Court in the Act is dead, long live Shitfucks Unite

I got tired of blogging on my lonesome so I stopped posting here a while ago (you probably didn't notice). I've started a new one at http://shitfucksunite.blogspot.com - I'm hoping that this one will stay a little more active as it's not just me keeping it updated. Update your feed readers. The archive of this blog will stay intact, but most of the links are dead and the blog itself will no longer be updated.

Cheers,

Persona 101

Mayhem - Live In Leipzig [1993]

Fortunately, notoriety isn't all that's needed to gain recognition within black metal circles. Sure, Mayhem have it in spades, due to the whole Euronymous business, and the suicide of Dead, after which band members allegedly took pieces of his skull and made them into necklaces, but it is difficult to deny that their music is some of the finest black metal art to ever grace this planet. This is the final official release done with Dead, and it is also one of the most effective live albums that this humble author has heard. It really puts across the atmosphere for those of us who, for whatever reason, never got the chance to see Mayhem in their prime, and, in addition, draws a delightful contrast between the more primitive material off Deathcrush and Pure Fucking Armageddon and the more refined, genre-defining De Mysteriis Dom Sathanas. Although I personally find Attila to be a more interesting vocalist (heresy, I know), this is also a vital opportunity to hear the legendary Per Ohlin.

v1 VBR (can re-upload in 320 if needs be)

Zippyshare

Blog news

Okay, so I had a lot of revision to do over the last break, and now I'm back at university so uploading's going to be difficult. However, I do have a plan for taking the blog forward:

1) Use links from other blogs (credited of course). These won't necessarily be mediafire.
2) Considering buying a mediafire personal account. This should help protect files from being taken down.
3) Obviously I'm always looking for more contributors.

In other news, I've started a Facebook page to share music: http://www.facebook.com/TrueMetalAndPunk

Jute Gyte - Isolation [2012]

Jute Gyte might just be the second coming of American black metal. Although this one-man (Adam Kalmbach) act's sheer prolificness (18 albums - not all of which are black metal - since 2006 and 10 over the past two years alone - and yes, that is a word - Google says so) might lead the unaware prospective listener into dismissing his work as thoughtless and just churned out for the sake of it, I can assure you that is not the case. No, here, Mr Kalmbach produces a fine collection of riffs, brought together with delightful cohesion to make a fine black metal album. Aside from the ambient title-track, which, to my ears at least, is just futile and does not improve the album at all, every song is a winner (as with all the best albums). Although this won't quite crack my top 10 of 2012 (a fine year for music), it's on the edge of it and well worth a listen.

Bandcamp

White Medal - Yorkshire Steel demo [2012]

YAAAAAARKSHIRE! YAAAAAARKSHIRE! Or so we say whenever we come across a Southerner (for what it's worth, the Scottish are Southerners too). White Medal originally attracted my attention with their 2010 Agbrigg Beast demo - and although that didn't seem to be much cop at the time, it's grown on me. Still, this is a lot better. For a band that have been around just 5 years, White Medal have certainly done splits with some prominent bands - first the almighty Skullflower (back in 2010), and more recently Caïna (meh), and Slægt (I haven't heard the split itself yet, but Slægt are a solid Danish band - their S/T demo is worth a listen). As for this, well, it's raw black metal. Far from revolutionary, but what White Medal do, they do it very well. Songs are constructed with a hypnotic feeling, and this is well achieved.

128 kbps

Mediafire

Dying Fetus - Destroy The Opposition [2000]

Although Dying Fetus have a large role in unleashing the hordes of shitty deathcore bands at the moment, no-one hates 'Slaughter Of The Soul' for what it influenced, so why should this be hated? Dying Fetus' first two suffered from horrific production values, so this was their first album which could really stand on compositional ability alone.

320 kbps

DMCA complaint received. For a dead link. For an album released 12 years ago.

Discordance Axis - The Inalienable Dreamless [2001]

In all honesty, I'm not a huge fan of this album. Sure, I like it, but I don't deify it as many latter-day grindcore fans seem to. But then again, I'm not a fan of the likes of Gridlink and Cellgraft which this undeniably influenced largely - I like my grindcore punky, not technical. That said, it clearly is a seminal album, and one of the best examples of the style it pioneered. For that reason, it's worth a listen even if you only listen to grindcore from time to time as a novelty. It will never, in my eyes, reach the level of seminality (is that a word?) of the likes of Terrorizer and Brutal Truth, let alone Repulsion and Napalm Death, but it's on the second tier certainly. Don't be influenced by the torrent of over-technical shit it spawned.

192 kbps

Mediafire