unique brand of urgent technical old-school hardcore than the vocals of Parkway Drive’s versatile and yet vital frontman Winston McCall are to them. And that’s keeping aside the fact that Australia’s Parkway Drive released one of the most dynamic modern/classic hybrid metalcore records ever in their 2007 opus “Horizons.” “Prophets,” however,” is not as determined an album to be the most metallic thing out there, which likely comes as a result of them being a hardcore band underneath all the breakneck thrash offerings, beatdown breaks, gang vocals, and tense harmonizing. Ideally these hardcore roots, if planted firmly enough, will reap future fruit in the form of continual releases of new music from these metalcore prodigies. Not since either Ignorance Never Settles and their 1997 landmark LP “Cycles of Consumption,” Day of Mourning’s recently reissued “Your Future’s End”, or Grade’s early split LP with Believe, has an Ontario band made such a convincing statement that they are ready to break out onto the international scene as Counterparts do. Their shows are likely as cathartic experiences for kids upfront as they are for the band themselves. It merits mention that Verona Records, the label with enough brains to pick up on these future legends, is run by Silverstein singer Shane Told, a man who can now claim the title of coveted A&R if he so desires. Seeing Canadian talent such as Counterparts handled by other Canadians from within Canada must be an effectual, intimate, and ultimately homegrown experience that many bands south of the border might not have similar experiences to reflect upon.

Some bands manage to get out of their dreaded hometowns, while others aren’t so fortunate. The latter proved to be the fate of Acton, Maine metallic hardcore act The Year Of Our Lord, who between 1997-2003 were bastions in the emerging New England hardcore/metal scene, haunting venues around the Northeastern U.S., down south, as well as in Europe with their confrontational yet reflective strain of blackened death metal. The story has been heard numerous times before; had they just stuck it out a little longer, they would have made it. While the truth to these claims as pertaining to other bands throughout the history of metal and rock cannot be substantiated here, it most definitely applies to the virtually-undiscovered The Year Of Our Lord. The wait fans had to endure for the band’s epic, double-disc swansong “Dead To You” to finally hit the presses is a sort of deprivation torture few devoted followers of a band should ever have to endure. Let’s just put it this way: Guns’n’Roses’ “Chinese Democracy” is a perfect example of how NOT to come back into the scene; with a new band, new style, and near-total alienation of their remaining fanbase praying for another November Rain to fall. Leave it to The Year Of Our Lord to show everyone the proper way to come back after making fans wait just a tad too long. “Dead To You” is much more than merely a complete discography with fancy packaging; it sees the band in fighting form unlike anyone could have expected after being gone for over seven years. All of the music on “Dead To You” was not merely re-mastered; new parts were recorded, including keys by producer Pete Rutcho that resonate infinitely more than on the original recordings, and freshly-recorded drum tracks by Colin Conway, drummer/co-songwriting wiz kid of Prosthetic Recording artists Cannae as well as the more experimental Frozen, who was also The Year Of Our Lord’s touring drummer during their final two years of existence. The songs were put through the best body shop a band could ask for at Damage Studios in Massachusetts, an increasingly prominent recording facility run by longtime friend Rutcho, who brought to life Boston thrash act Revocation’s latest “Existence Is Futile,” as well as having just wrapped up recording The Ghost Inside’s hotly-anticipated new album “Returner,” and in recent years working with Unearth, Bury Your Dead, Cannae, Seemless, The Classic Struggle, and dozens more. While there is no costly multi-fold digipak to speak of on The Year Of Our Lord’s new release “Dead To You,” reportedly and unsurprisingly, it was a costly project to assemble. Most investments in music are these days. But now that it has finally seen the light of day, all of the band’s classic material, much of which was moshed and screamed along to in basements and halls in New England’s underground extreme music scene around the turn of the century, can be appreciated anew and in a completely different light. The guitars cut through everything while vocals grind along like teeth, all over a punchy yet sturdy Colin Conway drum performance, likely the Boston skin-basher’s longest single recorded piece of music to date. Between the band actually putting their hearts into this project, a fact that can be heard from the single note of disc one until the self-titled album closer on disc two, and Rutcho bringing a sonically impressive, Devin Townsend-like production job to “Dead To You,” The Year Of Our Lord with this album prove they predated and/or wrote bleaker and more moving blackened melodic death metal than Nachtmystium, Darkest Hour, even Cradle Of Filth and Dimmu Borgir.

If school didn’t already bang the point home, the older you get you start to realize that for better or worse history tends to repeat itself. Just ask Albany’s Born Low, who with their debut full-length “Reincarnage” on Reaper Records have instantly revived a long-lost strain of early-90’s metallic NYHC. Just don’t tell them about Toronto’s No Warning, who with their cult sophomore record for Bridge 9 “Ill Blood,” pre-empted Born Low by a good seven years in resurrecting this somehow familiar east coast, meat-and-potatoes brand of hardcore. But let that be merely another example of history repeating itself. No Warning are no longer. And Born Low, who in their ranks boast ex-members of such influential Albany acts One King Down, Another Victim, The Promise, Burning Bridges, Lariat, and Once and For All, will soon prove with “Reincarnage” that not only do these veterans hunger for another go at the crown, they have all the venom and chops of a “Set It Off” or “Demonstrating My Style”-era Madball to propel that ambition. This ushers in the age-old debate of whether bands deriving from upstate or outskirts can claim city status and affiliation. While Born Low certainly aren’t pretending to be from the city, they can rightfully claim stake to whatever part of New York they please, because nothing this bouncy and crushing has come out of the city in years, insofar as early-90’s NYHC goes; the stem cell of the dominant sound in tough, mosh-oriented hardcore for the past twenty years. It doesn’t hurt that “Reincarnage” was recorded by revered producer Dean Baltulonis, who made his name over the past two decades laying to tape classic east coast blueprint releases from Madball, No Warning, Sick Of It All, Hope Conspiracy, American Nightmare, Nerve Gas Tragedy, and more. With the wealth of NYHC-influenced bands that have spawned from the new scene, notably Reign Supreme, Cruel Hand, Forfeit, Violation, Trapped Under Ice, Bad Seed, Bitter End, and Mother Of Mercy, it’s normal that among these hardworking bands some simply hit the mark more precisely than others. Seemingly out of nowhere has arrived Born Low who with “Reincarnage” supersede nearly all of the above acts with one of the most convincing slabs of street-style, aggressive hardcore since “Ill Blood.” Even one of the new scene’s more colorful frontmen, Justice Tripp from Born Low labelmates Trapped Under Ice, drops some scathing guest vocals on “World On Its Back,” an endorsement sure to turn any skeptics into believers. Formerly It’s Alive under which they released the critically-acclaimed “Only Death Will Deliver” demo, the renamed and reinvigorated Born Low boast the same rhythm section of Derrick VanWie and Bill Scoville that pummeled hardcore kids with two of the most pivotal straight-edge hardcore records of the late-90’s: One King Down’s “Bloodlust Revenge,” and “God Loves, Man Kills.” Born Low’s rhythm section is, in fact, one of the most cohesive and dexterous since Zowie/Tony Fontão helped turn the punky New York sound into a precise and lethal thrash attack on Leeway’s “Born To Expire,” Craig Setari/Will Shepler further mated the then-new metallic NYHC sound with traditional hardcore, Harley Flanagan/Pete Hines layed down the rumbling foundation for “Best Wishes,” Craig Setari/Armand Madji established the frenetic Sick Of It All battering ram, and Hoya/Will Shepler started the Madball revolution. Further emphasizing Born Low's do-it-yourself hardcore ethic, Derrick VanWie executed the poignant and slick digipack layout for "Reincarnage," not to mention having designed and printed shirts and jerseys for legendary Troy, NY act Stigmata dating back many years. The members of Born Low are deeply woven into the fabric of New York's once-dominant upstate scene, and "Reincarnage" is the cue that these guys are itching to break out and let the world know what they've been up to in recent years.

This is the perfect record to start off the New Year and I think it’s a fair statement to say that this will undoubtedly be one of the best metal albums of 2010. I have been a fan of Living Sacrifice since the early 90’s when I was introduced to metal and hardcore. At that time they were breaking away from their Slayer influence (their self-titled debut was considered by by many in the scene at the time as equivalent if not superior to Slayer's Reign In Blood) and adopting more of a death metal sound. They soon called it quits after three solid releases, then came storming back in 1997 with the classic “Reborn,” seemingly out of nowhere. I remember seeing them for the first time at their record release show for “Reborn” and being totally blown away by their revived sound which translated to a more Machine Head-meets-Meshuggah onslaught. It was totally devastating and warmly welcomed by metal and hardcore heads alike. One thing can be said about Living Sacrifice and it’s that they have never claimed to be anything but a metal band and have conveyed that in several ways over their 20 year off-again-on-again existence. Every release has been a solid slab of metal and remains some of my favorite albums to this day. Aside from a collection of greats called “In Memoriam” we haven’t heard a full album of new music from them since 2002’s “Conceived in Fire,” after which they called it quits again. In retrospect I guess I was fine with the demise of the “Sac Posse.” I had the privilege of going on tour with them in 1998 and seeing them destroy every night. I was pleased with every record they released and understood that all good things eventually come to an end; it was time for them to move on and do other things. So needless to say, I had mixed feelings when they decided to resurface in 2008 as a support for a Demon Hunter tour. However, those feelings were soon quelled with the 2 song teaser EP “Death Machine”. I think the world could use some more Living Sacrifice.

Styles, trends, and bands tend to resurge a decade after their death, and the reformation of Minneapolis-rooted, sludge-metal hardcore pioneers Disembodied last year, a decade following their breakup, fits right in line with that phenomenon. After years of hardship, struggle, and turmoil both outside and within their ranks, Disembodied’s swansong was the monumental “Heretic” full-length released in 1999 on Edison Recordings (Coalesce, Starkweather, Acme), a record that few had the good fortune of discovering upon its release due to the band breaking up soon after and only touring for it very lightly prior to that. Now that the initial decade of the new millennium is behind us, having taken the old-school revival and tech-core movements with it, Disembodied and their prodding, unique brand of heavy hardcore can live to ride once again. “Psalms of Sheol” is the first sign of life from the reunited band whose core of Tara Anderson, Joel Johnson, and Charles Johnson in 2000 immediately formed the renowned albeit short-lived Martyr A.D. project from the ashes of Disembodied. To dispel any remaining confusion as to origins of the material on “Psalms of Sheol,” it delivers no new material recorded since their 1999 breakup. What it does offer, however, is a completist’s wet dream. People brave enough to pick this gem up from Prime Directive Records will get thirteen rare Disembodied tracks they have likely never heard before, and certainly never in fighting re-mastered form as they are presented here. Disembodied were no different than most actual hardcore bands of the 90’s, releasing exclusive material on 7”, splits, and compilations that all went out of print before fans could successfully source this rare material. In turn, classic live staples from the “Confession” 7”, the “Bootleg” 7”, their 1995 debut “Existence in Suicide,” and an assortment of key tracks that ended up on scarcely-distributed compilations that never made it onto the band’s widely-available albums and EPs until now were not only difficult to track down but many fans simply were not aware of their existence. The music on “Psalms of Sheol” drove witnesses to their knees in basement halls and VFW’s across the country years ago, and finally fans and newcomers to the band alike can have their nerves shaved down by the abrasiveness of vintage Disembodied on one glorious multi-fold digipack CD. This release also serves as the belated final chapter in the history of Disembodied version 1.0. As of last year, the band has added Martyr A.D. guitarist Charles Johnson to its ranks, and his contribution to the songwriting process of Disembodied’s upcoming full-length of new material (due out sometime in 2010 on an as-yet-unnamed label) lends weight to the belief that their new album could eclipse the band’s entire back catalogue, a daunting feat but one the band seems prepared to attempt. If 90’s icons like Damnation A.D., For The Love Of, Merauder, Blood Has Been Shed, and Turmoil (the latter two who are on the verge of releasing monumental records in 2010) can return a decade or more past their heyday and deliver new music that is as desperate and soul-searching as their early material, then there can be little doubt Disembodied will follow suit and unleash a new record this year that will knock the scene as we know it flat on its ass. Disembodied’s music lies at the heart of popular bands like Emmure, The Acacia Strain, and pretty much any other down-tuned, mid-paced metallic hardcore act making the rounds today. And while the credit was never quick to fall into their laps, Disembodied seem intent on seizing the respect and admiration which has been owed to them for too long. “Psalms of Sheol” is here to wake people up to their motives, while their unnamed upcoming album will annihilate the masses in rather messy fashion. Thus far since reforming early last year, Disembodied have managed to share the stage with a variety of both underground and established metal and hardcore acts ranging from The Acacia Strain, Terror, Poison The Well, Bane, Unbroken, Mean Season, Monument To Thieves, The Final Burden, The Mistake, Seven Generations, The Haunted, Architect, Make Do And Mend, The Judas Syndrome, and more. They also recently crossed the ocean to perform a blistering set at Ieper Fest in Belgium, which let Euro hardcore fanatics know that one of their favorites from decades past were alive and unwell, for which links to video footage from this performance below provide convincing evidence.

There simply is no justice in hardcore. One of the sturdiest and longest-running upstate N.Y. hardcore institutions, Stigmata, have been to hell and back since their initial formation as Displaced Aggression in 1986. Besides having the bulk of their releases either allowed to go out of print by negligent labels or sabotaged by the same very labels that offered their help, the Troy five-piece also changed multiple members over the years. However its core of Mike Maney on guitar and Bob Riley leading the charge upfront has prevailed through the decades, and thanks to the continued efforts of Brussels label I Scream Records, Stigmata lives to ride again in 2009 with “The Wounds That Never Heal.” While this release celebrates the band’s two most infamous recordings, the 1994 (formally released in 1997) “Hymns For An Unknown God” and their 2000 Victory Records debut “Do Unto Others,” the latter which was released in Europe on LP and CD at the time on I Scream Records, the band has continued performing shows sporadically since their last studio recording was unleashed on tough guys around the world. 2005, 2008, and most recently in 2009 has seen Stigmata deliver memorable, pit-stomping performances that show the band can still throw down with the youngest of heavy hardcore bands. While Stigmata was born far outside the heart of New York, over the years their fledgling local scene saw them quickly rise the ranks of controversy and popularity as they made a reputable name for themselves providing direct support to bands such as The Misfits, Cro-Mags, Agnostic Front, Hatebreed, Madball, Murphy’s Law, Leeway, Warzone, Uniform Choice, Corrosion of Conformity, D.R.I., Only Living Witness, Sheer Terror, All Out War, Candiria, Crown Of Thornz, and countless others. Through travelling to CBGBs and spending time in the city though frontman Bob Riley became part of the fabric of the NYC-based D.M.S. crew, and was featured in the cult Brooklyn magazine Mass Appeal’s 2003 feature on Lord Ezec and the D.M.S. family. And with Bob Riley’s sister having married the Cro-Mags’ Harley Flanagan years ago, it could be said that Stigmata literally married into the family of NY hardcore history. Musically, Stigmata were heavily influenced by east coast hardcore but their love for and roots in thrash metal and crossover resulted in their brand of hardcore being more aggressive and violent than the common band at the time. As old fans will recall and new ones will discover thanks to “The Wounds That Never Heal,” Stigmata sounded like the bastard child of Biohazard, Cro-Mags, All Out War, and Merauder, a potent and unmistakable hybrid of brutal street-level hardcore and catchy metallic moments. As a result of their 80’s roots, in addition to their dedication to achieving the purest strain of heavy hardcore one could possibly create during the decade in which they reigned supreme, the 90’s, Stigmata always came across as a familiar throwback band who refused to modernize their sound to cash in. As a result, while their devoted international fanbase never transformed into much commercial success, Stigmata’s recordings and reputation have remained intact over the years and unblemished by the latest trends nor revisionist hardcore historians.

There is a certain survivalist instinct that pervades in the southern states. It has been documented in the resilience of its people over many centuries, in New Orleans’ recovery efforts from Hurricane Katrina, and in the immediately recognizable extreme music which has poured out of the region like sweat in recent decades. For those still untouched by the remorselessness of Goatwhore, they are a veteran super-group project comprising current and ex-members of Soilent Green, Crowbar, Acid Bath, and Nachtmystium who, since signing with Metal Blade in 2006 and releasing one of the purest blackened thrash albums the metal scene had ever been cursed with, have been compelled by popular demand to make Goatwhore the main priority in their lives. And with the band currently touring alongside the likes of surging retro acts Skeletonwitch and Toxic Holocaust, as well as having just been tapped to support DevilDriver and Suffocation in the new year, their persistence seems to be working. If Goatwhore’s 2007 opus “A Haunting Curse” didn’t give you a surge of the darkside as it should have, and in turn you haven’t already made Goatwhore a priority in your hectic listening schedule, their new album “Carving Out The Eyes Of God” should convert any existing non-believers. An old complaint in metal was that aging groups couldn’t keep up with the new trends, and young bands would end up stealing the fire ignited years earlier by the veterans. Whether due to the metal scene’s mushrooming in recent years, the Internet, or simply something in the food, this long-held gripe appears to have been turned on its head for once and for all. Now young bands bitten by nostalgia do their best to emulate once-reigning styles to picture perfection, while a veteran act like Goatwhore end up bridging the gap between black, death, thrash, old-school hardcore and punk better than any young band on the scene today. The band took what made “A Haunting Curse” such a mainstay in true metal aficionados’ collections and upped every single component to 11 on “Carving Out The Eyes Of God,” from influence to instrumentation to catchiness. They topped a perfect record with yet another perfect record. In that sense, Goatwhore are mirroring the kind of consistency southern bands like Corrosion of Conformity, Eyehategod, Crowbar, Soilent Green, Down, and Buzzov*en have effortlessly generated over the years, while simultaneously setting a new standard for the channeling of human pain and suffering through extreme metallic excellence. “Carving Out The Eyes Of God” blasts faster than your favorite death metal band, worships the occult with more devotion than most revered of death metal acts, and even manages to mosh and skank harder than the toughest hardcore out there. And with Ben Falgoust who doubles up as Soilent Green’s expressive frontman not only comparable but possibly superior to Pantera and Down’s Philip Anselmo in terms of spirit, perseverance, soul, and vocal versatility, Goatwhore have even the hard-to-find pieces in place to create a legacy that few bands could ever dream of leaving behind.

If the cat wasn’t out of the bag before, it sure is now: Despised Icon are French Canadian death metal wiggers. Whether in the comments section of their eye-popping video for the captivating title track of their latest album “Day Of Mourning” or on messageboards all around North America, this is what the Montreal-based, modern death metal pioneers are increasingly being referred to by both fans and critics alike. As the old saying goes though, if they’re talking about you, it’s usually because you’re doing something right. In Despised Icon’s case, that something tends to be testing people’s limits of tolerance for a band that is breaking down barriers faster than some critics can accept their demolition. And it’s not only in the case of Despised Icon’s over-the-top merging of upstate N.Y. slam-death in the vein of Pyrexia, Skinless, and Internal Bleeding with ferocious hardcore like First Blood, Buried Alive, and Hatebreed; an abrasive if not dazzling brand of crossover which by now anyone remotely involved in the heavy music scene is more than familiar with. If the mere fusion of street-style, hip-hop fashion cues with claustrophobic, paranoid, extreme metal is enough to cause a shit-storm to rile the masses, they are obviously doing something very fresh. The last time fashion codes in the modern death metal were examined, Dying Fetus and Misery Index, the bands who are perhaps Despised Icon’s two most prominent influences, wore baggier clothing than their single most successful descendant. If we are to earnestly address the issue of real vs. fake among metal bands, and accept that metal is meant to be an anti-follower and anti-poser movement, then what type of clothing is reflective of individualism and lack of concern for the prevailing trends? If most bands insist on wearing black and growing their hair and beards out, while the young men in Despised Icon prefer a close shave and adorning themselves in sharp Ralph Lauren Polo shirts, hardcore basketball jerseys, and baseball caps cocked slightly up and to one side, who are the true followers, really? Besides the fact that dressing sharply is statistically proven to attract attention and interest from the female gender thus likely scoring Despised Icon more backstage betties than their kvlt-clothed contemporaries, proudly boasting mainstream fashion appeal is likely to spread the music of Despised Icon, and therefore the under-appreciated genre from which they derive, much farther and wider than your average deathcore band can bring it. While the self-interested death metal underground and young metal fans unsure of themselves alike will pick a bone with anything that doesn’t fit the mold, Despised Icon have already become not only ambassadors of the death metal genre, but a gateway band for an increasingly fashion-conscious underground youth to open their minds to such severe and vicious music. Despised Icon are essentially devils in sheep’s clothing, rather than devils in devils’ clothing, so to speak. But enough about how they dress, let’s get down to this here new record of theirs, “Day Of Mourning.” To call it the missing bridge between 2005’s “The Healing Process” and 2007’s “The Ills Of Modern Man” would be somewhat reductionist. What is true, and what is sure to please the band’s multitude of hardcore rooted fans, is their insistence on reincorporating direct, mosh-worthy hardcore into the mix perhaps more than ever before. So if Despised Icon haven’t already pissed off the elitist and prejudiced death metal fans who enjoy the Montreal band’s music in secret, “Day Of Mourning” is sure to make their blood boil even more violently. Yet Despised Icon’s death metal and grind influences are as razor-sharp as ever, one of the band’s calling cards on which few if any other bands or critics can debate their prowess.

Everyone in the underground has a story about how they discovered their new favorite band. With social networking websites and blogs having fast become the most common ways to discover such subterranean talent, the traditional methods of studying thank-you lists and seeing t-shirts on other band dudes are still quite effective at making an impression. Case in point, Wetnurse, the NYC-based Seventh Rule recording artists who since releasing their “Invisible City” epic, have set a new benchmark for heavy, profound, and comprehensive fusion music. My first exposure to the band’s equally-distinguishing name came after purchasing New Jersey black/death/hardcore crossover project The Dying Light’s Willowtip Records debut in 2005, the liner notes within which legendary thrash drummer Brandon Thomas formerly of Ripping Corpse and Dim Mak was adorned in a Wetnurse t-shirt. When a drummer that eccentric in style and discerning in taste is seen wearing the Wetnurse logo, it’s a sort of golden endorsement one would be foolish to not follow up on. “Insivible City” directly reflects the contradictory nature of life. Whereas pure metal, hardcore, and punk reflect times of struggle and the constant of extreme conditions, the experience of life ebbs and flows with greater variety and richness than most forms of music are capable of fully encapsulating. Summits are simply much higher up when one begins deep in a trench, and Wetnurse dauntingly represent this normal but equally unpredictable and discomforting characteristic of life with the kind of d.i.y, gritty stylishness one could expect from a group of weathered, hardcore- and punk-bred outcasts existing on the fringe of Manhattan’s glitz and glamour. From the foundation of its very core on out to the minimalist artwork which gazes back at any person lucky enough to wind up in a staring contest with it whether in an indie record shop or online, “Invisible City” promises one thing then delivers another at more junctures than many can digest in the initial listening. Like a young plant, it’s a grower, as they say. But once it grows on you, it’s bound to become a staple among your top choices for catchy, experimental hardcore records that you simply still haven’t managed to classify following years of diligent listening. The best possible explanation for that phenomenon is Wetnurse seem unconcerned with fitting in. From the average six-to-seven minute song length to the final arousing journey of “Slow Your Spell, Missi Hell,” the album’s nearly twelve-minute instrumental closer, it is clear that at no point in its composition nor recording process did “Invisible City” compromise its original intent and fall victim to editing, abbreviation, or simplification. Wetnurse delivers their best here in all its excessive artistic glory. The frantic grind passages on the album sufficiently hint at their wherewithal for speed, and further insinuate that they could be the best art-grind or even experimental grindcore act in the scene if they so desired. The trifecta of death, black, and thrash metal also rear their menacing faces at free will throughout “Invisible City,” so if you need a new collection of disturbing soundscapes to ruin some Morrissey-adoring, fixed-gear bike-riding hipster’s day, this album has potential to serve that purpose; perhaps not to the extent of the latest Nile or Dying Fetus records, but it will do. These brushes with horns-up riffage and breakneck tempos are embedded, even disguised, deeply within the configuration of “Invisible City” amidst the prevailing lo-fi, post-hardcore/noise vibe that seems to tie it all together. Unsettling time signatures make up part of the glue holding the expansive set of Wetnurse’s influences together, and help pull the songs in the direction the band wants them to go, whether the listener is comfortable with that extent of artistic freedom or not. This is especially true during the frequent passages on “Invisible City” reminiscent of riff/stoner/alternative rock, which result in some of the album’s more stirring moments. Such familiar-sounding hooks however do not last long enough for Wetnurse’s music to be accused for being alt-rock disguised as experimental indie; an increasingly familiar trend nowadays.

Former Skinless madman Sherwood Webber is back with a new band. When a long-worshipped frontman leaves the band with which they made a name for themselves though, and then begins anew with project number two, it usually ends up sounding like a number two typically smells. And fans will usually follow said frontman for varying lengths of time depending on the degree of obsession a particular fan may be coping with. But soon enough for some, and not for others, the number two wafts eventually either send them running for the hills, or overcome the frontman’s devotees. It is safe to say, however, that in no possible way can Colorado’s Enemy Reign considered a number two, if you catch my drift. With their debut self-financed, self-released, and just about every other self-something you can think of EP “Means To A Dead End,” Enemy Reign threaten to be taken seriously as potential number one material. There can be no question, these guys and girl mean business. If before people were wondering why the hell Sherwood Webber would leave his fertile Upstate N.Y. roots and head for the rocky mountains, Enemy Reign and their thrill-ride of an EP “Means To A Dead End” are the reasons to end all reasons. Here we have a band that sprung from literally nowhere by popular conventions, and landed on all fours like a tiger, hungry to devour any and all living creatures in its sight. Before the band’s pedigree is further addressed the central element at hand, Enemy Reign’s infectious concoction of crossover death metal, must be brought to the forefront. There are many death metal bands out there, some very popular, who admittedly only listen to the style they purvey. And, for better or worse, it reflects immediately in their output; blastbeats and buzzsaws in, blastbeats and buzzsaws out. Enemy Reign draw together classic early-90’s rolling death metal ala Bolt Thrower, Sinister, Malevolent Creation, Deicide, and Cannibal Corpse, fuse it with extreme thrash in the vein of Exhorder, Demolition Hammer, and Solstice, integrate trademark N.Y. death metal like Pyrexia, Skinless, Internal Bleeding, and Suffocation which current deathcore leaders Despised Icon readily admit to being the foundation for their approach, and topped off with an unmistakable layer of east coast hardcore in all its injury-prone moshing glory. This is distinctive crossover for today and the future that hold just as much potential for cross-genre appeal as Sherwood Webber’s former band at the very least, and if they keep it up for their upcoming debut full-length, they could soon be rubbing shoulders with the top-tier deathcore acts commanding the extreme scene at the moment. But if their lineage is any indication, with Enemy Reign’s musicians having performed in Becoming The Enemy, Throat Culture, and Deadspeak among others, and drummer Andon Guenther having co-founded the up-and-coming extreme metal drumming video magazine www.sickdrummer.com, Enemy Reign are built to outlast any trend regardless of their inclusion in any particular subgenre for the time being. It was long accepted that Relapse recording artists and Skinless’ former touring comrades Cephalic Carnage were the most progressive, brutal, and enduring crossover death metal act that their hometown of Colorado would ever give birth to. Well, now they have some competition from a very hungry bunch; but this is won’t become the debacle we’re seeing in modern death metal scene where it’s become a childish competition to see who can Pro-Tools their album to be the fastest out of the bunch. It could only be considered friendly competition between old pals. After all, Enemy Reign’s producer on “Means To A Dead End” Dave Otero has been involved as a producer and contributor with Cephalic Carnage from their 2002 genre-defying album “Lucid Interval” until their most recent “Xenosapien” tech death landmark. Otero’s proven track record of helping great bands sound heavier on record than anyone else remains etched in stone with “Means To A Dead End” as Enemy Reign come across sounding like a band that has been jamming together for 10 years, and are already a live force to be reckoned with. While the band has only been together for a couple of years, their execution and work ethic are already being fast-established, and their recent announcement of inclusion in the upcoming Neurotic Deathfest 2010 in Europe alongside Origin (featuring former Skinless drummer John Longstreth), Dying Fetus, Napalm Death, Beneath The Massacre, Carcass, Bolt Thrower, and French hardcore institution Kickback is confirmation of the band’s live prowess.