Misanthropic Agenda: Harassor - Hater Of Man

Harassor - Hater Of Man CS
2012, Husk

After their 2011 selftitled debut lp, Harassor return with their primitive take on black metal with a limited cassette release  on Husk Records. Comprising of three dudes with an inordinate amount of dislike for humanity, Harassor play a style of old school black metal that incorporates lots of influences from the mid to late 80's; from raging thrash tempos and simplistic death metal riffing, a la Hellhammer, to crushingly heavy doom metal. There's a bit of a sloppy punk vibe going on at times, bringing to mind acts like Bone Awl, but these guys write way better songs. But the main focus here is simplicity. There are no solos, no over-complicated song structures, no unending jerk-off intros or excess song lengths. Of the eight songs merely three move beyond the three minute mark and only on the epic closing track The End Of Your World are we treated to some lengthy droney doom jams that run just over eleven minutes - but none of these songs feel long. We get fast, heavy and to the point, hateful blackened death/thrash, with lots of unexpected melody and dynamics yet with no pretentions of virtuosity. Not that these guys are horrible musicians or anything, but they just don't give a damn about anything other than writing great, blistering songs full of images of death, hate and pestilence. The production is raw and lacks some low end but it's almost become what's expected of raw retro-ish black metal. These recordings are from 2006 and I'm guessing the band has progressed somewhat since then, both musicallly and technically so it'd be cool to hear something more recent from them. Free stuff available at their bandcamp site here.

The end is Nigh

Nigh - Nigh
2012

This great short ep showcases some impressively atavistic metallic hardcore blended with a definite old school death/thrash vibe. There's some great riffage being dsiplayed here, with an early Slayer meets Hellhammer feel, alongside some really tasteful, almost covert, NWOBHM flairs thrown in here and there, as well as some really cool Discharge-like fast runs. The production is decent with lots of heavy low end and lots of breathing space for all the instruments to move within. My only gripe is that, sometimes, the drums sound a bit dry and wooden compared to everything else, especially in the, admittedly not very frequent, blast beat parts. This sounds as if it could have been released in the late-eighties, early nineties and I'm thouroughly impressed. Had they been released back then, I guess they would've been labeled as metalpunk or some such nonsense, a label as good or bad as any, I guess. These three songs are over in a heartbeat and that's another great thing about the band's music; they write short to-the-point songs that feel complete and never rushed. There's lots of movement within the tracks and yet they never sound overly complicated or technical. This band needs to be on a label, like right now! Download.