DVS Shoes: Total Eclipse of the Heartland Tour

This short tour video is definitely worth a watch. Luis Tolentino massacres anything in his path with his unreal pop. Some incredible tricks left right and center and it's hard to tell what's switch and what's normal as they all look perfect. I wouldn't dare try half the stuff these guys do!

The Ruins

This film isn’t fantastic however it does have quite an original concept. It seems to me that there is no decent horror films lately, usually trashy remakes from classics or just the same ol’ film of undead flesh eating zombies but after watching ‘The Ruins’ again I thought it was worth mentioning as it is slightly different. This is taken from a book (which I haven’t read) but I think it could be quite a good read, perhaps not after seeing the film. I like the re-introduced ‘nature against man’ concept which can be seen with the classic ‘Day of the Triffids’ only ‘The Ruins’ contains a large amount of blood and gore and it’s good not to have a group of teenagers being slaughtered for once. 

With regards to this it still follows the same sort of story throughout where the characters find themselves trapped in one single location and cannot really get out until they are all dead apart from one. You guessed it, one of the lucky characters manages to get away from the temple area and manages to dodge aboriginals arrows which seems highly unlikely if this was real life. (Although, where do we find ourselves stuck in the middle of another country, having our fun sabotaged by sacred, cursed plants, which like to crawl into your body.) I swear when I first saw this film all of the characters died but who knows. 

The plot of this film follows two American couples who are enjoying their vacation in Mexico and they happen to make friends with a German tourist whose brother has gone to a sacred temple with a female archaeologist. After his brother has not returned for a few days he seeks help from the couples to go look for him at the site. Once upon the ruins they are confronted by the Mayan villagers who are armed with guns and bows. After standing on the vines it appears they have stood on something cursed as they are now trapped by the villagers who will kill them if they come near them. They are then forced to set up camp at the top of the ruins where they are then terrorised by the vines which crawl their way inside you, drag the rest of the corpses into the temple and THEY CAN EVEN MIMIC NOISES AND SPEECH! So basically it’s another game of survival of man vs nature. 

There are many downfalls for this film which is mainly down to the cast. The characters aren’t really introduced that well so we know very little background from them and they do some ridiculously stupid things that are just common sense to you and me. Also the effects look incredibly lame at times and the lead actor Jonathon Tucker’s voice annoyed the hell out of me! All in all this film was disappointing but it wasn’t the worst. If you’re a horror film fan and like REAL horror films then this won’t be the film for you.

Full Blown Chaos: S/T

Full Blown Chaos have played a tremendous amount of shows and been on a countless number of tours shattering everything with their heavy metallic hardcore sound. With their distinct New York Hardcore sound they add other elements which almost borderline extreme metal with many solid breakdowns. There are also a hundred other bands that sound very similar to this style but for some unknown reason Full Blown Chaos seem to pull it off well.

The majority of FBC tracks do sound very similar with almost exact song structures and the generic breakdown mosh sound but this album is an album that you should definitely tune into. Although this sound has been overproduced over the time there is no doubt it has affected the passion and aggressive sound that this band have always carried with them. While their attitude being very ‘mature’ with such monumental live speeches such as ‘everybody punch someone in the face’ and ‘let’s see some bloodshed’ it leaves you with the impression that this band are over-grown men with too much testosterone trying to punch the crap out of anything that moves, they still manage to produce catchy music. Honestly though, don’t be put off by this ridiculous image as the music really isn’t that bad.

This could quite frankly be the perfect combination of metal and hardcore, however don’t get your hopes up too much as this doesn’t even compare to their early records such as ‘Prophet of Hostility’ and ‘Wake the Demons.’ The main difference in their sound can be heard on the track ‘Silence is Golden’ but apart from that, it has the repetitive feel of ‘Heavy Lies the Crown’ with the chugging riffs, portraying the same messages that they started their band image with.

This record is definitely worth checking out, however I am not sure if it is worth the amount of money you will pay for it. I do think that some webstores have some pretty rad deals on at the moment where if you buy the new release you can then have another of their releases for free. Probably best to get on it while you can.

'Carry On Moshing' Festival

Rad all day show going on at the Purple Turtle in London today, get to it!

At The Old Blue Last Tonight

Get on this if your about London this evening!

Skarhead: 'Kickin' it OldSchool'

Skarhead have recently released ‘Kickin’ it OldSchool’ which is a re-release of their EP titled ‘Drugs, Money and Sex’ including various remastered demo tracks and studio, live tracks. This re-mastered record pulls out all of the best parts of old school hardcore and blasts it all back with their straight-to-your-face sound.

After hearing Skarhead would release this record I was excited to listen to the remastered songs and I had good reason to be. The first few minutes in, this sounds fantastic. After not listening to Skarhead for quite some time, I forgot how aggressive, angry and fast paced their sound is. Definitely some of the best New York hardcore to listen to. This record contains some solid, furious classics such as ‘City of Sleaze’ and ‘Hardcore’ which I can guarantee, will keep you listening for days on end.

There is one problem with this record, and I don’t want to sound like a killjoy when I say this, but there are too many Skarhead songs that are repetitive. It’s best to stick to a couple of their records, which provides you with the good quality sound that Skarhead is known for. As for the rest of the songs, they sound pretty typical of this genre, so nothing special but there are a few tracks on this new record that stand out more than others. I’m sure you’ll be able to make up your own mind on which ones you like.

As an overall, the majority of tracks sound pretty awesome but one would want to expect a little more from such an almighty band. Buy it and listen to it if you’re interested.

Most Precious Blood: 'Do Not Resuscitate'

First impressions of this album are that it makes you want to basically destroy anything you come into contact with but is that really a great thing? It’s very bold and redeeming from start to finish and it is certainly an album I have been waiting ages for.

As most people know, Most Precious Blood just sort of disappeared after their massive tour in 2006 promoting the album ‘Merciless’ and after 5 years they have returned with a heavier album full of hatred and aggression. As expected there was a slight change of sound to their previous releases with different guitar work and a faster, less metallic feel. The changes are most definitely for the best though, as this album sounds fantastic all of the way through.

Most Precious Blood have taken anything at all positive in an album and completely ripped and shredded it apart to leave nothing but negativity, aggression and pure utter hatred. Not the best message to get across but for some unknown reason I just cannot seem to turn away from this record.

The instrument changes are not the only things that have changed in the sound of their music, the vocals from Rob Rusco are even more powerful than before. Whereas in the previous albums the vocals sound is very frequently screamy (obviously giving 100 percent), in ‘Do Not Resuscitate’ he has gone beyond his norms and given 200 percent which definitely pushes out the message from their lyrics. The musicianship has technically developed from the previous releases and has increased the structure of the songs to give an added accomplishment to it.

One major downfall to this album is the acoustic track, which seems completely out of place to the rest of the songs. What were they even thinking? It goes from pure aggression to whiny vocals, which, for me, just seems to ruin the mood the previous part of the album. The cheesy background effects from the keyboards really don’t help either so I recommend you add this track to the skip list and you’ll have no complaints.

‘Do Not Resuscitate’ is a very hard hitting album that will make you feel like you can take on the world so make sure you don’t miss out on this release. Make sure you get yourself a copy!