Photo: John Mourlas

By Dave Cantor

Black-clad freaks, gather. We’re here today eulogizing Oyarsa and its untimely demise. The metal duo still had so much to explore. But Noah Coleman has seen fit to take his guitar to the unknown wilds of northern Idaho, where the only thing outnumbering trees and mountains are militia men, dedicated to wresting freedom from some invisible tyrant—some secret Muslim.

The death rattle, its fits and shivers, has made seeking perspective on Oyarsa’s final Chicago performance from musicians sharing the bill a healing thing—one that can’t replace what Chicago’s losing, but can serve as a coda to the band’s truncated career. Read the rest of this entry »

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So late in the year, the frequency of quality festivals tapers off. But setting off that autumnal awe is the tenth installment of Adventures in Modern Music, a joint venture between the Empty Bottle and The Wire, to bring together a sizable selection of out-sounds from different genres. One of the better-known acts to be fitted into this sprawling look at contemporary music is R. Stevie Moore, who’s been given credit for presaging the slew of home-recording projects clogging up the internet nowadays. His work’s something like Daniel Johnston’s in that there’re clearly some ghosts being worked out in each affectional composition. He performs Wednesday. To highlight Adventures’ desire to strip genre of meaning, Rob Mazurek’s São Paulo Underground takes a spot on stage during the same evening, raving up experiments that use jazzy frameworks birthed from south of the equator. Read the rest of this entry »

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That people would be troubled enough by lyrics to restrict the speech of a cartoonish metal band is really what’s offensive. Cannibal Corpse has the dubious distinction of having its music banned in several countries. Of course, getting to appear in an Ace Ventura movie should mitigate any of those potential financial loses. That’s even cooler than Primus showing up in “Bill and Ted’s Bogus Journey.” With Chris Barnes helming the ensemble, Cannibal Corpse became one of the most visible metal acts in the country, a sort of more disturbed Slayer without any true commercial potential. Read the rest of this entry »

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Back in the nineties when Derek Hess’ art featured prominently on any number of album covers and grunge seemed to need an angry nemesis, a buncha straight-edge types went and upped the musical ante. Displeased with most aspects of the culture surrounding punk and metal, some folks in Syracuse, New York, founded Earth Crisis to function as a mouthpiece for the animal-rights and righteous-living camps. Remember when fights broke out at shows because someone was drinking a beer? Yeah, it was some tough guy who liked Earth Crisis instigating all that. Read the rest of this entry »

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Putting together package tours is good for everybody. Fans get to see a range of performers work up a variety of approaches to a similar music, while performers are exposed to folks who hadn’t previously heard them. What’s less apparent than all that is that tours also make fans broaden their musical boundaries. All those hyphenated would-be genres just enable musicians to take chances they wouldn’t have otherwise. Rap-rock didn’t turn out well, but metal dudes have been shading their music with sundry styles–well, since “Vol. 4.” Read the rest of this entry »

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Not to ruin the band’s mythology, but Midnight’s actually fronted by a guy who steered Boulder, Abdullah and a few other Cleveland-based metal bands during the last decade and change. Midnight, for some reason, has captured the attention of metaldom, perhaps in part due to the fact that frontman Athenar has gone out of his way to remain a character as much as a real human being. Read the rest of this entry »

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“Everything Went Black” opens The Black Dahlia Murder’s 2007 album “Nocturnal.” The title can be attributed to the Detroit ensemble’s enjoyment of Euro-styled black metal. But just as likely, it’s a reference to a compendium of early Black Flag material, collected and packaged under the same name. Musically, the influence isn’t overtly reflected, but during the Black Dahlia’s career, enough heavy music’s been assimilated into its work that it’d be difficult to fathom the connection being an accident. Just on that 2007 album, everything from grind to death gets referenced—and sometimes during the same composition. Its title track sports unrelenting tempos and tag-teamed vocals now synonymous with the band. Read the rest of this entry »

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This is some seriously disturbing music. And as all music goes, listening to Florida’s Deicide is best suited to a unique time and place. For metal of this particular caliber, the ideal scenario might be a worked-over pickup truck, speeding down some narrow road at inadvisable speeds. The music’s pace might demand such an extreme, but it might also be some evil ju-ju unloosed by listening to songs about God’s dismissal. Sure, we’re all skeptical at times, but Glen Benton, the band’s singer and bassist, doesn’t even go in for some exploratory discussion. He gets right at the crux of it and says, “Died for me, well that’s too bad, I don’t believe,” on the band’s first album during a song titled “Deicide.” Read the rest of this entry »

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There’s no shortage of metal in Chicago. Some leans toward the ghoulish. Some apes an artistic bent, and some is plain ridiculous. Whatever the proper balance between metaldom’s disparate aspects, Columbus, Ohio-born and Windy City-bred Sun Splitter has settled upon it. The trio, which has been issuing recordings for the past several years, doesn’t revel in slow tempos as much as seemingly unmoving ones. The first track on the troupe’s eponymous tape stands still, as a guitar chugs out quarter notes. Read the rest of this entry »

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Of the two Cleveland bands set to deliver well-worn metal and hardcore to audiences at the Cobra Lounge, Ringworm’s the better-known act, having worked with Victory Records during the better part of its career. And as a connection with that label hints, Ringworm takes itself as serious as its labelmates take animal liberation. Dedication is well and good, but occasionally makes the band hard to palate. “Angelfuck,” from last year’s “Scars” is tough to take in, but near classics like “13 Knots” just go down easy while aping a bit of thrash. Smart-ass uncaring runs through Keelhaul, though. Album titles like 2009’s “Triumphant Return to Obscurity” and a single from the same year called “You Waited 5 Years for This?” point to the level of professionalism the band holds itself to. Read the rest of this entry »