darkwave / post punk / goth rock

The Arch are without a doubt more popular outside their home country Belgium, some call them the best kept Belgian secret. VIII / XII is the third release since their comeback in 2011, containing a compilation of songs which were dropped monthly one by one during the year 2018. The four headed band  wrote, recorded and mixed  each song before starting on the next one. A diversity of music styles was folded together into twelve touching pieces of music.

We can’t deny that the sound of The Arch is recycled from the legendary new wave bands of the eighties and a lot of listeners will call this a copycat. Well, the music is far from original but the passion and ambition shows itself after a few attentive listening parts of this album. Fresh and merrily sounding guitar riffs with sensual synths convey a romantic pop sound without losing the gloomy atmosphere. The lyrics have a darker tenor than the music, which is very admissible.

The band is thirty years active, they started as friends, they disappeared, they came back and sound mature and better than ever. They flirt with gothic and indie rock that tinge their balanced (post) new wave style. On the folk inspired Cadaver synod, the band got the vocal cooperation of Blaine L. Reininger (Tuxedomoon). 

Hopefully this hard working band gets more attention from the Belgian music lovers. Their deep weaved reflections of this world deserves to be heard. We needed to put some more energy in this album to get deeper but it was worth. Good music doesn’t always trigger the mind immediately.  Depending on which medium you choose, the VIII stands for the number of tracks on the vinyl edition, the XII for the CD version.

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Patsker

new wave / gothic / darkwave

Already ten years active and entertaining the Belgian Post-Punk and Gothic scene, Der Klinke releases a compilation of their work called Decade. This summary is a time line containing remixes, cleaned up versions and two new songs. The CD version includes the story of this interesting band.

The band name ‘De(r) Klinke’ (doorknob) has its own history. A small garden house without a doorbell of the parental home of Geert ‘Chesko’ Vandekerkhof was a gathering space where you could just step in by simply using the door handle. This man cave was soon called De Klinke.

The musical path of Der Klinke is one of progression. Der Klinke formed in Ostend Belgium started to play music inspired by cold wave and electronics but slowly created an own stubborn and modern twist in their darkly music. Curtains and Bridges are new songs and show the deep influences from the Sisters and Front 242. Both songs are strong and filled with dark atmospheres. 

Cult hit The Doll sounds still timeless. The compilation has no weak songs and the remixes sound remarkably good. Der Klinke celebrates with glory their musical career. Gothic and dark wave lovers just can’t walk around this album. The mood on Decade is filled with ten years of gloominess, dark dancing tunes (The Doll and The facts of Live remix) and post punk vibes.

This selection of songs is dope. We can’t get enough of these wild and varied sounds of Der Klinke.  Decade is available on CD (limited edition 300 pieces) and vinyl (only 100 pieces). Do not hesitate to grab this Wool-E diamond. Instead of chasing shadows we are chasing the sounds of Der Klinke (again).

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Patsker

industrial post wave

Almost two years ago, I ended my review for the debut album by This Can Hurt with the words: "This is another example of Belgium's talent, unique but familiar and always intriguing. I'd like to see this live one day, preferably very soon..."

Unfortunately, I haven't had the chance to witness these guys yet but judging from this album, a tour is inevitable. Once again This Can Hurt has unleashed something intriguing. 'Worlds Apart' is another excellent statement about crossing genre restrictions, creating emotional alternative music and having great songwriting skills. 


Initially founded as an alternative rock outfit for Ray-M, This Can Hurt quickly developed into a unique entity in the darker regions of the rock industry. The band seemed to nudge towards gothic rock and post punk acts while also incorporating electronic elements from trip hop and industrial. At first glance, 'Worlds Apart' follows the path of its predecessor. The broody elements are still present, making most of these songs ideal for the darker dancefloor, where Sisters Of Mercy, Joy Division and Nine Inch Nails invite you to shake your hips.

But This Can Hurt has also grown over the past few years, and that results in a mature sound and several possible fan favorites. Title track 'Worlds Apart' is one of those and so is the infectious 'Rivers Run Deep'. The latter even brings Evergrey to mind, a melodic metal band. Thing is, with 'Worlds Apart' This Can Hurt tries to appeal to a broader audience. Yet, I didn't expect them to delve into the metal scene. But then again, dark rock and dark metal are very close together, just ask Trent Reznor.

My DJ-mind tells me that 'The Fall Of Mark E. Smith' will mix perfectly with 'Lucretia My Reflection' by Sisters Of Mercy. I'm going to try that out soon. Fact remains, this tune is massive, a certain dancefloor filler, even with the somewhat unusual vocals. And that goes for most of the tunes here. There is still something familiar, something from the dark eighties, but This Can Hurt adds a unique identity to their music which sets them apart from pretty much all other bands. This is the beauty of stubbornness, walking your own path and creating something brilliant.

'Some Days' is the track that mostly nudged towards trip hop, until the guitars come in. The focus here is mostly on straight forward rock music. Electronics seem to have a smaller role, which actually improves the whole thing. I think that's where the mature sound comes from. 'Diane' drives on a harsh electronic bassline but here too, the guitars eventually take the upperhand. The rest of the songs are up to you to discover. If you are a fan of dark rock music, this album definitely deserves a spot in your collection. I know, it's already a massive collection but still, I just know you will enjoy this.


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drone / ambient

death metal / grindcore

death industrial / dark ambient

Exabyss Records

post rock / ambient / electronic

ambient / classical

funeral doom

gothic rock / alternative / metal

drone / ambient / folk

dark ambient 

alternative rock / funk rock

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indie / dreampop

industrial / electronic

Perc Trax

​Serge (2 & 3 by Patsker)

drone / ambient / folk

electronic / ambient/ synthwave

bandcamp

bandcamp

acoustic / folk

post punk

post punk

funeral doom

shoegaze / dreampop

electronic / house / synth

hard rock

math rock / alternative rock / experimental / noise rock / punk

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doom / sludge metal / drone / dark ambient

This EP, or single, is long, seventy minutes but in that timespan Boobs Of Doom takes you on a trip through your own darkest imagination. Just download the album, because this is a full length, turn the volume knob to neighbour levels and drift away. Carrie will appreciate it, Boobs Of Doom will appreciate it.

drone / ambient

death metal

gothic rock

bandcamp

drone / dark ambient

Sombre Soniks

drone / dark ambient

dark ambient / ritual / drone

death metal / black metal

drone / dark ambient

ambient / experimental / downtempo

dark rock / art rock / blackgaze

traditional / folk 

post punk / new wave / goth rock

Heading from Bristol, Naut decided to ignore all current trends and to look back to the dark eighties. Now, this five-piece comes with a baffling debut EP, containing five pitch black goth rock tunes. Influences from bands like Sisters Of Mercy and Killing Joke run rampant and come with the overwhelming energy of post punk acts like The Jesus and Mary Chain. Song like opener 'Disintegration' and 'I'm Here' are destined to fill dark dancefloors everywhere. My personal favorite here is closer 'XVI'. It makes me curious and hungry for more, but for now I'm sure that this EP will be an excellent addition to every post punk / goth rock collection. 

doom / sludge

Sheffield doom mongers Kurokuma return with a two track EP, based on the Dope Rider strip from High Times in the 70s. The artwork comes from Paul Kirchner, the creator of the strip. The music is another slab of severe psychotic sludge doom, five and eight minutes long. Part 1 also showcases something industrial, reflected by repetitive, almost methodical drums. Part 2 simply continues to slow but brutal pummeling. Fans of bands like Conan, Dopethrone and Yob can easily trust Kurokuma to deliver the monolithic riffs and fierce vocals they crave so much. So if you want your sludge metal as destructive as a wrecking ball, this EP should do.

post-metal / doom / alternative rock

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Several months after the release of 'Serrated', Dutch heavy rockers An Evening With Knives unleash three songs that did not make the album because of the limited space on the vinyl. Yet, these songs were to important for the band to be ignored. Opener and title track 'Fade Out' deals with the death of Marco’s father due to Alzheimer disease. It's a long, heavy and cathartic lamentation, showcasing the darkest side of this band. The other two songs follow that example, be it a bit shorter. They all walk a similar path as the songs on 'Serrated', and thus would also fit perfectly into every sludge, doom and grunge collection. These guys are growing steadily, that's for sure.

electronic / ambient / experimental

An alienating two track EP that will leave you confused and entangled, that is what Soho Rezanejad delivers. Subtle electronics, minimalist drones, gloomy soundscapes and her vocals come together in two lengthy modern day folk songs. I can't help but think about a mix between Zola Jesus and Diamanda Galas, be it a bit less creepy than the latter. Yet, there is emotion, there is fear, mourning, wonder and hope in these two tracks. There is a mystifying atmosphere, one that borrows elements from dark ambient. Yet, above all perhaps, this is a unique piece of work, reminding me of an act like Dark Ensemble. Recommended only for eternally wandering souls.

post rock / post metal / stoner / sludge

In today's post rock scene, new bands pop up like mushrooms. Würzburg residents The Man Within are one of those newcomers. Mostly, that first effort comes with a low production and a careful introduction in what the band really is capable of. Yet, here that results in a full-blown post metal album with seven outstanding tracks. Most of them, including 'Mount Santo', my favorite 'Institution' (that rolling bass is hot!!!) and the massive 'Limitless' can easily entertain audiences far and wide. Although firmly rooted in the post-scene, elements from sludge metal, psychedelic rock and stoner rock are never far away. A great introduction, now let's hope they can confirm this in the near future.

dark ambient

The new brainchild of Nachtzeit, the man behind ambient dark metal project Lustre, comes up with an interesting dark ambient album. Although playful at time, this album takes us back to the mysterious  and dark age of the Norse gods. Early in 'Drömmarna' acts like Mortiis (on Cold Meat Industry) and Wongraven come to mind. Synths, soundscapes and dreamy melodies guide the listening on a musical tour of medieval Europe, so it seems, highlighting in 'Löftet' and 'Tårarn'. Strangely, the title track 'Hädanfärden' has an X-Files OST feeling about it, which isn't bad, on the contrary. Fans of old school medieval dark ambient can easily appreciate this album.

alternative rock / hard rock / grunge

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Belgian hard rock duo Breakfast At Midnight proves that two is enough to create heaps of noise. On this debut EP they blast seven tracks through our speakers, beginning with the heavy rocking 'Kidi Coke'. From then on, the rock doesn't seem to stop. Inspired by anything between Tool, Queens Of The Stone Age and Stone Temple Pilots, these two feed an everlasting fire. Most tracks drive on sheer energy but in 'What I'm To Say' and in '1813', the band delves deeply into the Pearl Jam version of grunge rock. Here, the vocals are excellent and clean while the other tunes contain heaps of aggressive screams. Not that I mind, this is pure rock 'n roll: raw, rough and heavy.

black metal / death metal

Grab onto something now because Ukrainian trio Goatsperm is about to unload a hellish, chaotic and vulgar EP, loaded with orthodox black/death metal. 'Voice In The Womb' contains three tracks, each one being a pummeling piece of extreme metal, as dark as Satan's butthole but with an ambient breather here and there. Somehow, this trio manages to combine atmospheric passages with sheer metallic terror, something that might indeed make a lot of banging heads turn their way in the near future.  Besides, 'Into The Deep Waters Of Catacombs' is one of the fiercest black metal tunes I've heard this year. If you're a self-respecting extremist, you need this.

krautrock / shoegaze / punk

What would have happened if Ramones used My Bloody Valentine's guitar effects? What would a punk rock cover album of Neu! songs sound like? Well, Finnish six piece Teksti-TV 666 might have a decent answer for you. 'Aidattu Tulevaisuus' delivers six high-octane krautrock tunes with the raw energy of punk and the immersive nature of shoegaze. I admit, it is something different from the usual slabs of rock 'n roll that appear here but 'Turbo-Mondeo' and 'Aidattu tulevaisuus' can easily get your behind shaking. My favorite here is the somewhat slower 'Rauhankone', which might be described as a down-to-earth space rock track. Recommended? Hell yeah!

ambient / electronic / experimental

Hailing from Porto, Vitor Joaquim is a sound sculptor and visual artist, active around the strange borders between soothing ambient and otherworldly noise. This new album, 'Impermanence' contains seven tracks, revolving around repetitive soundscapes, almost subconscious loops and immersive musical textures. Here and there vocals samples have been added to increase the narrative nature of the music. That, along with the minimal soundscapes, makes the title track my favorite here but I'm sure that every fan of decent ambient music can appreciate these sounds. Obviously, this comes highly recommended.

ambient / drone / experimental / noise

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An even more noisy and experimental variation on ambient sounds comes from Han, a project by Vitor Joaquim and Emidio Buchinho. This album revolves around live improvisation and real time processing, which results in something severely unusual and highly experimental. Yet, behind the gritty freestyle on the guitar, beautiful ambient loops lurk. These seven tracks are weird, immersive in one way, yet restrained and peculiar. Somehow this album feels like the early days of drone experimentation, when artists were exploring the other possibilities of their instruments. In all, this is an interesting release to dive into, but only for experienced avant gardists...

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post-metal / doom / alternative rock

dark jazz / ambient / experimental / trip hop

hardcore

acoustic blues

dark ambient / noise

doom / occult metal

death metal

black metal / doom / death metal

post punk / synth pop

breakcore / industrial

alternative rock / blues

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style of Tool and quite a bit of grunge - vocals that remind of Cobain included. So go buy this one if you appreciate something that refuses to fit into one box.

ambient / experimental

Pany Rosas Discos

gothic metal

A few decades ago, Moonspell became one of my favorite bands ever. With masterpieces like 'Wolfheart' and 'Irreligious', the Portuguese gothic metal horde literally changed my life. For the record, Tiamat and The Gathering belong in that same category. That era was a defining one in my life, and in that of countless of other people. 

Yet, as has happened with a lot of bands, I gradually moved away from the genre and into other things. Those two records remained a constant but most of the others simply passed me by. Again, Tiamat and The Gathering belong in that same category.

But recently, '1755' came in, and I, having returned back to my many roots since becoming a music journalist, was curious. On one hand, I didn't really want to review the album. The philosophy of Merchants Of Air is to push young, up and coming bands, which Moonspell is not. Second, there are those two albums from the nineties, which will forever haunt my image about Moonspell. Yet, eventually I decided to give it a listen and bark out a few words about the thing.

The album opens with a bombastic piece of neoclassical music, combined with those well-known grunts, in 'Em Nome Do Medo'. This might be one of the longest intros for metal albums ever. Either that or Moonspell turned into something even Richard Wagner would appreciate. The intense classical arrangements remain a constant throughout the entire album. Here and there, they even remind me more of Therion than Moonspell.

Nonetheless, once again Moonspell showcase their flair for combining excellent songwriting with immersive riffing. 'Abanão', for instance, is so epic that it immediately catapults the listener to those glorious nineties. That being said, perhaps some fans might find these arrangements and choirs a bit over the top. I have to admit, they are extremely present. But as far as nostalgia goes, this album is a smasher.

The verdict? Well, with brilliant pieces of music like 'Evento' and 'Ruinas' and headbangers like 'De Novembro', Moonspell delivered another classic in a genre that urgently needs this kind of forward thinking musicality. '1755' is no 'Wolfheart' or 'Irreligious' but it's undoubtedly a strong and vibrant Moonspell album which definitely earns a place in your ever expanding collection. Fans can easily trust this one to be to their liking, that's for sure. Check it out if you haven't already.


​Serge

doom / gothic metal

Yesterday, I was at a friend's house, drinking Irish coffee and talking about music. The subject was differences in quality between classic albums and modern day attempts. Every musical genre has its classic, must-have albums, released years or decades ago. My friend claimed that modern day albums rarely, if ever, reach the overall quality of those old favorites. I respectfully disagreed, mostly because I know that people define their opinion on "classic, genre defining albums" around their 16th year. Everything that comes after that, is usually new stuff, not to be adored as much as the so-called pioneers. It's just how our brain works.

In my opinion, there are loads of classic albums out there. The old bands just forgot to write and record them, which leaves that possibility open to other ones.  Of course, as a music reviewer I have actually encountered several of them. I think I have uttered the phrase "if this album was recorded in (insert year), this album might by now be a classic in the genre" many times before and I am going to have to use it again.

Polish gothic doom act Medebor takes us right back to the nineties. Founded in 1997, these guys obviously know their classics. Paradise Lost, Type O Negative, Tiamat, Moonspell, My Dying Bride, Anathema, November's Doom, Amorphis.... I too have heard them all, I've seen them all live and I recognize their influences in this epic album. In short: 'Dark Eternal' can easily stand right next to your favorite melodic doom albums.

The album opens with a strange, spoken word intro which lasts for a while before the guitars eventually kick in. But when they do, they immediately place themselves among the aforementioned giants in this genre. Melodic doom metal with both grunts and clean vocals, while the guitars and drums create a dark but immersive atmosphere. It's pretty much everything we loved so much back in the days.

I'm not sure which my favorite songs on this album are. I absolutely love the opener 'Forest Of Deranged' and the lingering doomer 'Never To Be Forgotten' but pretty much all the song carry the same quality, the same atmosphere and the same doom metal delight. In all, I can only recommend this beast to all you doomers out there, especially the ones who are nostalgic for that nineties era. Medebor will not disappoint you, that's a fact.


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