NEXUS: The Paradise Complex

Produced by Geoff Eaton and Dan Grainger

Released: July 2009

Perth's isolation from the rest of Australia has always made exposure to its metal scene difficult, but this same isolation has also made it one of the most remarkable scenes around, one that seems to throw up a disproportionately high number of quality bands. Allegiance, iNFeCTeD, Samain, Karnivool, Voyager, Pathogen and Chaos Divine are just a few of those amongst the cream of the western crop of the last 20 years, and to that list can now be added Nexus.

This death metal four piece has created something that can only be described as a saga, a complete science fiction mythology that even has its own language. With the beginning of the story having being played out on the earlier "Eve of Destruction" EP, The Paradise Complex continues the narrative of Raethe, a starship commander who transforms into an omniscient super entity called LhaArn'dHrr. The elaborate storyline is played out both in the lyrics and as a short story included in the booklet, and accompanied by some fantastic modern technical death metal.

Because this is a concept piece, this plays more like a suite where each track flows into the next, yet each one is distinctive enough that it never becomes monotonous or even predictable. Nexus throw in quirky off-time passages and neck-breaking bursts of technical playing, laced with neat melody lines. Stylistically, the band moves between jazz-inflected mathcore moments and technical grind with plenty of pure death metal in the middle. Occasionally, they get just a little too tricky and sound like they've cut off a riff midway through, which can make it all a bit jarring. The lyrics are heavily detailed and delivered through a voice that is variously a roar and a growl, with some sections in the band's own invented language which reads and sounds like a real language, rather than just a bunch of gibberish. This is no small feat in itself, but Nexus is clearly a band that likes challenges and excels at them.

The Paradise Complex is an amazing album and without doubt one of the best metal releases of this year.

1. The Paradise Complex I: The Reckoning
2. Ultimate Knowledge
3. Genesis
4. The Paradise Complex II: The Reasoning
5. Twelve Minds
6. The War of Thought
7. The Paradise Complex III: The Reawakening
8. LhaArn'dHrr

Rating: 87%

DIVINE HERESY: Bringer of Plagues

Produced by Logan Mader and Lucas Banker

Released: 2009

It's certainly a little bit hard to know exactly what to make of Divine Heresy's latest album. With founder and main driving force Dino Cazares now apparently back with the band that made his name and the controversy that surrounded that sudden turn of events, Bringer of Plagues has virtually fallen by the wayside and should the legal wrangling enveloped around Fear Factory be sorted out in Cazares' favour this may well be the last we hear from Divine Heresy.

Few tears would likely be shed if that turns out to be the case, because while it isn't terrible by any means, Bringer of Plagues doesn't really set the world on fire. The vocals are an uninteresting blend of hardcore rasp and Linkin Park-like clean harmonies and a few of the songs are unremarkable. Indeed, the last one-third of the album is quite weak and of the rest only three really stand out.

Cazares lives up to his reputation as a fiendishly tight rhythm guitar player but as usual his repertoire of riffs is deceptively limited. The phrases he puts together are typically catchy and ripping, especially in the pretty decent opening track, "Facebreaker", but almost every other song is built around some variation of the same pattern. Of course, Dino is such a master at this that he gets away with it; his lead playing on the other hand leaves something to be desired. The few solos he throws about are like stuff even Kerry King would throw away, thin bursts of single-note repetition that sound like they were dropped in late to fill a hole. Tim Yeung's drumming, however, has a colour and swing to it that makes him shine, particularly in "Anarchaos" and the track that follows, "Monolithic Doomsday Devices", both of which --especially the first -- are clear highlights.

In most other respects, though, Bringer of Plagues is rather lacking. Except for "Anarchaos", there's very little of the groove that helped make early Fear Factory so special and Travis Neal's generic metalcore vocals are nothing more than average. This one may be good for a few listens, but anyone looking for something more than a few heavy riffs probably won't find much to hold their interest.

1. Facebreaker
2. The Battle of J. Casey
3. Undivine Prophecies (Intro)
4. Bringer of Plagues
5. Redefine
6. Anarchaos
7. Monolithic Doomsday Devices
8. Letter to Mother
9. Enemy Kill
10. Darkness Embedded
11. The End Begins

Rating: 58%

BRISBANE THRASHED - Issue No. 1

This blog is called The Sound Cellar for a reason. It's a repository for musical goodies (and not so goodies), where they can be brought out and gazed upon in years to come to rekindle some fond memory or other of something. Every now and then, I come upon a true gem, something that really is a rare jewel one doesn't find too often. This is one of those finds.


A little while ago, I was interviewed in The Fallout Magazine and happened to mention that one of my goals is to have a complete archive of Australian metal stuff that I can one day pass on to a museum or something. Shortly after this story appeared, a dude contacted me offering to send me a copy of a video zine he worked on back in the 90s. The early 90s. So of course I told him I wasn't interested, thanks.


Like fuck.


I don't know how many issues of this were made, or how many copies of this issue there were/are, but if I'm ever in the same pub as Walshy I owe him about 100 beers for this. The video may be grainy (this is on VHS) and some of the interview questions a bit cheesy ("When did you form your band, and why?"), but this is pure gold. Brisbane Thrashed is a video zine from 1991 featuring "some of the best underground thrash bands" of the time, including Armoured Angel, Alchemist, Dearly Beheaded and Iron Lightning, as well as some of the more obscure ones like Abhorrent, A.I.M. and the awesomely-named Ewok Zombies From Hell. The interviews are intercut with raw live footage of the various bands playing around Brisbane (or in Abhorent's case, in what looks like someone's front room) and the zine opens with an awesome clip of Armoured Angel playing to a pumped crowd with guys stage-diving everywhere and just going nuts. The interview is a little hard to hear because it seems to have been taped at the venue before they went on so there's a lot of noise around, but at one point Lucy is asked about the future of metal and says something like "It will only get more extreme" which is pretty prophetic considering he's talking in 1991. There are other moments of prescience on display too: the bare-footed and shorts-wearing Alchemist lads are asked if they think they'll still be playing metal at 40... and they are!

Not everything is brilliant though. Hardcore lads A.I.M. seem oblivious to the fact that they are on a video zine for metalheads, making a couple of remarks that all but decry metal in general, including a suggestion that metal bands aren't "political" enough (even though a few minutes earlier, Armoured Angel had basically said that religion is stupid, which is one of the most political comments one can make) while ripping off D.R.I.'s fashion and Minor Threat's music. There's no interview with the Dearly Beheaded lads either, but their musical contribution is a ripper. Apart from occasional lapses in the sound quality though, there isn't a lot to complain about. Brisbane Thrashed was a fun nostalgia trip. Thanks for passing it on, Welshy!

DEVILDRIVER: Pray for Villains

Produced by Logan Mader

Released: 2009

It's taken me a long time to warm to DevilDriver. As one of those who came through the 90s being subjected to the vapidity of Coal Chamber, you could perhaps excuse me for warily steering clear of anything with Dez Fafara's name on it at first. Now four albums in with DevilDriver, Pray for Villains is the heaviest and best thing he's done yet, thoroughly crushing the memories of him as the leader of one of the most reviled of all nu-metal acts.

Of course, with such an enormous personality out front, the rest of the band is often overlooked. While Fafara's vocals snap, snarl and growl his lyrics of retribution and rage, it's the other four guys in DevilDriver who are credited with the musical side. And with the shadow of Fafara's inglorious past always looming over them, DevilDriver has sometimes tried just too hard to bury it. The Last Kind Words was violent and relentless to a point where violence and relentlessness became the be-all and end-all; on Pray for Villains they ease off without toning things down. With Logan Mader at the desk, the band is directly tapping the vein of classic early 90s heavy groove metal. Think the catchy groove stylings of bands like Machine Head, Sepultura and Pantera, who would be proud of tracks like "Back With a Vengeance" and the title track. But this is a remarkably diverse album that also touches base with the Gothenburg-esque elements and the thrashy metalcore they've done before, only better, and occasional injections of punk like in the stomping "Another Night in London". The dual melodies are extremely enjoyable and while the soloing itself isn't particularly spectacular, there are moments like during "In the Cards" where they work really well.

If anything, it is Fafara who is the weak point. His lyrics verge on the simplistic at times and his vocals can be monotonous. That said, this is only a moderate criticism. Pray for Villains is a solid album of heavy, aggressive, catchy modern metal that could well be the precursor of the true genre classic that DevilDriver is yet to make.

1. Pray for Villains
2. Pure Sincerity
3. Fate Stepped In
4. Back With a Vengeance
5. I've Been Sober
6. Resurrection Blvd.
7. Forgiveness is a Six Gun
8. Waiting for November
9. It's in the Cards
10. Another Night in London
11. Bitter Pill
12. Teach Me to Whisper
13. I See Belief

Rating: 82%

DREADNAUGHT LIVE IN SYDNEY

Dreadnaught, Switchblade, Be'lakor, Darker Half, From Winter's Grace
August 8, 2009
Bald Faced Stag Hotel, Leichhardt


When veteran campaigners Dreadnaught announced a Sydney date with a bunch of staunch up n' comers, it was time to once again come out of gig-going hibernation and try to find a parking space in Leichhardt on a Saturday evening to catch a show that held the promise of awesomeness. By the time I arrived, From Winter's Grace had already played and the room was full and vibing greatly to the melodic strains of Darker Half. Tonight was the first time I'd seen them since their early days when they really weren't very good so the change I noticed was stark, if not unexpected considering only one guy is left in the band from back then. While it was new guitarist Brad Dickson's first show with them tonight, the rest of Darker Half have spent much of the year touring and becoming a lean, mean metal machine in the process. Their slick trad/power sound struck the right chord with the crowd which was quite large and eager considering how early it still was.

Melbourne's Be'lakor have been getting all kinds of wraps for their dark noise and tonight was the proof as to why. These days the term "melodic death metal" conjures up images of Swedish metal-gone-lame acts like Soilwork and In Flames and their myriad of clones, but these guys who were scarcely out of nappies when The Red in the Sky is Ours came out go back to its roots and produce a dark, heavy and crushing style like early Dark Tranquillity crossed with the progressive meanderings of Opeth's Morningrise period. Be'lakor might not have moved around as much as the Darker Half lads, but they held the audience just the same with a tight set of great songs with real death metal vocals and not this raspy scream that masquerades as same so much lately. They really are something to check out.

Much like Darker Half, Switchblade has seen some line-ups come and go but it hasn't slowed them down. While Dreadnaught were the deserved headliners, it was no surprise this band drew the biggest crowd. These guys are arguably Sydney's most popular metal act at the moment, and I have never seen them play a bad show. This evening was no exception. On the back of several other high profile shows and a killer new album, Switchblade cut a swathe through the Bald Faced Stag crowd with a high-energy assault of aggressive groove and twin-guitar modern metal that highlighted the choicest cuts off both their albums. Andrew Najdek and Anthony Delvecchio make a formidable guitar partnering and Mat Picco nails everything behind the kit.

Dreadnaught has been under-appreciated in this city for too long, so the brilliant undercard meant they had a really decent crowd when they unleashed "Tattooed Tears". A few people may have left by then, but more fool them. With former bassist Squiz making a special appearance on behalf of an injured Ando tonight, the Naughties tore through their latest album in its entirety, omitting only the acoustic tracks and replacing them with a trilogy of earlier songs with the same level of venom as their newies. Just like the band to precede them, Dreadnaught are always awesome and explosive live, Greg Trull the angry, tortured front man, Richie and Damon trading melody lines and carving out catchy rock-inflected riffs while up the back drummer Racca rolls out the beats effortlessly. By the end of the set they had the crowd wanting more, and only finished up because Squiz "didn't know anymore songs" but they had rounded out the night with a devastating performance that may well have gotten though to the Sydney fans at last.

Dreadnaught set list:

• Tattooed Tears
• The Push
• Save Your Life
• Collapse
• More Than One Way
• Agony/Ecstasy
• Dead in the Dirt
• 10x the Pain
• Twist the Knife
• The Game
• The Gobbler
• Buried