Chris Maragoth, a composer and multi-instrumentalist from Germany, made his early musical steps as a member of various short lived bands and as producer of black metal act Draug. In many ways, though, his solo career has been a factory reset in both terms of melody and the potential to reach a wider audience.
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THE GENTS – Chop The Rot EP
Taking the grubbiness of classic Mudhoney and injected it with the spirit of old school punk and a pinch of early Motorhead, German punk ‘n’ roll trio The Gents whip up a speed driven storm on their 2022 EP ‘Chop The Rot’. Although speed is often the key to bringing a genuine excitement to their material, also a great pleasure to be had when hearing the band approaching most of their work at full volume. This results in the kind of release that would appeal to a broad spectrum of punk fans.
HAGALAS – As A Unit EP
Finland’s Hagalas are often promoted as a death metal band, but as with so many Scandinavian acts, their music has far more depth, and more of an interest in actual melodies than your average death-based act. Yes, the four songs on their ‘As A Unit’ EP come weighted down by some very aggressive vocals, but most of the time, frontman Kailie Kohonen’s approach doesn’t even venture into the old school growls and grunts associated with the genre. In fact, it’s fair to say that plugging them as a death band is to sell them short. Very short.
WEIRD TALES – Too Weird To Live, Too Rare To Die EP
At the beginning of 2021, Polish doom metal band Weird Tales released an EP of material based around classic blues numbers. Their heaviness was without question; their lack of compromise even more so. Unfortunately, the end results were not only as scary as hell, but actually insulting to the legacies of the Delta blues pioneers. Good or bad – or in this case, possibly awful – they definitely made an impression.
ELECTRIC FRANKENSTEIN / THE STRIPP – Split EP
At the time of this release, it may well have been fifteen years since Electric Frankenstein gave the world a full length album of self-penned, brand new material, but the band have kept themselves more than busy. In that time, they’ve released a bunch of singles (including an excellent cover of Alice Cooper’s ‘Under My Wheels’) and also lent their talents to a plethora of split releases, including discs shared with The Hip Priests, Kung Fu Killers and The Bordells. Making it somewhat easier to catch up with their sporadic recording style, a lot of singles and EP tracks have also been reissued on EF full length comps by Ghost Highway Records, further helping to maintain the band’s presence.