Metal!: Author & Punisher, Sadgiqacea and Hell

On the 25th day of the 12th month of 2012, the Six-Tongued Hellgoat was summoned to arise from the ashes and bring darkness to this place called Popdose. Join him in his quest.

Ritual Thrust into the Profane Maw of Churning Filth

Album: Author & Punisher, Women & Children
Label: Seventh Rule Recordings
Release: June 11, 2013
Genre: Industrial Doom
Rating: 7.5/10

Apart from Nine Inch Nails and random things from KMFDM and Godflesh, the Hellgoat tends to shy away from Industrial music as a whole.  While Author & Punisher certainly has an Industrial element to the sound, a good chunk of it is because of the way he creates the music and maybe that’s why a new A&P album is always a great thing.

If you aren’t familiar, we’re talking one guy – Tristan Shone, who goes into the lab and handcrafts the majority of his instruments and speakers and presents the world with these complex, often evil looking pieces of metal that end up producing the sound you hear on his records.

With each of his first four records, he progressed forward, starting with a lighter sound and eventually getting to Ursus Americanus,  which was eardrum destroying heavy.  The latter was truly his breakthrough as not only was it a fantastic record but he shipped out his instruments and took his amazing, unique show on the road.  As much as the Hellgoat loved Ursus Americanus, the one thing he was worried about was where Author & Punisher would go from there.  Each album had been a progression but that truly seemed like the hardest anyone could make an album.

So, where you do you go if you’re Tristan Shone?  You expand and you write more intricate songs.  If the last record was the punisher part of the moniker, Women & Children is the author.  The songs on this record are more intricate and well-rounded.  Don’t get the Hellgoat wrong as previous songs were great.  But they were heavy.  This seven-track collection is heavy and diverse.  And while Shone has this crazy device he sings into that makes his vocals all fuzzy and machine like, he also uses his own clean vocals a lot on the disc.

The latest sound blends mellower passages and atmosphere with harsh beats from his machines to create a decent middle ground between the styles.  The Hellgoat is still more partial to the earbleeders, like “Fearce” and “Melee” and quite honestly is not a huge fan of his singing voice when he’s not using the machine.  The slow experimental drone track, “Miles From Home” doesn’t fit real well in this mix and the piano driven “Tame As A Lion” is a bit creepy.  Overall though, Author & Punisher takes another step forward with Women & Children in his quest for mechanized world domination.

Below is a video interview from Ground Control Magazine:
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Somnolent Regurgitation of the Scrolls of Proselytism
(The Hellgoat wishes to convert you to the ways of the metal. But he prefers to let the press release and bio do most of the talking on these nefarious black circles.)

Album:  Sadgiqacea, False Prism
Label: Candleight
Release: May 7, 2013
Genre: Doom/Sludge

Press: Formed in 2010, Sadgiqacea (pronounced sad-juh-kay-sha) forge a diverse sonic palette that has been likened at times to Neurosis, Intronaut, Weakling, and Kylesa. Musically and artistically, the band draws from a melting pot of influences that together presents a lush yet tension-filled sound. They call it, ”music for our trodden minds and sodden souls.” Sadgiqacea has performed alongside 40 Watt Sun, Floor, Cough, Weedeater, Fight Amp, Mose Giganticus, ASG, Funeral Pyre, Hull and countless others in their still short history.

The Hellgoat’s Take (9.5/10): The Hellgoat lives with his human handler right outside of Philadelphia, PA where this duo is front and yet he’s never heard of them. Or maybe he has but the name is just so odd that it threw him off. But Sadgiqacea, will be on the radar now. This is a crushingly heavy doom record and at 40 minutes for only 4 songs it’s actually the perfect length to not destroy you completely. A tour with The Body would crumble buildings.

Album: Hell, III
Label: Pesanta Urfolk
Release: June 24, 2013
Genre: Drone-Doom/Black Metal

Press: Is hell a metaphorical place, or a literal one? Where is Hell? Hell currently resides in Salem, Oregon. It is largely the work of one M.S.W. To date, the man has recorded three increasingly expansive full-length albums, always on cassette format. Now, Hell prepares to make that metaphorical place a literal one – or is that vice versa? – with the vinyl edition of his third album, appropriately titled III. Released on vinyl by Pesanta Urfolk in conjunction with the cassette release, Hell’s III canvasses a large swathe of emotional terrain across its two ambitious compositions. A total of 37 minutes playing time, III is both light and shade, weight and weightlessness: from elegiac drone to feral black metal, viscous sludge to autumnal Americana, there and back again, sonic wanderlust riding the deluge, HELL unshackles itself and places the dense ‘n’ demanding burden squarely upon the listener. So, back to the original question: is hell a metaphorical place, or a literal one? Visit III and find out for yourself.

The Hellgoat’s Take (8/10): Released in 2012 on cassette, the Hellgoat is happy III is finally being released on LP. It’s long, drawn out, extremely haunting and also really rewarding if you can deal with the long lengths of the tracks.

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