The Bullet Belt

Download: MegaKematian - T1gab3las.

2011-10-26T01:46:00.000+08:00

1- Wah, betapa lama tidak mengemas kini blog ini. Walau apa pun, saya ingin maklumkan kepada semua bahawa Megadeth telah pun menerbitkan album studio ke tiga belas mereka yang bertajuk Th1rt3en. Sekiranya anda meminati bunyi yang terdapat pada album sebelum ini, Endgame, maka saya pasti anda akan meminati bunyi didalam album terbaru Dave Mustaine dan rakan-rakan ini. Bukan sekadar bunyi, malah kandungan lagu-lagunya seolah olah sama. Seolah-olah setiap lagu didalam album ini merupakan second part untuk setiap lagu lagu yang ada didalam End Game.

2- Album ini dibuka dengan intro untuk lagu Sudden Death . Seperti End Game album ini dibuka dengan duel diantara Mustaine dan Broderick. Lagu yang direka khusus untuk Guitar Hero ini boleh saya simpulkan sebagai violent dan seperti mana lagu pertama didalam album End Game, solo-solo kecil diselit dan dibiarkan bergelimpangan dimerata tempat seperti bayi bayi kecil yang dibuang. Chorus lagu ini cukup bermelodi dan mengingatkan saya kepada Hangar 18 dari album Rust In Peace.

3- Saya kira ramai yang sudah mendengar lagu Public Enemy #1 yang sudah tersebar luas di Youtube. Lagu ini juga sudah pun di mainkan di persembahan-persembahan live mereka. Whose Life (is it anyway?) pula terlalu mendatar dan kedengaran biasa sahaja bagi saya kecuali riff gitar pada bahagian chorus yang agak mencengkam.

4- Sekiranya ingin mendengar sound Megadeth yang klasik maka lagu We The People adalah lagu yang perlu anda dengar. Riff bergelimpangan. Manakala lagu Guns, Drugs and Money pula mempunyai riff yang menarik yang diulang-ulang sehingga ke akhir lagu. Lagu Never Dead yang menyusur selepasnya adalah satu lagi lagu yang saya anggap sebagai violent dan sedikit dark.

5- New World Order kedengaran biasa sahaja dengan riff utama adalah riff klasik Mustaine. Fast Lane merupakan sebuah lagu yang laju dipadatkan dengan permainan double paddle Shawn Drover. Black Swan pula cukup bermelodik dan agak poppish. Sebuah lagu yang sedikit radio friendly. Wrecker pula bakal menjadi crowd favorite untuk dimainkan semasa live. Millenium of the Blind pula sebuah lagu perlahan yang agak membosankan tetapi liriknya mengenai politik.

6- Saya menyukai lagu seterusnya iaitu Deadly Nighstshade kerana riff pada verse nya agak uptempo dan sangat sesuai untuk headbang tanpa henti selama 4 minit dan 56 saat. Satu lagi lagu yang sesuai dan boleh dijadikan crowd favorite. Lagu terakhir bertajuk 13. Sekiranya anda meminati feel pada lagu In My Darkest Moment, maka anda akan suka lagu ini.

DOWNLOAD

Interview: In Torment.

2011-08-05T00:00:00.000+08:00

In Torment

How are you and In Torment these days?

Im fine here thank you. About IN TORMENT, not so well now. We've been re-formating members and as for now, the only commited members is just me and Bai Grinder.

Can you please brief the readers about the formation of In Torment, the current line up and the releases so far? Any new materials that we can expect in the near future?
I think we started around 2001, jamming and so. we start as a death metal band. before, all ov us originally from Kota Bharu, Kelantan. after years ov surviving and line-up changes, the last show consist ov me and Kemma (guitars) from KB, Bai Grinder (drums) from Shah Alam and Devoured (Vox/Bass) from Singapore. Due to commitments and so, now it is only me and Bai Grinder. we release couple ov demo's and promo's. included in some compilations but no albums so far. looking forward to do so in near future.

In Torment plays fast, intense brutal death metal. Why this genre? What made In Torment different from other brutal death metal bands?

Brutal death metal now falls into more variety ov sub-genres. i dont consider it brutal death metal in any way. we just play death metal with more blasting and faster riffs because we like it. the term extreme is far more linear to us. many bands nowadays plays far more intensely brutal than us. they used to label Krisiun, Nile a brutal death metal band but not anymore and now Disgorge and Defeated Sanity are. with a lot ov sub-genres goin on, people cant really define what is brutal death metal nowadays.

You guys have been playing shows all over malaysia. Hows the acceptance of the audience so far?
We dont give a damn about the acceptance ov the audience. we play what we want to play. we dont play just to please others. if its only two people came forward at our shows, hell yeahhh!! we've been thru everything ever since. mineral bottle thrown at us, middle fingers, we dont give a damn! punk show, indie shows, private party, formal gatherings, metal shows, bike week shows, we play it all.

The heavy metal scene back in Kota Bharu Kelantan is developing rapidly. Can you name any good new bands from Kelantan thats worth checking? I know those Horrified dudes plays this awesome metal with a bit of rocknroll riffs here and there.
Yup, its good to hear some potential bands from Kota Bharu mainly and yes, Kelantan formally. lots ov bands everyone needs to check out! DARKREGIME, INCARCERATE, SLAUGHTERSOUL, OMEN, SACRED IMPIRIUM, POLONG, and so on. and yes, HORRYFIED is a good metal band. i think they play metal+some metalcore as well in their veins. junior crowds envy them in every shows. its great.

If I got my facts right, you got a metal shop back in kota bharu? Any possibilities for other local bands to send their materials for your shop? If so, how can they do that?
Hahaha. no more metal shop for now. its a long story. u can guess it out I think. People dont buy metal stuff at metal shops nowadays. They prefer buying it online.

Any last shout outs man? How can the readers contact In Torment?
Thanx to u for this short interview. to all who believe in our existence, we salute u. for those who want to contact us, just hit us at http://www.facebook.com/intorment.malaysia or maybe hit me directly at http://www.facebook.com/rimie.tormenized. cheers!!!

Interview: Kazanna.

2011-08-02T00:03:00.004+08:00

Kazanna

Assalamualaikum and hello. May I know who is answering the questions?

Waalaikumsalam Hafeez. Salam 1 Malaysia.This is Amar and thank you for having the interest to interview Kazanna.

Can you please brief the readers on the history of Kazanna?

Kazanna was formed and conceived in late 2010. All current members of Kazanna were actually former members of another band called Pasca Tragedy, a Shah Alam (Selangor) band playing power/gothic metal. Due to some unfortunate reasons, Pasca Tragedy was dissolved and from its ashes, we formed Kazanna. Kazanna plays Symphonic Metal exclusively, a kind of music where not many Malaysian bands dare to thread. We took this opportunity to introduce this genre to the local metal audience. Kazanna's current line up are Rezal on the drums, Fiza on vocals, Jack on bass guitar and Amar on guitar.

Kindly brief us a bit about Kazanna's awesome debut EP, Will of Heroes.

Will of Heroes EP was released on May 1st 2011 during the KL Metal Camp 4 gig which was held at One Cafe recently. This EP contains 5 songs plus 2 arrangement scores as bonus tracks. The title of the EP was chosen based on a song of ours called Will of Heroes. This song was about a sacred will made to his friends, by a hero. The guitars, basses and keys were recorded at my home studio while the rest were recorded in various studios all over Klang Valley. Most of our songs were about war, peace, love and the world in general.

Who orchestrated the awesome orchestral arrangements? To be honest, I was very impressed with the arrangements and honestly felt that it gave a grandiose and epic feel to your songs.

The arrangements were all done by me. My deep fascination with full scale symphonic orchestra and scores in all those epic films led me to learn how to compose those sort of sound through myriad of researches and videos on the internet. But on a personal note, I think there are still so much more to learn and improve. For the next release, hopefully a more mature orchestral sound and arrangement shall be produced.

Did you ever use any pre recorded music for live shows?

Of course we used those pre recorded orchestra as our backing track for live shows, you know, in the likes of bands such as Edenbridge, Unsun and Epica. We have yet to have a capable keyboardist to do all those orchestra sound live. (editor- Its too bad that I only knew how to arrange those sounds via computer softwares, or else you would be holding my resume in your hands right now, mate haha).

Ever thought of experimenting with Bahasa Melayu (Malay Language)? I seriously believe that it will definitely help push the band to a more mainstream audience.

We are still in the process of producing some songs in Malay language to penetrate the mainstream market although the process to properly amalgamate the language with this sort of genre is still in its infancy. We are still in the midst of doing a thorough reasearch process in order to produce something more suitable for the radio airplays. (editor- Well, Malaysian are suckers for good pop melodies and hooks, figure that one out and I can guarantee, you will be able to garner and generate excitement and interest for the band. Although all the limelight will most probably go to your hot front women. Thats Malaysia for you mate, pffftt)

Whats your future plan? How can the buyers buy a copy of Will of Heroes?

As of current we are busy working on our new songs for our full lenght. We hope that there will more people who would want to invite us for shows. You can buy Will of Heroes EP via our facebook, www.facebook.com/kazannaofficial. Just leave a message on our facebook wall and we shall inform you the details. We will be selling the record at our shows.

Bands: Kazanna.

2011-07-30T00:00:00.000+08:00

1- While I am writing this, I am feeding my ears to Kazanna, a local symphonic metal band and guess what, they're awesome. I have stopped listening to symphonic stuff a long long time ago because lotsa bands of that genre tend to produce lame pop melodies. For me, if you wanna go symphonic, the one word that you should keep in mind is EPIC. Not many bands can capture that epic and grandiose sound. Why settle for fucking pop hooks if you got one whole orchestra backing you up.

KAZANNA

2- Now, this band, Kazanna, a local band, got me really fucking stoked. Seriousfuckingly. Will Of Heroes is their debut EP containing 7 epic hymns that've managed to shake the core out of my symphonic metal judgmentalism. I almost brush these guys out from my radar due to the typical name. I was like, who the fuck calls themselves this? But I gave my curiosity a try. The intro to the Will of Heroes EP nearly blew me off my fucking chair. The orchestral arrangements were crazy and it sounded awesomely epic.


Kazanna - Will of Heroes EP

3- When a metal band uses clean vocals and melodic singing, the first thing that I will want to appreciate is the vocal melodies. If you are unable to compose good melody lines for the vocals, then in you go into my bottomless dustbin. But the vocal lines for Will Of Heroes were very very good especially the melodies for Love Sophistry. The one line harmony was perfectly done. One kudos point there. The only problem I got with the vocals is that it was a bit low in the mix. I was unable to make out what the hell was the singer was singing. The singer needs to improve on the pronounciation. Although operatic sopranos are not really my cuppa tea, but strong words are.

4- The guitar sound is very solid but the bass was a bit low in the mix. The orchestral arrangements were perfectly mixed and the scores were pretty tight, grand, epic and compelling. The pianos were crazy and being a piano enthusiast my self (although I cant play) I appreciate the effort. The drum was perfectly mixed with the bass drums were a bit high in the mix but I guess it served its purpose of pushing the songs forward with its speed. There is a simple but functional solo in Never Ending Epic which I really like.

5- All in all, Kazanna is a very very promising Malaysian band. And hopefully with all the good words I've put into reviewing their stuff, I will be lucky enough to date the singer. Haha. Check them out if you like Nightwish and Within Temptation. I seriously recommend this. If you wanna try a Malaysian brand of sumphonic metal and I suggest you go out and look for this.

KAZANNA at Facebook.

KAZANNA at ReverbNation

Download: Mistik - Airmata Sesalan.

2011-07-27T00:00:00.000+08:00

Mistik - Airmata Sesalan

Tracklist:
1- Airmata Sesalan
2- Her... Return I
3- Her... return II (Those Forbidden Art)
4- Voice of Misery
5. Perjanjian Syaitan (Instrumental)

Mistik: EncMetallum | Myspace

Name: Air Mata Sesalan EP
Label: Psychic Scream Production
Size: 28.1 mb
Year: 1999
Band: Mistik.
Genre: Black Metal
Country: Penang, Malaysia.

DOWNLOAD
Password: malaysianmetal

Download: Zubirun - Maximum Hell Overdose.

2011-07-24T00:00:00.005+08:00

Zubirun - Maximum Hell Overdose.

Tracklist:
1- Intro
2- My Vision 2 Killz
3- Al Masikh Ad Dajjal
4- Ketaksuban Ilmu Hitam
5- Outro

Zubirun: EncMetallum

Name: Maximum Hell Overdose EP
Label: North Poem Records
Size: 25.9 mb
Year: 2002
Band: Zubirun.
Genre: Thrash / Black Metal
Country: Perak, Malaysia.

DOWNLOAD
pw: malaysianmetal

Rants: A Cromok Reunion Show? A new album?

2011-07-22T16:14:00.000+08:00

There’s no need for Cromok fans to hold their breath or to wait on needles and pins. Yes, the metal juggernaut will grind its wheels soon enough with a reunion show planned later this year. And it’s not just one of those nostalgia gigs, but one with a new album to back it. -The Star July 22, 2011.

I am a pre Hillary Cromok fanboy and I had just wet my pants!

more HERE

Rants: Metal Thrashing Mad.

2011-07-22T00:00:00.078+08:00

1- I'm bored. I'm sitting here in my room at the office, got nothing to do but for my continuous failblog visits. Gotta keep abreast with the current and rampant development of internet memes, you know, for the lulz. Ok, whats happenin out there? Let us see.

2- Anthrax will be releasing their latest long overdue album, Worship Music, somewhere in September. You can actually go and listen to one of the songs on youtube which was made available for download recently. Fight Em Til You Cant was the title of the song and the lyrics dealt with zombie fighting. Good ol' humor filled Anthrax. I am excited because this will be the first Anthrax album featuring my favorite Anthrax singer, the ever goofy Joey Belladonna since Persistence of Time album.

3- Megadeth has announced the title of their 13th studio album. And the album title? TH1RTE3N. What the fuck was that all about. The title sucks, Mustaine, change it. This album will feature David "Junior" Ellefson since The World Needs a Hero in 2002.

4- You know, thrash metal bands from the 80's have been releasing pretty good albums recently (well, except Metallica but at least their kinda back with their old thrashy riffs even though the quality of the sound sucked big time). Megadeth's Endgame was one of my favorite album to spin, Testament's Formation of Damnation was really, really good, Overkill's Iron Bound was really, really good, Sodom's In War And Pieces was exceptionally well written (the album that Metallica should've recorded), Heathen's The Evolution of Chaos was good. Man everything seems to be good and well in Planet Thrash.

5- Hopefully we will be able to see more good albums from these bands in the future (well except Metallica).

6- Corey Taylor of Slipknot wrote a book called Seven Deadly Sins. Not interested. Next. Remember the all girl metal band, Kittie? They will be releasing their sixth album titled "Ive Failed You" somewhere in August. My all time favorite heavy drinkin, cheast beatin, muscle buildin, harley ridin band like of all time, Manowar is still recording they long awaited new album titled "Hammer of the Gods". Damn DeMaio, whats taking you so fucking long? Oh yeah, Bruce Dickinson received an honorary doctorate from Queen Mary University, London. Congrats Dr.Dick. Apa lagi? Ah yes, Post Mike Portnoy Dream Theater will be releasing an album with their new ever humble drummer Mike Mangini.

7- Fuckin kewl!

Download: Catarrh - Nightflight.

2011-07-21T00:00:00.000+08:00

Catarrh - Nightflight

Tracklist:
1- Crawling Over The Roof
2- Nightflight
3- Big Mountain
4- Horrifying Scream From The Rubber Estate

Catarrh: EncMetallum

Name: NightFlight EP
Label: Independent
Size: 31 mb
Year: 1996
Band: Catarrh.
Genre: Death Metal
Country: Pahang, Malaysia.

DOWNLOAD
pw: malaysianmetal

Rants: New Releases.

2011-07-19T13:15:00.000+08:00

1- Malaysia The Darkness Production is one of the few newer independent label in Malaysia. The latest release from MTD production as far as I am aware of is a demo CD from a band called The Temerity, a black metal foursome from the island of Penang. You can browse Facebook for Malaysia The Darkness or MTD production page and book the demo there.

2- The words in the flyer actually says, and I translate: The Temerity - Khayalan Syaitan Demo ("Satan's lust" in Malay), a demo from a band from Penang playing Eastern Black Death Metal. The demo contains 4 original songs and the lyrics were entirely in Malay. The price is RM6 a pop and the production is limited to 66 copies only. Book yours now, people.

Download: Indamnation - Black Guard.

2011-07-18T00:00:00.003+08:00

Indamnation - Black Guard

Tracklist:
1- Diurnal Occurance
2- Betrayal
3- Never Ending Pain
4- Blackguard

Indamnation: EncMetallum

Name: Black Guard EP
Label: DreamWorldDecay Production
Size: 44.3 mb
Year: 1998
Band: Indamnation.
Genre: Death Metal
Country: Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia.

DOWNLOAD
Password: malaysianmetal

Download: Cryptic Malediction - Insanity To Berzerk.

2011-07-15T01:56:00.001+08:00

Tracklist:
1- As My Shadow Withers
2- Insanity To Berzerk
3- Audiam
4- Enigmatic Dirge
5- Selfless Soul
6- Warriors of the Sand

Cryptic Malediction: MySpace | EncMetallum

Name: Insanity To Berzerk EP
Label: Ultra Hingax Production
Size: 78.0 mb
Year: 1998
Band: Cryptic Malediction.
Genre: Death Metal
Country: Selangor, Malaysia.

DOWNLOAD
Password: malaysianmetal

Download: Deep - Buried Beneath And Forgotten.

2011-07-12T00:00:00.005+08:00


Deep - Buried Beneath & Forgotten

Tracklist:
1- Buried Beneath & Forgotten
2- Through The Deep
3- Between Life And Lifeless

Name: Buried Beneath & Forgotten Demo
Label: Independent
Size: 15.7 mb
Year: 2011
Band: Deep
Genre: Black Metal / Depressive / Melancholic
Country: Kelantan, Malaysia.

DOWNLOAD
Password: malaysianmetal

Download: Purnamwulan - The Full Moon Over The Kliwon.

2011-07-09T15:52:00.001+08:00

Tracklist:
1- Prologue
2- My Bride of Silence
3- The Hidden of the Mystical Path
4- Seropoh Sombrong Mabhur

Purnamwulan: Website | EncMetallum

Name: The Full Moon Over The Kliwon Demo
Label: Independent
Size: 20.6 mb
Year: 1997
Band: Purnamwulan.
Genre: Black Metal / Eastern Metal
Country: Perak, Malaysia.

DOWNLOAD
Password: malaysianmetal

Download: Arkhaytul Mayt - Evening Flight.

2011-07-06T00:00:00.002+08:00

ARKHAYTULMAYT - Evening Flight Demo [1999]

Tracklist:
1- Evening Flight
2- Apparition in the Forest of Archaic
3- Pusaka of the Lord of Forestry
4- Just The Beginning

Arkhaytul Mayt: Website | EncMetallum

Name: Evening Flight Demo
Label: Independent
Size: 17.5 mb
Year: 1999
Band: ArkhaytulMayt.
Genre: Black Metal / Eastern Metal
Country: Selangor, Malaysia.

DOWNLOAD
Password: malaysianmetal

Rants: Eastern Metal.

2011-07-03T13:31:00.001+08:00

1- Hello there. I am writing this in the accompaniment of the tracks from Versailles, a Japanese speed/classical metal band and God, they are awesome. If you like highly melodic classical stuff, crazy shreds and riffs with modern baroque operatic baritone-esque vocals, then I suggest you try this crazy cross dressing (they call it Visual Kei, its more style then a genre) band. Be sure not to fap over the guitarists cute face, because the last time i checked he is still a guy.

2- If you recognize Florida for its Death Metal (Morbid Angel, Death, Deicide), Bay Area for its Thrash Metal (Metallica, Anthrax, Exodus), Gothenberg for its Melodic Death Metal (In Flames, At The Gates, Dark Tranquility), Norway in general for its regiments of Black Metal bands (Mayhem, Burzum, Dark Throne) then it is only fair that you should recognize this small country of ours called Malaysia with our own brand of metal called Eastern Metal.

3- I know that the name is kinda generic and cheesy and I too understand that Eastern is subjective, but there is nothing that I can do about it. If it was up to me to name the genre, I would have called it a much more awesome name like Malayan Metal. Ok, that too sounded lame. Who cares anyway. What about Barbaric Malayan Metal? Awesome? No? Fuck you.

4- What ever it is, Eastern metal (bare with me guys, stop complaining, fuckheads) was an original concept coming out of the shores of Malaysian waters. I do not know who coined the term Eastern Metal but my number one suspect was Langsuyr's Eastern Cruelty EP which was released in 1996 but I might be wrong since I base my suspicion solely on the term Eastern in Eastern Cruelty.

5- Malaysia back then, like most country in the South East region of Asia in the likes of Indonesia, Philippine, Singapore and Thailand, was a country highly blanketed by Malay mysticism, shamanism and black magic. Although due to the rampant progress of technology, modern mindsets and the widespread of Islam, these ancient tradition, rituals and practices were reduced, ignored and almost forgotten. Almost.

6- But you can still witness these elements in the form of traditional dances of the Malays. The ritualistic royal theater of Mak Yong and medicinal therapy of Main Puteri in Kelantan, the ritual calming of the spirit of the seas in Ulek Mayang in Terengganu, the theatrical battle dance of Kuda Kepang in Johor, just to name a few, are the instances of mystical elements that were still practiced nowadays although for a new different reason altogether. It is also a fascinating to point out that some Malay rulers (Sultans) still adhere to some of these ancient rituals. The ritual of Beting Beras Basah practiced by the Sultans of Perak is one good example.

7- But for me, the more important learning experience behind all these ancient practice of mysticism was not only in regards of its mystic and magic, but the legend, myth and rich history of the vikings of the orient. the ancient seafarers of an ethnic called the Malays, the main ethnic inhabiting the Malay Archipelago since time immemorial. Before I keep on ranting about the history of the Malays here, it is better if I stay on course. Eastern Metal, damn it, Eastern Metal.

8- Musically, Eastern Metal is basically an amalgamation of local dark musical folk riffs and extreme metal especially Black Metal. I dont know but Black Metal seems to suit the unification of these elements, musically and lyrically. The first band that did this (incorporate local folk music into extreme metal) was Cromok in an intro of one of their more famous song from their debut demo, Image of Purity, called Metallurgical back in 1990. It is also important to note that another local seminal thrash band called Freedom Thats Gone (FTG) did also incorporate a local classic musical style called Keroncong in their song titled Kill The Evil from their first EP in 1991 but thats a different discussion altogether.

9- But it was not Cromok who developed the music. The band just paved the way musically. It was a Singaporean Black Metal band called As Sahar that started to champion the mysticism of the Malays lyrically and developed the music into a distinct sound of Eastern Metal with their 1995 demo, Santau (voodoo-ish sort of magic) which was later released by a Malaysian record label called Nebiula Productions in the form of a 4 song EP called Meditation Embun Pagi, in the same year.

10- With song titles such as Stroll in Kafan (pieces of white linen with which Muslims wrap their dead with), basically a song about a Malay ghost called Pocong, and Santau Tuju Angin (Wind Voodoo would be an appropriate term to define it), As Sahar started to develop a lyrical theme and sets of distinctive Javanese based riffs that would later form the basic idea of what would later be known as Eastern Metal.

11- That legendary release, Meditation Embun Pagi by As Sahar, was soon followed by another legendary release by a local legendary band called Langsuyr/Ryusgnal (forest banshee in Malay with the latter being the same moniker spelled backwords, eery), in the form of a 4 song EP called The Eastern Cruelty. It was during this time that Eastern Metal was recognized as a genre.

12- As Sahar continued the eastern metal path with their debut LP called Phenomistik which was released in 1998 while Langsuyr contributed 2 songs in the same vein of Eastern Cruelty for a local compilation called Ipoh Metal Militant: Supremacist.

13- By then dozens of bands started being fascinated with the newly discovered genre. Alongside As Sahar and Langsuyr, other important bands that dwelt with Eastern Metal were Tasyim, Arkhaytul Mayt, Purnamwulan, Kharabanazak, Atrocious, Larrong or the newer ones in the likes of Singhasari and Polong. It is also important to note that even though most of the mentioned bands played either Black Metal or Death Black Metal musically, there were other bands which managed to incorporate Malayan myths and mysticism without the distinctive Eastern Metal sound such as Cryptic Malediction (death metal), Sil Khannaz (dare i say Progrockdeath?) and Uprising (folk metal). Worth checking them out.

Top 5 Most Influential Malaysian Metal Album of All Time : CROMOK - Forever In Time.

2011-06-28T19:17:00.003+08:00

Behold! Number 1 on the list of top 5 most influential Malaysian metal album of all time.

CROMOK - Forever In Time

Undeniably, this is, at least for us here at TheBulletBeltBlog, the numero uno most influential heavy metal record from Malaysia, Cromok's second album Forever In Time. Whether you like the band or not, it is an undeniable and difficult to dispute fact that without this album, which was released by EMI back in 1993, a lot of people would remain stuck with radio oriented hard rock for the rest of their lives, if not eventually turning into some disc hangin' jumpsuit wearin' YoYo sayin' rap aficionado.

Everybody knew the name and almost everybody knew the songs from this album, metalhead or no metalhead, especially the infamous "Another You" and "I Dont Belong Here". Cromok's brand of asiatic + oriental Thrash Metal comprises of aggressive and extremely heavy but yet very soothing asiatic melodic riffs, long and emotional guitar solos (harmonic most of the time) from Karl, semi growl vocals (whispery at times) by Sam and excruciatingly fast drum beats with crazy double paddle play through out each of their songs courtesy of Miji. The clear and professional production helps too.

Thus there you go, our top five all time most influential heavy metal records from Malaysia.

Top 5 Most Influential Malaysian Metal Album of All Time : SIL KHANNAZ - Gerbang Kayangan

2011-06-26T01:10:00.003+08:00

TheBulletBelts takes a look at 5 most important and highly influential metal albums from Malaysia. Here is number 2.

SIL KHANNAZ - Gerbang Kayangan

They started as a violently heavy straight to your face death metal band back in the early demo and first abum days but this album departed altogether from their previous genre and head towards a new realm of progressive heavy metal with growling vocals. What made this album stood out was the fact that it was their first album with malay lyrics in the full. The lyrics themselves, mainly revolved around the history of Merong Mahawangsa, the history of Kedah (a northern state of Malaysia, rich with history) and a bit on the epic tales from Mahabharata, were creative inclusion of ancient malay royal language of Sanskrit and modern malay. This album introduced Sil Khannaz to a new and younger audience and at the same time upsetting their original fans which were left dazed for not being able to make out the reason behind the controversial departure of their favorite death metal band. But everybody eventually accepted this album as a classic Eastern Metal album nonetheless.

Top 5 Most Influential Malaysian Metal Album of All Time : LANGSUYR - Occultus Mysticism / Eastern Cruelty.

2011-06-24T22:37:00.000+08:00

TheBulletBelts takes a look at 5 most important and highly influential metal albums from Malaysia. Here is number 3.

Langsuir - Occultus Mysticism

LANGSUIR - Occultus Mysticism/Eastern Cruelty.

The pioneer of Malay influenced metal. What made this blackened death metal (in my honest opinion, come on, you guys even used corpse paints once) band got listed in this top 5 most influential metal records of all time according to TheBulletBelt was their originality. Amalgamating malay folk lores and shamanism in their lyrics, the potential of which was never really explored thoroughly at that point of time or since.

Langsuir - The Eastern Cruelty

When most Malaysian metalheads at that time were too occupied bashing false religion and dragons, these guys came out and talked about Pawangs (Malay withdoctor/shaman), Malay ghosts and local folklores and managed to kick all the goat worshippers in the nuts. Armed with a very distinctive dual lead guitar riffs arrangement intertwining harmonically courtesy of 2 riffmasters, Azmaniac and Bentara, and a very unique vocal delivery by Azlanthor, Occultus Mysticism stood out as one of the best professionally recorded demo at that time and the Eastern Cruelty EP without any shadow of a doubt paved the way for a new genre all together, which came out to be known today as Eastern Metal.

Top 5 Most Influential Malaysian Metal Album of All Time : SUFFERCATION - Days of Darkness.

2011-06-22T22:28:00.003+08:00

TheBulletBelts takes a look at 5 most important and highly influential metal albums from Malaysia. Here is number 4.

SUFFERCATION - Days of Darkness.

This band definitely earned their place as one of the most influential band in Malaysia and their debut album, being the first death metal band to record a proper album back in the days, is without a doubt opened lots of eyes. They blew a lot of minds with this album. Heavy, aggressive and straigtforward old school (not at that time of course) death fucking metal. Everybody was like "wow you can actually record this type of music here". Everything was scary with this album. The cover depicted coffin carrying corpse and a bloodied terrifying looking logo. Nothing more death metal than that my friends. A lot of metal maniac nowadays admitted that they were actually unable to handle the heaviness of this album. It was too fucking heavy then and it remains one of heaviest metal record of all time.

Top 5 Most Influential Malaysian Metal Album of All Time : HERRIOT - Celestial Obelisk

2011-06-20T22:10:00.006+08:00

Besides being influenced, most of the time, musically and rarely, attitude wise by international heavy metal bands from all around the world, there were a few heavy metal records of diverse genre, which in my book, that can be considered as highly influential towards the development of the Malaysian heavy metal scene in general. It was these heavy metal masterpieces that, in my opinion, helped develop and mold the Malaysian heavy metal scene to be what it is today. Opinion may vary, but this is my list of top 5 most influential Malaysian heavy metal record. We start with number 5:

HERRIOT - Celestial Obelisk

Try and ask any Malaysian Metalcore bands nowadays what their influenced are, amongst all that crappy American new wave of heavy metal bands in the likes of Lamb of God, Avenged Sevenfold and what not, they will definitely mention Herriot, a local melodic death metal hero that may had been born in a wrong country, as one of their main influence. Celestial Obelisk EP was one of the most important heavy metal album in Malaysia, introducing Gothenberg melodic death metal to the local audience. As any In Flames, Dark Tranquility or Soilwork earlier albums, this 4 song EP was filled with dual guitar harmonies and innocent crunchy riffs scattered all over the place, while the vocals delivers a passionate and angry wrathful screaming growls. A hell of a release.

Bands: Goda / Zarquum Split Tape.

2011-06-17T00:00:00.000+08:00

Click for a larger view.

1- I used to review and promote Zarquum here in this blog. And when was that? Last year. You can go and read the entry HERE. Well, after one year long over fucking due, they have finally able to release the split that I was talking about in my previous post about them.

2- For your information, Zarquum (Technical Death Metal) and GODA (melodic death metal) consists mainly the same key individuals. Most probably wanting to try something new and different with each band, i guess. But it's worth the try man. I have always been impressed with Zarquum anyway.

3- What ever it is, the split release is called The Cryptic Aesthetic and it contains 6 songs, 3 from each bands respectively. If you are interested (and you should), do not hesitate to drop a bomb at farbeyondz@gmail.com or SMS to 016-8563002 to find out how to obtain a copy of the split.

Books: Hello Me Meet The Real Me: Mustaine - A Life in Metal.

2011-06-15T23:46:00.003+08:00

Hello Me Meet The Real Me: Mustaine - A Life in Metal by Dave Mustaine and Joe Layden.

Title: Hello Me Meet The Real Me: Mustaine - A Life in Metal
Authors: Dave Mustaine & Joe Layden.
Publisher: Harper Collins Publishing.
Additional Information: Hardcover, 346 Pages, RM 96.90, Kinokuniya Bookstore Kuala Lumpur.

1- I was super excited when I first heard that Mustaine will be writing and releasing his memoir and when it was released, I waited patiently for the book to hit the local shelves. When it did, I went to my favorite bookstore to purchase a copy of the book just to find out that it was sold out. Fuck! I guess Malaysians love their Megadeth. I got my copy only a few weeks later. It was never too late to enjoy a good dose of Dave Mustaine's arrogance in my book.

2- Let us move on to the contents of the book. It was written from a first person point of view thus you will have Mustaine narrating everything from top to bottom. The contents were divided into 17 chapters with the first two dealt with his background, his family and his early interest in music and guitar. 3 chapters were dedicated to his life when he was in Metallica and eventually ended up until he was booted out from the band. The rest of the book was about his revenge seeking in the form of Megadeth, rotating band members and his drug addiction.

3- Reading the book (and a couple more books on the history of hard rock and heavy metal) and from being an avid fan for so long, I just could not help but summarize that with out Mustaine, thrash metal would not be as it is today. Everybody recognize that the genre was pioneered by Metallica and of course there were more than a dozen guitar virtuosos that came after him in the likes of Scott Ian of Anthrax and Kerry King of Slayer, but it was Mustaine's furious guitar playing in No Life Till Leather that molded the basic template for thrash riffs in the 80's.

4- This is definitely a must.

Rants: Books On Malay Heavy Metal?

2011-06-10T07:33:00.015+08:00

1- How many books you think we have out there which deals with the Malaysian heavy bands or scene in general? None. Zilch. Nada. Why? Because Malaysians lack the interest to put things on record. "On record" here refers to readable materials i.e. books. Which is kinda pathetic and sad at the same time.

2- There are of course a few pages dedicated to Malaysian heavy metal in some magazines here and there but come on. 30 years of heavy metal in a couple of glossy pages, which most of the time, were not even written by heavy metal enthusiasts, is not enough. Mr. Abdul Aziz Ittar, you sir, need to do something about this.

3- Man, the history of Malaysian heavy metal is indeed a colorful and dramatic one and i bet that it would easily fit at least in a few hundred pages worth of readable materials. Why we Malaysians does not find it necessary to record it all in a proper book remains a mystery to me. Maybe due to the lack of interest to read.

4- If legendary Malaysian bands in the likes of Search, Wings and Cromok or even Sil Khannaz were formed in the United States, I bet there would be at least 4 or 5 books detailing the history of the band. Metallica alone have at least 4. The Beatles got hundreds of them. I believe that it will definitely sell at least couple of thousand copies if not more.

5- I found out just recently that Sweet Charity, a (considered) local hard rock band (credited as the first rock band in Malaysia/Singapore) released an autobiography about themselves. I think it is a good start. Even when Sil Khannaz (local Death Metal/Progressive Death Metal band) chose to release a rockumentary detailing their colorful history, I was in awe and made it a mission to go and buy the CD. And I did just that.

6- Dont you think its time we start recording some history of our own and bring the scene to a whole new level?

Download: Sepultura - Kairos [2011]

2011-06-08T21:47:00.000+08:00

1- Penulis masih lagi belum sembuh daripada demam akibat daripada keterkejutan melampau yang dialami gara gara keepic failan album baru Morbid Angel, Illud Divinum Insanus. Ternyata sangat mengecewakan malah berkemungkinan boleh sahaja diletakkan didalam kumpulan album album metal yang paling mengecewakan untuk tahun 2011 sebaris dengan album-album seperti... maaf tiada contoh yang boleh diberikan kerana tidak ada album album lain yang mengecewakan seperti kecewanya penulis dengan album baru Morbid Angel ini.

2- Lagenda thrash metal Brazil, Sepultura sudahpun menerbitkan album terbaru mereka yang diberi judul Kairos. Setakat 2 buah lagu yang sudah boleh didengar melalui youtube, lagu Kairos dan Just One Fix hasil saduran daripada kumpulan Industrial, Ministry, penulis boleh menyimpulkan bahawa album ini sedikit old school sepertimana lagu-lagu mereka dari era Roots. yang pasti, ianya menampilkan bunyi gitar yang berat dan permainan drum yang groovy.

3- Jika anda menginginkan Sepultura kembali dengan lagu-lagu seperti Beneath The Remains, penulis mencadangkan agar anda mendengar sahaja album baru Cavalera Conspiracy. Namun anda boleh memberi peluang pada album baru Sepultura ini untuk tenggelam kedalam telinga anda terlebih dahulu sebelum menolaknya mentah-mentah. Penulis juga tertarik dengan lukisan muka depan album ini yang sangat old school lantas menjadikan ianya agak cool dan cvlt.

4- Muat turun album baru Sepultura DISINI.

Rants: Rock 2 & Morbid Angel.

2011-06-07T11:49:00.000+08:00

1- As I have been informed, the good people who previously brought you the movie, Rock (a very awesome movie about a fictionalized 80's rock group called Rimba Bara starring Khir Rahman and Que Haidar) will be filming Rock 2 revolving around the history of a a non fictionalized local rock group called Search. I cant fucking wait.

2- Morbid Angel, he pioneer of what is known now as the Florida Death Metal sound, has recently unleashed their latest album, Illud Divinum Insanus and it sucked big time. SUCKED. BIG TIME. And this is Morbid Angel that we are talking about. Is this the same band that released Altars of Madness and Covenant back in the late 80s and early 90's? What the fuck? Azagthoth tried to defend the album by saying that Morbid Angel was infact tried to venture into something new with Illud Divinum Insanus. Something new my malay ass. There is nothing new with adding a few loops of 8 repetitive bars of a song and drum machines. Marilyn Manson, motherfuckers, Marilyn fucking Manson. Do not buy Illud Divinum Insanus. Unless you are a fan of Earth Wind & Fire.

3- Rest in peace Morbid Angel.

Bands: Deep - Buried Beneath and Forgotten.

2011-06-03T06:30:00.002+08:00

Coming Soon.

Band: Punah Ranah - Chapter of Killing Process.

2011-06-01T05:02:00.001+08:00

1- And so I have been informed that KL's grind fuckers, Punah Ranah had already released something, maybe an EP or an album or something, titled Chapter of Killing Process. I have already wrote some sort of a review about them in this blog somewhere. You can go and read about Punah Ranah HERE. Punah Ranah plays Grindcore.

2- Unfortunately, not much information that I can share with you guys here since theres not much info about the release on the net anyway. I noticed that a member of the band had recently dropped by so I am hoping that he will at least shed some light of information about the release for thebulletbelt. Maybe the guys from Punah Ranah can consider submitting the release to GrindandPunishment.Blogspot for a hefty sack of exposure.

3- Anyway, if you are interested to find out more about the band, you can always visit their MySpace page which I have already included in my previous post or go to their Facebook page HERE.

Rants: Of Silent Death, Hidden Silence, Tandus, Langsuyr and Karl Cromok.

2011-05-30T01:33:00.003+08:00

1- The first draft I wrote for this entry was in Malay but I stopped halfway because it was just too awkward, well at least for me. So english it is. I just got done reading some of my friends blogs. One of my personal favorite being Dissecting The Euphony. Why? For the new and upcoming release feature that they put up in their sidebar.

2- Silent Death is finally ready to release their long awaited album, The Silent Kiss of Death. The other night I got an SMS informing me that they have already opened the floor for the fans to prebook the album. Throw in some extra cash, you will get a nice t-shirt along with the CD. I have listened to the excerpts of some of the new songs by the band on youtube but I guess it is still too early to judge.

3- Hidden Silence, one of the best melodic death metal band from our shore, according to DtE, will be releasing a follow up to their infamous debut, Black Hearted Spiritual and I believe this upcoming release will be called Into The Childs Nightmare. I am full of expectations with this band and this new release due to their awesome debut which got positive reviews from all over the place. Certainly the guys in Hidden Silence got ears for wonderful and exciting melody lines. Cant fucking wait!

4- Tandus? The Thrash masters from Johor? A new album? Fuck yeah. I can still remember buying their debut EP, Logam Maut, back in the mid 90's. Hopefully the sound on this one will at least be more polished, mix and master wise, then the one they got in Logam Maut, if you know what I mean. Logam Maut despite of its awesomeness was way too raw to my ears. Maybe it was intentional, I dont know, but man, Tandus thrashed my earholes like nobody's business.

5- Wait a second, Ajizz is back in Langsuyr? Are you serious DtE? Wow man. Fucking awesome. I have always wondered why he left the band in the first place but thats none of my business to begin with. But him being back in the folds of Langsuyr is definitely an exciting feat. Now if somebody out there could just try and convince Dr.Ben to rejoin the band and get the legendary Occultus Mysticism and Eastern Cruelty line up to release one more Eastern Cruelty-esque record, I'll die a happy man. Haha.

6- The new release from Karl Cromok is already in store now. Shred It Back was the title of the release. I have given a go to the single called Petanda which featured Amy from the legendary hard rock band Search handling the vocals, and the verdict was lukewarm at best, but Karl's trademark melodic solo was there thus the sole saving grace for the song. The chorus lines were annoyingly repetitive. Force feeding a melody will only work if you got a good and strong vocal melody. And in Petanda's unfortunate case, the melody was weak besides the delivery felt insincere. Oh well.

Rants: TheBulletBelt In Malay?

2011-05-28T04:08:00.002+08:00

r1- I guess it has been a custom for me to start a new post with "It Has Been A While" nowadays. Admittedly, I've neglected this blog (and blogging activities altogether) for quite some time now. I noticed that there are actually people who follows TheBulletBelt and frequently visits this blog from time to time in the look out for the latest Malaysian heavy metal news. Sorry man. I'm just too fucking busy.

2- Well, on the hand, it's MySpace fault man. You know, with their new not that much of a user friendly template that made my surfing and browsing a hell of an experience (not in a good way), I sorta gave up looking for new bands to promote. It's just too fucking agonizing. Fuck MySpace. While I'm at it, fuck Facebook too for not providing a better platform for bands to promote their music. But from another point of view, what is it there to promote? Young metalcore asswipes kept on releasing albums, the local "real" metalbands kept on waiting for another Metalcamp Gig to attend without releasing any single shit. Come on, step up to the fucking plate will ya. Thank God for Humiliation.

3- I had been contemplating for quite sometime now about changing the language of this blog. I dont know. Should I start posting in Bahasa or should I keep the current medium? When I started this blog back in 2009, my one and only objective was to promote Malaysian bands to a whole new international crowd. I dont know man, is it me or the scene just kinda died out. Hey lazy fuckers, release something man. A demo, a rehearsal tape like in the good ol' days, you know, what ever. Just release something. Wormrot is fucking conquering Europe and Malaysian bands are still playing jam fucking sessions. Fuck!

Rants: Whats New Pussycats?

2011-01-15T10:07:00.000+08:00

1- Ideologies can sometimes be sickening. No shit. In Malaysia, if you were not segregated by partisan political allegiance, you will definitely separated by pseudo modern philosophical ideologies. Come on man. Do not let petty fights on ideologies ruin your God given rights to listen to some good ol' metal.

2- I never associated myself with any ideologies and I dont really give a fuck about others. If you are either an elite anarcho band or a fuckin Nazi band, if your music is good, your music is good. End of story. Almost all traditional black metal freaks out there worshiped fuckin Burzum. Burzum's 2010 "Belus" album was supposed to be called "The White God". Go fuckin figure. But we still feasted our ears with Burzum. Why? Because Burzum fuckin rock! It was a fuckin' awesome band. Fuck all these stupid ideologies and fuck all those politically correct assholes out there. Go listen to some fuckin Burzum.

3- Unless these bands try to be some fascist assholes and force their stupid ideologies onto me, only then this middle finger of mine shall be shown. I am not interested with your stupid ideologies and you can go fuck yourself.

Rants - New Releases.

2011-01-14T10:11:00.003+08:00

Click For A Larger View

Bands - Kherrow

2011-01-13T20:54:00.000+08:00

1- It's hard to browse for new bands nowadays thus the lack of updates on bands. I used to browse myspace on daily basis to find something to write about for this blog, but since they have changed the lay out and what not, I find browsing myspace a frustrating experience. Oh well.

Click for a larger view

2- Just to let you know that a Sarawak Melodic Metal band by the name of Kherrow has released an eight track album titled Bintang Timoer. I have heard of that name before but can't quite remember where, when and why. From a compilation maybe?

3- A bit bout the band: Kherrow was formed somewhere in the year 2000 and the current line for Bintang Timoer is Pricilla - Vocals (yes, a she. A very cute she), Zizie - Guitars, Muss - Guitars and Afdzal - Drums. Do they have any bassists? I have no idea.

4- I have listened to the 8 tracks snippets via the bands facebook and all I can deduct from that short preview was melodic death metal. The drums were high in the mix thus making it a bit percussive whereas the guitars were a bit crispy for my taste. But it was really really a short preview so I reserve my review and stand corrected if necessary.

5- Contact the band via their Facebook page HERE

Rants: Galneryus.

2011-01-08T00:00:00.029+08:00

1- Sorry, the previous post was supposed to be my short review of Galneryus. But it was so much fun writing about the opening gigs for 2011, I totally have forgotten about poor old Galneryus.

2- Somewhere in December last year, I feasted my ears to Galneryus newest album, Resurrection. Galneryus is a Speed Metal/Neo-Classical/Power Metal band from Japan. If you love Malmsteen and guitar shreds and licks with pop melodies in high pitch, then you should give this band a try. Go and youtube their albums before you buy (read: download) their albums.

3- In actuality, I have heard about the band before but at that time I was too quick too dismiss the band for being one of too many Japanese Visual Kei bands that roamed the scene back in the early 90's. Or so I thought.

4- Not that I have any problems with Visual Kei bands. X Japan is one of my favorite band of all time. It was the fact that almost all Japanese Heavy Metal bands that was introduced to me by the trust worthy internet, tend to adopt the Visual Kei style and produced shitty music that made me quick too dismiss any unknown bands from the land of the rising sun. But I was wrong with Galneryus.

5- Galneryus, well at least their latest album, showcase pure power metal complete with the epic feeling and heroic chants. And when you thought, the guitar was already enough, get a load of the keyboard Crazy! I should state that this is the only keyboard solo that I really liked and did not sound gay. Awesome. Give this one a try.

Rants: Galneryus & The New Year.

2011-01-06T11:14:00.002+08:00

1- Happy belated new year to all fellow headbangers and metalheads, Malaysia and world wide. How's everyone. Sorry for the long hiatus and thank you for still visiting Thebulletbelt. It was cool to know that this blog is still getting visitors despite the lack of new updates and entries. Kudos.

2- Hopefully 2011 will be a good year for the Malaysian heavy metal scene and let us hope that this year we can see more awesome releases from the local bands. I heard that the long anticipated Silent Death, eerily titled "The Silent Kiss of Death" will be released soon. Hopefully the long wait would be of some worth. What's taking them so long anyway?

3- Malaysian Metal scene celebrated the new year with Warmageddon Gig on 1.1.11 featuring a very very impressive line up of Demisor, Mandatory, Damien and Humiliation with a few other bands. It has been a while the last time I heard of Mandatory, the Melodic Death Metal brigade from Penang. What about Damien? I thought that band was just a one off project band and here they are, opening 2011 with desecration of kambings and biri-biris on stage. Let's not talk about humiliation. They fuckin rock!

4- On the 29.1.2011, another gig will commence, Kuala Lumpur Thrashed, with another impressive and international line to cater the Mat-Mat Thrash's dying need to headbang and fist pump. Tandus has returned. Remember that awesome "Logam Maut" EP? Fuckin incredible. Others in the line up is IronFist (s'pore), Infernal Curse (Argentina), Killing Fields (Thailand), Wartillery (Brunei) and few other local acts. Get yourself ready.

5- On the same date, Penang will be hosting a gig called Uprising III. Too many metalcore bands. Do. Not. Like. But on 5.2.2011, you will be getting your chance to headbang to the magical opuses of As Sahar and Samartary when both of these groups will be playing in Demi Darah Dan Maruah Patriot gig in KL.

6- Awesome.

Rants - Metal : A Malaysian Headbanger's Journey Part 3

2010-12-10T11:04:00.000+08:00

Metal : A Malaysian Headbangers Journey

1- Where was I? Yes, my second "satanic" heavy metal album was Kreator. It was only later that I found out that Kreator plays Thrash Metal. At this point of time (which was around 1995) I have yet to discover any local bands that play this kind of music until I was introduced to a band called Cromok.

2- I have heard the name before but never had the enthusiasm to find out what was it all about until I forced my uncle to by me their second album, Forever In Time. The melodies, the aggressiveness of the music and the memorable riffs officially converted me into a Cromok fan. Wow, I thought to myself, there are local bands that play this kind of music. My mission since then was to find out more about the local heavy metal bands hidden everywhere through out the country.

I ate your Impiety tape. Wutcha gon do about it?

3- I got my first taste of black metal through As Sahar's Meditation Embun Pagi and Impiety's Funeralight. It was a friend of mine back in my school days who gave me the cassettes. It was awesome. I think I never returned the cassette tapes. Both of the tapes fell into a river and err.. was eaten by two big ugly crocodiles. I got lucky to even be able to escape. The tapes didnt. That friend of mine never let me borrow any of his tapes ever again but it was a true story.

4- Another friend of mine brought a zeroxed traditionally type written "magazine" he called Fanzine. That was the first time I got to hold and read a fanzine. It was local publication called Brutal Noise Fanzine from Penang I think. Inside was loads and loads of information about the local heavy metal scene and from all around the world. I was bloody stoked. It aint gon get any cooler than this thus a goal was set to someday write a fanzine of my own.

To Be Continued.

Read Part 1

Read Part 2

Rants: Hellcut Propaganda Releases Deep/Animist Split.

2010-11-29T12:00:00.045+08:00

The Split of Awesomeness

1- I would like to thank the good people from Hellcut Propaganda for their effort in releasing this Deep/Animist split. I seriously thought that the idea was scrapped and was quite surprised myself upon my stumbling of this image but here it is and I think the artwork is fucking awesome.

2- Basically Deep was my personal melancholic and depressive black metal project. The original name for the project was Filsufatia but sometime earlier this year I decided to change the name to Deep. Released a promo (the songs which eventually end up as the tracks in the split) and changed the name back to Filsufatia after being pointed out that there were like 7 other bands from everywhere with the same name. Shouldve figured that out earlier.

3- So the name of the band is no longer Deep but Filsufatia, the old moniker. But seriously, the photo artwork is so awesome. Stare at it. Stare at it. Cool huh (pun not intended)..

4- I have been doing the band for 5 years now. Each year with a new demo/promo. Not really looking forward to sign to any labels although the people from Carnage Records and Kult 666 have been so kind to release my shitty songs all these years. I think Im gon start writing for a new demo. So inspired right now thanks to that awesome cover photo. Sejuk. Sejuk.

Bands: Medusa.

2010-11-26T12:00:00.000+08:00

Medusa.

1- Previously my favorite new band was Irotori but now after experiencing the awesomeness of Medusa, I am really contemplating to overthrow Irotori and put Medusa on top of the reigning list. Medusa is a progressive and very melodic metal band of awesomeness from Petaling Jaya, Selangor. Started out as a jam band Medusa is truly a new young force to be reckon. I will tell you why.

2- The songs man, the fucking songs. They blew me away with their fucking songs, the arrangements, their senses and ears for nice melodies, the nice breaks and the leads. When I first feasted my ear holes with their songs via their Myspace page, I was and am still hoping that the band is not a fucking metalcore band. All the songs available on their myspace have no vocals so it was kind of hard to judge but judging from the style of their songs, I doubt that Medusa is a fucking metalcore or else I will be very much frustrated. Do not waste your time with fucking metalcunt fellas.

3- Their first song is called Donnie Brasco. The started with some heavy guitars and blast beat drums before launching into a fully melodic riff assault. The kick drums were a bit all over the place here and there. 2 minutes into the song, the song went into some Gothenberg shits before going into some lame slam breaks. A lot of different tempos but they managed to stay groovy. The solo was decent and short to give more room for some dual guitar riff trades.

4- The second song is called Paradox. The sound quality for this song was horrible with the drums being too high in the mix. But being a drum enthusiast myself, I do not really mind that since I can still enjoy the awesome drum works from the talented drummer. Nice double paddle work and the groovy time play with the cymbals.

5- They got a couple more songs in their myspace. This band is highly recommended by The Bullet Belt. Medusa consist of Iffat (vocals),Ayai (guitar), Fixx (guitar), Pithang (Bass) and Rudi (Drums). and I believe none of them are over 26. It would be a mind fuck if Irotori could team up with Medusa and release a nice split tape. Visit them: http://www.myspace.com/medusamalaysia

Download: Logam Melayu - The Essential Collection of Malaysian Extreme Metal.

2010-11-23T12:00:00.098+08:00

Logam Melayu - The Essential Collection of Malaysian Extreme Metal.

1- I have compiled some old and classick songs from various Malaysian Black Metal and Death Metal bands and put it up here for you download. Witness the majesty of Malaysian Heavy Metal. The songs compiled in this so called compilation were old songs from the veterans in the likes of Sil Khannaz (Death Metal), Langsuyr (Black Death), Infectious Maggots (Industrial), Silent Death (Death Metal), Brain Dead (Death Metal), Nebiras (Black Metal), Suffercation (Death Metal) and Slum Scum (Grind Death).

2- Most of these songs were taken from the bands debut albums/EPs/Demos/whatever respectively. Download this and experience for yourself how Malaysian Black Metal and Death Metal sounded like back in the early 90's. Way too many death metal? Wait for volume 2.

3- You are free to spread and re-distribute this so called compilation else where, as long as you credit The Bullet Belt blog properly and well, as long as long you wont go out and sell this compilation for any monetary gains, I dont think the bands would mind. The only reason why I put this up here was to promote Malaysian Metal to the whole wide world and I hope you can help me do that.

4- If you are offended with this download, you can always email me and I will pull this compilation out and let Malaysian Metal die in obscurity. Fuck you.

DOWNLOAD

Bands: Punah Ranah.

2010-11-20T12:00:00.060+08:00

Punah Ranah

1- Punah Ranah is a political grindcore + brutal death metal band from the muddy banks of Kuala Lumpur. Punah Ranah (a malay word for Collateral Damage) consists of Epul (growls and shrieks), Azan (Guitars and shrieks), Ashie (drums) and Bess (Bass). I believe the band will be recording and releasing a proper record pretty much soon I guess. Their debut two live tracks promo have been circulating through out the net for quite some time now. Search for it your self, fuckers.

2- There are 3 songs in their Myspace page and man the songs were heavy. The first song, R.M.P.P, started with some radio excerpts before the heavy guitars came down plundering the earhole of any unsuspecting assholes with your typical five fast notes of grinding riff with a nice chugging parts at the end of the riff. Headbangable. The second song, Trichuris Retaliation, was supposed to be a live song. If it was really a live recording then I am impressed. The guitars were heavy. The vocals? Your typical cookie monster growls doubled with your typical banshee shrieks. Typical from top to bottom but give this one a chance.

3- Visit the band at their Myspace page: http://www.myspace.com/punahranah

Rants - New Malaysian Metal Releases.

2010-11-18T12:00:00.072+08:00

1- Since it has been a while since I last myspace walk so some of the releases below may be not as up to date. Well, better late then never, right.

The grim regiment of Immolate.

2- Immolate is a black metal band from Sarawak. The band was formed way back in 1998. It was in September this year that the band finally released a demo titled Immolate the Night Clewoon. You can try and give their songs a listen via their myspace page. There are a couple of songs in the page for those out there who like grim, dirty and raw black metal, one being the title track and another called Confession of the Enchanted. Nothing outstanding with those tracks, same old same old. Try and check their Myspace out at: http://www.myspace.com/immolatetian. Get their demo for RM10 or USD6.

Larrong Mighty Death Squad.

3- I believe the Malaysian metal scene is familiar with Larrong. I was introduced to this band through a compilation called Panggilan Pulau Puaka, a compilation produced and released by Psychic Scream Entertainment a long long time ago. But the band itself was formed somewhere in 1992 unleashing their first demo called Curse of Devastation. Blackened Death Metal? I do not know since I was never any good in determining the genre. The MCD was called Dakan Perana Tana and it was released way back in March, earlier this year. They got some catchy riffs. Check the songs out at their myspace: http://www.myspace.com/larrong.

Books: Heavy Metal In Baghdad - The Story of Acrassicauda.

2010-11-15T00:00:00.000+08:00

Heavy Metal In Baghdad - The Story of Acrassicauda by Andy Capper and Gabi Sifre.

Title: Heavy Metal in Baghdad - The Story of Acrassicauda.
Authors: Andy Capper & Gabi Sifre.
Publisher: MTV Books/Pocket Books.
Additional Information: Paperback, 290 Pages, RM 60.17, Kinokuniya Bookstore Kuala Lumpur.

1- I have watched the awesome video, Heavy Metal in Baghdad and now this is the book version of the same video. For those who have watched the video I believe you are familiar with story of Acrassicauda, a striving heavy metal band from the war torn city of Baghdad.

2- While the movie received a lot of positive attention and I personally think that the movie was awesome, unfortunately there is nothing awesome about this book really besides the fact that this is just another channel to milk for some more extra cash from the acrassicauda phenomenon. The book followed The Dirt formula, instead of an author telling the story of the band from a third person point of view, they let the band members themselves do the talking and story telling, a style made famous by that awesome Motley Crue autobiography, The Dirt.

3- I dont know but some of the word structures used were quite week grammatically. I am not a grammar nazi and not even grammatically proficient myself but come on, I paid a hefty lot of money to buy and read the book, I expect at least a good structure of sentences. So uninspiring for a very inspiring story. They even got one third of the book filled with the movie transcript. What the fuck? Why the fuck would I wan to read the fucking transcript? Was this a move to thicken the book?

4- Well, unfortunately I am not going to recommend this if you have already watched the movie. It's a waste of good money. By the way, if you are curious, Acrassicauda is now in the States and they have recorded an awesome EP, Only the Dead See The End of War with the mighty Alex Skolnick of Testament behind the producers chair. Get the EP not the book. Will they release a book about the process of recording that EP? I guess only time and greed will tell. Haha.

Rants: Understanding Metal.

2010-11-12T00:00:00.088+08:00

Unable to differentiate the various genres of metal music? No worries. Here are some fun and easy definitions of each main genre of metal which might solve your problem. Just for fun.

Heavy Metal: Rock music played with heavily distorted guitars, wailing vocals and weighty drums.
Glam Metal: Heavy Metal with make up.
Thrash Metal: Heavy Metal played fast.

Death Metal: Scary Heavy Metal played fast with deathly lyrics and sweat pants.
Melodic Death Metal: Less scarier Heavy Metal played fast with harmonies.
Black Metal: Scarier Heavy Metal played fast with satanic lyrics and make up.
Grindcore: Short Heavy Metal played ultra fast with political lyrics.
Porno Grind: Short heavy Metal played ultra fast with sick sexual lyrics.
Gore grind: Short Heavy metal played ultra fast with lyrics on human anatomy.
Speed Metal: Heavy Metal played faster.
Power Metal: Heavy Metal played faster with dungeons & dragons lyrics.
Industrial Metal: Heavy Metal played with a computer.
Doom Metal: Heavy Metal played slow.
Sludge Metal: Heavy Metal played slower.
Gothic Metal: Sad Heavy Metal with make up.
Groove Metal: Heavy Metal played with a groove.
Nu Metal: Groovy Heavy Metal played by douches with baggy jeans.
Metalcore: Groovy Heavy Metal played by douches with skinny jeans

Rants: Current Playlist.

2010-11-09T16:17:00.001+08:00

1- I am still playing Helloween's newest CD, 7 Sinners. I must say, all the songs in that album really grew on me. Of course 7 Sinners will never be as epic as the first three albums but for me it's already up there among the best Deris era albums of Helloween. Deris dominated the songwriting for this album with the other members contributed at least two songs each. The mighty main weenie, founder and guitarist Michael Weikath only contributed 2 songs; Raise The Noise and The Sage The Fool The Sinner. One thing for sure, there are a lot of double bass drum attacks in this album.

2- I do not know why but it seems to me that good heavy metal music nowadays only came from the more veteran bands rather than the newer ones. As of right now, I am waiting for Manowar to re-release their epic debut Battle Hymns with Donnie Hamzik on the drums and of course, their newest album, Hammer of the Gods.

3- Well for me it's not really that big of deal who is behind the drum kit because Manowar's songs were always heavily revolved around Eric Adams's powerful vocals, solos from Karl Logan and the epic song writing capability of Joey Demaio. Manowar had always been straight forward with their heavy metal. There is no room for no Portnoys nor Lombardos of drums in Manowar. Sorry Scott, you will not be missed.

4- Metallica will start writing some new tunes somewhere in 2011. Hopefully they will try and get a better sound engineer this time and for the love of God, properly mix the songs lah this time around. Death Magnetic, a good but not great comeback and return to form album but the sound was pretty fucking horrible. I dont know about you but Slayer's World Painted Blood also got that same horrible vibe. Rick fucking Rubin.

5- I am no Malmsteen fan but if you like his stuff, be warned that his newest album, Relentless, will be out in store sometime this month.

Books: The Bloody Reign of Slayer.

2010-11-09T00:00:00.098+08:00

The Bloody Reign of Slayer by Joel McIver

Title: The Bloody Reign of Slayer.
Author: Joel McIver.
Publisher: Omnibus Press
Additional Info: Hardcover, 286 Pages, RM157.65, Kinokuniya Bookstore Kuala Lumpur.

1- My third Joel McIver book after Justice For All - The Truth About Metallica (the most complete Metallica biography ever) and To Live is To Die - The Life and Death of Metallica's Cliff Burton (the only authentic biography of Cliff Burton. Yes, ever). I have already reviewed the later HERE and will later review the former. Stay tune for that. I would also like thank Mr.McIver for emailing me the other day. An absolute honor man.

2- You can now buy the paperback edition which is way cheaper than the hardcover version that I had. I bought the hardcover version because I just could not wait for the paperback edition. There goes my one hundred and fifty bucks out of my pocket for Slayer but fuck, it's all worth it. Every Slayer fans should get a copy of this book.

3- I am quite familiar with McIver's style of writing by the time I got this book due to my repeat read of Justice For All. Although an avid metal fan McIver provided a balanced story telling from a metal fan point of view and from those who are outside looking in.

4- In this book, you will be able to read about Slayer's early formation to its finest details. The book also got one whole chapter dedicated to the detailing of the fearsome four's early lives way , pre 1983, before the formation of Slayer. It has a chapter each for every phase of the band's progress. I mean you will have a chapter for each of their albums, from their Metal Massacre days to the Show No Mercy phase and the latest being their 2006 album, Christ Illusion. I believe there will be a revised edition to include World Painted Blood.

5- This is by far the most complete Slayer autobiography I have ever read, well not that they got a lot of that anyways. Get this.

Bands: Flesh Desecrated.

2010-11-06T00:00:00.041+08:00

1- A brutal death metal band from Kota Bharu, Kelantan. I like this band a lot, may due to the precisie and sharp drum beats and patterns. Wait. Is that Affare from Diman/Humiliation? Well, no wonder the drums were so precise. Affare is one of the better young metal drummers from Malaysia up there with those in the likes of Lan Bye of Sil Khannaz/Infectious Maggots/Brain Dead or Ly Razak of Suffercation or Wira of he got too many bands to mention.

2- Flesh Desecration was formed somewhere in 2005 by Wan Slaughter with a few other friends heavily influenced with Suffocation, Disgorge and Cannibal Corpse. The band was later disbanded and reformed in 2007 with a new line consisting of Wan Slaughter on the guitars/vocals, Abe on the bass/vocals and Affare on the drums.

3- You can try and have a listen to their one song on Myspace. Crazy riffs and crazy drums with that extremely deep gurgling vocals growls made famous by pioneering band, Demilich. Musically I like the song but I was never a fan of those deep gurgling vocals.

4. Those kind of vocals are so insignificant to me that it always spoiled my mood whenever I try to listen to a particular song with that particular vocals in it. Its like listening to an instrumental track but not really an instrumental track because the vocals are there, it's just insignificant that it made me feel like I should bust a cap on the singers head. Stop doing that! I miss those brutal "normal" growls. Maybe I should just listen to Humiliation instead.

5- Visit Flesh Desecrated at their Myspace page: www.myspace.com.com/fleshdesecrated

Bands: HellTerror.

2010-11-03T00:00:00.037+08:00

1- Again not much information from the Myspace. Hellterror is an awesome grindcore band and due to my ignorance and the lack of information, I do not know from where they came from.

2- Their debut demo War Of Idiocracy featuring 11 grinding tracks was released by Dis-Organ-Zed Netlabel somewhere earlier this year. What do you expect? Heavily influenced by Scum era Napalm Death with your typical dual vocals and your typical under 1 minute songs and once in a while that typical 3-4 chords of a song. You know, those extremely short songs first made famous by Napalm Death with their world record song The Kill back in the early 80's.

3- You can listen to all 11 songs of the demo here or you can visit their Myspace page at http://www.myspace.com/hellterror

Bands: Ablasa.

2010-10-31T14:44:00.001+08:00

1- Ablasa is a black metal band from Kelantan and was formed somewhere in 2009. Apart from being a band under the banner of the mighty Kelantan Metal Army, not much information that I can dig from their Myspace page which was really unfortunate.

2- They got one song called Nar Is Thee (Fire Whispering) on their Myspace page that is worth checking and from my point of view, the song is decent, clean and melodic enough to my liking. I am attracted to the whispering vocals although I don't how that will make out with their live performances.

3- One thing though guys, put some information in your Myspace. Visit their Myspace to check out the song at www.myspace.com/ablasa666

Rants - As Sahar and 7 Sinners.

2010-10-23T14:19:00.002+08:00

1- I am currently listening to Helloween's new much anticipated no.15 Studio album, the long overdue 7 Sinners. It is an Ok record I guess. Although the chugs were heavy as hell (as heavy as Better Than Raw if not heavier), I think it was too pop for me. I Still love it though maybe it wont be as much as I have loved their second album with Andi Deris, Time of the Oath. Oh I love that album so much. Well, you go download Helloween 7 Sinners HERE. If you happen to get this album, try and give track no.6, Long Live The King, a proper listen. I like that song for its typical thrashy riff that you can get off from any Bay Area Thrash bands.

2- Whats new? The pioneer of Eastern Black Metal, As Sahar will be re-releasing its debut album, Phenomistik some where in late December this year I guess. This album was one of the first few landmark albums that helped shape and inject the local Black Metal Scene with something original and something to call their own. Awesome. The re-release will be in a digi-pack Compact Disc format and will limited to 500 copies only. Go and order your copy HERE. If you order early enough, you will be getting extra goodies. Hurry up.

Rants - The Malaysia Metal.

2010-10-20T07:29:00.003+08:00

1- Whats up. I have yet to find the time to update this blog properly but do not worry because hopefully by next week, I will try and get this blog started again. Yeah, maybe the guilt seeing this blog still manages to pull a lot of viewers. Even with the no update what so ever, I still got like 1000++ viewers for last month alone and a lot (half) of them were from outside of Malaysia. I guess my objective to promote Malaysian Heavy Metal to the world is in full swing after all.

2- With out any doubt people out there were more interested with the download section. I guess after this I will be putting a few more good albums for you. There is no better ways to promote Malaysian metal music then giving you ear candies for you to listen and evaluate. We walk the talk around here. Hopefully the previously uploaded albums of Silent Death and Sil Khannaz had give you some ideas about Malaysian Heavy Metal.

3- To the Malaysian Metal maniacs, if you know any good metal bands out there, kindly inform me here. Sometimes I am just too lazy to browse myspace to check out them bands.

Rant - The lack of update:

2010-10-19T14:18:00.004+08:00

1- I would like to apologize for not updating this blog for quite a while now. Why? Because having to operate on too many blogs will eventually make you lazy and in case you are wondering, I am a lazy SOB.

2- Well basically, Ive just released my long time Hardcore Punk Fanzine Abstained Agogo Fanzine last month after 7 years of hiatus. Compiling articles, doing interviews and attending to the postal orders made my schedule a bit hectic. Its worth it though. Got it sold for nearly 100 hundred copies now.

3- I am also busy with another new blog on Nasyid music. Yes I am an all rounder and I try to get myself involved to the core of the music that I like very much like how I keep myself abreast with the mighty Metal scene and the harmony vocal scene. If you like to see me goof around you can visit that other blog: www.nasyidcafe.blogspot.com

4- Whats new? Sil Khannaz premiered their newest song during that Total War gig. Silent Death will be releasing their long awaited album soon. Malaysian gothic black metal band Halun have just released an album I think. Ok, maybe I should do a proper entry because this entry sucked too much. Ill be back!

Download: Silent Death - Before The Sunrise [1993]

2010-09-15T12:00:00.000+08:00

Silent Death is one of the pioneering and important bands from the late 80's/early 90's Malaysian Metal Scene alongside bands in the likes of BrainDead, SilKhannaz and Suffercation. Their debut album, Before the Sunrise which was released in 1993 by Dark Journey Records is one of those important albums from the early 90s to showcase how Malaysian Metal music sounds like back in the early 90's and how it has evolved since then.

Although the quality of the download will not be as good as the original material, I reckon that for promotional purposes, the album will be able to give you a taste of Malaysian Death Metal music from the 90's. The line up for this album are: Stone (bass/vocals), Pink (guitars), As (guitars) and Ollie (drums).

It is also important to note that Silent Death will be releasing their anticipated second album anytime soon. Malaysian Death Metal at its best!

Tracklist
1- Dying Moment
2- Voice of Misery
3- Reign of Inferno
4- Before the Sunrise
5- Twisted faith
6- Preacher of the Dark
7- Book of Death
8- Unharmony Unity

Silent Death: Facebook | MySpace | EncMetallum

Name: Before The Sunrise
Label: Dark Journey Records
Size: 34.66 mb
Year: 1993
Band: Silent Death.

DOWNLOAD

Rants - New Releases from Malaysia:

2010-09-12T10:20:00.006+08:00

(click image for a larger view)

DEMONICAL CRISIS ASSEMBLY - Open Fire LP, Infernal Kaos Production [2010].

One of the best War Black Metal regiment from Malaysia. If you like Impiety or Infernal War then you might want to check DCA. For more information do not hesitate to contact them at http://www.myspace.com/dcassembly

(click image for a larger view)

NEFTARAKA - Eternal Harsh LP, Apocalypse Venomous Records [2010].
Currently reigning the throne as the best Malaysian Black Metal band since the legendary Nebiras. Neftaraka shall assault you with the grimmest black metal from the deep Malaysian forest. For more information do not hesitate to contact them at www.myspace.com/necroneftaraka

(click image for a larger view)

HUMILIATION - Dawn of Warfare, Nebiula Productions [2010].
Labeled as the Malaysian BoltThrower and had been getting massive and positive reviews from all around the world, this is their debut LP. If you like old school death metal sound in the vein of Boltthrower, then this is a must! contact them through humiliationband@gmail.com

Karl Cromok The Interview:

2010-08-22T19:00:00.008+08:00

Cromok is a widely known and popular thrash metal band coming out from the shores of Malaysia. They first made their name within the Australian Underground Thrash Metal scene rising the ranks along with Australian Godfather bands in the likes of Enticer, SSDC, Mortal Sin, Frozen Doberman, White Trash, Addictive and Detriment. Cromok consist of Tarmizi Mokhtar - Drums, Shamsuddin Ali - Bass & Vocals and Khairul Anuar Shariff - Guitars.

First of all, it is an honor to be able to interview this legendary icon, on of the many reason why a lot of young kids were attracted to heavy metal in Malaysia back in the middle of the 90's. Everybody knew the band and everybody knew the riffs from the 1993 Forever In Time and everybody went over the top for Another You. It was the year 1995 when I first listened to them. I have heard of the name quite a lot before but was never bothered to find out. I was too busy with my radio rock ballads.

Until one fine day, I decided to fulfill my overstaying curiosity about this rock band with this odd (kelantan-isque) name, Cromok. I persuaded my uncle to buy me Forever in Time at a local record store in Kelantan, my third cassette with the first two being Helloween's Keeper of the Seven Keys and Kreators' Endless Pain, went back and played Forever In Time on the cassette player. Once Karl's first chord and solo note in the introductory riff to Memories, weighted with Miji's thundering bass drum kick followed with chugging guitar section moving along with Sam's spoken words, stomped my ears like nobody's business, I was never the same again. I believe at least a few younger metal heads out there shared the same story as mine.

It took me quite some time to really appreciate Cromok's first album, Image of Purity which was released in 1991 most probably due to the ugly sound. Now, I listen to Image of Purity more than I listen to any of their later albums.

I consider myself a big fan of Cromok and just like everybody else at that time, went gaga crazy when I first heard that Cromok will be releasing Yours Truly, a new album in 1996. I also bought all the albums by D'Cromok, Din's solo project (Din was the original guitarist, another founding member of Cromok who left the band in the midst of the bands biggest break in their carrier in Autsralia, an opening gig for Motorhead).

I followed the silent war between the two camps (Cromok and DCromok) via their thank list, made obvious to those who were sharp and die hard enough to notice. Cromok chose not to mention Din in their Forever In Time thanklist. Din, in the thanklist for his IIV Years IIV Days part 2 album, thanked Cromok for not mentioning him as a sign of frustration. However in the later 1996 album Yours Truly, Cromok mockingly mentioned Din in its thanklist with the tag: a very special mention. It was funny and I loved both bands to death but I honestly think Cromok was being a bit harsh on Din at that time. Din later died of Malaria in 1997.

i stoppped following the band after original guitarist Karl left the band. Although his replacement, Hillary Ang, was a guitar maestro and a legend in his own league, truthfully he does not belong in Cromok. I stopped buying Cromok's albums post Yours Truly. Not as a sign of protest but because Hillary's riffs and solos were not that appalling to me. I was too familiar with Karl's melodic solos and not in good term with Hillary's ultra technical yet less melodic solos. I parted ways with Cromok, the band responsible for introducing me to Malaysian Metal.

A couple of years ago, there were some rumours that Cromok will be reuniting with Karl. I was so excited. This is my interview with Karl Cromok made via FB. I would like to thank Abang Chot for his warm welcome and answers. Thank you. Here it goes:

1- How are you these days?

Great! Apart from writing songs for my new solo album, i am running my seminar in educating people on how to evaluate a business opportunity using the 16 fundamental criteria.

2- There were a few events in the likes of the April showcase, the inspiring moment showcase etc signifying your return to the music scene. Is this a definite return?

Yup definitely. I met some very talented musicians and i was so disgusted with music industry now. So I decided to do something to help those fellow musicians and other artistes. These musicians are so talented but they have no avenue to promote themselves. SO perhaps by collaborating with me, I can help promote them.

3- What inspired you to return after all these years? Fans? Passion? Heavy Metal?

Tangan gatal nak main! Ha! Ha! I met a frined of a friend 2 years ago in one of the concerts in KL and he mooted the idea of my comeback. In orincipal I agreed with the idea but could not find time to do it. After 2 years I decided to do it. So in december 2009 I started writing songs for my solo album. I started my facebook in January 2010 and up to now i have 3700+ friends. The support from fans has been very encouraging and that has kept me going till now. I am still passionate about heavy metal as you know my motto is Metal Forever!

4- How does it feel to be back on stage in front of a very driven crowd?

It feels great! Karl & Friends in MyEvo Clubhouse was a fun project. We enjoyed ourselves and actualy I was testing myself to see if I could play again on stage. See whether i still have the guts and skills to be on stage! Ha! Ha! I still have butterflies in my stomach everytime before going on stage especially after 14 years of dissappearance! Those friends (Shah & Zali nrocinu and Affey) were really good and actually they make me feel comfortable on stage knowing that i was performing with one of the best heavy metal musicians in Malaysia.

5- Everybody is waiting for a cromok reunion. Will it ever materialize?

Only time can tell.........

6- What have you been doing all these years being out of the band? Are you in constant contact with the other two?

I have not contacted Sam for 10 years until we jam recently in Hot Sound studio in Wangsa Maju. Check out my facebook photos. With Miji, I think we only spoke about 3-4 times in that 10 years. I spoke to him recently though. All these while I have been busy building my career in the marketing communications industry.

7- Did you bought any of the post Yours Truly albums? What do you think about the all the albums recorded with Hillary Ang?

I have never heard any of their songs!

8- Can we expect another showcase/product from Karl or Cromok? Another album maybe?

Insyaallah my single will be released during this fasting month. I am collaborating with one of the legendary singer in malaysia. I will announce it soon. My solo album is schedule to be released after Hari Raya and many more stories and activities to come. I will announce all those when the time comes. So stay tuned!

Karl Cromok Website | Facebook

Download: Sil Khannaz - Conception of Madness [1993]

2010-08-21T06:23:00.006+08:00

The introduction to the Malaysian Death Metal music would not be complete with out the inclusion of this wonderful album by the mighty Sil Khannaz. One of the earlier land mark death metal album from Sil Khannaz, the album, grotesquely titled Conception of Madness, was released in 1993 by Valentine Sound Production (VSP).

Sil Khannaz, at that time consisted of Jaei Jokhannaz - Vocals, CD Khanzab - Guitars, Joe Slaughter - Guitars, Tom Decibel - Bass dan Lan Bye - Drums, recorded the album in the legendary King Studio located in Petaling Jaya, Selangor. Although I loved their Pendita Gila EP, which was released 2 years later, it was this album, to me, that stood the test of time and remained a death metal classic and that opening riff in the song Sinner Burning With Out Humanity will always be the best riff to headbang to in my book.

This album was remastered and reissued in 1999 with 3 bonus tracks and some re recorded guitar parts.

Sil Khannaz changed their direction immediately after the release of this debut with the release of their EP, Pendita Gila which saw Sil Khannaz dwelt deeper into the realm of progressive metal thanks to their guitarist, CD Khanzab.

Track List:

"Slaughter" - 0:45
"Sinners Burning Without Humanity" - 4:28
"Frantical Scream" - 4:02
"Legion of Damned" - 3:01
"Debauch Absorption" - 2:46
"Beyond My Darkest Moment" - 2:01
"Catatonia" - 4:18
"Obscured Denial" - 3:58
"Conception of Madness" - 5:31

Sil Khannaz : Facebook | Myspace | EncMetallum

Name: Conception of Madness
Label: Valentine Sound Production
Size: 65.42 mb
Year: 1993
Band: Sil Khannaz.

DOWNLOAD

PESTA BLACK METAL TERENGGANU?

2010-08-17T20:40:00.002+08:00

TRANUNGKITE BLACK METAL BASHING

What the fuck was that all about? Oh another wonderful act of ludicrous judgment from the ignorant society. Why could not they just understand that it is only music? A form of entertainment? Yes, it is heavy, it is dark and it does not appeal to everybody, but it is still some form of entertainment.

What about their own backyards? Their lovely tudung clad daughters going crazy over some cute nasyid singers? Aint that some form of hedonism that to my opinion is far more worse than some black metal open society gay bullshit? Remember, a hidden enemy is far more dangerous and they can fuck you up real bad.

Do you really think that your daughters listen to nasyid for the message? Nasyid today is just another form of popular entertainment no different than your typical radio fueled non religious pop songs by the likes of Siti Norhaliza and Misha Omar with pseudo religious lyrics. How many nasyid songs nowadays that sang about boyfriends and girlfriends under the cloth of some arabic words here and there to make it sound religious. I can name you a thousand of them.

Hey, I am not here to bash nasyid. I am from that background. Even had a couple of nasyid groups myself during my university days and almost went for an album. I even helped wrote one chart topping nasyid song last year for a well known mainstream nasyid group with a couple more to come. But come on. This extreme music bashing gotta stop.

I have been listening to black metal since I was like 13 years old. I came from a well known religious school in Kelantan, furthered my studies in a local religious university and where am I now? All praise be to God, I now work in a reputable law firm in Kuala Lumpur and I still listen to Burzum, Mayhem and Dark Throne. You? Having no form of life what so ever, spending your days bashing heavy metal on the internet with your ignorance.

If all the accusations made by the media (Harian Metro, Mastika) these past few years against extreme music had been proven to be accurate and true for some reason, then i do believe even the people in the metal scene themselves would be more than happy to go and kick these blood drinking, goat worshiping motherfuckers. But the problem is, none of it had been proven true!

All the accusations made were fueled with sensationalism, ignorance, judgmental, hate, prejudice and insecurity, all the typical ingredient of your typical society.

Islam is a wonderful religion and it teaches its followers to use their brains extensively. Muslim should be wise, intellectual and smart. Stop sending messages that Muslims are stupid, insecure, hateful and dumb. For the love of God.

New Song By IROTORI:

2010-08-14T23:01:00.004+08:00

Irotori in action

I have already posted a lengthy post on this young and talented progressive metal band from Kuala Lumpur. Their first song Winds of Pain they posted last year stormed my nerves like nobody's business. While browsing the youtube recently, I just learned that they have recorded a second song and i can get enough of the song, damn it. The second song was called Vitreous minus the vocals. Wow! just fucking wow! I loved the vocals they did in Winds of Pain and i guess if the vocals were added into Vitreous, it shall definitely be a complete headbanging masterpiece since the vocals had this grim quality that may put fucking Abbath into the fucking gallows. If there are any international record labels out there who wants a good investment then you should definitely check this band out. I have already got people from as far as Germany asking about them. Highly recommended!

Listen to IROTORI - Vitreous.
Previous post on IROTORI.

Silent Death the Interview:

2010-08-14T07:05:00.007+08:00

It has been a while indeed since my last post. The hectic life again. What do we have here then? This is an interview with Stone of the legendary Malaysian Death Metal band, Silent Death. The band was formed in 1987 and was originally called Bacteria before the change of moniker to the now Silent Death.

The band recorded a demo in 1990 titled Eternal Damnation and went on to sign with a local label called Dark Journey records. In 1992 Silent Death went on to release its debut album called Before The Sunrise and provided 2 new songs for a local metal compilation called Dark Live Collection in 1993. In 1997, Silent Death managed to release an EP titled Breaking The Silence under Psychic Scream Ent. Silent Death recorded a tribute album called harbinger of Devastation and recorded 2 new songs for a compilation called Storm of Nebiula which was released by Nebiula Productions in 1998. Silent Death also contributed one song for another local compilation called Tribute to Rusty Blade in 1999 before going on an indefinite hiatus shortly after.

December 2009, the Malaysian Metal scene embraced the reformation of Silent Death with Stone leading the band and the scene into the fire of death metal! I managed to interview Stone via Facebook and he was kind enough to provide me with the answers with regard to the new long awaited album from the masters themselves. Here goes:

Hello there. Can you please introduce yourself?

This is Stone, the vocalist and bassist for the band Silent Death.

Silent Death is currently in the middle of recording a new album. Can you please update the readers with the progress thus far?

As of current, we have already recorded all the drum parts since our drummer, Ian Han, will be off to Europe. The initial plan was to release the album in July but certain things did not went out the we planned. Right now, we are pleased to inform you that we have managed to finish of 70% of the recording but for the bass, guitars and vocal parts. the completed songs were as follows: Budak Botak, Mati Senyap and Diam Mati. There are 5 more songs to be completed not including the intro and the outro by Joe Slaughter.

Ian Han off to Europe? How it is then for Silent Death to perform and promote the new album with out him? Will you be using session drummers?

Yes. Silent Death will be using session drummers to fill the line up while Ian is away. As of right now, we are using Art, from the band, Forsaken.

What do you think of the current Silent Death line up? Any comments on their contribution to the composition of Silent Death's songs?

I like working with this current line up. We worked for the album together, sitting down writing songs and sharing all the ideas for the album. Which part goes with which part.. What should be included in this part.. It was fun. Not like when I used to do everything all by myself. Joe Slaughter contributed 2 songs, E.Jal contributed 1 and the rest were composed by me. All of the songs are killer songs! I truly hope that this album will become a Silent Death killer album after all these years of indefinite hiatus.

Do you think that with all the contributions from Joe and Ejal will, let us say, disrupt the Silent Death Death Metal sound which is synonymous with your compositions?

I dont think that it will. The contributions from Joe and Ejal will provide an extra taste or something different to Silent Death. The old Silent Death sound which was synonymous with my compositions will still be intact. It will not disrupt Silent Death's brand of Death Metal at all.

I am very sure that this album will be more varied and colorful so to speak. Will Silent Death remain loyal to the old style of death metal in the likes of the previous albums or will we be seeing Silent Death experimenting with the now popular Gothenberg sound?

Death Metal in the likes of our old albums of course. If there are any changes it would not be that obvious I think. It basically goes back to the personal influence brought to the table by each of the band members.

Can you please brief the readers with the behind the scenes of the production of the new album? The recording studio, sound engineer, producer.

The studio we used was Sutra Studio, in Damansara Perdana. It was engineered by Mr.Yusalman Azua and mixed by Zairi. The executive producer is Affi Ibrahim. This album will be produced by me and Silent Death.

4. The new drummer is Ian Han. Can you please tell us more about Ian. Will Ian Han be able to compete with the strokes of the mighty Ollie (Silent Death former drummer)?

We chose Ian Han for his commitments. He is so committed towards each and everything that he is doing. It was not just about the skills behind the skins that we cherished but also his contributions in terms of ideas, financial, experience and a whole lot more. He is a funny little fella and humble too. He is the youngest member in the Silent Death family and guess what? He taught drums in Bentley. You should buy the new album and then judge his skills yourself whether can he or can he not compete with Ollie.

Although I think it has been quite a while since the last time we saw Silent Death as an active unit, but the metal fans from all over the country still gave their fullest and biggest support. How do you feel about it? For me, it was like Silent Death had never been away at all.

Yes. It feels like Silent Death had never went away. I blessed with all the support and the reception of the local metal fans. I was stunned and left in disbelief that there are still so many Silent Death's fans out there and that every body is waiting for a new release from Silent Death. I used to gave up Silent Death but after seeing so many supporters and loyal fans out there, I marched through.

I think, maybe the older bands like Silent Death or Brain Dead for example has that sentimental values to the fans. What do you think?

It think it is true. There a lot of people out there who really wanted to see Silent Death reformed and putting their hopes on me to go out and reform the band. Back then life was a bit unstable. Now that I am more organized, i felt that I was finally ready to reform the band with the help of my manager. Yes. Sentimental values. I was quite shocked to learn that quite a number of people out there grew up listening to our music. Unbelievable indeed.

Now, for the last question, why, in your opinion, should the fans go out and buy the new album?

A long awaited album after 18 years since Before the Sunrise album which was released in 1992. Should i say more? Do you need any more reason to go out and buy this album? hahahaha. Experience the changes in me and Silent Death after 18 years ok?

(We need no reason to go out and buy this album once it hits the record store. Its fuckin Silent Death!-ED)

Abstained Agogo Fanzine revived? Who cares!

2010-07-24T03:35:00.000+08:00

There are no updates because I am too busy reviving this fucked up shit. Who cares anyway.

Download: Filsufatia - Echoes of the Yonder [2010]

2010-07-10T10:57:00.002+08:00

Filsufatia - Echoes of the Yonder [2010]
DOWNLOAD

Filsufatia is my one man band. Since this is my blog, thus I shall seize this opportunity to put this up for download for the curious and interested. I have been constructing music for Filsufatia since 2006 with its first demo called "The Euphony of Regression". 2007 saw the release of Filsufatia's second demo "Tahyul" while in 2008 a third demo was released in the form of "Myan Luradh". I managed to find some time to write some songs and went on to release Filsufatia's fourth demo titled "Immortalis" which was re-released by some friends in Carnage Music in a physical professional CD-R format.

Oh, did I mention that all the releases were released as free downloads? Yes, all the demos were released as free downloads except the one with Carnage Music. earlier this year, i was toying around with the idea of changing the name of the project to Deep. I kept the name for a few months and even went on to change the MySpace address. Later a blogger friend advised me to change it since there are like 7 more other bands of different genre using the same name.

Thus I have decided to change the moniker back to Filsufatia and the songs that I have wrote for Deep are now in this Fifth demo for Filsufatia which I name "Echoes of the Yonder". This demo contains 4 songs with 1 melancholic intro. If you like melancholic black metal-isque instrumentals then why not give this one a try?

Bands - Master Jedi Promo Review:

2010-07-08T19:16:00.004+08:00

I got the package today. I would like to Thank Bentara for sending me a copy of the promo. Bentara, formerly known as Batara Guru, was the founder and the original guitarist of the now legendary black death metal band, Langsuyr, a celebrated band in the local metal circle, renowned for co founding a new sub genre for extreme metal, the eastern metal. The band pioneered the incorporation of Malay folklores, myths and mysticism into heavy metal particularly Black Metal, which at that time gave a gasp of inspiring breath of fresh air to the Malaysian Metal, even just for a short period of time.

Bentara quits Langsuyr in the midst of the production of their second full length and went on to venture new projects of his own and this one man band called Bentara was one of it.

The promo contains 3 riffy black metal-isque tracks. “Penasaran”, “Master Jedi” and “Jebat”. The sound was extremely horrible to my ears. The guitars were muddy and raw due to the unmastered home production and I never fancied drum machines either. The vocals were high in the mix and it was repulsive. Bentara was like trying to sound extreme in his singing but at the same time suppressing his voice so that he would not make too much noise and disturb his household.

Among other things that abhorred me were the lyrics. To be honest, I never thought that I would see the day to hear the word Chewbacca in a metal song. That made my day. Attracted? No. Possibility of thinking that the song was recorded as a joke? Yes. All in all, 12 minutes of agony.

Now, having said that, I think the sound quality should be extremely enhanced. You have to understand that it would be normal if a raw black metal band sounds like a raw black metal band which is ugly and hideous because that’s how they were suppose to sound. But the sound of the promo will left people confused. Why does it have to sound like that? Charging people money for it is out of the question in my honest opinion.

I loved the harmonic riffs because in a way it reminds me of Langsuyr’s dark and long swirling riffs. But the guitar sound should be more comprehensible and maybe a little bit of sharpness thrown in would not harm anyone. Maybe more on the trebly sound rather then the bassy tone which were neither extreme nor heavy.

Lose the drum machines or at least get a compatible drum fonts software like EZ Drummer (Drummer from Hell Kit) for FlStudio or the drum RSE2 for Guitar Pro. But sometimes it is not really about the sound of the drum machine; it’s how you arrange it. I love how Sil Khannaz manipulated the drum machine in their Pendita Gila EP. It all goes down to the compatibility of the drum machine sound with the music because to me drum machines would be far more appropriate to enhance the groove rather than being the back bone of a song, especially metal songs.

With regard to the vocals, I suggest that Bentara try using vocal effects because, man you sounded horrible. As for the lyrics, I know that you are trying something new which is good but sometimes the listeners need time to adapt and figure out what is going on with the lyrics and most of the time they do not have the time to be patient.

In general, people will only listen to what they want to listen and Metal fans, whether we like it or not, are like the people in general, they have expectations, favorites and personal preferences and I doubt that they prefer to listen to metal songs about Pokemons.

Visit Bentara at his blog to get the information on how you can get a copy of this promo. Support your local metal music. The contents were my honest opinion and opinions may differ. Experience it yourself.

Tribute - In remembrance of Pink of Silent Death:

2010-07-06T11:45:00.004+08:00

It was announced on Silent Death's Facebook page a few days ago that the band's original guitarist, Zulfikar Ismail, widely known as Pink to the Malaysian metal scene, has passed away. Alongside Stone (Bassist, Vocalist), another founding member of the now legendary death metal band, Pink founded Silent Death (formerly known as Bacteria) back in 1987. You will be missed. Rest in peace brother. Alfatihah.

Download: Dark Live Collection [1993]

2010-07-03T05:00:00.005+08:00

While attempting to finish this entry, I listened to Sauts Alastor, the Grand Executor album which was released by Nebiula Production in the year 2000. A remarkable elite black metal squadron hailing from Subang, Selangor. I like this EP very much. The band managed to incorporate rich and profound melodic chops due to the extensive use of keyboards and synths into the grim and evil Emperor-isque Scandanavian sound. Soothing to my ears as far as I am concerned.

Having said that, this is one more hard to find Malaysian Metal compilation and this one was called Dark Live Collection. This compilation was released in 1993 by a now defunct local label, the legendary Dark Journey Records. Dark Journey Records was one of the first pioneering extreme metal record labels in Malaysia. Valentine Sound Production and Sonic Asylum were also another two worth mentioning Malaysian record labels who were bold enough to produce and distribute local metal albums at that time.

Anyway, this compilation featured 6 Malaysian extreme metal bands: Silent Death (Death Metal), Brain Dead (by this time they were experimenting with a darker version of Death Metal), Nemesis (thrash metal), Catarrh (the earliest version of Malaysian porn death metal?), Tormentor (Death Metal to my ears) and Nebiras (Black Metal).

Both Silent Death and Brain Dead, the two towers of Malaysian Death Metal, had already been reformed recently with the former is currently in the studio and is set to release their new album. Nemesis was disbanded with the front man went on to form a Roots era Sepultura rip off band, Koffin Kanser. Tormentor was also disbanded without living any trace thereafter with the drummer went on to drum for a few metal bands, Sil Khannaz and Slum Scum and a few commercial rock bands, XPDC and DefGabC before joining a local cult and disappeared not to be heard again. Ive already talked about Nebiras when I posted the Intrusion compilation whereas Catarrh went on to release a few EPs afterward.

I found the compilation on the internet and I do believe it was ripped from the cassette version thus be warned that the sound quality of this material may not be that audio friendly. I have the cassette version but I am too lazy to rip it.

Silent Death: Facebook
Braindead: Myspace | Facebook
Koffin Kanser: MySpace | Facebook
Catarrh: Myspace

Name: Dark Live Collection Compilation
Label: Dark Journey Records
Size: 6.7mb
Year: 1993
Bands: Brain Dead, Silent Death, Nemesis, Catarrh, Nebiras and Tormentor.

DOWNLOAD

Rant - Another Hectic Malaysian day:

2010-07-02T11:42:00.003+08:00

I at present am stuck with Overkill’s 2010 album Ironbound. It is in my book, one of the best sounding metal albums so far for this year. The guitars were clean, heavy and chunky and the drums sounded amazing and the iconic Bobby Blitz never sounded better than in Ironbound. A fast and furious album indeed it is, a billion times superior then their scrawny little album, Immortalis (or Metallica’s Death Magnetic so to speak) which was released in 2007. Having said that…

I have been busy for the past few weeks with my myriad of never-ending and bludgeoning cases thus the reason for the lack of updates in TheBulletBelt recently. I am still doing my weekly browsing of any innovative and fresh sounding Malaysian heavy metal bands to promote to the whole wide world regardless of the hectic time schedule though.

I will be preparing a couple of classic Malaysian metal albums for downloads in the nearest of time and for those metalheads out there who have been on the tenterhooks that I will be putting up local metal stuff online, please accept my request for forgiveness. I have said it before and I am going to say it again, I am not going to turn this blog into a download blog. All the albums that have been or will be featured in this blog are the classic landmark albums, deemed fit to introduce the world to the Malaysian heavy metal sound. I do not take requests but I do take suggestions.

The latest mouth watering brouhaha for the local metalheads was the Vokill Record’s Vokill Fest gig that will be held at One Café Kuala Lumpur, next month, 1.8.2010 to be exact. The Malaysian black metal godz, Black Fire will be headlining. The legendary Ipoh death metal band Profane Creation and Kuala Lumpur’s own black metal battalion Aradia will also be performing. The other bands that were listed to play were Dark Nirrajim, Infernal Void, Hayagriva, Farasu, Ensemble of Silence, Vetis, Demonical Crisis Assembly, Nefarious Azarak and surprise surprise, Vermillion.

Laters.

Books - Steven Adler and Acrassicauda:

2010-06-24T01:00:00.002+08:00

According to Blabbermouth, Steven Adler had just begun promoting his tell-all autobiography called “My Appetite For Destruction: Sex and Drugs and Guns N Roses”. If you do not know who Steven Adler is then you are an idiot. Adler commended his popularity and super stardom status for his 5 years stint as the drummer for the world renowned heavy metal band the mighty Guns N Roses. When everything's not working for you, your projects were not that well received by the popular culture, always remember that you can at any time write a book about your previous band for a few chunks of cash, even though you’re just the drummer. Hell, drummers have stories to tell too.

Have you seen Heavy Metal in Baghdad in 2007? Never heard of it? Well, Heavy Metal in Baghdad was the name of a 2007 documentary film about this one heavy metal band who called themselves Acrassicauda from Baghdad the glorified capital city of Iraq. Basically, it was about these four Iraqi headbangers trying to endure playing heavy metal music and surviving the bombs and bullets from the second gulf war in Baghdad. It was a very fine and pleasurable documentary which I would recommend to everyone. I shall write a late review of that film some other time. I have just found out that they also had a book accompanying the film which was just recently released. The book was basically the complete autobiography of the band and their myriad of experience relocating from Baghdad to Turki to the good old Uncle Sam.

Hopefully these books will be available here in Malaysia.

Bands - Death Story:

2010-06-21T01:00:00.000+08:00

I am currently listening to Vociferation Eternity – Meadows Yearn. Fuck yeah.

DEATH STORY

Death Story is a death metal band hailing from the royal city of Kuala Kangsar, Perak, Malaysia. First of all I must say that I like the simple and memory friendly moniker. I like the visible logo too. It reminds me of Septic Death and I do not know why.

This five piece death ripping band plays stripped down straight forward death metal, the sort of death metal that I personally favored. Started off as a jam band in 2002 covering songs from bands in the likes of Hypocrisy and Therion, the band later evolved into this unit of death metal deadly assassins (so death metal) with one demo under their metal belts fittingly titled “Endless Stories of Death” which was on the rampage in 2008.

There were 5 songs available for preview on their Myspace page, one of which was a one minute acoustic intro I guess and I do believe that most of the songs were taken from their debut 2008 demo.

Death Story

I love the fact that the songs sounded organic and simple, maybe due to the fact it was only a demo. In terms of the songs, straight forward death metal meant that there were neither of those ultra technical riffs nor those ultra hyper blast beasts that would end up confusing the listeners and making emo boys vomit blood. All you got were these plentiful chunks of gritty and straight forward dark and deathly riffs through out the 3 minute period of each of the songs, headbangable mid tempo drums with a few blast beats here and there just to keep things interesting.

The bass was audible enough in the mix and it managed to hold the whole structure of their songs to be quite solid and heavy despite of the gritty guitar sound. I was quite annoyed with the vocals though, I honestly believe that the vocal effects were unnecessary and the vocalist should concentrate on producing traditional brutal death growls and extreme high pitch shrieks. For a demo I guess the production of this demo was quite ok although it could have been better.

Death Story: Harryat – vocals, Lord Raven – Guitar, Eibon – Guitar, Amygoth – Bass and Mme – Drums.

Death Story Myspace

Download: Intrusion of Dark Journey [1993]

2010-06-18T01:00:00.000+08:00

I am currently listening to Infectious Maggots – Unknown. Infectious Maggots is a local band that has been around for quite sometime, with three full lengths under their belt, playing industrial grindcore to the fullest. Fuck yeah. “Unknown”, their second album, was released in 1996 by Pony Canyon music.

In my previous post, I have determined that I will be putting some downloadable materials up in the bullet belt and this shall be the first entry under that newly created download tag. I think the best approach to initiate the preamble to the Malaysian Metal music is by letting the listeners indulge into the earliest form of Malaysian Metal compositions and the “Intrusion of Dark Journey” compilation is the best way to kick starts the engine.

“Intrusion of Dark Journey” was one of the earliest extreme metal compilations ever to be recorded and I suggest that every metal heads in Malaysia should consider getting this compilation tape as an essential document to the history of Malaysian extreme metal. But please be informed that you do need to excavate unfathomable archeological sites to find this one since it is extremely difficult to find the tape nowadays.

For the Malaysian headbangers, go and look for the last available copies in Campbell Complex, Kuala Lumpur. I found my copy there and that was like 10 years ago. If you are interested to get yourself in the know of the evolution of Malaysian Metal from the earliest of form then this recording, in my honest opinion, would be a good place to start.

This compilation was produced by the historical Dark Journey Records, to my best of limited knowledge, one of the earliest independent record labels ever to emerge from Malaysia championing extreme metal, in 1993. There are 8 Death metal and Black Metal bands featured in this recording. The bands were Demisor, Profane Creation, Incubated Worms, Nebiras, Bazzah, Aradia, Misanthrope and Kitanai-Chi.

Correct me if I am in the wrong about these facts but if I am not mistaken Demisor was and very much still is a Singaporean godz of grind and as far as I know Profane Creation, Incubated Worms and Kitanai-Chi have all been dissolved. Profane Creation contributed 2 songs for another local compilation called "Ipoh Metal Militant Supremacist" in 1998. Kitanai Chi went on to release a four song EP in 1995 titled "The Mystery of the Dark War Come true" under the moniker Mystery.

I do not know the status of Nebiras since their last offering, “The Great Rites” in 1998 but you can still reach the band through their Myspace page, Misanthrope changed their moniker to Ravenlord and released an album titled “Martyr, Hail” in 2000, the legendary Bazzah is still active and their latest offering was in 2006 titled “Possessed by Evil” and Aradia had just been recently reformed and finally with a full length album under their bulletbelts titled “Draconis Eulogy”.

Bazzah: Myspace | EncMetallum
Aradia: Myspace | EncMetallum
Nebiras: Myspace | EncMetallum
Profane Creation: EncMetallum
Ravenlord: EncMetallum
Mystery: EncMetallum

Name: Intrusion of Dark Journey Compilation
Label: Dark Journey Records
Size: 39.6mb
Year: 1993
Bands: Demisor, Profance Creation, Incubated Worms, Aradia, Bazzah, Misanthrope, Nebiras & Kitanai-Chi.

DOWNLOAD

Bands - Akhnakh

2010-06-15T01:00:00.000+08:00

AKHNAKH

Akhnakh is a five piece melodic death metal band from Ipoh Perak. Citing Amorphis, Sentenced, Dissection and Shadows Fall as their influences, the listeners might have some idea of what to expect from Akhnakh. The band was formed in 2004, and being a band from the mighty Ipoh, I do believe that these guys have a reputation to live up to since Ipoh had been known since the early days as the breeding ground for local extreme metal heavyweights in the likes of the mighty Brain Dead, Vociferation Eternity, Langsuyr, Necrotic Chaos, and Hayagriva just to name a few.

I have always been rather fond of Ipoh. I would usually go there four or five times in a year and would always find it funny and amusing that Ipoh townsmen would normally have myriad kinds of fried rice for breakfast, the kinds of which the KLites would usually have for dinner. They got a thing going on down there in Ipoh with their Ipoh Metal Militia thingy and all of the above mentioned bands were either originators or instigators commanding godly respect in the league of their own.

Judging from the three songs available in their Myspace page, musically, Akhnakh seems quite promising if you are looking for your typical one-lead-guitar-riffing-through-a-structure-of-chords melodic death metal with a few chunk of heavy metal here and there. My only complaint was the vocal and the guitar solo department.

I was never really a fan of those choking core growls that were neither brutal nor horrifying. It was too monotonous. Unfortunately the vocalist seems to be having a hard time catching up with the tempo of the songs, something that I could not really tolerate because it would just spoils the whole song, not to mention my mood. The guitar solo was done half heartedly, that I can tell.

It is quite normal for the local bands to produce their songs themselves rather than having an actual producer with them in the studio, which is for me is quite an unhealthy prcatice since band members have the tendency to get themselves immunized of the mistakes or glitches that would sometime (most of the time) result in fatal.

Having a producer in the studio can actually help you a lot in terms of identifying mistakes in the production and giving a breath of fresh air in to the creativity department. Financing a producer, however, was always the main problem with most of these bands, not to mention that there are only a few producers nowadays who produce metal anyway.

I honestly do hope that these guys can produce better songs in the future since they have already got a few releases under their belt since the inception of the band anyway. Akhnakh is Ajak – vocals, Amzar – Guitar, Abe – Bass, Nan – Drums and Soll – Guitars.

AKHNAKH on MySpace

Rants - Malaysian Metal Downloads:

2010-06-12T01:00:00.000+08:00

I am currently in the office and I am too lazy to read my files or to attach myself to anything related to work. I had been contemplating to put up a download section in The Bullet Belt, weighing the pros and cons of having the section in this blog, for a more than a couple of weeks now.

When I first started this blog, it was solely out of the idea to promote the obscure Malaysian extreme metal scene and its music. Come to think of it, the best way to promote the music is by letting the music speaks for itself. I can write and promote the bands as hard and creative as I wanted, but at the end of the day, the only thing that would remain relevant will always be the music.

Sure, I can write about how good and cult Malaysian local bands, in the likes of Sil Khannaz or Silent Death or Nebiras or Negation, are, but with out the pleasure and opportunity to listen to their respective brand of good and cult heavy metal, all the promotions that I have been doing all these while, at the end of the day would only land on deaf ears and blind eyes.

Thus, I believe among the best way to promote Malaysian metal music would be by giving the readers (non Malaysian especially) the opportunity to experience Malaysian metal music for themselves.

No, I am not going to turn this blog into a music download blog. I will only feature the albums which to my personal opinion should have been regarded as local landmark albums or those local metal albums that I think should be shared to the rest of the world.

Looking at it from the brighter side, having a download section would also attract more international visitors especially those metalheads out there who often scour and scavenge the cyberspace for downloadables (I should know because I am one of those so called cyberspace scavengers haha). Hopefully they would remain to be unique frequents of this small unattractive blog.

Bands - Ghastly Of Gill

2010-06-10T01:00:00.000+08:00

I am currently listening to Entombed - Clandestine. Fuck yeah!

GHASTLY OF GILL

I like the name of this band; it has a nice ring to it. Having said that, Ghastly of Gill, according to the depiction written about the band in their MySpace page, plays melodic black + death metal, hailing from Pulau Pinang, the pearl of the orient, located to the north of Malaysia.

The band itself is not really new to the scene and has been around since the year 2000, recorded a four track demo which never had the chance to see the light of day, was invited to contribute a song for local compilation arranged by one of the most prominent local record label at that time, Psychic Scream Entertainment which also was never released, before breaking up in 2004. The band was reformed in 2006 with an almost entirely new line up and a new headquarter, Shah Alam Selangor.

There are 3 songs uploaded in their MySpace page. Although the sound quality was a bit sub par and the solo was a little bit everywhere and the notes were like all over the place, evidently in the track “The Tyrannical”, the riffs were not as bad and headband friendly in most of the chops. I honestly think that, musically, the band gave the monotonous Malaysian Metal scene a breath of fresh air. The band even added layers of synths appending a really dark and gloomy atmosphere to the chaotic, frequent tempo changing songs that they’ve had, reminded me of another local death metal band called Mandatory.

I personally liked Damnation of Eternity. A decent black metal-isque track with crazy tempo changes. Kudos to the drummer. Even though I love the addition of the keyboards but I sincerely think that keyboard players in general should really crack their heads once in a while and come up with better ways to utilize the keyboard sound. I am really tired and exhausted of listening to the same Dimmu+Cradle orchestraic synths and to that typical classical piano riff that you would find in almost every melodic black metal song there is nowadays.

The problem with the Malaysian heavy metal scene is that you can not earn a good living with music except if you are involved in the music production business. Even that doesn’t guarantee you a decent meal on the table. At the end of the day, music would only be considered a side project for some, rather than being the primary. This usually led to bands breaking up, talents being unpolished so on and so forth.

What ever it is, Ghastly of Gill is a band worth supporting and I hope they will write more songs in the future. Ghastly of Gill’s current line up is: Jepp – Vocals, Aizad – Drums, Isey – Bass, Menn – Guitars and Fuad – Guitars.

Ghastly of Gill on MySpace

Videos - Until The Light Takes Us:

2010-06-08T01:00:00.000+08:00

Until The Light Takes Us, Audrey Ewell & Aaron Aites.

I have managed to watch this yesterday and as a huge fan of documentary flicks and black metal music in general, I was quite disappointed with how "Until The Light Takes Us" turned out to be. In fact when I first heard the rumors about the making of this documentary a couple of years before its actual production, I was quite reserved as to how they're going to pull this off. Disappointed but I think I kind of saw that was coming.

I must admit that I am not really a big fan of the earlier Norwegian black metal music due to lack of exposure and to the fact that I could not really bring myself to tolerate with the lo-fi sound production, the gritty cold sound opted and championed by most of the bands from that era, although I have to say that I have always been a snotty fan of Immortal and the earlier stuff by Emperor. I have always been fascinated with the controversies though, thus the reason why I’ve made myself endure this time consuming piece of frog crap.

The phase was too sluggish. There were quite a number of scenes which I regard as absolutely unnecessary, absolute waste of time and contributed absolutely nothing to content of the documentary. For example, the part where they filmed the mighty Fenriz in a black metal art exhibition or the part where they filmed Frost doing some silly pantomime while cutting himself open and shocked some Greek teenage emo girls.

Do not miss the part where they found a crazy hobo, dressed that poor fucker with a leather jacket, corpse paint and all, and filmed that buffon doing a tap dance routine to a gothic score, headbang, metal horns and all. What does that got to do with black metal? I have no fucking idea.

Basically, UTLTU is a documentary about the Norwegian Black Metal music scene, its history and its world renowned notoriety. If you are fascinated with the myriads of myths behind that celebrated scene, you might want to check this out just for fun. But if you are looking for in depth researches and investigations, I would simply recommend you to go and read Lord of Chaos.

Well, for a kick, you will be able to see Abbath and Demonaz, a whole chunk of Fenriz, a whole chunk Varg Vikernes, Some chunk of Frost, Hellhammer, Garm, Faust and some other names you might recognize. Dont forget Tony the tap dancing black metal clown.

Rants - Metal : A Malaysian Headbanger's Journey Part 2

2010-06-06T01:00:00.000+08:00

Metal : A Malaysian Headbanger's Journey

Being a very naive and somewhat dormant kampong (rural community far from the outskirts of the city) boy, I was so thrilled about this new “satanic” music, so thrilled that I went out and bought my first record soon after. Instead of scaring this naive 13 year old (which the tabloid is still trying to do till this day to boost the sale of their crappy tabloid), that bloody tabloid converted me to Heavy Metal. Haha in your face assholes.

I saved my daily allowances (which was not much), took a bus ride to the city and head straight to the record store with a mission to buy me a “satanic” heavy metal record. My first heavy metal record was Helloween’s Keeper of the Seven Keys Part 2 and that fucking Kiske blew me away. It was quite an old release since the record itself was released way back in 1988 but I had no time to give a damn. I was on a mission to be a headbanger and a headbanger I have been ever since.

The supercool "black metal" album! haha

My second record was Kreator’s Endless Pain. I bought it because it had a super cool cover artwork and Kreator had a super cool heavy metal logo. I hurried home and put the cassette tape (ahh those were the days) into the player and got myself my first dose of Teutonic Thrash fuckin Metal. Unfortunately being a naïve 13 year old still with the ears for singing birds and late night lullabies, I hated the record. Petrozza’s growls were so alien to me and I couldn’t figure out the riffs because it was too fucking loud and it was too fucking fast. “This must definitely be a black metal record” I said to myself.

It was from this point on that I started to learn to appreciate band’s logos. I think it is an under rated art. Look at those early Norwegian black metal bands, you need to have a very imaginative head to come up with those wicked logos. It was fun trying to decypher the name of the band just by looking at the logo. Back when I first started buying my own metal cassette tapes, if it aint got a cool logo, it aint heavy freakin metal and I aint buyin it.

to be continued...

Read Part 1

Bands - Irotori:

2010-06-04T01:00:00.003+08:00

I have been browsing the net again keeping my eyes and ears open for any talented Malaysian metal bands in the rough. Lo, seek and I shall find and look what have I found. I kept my ears opened every now and then for the bands with promising skills on their respective instruments. It is not just about promoting Malaysian bands; it is also about promoting the quality of Malaysian instrumentalists. Behold.

IROTORI

Wow! Irotori is one promising melodic death metal band ever to come out from the muddy banks of Kuala Lumpur, the capital city of Malaysia. First of all I have to admit that I was totally captivated by the vocals when I first listened to their song “Winds of Pain” on youtube. The singer’s high pitch black metal-isque growl has that robust grimness quality and it was executed perfectly by the vocalist.

In that one song alone featured an impressive three sets of vocal styles; the high pitch growls for the main verses, harmonized clear vocals for the choruses and some angry hardcore screams at the end. The brilliantly constructed flow of emotion was all over the place. Well done. Yeah, everybody can do multiple styles of vocals but how many have you heard doing it nowadays?

As a drummer myself, the first thing that I would try and appreciate when I listen to a particular song was the drums. I can seriously say that I felt that the drummer had fun recording his part, flawless tempo changes showing the faultless musicianship of the drummer, executed beautifully through the song.

3 second after the drum intro, waves of keyboard riffs, which was a bit high in the mix, were thrown into the song giving the listeners some ideas on what will they be getting next. Needless to say that guitar parts, although unfortunately were a bit low in the mix, were also beautifully done. The band even gave a few slots here and there for the low end guy to show off some of his skills behind the four strings. A perfect song indeed.

I felt the sincerity in the song and I have nothing but positive words for this band. I highly recommend this band. Try and give them a listen, they will blow you away with their powerful brand of melodic death metal. Untowardly, my review was only based on one song, the only song they had on youtube as well as on their myspace. Hopefully we can here more songs from them soon.

IROTORI MySpace

Book Review - To Live Is To Die: The Life and Death of Metallica’s Cliff Burton:

2010-06-02T01:00:00.000+08:00

To Live Is To Die: The Life and Death of Metallica’s Cliff Burton, Joel McIver, Jawbone Press, 2009.

With out any shadow of a doubt, Cliff Burton can be considered the most influential heavy metal figure out of the 80s Thrash Metal scene. Yes, Geezer Butler (Black Sabbath), Phil Lynott (Thin Lizzy), Steve Harris (Iron Maiden) (with the former two, each being a major influence to the playing of the mighty Burton himself), just to name a few, were all great bass players but the legend, momentum and impact that each and everyone of these legendary bassists have had on the underground metal scene, in my honest personal opinion, is incomparable to those of Cliff Burton’s.

With Metallica being the most successful heavy metal band of all time, the legend of Cliff Burton is not just some second page yesterday news.

This book was written by the mighty Joel McIver (the author who brought you the 2004 “And Justice for All: The Truth about Metallica” and 2008 “The Bloody Reign of Slayer”) with Metallica’s Kirk Hammet penning the foreward. Now that I am quite familiar with McIver’s methods in constructing the contents of his books, I have managed to finish this 272 page book at one go. One heavy metal biscuit for me, cheers.

This book can be considered as the most complete autobiography of Cliff Burton (none had ever been written anyway, except for the chapters written about him in every book written about his band). Covering in detail the journey of Cliff Burton, from his days playing in EZ Street with Jim Martin to his days in Trauma to his days in Metallica detailed down to his last days in September of 1986.

It felt like it was an off shot read to Justice And For All, McIver’s book on Metallica, since in And Justice For All, McIver had already dedicated a spread of 16 pages on the mighty bassist alone. If you have already read And Justice For All, reading through the pages of this book will give you a stint of déjà vu, if you get my drift.

What ever it is, this one is a must for all you Metallicats out there. RIP Cliff Burton.

Videos - Sil Khannaz Rockumentari:

2010-05-30T01:00:00.000+08:00

The first of its kind, finally a (local made) documentary about a local Malaysian underground death metal band and the mighty Sil Khannaz was without any doubt a well deserving and document worthy band in my book. Sil Khannaz is one of the more popular and well recognized death metal bands in the local heavy metal circuit today and one of the few bands (the only?) who stuck with their guns from day one against the neverending assaults from the government, media and the society since the 90’s.

Having formed way back in the 80s somewhere in the gloomy land called Perlis, a small state located in the northern part of Malaysia, Sil Khannaz had evolved (and is still evolving I guess) from playing thrash covers to straight no bullshit death metal in their early demos and debut album titled Conception of Madness, progressive death metal in their controversial Gerbang Kayangan album and melodic death metal in their latest album Berdiri Antara Panji-Panji.

This 2005 documentary was produced by Nebiula Production, the bands’ own independent record label and it mainly contains music videos, early concerts and interviews with the members of the band, the fans and a number of local veteran heavy metal enthusiasts illustrating the colorful history of the band and its undeniable influence to the local death metal scene and Malaysian metal as a whole.

Unfortunately the narration and the interviews were all conducted in the Malay language since I think it was only targeting the local market and was not really meant for an international release except to a few neighbouring Malay speaking countries in the likes of Indonesia and Singapore.

The only frustration I had was that it did not include any interviews from any former members of the band from the earlier version of the band except for an undersized and brief commentary from their previous guitar who played the guitars in their highly acclaimed debut album. Apart from that slight disappointment, this video was a decent documentary of the band. A must for every Sil Khannaz fans.

Bands - Vermillion:

2010-05-28T01:00:00.001+08:00

Due to my hectic day job, I totally forgot about this one interview request that I had made to this one nasty melodic death metal band called Vermillion. Do you want a Gothenberg sound and worship the ground In Flames walked? Have you been dreaming about Angela Gossow (archenemy) tearing your ears lobes lately? Have you been wanking off a centerfold poster of Jessica Alba lately? Then I give you Vermillion that has nothing to do with Jessica Alba.

VERMILLION

Vermillion is a talented 5 piece melodic metal band from the muddy banks of Kuala Lumpur. Nothing new there except for the fact that this is an all girl band. Nothing new there either. What ever!

Besides the talented Singaporean thrashers, Tormentress, and another local thrashers, Shewolves, I have to say that I have got to tip my hat to Vermillion for doing what they are doing. I am very impressed with the hair rising Gossowic vocals though. Extremely brutal. Even to the extent of being so much better than some of the wimpy growls from a number of our glorified local male metal core vocalists ever had nowadays. Another female growler that had me impressed with her growling skills is that girl from Predicate Not Define, couldn’t really remember her name though.

Musically, there is nothing complex nor impressive about the songs (2 to be exact) uploaded on their MySpace page, but I honestly do believe that within time they will be able to polish their instrumental skills giving all the other bands a long and tiring run for their money. The solos were mediocre in my book. Well at least she can damn solo. Haha. Even the drummer can drum better than me for God sake. One thing though, wipe out the core elements, go for pure death metal next time ladies. That would be a shocker.

Maybe the local heavy metal gig promoters should open their eyes and arms for this young and rising band. Put their name on the bill for the next metal camp 4 gig next year. Get them out off the lame metal core circle more often. Those wimps does not deserve Vermillion. We do. Haha.

Judging from the gig lists on their MySpace, I have got to say that these girls have been marking their territories all over the place, which is very good. Obviously they have been very busy gigging since 2008 with up to 20 performances under their belt. Impressive for a three year stint of gigging and I hope we will see more of them in the future.

Vermillion is Aca on vocals, Hana on lead guitar, Yaz on rhythm guitar, Syahnaz on bass and Alie on Drums.

VERMILLION MySpace

Bands - Brabazom:

2010-05-26T01:00:00.001+08:00

I have just finished doing my daily routine of religiously scouring the internet for any unknown Malaysian heavy metal bands that I would probably want to feature in this blog in the near future. I have made my search very specific this time around and for today’s session, Black Metal. I got it in the form of this one talented band from Butterworth, Penang, Malaysia, called Brabazom.

BRABAZOM

Brabazom is a six piece melodic black metal band that you would really want to pay attention to. From the songs uploaded in the band’s MySpage page (which I do believe were hauled out from their unveiling debut, a 3 track demo CD entitled Beast of Mortality which was released in 2009), I can tip my hat (my favorite phrase these days) to the execution of (thy unholy) instrument department, something, besides ear ringing melodies, that I have learnt to appreciate these days. A not so bad playing I must say.

The accumulation of the keyboard riffs and layers really adds some weight to the melodies and especially to the atmosphere of the songs. They totally have the ears for nice catchy melodies which I tend to concede and acknowledge. I would really like to hear more of that hopefully soon.

The band was formed in 2006 in Penang with the hideously ugly Brabazom Corpse as their first true moniker (haha). In 2009 being as self sufficient as they were, a three track demo was released in the form of Beast of Mortality. You will find some Hecate Enthroned in there, some later Dimmu in there and even some shades of As Sahar (a much glorified Singaporean/Malaysian black metal legend) were thrown in as well, especially during the slower parts where the band lets his keyboard player do his thing.

I am not going to tell anyone to be original because the fact is everybody have already done almost everything and finding the remaining portion of that almost would be like looking for a needle in a haystack. I truly that this band would sharpen their musicianship skills, produce more listenable songs, throw in some more memorable lines, play some more gigs and finally write a thesis on what makes a good song good. I’ll give you a hint: Memorable hooks. Try and give this talented band a sincere listen, you wont waste a dime.

BRABAZOM MySpace

Rants - Metal : A Malaysian Headbangers journey part 1.

2010-05-24T01:00:00.002+08:00

Metal : A Malaysian Headbangers Journey

I am writing this to the majestic compositions of Manowar 1988’s Kings of Metal galloping through the speakers bombarding my ears to kingdom come.

Actually being a metal head in Malaysia is not that bad of a deal if you don't mind being judged by the ever intolerant and ignorant society or getting caught wearing corpse paint while attending underground heavy metal concerts or getting your records seized by the custom officer from time to time. I have long accepted the fact that Heavy Metal was, is and always will be a tribal thing. Heavy Metal, this wonderful sick music, gave me some sense of pride, self empowerment and to a certain extent kept my head up high when life was being a hard on me. And one more thing, metal was never meant for fucking Ipods! My name is Hafeez and this is my story.

When I got my first dosage of heavy metal, I was about 13 years old. I think I have already written somewhere in here that I was introduced to heavy metal, not from any heavy metal uncles or any long haired heavy metal friends but from a shitty local tabloid called Harian Metro (a Malaysian daily metro; a still existing local shitty tabloid which regularly glorifies sex related “intelligence” as its major headline and from time to time launches crusades against heavy metal).

Before the life changing revelation, I was just your typical neighborhood adolescent nerd who would listen to whatever there was on the FM radio. Back in the early 90’s, although Hollywood rock, or glam metal or hair metal as some people would call it, was slowly losing its grip back in the United States due to the Seattle/Kurt Cobain’s phenomenon (read: grunge); here in Malaysia, Rock was fighting for her last few breaths against Rap music.

Behold! Its the dudes who ended the spandex phenomenon.

Despite of the matching jumpsuit and baggy pants wearing miggers (Malay niggaz haha) flooding and breakdancing all over the fucking dance floor worshipping their Kriss Krosses, MC Hammers and Vanilla Ices, there were still a couple of decent rock bands hitting the radios with a couple of slow rock numbers trying to relive their glory tight jaguar spandex days of the 80’s.

To be continued...

Rants - Depressive Black Metal?

2010-05-22T23:37:00.004+08:00

I sure am not going to write anything on Depressive Black Metal. It is just that I am currently listening to some songs that I had composed for my own one man Depressive Black Metal band called Deep and nothing in this post will have anything to do with Depressive Black Metal except for this introductory paragraph. Nobody cares anyway. Bah!

I went web/blog hopping just now. Post metal monster, Isis broke up the other day which was a very big deal to a lot of people and I dont know why. I was never a fan of that band anyway although some of their slow churning sludgy gloomy songs were indeed quite compelling. Sludgy song rules!

Soulfly released another album? Sorry, am not interested. Cavalera Conspiracy rules!

My favorite vocodered singing progressive metal/"jazzy"death metal band Cynic will be releasing an EP titled "Re-Traced". According to Blabbermouth, it contains 4 reinterpretations of some of the songs in their 2009, quoting Metalsucks.net "now legendary" album "Traced In Air" and a new song called "Wheels Within Wheels". Somebody posted the song on Youtube and I cant wait for the next full lenght follow up. They are not using vocoders for that song but retained the falsetto vocals. Cynic rules!

Joey Belladonna will be re-joining Anthrax! He is my favorite Anthrax singer and man, that guy can really sing. I do not know what have happened to John Bush because when Dan Nelson was kicked out of the band, John Bush seemed to be the right person to man the vocals because i thought that Among The Living Belladonna-Anthrax reunion tour that they had in 2005-2007 was just a brief to-the-good-old-days tour. It would be exciting to listen to Belladonna on a new Anthrax song. Among The Living rules!

Korn got a new album? Fuck Korn!

Oh yeah, in case this blog do have any readers, i have scheduled some entries for this month. New entries will automatically be posted on all the dates which have even numbers in them (hahaha, call me an idiot but I really cant figure out what these dates were called). I will randomly post some new entries in between. Just like this one. I rule!

Bands - Zarquum:

2010-05-22T01:00:00.000+08:00

As usual, there I was minding my own business within the unknown realm of cyberspace, browsing and peeping through some local Malaysian heavy metal band’s MySpace page, trying to sniff what were they up to these days, when I came across with quite a few stunning new bands (well, at least for me) which I think deserves more exposure than Lars Ulrich’s snare sound in St Anger. I Shall first start with this band.

ZARQUUM

At first glance I thought this was a Black Metal band due to its Black Metal-isque name. Then I listened to the songs uploaded and end up asking myself, what kind of Black Metal is this? Zarquum turns out to be a Death Metal band hailing from the muddy banks of Kuala Lumpur. Well, don’t blame me for associating them with Black Metal since the name Zarquum itself means The Fruit of Hell in Arabic. Arabic name? The Fruit of Hell? Its got to be a black metal band. Haha. Well, that was just me being stereotypical.

All bullshits aside, Zarquum plays a very well played technical death metal in the veins of Arsis or Necrophagia maybe. Well, I am not that good in providing references anyway. Seriously, you should give this band a try. The guitars were crunchy enough for my ears, with double guitar riff attacks here and there and not to mention the shreds were like all over the place which reminds me of that French technical band, Gorod. The timing and the tempo changes of the two songs uploaded on their Myspace were unbelievable. It was like jumping on a trampoline on a bad acid trip.

I’ll tip my hat for the solos. Very well played, sirs. The vocals were the typical dual growls and high pitch screams. Nothing can be wrong there. I hear some synths too. Maybe it was added to add some gloominess into the song. Guess what? It worked. My only complaint? Vary the licks.

Give this band a chance to develop and I am very sure that they can be the Malaysian answer to Arsis. Even with the current state of the production quality of Malaysian studios, I can honestly say that these talented guys will give Gorod a run for their money. Try and give the songs a proper listen and tell me what you think. Oh ya, the band is preparing to release a split with another local melodic death metal heroes called Goda, another band worth mentioning band from Shah Alam, Selangor.

Zarquum is Lord Nafkhatul Faza (Vocal) Sir Farex (Guitar) JY (Guitar) and Ajan (Bass).

ZARQUUM MySpace

Book Review - Sound of the Beast : The Complete Headbanging History of Heavy Metal

2010-05-20T01:00:00.000+08:00

Sound of the Beast – The Complete Headbanging History of Heavy Metal, Ian Christe, Harper Entertainment, 2004.

If you are an avid heavy metal fan, you are new to the music and you didn’t know shit about the history of this blasphemous music, then this is the gospel for you. I got this book somewhere in August 2009 and managed to finish the book a few days later. Captivating would be a perfect word to sum the wonderful deliverance of this book. It’s a fun read.

It was not really the academic type so to speak. Compared to Lords of Chaos, this book is far more light weight, in terms of how the book was authored, content wise though, this book offers more information than anyone could handle thus living up to its title, the complete headbanging history of heavy metal.

The one I got was the revised edition with a newly added chapter discussing the perception and tribulation of heavy metal music in the muslim world. And guess what? Malaysia spearheaded the chapter and even Harian Fucking Metro got a worthy mention.

The content of this book follows the root of heavy metal in the 1970s, the NWOBHM, the thrash metal evolution in the 80s, the rise of death metal and the blasphemy of the Norwegian Black Metal in the 90s each with a chapter of its own.

A few pages in between were dedicated to explain the more major types of heavy metal in the likes of Thrash Metal, Death Metal, Black Metal, Industrial Metal, Grindcore just to name a few, complete with a list of influential bands and albums for each subgenre for easy reference.

This book also closely followed the evolution of Metallica, just so you know.

Tribute - Ronnie James Dio (1942-2010)

2010-05-18T23:30:00.003+08:00

Ronnie James Dio 1942-2010

A depressing day indeed as we mourn the lost of our brother of metal, Ronnie James Dio.

Rest In Peace Bro.

Rants - Obssessive Compulsive Disorder.

2010-05-18T19:46:00.000+08:00

Rants, rants and more rants. While I am writing this, I am feasting my ear holes with Nebiras 1996’s cult EP, Into The Medieval Cults. One of the best and finer Malaysian black metal releases from the 90s in my book. The band gained local notoriety when it was acknowledged by Darkthrone way back in the early 90s when the band was considered to be a brother band to its Norwegian counterpart. Fenriz even dedicated a poem for the band. So sweet of him that Fenriz. I remember dedicating the lyrics of Langsuyr’s Tangisan Embun Pagi to my now ex-girlfriend back in high school. Talking about being unoriginal. Haha.

But all jokes aside, for an unknown Malaysian (back in 1992-93, with the absence of Internet and all, I don’t even think anybody knew where Malaysia was located, so much so if they even knew the existence of the country so to speak) band to get that kind (or somekind maybe) of a blessing from the head quarter up north was enough to give them a right to brag. And brag they did. What ever it is, Nebiras was without a doubt, one of the most prolific band out of the shores of Malaysia. I’ll tip my hat to that.

Well, basically I am not really going to talk about Nebiras. This post is essentially dedicated to my hectic life. Not that I have ceased being hectic, it’s just that I think I have not been able to give this blog the attention that it deserves. It became worse with me knowing the fact that I had started this blog to promote Malaysian local heavy metal scene. I have not been very faithful to that cause I guess.

I hope you will like the new minimalist lay out. I almost wanted to start a new blog just because of the decrease of my fascination with the old template but I figured out that rather than I waste the contents that Ive already written for The Bullet Belt, it would be much easier to adopt a new look. Well, that was just me being me. Obsessive compulsive disorder. No, it’s not a title from an early Carcass song. It’s a symptom of being unable to tolerate and comprehend anything unorganized and out of order.

I chose the simplest template (actually it was one of the default templates in blogger. Minima Lefty if I am not mistaken), used my inferior knowledge of template scripting to edit the HTML settings in order to quash the ugly boarders for the Blog title, fixed the sidebars so that it would align to my right rather then the ugly original left, edit some colors and voila! There you have it. The new simple look for The Bullet belt.

And what has all that got to do with Malaysian metal? Nothing.

Rants - Back From The Dead.

2010-05-16T03:25:00.000+08:00

Wow. How long has it been since the last post? I have been editing and re-editing this page for the past couple of hours. Nobody is reading it anyway so i might as well re-kick start this blog with this short post. Hopefully we (i) will be seeing more new posts after this.

AJAL

I went myspace strolling just now and found out that that this potential Thrashy Black Metal band had already released their debut 4 track demo neatly and appropriately titled "Ajal Tiba Bila Seruan Menjelma" with the help of a local label called Malaysia The Darkness Production. Ajal or simply "death" in malay, was consumated into existence somewhere in 2008 and playing raw thrashy black metal is their game. I liked the songs but I think the lead guitarist needs to brush up on the solos. Being raw does not mean that you are allowed to go off key. Try and give these fellas a chance by visiting their myspace.

AJAL MySpace

SILENT DEATH

The Malaysian Death Metal veterans! Apart from a few other worth mentioning bands in the likes of Brain Dead, Sil Khannaz, Nebiras and Suffercation, Silent Death was the ultimate (and penultimate) death metal band that helped shape the landscape of Malaysian Metal Scene back in the early 90s. I was in contact with the main man of the band, Mr.Stone, through Facebook because I was buying a Silent Death shirt which I wore it like it was nobody's business. They are currently in studios recording the follow up to the awesome 1997 "Break The Silence" EP and I cant wait.

SILENT DEATH FaceBook
SILENT DEATH MySpace

ARADIA

The return of the Warlords after 10 years of seclusion. Hailing from the muddy banks of Kuala Lumpur, Aradia was one of the worthy fews, alongside Cryptic Malediction, Ravenlord and Imperial, forefronting the Kuala Lumpur metal scene back in the days. Following the return from their 10 year hiatus, the mighty Aradia had successfully executed 10 majestic songs.. ehem, hymns, which was recently released as "Draconis Eulogy". Judging from the songs uploaded in their Myspace, I gotta say that the production was top notch. The multi layered guitars were crazy and melodic, not to mention a bit "clean". I really liked the effect that they have used for the vocals. It gave the vocals an evil and twisted sound. Gotta go and buy this one.

ARADIA MySpace
ARADIA FaceBook

Bands - Hayagriva

2009-09-28T23:11:00.000+08:00

It has been a while since I left this blog without any updates what so ever. Day jobs consumed me and most of my time. Since I am still in my holidays, I guess I can spare a couple of seconds and write something on this blog. You can also safely say that this particular post is guilt ridden because it is guilt ridden, thanks to the lack of time in my department. Oh ya, above is an old picture of the band. But I am so in love with that picture I decided I wanna immortalize it here.

I have been trying to get a hold of this one particular hardworking band for months and finally to get some answers from the main man behind the band, Mr.Mantheravatee, the guitarist, was a definite relief. The in depth answers that Mantheravatee gave me made the wait a definite worthwhile. Another noteworthy Malaysian Black Horde.

Hayagriva is another great band originating from the breeding ground of all things heavy, the heavy metal land of Ipoh Perak, one of the two strongholds for heavy metal scene in Malaysia back in the days and the other one, being the unholy muddy banks of Kuala Lumpur. Playing what they called as Dark Shadow Metal, the music was basically melodic and atmospheric Black Metal with synths and keyboards for a much more melodious soundscape. What are the criteria for Shadow Metal? That, you have to ask them personally.

Being one of the most prominent bands in the Malaysian Metal circuit nowadays, Hayagriva is without a doubt one of the most hard-working band there is to have came out from the outskirts of Malaysia. Formed way back in the 90’s Hayagriva marched through as one of the few surviving Black Metal outfits that managed to battle through after the nasty media turmoil that shook the very core of all Malaysian heavy metal lovers with the banning of all things black, to an extent that you can get caught just for wearing a black shirt. To be honest I thought I would never be able to see another Black Metal band again.

Hayagriva first started off with a demo under its belt called The Lord of Never Ending Wrath (which is also the literal meaning of Hayagriva) which was released in 1995. Impressed with the demo, Ultra Hingax Productions (a local metal label) offered to release their debut EP entitled Silverian’s Art (Elegy Domain) which was later released in 1997. In 1998, teaming up with another cherished south eastern metal barbaric tyrant in the form of As Sahar, they released a split tape entitled Beyond Firmament. It took a few numbers of years before another new record from Hayagriva saw the light of day.

In the mean time, when I thought all Malaysian Black Metal bands died out from the first assault against Black Metal by the press and later by the government, Hayagriva was actually busy with their gigs and tours promoting their brand of music. By 2005, Hayagriva was already in the studio writing for their debut full length assault in the form of an album called Red Heaven. It took 2 years before the album was finally released and this was due to the second assault against Black Metal, the shifting of their studio and related issues pertaining to the line up of the band. The news of the new album quickly shook the dry Heavy Metal scene.

Red Heaven was a desecrating release indeed. Atmospheric and melodic with the proper and full utilization of the keyboards in creating a bigger and wider landscape around the melodic guitar riffs, Hayagriva soldiered on with the brand they called Shadow Metal. Although in my personal view, there are plenty of spaces filled with single riffs which would sound more melodic and in fact better if it were properly harmonized.

But I guess my prayers were answered when a few sample riffs for the new album were aired in a pre production clip they got on Youtube demonstrated a much more melodic guitar riffs. I did made known my fascination with the riffs.

To support the release of Red Heaven, Hayagriva occupied their time with gigs and the responses they got from the live crowd were nothing but positive including the crowd in Indonesia when they played in Surabaya and the heavy metal fans in Thailand when they played for them in Bangkok.

Even without the support of a Major label, Hayagriva managed to sell 1000 copies of Red Heaven, a figure that they can brag about judging from the poor buying rate due to the rampant downloading activities nowadays. It also shows that there are at least 1000 loyal Hayagriva fans that would support them no matter what.

The next album will be released early next year. I would like to see them on an intense tour around south east Asia. A talented band indeed thus we shall wait for the wrath of Hayagriva!

Bands - Black Abyss:

2009-07-21T01:24:00.000+08:00

My favorite sub-genre of Heavy Metal music is with out any shadow of a doubt would be Black Metal. The most controversial and the most terrifying form of heavy metal there is. It felt closer due to the gloomy and melancholic atmosphere that I tend to appreciate so much besides certainly being able to relate to its palpable constituent of self empowerment echoing through the prominent utilizations of the corpse paints, bullet belts and spikes. Terrifying but enchantingly autonomous.

One of Malaysia’s most assiduous Black Metal regiment was this band called Black Abyss. Despite the simple and memorizable name that the band opted to use as a moniker, it also gives you an idea about the music they play; straight to your face raw and deep rooting black fucking metal.

I personally am very idyllic to witness the continuing existence and the survival of Black Metal bands in Malaysia. This was despite the burdening pressure and constant prejudicial scorns from both the fearful society and the powers that be upon the music, to the extent of the outright banning of the music a few years ago. At one point, I even thought that I will never be able to see another Malaysian Black Metal band again. I was so wrong. Malaysian Black Metal survived. Thank God for that (Oh, the irony. Haha)

Black Abyss is a black metal assault team hailing from Shah Alam, Selangor, Malaysia, playing black metal in the veins of Burzum and Darkthrone except Black Abyss tends to go faster. The band also put forward one local Black Metal band, Bazzah as one of their favorites. Bazzah’s album Death Is All I See was one of those sought after rare oriental Black Metal gems from Malaysia, popular due to the fact that it was told that a huge amount of the album were seized and burned by the Malaysian authority during the government’s crusade against Black Metal back in those days. Bazzah gained cult status shortly after that.

According to Impaler, the band’s drummer, Black Abyss, formerly known as Goatvomit, was founded in 2003 as a guitarist and drummer duo band. It was only in 2006 that Black Abyss finally managed to secure a stable and steady line up to record their eponymous debut, When Sky Comes Black demo.

For a Malaysian band playing evil music in a country where all things black were despised and cursed to die, being able to sell and clear out 500 copies of compact discs containing 3 goat worshipping hell plundering black metal tracks, in my opinion deserves a bragging right and Black Abyss did just that.

The “When Sky Comes Black” demo received mainly positive reviews from all over the world especially from those lurking fanatic black metal fans from China, Sweden, Colombia, Singapore and United States. One review mentioned that the sound quality of “When Sky Comes Black” demo was so well polished for a black metal band that it would be a minor obstacle for the more primitive black metal fans to enjoy, an indication that sound quality was an important and fundamental substance to each and every one of the talented gentlemen behind Black Abyss.

Black Abyss have been playing gigs and shows to support the demo and one of the highlight was when they were given the opportunity to open for As Sahar, one of the most renowned and celebrated black metal band in Malaysia during the latter’s showcase a few months ago to support the release of their latest album. As a new and upcoming assault regiment war fronting the Malaysian black metal battle horde (I love using all these cool black metal phrases), the fans have been more than eager to support this talented band.

All their sweat, blood and hard work in putting out and promoting “When Sky Comes Black” finally pays off when Black Abyss was offered a record deal by two prominent black metal labels expressing their interest to release future materials by Black Abyss, one from Sweden and the other being Funeral Moonlight Productions, a dedicated pure underground black metal label hailing from Shanghai, China, with China’s own highly acclaimed depressive black metal band Original Sin in the label’s band roster. Funeral Moonlight Production will be distributing the debut full length of Black Abyss. The album entitled Funeralchrist, which will be released somewhere in December this year, will, hopefully, provide international exposure and worldwide recognition for Black Abyss thus once again putting Malaysian Black Metal on the map.

Besides the full length under Funeral Moonlight Production, Black Abyss will be involved and participating in numerous split projects and one of the projects being a split cassette release with Thailand speed raw black metal, Plaguebringer under Hellhouse productions. Another split cassette release with a Columbian raw black metal band, Tzelmoth, will also be released somewhere in September this year under Florida’s Lux Ferre Records. A four way split release under local’s Kvlt666 Production are also on its way subject for release by the end of this year. I guess it will be a very busy year for Black Abyss.

I do believe that this hard working band have what it takes to succeed. Feel free to visit Black Abyss and taste the conquering assault and triumphant sound of Malaysian Black Metal under the deathly siege of conservatism and narrow mindedness of Malaysia. Black Abyss current line up consist of Abyssic War on vocals and Guitars, Impaler on drums, Mordhthurnum on bass and Nershymn on guitars.

Black Abyss Myspace page:
www.myspace.com/stigamatacrush

Covers - Cromok's Forever In Time:

2009-07-15T13:31:00.000+08:00

One of the first few heavy metal records that I bought when I was still a younger version of me was this record of a local thrash metal legend called Cromok. I was caught awed when I first knew of the band and later on succumbed to the beauty of the oriental melodies neatly incorporated in every thrash metallic notes, chords and riffs in each and every song in this album. Mesmerizing. The album was released in 1993 by EMI.

Cromok was considered by many local metal heads as a legendary band in its own right. The band was formed in the late 1987 when all the founding members were still these four young long haired foreign students struggling to survive Australia. The good ol’ down under. By time, they have harvested a huge underground following and gained reputation and respect as the most popular Asian Thrash Metal band amongst the blond underground Australian head bangers at that time. They were so popular; to an extent the band was offered an opening slot for a Motorhead concert when Lemmy Kilmister and co was touring the country. The gig was unfortunately turned down by the band.

Enough about the band let us now examine the artwork. The cover depicted the head of a metal unicorn in its entire splendor. The unicorn has been a known trademark for the band since day one and appeared on the entire discography of the band except for one record which was Engraved in Eternity, a best of compilation released in 2003. I think it was indeed a very creative attempt to amalgamate the element of mysticism (unicorn being a mystic and mythical animal) and heavy metal (the metallic clad). To say that the artist envisioned an amalgamation between east and west would be a bit far fetched since I can’t really remember seeing unicorns being popularized as icons in any local myth or mystic tales.

It was rather odd to have a unicorn as a mascot since most of the Thrash Metal bands from that particular era, what more playing that type of music, were more keen towards explicit, horrific and sometime shocking images to embellish their record. The use of unicorns would give an impression that this was a tame band, although I have to admit that the band’s first record, Image of Purity which was released in 1991, was rather atrocious and ferocious in its own right compared to the songs available in Forever In Time. Maybe it suits the style, I don’t know. But still, it was one of the best cover for a local band, it is still is.

Bands - Wabak

2009-07-13T00:23:00.000+08:00

Wabak is a Malay word for plague and I do believe that they have the potential to evolve into one mammoth plague if they can figure out the correct ingredient and formula that they wanted to employ for their music. Wabak is a heavy metal band hailing from Banting, Selangor, Malaysia. I have to say that the lead guitarist can really execute his instrument judging from the Youtube clip I saw of them, although the songs on their Myspace page were far from impressive, well, at least to my ears they were not. Maybe I was expecting crazy note progressions and killer complex riffs from a band of heavy metal musician that have a John Peter Petrucci playing lead in it.

I have personally informed the band of my distastes of the melodies constructed for their vocals. I was utterly awed with the vocalist’s competence to get in contact with all that bloodcurdling high note screams, but melody wise, nothing out of the vocals stuck in my head. It was just sheer high note screams and that was it. The vocal melodies on the song, take Blindness Heart for example, had no more than 3 notes on a single bar. Yes I am no position to judge since I myself am not a qualified musician but hell I can still make a distinction between what’s listenable and what’s not. Maybe I was expecting good sappy but hummable melodies from a band that have a Michael freaking Kiske singing their songs. Sigh.

Apart from that I honestly believe that Wabak can still cut out as a decent Malaysian heavy metal band if they can give a little bit more effort on writing better songs with better riffs and strong melodies for the vocals. I was also informed by their axeman, Mr.Fuzzlee, that Wabak is currently writing and compiling original materials for their upcoming debut album. Wabak consist of Shah on the vocals, Fuzzlee on the guitar, Hanif on the guitar and Mizi on the bass. I hope these guys can decorate their repertoire and gain more experience as a good live band by playing more and more gigs in the future. It is hard to get gigs in Malaysia, if you got one, take it.

Get in touch with this band through their Myspace page:
http://www.myspace.com/metalkronik

Videos - Anvil: The Story of Anvil:

2009-07-11T02:51:00.000+08:00

Gosh, I have been so busy I totally forgot to update this blog. For this entry, it is going to be a short one. The other day, I received an email from Simon Owens of Bloggasm, ushering me about this yet to be released 2008 documentary by Davis Guggenheim, who directed Al Gore’s The Inconvenient Truth for those who don’t know him. The documentary revolved around three greater than great guitarists, all three well known for their fondness of conducting weird and bizarre experimentations with their respective guitar sounds, all three were from three different eras of rock n roll, getting themselves cramped into a garage somewhere to talk about guitars, its unique sounds and their journeys in trying to get the guitar sounds that they have always wanted for their respective bands. It’s a must watch for those who are passionate about their guitars. It might get loud dude. Thank you, Simon.

Enough with the introduction let us go straight to the main content of today’s entry. I reviewed the book in my previous entry, now it is time to review the actual video. Anvil:The Story of Anvil is basically a documentary depicting the trials and tribulations faced by a forgotten Canadian Heavy Metal band comprised of two childhood friends, singer and lead guitarist, Lips and drummer, Robbo, in accomplishing their teenage dream to someday become rock stars. The book was like a more meticulous, prolonged and detailed excerpts of the video, so on the whole, what you got in the book is basically how it was in the video, except you will be getting a more thorough, detailed and comprehensive chronicle about Anvil in its earlier formation, the struggling years and their victory in Japan from the book. But still, the video was a fun watch.

The movie was directed by Sacha Gervasi who wrote Tom Hank's The Terminal. Gervasi was a friend they met while they were on tour back in the 80's.

There was this one part in the movie where Anvil was set to play at Metal Festival somewhere in Sweden, we can see Lips running around like a little kid trying to greet heavy metal personalities that he idolized and knew. Some of them didnt even know who he was. He was just like an innocent little boy running for Ozzy Osbourne for autographs.

Japan has always be a point of fascination to me for their fanatical fans, not to mention that it has the second largest music industry in the world, hot on the heels of good ol’ Uncle Sam. Note this all you heavy metal bands in Malaysia, if you really want to get rich with your unique music, try and get a distribution deal from any heavy metal record labels up there in Japan.

It was a good movie. I have to admit though that through out the whole This Is Anvil, I chocked in tears. You got to see it for youself to experience it.

Covers - Necrotic Chaos's Regime Grotesque:

2009-07-06T21:42:00.000+08:00

I am writing this entry while Regime Grotesque is destroying my speakers and spontaneously my eardrums too. The next album cover that I wanted to share is Necrotic Chaos debut full length entitled Regime Grotesque. Necrotic Chaos is a brutal death metal band hailing from Ipoh, Perak, Malaysia. The band was formed in 1992, along with the surfacing of quite a number of Ipoh based Heavy Metal bands in the likes of Langsuyr (Black Death Metal), Athotorgh (Thrash) and Profane Creation (Death Metal) (Ipoh Metal militants as they called themselves), with 5 official releases under its belt. Regime Grotesque was released in 2003 by the cult label Ultra Hingax Productions containing 8 absolutely blistering, brutal, sick and quite technical death metal tracks. Oh there are no sappy or memorizable melodies here.

The undomesticated excellent drumming, which had always made an impact on me, was of the courtesy of one of the most brilliant and highly respected heavy metal drummer ever to emerge from Malaysia, the iconic Mr.Wira aka Old-T. On the other hand, the guitarist and one of the band’s founding members, Mr. Jadam, is also a legendary producer, highly regarded and well respected within the Malaysian heavy metal circuit. It was quite a disappointment that their Black As Incest EP failed to top the intensity shown in Regime Grotesque. The sound production was horrible too. Well, at least for me it was.

Now, enough about the band let us now examine the artwork. The cover illustration on this album was drawn by Desmond Sia, a local prolific illustrator known for his killer artworks battle fronting the epic releases of such distinguished bands in the likes of Impiety, Angel Corpse, Abhorrence and Profanatica. I have been a fan of Desmond Sia’s artwork since I first knew that he was a local and for his superb artwork in Impiety’s Skullfucking Armageddon. Total cult.

The cover gives a picture of images of skulls and ghouls the old school and analog way, if I may put it that way. Is there any other better ways to illustrate a cover for a death metal band than having skulls and ghoulish faces splattered all over the sleeve? Simple, horrifying and one look at the cover you know that you will be in for a sick treat. Decapitated bodies are so over rated these days.

With out any doubt, the illustration has managed to give proper justice to the title of the album. Notice two of the skulls were drawn to wear war helmets. I believe that would the interpretation for the word Regime. Do I need to point out that entire artwork is monstrous, gruesome and horrendous? That would be the artiste’s elucidation of the word Grotesque. Straight to the point.

Apart from the killer album cover, I have to say that this album was a very well defined album. From the name of the band, album title, cover artwork and the songs. Sick!

Get in touch with the band at:
http://www.myspace.com/necroticchaos

Videos - Metal : A headbanger’s Journey:

2009-07-06T00:31:00.001+08:00

Metal : A headbanger’s Journey, Banger Productions, 2005.

I know it is kind of late to write down a review about this incredible documentary. I watched this one last year and that is kind of late too taking into account that the documentary was released way back in 2005. Where the hell was I in 2005? What ever it is, I have to say that this is the documentary that everyone should spend some time watching to really understand what heavy metal is really all about. Either for those who long to appreciate and value the history and origin of this wonderful music we call heavy metal, or for those who, out of innocent curiosity, wanted to read through real reason why it had such an immense or superlative cultural impact on its devoted listeners, this is the documentary that will explain and answer some of your questions.

The video follows Sam Dunn, a devoted metal listener and a Canadian anthropologist turn film director, on a journey to all the significant places through out the globe, England and Norway for instance, both remain closely significant to the birth of New Wave of British Heavy Metal and the second wave of the Satanic Black Metal respectively, while dictating the origins of the music, the musicians and its cultural impact on youths to the viewers.

The video was neatly divided into several parts and primary contents where Dunn would help and introduce to the viewers to the inside world of heavy metal, step by step. I enjoyed the segments and it appears to me that the video was produced as a very much viewer friendly documentary by manipulating the easiest but the most effective and best ways, the mechanism to reach for the curious cats out there who really wanted to understand heavy metal, without just vomiting the superiority of the music all at one go. Dunn and his team really do want to edify and educate rather than doing a one off shot documentary with crappy contents and footage quality. It was this quality and dedication that impressed Iron Maiden, whose singer Bruce Dickinson also appeared in the documentary, so much that they invited Dunn and his crew to film the mighty Maiden on tour. The film was later produced and released as Iron Maiden: Flight 666.

There was also this chart on the evolution of Heavy Metal that really made me fascinated. The chart explained how heavy metal evolved from Black Sabbath, Led Zeppelin and Deep Purple to Dio, Iron Maiden and Judas Priest to Metallica, Slayer and Megadeth to Mayhem, Darkthrone and Immortal so on so forth. Dunn and his team also released another documentary called Global Metal in 2007 as a follow up. I shall write a late review on that video too. This is recommended to all you Malaysian Heavy Metal enthusiasts out there.

While I was writing this entry, i listened to the newest album by a Greece melancholic and depressive Black Metal band called Sad, entitled Enlightened by Darkness. Really sets the mood. Haha.

Covers - Langsuyr's The Eastern Cruelty:

2009-07-04T19:09:00.000+08:00

Hey, I am definitely getting the hang of doing this cover review series. Thank you MetalMark for this awesome inspiration. When I first had the idea to do this cover reviews series, there were a few album covers that flew straight into my head and made its way straight into my best album covers top ten list and this was one of them. Langsuyr’s The Eastern Cruelty EP cover which was released by Nebiula Production in 1996.

I was still a very naïve and young aspired metal head back when I first discovered this album in its cassette format on a shelve in a record store somewhere, and I have made it a mission to go and get this album. Why? Because I was attracted to the killer and evil cover artwork. Langsuyr is a Black Death metal band hailing from Ipoh, Perak, Malaysia and one of the earlier bands whose music prototyped a whole new genre, the Eastern Metal. Eastern Metal basically was heavy metal, usually black metal with the incorporation of Malay occult and mystical theme usually lyrically and rarely image. It may sound a bit trendy today to have occult and mystical Malay poems as lyrics, but back then it was a very unique and original phenomenon. The name Langsuyr or langsuir was taken from the name of the deadliest banshee, the deadliest version of the numerous versions of Malay female vampires available in the Malay folklore.

If my memory serves me correctly, the artwork was drawn by the band’s drummer at that time and the logo was designed by the guitarist. I have to prefer the logo on this release compared to their original logo on their first demo or any of their later releases. The Eastern Cruelty logo depicted the name of the band covered in flames. I loved the details and for me it has a very evil, wicked and eastern black magical atmosphere.

Let us examine the cover. The cover consists of the image of a seven headed dragon most probably as a reverence to one of their songs included in the EP entitled The Seven Headed Dragon of Pelangi. Pelangi is a Malay word for the rainbow. In the middle of the chaotic swerves and swirls of the dragon’s heads, sits a menacing looking female figure with a sinister grin which I believe to be a Malay female shaman. This was due to her being drawn holding an incense tray with her left hand in a position to cast a spell. It could have been the lady langsuir herself. Notice the long, sharp and disturbing fingernails?

I adored every bit of details available in this artwork. It seems that the dragon drawing and the female figure drawing were actually two pieces of artwork pasted together. Note the white line outlining the female figure? Although another explanation would explicate that the method of outlining a figure in an artwork is actually normal in order to highlight a particular character. Fair enough. Although I am no expert in art and the quality of an artwork, I would really like to believe that the whole The Eastern Cruelty artwork was drawn using colored pencils. The precision is excruciatingly well decorated. This cover will always be one of the best decorated album cover in my view.

Get in touch with Langsuyr:
www.myspace.com/langsuyrband

Covers - Claw's Summoning The Darkness:

2009-07-04T16:39:00.000+08:00

One of my favorite blog is MetalMark. I enjoyed reading his thoughts and personal views on all things metal. There is this one column in his blog that I enjoyed reading called Clash of the Album Covers, where MetalMark would post two or more album covers and later let his readers choose and decide their preference. It was fun reading the hilarious and side-splitting comments from his readers and MetalMark would occasionally give his own personal views and favorites. I decided to put out something similar but it would not be another Clash of the Album Covers rip off. It would be much more comparable to what MetalMark and his friends were doing in A Whole Lotta Album Covers, but since The Bullet Belt will only be concentrating on Malaysian Heavy Metal scene, it is obvious that I will only write about Malaysian Metal album covers. This will be fun I hope.

I shall start with Claw’s Summoning the Darkness 2009 demo cover. Claw is a promising grim and raw black metal band from Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. In Malaysia, this grim and raw type black metal sound is popularly known and labeled as Black Metal Hutan. Hutan is a malay word for forest. The sound was so grim, raw and primitive it must have been recorded primitively in some deep jungle some where, thus the term Forest Black Metal. Hey, that might just have been a new unique genre there if the bands could just throw in some unique trademarks. Well, as for the band, they have managed to release two well received demos and a four way split tape in 2008 since their inception into blasphemy in 2004. Summoning the Darkness was their most recent demo released through the dedicated Morbid Invasion Records. Some native tribesman out there in the deepest jungle, who must have engineered the demo, must have been really proud.

I personally loved the new Claw logo. I personally think that it caught the grimness of the band. It’s definitely eviler and desecrating compared to the old 2007 logo. The old logo reminded me of a logo used by a death metal band from South America, unfortunately I forgot the name of the band. The fact that the logo was nicely designed in symmetry and was colored white rather than the typical black, made it more captivating, if I may say so. Let us examine the picture on the cover. The cover depicted a grayscale photo of a dusky, foggy and yet very icy mountain top complete with its dry and rather pale forestry gloominess. The fact that the mountain was kind of covered with snow was a bit a turning off switch for me since there are no icy mountains in Malaysia. Or is it me being bad in geography? This is not Norway mates. Again, this was also, to my eyes, a perfect illustration and representation of the band’s style of music. The cover was indeed very atmospheric. The perfect mishmash of dark, cold and gloomy atmosphere made it to be as one of the most perfect album cover in 2009, well at least for me if we were to exclude the snow.

Get in touch with Claw: http://claw-kvlt.blogspot.com/

Bands - Imperial

2009-06-30T12:38:00.000+08:00

It has been quite a while since my first post about Malaysian bands. I have been in contact with quite a few highly potential bands for a feature post in this small timer blog and hopefully, with my endless devotion in promoting this blog, The Bullet Belt can compose, at least, an undersized scrap of contribution and input in promoting these bands featured in this blog in the future. There are plans for a wider scale promotion that have been flying in and out of my mind for quite a while, but I am still trying to sort things out and in time needed to stretch out these strategies upfront for the approvals of the bands respectively. I am calling it, Tali Pinggang Peluru Presents (malay for The Bullet Belt Presents). Fingers crossed.

So, what do we have here? The second band that I deem fit for a feature post in this blog is this one band called Imperial. Imperial is, well, at least for me although denied by the band’s founding member, primary songwriter and guitarist, Mr.Zarim, in an interview I made with him recently, a Black Metal band from Kuala Lumpur, the heart and focal point of Malaysia. Imperial is no new comer to the local metal scene. Started way back in 1993 with a demo entitled “Enslave” released in 1994. Heavily influenced by Scandinavian bands in the likes of Darkthrone, Samael and yes, Emperor, the band marched through 1995 with another demo entitled “Emperor of The Hordes”. Wow! Enslaved and Emperor would be so proud. “Emperor of The Horde” established Imperial as one of the many prominent Black Metal outfit hailing from the center of the Kuala Lumpur city in the instance of Aradia and Misantrope. Emperors in their own distinctive metal league.

The band played a number of gigs through out the country and was in the midst of preparing for the recording of their debut EP which was set for release, I believe somewhere in 1999 or 2000 under a local label called DreamWorldDecay, when the band faced internal and external conflicts and problems which resulted in the quitting of one of its founding member. Sadly, even though some of the new songs were already recorded, the EP idea was scrapped.

The band soldiered on and played their last show somewhere in 2001 before Imperial was officially put under and indefinite hiatus. The bands members concentrated on other normal commitments, the same normal commitments that usually become the main reason for the hindrance of progress of bands in Malaysia, like day jobs and families, sometimes or most of the time would lead to the disbandment and death of bands.

After 7 years of hibernating, the band members decided to reactivate the dragon and put forward their passion for music once again with the tying knot in the form of Imperial brotherhood. The new era of Imperial was celebrated and officialized with the release of their promo single entitled the Imm… oh, wait. No it is the “The Conqueror” this time. Haha, The single was released by Astral Lore Productions, one of the few remaining local labels who have stayed enthused in championing local black metal bands in Malaysia. The single was released in 2008. The debut album is currently in plans and the recording session is due to begin somewhere around august. Will the title of their new album contain the name of another scandanavian band? That would be the million dollar question. Immortal, Darkthrone and Satyricon will definitely be on the edge of their seats from now on. Haha.

Judging from the arrangement of The Conqueror, Imperial is set to rest on the formula of atmospheric, technical and progressive songs and the debut album, I believe, will contain strong feel for the atmosphere since synth will be fully utilized by the band. I have to suggest that this upcoming album should be a must for all heavy metal fans world wide for a dip and taste of Malaysian Progressive Black Metal, if labelling is inevitable, well, at least according to me. Again, this is a must for the fans of the later music of Emperor and Enslaved. The current line up of the band is composed of Zarim on guitars and Synths, Zam on vocals and bass, Jon on bass and second guitars and G-knight on the drums and percussions.

You can reach the Imperial Battlefront on their MySpace page
www.myspace.com/imperialbattlefront

Videos - Get Thrashed : The Story of Thrash Metal:

2009-06-27T15:59:00.000+08:00

Get Thrashed : The Story of Thrash Metal, Saigon 1515 Productions, 2008.

I have just finished watching this one great documentary on Thrash Metal, and it was a fun watch indeed. Get Thrashed explored the birth and origin of the Thrash Metal music, it talked about various prominent and influential bands, Metallica and Megadeth just to name a few, during that era that have helped shape the music and the entire movement and discussed further about various Thrash Metal scene from all over the world. 9jmix4w2pr

Like most of the documentaries out there, Get Thrashed contained loads of interviews and numerous video clips from old shows from the 80’s and early 90’s. What is Thrash Metal without the mention of the big five (big four to some)? The prominent bands featured at length were for example, the band who brought the genre to worldwide attention and the one responsible for the movement in the first place, Metallica, check, the band who elevated the genre into a higher level of phenomenal superhuman technicality with a display of callous ingenuity in songwriting, Megadeth, check, the pioneering and very much influential Exodus, check, the band who resorted to shock value, inspired a couple of other heavy metal subgenres and lifted the music to another level of superhuman intensity and velocity, Slayer, check, and the band who popularized experimentations in the genre, Anthrax, check. All the big five were deeply discussed and elaborated, don’t worry. The mention of Suicidal Tendencies and Pantera can be considered as a bonus.

The documentary also took a peak into the equally important Thrash Metal scene from all over the world, especially German and Brazil. What is Thrash Metal with out the mention of its Germanic extension, the Teutonic Thrash and its close cousin the Brazilian Thrash Metal. Bands like the mighty Kreator, Sodom, Destruction, Sepultura and SarcoFago were equally important in contributing to the mass appeal of the movement back in the 80’s.

The height of the documentary for me was always with the Dave Mustaine of Megadeth interview. No matter how arrogant Mustaine appeared to be, to the extent that he claimed James Hetfield of Metallica and Kerry King of Slayer were the extension of his style and play, which for me is quite true, Mustaines crazy songwriting skills, is and will always be indisputable. The first two of Megadeth albums, Killing is My Business… and Business is Good and Peace Sells… but Who’s Buying?, will always be thrash metal classics alongside Metallica’s Kill Em All, Slayer’s Show No Mercy and Exodus’s Bonded by Blood.

This is a very good video and I recommend this one to those who would like to know the history of the music that they listen to.

Rants - The Heavy Metal Misconception:

2009-06-26T12:11:00.000+08:00

How I see myself as a Metal fan in Malaysia?

Like in any other places all over the world, Heavy Metal will always be regarded as the music for the mischievous sprite and Malaysia included. The functionality of the media and press in this country offered no help what so ever in aiding the curiosity of the conservative, uninformed and anxious society with the very much-needed explanation despite their roles as propagators of truth and conscience. As far as I am concerned, Heavy Metal in Malaysian will always remain as an underrated and second-class form of musical entertainment in the eyes of any normal Joes and Janes, despite the cultivations of a comprehensive amount of creativities and innovations within the local Heavy Metal scene through out the decade, showed by these underrated musicians and enthusiasts. Maybe it is for the better.

As fans of everything heavy and extreme, some Malaysian heavy metal fans were very much open to be a subject of ridicule and the prejudicial judgments of the society in general, especially during the height of the Black Metal/Satanism controversy, which resulted with the music being banned right there and then by the local religious authorities sending parents and teachers into an uncontainable frenzy and restlessness.

As dedicated I am in wanting to defend heavy metal, I cannot put the blame unjustly to the local authorities, parents and teachers. The fears were indeed legitimate but the manner they tend to use in resolving the problem was just another hands off approach. There were no thorough and detailed studies being conducted. There were minimum confrontations. The conclusion was made solely via assumptions, hearsays and the exaggerations and misleading flights of the imagination puffed out by the local ignorant and biased medias. If it was really a life, moral or belief threatening situation, they have all the rights to put a ban on the music, hell, I would even give them my support, but the question remained unanswered, how threatening the situation was? Were all the rumors true? One rotten apple does not make the whole barrel inconsumable, thus banning the consumption of apples in general would make the lawmakers appeared absurd, unintelligent and ridiculous.

Heavy Metal will always be related to a psychological form of entertainment. Heavy Metal fans do not condone to these heavy, brutal, unlistenable and extreme form of entertainment just to be solely entertained. It was and always will be a form of psychological therapy, in some ways or another, listening to a music resented by the rest of the society gave them psychological prowess and autonomy, elites in their own little world, thus the reason why Heavy Metal is so much a tribal music. In order to understand these kids who worshipped Slayer or those frostbitten Norwegian bands in the likes of Mayhem, Burzum, Immortal and Darkthrone who often in their earlier formations championed satanic and evil imagery for shock values, the authority should have studied the reasons why these kids were listening to these kind of music in the first place. They will be in for a surprise to find out that most of the kids did not even give a fuck about no lyrical contents. These bands could have sung about lollipops, candy bars and teddy bears, but with that awesome kind of voice, they could have sung about eating Pizza under the eclipsing winter moon, I would still be listening to the great music!

Rants - The Pre Introduction to the Future:

2009-06-23T12:20:00.000+08:00

I am still waiting for Mr.Mantheravathee, the lead guitarist and the riff master of the mighty shadow lords, Hayagriva to come back to me with some details about his band for my next feature entry. In the mean time, I will be structuring and assembling a lengthy and extensive opinion based entry about the future of Malaysian Metal and the challenges that it will be facing in keeping abreast with the rapid development of the Heavy Metal scene world wide. Sounds impressive huh? It shall not be intended as a proper study of cultural anthropology for Malaysian Heavy Metal, but I do hope that it will shed some lights for those who are interested to be acquainted with various realistic guiding principles that they can apply as a diagram to shape Heavy Metal music with their own identity, personality and distinctiveness. In advance, I would like to thank those Metal enthusiasts who have agreed to accept my invitation to participate. Thank you.

I have already received a few answer sheets and the opinions were intellectually dominating, mind bombarding and served the point more better than better. I cant fucking wait!

The entry will mainly be dealing with the issue of originality and passion in Heavy Metal in the context of Malaysia; the issue of having the right driving force that will be needed and acknowledged as a striving foundation for Malaysian bands on their quest to build reputations for their respective bands on a wider and larger scale; and the last but not least, the challenges that needs to be noted and overcome. I am trying to promote this blog internationally and hopefully the forum shall be an eye opener for the worldwide audience of Heavy Metal, of the intensity and innovativeness of Malaysian Heavy Metal. Fingers crossed.

Rants - The Malaysian Black Metal:

2009-06-19T12:59:00.000+08:00

When I first started The Bullet Belt a few weeks ago, it was only for one sole motivation and that sole motivation was my dire need to contribute and promote local underrated heavy metal bands from all across Malaysia regardless of genre and origin. I know that it will not be much of a contribution for the time being since I am still quite in the dark as to what would be the best and most effectual ways to promote the bands featured in this blog. Myspace would be a good place to start. In any case, I will try and see it through.

I have been checking out a number of exotic metal bands on the Astral Lore Production’s roster and currently crossing my fingers in the hope that all the bands featured on the roster are still amply alive and active. I know some of them are. It is quite blissful to witness the actuality that there are still some perseverance, enthusiasm and devotions from the good people in Astral Lore to promote exotic bands from the local black metal scene. A few years ago, I often wondered what in the name of damnation have happened to all these greater than great Malaysian black metal bands? What happened to all those bullet belts, pentagrams, spikes, inverted crosses, corpse paints and those nerve wrecking high-pitched haunting wails? Long gone were the glorious reigning days of Klang Valley Black Metal elites in the likes Nebiras, Aradia, Sauts Alastor, Ravenlord and War 666.

The black metal rhetoric toyed around by the local media had really made a huge caustic and destructive impact on the local metal scene especially the local black metal scene in particular. All of a sudden, the bands seemed to have died down. It was a very dark and gloomy year for the metal industry during those challenging days back then and the result showed.

I hope with the current development smearing rapidly in the local black metal scene, the hell hordes, with high hopes, shall once again reign supreme. With the reformations of some of the older bands like Aradia, Mistik and Imperial, the release of albums from bands like War 666, Hayagriva and Insultor and newer bands started to emerge these recent years, there might be a possible bright future after all for the local black metal scene. Or should I say, a dark and black future? We shall see.

Book Review: The Heroin Diaries - A Year in the Life of a Shattered Rockstar:

2009-06-19T00:10:00.000+08:00

The Heroin Diaries - A Year in the Life of a Shattered Rockstar, Nikki Sixx with Ian Gihins, Pocket Books, 2008.

I am currently waiting to write something about one of the most hardworking and dedicated metal band from Malaysia which goes by the name of Hayagriva and I am currently doing some proper research about the band and until I completed this mini investigation, I shall write about something else so that The Bullet Belt would not end up being a lost work like most of my other one hit wonder blogs.

This is not actually a book, but more of a collection of entries from Nikki Sixx’s 1987 diary with additional commentaries by various people who were mentioned in his entries. This is like an additional text book for the hard hitting New York Times bestseller The Dirt, the complete autobiography of his world famous hard rock band, Motley Crue, straight from the horse’s mouth. I will be reviewing The Dirt later. Now, let us focus on The Heroin Diaries – A Year in the Life of a Shattered Rockstar by Nikki Sixx with Ian Gihins.

Nikki Sixx was and still is the bassist and principle songwriter of Motley Crue, one of the most influential and prominent hard rock bands in the history of American rock and roll, if the world would be an overstatement. Their insubordinate and wild attitude both in life and music, on and off the stage, was the elementary constituent that shaped the whole music industry in the 1980’s. Cock Rock, Glam Metal, Hair Metal, Rock Kangkang, Rock Paras, call it what ever you want but it all undeniably started and revolved around bands like Crue when Steven Tyler and Joe Perry were too busy knocking each other off the stage.

Through this diary we can dive deep into Nikki Sixx’s life of rock n roll, booze, drugs and sex. Most of the entries contained either about Sixx doing drugs, trying to be sober, preparing to go on stage and a bit about his fellow band members here and there. Each entries comes with additional commentaries from his band members, former managers, ex-girlfriends and Sixx himself, trying to put in little bits of details about what really happened on various events mentioned in each of the entries. That very much helped the readers to understand what in the name of hell is he talking about.

The lay out of this book is all over the place so you really need to focus on what you read. Ghoulish arts and drawings here and there and most of the contents were either black, white or red in color. It was a bit of a turn off for me because more than once that these horrendous lay outs distracted my eyes from reading the texts. Like I said, this book is just a supplemental read for The Dirt. For those who wanted to know more about Motley Crue, I would suggest that reading The Dirt would be more than enough. For collectors, this is a must.

I bought this book for RM57.50 from Kinokuniya, KLCC on 13th February 2009.

Bands - Filsufatia:

2009-06-14T02:24:00.000+08:00

Would it make me a self boasting basket case for writing about my own band? I love writing and I love reading my own writings. I have always been my own blog audience. Although, this blog was created for one straightforward reason; so that I can write something about Zubirun and Qharinth, I still need to consume and utilize these empty spaces, at least for the time being, before I have enough materials to write about the above mentioned bands. Until then, I shall write what ever I deem fit for The Bullet Belt.

Filsufatia is my one man band and it has been in existence for quite a while now. If my memory served me correctly, I formed Filsufatia out of boredom, as a bedroom band project, somewhere later in 2004. It all started when I first managed to get my hands on this one cool home studio software called Fruity Loops Studio. Well, it is not until later that I found out that I could actually utilize this loop program to create heavy metal. I started using Fruity Loops Studio since 2003. Back in those days, it was all about RnB and Hip Hop music (hell, I still do the normal music arrangements once in a while). One fine day, I found out that there were some of the loops available in the program resembled the sound of a distorted electric guitar and if utilized and mixed properly, I can actually emulate the sound of a real band. I kind of freaked out. To cut the story short, the rest was history.

I always wanted to be in a metal band because there were always a plentiful of crazy riffs and melodies flying in and out of my head. I have been in a number of bands before but they were either punk, hardcore or pop and never metal. The satisfaction of playing live instruments was there but not in terms of the need to express my heavy metal creativity and originality. I need an outlet to express this fervor for grunting vocals, orchestral arrangements, haunting chapels, dark riffs and corpse paints, thus the formation of Filsufatia as a foundation to gratify my metallic lust and growling desires was the most perfect venue. It was the best venue for me because using computer programs would mean I can continue doing this on my own without the need to go through the painstaking task to recruit band members and when ever I feel like I want to compose songs, I just turn on the computer.

I have been releasing demos every year since 2006 and it was loads of fun reading comments and feedbacks, be it negative or positive, from those who have been kind enough to spend their precious time listening to my music. You can always sell tons and tons of records and get a huge paycheck for your work, but at the end of the day I personally believe that the best accolade for a musician is when people tend to appreciate and value his works.

Orchestrated under the influences of three legendary home grown bands in the likes of Sil Khannaz, As Sahar and Riusgnal, I do believe that, with the right formula and ingredients, local bands can be as much as fundamental as any metal bands coming from the outskirt of Europe, United States or the isle of Great Britain. Originality is and has always been the key for any local bands to smell the scent of success. For instance, I am still in awe each and every time I put on Pendita Gila. One word that I can use to describe that record is precision. The riffs were very much haunting, mind sticking, awkwardly groovy and the fact that they used a drum machine made the record even more defined and original than any other metal records available during that time, locally or internationally.

As for As Sahar and Riusgnal, it was the idea that made them into icons. The music was a beautiful amalgamation of brutality and straight forward melodies, although not as original but it was the fact that both of these bands introduced the idea of incorporating Malay occultism and mysticism in their lyrics with heavy metal that had made them into pioneering bands. It was really an eye opener and it caught my attention. It was from the brilliant and luminous idea of these bands that made the music eventually evolved into a whole new heavy metal genre, what is now called Eastern metal. That’s originality my friends. I even dare to say that it was the idea to incorporate Ulek Mayang into thrash metal that made Cromok ever so popular with the Australian Metal crowd back in the late 80s. Rather than turning to Lavey’s Satanic Bible for lyrics, you can always turn to your own backyard.

With Filsufatia, originality is still way ahead of me. I am still struggling to capture the grandiose of heavy metal music but who knows maybe after a while, after I have exhausted all these crazy riffs inside my head, I will finally be able to see a point where I can be original with my music.

Filsufatia on MySpace.