Album Review: Man The Machetes – Av Nag

For a large proportion of fans, Man The Machetes are a band that require deep consideration before you attempt to tackle their music.

Q: Do you mind if there’s not a jot of the Queen’s English in your lyrics?
Q: Do you insist on a variety of attack or styling between tracks?
Q: Do you balk at any one of punk, groove or rock n’roll?

If the answer to any one of these questions is a resounding “Yes” then step away from this review. As much as they’d hate to admit, this fiery sextet play tightly-focussed, unrepentant Norwegian punk n’roll and, by association, require their English-speaking fans to have open minds, open souls and open hearts to make any kind of impact. Thankfully, here at Ave Noctum we do have acolytes of the band and we are determined to absorb all others in our joy-fuelled drunken party that breaks out every time someone slaps on a Man The Machetes track. Is album number two just as fun though?

Yep, it’s a cracking album. The band picks up where Idiokrati left off, with the new tracks whipping along at an equally dizzying pace. With the vocal tightened up and brought to the front of the mix, which coincidentally reduces the impact of the chord power, the whole feels punkier, more visceral. It certainly solidifies their position as bright young things on the scene. It doesn’t hold as many stand-out gems as their startling debut and there isn’t any sign of them experimenting with their established system of riff, chug and adrenaline-coursing roar. And yet it’s still a total mosh.

Going at this from a different angle, let’s analyse what makes the band a tour de force. In a word, it’s the “groove”. With every instrument, driving towards the same end goal, the result is an infectious, rhythmic machine like no other. It starts with the drums and in Per Christian Holm they have a pumping, pistoning machine. He drives everything with a vicious snare strike and an inate aptitude for colourfully patterning the music with cymbal strikes. The other key component is the triple guitar attack of Morton, Erlend and Markus which are layered into the music to give a startling effect of having the chugs and mini-riffs work like ripples as they each bite to the front before fading to the back or over to the left or right ear.

Also, like all good masseurs know, the key is to always retain contact with the intended recipient. Consequently, the songwriting is structured so that whenever the music drops out there is always one finger of instrumentation still tickling the listener at all times. It could be a lone, gutsy bassline, a trickle of cymbal strikes or a bare vocal but the band make sure they are always on it.

Standout moments come with the stepdown in pace to the crawling lead and sweet rock-a-bye riff on “Tung Luft” and with the crafty, constructive forethought that has gone into the humdinger “Orkenmarsj”. It’s still lagging behind their debut when it comes to hooks, raw grunt and staying power but with ever-improving production values this still knows how to throw its weight around. To this end, Av Nag clambers over the writhing bodies of Kvelertak, Feed The Rhino and Cancer Bats to grab at you. Fear not though, these boys don’t want to fight, they want to dance, chant and sing at your side – as comrades in arms.

Also online @ Ave Noctum = http://www.avenoctum.com/2015/09/man-the-machetes-av-nag-indie-recordings/

Album Review: Servers – Leave With Us

In an age when an embattled music industry has sucked up hit after hit, record labels and their artists have found solace in the art of advertising. A brash band t-shirt, a solid tour slot, an enticing line of blurb, one fanatical album review in the right place and a strong social media presence. Any of these things can be the making or breaking of a band these days. With that in mind, you’d honestly believe that the UK trio Servers were rank amateurs. An instantly-forgettable and distinctly internet-unfriendly moniker, a face-concealing “promotional” snap and music video and a few lines of biographical waffle about cults – that’s pretty much it. It’s certainly a back-door approach to self-promotion.


Take a closer look though, because lurking back there in the shadows is an absolute behemoth spouting musical ear-worms that boast grit, melody and muscle. Some groups may mesh a couple of genres together to create something fresh and dynamic – Servers are an octopic rock band with a groping arm in every pie. They are the very definition of the band you simply cannot pigeonhole. Song by song, their chameleonic music takes in grunge, dark rock, screamo, sludge, cult metal, new wave, industrial and punk n’ roll – there are even a few 70s prog touches here and there.

The keystone here is vocalist/guitarist and former GU Medicine frontman Lee Storrar. His “all is lost” melancholics and soaring Jaz Coleman-esque (Killing Joke) throat-ripping wails lock themselves seamlessly onto his portly chugs and wild riffs, but there is solid support from Ant Nettleship’s pounding drums and Lee Wilde’s fizzing bass. This here is a debut album loaded with viperous intent, an intoxicating dark quality and shedloads of melodramatic attack.

Opening with bleak menace, ‘Save Me From Myself‘ is two-parts Cancer Bats and one-part Five Finger Death Punch. It burns with an intense heat and Storrar’s hoarse yelping rises to a scream with the crecendoing chorus whilst the pistoning rhythm rumbles beneath like a detached and hopelessly lost soul. ‘Universes & Supernovas‘ and ‘Run With The Foxes‘ are their two epic firecrackers with vast riffs that will suck you in. Both Foo Fighters-esque in construction and tone, they feature big, sparkly choruses that will aggressively weld themselves to your brain. Wedged between them the intensely gothic, Icicle Works-friendly comedown of ‘Claustrophobia‘ is utterly thrilling and it’s tonal brother, the dark, sultry creature that is ‘King Things‘, is a pulsating beauty with a powerful “breathe in, breathe out” suckerpunch.

‘Mega High‘ ups the ante as Lee Wilde’s fat bass strings combine with Storrar’s buzzing, sludge-flinging guitar to take them powering into Orange Goblin and Fu Manchu territory. This gives licence for the vocal to dial up the snarl and caterwauling as the shit-kicking rock licks come out to play. The joy of the stomp is used to great effect for the raging bluster of the QOTSA-esque ‘Do Gooders‘. Here, their bleak cult ethos that they seem to thrive on adds another more sinister tone to their appeal.

Layered deep enough to give it a potent attack, the strong production also slaps on a slick finish and yet it’s been handled lightly enough to give it real character. Listen closely enough and beneath the power and precision, there is still the odd pop and crackle that bursts forth. No matter which track you shuffle to, there is a resplendent joy prevalent in the construction and an undeniable swagger in the delivery. Here is an album that you sense is alive and breathing. It’s dark purpose may be there in the background but, thankfully, it has not been consumed by it. Rather it stands silently within the crowd, yet with arms open, ready to wrap you in its warm, loving embrace.

When the songwriting is of this kind of quality, there really is no need to go through the standard ritual of self-promotion. If the South Yorkshire trio continue along this path, focusing solely on the creation of the music alone, the rest will simply take care of itself. As their final track clearly points out with its (rather tacked on) spooky soundbite from the “Heaven’s Gate Cult Recruitment Tape” – “The only chance you have to survive is to leave with us”. One listen to this album and you will surely want to follow Servers to the ends of the Earth.

Also online @ Heavy Blog Is Heavy = http://www.heavyblogisheavy.com/2014/01/24/servers-leave-with-us/

Album Review: Axewound – Vultures

The trouble with supergroups is that they don’t tend to last and their shows and material only appear when their multitudinous commitments allow for it. Throw in the point that there is a tendency for their work to be seen as something of a gimmick, or the fact that their sessions together might well receive less than each band member’s full attention, and it’s a wonder how any supergroup ever makes it past the conceptual stage. Just imagine the scheduling nightmare that bands like Down, Them Crooked Vultures or Shrinebuilder must have – getting their shit in order must drive them nuts!

Of course, as consumers, there’s little that compares to the buzz that accompanies the announcement of a new supergroup. Imaginations can run wild at the potential of “this vocal” with “that bass” combined with “those guitars”. Such was the thrill when Axewound were first announced to the public. The concept was always going to live or die on just how well its constituent parts would gel. Throwing Cancer Bats’ Liam Cormier’s screaming punk vocal at Bullet For My Valentine’s Matt Tuck and Glamour Of The Kill’s Mike Kingswood and their carefully-placed shreds and smooth guitar tones was a big risk. Add Rise To Remain bassist Joe Copcutt and Pitchshifter drummer Jason Bowld into the package and you get a lot of eager faces banging at the venue gates and, with debut album Vultures, music shop doors and online windows.

I got a sneak peak at them back in June when they hit the UK’s Download Festival. My expectations for just where this particular collaboration was headed panned out pretty well. They gave us petulant, direct metalcore peppered with cleans and screams all underpinned by hefty double-kick and scattergun fills. The surprise for me with the album, if there was to be any, is the nature of the emotive crooning they decided to actually throw out there. Back then, wedged into a vast tent filled with thousands of people, it didn’t seem so obvious but here, with what is an obscene level of production slapped on it, it sticks out a mile. “Cold”, ugly and unyielding at every turn, and the somber orchestral ballad “Collide” are great examples of songs where the lead and backing vocals work against each other (the line “When these two worlds collide / There’s nothing left to hide” seems particularly apt), and “Post Apocalyptic Party” and “Church Of Nothing” highlight just how easy it is for the slick riffs, chord holds, slimy guitar tones and blasé song construction to suck the fervour out of these songs.

On the flip side, the title-track (featuring an unseemly, tacked-on Synyster Gates’ solo) and the thrashing “Victim Of The System” peel back the varnish and simply rip it. Head-banging, air-guitaring fury from beginning to end. Cormier nails it as the backing vocal stays suppressed to allow him to remain unsweetened. Tracks like this and the hammering drums and skidding strings of the Unearth-esque “Destroy” prove this band could conceivably have a future if they keep away from descending into the more predictable metalcore formulas.

Essentially, with the two main protagonists, Cormier and Tuck, pressing down hardest of all, Vultures (not to be confused with Rise To Remain’s 2012 debut City Of Vultures) is more likely to appeal to the Bullet For My Valentine posse than Cancer Bats fans. If you like disco rhythms to accompany your breakdowns, you’ll probably eat this for breakfast. For anyone who fancies something a little more visceral, slightly anti-establishment and with a handsome degree of integrity (all of which Tuck promised Axewound would be), view this as a project that Tuck needs to “man up or shut up” for or that Cormier needs to ditch in a hurry.

Also online @ The NewReview = http://thenewreview.net/reviews/axewound-vultures