Tag Archive: Drewsif Stalin


[Not so fast! We have a late addition to our collection of best-of lists! Contributor J Bobski has given us his rundown of albums from 2011 that (bed)rocked thoroughly rocked his shit! - JR]

A lot of cool, progressive, trendy shit came out this year, but I found myself going back to the basics a bit. I definitely favored the things that never go out of style-fat grooves, killer riffs, and memorable songcraft-over adventurous dorkery this year. A lot of ‘djent’ and ‘prog’ albums that you will no doubt find on many a HBIH writer’s list this year simply didn’t do it for me at all. Admittedly, I probably didn’t spend enough time with some of them, but I did try quite a few of them out. I also love me some black metal and grind, but I was so busy jamming the shit out of the albums on this list that I didn’t have much time to get into any of it. I have some catching up to do, no doubt. But for me, 2011 was all about getting hooked on an album and listening to almost nothing else for days, weeks, and maybe months. I listened to my #1 album so many times it’s a wonder I even had time for 14 other albums to fit on this damn list, ya know? Anyhoo, that’s how I tried to structure this list, by how many times I actually listened to an album (so these are my actual favorites, not what I wish were my favorites or what I think you want my favorites to be) Here we go:

View Full Article »

As we have previously stated over on our facebook page, us heavy bloggers haven’t had the ample opportunity of supplying you guys with your daily reviews and whatnot. Alternatively though, Alkahest has provided us with some stellar content like interviews with Last Chance to Reason and Chris Letchford of Scale the Summit. So be sure to check them out. Also give a warm welcome to our new columnist  Chris Collins who will be spoiling you with a professional and in depth view on Music Videos. I would also like to take to the opportunity to thank you guys for another awesome year here at heavyblogisheavy. I haven’t been here long, but I think I speak for all of us by saying we have the best readers on the planet.

Anyways! I got a little carried away! Down to the meat and potatoes! The djent fanclub that goes by the moniker “Djentlemen’s Club” has downright spoiled us rotten this holiday season. So be sure to give them a like on facebook and throw money at your computer screens because they put together an outstanding Christmas compilation featuring acts like Forms, Substructures and the previously mentioned Drewsif Stalin and Carthage. This is one of the best Christmas albums ever for sure. Also, did I mention it’s free? You can download it here for Part 1 and here for Part 2. Check out the songs and track listing after the jump!

Happy thallidays!

View Full Article »

Everyone’s getting into the Christmas spirit and doing metally renditions of classic Christmas songs. This year so far, we’ve had Austrian Death Machine, Becoming the Archetype, and August Burns Red release some holiday cheer in their own respective styles. Now you can add Drewsif Stalin and Carthage to your Christmas party mix.

Drewsif Stalin just released a medley of Christmas music titled “Black Christmas”, which includes “Silent Night” and “Joy To The World.” This track features Drew’s kickass singing voice, which I’m glad we’re starting to hear more of! Listen to that below:

Carthage, Tre Watson‘s band, also released a cover of “Mary Did You Know” in their own style. It’s definitely a risky cover to make because it’s supposed to be this very haunting song, but as far as stylistic interpretations go, Carthage did a pretty good job with it! Bonus points for the flamenco intro.

Yay, Christmas!

- JR

Anup Sastry Rocks!

I’m sure most of you who hang around here on a regular basis know of Heavy Blog bro Drewsif Stalin – but have you heard of his drummer, Anup Sastry? He’s pretty awesome too; he writes his own songs for the drums, then samples note by note guitar parts on top of them to make ridiculously groovy tracks. Here’s some of what he’s come up with:

These are all his original creations, and he also has a ton of covers on his youtube channel. He also vows to upload his songs in mp3 form on his Soundcloud soon, but until then you can also check out some other tracks he has on there. I think he’s one of the more creative drummers out there, and you should also check out his work with Drewsif Stalin too.

- NT

Look At This Dog

That’s a sweet hat.

- JR

Drewsif Stalin’s one cool dude. It’s like he’s constantly releasing bits of new musical endeavors left and right, which I can dig. If the above photo doesn’t make it obvious, he’s also known to get silly and have fun. It’s always nice to meet musicians who are great at what they do and don’t take themselves so seriously, you know?

My man-crush on Drew is never ceasing, and with the new DSME cover of Katy Perry‘s “E.T.” (the version without Kanye West, thankfully), it only grows stronger. I always thought as Katy Perry as being better than your run of the mill pop-stars, and if there’s anything that can get me to notice how infectiously catchy pop is, it’s metal covers and mashups (see: “Bleedarazi”, which made me actually pay attention to Lady Gaga). Check out the video of Drew and drummer Anup Sanstry slinging some djenty pop woo.

You can download the track for free at the DSME bandcamp page. Enjoy your new guilty pleasure.

- JR

Alright, I will admit that the recent trend in pop songs (Ke$ha, Lady Gaga etc.) are a guilty pleasure of mine. Well, that guilty pleasure reached new levels when I discovered metal cover/remixes of said songs. I even divided them into a few categories, but there is one important rule: the spirit of the original song must be preserved. This usually means I don’t like people doing metal vocals over the original song, because vocal melody is probably the most important part of most pop songs.

Mashup Of An Existing Metal Song With Pop:

This category is perhaps one that requires the least amount of effort on part of the maker, but it’s still not easy to do well. Actually, there are very few of these that are exceptionally good.

Let’s start with a short and simple one. This one is done by Drewsif Stalin, it’s a mashup of Within the Ruins‘ “Tractor Pull” and Katy Perry‘s “I Kissed A Girl“:

Here’s one that’s really popular, I don’t really like it but a lot of people do so there you go. It’s Meshuggah‘s “Bleed” with Lady Gaga’s “Paparazzi“. I like the extra effort someone else made to put the videos together in a way that kind of makes sense:

View Full Article »

Disfiguring the Goddess

Circle of Nine

01. The Age of Seraphim
02. Throne of the Meek
03. Void Leacher
04. Mind Infection
05. Circle of Nine
06. Stroggos War
07. Breaching The Clone
08. Uprising
09. Klesk
10. Time Spanned

[3/29/11]
[self released]

Admittedly, I’ve never paid much attention to Cam Argon, aka “Big Chocolate“, or his various musical endeavors. I just didn’t have the bandwidth for a kid who specializes in home-made dubstep and deathcore, no matter how many people were swinging on his nuts. But 2011 has been a year of firsts for me, and I’m glad I decided to start paying attention to more artists in the ‘one man bedroom band’ genre, because there has been some fabulous music coming our way from these dudes. 2011 has already seen great releases from Keith Merrow, Paul Wardingham, Tre Watson, and Drewsif Stalin, just to name a few. I’m sure part of the reason I got  interested in and became a fan of these artists is that I’ve been dabbling in the field myself. So I’ve been listening to a lot of other one man productions to kind of chart myself against the competition, so to speak. And if I’m being honest, every one of the guys I just listed makes me want to give up music and producing forever because they blow my shit out of the water. Anyway…

Now we have Big Chocolate’s full length release from his Disfiguring The Goddess project. An utterly crushing, futuristic, slamming death metal slab that is not just ‘impressive for a homegrown, self-produced project’. No sir, what we have here in Circle of Nine is an album that may be the future of death metal as we know it, and could very well be one of the final nails in the coffin of the entire deathcore genre.

View Full Article »

When my good friend Tre Watson asked me to help him by coming up with the artwork for his upcoming album Death of a Monarch, I was worried that I wouldn’t be able to do a good enough job when given direction. After about a week of talking it out, we settled on the above design the upcoming album, and I’m proud of it!

The album will be released in two parts, Death of a Monarch—the original instrumentals—and Rebirth—the songs featuring guest vocalists. Death will be released first on January 11th, 2011. Rebirth will see release later on.

Here’s a cut off of Rebirth, “My Nan and the AmTran” featuring Drewsif Stalin on vocals.

- JR

It’s short and a work in progress, but you can hear the direction Drewsif Stalin plans on taking with vocal work.

The original song is called “Collapse” and can be heard on An Insomniac’s Narrative. You can listen to and download that album here.

- JR

Powered by WordPress. Theme: Motion by 85ideas.