Sure. But as badass as Montrose and the Haggie-P are, we've also decided that this "badass" term also applies to Nile, Immortal, and Napalm Death. We're digging these records so much more than we ever imagined we could. "How much?" you ask. Why, this much:
Nile -- Annihilation of the Wicked We're gonna steal a line from our bros over at San Fran's aQuarius record shop and say that Nile's six-minute tunes about pharaohs, mummies, and rivers that flow uphill make you "feel like you've been through a desert sandstorm." And how true it is. These songs may start out like straight-up death metal with their ubiquitous blast beats, unintelligible ursine grunts, and riffs so fast they play 'em eight times before you realize they just started another part of the song, but pretty soon you'll realize everything's so well structured that it's making you smarter and more cosmopolitan with each passing minute. Nile's extreme sound never stops bludgeoning your cilia, but their British Museum tour-guide lyrics 'bout centuries of slavery, torture, and half-man half-goofy animal gods will have you acing your Egyptology seminar's midterm exam. We're going all-out and declaring that not only is this record as epic as anything we'll ever own but its impossibly downtuned smiley-EQ'd guitars, brisk roto-toms, and swirling pukey solos will scare your neighbors no matter where you live. Easily worth the Terrorizer hype. And a new disc this summer!
Immortal -- Sons of Northern Darkness We're glad our first foray into black metal was with these guys who seem to be the Duty-est of black metallers. Just look at how ridiculous they are. The facepaint! The Woolworth's pickaxe props and homemade bondage gear! The songs about permafrost, demon spirits, and O's with the lines drawn through 'em! We suspect these Immortal cats are only your kind of black metal band if you're too cool for Dimmu Borgir but not quite cool enough to travel to the Emperor reunion. But there's no reason to turn this into pissing contest when that double-bass is so rad and those thrash metal riffs are so kick-ass. Most of all you have to dig singer Abbath's supremely evil delivery, one that's equal parts sprier Star Wars emperor and less-conniving bridge troll. The way he gutturally moans his way through that part of "In the Kingdom of Cold" that sounds like "in these mountains which I heart" is so much cooler than you'd expect from a line that stupid. And this record's full of it! Words can't even hope to describe the abject humorlessness, heavy metal thunder, and evil purity of the Northern Darkness. Immortal really means it when they write a whole song about the Antarctic ice shelf. They might just kill you if you don't agree. Or at least shriek and shake their studded armbands your way before they obscure the stage with dry ice fog. All hail Immortal, our second favorite band from the Land of the Midnight Sun!
Napalm Death -- Enemy of the Music Business This one gets special mention 'cause it was Napalm's brand new single that put the extreme metal bee in our bonnet in the first place. We think liking the Nappy D's is cool since they're a bunch of pudgy middle-agers who've been putting out albums sure to alienate each and every one of your co-workers for over twenty years. Two decades of shit like this? Amazing. We dig how everything we've heard from Napalm Death is seriously fucking brutal and mean: tracks packed with blue-streak guitar riffs, drum fills, and some guy red-facingly growling at you about social politics and John Peel. This record is no exception: the kind of stuff that makes us redline the Duty roadster and start placing orders from Disinfo and Feral House.
Hey, that's a great idea. We're off to pick up a Choosing Death / Lords of Chaos twofer! Stay tuned.
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